I was heavily pregnant with our first child, The Woo, when Hubbster thoughtfully suggested that since the birth was fast approaching, I might want to take myself off to a beauty salon somewhere and get a bit of a tidy up down in my nether regions.

I had long since given up trying to maintain it.  I hadn’t even seen it in weeks. It was a clear cut case of, out of sight – out of mind.

And as my due date neared, to be quite frank, Hairy Maclary wasn’t all that interested in the bone, if you know what I mean?

Besides that I was guzzling milk by the litre, to try to combat the dreaded heartburn (which flared up if I even so much as looked at a Tim Tam.)  My back was sore from lugging around the extra luggage and junk in my trunk, and I was waddling around like I was trying to hold a rock melon between my thighs.  Quack!  Quack!

With the impending birth looming over me, I resented his suggestion.  How dare he?  The last thing I wanted to do was heave my big old belly up onto a bed, naked from the waist down and let somebody stick hot wax on my lady-parts, and then rip all the hairs out, one-by-one.  As far as I was concerned, my vagina was about to be turned inside out and I wasn’t about to inflict any extra unnecessary pain on my poor aching body.

Only, with the aid of pregnancy hormones, I didn’t quite manage to communicate my feelings on this matter quite so eloquently to hubby.

“What?  WHAT? How friggin’ pretty do you think my vagina is going to look after pushing out a baby, huh?  You’ve seen the size of the heads in my family!  I will be lucky if I even have a vagina left!  Do you think the midwives are going to be looking at my hairstyle?  Do you think I will even care?  How about I book you in for a back, sack and crack wax?  Huh?  Just leave me and my vagina the HELL ALONE BUDDY!”

On the 27^th September 2006, at 6am (as hubby was about to step out of the door to go to work) I felt a POP in my tummy.  Luckily the en suite is just a hop, skip and a jump away from the bed, (or rather a waddle and a quack) because I made it to the tiled area just as my waters poured forth.  The first thing I did was grab my mobile and call hubby back (after taking my wet underwear off).  The second thing was to hop into the shower to freshen up.  As I washed my big belly and reflected on the exciting prospect of meeting our child very soon, the horrible realisation suddenly hit me!

I hadn’t had my bits waxed!  I was hairier than a Yeti!  I didn’t want to see my sons head emerge into the world looking like he had a Ned Kelly style-beard!  In a panic I grabbed a Bic razor and set to work.  It wasn’t the easiest task.  The mild contractions were becoming a little stronger each time and it was difficult to manoeuvre around my big belly.  But using a technique similar to reading Braille, I managed to give myself a neat little trim.

Later in the delivery room I remember registering the puzzled look on my darling husbands face when I stripped off my underwear but I was soon riding the seemingly endless wave of  the next contraction all too soon.  A few long, deep drags on the gas and air and I couldn’t care less anyway.  Whatever!

It wasn’t until I was sitting in the bed holding our beautiful, perfectly formed son in my arms that I realised.  Checking me for tears and such like, the midwife proclaimed that my vagina had lived to see another day.  I had no tears.  Yippee! There were just a few ‘grazes’ which might sting when I weed.  Oh, the miracle of childbirth, eh?   I was secretly (and ridiculously) very proud of my super-stretchy vagina!

Looking down past my weird, wobbly jelly belly, I threw my vagina a congratulatory wink!  We did it, old girl!  We bloody well did it!

That’s when I realised.  The nice little trim I had given myself looked less like a smooth baby’s bottom than an echidna with alopecia!  A random mixture of wiry tufts and bald patches!  Oh the shame!  Needless to say I booked myself in for a tidy-up at the salon before birthing my other two children.  Hairdressing really isn’t my thang.