On hospitals, twins and the lives of men*

Mars: Is this where men come from?They say that there is no time like the present, but the present is often so hard to handle.

There are many places to which we can retreat in order to avoid the present. One of the greatest accomplishments of modern society has been its ability to develop a range of synthetic ‘resting places’, sophisticated dream-factories that allow us momentarily to forget the tormenting voices of the present.

But if there is one place that will rarely allow this narcotic to pass it doors, it is most certainly the hospital. 

Episode 7: News

Two babies.

I could almost feel the neurons firing in my mind more quickly as I tried to assimilate this most unexpected news. But as one Nineteenth Century writer once said, there are two things in this life for which we are never fully prepared and that is twins.

My Love was the first to bring meaning to this ironical twist in the unfolding drama of our lives. I am sure that God just got fed up with us asking for a child, so he sent us two so that we stopped bothering him with our requests.

I was less philosophical. In a single moment, our ‘Game of Life’ had changed and we were back in unchartered terrain. This was neither a snake, nor a ladder. We had thrown a lucky six, had another turn, passed ‘Go’ and gone directly to ‘Jail’. And my first thought was that it was going to cost us much more than two hundred pounds to get out of this one!

Episode 8: Scan

It is said that the average heart will beat around 3,000 million times in a lifetime. It is the first sign of human life and, in a single beat, declares its end. To countless millions around me, these two additions to the chorus of humanity are nothing. Their absence would never be noted. But for me, it is so very different. As I sit in front of the ultrasound and listen to each tiny heart beat, I cannot help thinking that this is the most beautiful symphony I have ever heard.

I feel like I am falling in love. These two little angels, so fragile in their existence, are already completely captivating my attention. With each and every beat of their tiny hearts, they embrace me as a father and draw me into a relationship of love so strong that I cannot resist. And this is perhaps the greatest irony of all; for, in this single moment of connection, it seems that it is not I who loves, but them loving and accepting me for none other than who I am and who I want to be. It is the child within me - with all its anxiety and vulnerability - that rests in the sweet embrace of another.

Episode 9: Scream

I am woken at 1am and quickly realize that something is wrong. My Love is standing by the door. Frozen with panic, she tells me that she is losing blood. What have we done to deserve this? This shouldn’t be happening. Not now.

We rush to the hospital and hardly say a word. Hang in there, my little angels, I whisper. Don’t leave us now.

It doesn’t feel right being at the hospital again. It is full of too many bad memories. Lying on the bed, waiting for the doctor to arrive, My Love looks so small and fragile. I want to hold her and tell her that everything is fine. But there is just too much blood now. I say nothing.

When the doctor arrives, I feel the urge to scream and shout at him. He has an air of arrogance that I cannot stand, least of all in doctors who give every appearance of having a messiah complex. At first, he does not even look at us, preferring instead to pose his pointless questions to the wall. And while he stands there playing god, I wonder to myself where God is now. Does he really hold our tears in a bottle? Is there really a place where things like this don’t happen?

The waiting is horrible.

Finally, the scan flickers into life. Two little heartbeats still beating. Hands, feet, limbs, moving about in their personalized dream-cocoons, completely unaware of the frantic soap-opera that is unfolding around them – oblivious of the fact that their lives still hang in the balance.

Hope quickly floods back into my mind and the dream is reborn. The emotional rollercoaster is now going at full speed. And I feel every twist and turn in the pit of my stomach.

Episode 10: Men

I know that women come from Venus and men originate from a colder planet, traditionally inhabited by aliens with green heads. I much prefer, however, the way MC Solaar differentiates between the sexes: Les femmes viennent de Venus, Les hommes mangent des Mars.

I ate a lot of Mars bars those few days. Quick fixes of sugar grabbed from the hospital canteen, they were an instant way of avoiding yet another frozen meal. More importantly, though, they were instant bars of comfort - a coping mechanism, perhaps.

Men and women are different. Of that, there is no dispute. Women bring to the world a set of hermeneutic tools and narrate the story of who they are in ways that we Martians find quite ‘alien’. In our silence, they will search for words. Confronted by our attempts at being rational, they will make an emotional response. In contrast to our denial and desire not ever to show our vulnerability, they are skilled in the art of setting up personal emergency support centres. Manned by close family and friends, these guardian angels are the ones who drop everything and fly in with their listening ears, kind words and endless supplies of glossy magazines.

Back in the hospital, I understood all this, but still I wanted to stand up and shout from the rooftops that we men are men, not Martians. We are not all about hiding our emotions and being a perfect chemistry of balanced hormones. We are not walking about in bubbles of rational thought, oblivious to shit that is happening around us.

It was not my blood that flowed, not me who became a prisoner to enforced rest. Not me who had been pierced with needles, stuffed with hormones, and vomited every day for three months. Not me who developed a nose that could smell aftershave from two-hundred yards, seen my body change in all the wrong places, taken seventeen trips to the toilet in a single night, and become tired even at the thought of stepping outside the house. I will never experience this for as long as I live.

But be sure of one thing: the blood that flowed was draining the life out of me too.

*Note: This post is a continuation of the story I first published in 2006 under the title, Fragments of Hope (AWAY Magazine), which explored a father’s perspective on IVF treatment. You can read it here.

Comments

[Valerie]

I've read it before but it still makes me cry...
Thank you