It touched me to hear that at 48, the TV presenter Ant McPartlin is a new father. His wife, Anne-Marie Corbett, who has two daughters from a previous marriage, gave birth to their son, Wilder Patrick, last week. Sharing a poignant image of them both, he welcomed his son to the family, posting: “Baby is beautiful, Mummy’s a legend, Sisters are over the moon. Dad’s a mess!”
I’d venture to say I know something of how he feels. I was the same age when I first became a parent four years ago, with my wife, Trish. Seeing my daughter, Rosie, brought overwhelming joy and emotion. It was the most magical feeling. Three minutes after birth, she reached out and grabbed my little finger. My heart felt as if it might explode, because this wasn’t just a nine-month pregnancy. It had been five long years of IVF — this was everything in that moment.
Trish and I had known we wanted children together shortly after falling in love in 2014. We started trying, but then — not managing to get pregnant after going at it like teenagers for close on a year — we began IVF privately. Trish was 39, and I was 44 — too old for the NHS.
I hadn’t foreseen problems; my grandfather was 73 when my dad was born. So while I may have been coming late to the party in terms of fatherhood, I’d imagined it would be an easy thing to achieve. I subsequently learnt that men have a biological clock as well as women. It might not tick as fast but it’s still an important factor.