Happy New Mum

How to give birth. (Start by shutting your ears.)

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A friend of mine has just had her baby.  She’s knackered, milky, blissed out, and then knackered again.  Our beloved NHS got her baby out safely – gosh, how easy it is to forget that no matter how tough a labour experience we have we are so very lucky.

And yet.  And yet every mama’s journey from conception to delivery is different.  But oh-so-many people tell you what you should be doing.  Don’t touch booze.  One glass won’t hurt.  Sleep on your side.  Sleep on a pillow.  Get a pram.  Use a sling.  And you are sponge-like, soaking up the advice, panicking about the number of muslins you need (double whatever you think), and whether or not the baby has enough blankets, and what onesie should they wear home from the hospital.  By all means take in all of the advice, but I promise you, your baby will guide you.  You’ll get it right, or near enough.

Labour attracts even more conversation.  Drugs?  No drugs?  Homebirth?  My choice to hypnobirth was mocked, but it remains the best £300 I spent because of the techniques it taught me, which have proven to be as useful in the boardroom as it was on the labour ward.  But in hindsight, I realise my snobbish attitude to drugs was naïve because labour HURTS.  And to be honest, I wasn’t averse to some mild mind-altering substances in my 20s, so why I turned down the free pharma I’m not quite sure.

For every NHS hospital tour, or midwife appointment, or midnight google of Mumsnet, I wish someone would tell a mum-to-be that it is ok to be nervous of labour.  You don’t have to face it like an Amazon, determined to get through on gas and air alone, when if you were having any other part of your body stretched to its limit (and beyond) you’d pop a pill or three.  (Can you tell this is partly a letter to me, four years ago?!) Equally, if you want to try and embrace the power of labour with no drugs, go for it.

I wish someone would tell these pregnant ladies that so many of the decisions are theirs, from delayed cord clamping, to turning down a sweep (you aren’t a chimney my love) which is basically a fisting from a stranger.  The obsession over due dates blows my mind because, on average, first babies are five days late so why the heck do we expect them before that?  Can’t we rejig the maths to add five days to the EDD?  Can’t we take the pressure off the whale-sized, swollen-of-ankle, hormonal, hungry preggo, and let her cook the baby for exactly the right time?  I cried every day after my EDD because Aunty Doris kept calling to see if the baby had arrived (FFS Doris, I’ll bloody tell you, now naff off and let me watch McDreamy).  As Gandalf said, “A wizard is never late.  Nor is he early.  He arrives exactly when he is meant to.”  By all means take on board the medical advice, but don’t let anyone push you into anything you don’t want to do.

People don’t stop offering advice when the baby comes.  And isn’t that wonderful – that everyone from Aunty Doris to the barista down the road (not forgetting the annoying blogger online) wants the best for your tiny human. Take it all on board.  Discard the bits you don’t want.  And bite your tongue when you start telling your mates how best to give birth.

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PND – Why Aren’t We Talking About It?

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How come we still aren’t talking about it?  Why is it still so hush-hush? At Christmas, when charity buckets rattle collecting spare change for mental health charities, why am I still reading that new mums feel guilt and fear around the blues that follow the birth of a baby.

If I broke my leg, I’d tell people.  Hell, I’d probably put a witty post on Facebook and filter a snap of my cast on Instagram.  And I’d sit back and wait for the sympathy.  When I have a cold I ask my husband to pick up some Lemsip, a copy of Grazia and a KitKat and I demand full control of the remote.  But when I was diagnosed with PND, I kept it really quiet.  I took the pills, being sure to put them at the back of the cupboard, behind the vitamins.  Not just to keep them away from the kids, but so my cleaner didn’t see them.  (First world problems, right?!)

And when I told a friend in a similar situation and realised that she was on the same pills, and had also sobbed into her pillow, and on her doctor’s shoulder, I felt both surprised and comforted.  Adele’s Vanity Fair piece where she admits just how bloody hard it is, and the feelings motherhood can provoke, created headlines around the world.  Fearne Cotton admitted to a depression diagnosis recently.  I’m in excellent company.

The NHS suggests that one in ten new mums suffer from PND.  My group of mums defies those odds.  Three of the nine mums I met through NCT, baby massage or latte drinking have been on the happy pills.  That’s a third.  And we are the lucky few.  We own our homes.  We have well-paying jobs (not necessarily flexible, but that’s another article).  We have supportive partners who share the load – and the nappies, and the washing.  They pour us a gin at 7pm and let have a lie in at the weekend.  Sure, we have to put up with Aunty Edna asking if we are going back to work – a question that has never, ever been asked of my husband.  And we have to explain that actually, before babies, we led meetings, and ran marathons, and managed budgets.  But these are minor gripes compared to mums struggling to heat the flat, or get the maintenance payment off the ex, or put food on the table.  Money and fame doesn’t protect you from this.  It’s blind to how supportive your partner is, whether you’ve had kids before, your social media following.  Being a size 10 doesn’t help (and I always thought being a size 10 would solve everything).

The lesson I learned through being honest with my boss, my mum, my mum-friends, is this.  Put your hand up.  Higher, higher than that.  Reach out and ask for help.  My hairdresser has cuddled the baby whilst I’ve run errands.  My mum has rushed to the rescue when Norovirus has hit (c’mon people, that’s brave.)  My child-free friend babysits, as long as Netflix is available and there is pizza.

I’ve always been so independent, living alone, paying my own bills, buying my own treats.  Sometimes it feels hard to accept these generous offerings.  But here’s the thing. Child-free people often enjoy hanging out with kids.  Spoiling them, playing with them, and then leaving as the sugar high hits.  Before I had kids, I adored hanging out with toddlers.  They love you for your enthusiasm, your readiness to play.  And it’s a short-term commitment. Your friends and family want to help you, so stop being so independent and allow them to put the kettle on/ run the hoover around / babysit whilst you get blotto on the first cocktail in 8 months.   The thing is, if you say “no” too often you might just find that the offers dry up.  And the older the kids get, the more you need that time.  So say yes, and pay it forward.  Babysit for your neighbour.  Drop round a lasagne to the NCT mum who has had her second baby.  But most importantly say yes.

And when someone tells you they have had a terribly low period, and have seen their doctor, give them a hug.  Pour them a gin (NB I don’t think this is medically supported, but from my perspective it worked).  Take their kids for an hour so they can wash their hair.  Drop round some posh ready meals.  And let them know they aren’t alone.  Statistically, they aren’t alone, but the shame surrounding anti-depressants and PND won’t let them believe that.  Be a friend.  Put the kettle on.  Listen.

It Takes a Village to Raise a Child

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I’m SO lucky to still have my parents – they are both still around in body and mind, although living three hours away gets them out of babysitting.  The boys adore them, Grandpa kicks a ball and Granny does loads of cuddles and the occasional Scary Look, and it’s a mutually appreciative relationship.

Flashback to me, aged 14, in the midst of puberty, shouting at my mum to fuck off because she didn’t understand.  Me, aged 3, infamously refusing to be talked down off a sand-dune, and having an epic tantrum.  Me, a couple of weeks ago, calling my mum because my husband was away and I was knackered and I think I ranted for 20 minutes before remembering to ask how she was.  On reflection, it’s been a lifelong habit of taking them for granted, pushing against their boundaries, enjoying swearing because I know it annoys my mum, and talking about politics with my Dad because I know my Guardian-like principles get up his nose.  God, what an ungrateful brat I am, even now.

I remember having had my first son, and not being able to sit down, and being in shock at how brutal labour was, and how much it had hurt, and feeling incredulous that my mum had gone through that TWICE for me and my brother.  I felt humbled and indebted (and incredibly grateful for codeine).  And then, when I learned how all-consuming it is to look after a new-born, and how you lose your sleep, and sometimes your sanity, and I realised my mum did that, but with less effective nappies, crap coffee and a much more absent husband.

I’m lucky to have been able to afford childcare to return to work, but my mum didn’t have the opportunity to “lean in”, she was stuck at home with two babies whether she wanted to be or not.  I had the choice, and no matter how much I think we are lacking in flexible working arrangements in this country, I am so grateful that I get to do a job I adore, with people I respect.  Just being able to wear lipstick and pee with the door shut is a start; earning money for doing something I enjoy is icing on that cake.  I was also able to lean on my (kind, gentle and sympathetic) doctor for help when I felt really low, which would have been unmentionable 36 years ago, as would saying bollocks to it, and dragging your toddler, baby and closest mum friend to the pub for a bottle of Viognier. So I think in many ways, my life is easier than my mum’s was at the same stage.

I’m also very supported.  I’ve got lots of friends.  Not in an I’m-so-popular way, but because I’ve lived in the same city for 13 years, and on the same street since having both my sons.  So my network from NCT and baby classes is pretty broad, and I’ve met other parents in the local coffee shop, buying double shot lattes and hoping that a ration of avocado on toast is enough nutrition for the day.  Whilst my parents are fantastic grandparents, they have their own lives rotating around golf, tennis, and being the only people who still visit the supermarket in person, as if Ocado doesn’t exist.  That is to say, they are busy people, and they’ve raised their own children, and are too busy planning their retirement holidays (do I sound jealous?!  I am!) to want to raise mine.  So in the absence of Granny-next-door, I have my friends, but also my neighbourhood.  The local hairdresser who rocked my baby’s pram whilst I scoured the street for my mislaid house keys.  The next door neighbour who always takes in my parcels and doesn’t judge me wearing pyjama bottoms to the corner shop.  It does take a village to raise a child, but it also takes a village to support knackered parents.  My London village is gritty, urban and ugly in parts, but has a pub and a coffee shop, and some incredibly kind locals.  My kids are lucky to have the best of both worlds.  Grandparents to spoil them, but also a neighbourhood to teach them the value of where they come from.

The Secret Lives of Parents: What Happens Before 7am

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 What happens before 7am?

Let me tell you.  It isn’t good.  Nothing good happens before 7am (similar to my rule of parties in my twenties – nothing good happens after 2am.  Go home at 2am.  If I’m up at 2am now it is for very different reasons.  Rarely featuring tequila.)

So, before 7am, when non-parents’ alarms go off still leaving them time for the gym before work, or maybe a couple of presses of the snooze button… what do we do?

1.   We negotiate.  Think Theresa May and her hard Brexit, but we are working on bed-exit.  You may NOT get out of bed until the sun on the Groclock has come up.  You may NOT get out of bed until it’s at least semi bright outside and the coffee has brewed.  Please don’t get up yet; you’ll wake your brother.  Just stay in bed.  I’ll let you have a chocolate button if you stay in bed.

It doesn’t work.  They get up.  You follow them downstairs because you can’t not, they’ll fall off the table / bite the cat / eat the bleach that is in a childproof cupboard that you know they’ll crack.  The day starts here.

2.   We negotiate some more.  Having accepted that at least one adult has to get up, the dialogue starts.  “You get up.  It’s your turn.”  “No way, I did the midnight poo and four renditions of the Gruffalo at bedtime.”  Single parents, I salute you (not for the first time).  If one of you was drinking the night before, the hangover means you throw everything at this.  “If you take them ’til 7.30am I’ll cook dinner all week and deal with all the nappies.”  You would sacrifice a lung to stay in bed right now.

3.   We continue to negotiate.  If you pull the short straw and are downstairs with the kids, the mediation continues.  You aren’t allowed Radio 4, it has to be Chuggington or Octonaughts.  But if they watch Chuggington and sit on the sofa quietly and allow you to put the kettle on, it’s worth it.  They don’t agree.  They pull at your pyjama bottoms, whining for Weetabix and piggy back rides.  Your eyes, still not focussing, can’t make out which child is which, but frankly, that’s not important.  Get them on the sofa.  Put the kettle on.  Coffee is essential right now.

4.   Somebody will need the loo. If they don’t shit themselves you are winning.  When you are supervising the loo situation, the other child(ren) will trash the kitchen.  So you have to deal with a turd (probably before coffee) then avoid treading on Lego.  This is the new normal. Fighting it is pointless.  Just get to the coffee.

5.   At work, you mention that you’ve been up since 4.56am.  “Have you tried putting them to bed later?”  Of course I have.  That just means I have a crap evening, and still have to get up before the milkman.  “A Groclock worked for us.”  If you manage not to punch the smug faces saying this, congratulations.  My children are clearly gifted as they see through the fake sun and demand to get up.  Not helped by me setting it wrongly and the sun coming up at 2am once.  I blame the gin.

6.   As with all things parenting, I’m sure that this is #justaphase.  Like the cluster feeding, the teething, the bottle refusing…. And I look forward to moaning about them sleeping the day away when they are teens.  But for now, I’d really, really like to go back to bed.