frank by hillary

Here is what the books didn’t tell me. That I would be in so much pain I wouldn’t even want to be touched, let alone ask for a back rub. That the only type of breathing I’d possibly be able to muster was to blow raspberries. That I would get stalled for half a day at 5 centimeters.

Nine years ago, during the last storm of the snowiest winter in Philadelphia history, my stomach began to gurgle loudly like a draining bathtub. It took about an hour to realise what this meant: my daughter finally wanted out.

Toward the end of my pregnancy, I’d discovered that my baby was facing my belly in my womb—“sunny side up”, the midwives called it, which sounded to me like an apartment listing that calls a tiny studio “cosy”. I was told to hang out on my hands and knees as much as possible and the baby should turn in time