Esther McCarthy: I’ve had three sections and it's not the easy way out — it’s major surgery

She does these little pants at the end of every sentence because her lungs are getting squashed into her throat by her ever-expanding womb. This woman is
undoubtedly with child. Still, I don’t mention the elephant (not her!) in the room and I keep my eyes firmly above the equator.

For you see, dear reader, I have been on the stinging end of that conversation.

“When is the baby due again?” this older colleague once asked me brightly, looking pointedly at my belly and my shit shoes, 12 MONTHS after I’d popped out my first fella.

“Are. You. For. Real?” I enunciated slowly, between chews.

“I’m back from maternity leave. You signed the card. I showed you the pictures! You said he had my eyes. WTF, dude?”

He backed away slowly, hands up, as if calming an overwrought and overweight horse as everyone else in the canteen avoided eye contact and getting between me and the microwave.

So I do the decent thing with this girl and keep the banter going until she brings it up.

“Ah congratulations!” I beam. “Aren’t you very neat?”

This is the ultimate compliment to preschoolers colouring in, and women about to give birth.

“Oh, I’m very nervous,” she says, “I’m hoping to get a section.”

“HOPING?” I bellow, forgetting that pregnant women and their bladders startle easily.

“Are you insane?”

She says lots of her friends who’ve had babies had caesarean sections, and they didn’t have to compromise their vajayjays.

What in the name of mucus plugs is going on? Come to think of it, I’ve been hearing this a bit recently; Irish mothers-to-be looking favourably on getting baby out via the sunroof rather than the more conventional bonnet option.

A2023 study by the School of Nursing and Midwifery in Trinity College, Dublin, found factors that influence a clinician’s decision to perform a section on a first-time mother, are “complex and multifactorial”. They also discovered more than one third of mothers are giving birth to their first babies by caesarean. I wonder what’s going on with this year on year rise – over a 30% increase?

Some of the findings I get — it kind of makes sense that for the clinician, the fear of adverse outcomes and of course the possible court case if anything goes wrong, is something they would want to minimise. But I’d be surprised if first time mums would actively want this type of birth.

I’ve had three sections, and it ain’t no picnic, let me tell you. The first one an emergency at about 4am in CUMH, after we were told the baby was in distress, the heart rate erratic, and no amniotic fluid left. When you hear that, said in sombre tones, you don’t care about getting sliced and diced. You just want your baby out safe.

But on my second pregnancy, I was determined to give birth “naturally”. It felt like I had cheated last time and missed out on something important. It wasn’t the easy way out though, it’s major surgery, with up to eight weeks recovery. That means no driving, lots of bleeding, and a fair share of pain as your uterus and your tummy wounds heal.

Baby number two had other ideas. To have him naturally, I couldn’t go over 10 days past my due date. I tried to get him moving in the right direction, I put everything into my body that purports to trigger labour; spicy food, acupuncture needles, a penis. Nothing worked.

The hospital won’t induce you in case the contractions burst the stitches in your uterus from the last section, and so it was with a heavy heart, and a massive arse, that I booked in for a c-section.

Well. After they hoisted him onto my chest after he was born, I changed my mind fairly lively.

He was massive. I asked my husband if they’d given me Danny DeVito by mistake. He was 10 pounds, 14 ounces. He was too big for the cot thing they put them in next to your bed. I was worried he was going to kick the glass out. He’d definitely have ruined my birth canal.

My third baby, I didn’t have a choice, after two sections, it’s chop-chop again for my abdomen, and snip-snip for my husband’s vas deferens not too long after. I still have no feeling along the ridge of the scar, he reports no such side-effects.

My advice to my friend? All you’ll want is your baby healthy and happy in your arms, however it happens – sunroof or bonnet. Let no-one near the boot though.