Baby, are you engaged yet?

So I’m in my final week of pregnancy and the baby’s head still hasn’t engaged. In other words, the baby hasn’t descended into my pelvis yet. Not that I blame her – I mean, I can’t imagine it’s all that comfy in there. But, you know, she has to go through it if she wants to come out the other side. It’s like having to put up with all that crap at airport security just so you can get to the sun lounger in Spain.

But, I guess, from her point of view, she already has pretty much everything she needs, so why bother uprooting? She’s got free food and drink, lovely warm central heating... The kid is living in the lap of luxury. Fair enough, her conditions are ever so slightly cramped, which is why I understand the reluctance to want to limit her space even more. After all, I wouldn’t be so keen on moving from a relatively spacious stomach to a less-than-palatial pelvis, but hey, it’s free digs. She can’t really knock it, you know?

So yes, I completely understand why she wouldn’t want to be evicted. She’s like a student who, upon graduating, is faced with the harsh realities of work and responsibility so, instead, enrols on another course. But now her student loan money is running out, so she either comes willingly in the next two or three weeks, or she’ll have a helping hand from the hospital staff.

The midwife is slightly concerned at the fact that the baby seems unwillingly to give up the cushy number she’s become accustomed to but, when you’ve got the world’s two most stubborn people for parents, I’m not really all that surprised. She’ll hang in there ‘til the last minute. I wouldn’t even be surprised if, after delivery, she tried to claw her way back up the cord. She’s exactly like her mammy – she doesn’t like change.

Still, not understanding that stubbornness runs in the family, the midwife sent me packing to the doctor to have a look. I don’t know if you’ve ever been pregnant but, to briefly explain, you pretty much get mauled at every appointment. Your bump is prodded and poked until the baby starts to retaliate with a series of swift kicks. What I wasn’t expecting was the utter man-handling I got from the doctor. Without so much as saying a word he just started manually moving the baby about – a less than comfortable manoeuvre. I mean, seriously, buy a girl dinner first.

You know those programmes where you see people perform surgery with their bare hands? You know the ones – they just push through the skin with their fingers until they end up removing your liver or whatever. (Am I the only one who watches that type of programming?) Well that’s exactly what it felt like. I wasn’t sure if he was just trying to search for the baby’s head or slice me open and deliver her there and then.

Thankfully, he finally told me it was nothing to worry about. And that was that – I was chucked out on my ear feeling disoriented and more than a little disconcerted. There was no discussion of what I could do to help things along, or what might happen next, so I’m just back to playing the waiting game. How fun for me.

So yes, I’m pretty sure I’m at that stage in pregnancy where you become very impatient to have the whole thing come to an end. It’s not that I’m fed up being pregnant – I love it – but there’s only so much uncertainty I can handle. Hubby, likewise, is eager for the whole thing to be over, but he has an ulterior motive. Living with me is probably pretty tricky at the best of times, but living with me while I’m the size of a house and have hormones flying all over the place? I reckon he’s close to dragging the baby out of me himself. Hopefully, he can hold out a little longer and it won’t come to that.

Long story short, there’s a timer on this oven that’s counting down the minutes and, one way or another, this bun is almost done.