Uncomfortable

It's been a while coming.  Nearly thirty-nine weeks in fact.  She's done well, but now she's just about done.  It's just too much.  Too much weight.  Too much volume.  Too much circumference.  The bump is finally defeating my wife.  Wobbling around like some 50s b-movie monster attached to the front of her, the bump has begun to take its toll.

I've been amazed through this whole nine month process that there hasn't been more in the way of aches and pains.  The books all say a woman should expect to start hurting far earlier than one week prior to the due date, and I'm sure most do.  Mrs L has been toughing it out though, that or extremely lucky.

But not any more.

Every movement is accompanied with a breathless sigh.  A trip to the shops is akin to a major expedition to some hitherto undiscovered corner of the globe.  Even resting is no longer a rest, rendered unpleasant by the sheer size of that baby oven.

No combination of pillows, cushions, duvets and assorted other ephemera yields the comfort my wife so desperately craves.  Her anatomy is at the mercy of the baby, stomach squished up inside her so that she's never hungry, her hips, knees and ankles working under conditions that have their union rep threatening strike action, her feet swelling into caricatures of their normal selves.

Yet through all of this, there is hardly anything by way of complaint (there's certainly a lot less whinging than would be happening if I was carrying all that around).  Not once have the words "I just want this baby out of me" passed her lips.

She's bloody amazing, and I, in turn, am bloody amazed.