A Christmas Letter

Dear Little Bean,

This will be your first Christmas ever, and we are so excited. We haven't got you a present, as we don't think you'd really care, and we should probably save that money for a high chair as you are growing and learning SO fast, that we almost can't keep up!

This time last year you were a thought in my head, an idea that sparked such excitement in me that I was already starting to dream about you. I knew you were there before I even found out I was pregnant because I dreamt about you. I asked you what we should call my mum, and you said "Nana Ali." In my dream I said 'A-, That's a great name," and when I rang Nana Ali the next day to tell her, she said "that's funny, 'cos that's the exact name I came up with yesterday."

We've had a rough start you and I. I wish I could do the beginning of your life all over again and make it better for both of us. I would tell the delivery theatre doctors to leave you be, to not take you away from me the minute you were born. I would hold you and tell them to leave you alone. I would figure out a way to stay by your side in the NICU ward, and I wouldn't let them tell me to not stroke your tiny hand. but I can't. So instead I am focussing on making your future the best that I can.

I wish I could protect you from all that world is going to throw at you. I wish I could keep you hidden from it's horrors forever. I wish that I could guarantee that you will never have to feel the pain of a school yard fist, or the sting of a bullying remark, or the tears of a broken heart. I pray that you don't feel the same anxiety I did as a teenager and I hope that I can be the role model you need me to be in order to become strong enough to deal with life's struggles. But I can't promise any of that. All I can do is promise that I will be there with you for it all. I will catch you when you fall and I will always pick you back up. I only hope I can give you the life you deserve.

Little Bean, you have changed me in ways I can't even describe. I used to be anxious all the time about what people thought of me, about death and pain, about me failing. But that changed the moment you were born. I still worry about what people think of me, but I care less about it. I don't freak out about performing because I want to show you that I am not scared and neither should you be. I fear death only because I am worried about what will happen to you if I am not around, and rather than worried that I will fail and embarrass myself, I worry that I will fail you most of all.

This christmas you are nearly 4 months old.  You smile and coo, and are about to laugh any day now. You are just learning to roll over and to grasp at toys. You still wake 2-3 times a night and you don't like to sleep during the day. You love bath time and you love singing with me and Daddy. I don't know what the future holds for us, but I do know that I will love you for every single second of it. Probably you won't read this letter for many, many years, but when you do, believe me when I say that all this will still be true.

Love,
Mummy

Learning

Recently a blog has been circulating my Facebook circle, regarding what are good presents for childless people to buy for their friends kids, and what are not. As I read it, I found myself nodding my head at every single item...both because I had received these items and understood why not to give them, and also (strangely) because only months ago, I myself had gifted these exact items to friends with all the best of intentions.

CRAZY!

As we are now in the final two weeks of the year 2013, I find myself reflecting back on what an intense year it has been for our little family, and at the same time, suddenly realising just how much I have changed and learnt during the course of it.

So, in typical me fashion, I figured I'd blog about it!

The 2013 List of Things I Learnt About...

...BABY CLOTHES
The cuter the outfit, the less likely it is to be worn.

This goes for both baby and mum. Cute cotton baby dresses with frilly bits and gorgeous buttons that go UP THE BACK??? May look to-die-for on the rack, and believe me, you would rather die than attempt to put that on a baby and then have them wear it for a day. They end up under their armpits for the most part, nappies on display all day, buttons up the back are a nightmare to do on a baby that can't even sit up yet, let alone undoing them for the numerous changes you WILL have to endure because of spit up, leaking nappies, or just general wetness. Give me a onesie that has domes ONLY on the crotch, and is made of jersey fabric any day over a dress. Shove some cute pants over it, put on some socks and tuck those pants into the socks and you're set!

...PREGNANCY

It Sucks.

Even now, I am often confronted by Mums' who say things like 'don't you wish you could be pregnant again, just so you can have a break?'

Honestly? No. No, I do not. Pregnancy was painful, gross, tiring and just awful in every way. There was literally nothing I enjoyed about being pregnant. But there is plenty I like about being a Mum.

...CHILDBIRTH

Was a breeze compared to what came after.

You recall how I spent all that time freaking out about labour during the year? Well, mummies, I have learnt my lesson. Labour was awful, excruciating and terrifying, but at least it was definitely going to end, and with the epidural, I even managed to escape it for a while. The weeks immediately after giving birth are far, far worse. Physically, mentally, and emotionally extreme. In fact, I would do labour all over again if it meant I was spared those first few weeks....well the lack of sleep bits anyway. Which incidentally, is the majority of it.

...THE MUMMY CLUB CONSPIRACY

Those happy mums and gorgeous photos of happy families on facebook - It's only a glimpse of reality.

Sure, that status may say they are 'so in love', and that picture of the smiling baby is 'so adorable'. But that's only half the truth. Yes, they love the baby, but that doesn't mean they always like the baby. You try 'liking' a crying baby at 3am when you have literally done everything you can think of to calm them, and you haven't slept in 20 hours. Most parents only post the good times. Which in turn adds to the general opinion of childless people that babies are always awesome, and being a parent is easy.

...SLEEP

I can survive on much less than I ever thought possible.

I remember the days where I got 8 hours.....IN A ROW!! 

*Cue manic laughter*

I have nothing more to say on that topic.


...MY BABY
Is the most awesome thing that has ever happened to me. EVER.
Sure, I don't get much sleep, and I usually am only guessing at what she is wanting. But recently she has started having these awesome baby conversations with me, and smiling these amazing smiles. I think she really likes me! Which makes my heart glow brighter. I never get tired of her smiles, and I am so excited to know what her laugh sounds like, wether she's left or right handed, what her favourite food is, what song does she like the most, what does she sound like when she talks.....The future is a veritable feast of new discoveries and I can't wait.

My Bald Baby

My Baby Girl has a lot of hair.

Super Cute Little Bean

Good. Now that that's out of the way I feel I can move on with my life.

Me in Paris

No!

Apparently I CAN NOT move on with my life, no more than I can claim that the above photo was taken in Sweet Paris. Nope, not until I have been alerted to the unusual amount of hair on her head by, oh I don't know, how 'bout

Every.

Single. 

Person.

Here are some things people have suggested I say, as a way to make it more interesting for myself.

Typical interaction.

Stranger/acquaintance: "Look at all that hair!"

Me: "Yes, she does have rather a lot."

Suggested interactions.

Stranger/acquaintance: "Look at all that hair!"

Me: "It's a wig."

Stranger/acquaintance: "Look at all that hair!"

Me: "Yeah, can't wait for it to get a bit longer so I can cut it into a mullet to match her daddy. At least, we think that's her daddy, the other guy was bald so..."

Stranger/acquaintance: "Look at all that hair!"

Me: "Really? Oh, now that you mention it..."

Stranger/acquaintance: "Look at all that hair!"

Me: "What? OMG I took the wrong baby AGAIN!"

What I enact in my head.

Stranger/acquaintance: "Look at all that hair!"

Me: *cue manic laughter and something synonymous with a stabbing motion*

So yes, my 13 week old Little Bean looks like a tiny adult already, and receives an awful lot of attention. I've managed to master the art of keeping moving and nodding politely whilst muttering said curse under my breath, but some women (and yes it is almost always women) are un-seemingly persistent. Apparently blind to the unfriendly (and often downright hostile) body language, and deaf to the not so subtle tones of 'leave me alone'. 

And so ends, the entry of the Little Bean with lots of hair and the *cough* semi insane mother.

It Takes a Village

Firstly, I am not writing this post to garner sympathy from my friends and family. I have not decided to write this to look strong, or weak, or to impress on anyone that I need praise or encouragement.  I am not writing this as a way of asking for help without actually asking. When I need help, I do ask. I am simply writing this because that's what I need to do. I am writing this because I know that I am not the only mother out there feeling like this, and putting my thoughts and feelings into words is how I process things. It makes the world clearer for me and it makes me calm.

Secondly, this post is likely to be a little Too-Much-Info for some readers, particularly if you know me, are male, or are made uncomfortable by people being too open about physical things.

So, probably that is all of you. 

Finally, this post is long. But I make no apologies. 

If you are still reading, then consider yourself warned. I'm no longer embarrassed about this stuff, so if you are, and you meet me, then you will feel awkward, but I won't care less.

It Takes a Village

When you have a baby, you very quickly get over being embarrassed or conservative about many things. The words breasts, nipples and poo suddenly become as frequently used as the words coffee, chocolate and sleep. As a breastfeeding mum, you have to get over the weirdness of pulling your boobs out anywhere and everywhere because if you didn't, you would never leave your bedroom, and neither would your baby. As a mum with a new baby, you find yourself being asked by perfect strangers about breastfeeding. Are you breastfeeding? How's it going? Why are you doing/not doing A/B/C? As though it is somehow their business, and it isn't weird to be discussing your nipples with your hairdresser. And if, like me, anything is out of the normal, then be prepared to explain it to everyone.

I am having to use nipple shields to feed my baby. Now to me, the fact that I am breastfeeding her at all is a miracle. I have inverted nipples - the worst my lactation consultant has ever seen apparently - and this means that there is nothing for baby to latch onto. The shields give her the ability to latch, and therefore the ability to feed. Getting this going was a mission and I almost gave up completely at week 2, 3 and 6.  In fact, a number of midwives, psychologists and even my lactation consultant actually suggested that perhaps I should consider switching to formula to avoid becoming incredibly overwhelmed and depressed. However, I am notoriously stubborn. If my mum could do it, so could I. By week 7, I went for 24 hours without using a bottle of formula, expressed milk or pumping and I was absolutely elated! 

Since then I've been relatively successful, only feeding her formula a handful of times when she was out with her Dad, or on the one night that I went out with my friends. Success! I am incredibly proud of this achievement, as I was convinced it was going to be impossible for me to breastfeed at all, yet here I am. Of course, whenever I pull out the shields, everyone wants to know why. So the secret shame I harboured for most of my life, is now known to all and sundry. 

Which is why, as I am now forced to consider mixed feeding in order to regain my sanity, I am feeling incredibly, overwhelmingly conflicted.

Last night I lost it.
I had a complete meltdown. I felt so angry and so frustrated and at my wits end in every sense of the word. I couldn't think straight, I could barely see straight. After 11 weeks of being woken every 1-3 hours for feeding, I'm finally wondering if all those people weren't right from the start. Clearly I am not able to hack the sleep deprivation that goes hand in hand with exclusively breastfeeding. I am angry with my husband for being able to go to work, for going for an hour run once a week, for not being able to find the debit card which was in my bag, for letting her fall asleep on him every night, even though I do that during the day, for not being home with me during the day to help me. I can see how people get the point of wanting to shake their babies, as though that is somehow going to snap them into consciousness and make them realise that if they just went to sleep, everything would be easier.

Which of course, is ridiculous.
She's just 11 weeks old. She is only crying because she is so overtired she can't fall asleep anymore. And he needs to go to work, otherwise we wouldn't be able to afford to live, eat or do anything remotely fun. His runs aren't a way for him to make me feel more isolated, they are helping keep him sane. Which is a good thing. At least one of us needs to be.

I know that all I need to do is say the word, and I too could go have some time to myself. Only, at the moment I feel that this is impossible because I am exclusively breastfeeding. I can't leave her in case she gets hungry, I can't have a few hours in the afternoon or evening where I go out because if she has a bottle of formula, it will mess up my supply.

And so here I am, considering mixed feeding and feeling guilty about it because 'breast is best', and 'formula isn't natural' and 'why aren't you breast feeding your baby?'
But what about 'happy wife, happy life', and 'baby needs a coherent mum' and 'don't be a mombie' and 'sleep deprivation is your biggest trigger for depression'?

It takes a village to raise a child. Baby A deserves to have a mum who isn't crying constantly, or wanting to hit her father, or feeling hard done by and exhausted. She deserves to feel loved, to be happy and see happy. I can't do that alone. If giving her a bottle of formula once or twice a day and sharing the feeds so that I can get an hour more sleep is what it takes to remain sane, how is that any worse than her Dad spending 2 hours less time with her so that he can go for a run maintain his sanity?

It takes a village to keep the parents sane. To give them time to find themselves again, to spend time together, and to exit the baby haze once in a while. It takes a village to look out for them and make sure they are ok. Last night J rang me at 10pm after I text her saying I wanted to walk out. It took 20 minutes, but she managed to calm me down enough to want to apologise to my husband. This morning, A has come round after reading the text I sent her last night, to help me get some rest and to vent a bit. She is currently in the nursery trying to settle Baby A for the third time. In the weekend my whole family arrived out of nowhere, and suddenly my house was clean, and I was able to go get my hair done and have some down time. My parents even left dinner in the fridge so we didn't have to cook that night. I only wish we lived closer to some family so that we could remain saner for longer.
I guess I have to work at building my own village family in order to make up for the fact that we live so far from our real ones. And this pressure on mums about breast feeding needs to end. Yes, it's wonderful and it is the best food for baby, but the mum's need looking after too. It takes a village to remind a Mum to do that. And all too often, in this age of being constantly connected, we are left alone.

Growing Up Catholic

One of the, dare I say, many unfortunate by-products of growing up Catholic, is that you feel guilty about everything. You feel a constant need to confess.

All the time.

It NEVER GOES AWAY!

When you become a parent, you also feel guilty. All of the time.

It

DOES

NOT

STOP!

So when you combine the two, you end up with a guilt overload. It's like crashing two atoms together and creating your own guilt universe. Everything you don't do perfectly becomes a catastrophe, everything you think and want for yourself is a terribly selfish thing, and you feel like you should simply go to your room and hide, or beg for forgiveness, or cry, or say sorry, or do all of those all at the same time!

Today is one of those days where I would give almost anything for someone to take my daughter for the day, simply so I can sleep for longer than 2 hours at a stretch and regain a sense of sanity. But even the fact that I am thinking that makes me feel like a horrible mother. No, a horrible PERSON, akin to a hun, or Stalin, or Sauron, or Darth Vader.

Thinking these thoughts makes me feel...

..Guilty.

These days where I wished this disappeared for a while, but now have returned with a vengeance. I'm really not sure why. Perhaps it's because my shoulders and back are aching from looking down at and holding a feeding baby for hours a day. Maybe it's because I'm so run down, I feel like I have been on the brink of having the flu for two weeks now and am waking up in-between night feeds with headaches and runny noises. Or perhaps it's to do with the increasing episodes of Mummy guilt over things I'm doing wrong, and encroaching anxiety as I realise how I truly could not cope if something unspeakable did happen.

At ten weeks, these are some valuable lessons I have learnt.

1. Cutting baby fingernails is a next to impossible and extremely dangerous endeavour. Best to mitten up their little hands or bite the nails while they are feeding. But even that can lead to disaster and screaming and GUILT.
2. The old wives tale (and popular opinion on 'the natural parent' facebook page and numerous mummy forums online) that breast milk will cure sticky eye (and all manner of other ailments) is a lie. In fact, it can make them much, much worse and you will end up feeling extreme GUILT when you do go to the doctor and they ask if that is what you have done. 
3. Going to the doctor is free for under 5's, even after hours. I feel GUILTY that I waited till sunday to take her, when I should have taken her on friday. I should have been more proactive.
4. Don't pick a baby up with one hand. This can lead to falling babies, babies knocking heads on things, screaming babies and extreme GUILT for you.
5. Babies don't always let you know when they need a new nappy. You have to remember to check and change them. If you don't remember and suddenly it's been 6 hours and when you do check they are really in need of a new one, guess what, you will feel very GUILTY!
6. Always have a cloth over your shoulder. Ironically, I don't have one there right now. Failing to do this wont make you feel guilty. It will just make you more washing.
7. Babies need to be entertained. They need "stimulation". They need it from you. If you are however, only getting about 5 hours maximum of broken sleep each night, then you will feel GUILTY for not being enthusiastic about this, and instead wishing that your baby would just go to sleep.

So, here I am, feeling like I am a horrendously lazy mother. Clearly I don't care or love my child enough because all I want to do is sleep. I don't want to spend the next hour repeating silly baby noises and poking her nose and forcing myself to smile and laugh because it makes her smile back occasionally. I want to sleep. 

And so here I am. Typing this. Feeling overwhelmingly

...Guilty.

This Too, Shall Pass

Two days after Miss A was born,  I suddenly realised that I had made a really big mistake. I wasn't meant to be a mother. I wasn't cut out for dealing with a new born. I didn't feel that overwhelming rush of love that everyone talks about, instead, when I looked at her, all I felt was fear. Fear that my life was over. Fear that I wasn't up to the task. Fear that I had let her down already, that I would be a disappointment to her, that I would never feel the love that I was supposed to feel - had EXPECTED to feel for this tiny, brand new human.

Tomorrow, she will be 9 weeks old, and last week, I took a rare moment of quiet, to read through this entire blog from the start. I realised how far I have come, how far we have come, and how much I have changed. Before Miss A was born, I was bored. A lot.  I was anxious about things which I had far too much time to think about, and I generally spent my days pondering the future, or remembering the past. I have not been bored even once, since she was born. I've been frustrated, tired, overwhelmed, scared and elated, but I have not been bored. I am far less anxious now about life than I can remember being in a long time, perhaps this is because I haven't got the time to over-think, to plan out the worst possible scenario or let anticipation take over. Or perhaps it's because suddenly, I realise how precious each moment is. Each sleepless night is the only one I get with her. Every tired morning and exhausted afternoon are only fleeting moments in her life, and nothing lasts. I am spending far less time dreaming of, or worrying about the future, rather, I am suddenly realising how precious each moment with her is.

Everyone keeps saying: 'it's only temporary',

'this too shall pass', 

and 

'it's just a phase'. 

Sayings (I assume) meant to help parents envisage a light at the end of a tunnel when everything becomes too overwhelming. But they also serve as stark reminders that everything is only temporary, that this will pass, and that once it's gone, it won't come back.

How far I've come since the start of this year. How much I have learned. I am most definitely a different person from what I was, my daughter has changed me in ways I never dreamed. I am more patient, far calmer, and somehow more in control of how I react to situations. That's not to say that on the inside I am not freaking out and completely losing it, but outwardly, I am able to maintain my composure, at least for a while.  I have a friend who is in their third trimester, and I suddenly find myself a source of advice, an experienced 'parent', who apparently looks like they've "got this parenting thing down", to outsiders. I certainly don't feel that way! It seems ridiculous that I'm offering advice at all!

The Parent App

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Terms and Conditions

By committing to purchase you are stating that you have read these terms and conditions. 

The Parent App requires access to your entire life. Your calendar, your family, your friends, your job, your social life, your house, your ability to leave your house, your ability to travel, your ability to sleep, your ability to watch a movie uninterrupted, your ability to eat a meal with both hands, your ability to rinse the conditioner out of your hair, your ability bath, your desire to have sex, your mental stability and your notion of personal space and ability to spend time alone.

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Good thing no one ever reads the T&C'S!