Ma Wa Gray

Two nights ago Stephen and I sat down on the couch and let out a collective relieved sigh. Both children had been bathed, fed and put to sleep. And I'm going to throw this word out there, the word that describes the feeling just before a fall - smug. The smugness lasted all of a literal minute because at that moment the noise of a seal auditioning to become part of the Ushaka Seal Show came resonating from Grays bedroom. To be honest I didn't know seals could waddle this far inland. When I say I could mainly see the whites of Stephen's eyes I am not over exaggerating. We froze. And then the bark again. The croup bark. The bark to end all barks. The bark that launched a thousand ships in the opposite direction. Shit. Having recently unpacked our medicine cabinet - it is literally the only thing I unpacked in our entire move I made a beeline for the aspelone as fast as my bruised nether regions would allow. Within seconds our poor little sleeping boy was pinned dow...

So I'm now Ma Wa Gray and Eva. I have a daughter. A raven haired beauty weighing in at 4kgs. And I managed to push her out. I am shattered. Literally. Shattered. The thing about having a daughter is that, for me at least, I have a very deep sense of knowing with her. She is familiar. She's like that person I've always known but never met face to face. She is a part of me that now happens to be in another body. When we give birth to daughters there is generally a slight note of panic in people's responses to the news. The old 'dad needs to take out his shotgun' fart nugget comes to mind. And dads often go into overwind because they understand how vulnerable their daughters are. After all - 'men believe in premarital sex before daughters are born'. Very few people's responses to the news of the birth of a boy are ones of immediate vulnerability and protection. Are males not vulnerable too? So I'm not going to go into a whole gender deb...

It's that horrific time of year. The time between Christmas and the start of the new year. If you're South African it's also the time when even the strongest start googling aircon specials. The gammon is starting to look a bit iffy but you are buggered if you're actually going to cook an actual meal. You've already worn your new Christmas clothes once and if you're a parent half your child's new toys are already looking a bit battle weary. This year two things happened during this no man's land time that really put things into perspective for me. The first was that a very distant relation of mine, little Kiara Mun-Gavin, was in a horrific car accident which left part of her skull fractured. The second was that I started showing some early signs of labour. Every day I have read the deeply powerful updates that Jaci (Kiara's mom) has been posting about their journey into a moment frozen in time. A moment no parent ever wants to consider. A moment ...