In the lounge room two toddler brothers (Jet, 3 years & Indy, almost 2 years) entertained one another and their six month old friend. Meanwhile in the kitchen their mother was on all fours in a birth pool screaming "GET ME OUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUT! AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!", with their father and their friend's mother kneeling by the pool.
Mum had been in labour for thirty hours, and her body was now making the transition from dilation to pushing. Throughout the past twenty-nine hours all the children had gone about their regular business: playing with their toys, watching some television, colouring in and drawing in books, playing with each other, sleeping, eating and drinking. They watched as their mother would stop what she was doing and reach for their father. They watched as their father and their six month old friends' mum would become silent, their parents hugging and their adult friend sitting by, and their mother would chant "ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!" and breathe her way through labour rushes.
Sometimes the younger tot, Indy, would notice his mother was chanting and breathing in that focused way, and he would find the big bouncy ball and roll it to her side, having seen her roll around on it earlier when making those sounds and breathing that way.
Mum laboured in the lounge room, the kitchen, and the bedroom. The tots would come in and out of the rooms, see where everyone was and what they were doing, roll the bouncy ball to her side, get bored and go back to playing in another room.
Daddy put the tots to bed while Mum chatted to her friend who breastfed her baby. The tots slept for hours in their bedrooms, while labour continued in the kitchen and lounge room area of the house. Their Mum and Dad laid together on a mattress on the floor, drifting in and out of sleep, and when the labouring Mum started to snore, her friend went to their bedroom with her baby and breastfed until her baby fell asleep.
All the children slept for a couple of hours, and all the adults sat together in the lounge room and kitchen area, talking and laughing together between labour rushes, and silently listening and supporting the mother through the rushes.
Shortly after midnight Indy woke up and joined his parents. He sat on the couch cuddling Daddy while Mum rolled back and forth on the ball, breathing and chanting, her friend sitting by. When she stopped chanting the adults would resume their chatter.
Indy went back to sleep on the mattress on the floor and at 4am his six month old friend was gently moved from the cooling bedroom to the mattress by the heater with him. An hour later Indy woke to find his Dad filling a big plastic pool with water in the kitchen! So very exciting! He tried to climb up into the pool, but couldn't. Mum got into the pool, and Indy walked around the outside of the pool, trying to figure out if there was a way to get in. Daddy passed him some crackers to munch on and suggested he take them to another part of the room to eat.
Mummy was sitting in the pool, leaning back and relaxing, she was wearing a very interesting necklace. It looked like a necklace made of lollies. Indy played with the necklace, until he started pulling too tight and Daddy encouraged him to let go and take a break from hanging out by the pool. Around 6am time his older brother Jet woke up and joined everyone in the kitchen. Jet also tried to get into the pool, and Daddy had a chat to him about how it wasn't a good idea. Daddy gave them breakfast at the kitchen table.
With their attempts to jump into the pool thwarted, Jet and Indy took to splashing their hands in the water when they could. Mummy was sitting on the other side of the pool, deep in a labour haze. Again Daddy and their friend's mum encouraged them to leave the water be.
A DVD was put on the TV of one of their favourite shows. They sat with their six month old friend watching the screen. Occasionally the tots would wander into the kitchen to see Mum labouring away. Most of the time they played in the lounge room. They had great fun rearranging and jumping on the mattress in the lounge room while their mother roared her way through transition.
When they returned to try and splash about in the pool their friend's mum suggested a game, she ran into the lounge room and across the mattress and they followed. First they ran across the mattress, the adult followed by two tots. Then they jumped across it. Then they hopped across it. Then Jet suggested "scooping" across the mattress, which turned out to mean "skipping". So they did that too.
After their mother would yell Jet or Indy might wander in to see what was happening, but aside from the novelty of having a pool inside the house, they were only minimally interested in what the adults were doing in the kitchen. They never got upset or disturbed by what they heard or saw. And the adults behaved as if everything was normal, so why shouldn't they?
The six month old baby grew weary of being with the other children in the lounge room and called for her mother. Her mother put on a wrap around carrier and placed her baby on her front, which satisfied the bub.
When the baby was born six minutes past nine that morning, his Mother was on her knees bearing down in a birth pool, his Father had his hands in the water, ready to catch his little body. His two older brothers were playing on the couch in the lounge room together, and a friend was standing back taking photos wearing her sleeping six month old daughter.
After a few minutes of hearing some kind of excitement taking place in the kitchen, and the word "baby" the toddlers ran in to see what had happened. There they saw their Mother holding a brand new baby boy, and their Dad kneeling by the pool tearful and smiling.
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