Accepting the child you have

Permalink

I'm sure I'm not alone in having had expectations of what I would get up to with my baby while I was on maternity leave - not only would I find the time to get outside in the garden while my baby happily bounced away in their vibrating bouncer, we would do all manner of activities. Baby sensory classes, baby yoga, baby massage, messy play sessions, baby swimming - we were going to do it all! One of the activities I was most excited about was baby swimming. I'd loved to swim as a child, and as my husband isn't a hugely confident swimmer, we felt it would be great to introduce Max to the water early on. I was entranced by ...

Anxiety and the Modern Parent

Permalink

I'm a mum who tends to worry a lot. About whether my child is hitting their milestones, about whether he's happy, if I'm doing the right thing sending him to nursery, if I'm doing enough crafting with him, if he should know his colours by now. These are worries that I can put aside, but then will pop into my head again, just when I think I've got past them. I'm clearly not alone in this, as I read similar concerns from other parents on a regular basis. It seems to be the curse of modern parents.   Testing, testing, testing... Generation Y parents are used to being tested. My school year was the first to encounter SATS testing in Year 6, before being tested again in Year 9, ...

A Letter to my son on his 2nd Birthday

Permalink

Dear Max, Today you are two - Happy Birthday! It seems like only yesterday that we bought you home from hospital, a little red, wrinkly, screaming bundle - and yet at the same time that seems ages ago, as you've changed so much in those two years. Over the last year, you've learnt to walk - first taking those really tentative steps, but now you're running around faster than I can keep up with half of the time. You're such a little professor and you love a puzzle, or to figure out how something works. I think you'll end up being an engineer, just like your Daddy.     Your personality has developed so much over the last year too - you're a child of extremes, ...

My breastfeeding experience

Permalink

When I was pregnant I was asked many times by midwives and others whether I planned to breastfeed. I'm a big reader, so I was well aware of the health benefits of breastfeeding, but had also heard from some friends that they'd not been able to breastfeed for one reason or another, so my feelings were fairly laid back; if I could breastfeed, I intended to, but I wasn't going to put unnecessary pressure on myself. I felt I was fairly prepared for the realities of breastfeeding - like many people in the UK I'd completed the NCT course in preparation and thought I knew all I needed in terms of the technicalities, positions, and who to contact if I was having ...

23 Months

Permalink

23 months - just one month now until you'll be turning two! I know all parents say it, but where did that time go? It seems like just the other day we were bringing you home from the hospital but here you are rapidly growing up into a little man. Your kind side has really come out this month - you've started saving your last grape / piece of biscuit for me and then feeding me it. You even handed me have the little biscuit that came with my coffee at M&S the other day - normally it's swiped from under my nose before I can get a look in! Despite loving your food, you're clearly a much better sharer of it than ...

When a ‘smug mum’ moment lead to a realisation…

Permalink

Last week I had the loveliest day. It was a completely normal day – it was Thursday, the one day of the week when I have Max all to myself with no activities planned. I don’t often take Max out for a proper meal with just the two of us as it can often be a bit of a battle to keep him amused, but that day we stopped at Bill's for some brunch as a treat.   From the moment we walked in, Max was the most angelic child – smiling and flirting with the waitress, sitting patiently in his high chair opposite me while we quietly read Postman Bear as we waited for our food, and then charming the two ladies ...

22 Months

Permalink

Here we are, rapidly careering towards the onset of the Terrible Twos. Well, scratch that, I think we may already be there, given the level of tantrums going on in our house lately, but hey! You've reached the grand old age of 22 months - so old now that soon we'll stop counting in months and just go for the years. You are very much a little boy now, rather than the baby it feels like you were only a short time ago. You had your first haircut, and suddenly look so much older. Your speech has finally started to come, and it's coming thick and fast, in leaps and bounds, making me wonder why I wasted so much energy worrying ...

Facebook Motherhood Challenge and the Motherhood Backlash

Permalink

You must have seen the Facebook ‘Motherhood Challenge’ doing the rounds over the last week or so – a mother shares 5 pictures that make her proud to be a mum, and then tags some friends who she thinks are also great mums and might like to take part as well. It wasn’t long before the inevitable backlash started – Flic Everett posted this article on The Guardian, slating the smugness of these participants and their rose-tinted view of motherhood that apparently makes her 'want to punch her computer screen', and Daisy Buchanan wrote a slightly more sympathetic article for The Pool, although still criticising the challenge for it's pressure on mothers to present themselves in a perfect light. There appear to be ...

Are you breastfeeding and concerned about low supply?

Permalink

Breastfeeding is one of those mysterious things that for me sums up motherhood - you start off with neither you or your baby knowing what to do, you learn together, but it is something that you have only your instinct to rely on that it's actually happening properly; there is no way for you to measure how much milk your baby is actually taking. For me as an insecure first time mum, it was this complete unknown and need to rely on instinct that led me to feel that I may have a low supply issue. It's important to remember that very few mothers actually experience low supply. The best indicators of a healthy supply are wet and dirty nappies, and that ...

Thoughts on body image

Permalink

‘They’ say that women become most comfortable with their bodies in their 30’s. Over the years I've read this countless times in magazines and online articles and having reached aged 32 and now post pregnancy, I’ve been reflecting on this lately. I’ve given myself a hard time over the years in terms of my body image – at 5ft3 and being naturally curvy (read: a few more wobbly bits than I’d like, and specifically quite a little pot belly) I’ve struggled when comparing my body to the typical ideal. Throughout my teenage years I’d spend time doing sit-up’s on my bedroom floor trying to achieve ‘that perfect flat stomach’ that the latest magazine promised if I just did these few exercises. ...