{"id":647379,"date":"2026-11-01T00:58:09","date_gmt":"2026-11-01T00:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/647379\/"},"modified":"2026-11-01T00:58:09","modified_gmt":"2026-11-01T00:58:09","slug":"election-2026-christopher-luxons-six-page-birth-plan-and-the-lesson-he-learned-the-hard-way-ask-me-anything-with-paula-bennett","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/647379\/","title":{"rendered":"Election 2026: Christopher Luxon\u2019s six-page birth plan and the lesson he learned the hard way \u2013 Ask Me Anything with Paula Bennett"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n But when it
\n came to preparing for the birth of his first child with wife Amanda Luxon, he discovered the delivery room is a world away from the boardroom.\n <\/p>\n

Speaking to Paula Bennett on the latest episode of Ask Me Anything<\/a>, the National Party leader reveals that he failed his first big test of fatherhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wrote a six-page typed document about the birthing, the labour process,\u201d Luxon says.<\/p>\n

The plan included \u201ca whole bag ready to go\u201d packed with mixed tape, massage equipment and jigsaw puzzles.<\/p>\n

\u201cI got really into it, so I read every book known to mankind on what to expect when you\u2019re expecting,\u201d Luxon said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d sit up in bed, and I was telling Amanda, \u2018Oh, wow, fascinating. The baby\u2019s the size of a grain of rice today\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the big day arrived, Luxon presented his delivery strategy to the project manager.<\/p>\n

\u201cI sort of said to the midwife, \u2018Oh, hey, listen, look, I\u2019ve got a birthing plan. We\u2019re just going to have a series of escalating sort of actions as we go through the process\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when Luxon found out he wasn\u2019t in charge this time.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe said, \u2018Well, thank you very much, Mr Luxon … it\u2019s not about you, it\u2019s actually about Amanda\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luxon took the feedback on board and by the time the couple welcomed their second child Olivia Luxon, he was happy to take on a supporting role.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no birthing plan at that point.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luxon, who describes his 5-year-old self as \u201ca very organised little chap\u201d, has since learned there are times in life when you have to relinquish control.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou do everything to the plan as best you can. You have a plan, but actually you\u2019ve also got to hold it loosely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perhaps if he hadn\u2019t learnt to let go of the plan, Luxon might never have ended up running Air New Zealand, let alone the country.<\/p>\n

While neither opportunity was on his to-do list, he\u2019s glad he was open to them.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve go to keep yourself available for opportunities and where life may lead you.\u201d <\/p>\n

Listen to the full episode<\/a> for more from Christopher Luxon on:<\/p>\n

Why he would rather face a crocodile than a bear.The unusual sights and characters he\u2019s encountered on the campaign trail.How he and his wife protect their family life from the pressures of politics.<\/p>\n

Ask Me Anything is an NZ Herald podcast hosted by former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett. New episodes are available every second Sunday.<\/p>\n

You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio<\/a>, Apple Podcasts<\/a>, Spotify<\/a> or wherever you get your podcasts. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But when it came to preparing for the birth of his first child with wife Amanda Luxon, he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":647380,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[2246,21045,95,32758,40923,13990,57197,15316,138,16426,5903,21039,6098,692,40484,12782,12018,16427,27983,14909,111,139,69,5493,52990,2170,317213,223,416,16670,14047,102],"class_list":["post-647379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-2246","tag-above","tag-and","tag-anything","tag-ask","tag-below","tag-bennett","tag-birth","tag-business","tag-christopher","tag-election","tag-episode","tag-hard","tag-he","tag-learned","tag-lesson","tag-listen","tag-luxon","tag-luxons","tag-me","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-open","tag-paula","tag-plan","tag-sixpage","tag-the","tag-video","tag-watch","tag-way","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=647379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/647380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=647379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=647379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=647379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}