WHOLESOME REAL LIFE
Becs Lewis, 29, from Rotherham, took her tiny newborn baby on atrip of alifetime...
Laying awhite sheet down on the floor, I gently placed my baby in the middle.
‘Let’s try again,’ I said to my partner Will, 32.
I’m not sure how many people know the struggle of taking apassport photo for a newborn baby, but Ican tell you it is hard work!
And only alittle newborn baby, our little boy Atlas wasn’t old enough to hold his head up by himself.
But we’d had abrainwave. Placing him down on the sheet, Will held his arms, while Itook avideo of his face.
Taking screen grabs of the video, we finally had aperfect passport photo –Atlas with his eyes wide open.
And now we were ready to set off for our big adventure.
It may sound crazy jetting off from New Zealand to Europe with anewborn in tow, but we planned to go travelling long before Iknew Iwas pregnant.
I’d moved to New Zealand back in 2016 after falling in love with the beautiful views whilst travelling myself.
And working as aretail manager, I’d met Will, anative Kiwi, at work.
Knowing he had alove of travel and hiking, it was something we wanted to do together. Only in 2020, we were in the middle of lockdown and the borders were shut.
Planning to go on atrip around Europe after the borders were open again, Ihad asurprise in February 2022. After experiencing some bleeding, I’d been to hospital for acheck-up when anurse asked if Iwas pregnant. ‘No, I’m not,’ I’d told her. ‘Well, it looks like you are,’ she said.
In fact, Iwas 10 weeks! Due to Covid, Will had to wait in the car .Breaking the news, he was over the moon –I was in such floods of tears, he thought I’d had bad news.
Despite the initial shock, my pregnancy went smoothly and Atlas was born via aC-section on 31 August 2022 at 11.28pm, weighing 5lb 5oz.
And Atlas was such afitting name. We both had alove for travel and came from opposite ends of the planet –it was a perfect fit.
Despite the fact I’d just given birth, postponing our trip was not on the cards.
Our rental contract had come to an end and we’d been really looking forward to going.
‘I can spend more time with him, too,’ Will said. Taking a year sabbatical from work to travel, he’d see more of Atlas’ milestones than taking paternity leave.
And it would be easier to do it before he had nursery and school commitments.
Instead of acalm, peaceful baby bubble, the next six weeks were abit of amad rush as we got everything ready to leave.
Selling our stuff, moving out of the flat and into Will’s parents, it was stressful.
But Atlas was chill –asleepy baby, he took it all in his stride.
Jetting off to Singapore when Atlas was just six weeks ol
