Holly Day Photos

I was sitting peacefully in our back garden, reading a book in the sunshine, late afternoon on Friday 11th September, 2009 – our due date. A date which has other connotations these days, and other, blacker memories, but for us it will now always be the day that our first baby announced that she was ready to arrive.

I’m half way through The Caine Mutiny, for the umpteenth time, when at 4pm, Marie called out to me from inside the house in a curiously uncertain voice. “Andy, I think me waters have broken…”.

Just over twelve hours later, neither of us were uncertain about what had just happened:

There she was, born at 04:36 on Saturday, 12th September 2009, our baby Holly Hiseman. I took the picture above just nine minutes after she was born…

We’d arrived at Peterborough Hospital’s maternity ward at around 21:30, after a few hours of tests and a short trip back home. Her mum Bev came with us, and her dad John stayed at our house with our 9yr old boy, Devon. By this time Marie’s contractions were pretty tough on her, but early on the trusty gas & air machine was all she needed:

And so began the long night. An epidural joined the gas & air machine, which relaxed Marie no end, but it was a gruelling few hours…:

When the final stage came, Marie gave birth astonishingly fast. The final push lasted just eleven minutes. For 45 years I’ve heard people rate their great life experiences against the moment their first child was born, and I now understand why nothing can ever top it. Miraculous, overwhelming, unreal, and brilliant beyond words.

For a long time afterwards, we – and Holly – were quiet, simply murmuring to each other, lost in the size of the occasion:

And through the next twelve hours of tests, examinations, form-filling and waiting around, Marie and Holly stayed almost supernaturally patient, quietly getting to know each other while the world around them went about its business:

Mid-afternoon it all changed, and the volume levels increased, when Holly’s big brother Devon got to meet his new sister for the first time ever:

Now, a day later, we’re all happily getting used to each other. We love little Holly May Hiseman to bits, and we’re looking forward to showing her off to all of our loved ones:

She’s beautiful.