Day three

After the horrific ordeal that was my labour (one day I'll blog about it as a free virtual contraception to any readers still around to hear me complain) my wonderful midwife came over for our first check. She weighed baby and did the usual midwife type things and then she said as she left: "Remember, around day three you'll suddenly feel very emotional. This is hormonal. And it's normal. Just be ready for it. If you start to feel out of control just take a breath."

I immediately forgot this advice while staring at my little bundle of perfection who had been born only eight hours or so earlier.

On the morning of Day Three I was feeling very smug. I still had that adrenaline-fuelled-happy-happy-thank-all-of-the-Gods-I'm-not-pregnant-anymore-look-at-my-perfect-baby rush going on. I was dressed which I felt was a huge achievement. I was still feeling powerful (but in an I survived a massacre kind of way) about my son's birth. A coffee was all I needed and my day would be perfect.

I turned on my new coffee machine.

The little light with the beautiful little outline of a coffee didn't turn on.

What the fuck?

I pressed it again, but the little light with the little outline of a coffee didn't turn on.

I shook the machine. The light. It didn't fucking turn on.

I took the thing out of the thing. It didn't turn on.

I hit the machine. It didn't turn on.

Suddenly I knew with every fibre of my being that this was my husband's fault. He had clearly broken the machine. Never mind that he doesn't drink coffee. That was a minor detail. I bet he fucking broke it and didn't fucking fix it. Probably because he doesn't drink coffee. And you just can't trust people who don't drink coffee, even if you're married to them.

Then, like a deer about to be hit by a leaking truck fuelled not by petrol but by pure incandescent rage, my husband walked nonchalantly into the kitchen.

"The coffee machine won't work. You need to fix it," I told him.

"Can you just have a coffee at my mum's?" He said in a perfectly reasonable tone. "We are already late".

"HOW DARE YOU. HOW VERY DARE YOU," I screeched. "FIRST YOU GET ME PREGNANT AND THEN YOU DENY ME COFFEE. YOU FUCKING MONSTER."

My husband blinked at me. "Don't you think you're overreacting a bit? It's just coffee. Just have one at mum's."

"JUST COFFEE? JUST. COFFEE. WHO EVEN ARE YOU??"

I launched into a 45 minute attack that covered most of his suddenly apparently numerous failings and the fact that there's only instant coffee at his mum's. "Why can't you just fix the machine that you broke so I can just have the one thing I need in this world?" Clearly our marriage was in trouble if he couldn't do this one thing that would make me so happy. Suddenly I was devastated, I had always thought we had a good marriage. People had commented on how good our marriage was. And now, it was all a lie. We would need to divorce probably. What kind of impact would this have on Christmas? I don't want to have to fucking drive on Christmas Day when Christmas Day is clearly a day for drinking too much. What if he got a girlfriend? What if he married someone? What if my new baby called her mum????

He picked up the nappy bag.

"Are you leaving me?" I cried.

He stared at me utterly bewildered.

I began sobbing.

I was clearly a terrible wife. I adored him. And I didn't want to raise two kids on my own. I didn't want my kids being raised by some other woman who would probably be far more attractive than me. But he did break the coffee machine.

"Umm I don't know what's going on with here but I think we should just go to mum's and we can buy you a proper coffee on the way there".

We cannot afford a proper coffee I thought. We are so broke. What are we going to do? Now I have no coffee machine. I can't buy coffee and I can't make coffee at home. I'll have to go back to work tomorrow even though it's Sunday and the office will be closed. I won't be able to bond with my baby. He will turn into a serial killer. I'm going to ruin my precious baby's life. I fell to the kitchen floor sobbing.

"I am a terrible mother," I wailed. "Just leave. Take the kids. They're better off without me".

My husband stared at me with a look of confused fear on his face. He walked slowly over to the coffee machine trying to avoid turning his back to me. He maintained eye contact. His movements were slow and deliberate.

He turned the power on at the wall. He pressed the button. The little light with the little outline of the coffee cup turned on.

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