BOGOF!

A day I will never forget.

It was a beautiful, sunny, bright morning. The date was July 6th, 2006. We walked down to Chelsea and Westminster Hospital at 9.00am.  About an hour later, we walked out of the operating room with 2 babies. How does that work?!

Don’t worry, I will spare you all the gory details, but it was a miracle. After 9 months of carrying 2 babies, 2 amniotic sacs,  and 2 placentas (yes, I was huge!), the babies were out in 20 minutes. It was like we had just popped in for a takeaway – and got a Buy One Get One Free deal!

I still remember all the scans that I had, and the nurses trying their best to find the 2 heartbeats. The first time I heard a heartbeat, it sounded like an express train careering through my body or a stallion galloping at full speed! It really is amazing how fast a baby’s heart beats. All you can wonder about is whether that sound really is coming from inside you! There was the time when they found Twin 1’s heartbeat, but could not find the other one. As you can imagine, this is a scary situation as you don’t know whether there is something seriously wrong or if the baby is just hiding  very well. Luckily, it was the fact that Twin 2 was too busy doing somersaults and gearing up for the Olympics or something, so decided to change positions 3 times during the appointment!

I remember the times towards the end of the pregnancy when the babies really started kicking and moving around. Can you imagine 4 sets of elbows, fists, knees and feet kicking and punching you in places you never even knew existed?! Forget the pain, but the sight of those body parts prodding and poking through my tummy in an apparent attempt to get out would have put Sigourney Weaver and the rest of the Aliens cast to shame!

Anyway, back to the matter at hand. There were about 5 or 6 people in the room including my hubby. This wasn’t because we had gone private, but because we were having twins – and there was always a chance of complications. Somebody asked what sex the babies were, and hubby replied that we didn’t know. They couldn’t believe that we did not find out the sex earlier, that we wished to keep it a complete surprise! Well, now you will have to tell everyone what you are having as the babies come out, they said to hubby.

At the last minute, our regular obstetrician had to attend to another pregnancy, and we were left with a substitute registrar. No pressure then.

I had to have a caesarean as Twin 2 was breech. Twin 1 was head down. When the first baby was pulled out, hubby shouted it’s a boy! I couldn’t believe it as I have 2 sisters and hubby has 3, so I just assumed we were in for 2 girls. When the second baby came out, he came up to me and told me it was a girl. I was stunned and had a lump in my throat. The tears streaming down my cheeks did all the talking for me…

Hubby cut the umbilical cords, and of course that made him The Main Man, The Mac Daddy, The Godfather!

We are truly blessed and we never take it for granted. Thank you God.