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Speaker 1: Try it just once, you don't get the big bird.

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Speaker 1: The big bird.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to our book club, Holiday book club.

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Speaker 3: This is our holiday book club, and welcome. I know

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Speaker 3: it seems a bit.

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Speaker 2: Up yourself egotistical.

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Speaker 3: The only books we're reading from are our own, but

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Speaker 3: it's a springboard to talk about ourselves, so it's not

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Speaker 3: up ourselves at all.

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Speaker 2: It's nothing nothing narcissistic about this in any way.

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Speaker 3: Well, in a previous one we spoke about my IVF attempts.

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Speaker 1: Yes, the grueling experience.

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Speaker 3: It finally culminated in having a baby, so we thought

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Speaker 3: we'd read our birth scenes. Brendan and if you tell

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Speaker 3: me you were tired and your body hurt, I don't

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Speaker 3: know what I'll do.

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Speaker 2: What you got to stand up? You got to rub

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Speaker 2: the bag, That's.

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Speaker 1: What Harley said, all my fingers.

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Speaker 3: Actually, at one point I remember the nurse said, look,

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Speaker 3: you shouldn't eat. I just ate my dinner and his

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Speaker 3: and then threw it all up into an empty ice

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Speaker 3: cream container. So good times. Harley enjoyed it enormously. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: all right over to you, okay, I assume you'll start

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Speaker 3: with your eldest.

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Speaker 2: My eldest, yes, and working backwards from there or forwards?

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Speaker 1: What did the doctor say, you work backwards or forwards?

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Speaker 2: Our first son, Morgan, was born in Musselbrook Hospital on

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Speaker 2: the twentieth of November nineteen ninety two. Helen's labor went

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Speaker 2: for fifteen hours and there was one moment the doctor

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Speaker 2: and I were at the business end, as if we

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Speaker 2: had our heads under the bonnet of the family Kingswood.

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Speaker 1: Were you checking out a doc?

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Speaker 2: Just trying to work out what we could do? A

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Speaker 2: song came on the radio. It was me and Bobby McGhee.

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Speaker 2: The doc looked up at me and said who sung this?

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Speaker 2: I said, oh, Janice Joplin, and then he said no, no,

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Speaker 2: but who did it originally? And I said, oh, it

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Speaker 2: was Chris Christofferson. He looked a bit perplexed, and I said, well,

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Speaker 2: a country singer. He was in the movie Convoy and

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Speaker 2: the other one with Barbra Streisen, you know that's and

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Speaker 2: Helen piped in Star is Born. Now get this baby

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Speaker 2: out of me. As if right on cue, little Morgan

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Speaker 2: popped right.

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Speaker 1: Out, popped right out, so simple.

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Speaker 2: Along with the biggest placenta that Musclebrook had seen in ages,

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Speaker 2: it would have fed a commune of hippies. For a month. Oh, Brendan,

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Speaker 2: well it was massive. It was like a two kilo placenta.

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Speaker 1: But you didn't know that that was massive.

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Speaker 2: I said, this placenta is massive. Can we take some

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Speaker 2: pictures of it?

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Speaker 3: Did you take the wrong thing home at the hospital

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Speaker 3: and wrapped up the placa?

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Speaker 2: Is doing well? Right now? We had I was running

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Speaker 2: my hands through it. Why because I was so big.

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Speaker 2: I appreciate feats of strength, and this was extraordinarily amazing.

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Speaker 1: You didn't plant it under a tree or anything.

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Speaker 2: Nah, No, let's put in the hospital incinerator. That burt

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Speaker 2: for weeks. Did you have all that? Because when you

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Speaker 2: have a baby, when women have a baby, it becomes

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Speaker 2: all about them.

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Speaker 1: Oh, aren't they selfish?

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Speaker 3: Tell you what happened is well, as you know, many

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Speaker 3: many years of IVF and finally here we are the

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Speaker 3: da Liam is born. When we finally arrived at the hospital,

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Speaker 3: we were taken to our room and things started to

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Speaker 3: speed up. I told Harley that when the time came

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Speaker 3: and I was in the midst of a dreadful contraction,

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Speaker 3: I wanted him to say that my uterus was like

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Speaker 3: a flower opening up a little more each time, and

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Speaker 3: then each contraction was bringing us closer to meeting our baby.

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Speaker 3: He tried it once before I even got.

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Speaker 2: To like a flower.

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Speaker 1: I told him to shut up.

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Speaker 3: The pain of the contraction shocked me. I felt the

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Speaker 3: entire process of giving birth was so brutal. I remember thinking,

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Speaker 3: is this what every woman goes through? Did my mum

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Speaker 3: feel this? Why didn't someone warn me?

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Speaker 2: Well?

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Speaker 3: Who would do this more than once? It is truly shocking,

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Speaker 3: and I think many new mums would are in shock afterwards.

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Speaker 3: When I was little, used to us mum what it

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Speaker 3: felt like to have a baby. How much did it hurt?

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Speaker 3: She gently squeezed my wrist and say a little bit

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Speaker 3: like this. I see now that she would have needed

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Speaker 3: a monkey wrench to really give me the gist.

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Speaker 1: It was horrendous.

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Speaker 3: I lost sight of the face we were welcoming a baby.

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Speaker 3: I was simply a case if someone make this appalling

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Speaker 3: experience stop. I tried sucking on the gas that they

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Speaker 3: offer you for pain relief, to no avail. I merely

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Speaker 3: clenched my teeth around the tube, the way cowboys in

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Speaker 3: western movies bite down on a bullet before they have

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Speaker 3: to tolerate a homemade operation. I was too tense to

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Speaker 3: let any gas get through the tube. I greeted each

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Speaker 3: new contraction with fear. After several hours, they examined me

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Speaker 3: and said I was four centimeters dilated.

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Speaker 1: Four centimeters. My god, surely I was closer to ten.

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Speaker 3: I wasn't even halfway there. It was time for the needle.

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Speaker 3: Not the needle they'd give an old dog at the vet,

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Speaker 3: though there were moments I would have chosen it, But

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Speaker 3: the lovely needle bearing pain relief, the epidural. When I

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Speaker 3: asked the nurse for the epidural, she thought she'd try

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Speaker 3: another tack. She said, how about I run you a

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Speaker 3: lovely warm bath. I said, how about I get a

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Speaker 3: needle in my spine?

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Speaker 1: Anyway, all of that continued.

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Speaker 3: Oh, I was curled over the arm of the chair,

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Speaker 3: chomping down on my plastic tube. When the anesthetist arrived,

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Speaker 3: he tried to have a normal, convivial chat. My son

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Speaker 3: once featured on a show with Andrew Dent, and he said,

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Speaker 3: I'm normally irritatingly polite, but not today. Shut up, I

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Speaker 3: feel through the tube.

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Speaker 2: Just shut up.

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Speaker 3: No one heard, but it got me through another contraction.

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Speaker 3: So let me just get to the bit because I'd

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Speaker 3: had the contraction. I couldn't feel anything from the waist down.

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Speaker 3: It was a bit like conception. But anyway, finally, after

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Speaker 3: a lot of face pulling on my behalf, they said

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Speaker 3: it was time to get the baby out. Some kind

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Speaker 3: of bathroom plunger was produced, which was stuck on to

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Speaker 3: the top of the baby's head like a blockage leaving

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Speaker 3: a down pipe. Our miracle entered the world. It's a boy,

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Speaker 3: cried Harley, and the next thing I knew, my baby

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Speaker 3: was in my arms. I'm crying as I write this.

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Speaker 3: He was like an animatronic toy. I still wasn't convinced

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Speaker 3: he was real. He opened his eyes, big, unblinking alien eyes.

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Speaker 3: We gazed at each other and I thought, we will

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Speaker 3: look at each other like this for the rest.

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Speaker 1: Of my life. It was a profound moment.

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Speaker 2: Ah, that's nice.

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Speaker 3: But now, before Liam went away to UNI recently, I

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Speaker 3: just said, next to him on the couch, because he

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Speaker 3: left home to go to UNI out of Sydney, I

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Speaker 3: just sit next to on the couch and just look

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Speaker 3: at him, and he go, okay, okay, thinking back to we.

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Speaker 2: Will look at each other like this crys Lily character

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Speaker 2: in they can be heroes. Remember that that that crazy

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Speaker 2: woman the pan that used to go He kept looking

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Speaker 2: at her husband.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well yes, And I just stroked Liam's armond as

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Speaker 3: a look at him and he's going, yeah, okay, whatever,

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Speaker 3: I'm going to move on. You lend me some money,

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Speaker 3: all right, So let's get on to your second. One second, Romany,

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Speaker 3: you got your figure back. It was incredible.

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Speaker 2: Brandon Romany was born in April of that year. She

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Speaker 2: was two weeks over due. Typical of her, she's always

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Speaker 2: running late. Their weeks over June, she was two weeks

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Speaker 2: She came out with a driver's license.

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Speaker 1: Did she was like what? Did she have a lot.

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Speaker 2: Of hair or fingernails?

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Speaker 1: Wow?

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Speaker 2: And she looked, Oh goodness me. You know, Morgan was beautiful,

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Speaker 2: a beautiful baby. Romany came out. I went whoa like

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Speaker 2: a rockery. She came in. She she came out like

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Speaker 2: a triangle. Her head was like a triangle. It was

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Speaker 2: a quick birth, though, but not without drama. After she

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Speaker 2: had an adverse reaction to the pethodene that Helen Abeaded ministered.

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Speaker 2: She came out not breathing and looking like a lifeless slut.

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Speaker 1: Oh cripes.

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Speaker 2: The nurses whipped her out of the room straight away.

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Speaker 2: I tagged along to see what's going on. As we're

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Speaker 2: walking the corridor, a doctor joined the nurse and in

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Speaker 2: a businesslike tone, started counting out loud twenty five, twenty six,

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Speaker 2: twenty seven, twenty eight. Come on, we're going to lose

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Speaker 2: this car. While this is all going on, everything slowed

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Speaker 2: down for me. I wasn't panicked, but my heart was

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Speaker 2: hammering in my chest. They pushed the doors of an

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Speaker 2: empty room with me into The doctor put Romani on

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Speaker 2: a table, got a syringe and injected it into her

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Speaker 2: little foot. The effect was extraordinary. From the point of

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Speaker 2: entry of the needle, her foot almost lit up with

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Speaker 2: a healthy pink. It was like she being touched by

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Speaker 2: one of those old dudes from the movie Cocoon. The

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Speaker 2: doctor got a tiny oxy mouth, put it over her

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Speaker 2: nose and mouth pecuriously disconnected the hose and started breathing

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Speaker 2: into the hole where the hose had been, and, almost

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Speaker 2: like push starting an old motorbike, Romany roared into life

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Speaker 2: with a.

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Speaker 1: Lusty cry, Is it all bike related? With you?

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Speaker 2: The doctor turned around and noticed me and said, who

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Speaker 2: are you. I told him I was the father his

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Speaker 2: demeanor went from business to light and friendly. He said,

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Speaker 2: your daughter has had a reaction to pethidy and your

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Speaker 2: wife was administered during labor. We've injected her with nacan,

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Speaker 2: which is commonly used for reversing the effects of heroin. Great,

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Speaker 2: my kid's not even two minutes old and she's already

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Speaker 2: had a drug overdose. Wow, it was so it was

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Speaker 2: so freaky, It was so surreal at that time.

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Speaker 3: Were there any other implications for Romany's health after that?

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Speaker 2: Nh I no, other than she's just late all the

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Speaker 2: time and messy. But you know, she's twenty three, in

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Speaker 2: her health.

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Speaker 3: And a beautiful looking woman whose head is no longer

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Speaker 3: shaped like a triangle, and.

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Speaker 2: She looks looks absolutely wonderful. But there was a time

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Speaker 2: because she was overdue and she was dead when she

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Speaker 2: came out, she didn't. That'll do it, Yeah, that'll do it.

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Speaker 1: Wow? All right.

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Speaker 3: Well, then two years later Jack arrived and Harley's parents

201
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Speaker 3: decided on the morning of Jack's birth that they were

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Speaker 3: going to sell their house in New Zealand, and Harley was.

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Speaker 2: What's it called excommunicated?

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Speaker 3: No, when you have to make the decisions executive, that's

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Speaker 3: the one. After hours of feeling terrible. I told Harley

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Speaker 3: to get off the phone. He said to the person

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Speaker 3: he was talking to, my wife's having a baby, and

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Speaker 3: he said, well, thank you, but she's actually having one now.

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Speaker 3: Harley rushed off to drop Liham at a friend's place,

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Speaker 3: and by the time he got back, I felt like

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Speaker 3: things had gone from zero to sixty. The pain was

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Speaker 3: so intense. The only thing holding me together was the

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Speaker 3: promise of drugs. As soon as we got to the hospital.

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Speaker 3: I'd always thought the people you saw on the news

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Speaker 3: giving birth in cabs are on the side of the road,

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Speaker 3: had to be mentally deficient, and yet here I was

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Speaker 3: in all sorts of trouble. When I got out of

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Speaker 3: the car in the car park at the hospital, I

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Speaker 3: was instantly on all fours. Somehow we got to a room,

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Speaker 3: and the pain I felt when they checked my dilation

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Speaker 3: was indescribable. Even worse was the news that the labor

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Speaker 3: was so far along I was too late to get drugs.

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Speaker 3: Bloody hell, how was I going to do this? I

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Speaker 3: wanted to give up then and there. Sorry, everyone, there's

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Speaker 3: been a mistake. I've changed my mind. This whole pass

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Speaker 3: of the baby through a birth canal business isn't for me.

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Speaker 3: Gas was my only medical friend, and this time I

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Speaker 3: was determined to make it work.

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Speaker 1: I can't remember much of what followed.

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Speaker 3: But only an hour later, a little person was lifted

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Speaker 3: into the air to Harley's cry, it's Jack. That's how

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Speaker 3: I knew we'd had a son. For a boy would

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Speaker 3: pick the name Jack Henry after my grandfather. My post

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Speaker 3: birth experience was so different second time around. Having had

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Speaker 3: no drugs during the labor, I was alert and with it.

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Speaker 3: Jack fed instantly and slept in his little crib next

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Speaker 3: to my bed. The morning after he was born, I

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Speaker 3: opened the curtains, held him aloft, and said out loud,

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Speaker 3: there's a new person in the world, and his name

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Speaker 3: is Jack Henry Oliver. It was like a scene from

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Speaker 3: The Lion King, but with terrible music and less costumes.

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Speaker 3: Harley brought Liam to meet his little brother later that day.

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Speaker 3: It was so odd. When I'd lived home the previous day,

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Speaker 3: Liam had been a baby. Now he looked like Gulliver,

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Speaker 3: a giant in a pram. We bought a little truck

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Speaker 3: and presented it to him as a gift from baby Jack. Luckily,

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Speaker 3: he didn't think to wonder what kind of shops were

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Speaker 3: at his brother's disposal.

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Speaker 1: In my womb, you got the gift shop down there.

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Speaker 2: That's what I've heard.

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Speaker 1: That's right, and no returns, no returns.

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Speaker 3: So that's baby number two, and baby number two, like Liam,

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Speaker 3: my oldest is now at UNI. Baby number two is

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Speaker 3: completing his final year of.

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Speaker 2: School next year.

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Speaker 3: And because these children were so hard one to all

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Speaker 3: those years of IVF and looking down the barrel of

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Speaker 3: never having a baby, I for years would get a

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Speaker 3: thrill when I'd be at the lights and I'd think,

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Speaker 3: I'm going to turn around and there are at two

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Speaker 3: children in the back seat here and then mine. And

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Speaker 3: I still do this at home. When I pressed the

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Speaker 3: garage door opener, I've asked the kids to come down

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Speaker 3: and empty to help get.

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Speaker 1: The groceries up.

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Speaker 3: I press the thing and the door comes up, and

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Speaker 3: I think, whoever, I see, that's my children, And it

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Speaker 3: goes up and I see their giant man legs. It

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Speaker 3: still it blows my mind.

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Speaker 2: So you did bring them to make sure they come down.

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Speaker 1: I don't make them stand there all day like all day. No,

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Speaker 1: it's right.

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Speaker 3: At approximately three fifteen, I'll be returning from the shops

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Speaker 3: in a northeast trap. Now I phone them and they go, oh,

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Speaker 3: and I say, please, I'm pulling into the driveway.

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Speaker 2: Now, did you toy with the idea of having three?

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Speaker 3: No, Actually, it's interesting that we had two because with IVF,

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Speaker 3: what an achievement to have a baby. As I said earlier,

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Speaker 3: these were the days where one in three had a baby,

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Speaker 3: two out of three didn't. And when we had one,

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Speaker 3: we had a nanny, a beautiful nanny who became a

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Speaker 3: big part of our family, called Bev, and she had

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Speaker 3: lost a child in a car accident, and she said

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Speaker 3: the only thing that ever got her out of bed

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Speaker 3: was having other children, and.

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Speaker 1: It wasn't because of that. But I hadn't occurred to.

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Speaker 3: Me to go again, and I thought, well, I don't

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Speaker 3: want to get to fifty and wish I had. So

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Speaker 3: we had another go and this time, first time round,

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Speaker 3: we had Jack. But it showed the drop off in

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Speaker 3: my fertility. The first time I'd get twenty eggs and

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Speaker 3: all these embryos. This time round, I think the two

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Speaker 3: that we put in were the only two that survived

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Speaker 3: the freezing process all the others and I feel very conflicted.

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Speaker 3: If I still had embryos left that were frozen somewhere.

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Speaker 3: I wouldn't want a third, but I don't I wouldn't

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Speaker 3: want them destroyed now they none of them survived the process. Okay,

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Speaker 3: And it's funny that we're getting pregnant first time round

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Speaker 3: with Jack all the excitement of that first time with Liam.

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Speaker 3: Second time, I was exhausted with an eighteen month old

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Speaker 3: baby at home, and less than that, they're two years apart.

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Speaker 3: And when they said, Amanda, Wow, you're pregnant, I was

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Speaker 3: just filled with Oh, my god, how am I going

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Speaker 3: to cope? Rather than Oh, isn't this brilliant. If I'd

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Speaker 3: known it would have worked first time, I probably would

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Speaker 3: have thought I'll make a three year gap. But in

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Speaker 3: the end, the two year gap was perfect. And I

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Speaker 3: say to other people who have a two year gap,

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Speaker 3: you'll feel like you're drowning.

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Speaker 1: And then it's the best thing in the universe.

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Speaker 2: I look at your boys and they just they well,

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Speaker 2: they stir each other up mercilessly. But my brother and

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Speaker 2: I have the same gap, and it's yeah, it's.

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Speaker 3: Hard for parents but great for kids. And yes, and

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Speaker 3: I still can't believe my luck that we had two

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Speaker 3: great kids for us.

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Speaker 2: With the third it felt like Helen had always said

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Speaker 2: they felt like there was another little soul out.

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Speaker 1: There, and did you agree?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I did. And our kids are spaced out,

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Speaker 2: not in demeanor but age, so there's five years between them.

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Speaker 2: So Morgan, my eldest, is twenty eight, Dominic, my youngest,

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Speaker 2: is eighteen. This is around the time when Dominic was born.

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Speaker 2: From my book, Helen and I heralded the new year

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Speaker 2: with the news we were going to have another baby.

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Speaker 2: This was a nice bit of news after the tragedy

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Speaker 2: that we all had witnessed some months before in New York.

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Speaker 2: You'd think by the third child, the birthing experience would

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Speaker 2: be easier, but unfortunately that wasn't the case. After a

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Speaker 2: marathon labor, the doctor said we're going to have to

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Speaker 2: go for a cesarean. This didn't please Helen in any way,

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Speaker 2: and I don't blame her. If I'd spent the last

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Speaker 2: few hours trying to push a rock melon out of

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Speaker 2: my area only be told that now they were going

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Speaker 2: to cut my guts open, I wouldn't be too happy either.

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Speaker 1: So you've never had a kidney stone, then.

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Speaker 2: No, Helen got rushed into the operating theater and I

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Speaker 2: put on some surgical scrubs. The theater urse said there

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Speaker 2: were some students doing a tour and asked if I

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Speaker 2: was okay if they watched Helen. Helen said she didn't

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Speaker 2: care if they danced a jig, so all the students.

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Speaker 1: Filed in and danced a jig.

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Speaker 2: The doctor was about to administer the relevant pain medication

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Speaker 2: for the forthcoming cesarean when all of a sudden, he said,

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Speaker 2: hold the phone, here comes the baby. With that, a

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Speaker 2: baby came halfway out. He got stuck though, because he

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Speaker 2: had his umbilical cord wrapped around his neck. I yelled out, cord, cord, cord.

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Speaker 2: The doctor said, good, spot that student there. Because we're

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Speaker 2: all wearing masks, he thought I was a medical student.

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Speaker 1: Wow.

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Speaker 2: He grabbed my finger and put it between the cord

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Speaker 2: and the baby's little neck, and then said, where's dad?

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Speaker 2: Does he want to cut the court? I said, I'm here.

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Speaker 2: Then he realized it was me. He looked at the

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Speaker 2: other gathered students, then back at me and said, well,

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Speaker 2: you might as well cut the court. Then he looked

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Speaker 2: at them, you guys, you should have picked this up.

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Speaker 2: This guy that's right now with no restrictions. Little Dominic

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Speaker 2: Jones came into them. I looked at Helen. She reminded

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Speaker 2: me of the Bluesmobile at the end of the Blues

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Speaker 2: Brothers movie, and we both knew that this would be

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Speaker 2: our last child. Oh, there was no little soul out there.

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Speaker 1: Can I say?

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Speaker 2: Though?

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Speaker 1: At my age now, I'm very moosy about babies.

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Speaker 3: I'm far enough away from the fraud early years, and

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Speaker 3: I see people holding hands of little toddlers and I

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Speaker 3: think what I'd give for a day of them being

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Speaker 3: that aging.

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Speaker 2: I find that as well. Sometimes when on the park,

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Speaker 2: I'll just look at it, like a lady with their

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Speaker 2: little baby, and because I'm a fifty two year old guy,

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Speaker 2: they look at me and I go, oh, is an

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Speaker 2: he cue? And then sometimes they you know, I think

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Speaker 2: of this age, we've demonized everyone so much. There's so

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Speaker 2: much bad out there, but there's a lot of good people.

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Speaker 2: Not that I'm saying I want to enjoy your baby, but.

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Speaker 3: You know what I mean, you want but babies and children.

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Speaker 3: And I wonder if this is the grandparent effect. That's

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Speaker 3: why a lot of people are so relaxed as grandparents,

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Speaker 3: because you love the child without having to go through

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Speaker 3: all the stuff, saying to a woman the other day

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Speaker 3: who said that she felt that she'd been so busy

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Speaker 3: and fraught when the babies were little that she wished

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Speaker 3: shed She wondered if she'd been a good enough mum.

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Speaker 1: But I think what.

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Speaker 3: It is for us is that you look back and

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Speaker 3: you think, I wish I'd been more present, Because when

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Speaker 3: you're in it, you're in the midst of it, and

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Speaker 3: you're forging a life for your children. You're trying to

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Speaker 3: keep them alive. You might be back at work. It's

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Speaker 3: only afterwards you look back and think, oh, I'd relax

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Speaker 3: into it now and I'd enjoy it. Doesn't mean you

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Speaker 3: weren't doing your absolute best at the time, and you

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Speaker 3: were a great parent just for loving them and being there.

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Speaker 3: But I can see why it's easy to give me

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Speaker 3: another crack just for when they're little, and i'd be better.

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Speaker 2: Well, your grandkids are head here. Although weddings first, yea,

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Speaker 2: then baby I specify that to my kids of course.

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Speaker 3: All that's very satisfying, very satisfying cup of tea.

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Speaker 2: Yes, see you next time, as we turn the pages

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Speaker 2: of our lives yet again.

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Speaker 1: Yes.

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Speaker 3: In another episode of Jones and Amanda's book Club j.

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Speaker 2: For more Jonesy and demanded podcasts, download the free iHeartRadio app.

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Speaker 1: You don't get the Big Bird.

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Speaker 2: I could watch that all day