To my Dear Yaksha, Alatus,

How are you? I see you've been very active lately, even as far out as joining people for dinner! I'm so proud of you! It's fine to go out with friends once in a while, Xiao.

About the stunt you pulled back at the Chasm.. I would've chastised you, but I cannot for the love me just get mad. Please, do not pull that stunt ever again, it would immensely break my heart.

You mention you'd like to dance, right? We should totally go to a festival together next time!

For now, take care of yourself, Xiao. I will see you soon.

(along with the letter fitted inside a pure white envelope was a small bow filled with separately wrapped marshmallows and a qingxin flower, tied together with a green string).

xiao heaved as he sweeped the hilichurl camp for the last time, finally allowing himself to dismiss his polearm. this one had been particularly tough, a samachurl had hidden itself behind some crates and kept healing enemies when he wasn’t looking. still, it was over now. irritating, yes, but impossible, no.

he turned, ready to vanish in a puff of smoke to wherever the next danger in liyue was, but a bright light from above caught his eye. xiao looked up, noticing the stars streaming across the sky for the first time.

notably, he sees the one seeming to come straight for him.

he frowns, well aware of how your regular stars work. but those crossed the sky, confined to the heavens, never… never coming to earth, never landing in his tentative palms, never sharing their heat through the fabric of his gloves.

xiao stares at the star in his hands, and watches it crumble. it’s expected, as anything pure would collapse under his karma, but what isn’t expected is what remains in its ruin.

a sheer pouch, filled with qingxin blossoms and some sort of soft candy, the green ribbon looking blue in the dark of twilight. next to it was a plain white envelope, his name written on it in a similar shade of green.

xiao blinked at his hands. a gift?

…or was it an order?

without another thought he pocketed the pouch and opened the envelope, pulling out a simple letter.

it wasn’t an order.

the closest thing to directions that you came was when you asked he didn’t put his life at risk as he did in the chasm, and that was hardly something he planned on doing again. the chasm… the chasm was an edge case, and one he wasn’t keen on repeating. he could feel your distress across worlds, and even if he didn’t value his own life, your happiness came above all else.

but for now, all you asked was that he took care of himself.

later that night, one of the opened sweets in hand, xiao looked up to the stars and wondered how far away ‘soon’ would be.

A Birth Experience

Bags packed, we were ready to go to Oxford for the weekend to help Nic’s friend Ian sort out his stuff having had to leave for Singapore in a hurry and as an excuse of a final weekend getaway before baby arrived.

Of course, in the Valolas world this meant that baby was likely to come this weekend.

25th July 6am, I awoke with period cramps. From reading a number of positive birth stories, I knew this was an early sign of labour, but partially in denial and not wanting to defer from our weekend getaway plans, I pushed these aside. However, my body had other ideas and continued down the labour track as I got up to go to the loo from slight leakage. Again, I tried to sleep through this, and the cramps, but at 9am, as if to confirm it was really happening, I had heavier leakage and a sticky clear mucus on tissue, which could only be my mucus plug. I also felt the urge to do a poo but nothing came.

After telling Nic and giving Ian a quick call, we decided instead to do a day trip to Oxford as from this point labour could still be a day or two away. Perhaps instinctively I knew that baby would arrive early as I had worked late into the night the previous night to finish off the project profitability report for work which gave me slight closure. However, it was still 2 weeks before our due date of 8th August and we weren’t quite ready.

We loaded up the car and headed out on our way to Oxford, stopping off for a hearty MacDonalds sausage mcmuffin along the way. It was as if the universe was trying to tell us something! I have always thought God has a sense of humour, particularly when it comes to us but he dropped us a number of hints. First there was the dad licence plate on a car in front of us, then talk about babies on the news and finally a billboard with ‘Nappy Days’ advertised. 

We arrived in Oxford some 2.5 hours later. Ian’s apartment was nice; overlooking the river and I suddenly felt slight FOMO at not being able to live out my weekend getaway - the tapas place I had booked for dinner, the Cotswolds walk I had planned for the Sunday etc. Still, we continued with the task at hand, sorting out Ian’s stuff into throw, recycle and ship piles. Midway through and when we were contemplating whether to go out for lunch or order in, I felt a trickle and rushed to the loo. It was as I had read in books, heard from NCT and in our positive birth company videos - a ‘straw coloured discharge’. It wasn’t the Hollywood gush of water but my waters had indeed broke at around 1pm. 

This set Nic into action mode as he called Ian to enable Plan B. Nic handed an unfriendly, unenthusiastic Singaporean, a fellow course mate of Ian’s the keys and informed her that I was in labour, to which she responded ‘poor thing’ and with that we were back on the road home.  

Along the way, I managed to call Lewisham Birth Centre at the hospital to let them know my waters broke to which they asked us to come in to check. We arrived at the hospital at 4pm, no contractions but they confirmed my waters had indeed broken and after doing a vaginal examination (ouch!) also confirmed I was not dilated but I was to return in 24 hours if not earlier if there was no immediate onset of labour. Since there was no immediate rush, we took this opportunity to go to Tesco to do a quick grocery shop for when we returned home from the hospital (which I was expecting to be Sunday 26th at the latest), even buying a birthday cake as Julia from NCT had suggested (I was not baking one!). 

Back home, we realised in all the excitement, we had skipped lunch but anticipating a long wait ahead, filled up on an early dinner of tortellini with spinach in a mascarpone sauce whilst watching Netflix. Also anticipating that I would go into labour in the next 24 hours, I did a quick email handover at work so I could have closure and wrote my love letter/card to Nic. 

I ate a quarter pack of dates to hopefully naturally induce labour and finally around 9pm, I started to get very mild contractions maybe 10 -15 minutes apart. I was hopeful that this was all the pain I was going to feel and that the pain was overrated but unfortunately I was in store for so much more. I bounced around on my birth ball, knelt down by the bed as the contractions came closer and closer together and I monitored them on my contractions app. By 10pm, I started to get 3 every 10 minutes, a prerequisite of getting admitted into the hospital. I endured this for an hour and a half, feeling quite proud and also hopeful that once at the hospital, as in seemingly all of the positive birth stories I had read, I would be able to find out I was so far dilated that birth was imminent. My dreams were crushed when upon another vaginal examination in hospital, I found I was only 3cm dilated. 

We were led into a birth centre room anyway and pretty much left to our own devices. It was a nice set up, though chilly, with a double bed, sofa, birthing pool and a private room. We made ourselves comfortable putting up fairy lights, music on and working through my contractions together as they got stronger and stronger. 

The rest was all a blur. The contractions got progressively stronger and less manageable. I kept feeling like I wanted to go to the toilet but was unable to. Nic was my rock and strength all the way, feeding me bits of croissant to keep my strength up, holding me through the contractions, if I had to do it myself, think I would have just broken down. I went from wanting a completely natural birth to taking all the pain killers they offered me - paracetamol, codeine, pethidine and of course gas and air. 6 hours later, they measured how far I was dilated again, still 3cm. I was close to breaking point after hearing that and in so much pain. The pethidine gave temporary relief as I tried to ‘rest’ between contractions. 

I kept getting the ‘urge to push’ that was talked about on all of the positive birthing company videos except that they told me specifically NOT to push as my cervix wasn’t dilated and this basically meant I would be pushing against a wall which would bleed. It was excruciating pain but somehow I got through this through inhaling gas and air like my life depended on it.

Next thing I knew, I was being measured again. 9cm dilated. I felt a sense of relief, like I wasn’t imagining that the contractions were indeed getting stronger and more intense. Still I had to wait for that last cm. Chris (a midwife with pink hair) and another lady came in to monitor me and baby every 15 minutes. To allow baby room to descend further, they had to empty my bladder with a catheter but baby was apparently sitting on my urethra and so they poked and prodded around and were unable to find it. IT WAS EXTREMELY PAINFUL. Another two senior midwives came in to help with this, I inhaled gas and air so violently that I was almost scared it would give me brain damage as I almost blacked out with the light headedness. I vaguely remember 4 midwives standing over me with Nic holding my hand beside me and a curly haired one telling me I was doing so well. I didn’t feel like I was doing well and badly wanted it to be over. At last I was able to feel temporary relief from them finally managing to connect the catheter and release my bladder.

9cm dilated meant I was able to finally go into the water bath. It was warm and I felt temporary relief as Nic held my hand and I managed my contractions in the water, still holding back the urge to push. Finally, I got the go ahead from the midwife to push. However, at this point it was around 11am on 26th July and I was so exhausted from no sleep and barely any food that I had little energy left to push, I sucked on the energy sweets, hoping that it might bring me that boost of energy I needed. Sadly, though I moved in position to push in the water, the contractions had slowed and I pushed with all my might to no avail. This definitely was not the ‘urge to push’ and breathing the baby out through down breathing as we had watched in hypnobirthing. 

After trying in the water for ages with the encouragement and direction of the two midwives, we decided to try pushing on the bed. They were both getting increasingly worried about the risk of infection given that my waters had broken more than 24 hours before and so called in the senior midwives for assistance as well. I was completely drained of energy, but tried my best to stay motivated to push. They could barely see the head of baby though and apparently her head was turned, in a back to back position so we needed to turn her before she could come out although they kept reassuring me they could literally feel her head right at the entrance. I had to give up the gas and air so I could push better so the pain was the worst I had ever experienced. I tried different positions, on my side, on my back, on a toilet like seat, on my other side but nothing worked. They gave me energy in the form of HP ready salted crisps in between contractions and the midwives were so good in motivating me to march and squat to urge the contractions on to give a boost to the pushing. I pushed so hard that I squeezed Nic and the midwife’s hand probably to breaking point. But still no progress. It was beyond disappointing. All through this though, baby somehow remained calm and her heartrate was normal which was reassuring.

From there, there was no choice but to wheel me upstairs to the delivery suite for intervention. I was put on a hospital bed and immediately several people came around me offering this, that and the other. The contractions were still coming but at lower frequency and they encouraged me to continue pushing but I was completely drained of energy. I was to be given some kind of spinal epidural and the baby was to be turned around by forceps and brought out. The staff were very matter of fact and I was wheeled into the operating theatre very quickly for fear of risk of infection.

The operating theatre was as scary as it looks on Greys’ Anatomy. There were at least a dozen people surrounding me. They introduced themselves one by one but I couldn’t take it all in. It was intimidating and I just wanted it to be over. I was given the injection in my spine and told not to move. They tested it was worked by spraying a cold spray from my waist down and asking if I could feel it. I couldn’t. It was a scary feeling in itself, not being able to feel your own lower body but this also meant I couldn’t feel the pain of the contractions. I remember touching my leg and thinking I had touched someone else and so apologised but looking up and seeing it was my own legs up in stirrups. 

From here, while they worked on me below, I decided to shut my eyes to shield myself from the blood and whatever they were doing down there. They made a cut - an episiotomy to assist with the giant forceps they were going to shove up there. Nic was on my left side but I could barely focus. A woman had her hand on my stomach to feel the contractions for me and directed me to push. I tried so hard to ‘push’; there was no sensation or feeling of pushing or even direction when she asked me to imagine doing the biggest poo I had ever done, there was simply nothing down there.

At last, I heard them vaguely say they could see the head. I had pushed the head out! I couldn’t feel anything and there was the sensation that I was in fact watching this happen to myself from up above. Then with a few more contractions, I ‘gently’ pushed the rest of the body out. I felt a little emptiness inside my belly. They lifted baby up and congratulated us. Nic teared up. I think I teared but partially out of relief. I felt so distanced from the experience and delirious. Nic went to cut the umbilical cord and they brought baby over to the scales to weigh her and do their checks. I thought I heard her cries but was so faint, I closed my eyes. I heard them busying around me, counting up the pieces of equipment, at one point it seemed like they had lost a piece of rag, I shut this out mentally. They helped me deliver the placenta and sewed me up for what seemed like ages. I was told I had lost 1.3 litres of blood when the norm is 500ml. It was all just a blur until they put baby, all red and covered in white gunk on top of me. 6.34pm she was born weighing a mere 2.64kg.

We had done it! Baby was out in the world and alive and kicking! I felt such relief and couldn’t believe she was really ours! She was so much smaller and skinnier than I had imagined, I couldn’t believe she was really here!