MY WIFE WAS PREGNANT AND SO WAS I By Ayo Alonge

Let's just say pregnancy fell on my wife and I was caught responsible for it.
I will confess. My wife was actually pregnant and so was I.

But, how?

Well, I was practically working as a midwife all through the process. Alas, I was actually pregnant too, just like my wife was.

The difference is that while she was carry the pregnancy in her tommy, I was carry it about on my head, like gala, so to speak.

I soon found out that nursing a pregnant woman all alone is more like an 8 to 5 paid job, especially when there is no housemaid around to help out. The husband material in you will pop up, by default.

And then, I was helping out with chores, by compulsion. If you are the emotional type like me, you don't even want to watch her do chores.
By force, I learnt gentlemanliness, patience and obedience to all her commands. Those were the times she would demand ofada rice, assorted fruits, unripe plantain with garden egg sauce, amala from Yakoyo spot in Surulere, name it. One of the occasions, I became a regular caller on the pepper soup joint in the neighbourhood.

That would have been fine but for the fact that she started to poke everything that entered her mouth, after all the wahala involved in the process of getting it. That was during the first trimester.

Soon, the endless vomiting and feverish condition set in. Then I was told she had Hyperemesis Gravidarum.

"Doc, what is that," I asked in anxiety.

"Not too worry, it's just a condition at the early stage of pregnancy characterised by severe nausea, vomiting, weight loss, and electrolyte disturbance," he replied.

Then came the delivery date.

A naturally soft-spoken person, for the very first time in the marriage, yelled at me.

 "Put on that AC!", she yelled at me like you would do to a kid.

My legs slipped, as I shivered and staggered around her ward, looking for the stupid remote which was nowhere to be found.

Right under my nose, I watched her cry in intense labour, as tears rolled down her eyes, but the man in me kept pushing back my version of tears. Otherwise, who would have consoled who?

Then it was time for her to push. We were in it together right in the labour room. How would I have given an eyewitness account reportage?

As my heart beat faster on a per second basis, I entered the labour room with my cold feet and my heart in my mouth.

Finally, on just two pushes, right under my nose, and on the dot of 8:34pm, our bundle of joy and my carbon-copy arrived safely.

It's a boy!