Ok, so which MNer gave birth in my campsite this morning? I have some questions....

[TorchlightMcKenzie]

like, how did you fill the birth pool?
How did you keep hot?
How did you empty it?
Did you also deliver the placenta in the bell tent?

And many MANY more!

And, can I meet you? Am also in bell tent with 7 week old!

This thread is hilarious and has made my day. The fact I got a long quote on the "summary of meanness" on page 10 added to my delight.

I particularly love the few amazing examples of seemingly right-on people showing way more signs of being more intolerant than the supposedly intolerant people they are trying to berate.

The thing is though - was it really a choice?

If her and a husband usually do the festival circuit every year what should she have done. Stayed at home and given birth without husband? Made husband stay at home too for a reasonable period around EDD? Call an ambulance to the campsite?

She wasn't planning to give birth there, we all know how random EDDs are compared to actual birth date.

She didn't know she was going to give birth in that campsite, at that festival. She was just prepared in case she did.

Yay I made it into the quotes too!

Maryz , your post is very sensible. Well done for speaking calmly through the hysteria.

Starlight- does your Ds share a name with a character in a famous TV show?

^ What northernlurker said

I think it would quickly become obvious what the noise was so if dc were worried it could be explained. I wouldn't be bothered at all by being woken by a woman in labour, its not like drunks singing and it was only one night. It sounds like a lovely way to enter the world

I would find it a lot easier to explain to my children why a woman in labour was making a noise in a campsite than why seemingly reasonable adult men were staggering round tripping over guy ropes at 3 in the morning with bells strapped to their legs.....

Lol. Yes Seeker, that's him.

Oh, I think it's lovely. Good for them.

And I speak as someone whose neighbour had a homebirth without telling anyone in the building that she was planning it. We were in the flat next door in a badly converted former house, so it was very loud. Once we knew what was going on (I went round with phone in hand about to call the police, only to bump into the midwife), it was fine.

I made sure I warned the neighbours before mine!

'Will you buy them gifts to make up for the noise your baby may make crying at night? Because that's likely to be just as loud, and go on much longer than your birth noises.'

Do you want to bet on that?

ds2 did not cry more than twice in his first six months of life. Literally he didn't. I managed to scare the postman away with my screams while I gave birth to him.

Plus - I have warned the neighbours I'm having a baby, and apologised for this, in case I get a crying one this time.

I also give them presents now and again just for being lovely neighbours - so, yes, in answer to your question, I will. Does that help?

Starlight- that's cool. She's been talking about him- she thinks he's great. Small(ish) world!

That's devotion to Broadstairs Folk Week.It affects some people that way ( they moved it to a week later this year so I can't make any of it) I think I've actually been in contact with this woman about a Dormobile she was selling....

I like hippies......

I think it sounds lovely.

Come on fivemonths - there is no way your baby only cried twice - unless he was seriously unwell. Do you mean he only did the epic screaming 'you've abandoned me and the world is a terrible place thing' twice? Because that I can understand. I remember dd1 only doing that on a couple of occasions.

No, sorry...it's true. He was much more cry-y after that time - he started teething and so on - but before then, it was just wonderful.

Sure he did the 'uh-huh, uh-huh' noise on a few occasions but I was lucky enough to be around him most of the time, and went straight to him and he was easily sorted out, usually by feeding, which I know a lot of babies are not...it was very weird, but very nice.

He was born at the start of the summer before ds1 went to proper school, and we were all together at home, it was nice weather, we just hung out doing very little. He was just a very easy baby for that period.

He is a lunatic now though.

and as I said he did cry on two occasions, both for around 20 minutes, half an hour I think - possibly he had horrible wind or something. I remember those two times finding it very hard to comfort him.

I know ds1 cried a lot more than ds2. All babies are different, I bet this one is a proper screamer...

And, well said Northernlurker!

Ah thanks Seeker! He's a funny and sensitive little soul but many don't have the patience to try and 'get' him and get irritated by his monologues about letters and numbers and his poor social skills, but your DD (and her mates, to be fair) have been really kind.

I wish ShagmundFreud and NL were my friends. I think we should celebrate this a bit more and I say this as the most conservative, least alternative person you could imagine.

I suspect many of the people on this thread have never been to Folk Week. Observing it from a distance, I'd say that a woman called Galadriel giving birth in a bell tent in Upton School's playing fields is entirely in line with most attendees' expectations :)

Ha ha - I've been, Dowagershump, and you're so right!

actually DS1 never cried either when he was very young. He was a lovely calm baby. You put him down to sleep and he went to sleep. DS2 however screamed when he was tiny whether you picked him up or put him down. He just liked screaming.

Sounds lovely but selfish to me. That would freak my two kids out completely.