WE WENT to the aid of a friend the other day. She had just given birth to a little bundle of joy but was struggling a bit in the early throes of motherhood. It did take me back to the blur that was the first month with Ben.

I remember feeling completely without a clue or confidence which, for someone who had spent most of her life being in control of what was going on around her, was a massive shock to the system.

It was the same with my friend, she had an idea of how she wanted the birth to go, even invested in a home birthing pool. In the actual event, she didn’t even get near the pump to blow the thing up. An overdue child by about ten days followed by other complications meant she was rushed in for an emergency cesarean.

Recovering from that was a difficult enough job but she then struggled with breastfeeding which is something she really wanted to do. All these things added up to a pretty unhappy new mummy.

So we were dispatched to get her out of the house and back into the swing of things. I was planning on adopting the role of experienced mother who had the whole thing cracked in the hope that she would see that if I could get to grips with it then so could she. This did not come to pass. As it turned out, Ben was not up for playing the obedient child, more a tantrum afflicted ball of rage.

Which was nice. Playing ball he was not, to the naked eye you would have been forgiven for thinking that I was the one on a downhill slide as I wrestled (literally) with my son and heir in the middle of a coffee shop.

Meanwhile my friend’s three week old bundle made not a peep, hardly murmured, didn’t hear from him. Although that could be because the sound of Ben wailing in response to a simple request to sit down, drowned him out.

When we had disturbed the coffee drinkers for long enough we headed for the seafront which again proved trouble ridden with Ben in the end laid full out on the ground kicking his legs because he was denied an ice cream – due to his lack of cooperation with all things behaviour wise. This apparently came as a shock to him as the following ten minute strop proved. Anyway back in the car on our way home reflecting on the disasters of the day, and how I had probably set her back weeks, my friend turned to me and said how it was the best she had felt in ages. I can only imagine having spent the day in our company she realised she didn’t have it quite so bad after all.