This post is a couple of days late really, but…

On Thursday evening just after I got home from work, Mrs C started to have short (3 or 4 seconds a time) but very painful (it bent her over double) contractions.

When she first leant over the work top, I thought she’d just stood up too fast.

“Are you alright?” I asked (ever the caring husband).

“I think I’m having contractions and they really hurt!” She calmly replied.

“SHIT!” I though to myself. “We haven’t really packed a bag for hospital. Bernard isn’t house trained yet. I’ve got loads on at work.” The stupid things that go through your mind when you think you’re about to have your first baby…

I managed to compose myself just in time for the first set of contractions to stop.

“Well, let’s wait and see if they get worse before we do anything. Have you even got wet pants?” Remembering all the things I have learnt from our NCT classes.

“No. They’re dry.” Came the response.

“OK. Right. Remember your breathing. Calm down. This is going to be alright. Just some Braxton-Hicks contractions.” I reassured myself.

If this is any indicator of my nerves, it looks like I’m going to be so delirious on the day that I’ll need the gas and air more than Mrs C. She’s a lucky lady…

“Do you worry that we’ll like Bernard more than the baby?” I asked Mrs C today.

She was too embarrassed by the answer to say it, but I knew she was worried we would do.

Finally she came to: “I think that when he comes out, we’ll feel the same way with the baby as we do with Bernard. At least I hope so, because I love Bernard!”.

I hard to believe you could feel so strongly about something that just eats, poos, sleeps and whines but you can and, more to the point, we do.

And I know we will feel the same about the baby. We will, we will, we will…

Mrs C had her first major wobble yesterday. Today was her first day on Maternity leave and her body was full of near end of pregnancy hormones. This combined with talking about “The Baby Blues” at NCT on Saturday has put some fear into her mind.

“It’ll never be the two of us again!” she sniffed through some tears.

“Oh God, she’s right” I thought but I didn’t say it. I gave her a hug and stroked her hair.

“No, but you never know it might just be better” I did say that, it didn’t stop the tears though.

Then just as quickly as she started to cry, she stopped and was back to looking forward to time off work and time with Bernard.

I can’t help but feel that my worries about the impending birth of our child are nothing compared to Mrs Cs…

The downside (or maybe the upside) to having a brand new puppy is that it has made Mrs C (well maybe not Mrs C so much) and I forget that we’re having a baby in less than 3 weeks (or so).

Pretty much all of my attention has been on Bernard and trying to get him to settle into life with us. I even got the green light to skip the NCT class yesterday. Sadly, I still had to go to the pub lunch afterwards (the things you do for love hey?).

Yesterday evening Mrs C said to me: “I don’t remember if I’ve been kicked today”.

“Hhmm? By who?” I replied in slight confusion.

“By the baby. You’re supposed to remember these things so the Mid wife knows he still alive in there.” Mrs C told me.

“Baby. What Baby? Woo, look at Bernard now!”

Hmm, I think I might have had my first taste of fatherhood, thanks to Bernard.

We were told to expect some whimpering from him when we put him to bed (9pm sharp. “No Bernard. You can’t have a glass of milk. No Bernard. You can’t have a cookie. No Bernard. You can’t have the light on for a little bit longer.”) but if Junior makes the same noises as Bernard did last night I don’t think my heart will be able to take it.

Bernard, being a pack animal (err, a dog), likes to follow someone around. For the rest of his life this will be me and Mrs C but we’d like him to try to sit in his bed once.

We decided to put his little dog crate at the top end of the kitchen. This seems to be our first mistake. Because last night (his first one at home) after I’d put him in his crate, he dashed out and after me down the kitchen before I’d made it to the door.

OK, I’ll leave him, maybe he’ll make his way back to bed.

Sadly no, he lay on the cold, hard floor on the other side of the door (I know this because as an obsessive parent I bent down to look under the door and his adorable little face was on the other side).

This made me desperately worried that he was going to freeze to death on his first night home. I’ll put a bit of veterinary bedding on the floor so at least. This was the second mistake. It triggered some whining that tugged so hard at my heart strings (I’ll just go and pet him a little bit, just for 5 minutes….) that in the end I had to go to bed and put a pillow over my head.

Going to bed didn’t help though. I lay there worrying if he’s OK “Should I go and check? He was very quiet, I hope he’s not dead”. That sort of thing. When I did get to sleep, it was only until 6am and my first thought was “I hope Bernard is alright”.

I’ve a funny feeling that this is what it’s going to be like to be a new father. Still, not too long until I find out now.

I know, I know. I said I wouldn’t write about Bernard again. But he finally came home today and you can read about his eventful evening with us here on his Miniature Schnauzer Stories blog.

Needless to say, Bernard is the best little puppy in the whole wide world (except for already having poo’d, wee’d and vomited on our kitchen floor) and I think we’re going to love him loads.

More than the baby, though? Of course not….