The Birth Of Our First Son
With the birth of the baby to the Duchess of Cambridge expected within a day or so, it is perhaps a good time to tell the true story of our first son’s birth in 1969.
Our circumstances just before the birth on the 16th of July, were a bit chaotic to say the least. I did outline them to a certain degree in this post about waiting for Apollo 11.
To summarise, we had no hospital for the birth, were living with C’s mother in Barnet and the baby was four weeks overdue.
C thought it would be a good idea to go and sit in St. James’s Park, as it was getting rather oppressive with her mother, who had no idea or experience about childbirth as C had been adopted. Mother felt she should be in the Victoria Maternity Hospital in Barnet. You never told C what to do, if it was against her wishes. Especially, if you were her mother!
It was a lovely day and we sat in deck chairs in the Park until about five o’clock, when C said that she thought she was in labour. As I said in the other post, she decided she was going to the old Middlesex Hospital, where because of her imminent state, she was seen by a doctor and admitted as an emergency.
As I said in Part 2 of the waiting for Apollo 11 story, I stayed all night and nothing happened, except that about midnight the contractions stopped. C always said she was telling me to go back to her mother’s and get some sleep, but whether I was being loyal or stubborn, I don’t know and I just stayed.
I went to work on the Monday and the evening was another of waiting, with the odd contraction thrown in.
Part 3 gives the full story of the birth, with our first son being born soon after midnight.
Only after we had returned to her mother’s did C reveal the truth about what had happened. Until about four or five hours after they broke the waters, did she ever have a proper contraction.
She had fooled the doctors, so she could get into her chosen hospital.
I doubt the Duchess of Cambridge is faking!
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The Anonymous Widower 
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