Confessions of a Stay at Home Mum...

greenkids sale

2011-08-05T11:31:00.001+01:00

Oooh sale on at Green Kids nappies, I love their nappies...been using their anytimes as night time nappies first for dd and 4 years later they're just as fab at night for lil h :) :) :)

Don't forget to share the details of our a chance to win one of 2 Green Kids prize packs!

http://www.greenkids.com.au

June

2011-06-23T14:02:00.000+01:00

June already? Really? How utterly incomprehensible I quite refuse to believe that is is in fact June and I demand evidence. Have you looked out of the window lately? grey and monsoon-esque rain does not a June make.

Did I ever warn you in advance that I am quite monumentally crap at updating these blogs?

So what is new you may ask? what indeed? The Baby is now 14 months of age and yet doesn't appear to have grown an iota in he last 8 months. No, really it's not one word of a lie, he's still wearing the same clothes and everything. He's been a walking for around 5-6 months now and yet still looks far too tiddly to be so mobile which invokes some rather bemused looks from random strangers, not that he actually walks outside that often. Although words are limited to the adorable 'Mama' which would be slightly more adorable if he didn't actually call everything it..... 'Dada', 'yeah', 'Again' and 'Bye Bye' however for some one of so few words he has a rather large gob and is not afraid to use it, at full volume. Food still remains to be predominantly something to play and throw with an amusing interlude for the recent addition of jelly, which is apparently hilarious when you poke it. The baby is unequivocally a boob junkie just like his sister and is still fed on demand night and day, sleeps next to me in bed and has yet to travel in a buggy as we simply adore our slings far too much. He's such a vibrant little chap and really is brighter then the sun.

Thing One & Thing two are thriving although squabbing incessantly having gone from topless 'gigging' to topless wrestling now complete with real 'ow's'. Thing Two is flourishing within nursery despite wanting spending all her time writing, she's a child obsessed. I will confess to feeling decidedly wibbly about the ever approaching September when she will disappear into full time school. Thing One had his first real accident which in turn gave me my first 'Is that Thing One's mum? It's the school he's had an accident ' Insert heart in throat. All was well though after a trip to the local walk-in centre and some surgical glue.

I'm ploughing through the trials of finding a decent Nursing bra and jeans that don't fall down the dreaded jelly belly and actually failing quite miserably which in itself is quite depressing.

Approximately five weeks until the summer holidays. There is not enough Valium in the world......................

Bugger.

2011-01-02T11:53:00.001Z

Oh please tell me this isn't a preview of things to come, if so I do believe 2011 and I shall not be friends, let alone lovers.

The Baby had a rather disturbing episode in the early hours of the morning that consisted of insuppresable manic howling that was utterly impenetrable apart from random 2 minute respites before it started up again. Absolutely heartbreaking & yes I will admit to being somewhat frightened by it all. Utterly ghastly experience. He managed to pause long enough to have a good long feed and fell asleep on the boob so to speak and has been fine from therein. Most odd.

He's now reclined in my arms, cheekily sneeking in a pre-lunch boob, smiling around it looking positively darling whilst fiddling with my 'cables' (drawstrings of my NIN hoody) He's such a delightful little chappy.

The Girl Child spent a good ten minutes layering on her dressing up items, jewellery, bags, dress, wings, wand...only to strip them all off and put them away ten minutes later. I do believe my daughter is broken, she rarely dresses up, she doesn't play with her dolls and has no affinity to a particular toy other then a torch that she 'sometimes' sleeps with. However she is rather striking budding artist in the making and is impossibly obsessed with trying to write. Such an enchanting oddling.

My back is even worse today, oh the agony.

Ah peace at last The Boy Child and The Girl Child have ran up the stairs to 'do a gig' with their guitars and microphones, hopefully with clothes on this time.

2011

2011-01-01T21:25:00.000Z

Happy New Year? Well if this is a taste of the year to come I think 'll stick with 2010. Last night had the typical blitz of fireworks turning the area into Beirut , not that my middle name is killjoy (no honestly, it isn't) must people set fire works off randomly from 9pm onwards? Surely that defeats the object of New Years Eve and the whole midnight thing? Just saying....

Add to that the fact that for some reason unbeknown to me my back pain has reappeared (I'd say I missed you darling, but quite frankly I didn't) The Baby woke up twenty minutes after going to sleep and commenced howling and then decided to stay awake for 2 hours solid from about 5.40am onwards. To say the day improved from that point onwards would unfortunately be a lie. This morning was full of arguments with The Husband (although believe me I can think of some rather more colourful titles for him) and top it all off with an inconsiderate noisy neighbour and a somewhat disappointing tea.

To sum it up, 2011 is rather pants.

I may endeavour to do an obligatory summing up of 2010 at some point.

The Baby now has eye drops, not that he has become at all bothered by his gunktastic eyes but we'd left it the required time to give it a chance to heal au natural and it failed. I asked the rather nice young doctor to check his ears too (the baby's...not the doctors, I'm sure his ears are fine) as he keeps tugging at one yet we got the standard 'well they're a bit pink is all' answer. Last a doctor said that with regards to The Girl Child we ended up at a walk in centre within a day or two after with her howling in abject misery and those pinky ears were raging red inside by then.

It's interesting how peoples opinions divide on babywearing and indeed more so how they feel they simply must project their opinion onto you. As we crossed the road to the pharmacy some random pleb decided he had to stop me and say 'they're not nice, what if that should snap and that came unwound and that came undone, it's not safe' I must admit it was a rather impressive string of what if's that had to occur in a particular hazardous sequence and since we were in a hurry I didn't have time for my usual churlish retorts and had to shoot a quick 'well what if my tyre burst on my pram or what if i let go and it went into the road?' gave him the 'evil eye' and went on my merry way with The Baby looking jolly well comfy and happy in his sling, and why shouldn't he be? he's only ever been outside in a sling. Yet upon entering another shop some mild and eccentric woman started stroking his divine custom sling whilst waxing lyrical about how absolutely beautiful it was and how happy he looked, she looked most enchanted by it. People really are strange. Thankfully we've not had the 'oh darling are you still breastfeeding him?' My mums second son was fixated with 'bitty' jokes and is somewhat phobic of me feeding my baby in his vicinity (when The Girl Child was breastfed until 2years & 9months of age) though rather then phobic i think it's more of breastfeeding-ist. I'm sure the outlaws were amused by their hippy daughter in law dressing their youngest grandchild in an amber teething necklace and some delicious flongies made by a clever wahm. We won't even start with 'The Nappies' (as with The Girl Child we are obviously using reusables again)

I don't make resolutions for the New Year I think really you're just setting yourself up to fail but perhaps when I'm in less pain and have more inclination I may share some of the beginning plots out of neurosis that are bubbling in my mind.

The soapbox

2010-12-28T16:22:00.001Z

So alas Christmas has been and gone yet again, another year is waning into the past out of reach. The Children were acceptably excitable with their hoard of gifts and The Baby was inexplicably obsessed with The Girl Child's Snow White dress (I rather hope this isn't indicative of a future character trait, not that I'd have issues with him wearing a dress but blue and gold is rather crass)

Other then the rather annoying Royal Mail debacle (they lie....) everything would appear to have occurred without a hitch, presents wrapped in time and enjoyed, the tree has miraculously remained upright despite a rather curious baby and a major bonus is that I managed to not poison any of us with the turkey.

However I am quite stricken by the numerous accounts I find online of mere Children receiving ludicrously adult gifts such as iphones and laptops, for Christmas. Whatever happened to crayons and puzzles and board games? Why the hurry to endorse adult ideals and past times on their sponge like and ever expanding minds? If you get say a 6 year old their own ds or indeed an 8 year old an itouch, what on earth would one get them next year? The Boy Child asked for a DS and yet he doesn't actually know what one is other then an implement to 'play games on' and since he (and indeed us) can't afford said games it seemed a rather redundant and extravagant gift so we opted for a retro Sega thing with 20 games already on it which he is positively charmed by and actually didn't quite realise it wasn't an almighty ds. In fact I'd hazard a jolly good guess that i it wasn't for his school friend he'd not even know the term 'ds' or 'wii'. Mayhaps there are too many parents who rather then share a child's passion they encourage the child to share theirs. Are children being denied the art of play and the craft of imagination? Childhood is so mortally short, it should be fed and nurtured. There's plenty of time for these gifts to satiate the ever ungrateful and demanding things called teenagers.

Oh dear this appears to be a rather churlish entry doesn't it? Especially as I'm about to endeavour to translate to you another rant of mine.

Kindles. I'm sorry but they're simply ghastly contraptions. I'm all for a bit of technology, in fact I'd blow one of Santa's elves (& swallow) for an iphone, I'd possibly consider giving Santa Darling a toe job despite my vivid and colourful phobia of feet for one too. However, some things should simply remain sacred. I adore books, new books, old books fat books, thin books. There's something delicious and soulfully explicit about a book, it's texture and weight, the type face, the hole ritual of turning the pages, the creased spines and bent pages, the smudged lines and something innately comforting about grabbing one when in bed, curled up on the sofa, in the bath....on a bus or train or sat on a park bench. I fear that the kindle will be somewhat married in essence to the e-mail, where instant gratification endears itself to people and through it we lose the art and patience of that which should be personal. I love e-mails as good as anyone yet nothing can beat the arrival or a real handwritten letter, yet with the invention of the e-mail by the time a letter arrived people have already exchanged news ten times via and e-mail and then the ultimate in personal communication terrorism. We don't even have to ask how a person fares anymore as through instant updates and witterings we can become a mere ghost voyeur of their life without having to mine nor act for the divulgence of details which in turn makes people accept things more at face value. Through being told someone is shopping and cooking and watching tv we accept that they are okay and forget to ask how they are & what they're feeling.

So much is lost.

I still have letters somewhere from my childhood. I find it inexplicably hard to throw away something handwritten, just for me. I cherish the thought, time, effort and personal investment of these from the person who wrote them, for me and only me. The more vivid and colourful pictures the words paint as they fill in the time and space that you were not an audience to.

Perhaps I've intertwined them too much but I feel just as strongly about books. E-books seem so crass. I'm not saying they don't have their place and appeal for some people but I guess what i'm trying to say is they're not for me.

Maybe I'm a hypocrite, after all despite my great affection for that seductive 'hiss' of a vinyl LP, i own over 200 CD's and am shortly about to rip most of them to a shiny new mp3 player when it arrives. As amused as I am by the old dial phones of my childhood, i own a cordless phone and a mobile. I guess it would just be nice if some things were left sacred.

Jingle Bells, Batman Smells..Robin's ran away. Uncle Willy shot his willy on the motorway.

2010-12-24T21:52:00.001Z

Where is this year going, on the one hand it seems like The Baby has been with us forever and yet how can he be a whole eight months old already? I find it strange to think that this time last year he was inside of me. He's such a charming little boy, he really is the sunshine in a world of grey. He's desperately intent on being as mobile as possible, having not been happy at simply mastering rolling, he decided within a few weeks to crawl, pull up and cruise. He's now practising the new art of standing when we let go of him, something he can manage for a mightily impressive 40 seconds. In fact he's realised now that he doesn't have to 'fall' when he feels his balance waning he either grabs onto something or else simply bends his knees and sits down instead. Awfully clever. Takes after his Mummy, obviously.

He keeps eyeing gaps and spaces with a shuffling of his feet as if to look and think about crossing a difference will over-ride his actual inability to walk should he attempt it. The arrogance of him assuming abilities that are so far beyond him, comes from Daddy.... obviously.

The Boy Child had a class trip to a local church upon which he declared it was 'too jesusy' that's our little Heathen! He's also decided that at yes, age 6, he has a death/thrash/black metal band called 'Raining Metal ' he will wear on stage red leather pants, a black leather jacket, bullet belt and cocks paint (the darling meant corpse paint, bless) His first three songs will be called Suffocation, Certain Death and........ Eat Shit. Upon getting home from school he'll say the obligatory hello's then run upstairs shouting 'I'm doing a gig' ripping his shirt from his torso he'll wear his guitar, topless, in his room with the lights off and Iron Maiden blaring on his tv and video (yes, Video...we're awfully retro don't you know) He's an absolute maiden geek and frequently bores the pants off of us with random facts. He knows who's written what, he performs it and even their personal headbanging style He's currently practising writing in the Slayer font.

The Girl Child has taken to nursery tremendously albeit surprisingly well. However, we're not actually sure that she talks there which is a shame as she's been talking fluently and rather frighteningly well since she was a young toddler. She's still such a darling yet with an edge of precociousness about her and a need to constantly correct people. Her sarcasm skills are also blooming and she is the absolute queen of sulking. She's currently obsessed with art and writing which she is actually teaching herself, clever little critter that she is.

The Husband is definitely a keeper, whilst I was contemplating the grim prospect of the beast of our turkey and the giblet situation he gallantly charged in and pronounced 'it's okay I'll fist the bird for you and get them out' My Hero. This gallantry may or may not however be connected to his vendetta against The Turkey after all 6.6kg of it in it's frozen state turned his big toe rather black when it fell upon it. His extraordinary stamina and immunity is persisting to such an extent that once again he bemoans about the fact everybody gets ill except for him and that he'd quite like his turn for once. He is indeed the exact opposite to me and my especially shoddy immune system that culminated in me having a horrific cough for over four weeks straight, god bless Ventolin I say. Indeed.

Well best go, presents to lay out and a somewhat tired and agitated baby with gammy eyes.

Hello again

2010-10-03T19:40:00.001+01:00

So much time passing and at such speed it slips through my fingers. & still that feeling of not justifying it's passing and doing life a disservice through my lack of textual attention to it's ups and downs.

The Baby is now rolling both ways which is awfully fun for him, however despite doing enough sit-ups to have ab's of steel he is yet to sit unaided. You sit him up and he rather amusingly wibbles and wobbles but unlike a weeble he does indeed fall down. He is tremendously close to the art of crawling and as such has a tendancy to get rather pissed off at his inability to nail it. He can get right up on his knees, and face plant on the floor...he can get on the tips of his toes and the flats of his hands and he can shunt and army crawl backwards which is fabulously funny to watch despecially as he can scale the length of half the room that way.

Oh and my god the shouting, he does indeed have a cracking pair of lungs on him and isn't shy of using them with this brain tazering shout that is akin to a crow being brutally murdered.

He is ever nearing the half birthday when I shall be forced to start weaning, we're bypassing that pesky unecessary puree stage and going straight on to real foods which he shall feed himself. This worked wonderfully well with The Girl Child yet I fear it was so long ago that i'm quite at a loss of where to start as am suffering from a tad of anxiety not singularly created by the fact The Baby is simply growing up too fast!

He's still co-sleeping and a boobie-monster which I can't see changing anytime soon and nor would I wish it too and he is still as of yet not been in his pram as we favour the sling.

I have a curious addiction to fluff, that is to say cloth nappies which I obsess and lust over making me painfully aware of how much i've changed. Once it was cd's, pvc, hair dye and velvet Icovetted andn now it's cheap funky cloth nappies from China.

The Boy Child has settled in nicely into year 2 as far as we are aware though it will be interesting to say the least to talk to his teacher at parents evening seeing as he continues to be increasingly hard work to live with at home. He is delightfully cute, handsome, funny, lively, friendly and clever and yet he's obnoxious, back chatting, disrespectful, distractful, impulsive, rude and begs the question of wether he is in control of his behaviour or wether perchance it may be indeed controlling him.

The Girl Child has started nursery and by some strike of luck appears to adore it, we genuinley thought it would be incredibly hard for her but as usual you goes above and beyond to surprise us. She is attending two mornings a week for now as depsite being entitled to five half days i'm painfully aware that once they start reception they're in the school system full time for the next ten years so i'm enjoying her at home, she's such an agreeable little child (& frightfully clever)

The Husband is disturbingly swinging between Jekyll and Hyde, exploding one minute and baking cakes with 'I Luv You' in chocolate chips on the top of next...simply boggling. Still he makes a rather decent cake so shan't complain, for now.

I guess that just leaves yours truly, how am I? well quite, how *am* I indeed? I beg you to tell me for I don't really know. I suppose that then begs the question of who am I too to which I don't know the answer to that either. I feels fuzzy at the edges and faded in the middle and eerily vacant on the inside. Bother bother bother.

please sir, can I have some more?

2010-08-08T20:21:00.002+01:00

Well aren't you the lucky ones, two...read it again, yest two updates. Do you feel special? you should. One may even suspect i might actually like you.

It is currently the torture period, aka the Summer Holidays which means The Boy-Child and The Girl-Child have all day everyday together resulting in WWIII atmosphere and The Husband on a very thin line between Hulk and a breakdown whilst I conveniently hide with The Baby in the bedroom (The Baby is a bit of a sleepoholic which is quite charming) My parents have conveniently 'buggered awf' to Spain for a week thus taking away our rehab option for The Boy Child to go and chill out whilst we try and regain some semblance of sanity, whatever that may be.

I'm one of those weird attached parents who breastfeed on demand, co-sleep, cloth bum, baby wear, refuse to CIO, abhor early weaning yada yada yada although i hasten to add i currently do not weave my knickers out of lentils and I'm hellishly carnivorous.....did i mention I bite? if you're lucky.

I'm finding it most difficult to accept the fact that The Baby will indeed be my last baby. I don't feel finished yet and my dear womb is positively weeping at the prospect of being abandoned and derelict. The Husband is most insistent that there shall be 'NO more' (oh please sir....? Can I have some more?) despite my incessant imploring and my bottom lip which has sulked out so far you could sit on it. He is most adamant he is going to get The Snip despite me kindly offering to do it for him in the comfort of our own home should he agree to a fourth.... Not that a fourth would be possible anyway since I refuse to go near him with that roadkill on his face and he refuses to shave it off. Abstinence is indeed the most successful contraceptive.

Oh and i'm now the ever fateful 3-0 with even less idea or direction in life then before. Arse.

I suppose one should really entertain the idea of gathering a life as such has been unbeknown to me since i became a socially anxious obese hermit (oh darling pvc i miss you) Actually leaving the house may be an idea as I seem not only to be reclusive but a touch agoraphobic now too, as if I didn't have enough issues (oh dear. I appear to have fallen into an emo realm)

The Baby is grumbling, must go....

Better late then never....

2010-08-08T19:57:00.004+01:00

Ah i believe i promised you all an actual update, did I not? Well here you are my lovelies.

As you have probably correctly guessed we are now a family of five. Pregnancy was unfortunately the hardest yet with back pain and spd so severe I was near housebound for four months other then frequent trips to fat camp for naughty blood pressure. Oh the joys.

Oh and along the journey I also managed to 'sack' one awful midwife with a phonecall to her superior along the lines of 'do not let that vile woman darken my doorstep ever again' in an i'm a pregnant woman hear me roar moment aka 'fuck with me and i'll sit on you whilst subjecting you to my pregnant ninja hormones'

I suppose at this point a birth story may be in order....those with a penis and without vaginal secretions may want to look away.

A VERY long write up for a very short birth!

So just to recap, on Wednesday 14th I had a hospital antenatal appointment at 39+2 were the doctor agreed to give me an early sweep (I had a bishops score of 9 and was soft and 3-4 cm dilated) I was then sent for a BP profile (they take your BP every 20 mins over 100 mins so there's five readings to compare and so a pattern can be gained, they also put you on a fetal monitor for 20 mins to monitor baby's heart rate and movements and to detect any contractions. They also take PET bloods) as my Bp was once again on the up.

Bloods came back clear, BP sort of settled, it was still high for me but no longer hypertensive. Baby's trace was perfect.

A doctor came and said that due to my immense disability from the spd and spine and my naughty BP they'd have me back in on Friday for a repeat BP profile and another sweep. After that they'd admit me at 9am on Monday 19th (Harris' EDD) for induction (ARM and drip).

Once home I had a clary sage bump rub and as usual spent the evening on my birthing ball bouncing before having a clary sage bath. With my previous sweeps I’d gone into labour within hours so wasn't feeling too hopeful in the evening. As we'd been at hospital all day my mum and brother kindly bought us a takeaway curry (Not to start things off tho, i only had a korma lol) then i had a long soak in a clary sage bath and washed my hair. I'd not had a single cramp, twinge, tickle of even a braxton hicks (i never get braxton hicks in pregnancy). The only thing that happened was i was losing more and more mucus plug throughout the evening and the next morning (all plug, no bloody show)

Morning came and I’m feeling decidedly unlabour-ish and slightly peeved that the sweep hadn't worked.

At 10.40am I was in my sons room with my daughter putting away some washing (as it was clogging up the cot in my room lol) and I felt a pain, a painful and sudden pain out of nowhere. I discounted it but then a few mins later i got another. I came downstairs and sat on my ball and 'zoned' out trying to establish what i was feeling and more pains came. By 10:20am I’d had about 8-10 intense pains (full on contractions, no niggles or build up cramps) , my bump was going hard and they were coming every 2mins 40 seconds lasting around 50 seconds. At this point I’m in total denial chatting to me bezzy mate online whilst dh was mowing the lawn. Due to various ailments i have a warped reaction to pain. Small sudden pains i wibble over but real intense pains i almost step around and outside of if that makes any sense. I decided I’d have a bath and take two paracetamol so up stairs i go, bath running, dh is with the washing machine repair guy and I’m bent over the sink in tears. Yes tears. I couldn't deny it any longer these pains were hard, fast and crippling.

Dh comes up the stairs takes one look at me, pulls the plug on the bath and gets my bags ready to call an ambulance, it's only about an hour after the very first pain and I’m near rigid with pain and unable to stop crying. I insisted we wait for my parents first as they were due to have dd that day anyway and were on their way. I try to call the hospital but the 24 hour maternity phone number............had nobody answering it! Cue more panic. I tried calling about 5 times.

Once parents were here I’m trying hard to block out the pain and remain composed, i don't 'do' company when I’m in pain, i have to seclude myself in my own space so it wasn't helping with my mum flitting around me, i know she just wanted to help but it was having the opposite effect.

The ambulance took about 20 mins to get here. I waited at the top of the road as i was insistent I’d not let them put me on one of those chairs they strap you in. Imagine my horror when about 20 mins after phoning for one....a rapid response car turns up?!?! ARGH! The bloke see's I’m clearly in labour and looks a bit worried when told that even before labour i was 3-4 cm dilated...oops. My mum is stood there rubbing my back which is driving me up the wall and making me want to slap her but i sucked a breath in and blocked it out because she was trying to deal in her own way of seeing her daughter in pain and she thought she was helping. Dh and i get in the ambulance and the paramedic starts asking questions. I'm quiet....just like with my other two people mistake the composure for lack of pain when in fact it's the opposite. The paramedic notices the tension in my face and the silent tears still streaming down my face and the lights and siren go on and he finally offers me entinox, yay!!!!! I'm hammering the entinox like there's no tomorrow because for that brief blissful minute when you're hammering it, everything goes furry round the edges and details fade and you can 'escape' especially as i close my eyes and just concentrate on breathing it in and breathing out. The contractions were on top of each other and I remember saying to dh 'I’m really sorry but please don't talk to me because you don't even exist right now'

It seemed to take forever to get to hospital and when the ambulance parks up i turn to dh and apparently said 'f**k, I’m stoned!' lol. There were no wheelchairs but i insisted I’d walk whilst hubby carries the entinox canister under his arm and I’m shown into the first delivery room.

Bliss entinox on tap...it comes straight out the wall! I ask for diamorphine.... the mw chuckles and thinks’ I’m joking. The paramedic said to the mw ‘do you have some entinox i have to take this back to the ambulance’ to which the mw replied something along the lines of ‘er..yeah we have some, what with us being a labour ward’ and then pulled a tube out of the wall where it was ‘on tap’ .

My BP is high, an internal shows I’m 7cm and baby is 'very low' ..... this time i get my diamorphine when i re-ask! ...'if you get me diamorphine i will marry you' ... 'are you sure you want some?' .. 'YES'.. That’s why i blooming asked...twice. duh.

Upon finding out I’d not eaten since the night before the mw sends dh on a mission to get me a non-fizzy energy drink, he comes back with raspberry sport lucozade, a giant cookie and a large bakewell tart.... thoughtful? Very but I’m in agony, my world revolves around the blissful furry blackness of entinox, the last thing in the world i want is food! Fool!

Everytime a contraction ends and I’m coming down off the G&A my voice croaks and I get the compulsion to talk...a lot....and i feel like jack Dee on stage.

My BP should be settling however it's not...it's increasing and when diastolic was 113 they seek a dr who tells them to medicate me to try and bring it down. However, baby's trace is perfect, he's apparently very happy and kicks me a few times to prove it, I didn't expect him to kick in labour so was surreally amused!

Dh was wearing a bandana/cap head thing and I allegedly turned to him and said in an acerbic tone 'do you think you're some kind of effin' surgeon with that stupid thing on your head or what?'

They need to test my pee ( have already stolen my blood) and I’m desperate for a pee but know there is no way in hell i could walk to the loo, the pain is too fast and intense so shame of shame...she gets a bedpan, i feel like a geriatric.... she puts it on the chair but i can't physically get off the bed so she puts it under and i can't effin' pee! He was resting that low so she had to use a catheter (nooooooo! i don't want it!) I was later told there was very significant amounts of protein in my wee :/

As my BP is not behaving (i'm hooked up to a cuff throughout and it takes readings automatically on a timer) a dr tells the mw to break my waters....she examines me and I’m already 10cm, probably had been for ages hence why i couldn't move/wee/think. She breaks the waters and suddenly she's calling out for more people in the room with phrases like 'thick as gravy' being thrown around (I later learned this was grade III meconium, the worst kind) Whilst this is happening I get a contraction and i hear a voice...that's apparently mine whimpering this confused and pained 'oh? oooh?' not understanding as I feel my body working without my consensus, without any effort or action by me i can *feel* him sliding down, the midwife literally blinked, turned back and shouted 'heads coming!' I was already 'panting' on the G&A as she's saying ...'yes...control it...short breaths' i felt like shouting 'I’m not doing anything! I’m not pushing! i don't even know why I’m panting before being told to' no sooner as she'd said heads coming, it was out and his body followed straight after. There was no bearing down or conscious effort...it was like the waters were the only thing stopping him falling out and once they went he slid out....i just felt this weird descending feeling followed by a ‘flop’ as he sped out.

I'm was shaking...proper 'shock' shaking, I couldn't genuinely comprehend how in 5 short mins i was declared 10cm, waters were broken and baby is screaming and slithering on my tummy covered in slime, blood, vernix and LOTs of thick brown glooopy mucus meconimum...I’m petrified by my own confusion.... I didn't even try and push...how is he here?! " huh? how did that happen?' i meeped to the mw's....they were too busy to reply!

APGAR @ 1 min was 9
@ 5 mins it was 6.....

One min i'm getting my head round the fact my baby is here and the next they're taking him away from me........Not just away from me but out of the room.

According to the notes whilst away he had: Tracheal suction, vocal chords visualised, mask and valve ventilation and tactile stimulation.

Whilst he was away the mw found i had a 1cm 1st degree tear and put three stitches in whilst i puffed on G&A (she said to use a local anaesthetic it would just be even more needles for me to feel lol) I was still shaking with this bemused and blank expression on my face (I have a pic to illustrate this but no, i aint posting it lol) , my teeth were clattering with shivers and shakes against the mouthpiece of the G&A, i don’t think i’ve ever been that close to being in actual ‘shock’ before. Oh and just to add to it tey found a 'lump' down there and had to call a doc in but she thinks it's just a cyst.

Once he was back with me they let us have ages of time alone. It was like this with my first but with my second i was shunted into a bath and up to a room on the ward before i could do/say anything getting virtually no skin to skin. Eventually I felt ready to have a shower after demolishing the giant cookie and falling utterly in love with my beautiful boy and came back from the shower to a pile of toast, i couldn't stop eating and tbh am still eating like a pig three days later!

I got my own room on the ward (free too for medical grounds ...i.e mental health )which was a massive worry off of my mind....i get freaked out in social situations. However, it had it's own shower, bidet and sink but...........no toilet!? I had to trundle down the corridor every time i wanted a wee lol. Food was teeeeeeeeeeny portions so dh kept me in stash of yummies lol.

I didn’t sleep the first night or various reasons...too high on adrenaline? Couldn’t figure out how to turn the light off, noisy bints on the ward next door, the door bell of the ward constantly going off and woman constantly pressing their buzzers.....all night long. The headboard thing was too stiff to move, the pillows were horrid and i knew if i laid down i’d bleed heavier and it was a long walk to the loo’s to c lean up if that happened!

The ‘Patient line’ tv/phone/internet thing was a waste of money. The internet wouldn’t open babycentre and wouldn’t load facebook! I wanted to watch greys anatomy but it didn’t have living channel on it. So waste of a fiver really!

My parents brought my ds and dd to visit the evening after he was born, they are besotted with him J

My BP was monitored closely on the ward as were Harris' obs. He has plasters on both feet and on his hand as they had to take blood from him four times :( At first he had my rhesus antibodies in his blood, then he didn't, then they thought he had ABO incompatibility (I’m O- he's A+) an his bilibrum (sp?) levels were checked a fair few times too. He wasn't at all interested in feeding and all he wanted to do was sleep and spit up mucus (just like my other two) I was panicking that the lack of feeding and the blood stuff would keep us in hospital longer (this happened with dd) but the mw's were fab and agreed that he was probably too full of mucus, tired from the birth and doped up from my diamorphine to feed, that he would when he was ready and that as I’ve bf before they agreed i know what i was doing and they'd leave me to it :)

He filled about 3-4 nasty nappies in hospital (has done about 8 meconium filled nappies in three days...grim) but doesn't seem to be a big wee'er yet. Was getting worried about his feeding (or lack of) the next day but mid aftern oon he started feeding and is now a pro :) He generally wants feeding every 60-90 mins tho atm, a theory is that as he's such a good weight for gestation (8lb 9.5 oz at 39+3) he's trying to make my milk come in quicker by feeding more often. My poor boobs lol.....blistered nipples...owie! The first night home he screamed like a banshee all night....not fun at all but last night he seemed to wake every 60-90 mins for a feed (feeding for about 10-20 mins a time) then he'd settle back down for another 60-90 mins so at least it was a bit predictable.

He's so gorgeous :) He's beautiful and cuddly and adorable. His siblings adore him :) He seems to spend all his time feeding and sleeping.....such a hard life *L*

After pains are....painful.....very. Stitches are a tad uncomfortable due to where they are. DH is being an absolute hero and doing loads with the kids so me and Harris can just veg out.

Al l in all from first pain to birth was 3hr 45 mins with no build up or warning.

Harris Jude George Storm Seddon was born at 1.25pm on the 15^{th April.}He was registered the next day by Dean as there is a small regisery office in the hospital. We usually do it together but it would have meant leaving Harris on his on in a busy ward.

2010-07-31T13:26:00.003+01:00

What's up pussy cat?

2009-12-06T14:02:00.005Z

Where to start? Whilst procrastinating over the endless gaps in updates and with what to say and indeed to not say I have decided that this shall suffice...

I am with child.

I am currently 20+6 and he (yes he, he has a willy) is due to grace us with his presence on the 19th April 2010 though he'll undoubtedly overbake like his siblings.

The Husband is harping self congratulations over his super-sperm that never fails however, I personally think it's my special eggs, afterall I have but one a month, he gets millions of sperm per squirt. However, he has also stated that as soon as baby h arrives safely, he is booking himself in for 'the snip' and there was me hoping for an accidental fourth.....

The Child is rather obsessed with the notion of daddy's special seed, more so infact at meal-times. The no-longer-technically-a-Toddler reassured me in the early days with this little gem 'If this baby doesn't die, I promise not to jump on it when it is born' She's also recovered from the fact it's a boy.

We are ecstatically happy and cannot wait to meet him. Even the darkest nightmares can pave their way to dreams.

I'll never forget my lostling and yet without them, baby h would not be here, kicking and thriving inside me.

From the mouth of a babe

2009-07-13T21:35:00.002+01:00

Me: '& remember that tomorrow night Daddy will be putting you to bed'
The Toddler: '*gasp* but daddy can't read!'
Me: 'Yes he can silly billy...'
The Toddler: 'but he doesn't have boobies'
Me: '& what do you need boobies for?'
The Toddler: 'well babies drink from them and you had a baby in your tummy but it died. So you're growing another and if that one doesn't die, it may come home and live with us and i promise not to jump on her. I will just look at her and see if she likes Peppa Pig & show her Dora the explorer!'
Me: *gulp* ... * welling up* 'erm..well yes it did and mummy and daddy are 'trying' to grow us another honey...we're trying'

Tuesday Wibbles

2009-07-07T23:13:00.005+01:00

Not to be morbid or anything but I 'should' have been 8 weeks pregnant today. I'm fine, really. I just have mini-wibbles on Tuesdays. I think that's allowed.

The Husband was most thoughtful in the fact he's scrubbed out the 'First Scan!!!!!' on the Calender on the 30th of this month, I simply do not possess the heart to point out that the small yet significant 'weeks' are scrawled on for each Tuesday. Often the things others forget are the things we're destined to remember, alone.

The Child is awaiting the immense excitement that is to be his first ever school sports day, bless. Unfortunately due to the grimness of the weather it's been postponed already and the mean parents that we are, we live in hope that it will also be postponed tomorrow due to a manic day which is looming ready to assault us with it's rather complex logistics.

Typically parents evening has been scheduled for next Tuesday which seems pretty unremarkable until you factor into this that Tuesday is the first evening I'm due to go out since, wait for it........ 2003. Wonderful timing, no?

The Toddler decided to forgo the actual act of eating her tea tonight and instead favoured a new found joy in the activity of filling the holes of a potato waffle with peas and then bashing them down with a spoon. It sounds positively brutal yet she does it meticulously and oddly enough from her, it seems nigh delicate.

This of course was after her pre-tea shenanigans. Perched upon my knee, conversing with Dora, she started to bite her hand and consequently burst into tears.

Me: "Oh what's the matter honey?"
The Toddler: " I hurt my hand, look!"
Me: " Why did you bite it silly billy?" (whilst kissing it better)
The Toddler: "I was eating my hand because i have no food to eat and I'm so hungry"
Me: "You could have just asked for some food...."

Okay. Ooooookay. Usually the silly child simply asks for food and it is thus given to her. Just to reassure you that The Toddler is not actually starved and is not being forced to cannibalism she had eaten considerably well today and I immediately got her a snack, as is the norm.

The husband is hiding in the kitchen in fear of having his bones jumped. Men are so hard to please I mean really, he sulks throughout the long term lack of my libido and when it returns he neat whimpers with the injustice of my demands. Little does he know that I'm neither in the mood nor seemingly fertile (not that it's stopped me nailing him scarily often this past week) tonight so he's actually quite safe.

Ah yes, that old chestnut. Fertility. I am suspended in the land of limbo, my fertility returned after a massive absence down to the extended breastfeeding of the delightful Toddler in a somewhat erratic and frustratingly non predictable pattern. Miraculously I became pregnant and yet obviously we lost our much wanted baby. I now have to contend with the unknown of waiting too see just how much The Miscarriage will further distort my already distorted cycles. the unfairness of it is simply unjust.

I'll cease from boring you with the details but needless to say after much heart searching and navel gazing (minus fluff) we have weighed the facts, researched until our eyes bled and decided to try and catch the Scarlet Pimpernel of an egg (we seek it here, we seek it there...) that may or may not make a journey before the unknown return of Aunt Flo makes an appearance sometime in the next oh four to 8 weeks. Confused? you should be. It's agonisingly frustrating not knowing any dates, numbers nor time frames to work within and with a small stab at retaining sanity I'm attempting to not pander to my psycho-obsessive nature and refrain from the trappings of opk's and bbt charting despite the temptation both of which I managed to resist and conceive our little lostling. If you're blissfully unaware of these abbreviations, think yourself lucky. Oh how I wish to unlearn that which I have researched, it was so much easier with The Child & The Toddler, ignorance was bliss and pregnancy was achieved fairly effortlessly.

Once again I should be in bed, once again i'm not. When will I learn the benefits of having an early night? What the hell am I rebelling against, i'm 29. Go to bed woman. Shoo.

Pimp my butties

2009-06-29T22:41:00.002+01:00

I love The Child, I do, it goes without saying he's my beautiful boy but can I just say my god am I thankful that he's finally back at school after The Illness.

The Children are usually quite loving, obviously they argue (despite their parents they are normal darlings) but recently The Toddler has become hideously over sensitive and The Child dastardly mean which results in far too many tears. The other day we caught The Child with his hands around The Toddlers neck, she looked a little red and coughed for effect. Horrified and terrified comes to mind, and so indeed was The Child when the full hurricane of The Daddy descended upon him. All's fair in love and war though as The Toddler tried to strangle The Child right back a little later in the evening.

The Poor Child is looking rather scrawny after The Illness and is still coughing like he smokes 40-a-day, despite weighing a tonne he's never really had any body fat so the result of two weeks of illness makes him look decidedly skeletal. I keep wanting to chase him round the house pushing butties on him like some weird buttie-pimp to fatten him up a little.

He's actually going on his first school trip tomorrow, yes that is a tear in my eye. He's growing up rather too quickly, can we stop time for a while please? thankfully at school he is positively angelic and an absolute credit to us. I suppose if he has to be trying it best be in the confines of home though I do often question the sheer unfairness that we deliver a perfect wee boy to school each morning and each night they hand us back a little monster. Whoever said life was fair though?.

I wonder at what age i'll stop watching him sleep breath for a minute before I go to bed each night? A habit started in babyhood and never quite shrugged off. There's something near poetic about watching the gentle tide of his chest rise and falling accompanied by that sweet lullaby of his dream filled breaths and in that moment you stand riveted and you know with every fibre 'This is Love'.

I'm sure il'l prattle on again tomorrow but right now this heat is killing me & I keep threatening to bring the paddling pool into the lounge to fill with cold water and sit in. I think The Husband is somewhat scared that in my fractured mentality I may not actually be joking.

Recovery

2009-06-29T22:17:00.003+01:00

I'm beginning to debate the luxury that i do not possess of having the time and space to be utterly broken yet with two small children the only time that is truly mine to feel, to think and to realign myself with my life, to reconnect the link of the present with the future is when I finally collapse in bed in the dark. My eyes ache from seeing the ghosts of events replay behind closed lids. My heart is heavy and pulped, swollen and bruised like some over-ripened fruit on the wrong side of rotting.

& yet I'm doing okay. I am.

I feel stronger and brighter, I'm mending the bones of this broken soul and teaching it to walk again, into the future where it belongs.

I have my daily wibbles that are at times unexpected and catch me off guard, they last but the blink of an eye and yet in this insignificant flicker of time the world spins and turns black as i simultaneously slump and stumble into it and out of it.

I opened my handbag today and out spilled the lovely positive pregnancy tests, four of them joyously dated with black marker. My fingers tripped across them, stung by the shock of their touch, whilst these sad lips twitch and strain trying to once again make that smile that these sticks once put there.

& yet it's only seconds and then I'm okay again. I'm okay. (& if I'm not, i will be)

Walking around a supermarket today (yes for two days running now I've managed to actually get dressed and brave the world) I inwardly flinched as the corners of my eyes briefly touched upon the beautiful baby clothes.

The Toddler is a Tonic and The Child is , shall we say, a uhm..distraction. Both welcome in their own way.

For the first time in my life I shall be taking a cheap and sensitive (oh the irony) pregnancy test soon and hoping for it to be negative. My hcg was quite low the day before The World Ended so i'm quite positive that within a few days it should be back to a non-pregnant and that will be The day The World Began Again. I have a feeling due to the slowing down and diminishing of the main symptom (c'mon you really don't need me to spell it out) and a certain levelling out of emotions that my hcg must be very low indeed now.

Although there will be an eternal inability to forget (& in a morbid dance around the facts, why should I? I wouldn't have traded those few weeks of happiness for anything) I do have a readiness to move on. My future is waiting patiently, but it is whispering that bit louder for me to step towards it.

& I'm feeling readier with each passing day. I'm stronger now. The vicious laceration of grief is now some rich deep bruise that hurts to touch as i wear it like some blue dress that becomes a new skin.

With each pregnancy I've felt the fear of this and yet reflecting it was only this pregnancy where somewhere I think I always knew that we wouldn't get our happy ending, it was a stubborn feeling of impending doom like a red stain on a white carpet that I couldn't blinker out.

Life goes on. Wish us luck that it won't take us long to fall again, & please....from the bottom of my heart, make our next one a sticky one.

I'll never forget the one we loved too much & yet we have so much more love left to give.

I'm a mum get me out of here.

2009-06-27T12:59:00.000+01:00

The Children are being little pissants today, can't a girl even grieve in peace? The Husband is positively exasperated with them and I'm day dreaming of summer camps and the delightful notion of slipping out the front door and running away from their cretinous ways and petty squabbling about everything. Tears and tantrums (& that's just me and The Husband). As much as I adore and love the little ~~wankers~~ darlings, I really do not 'like' them today.

& yet perhaps it is The Children that are the (albeit abrasive) balm that eases the grief, after all there's simply no time or space to collapse and remain broken. I'm a full time referee in the sport of sibling-hood. Onwards and upwards. & to think we want another. I never once said i was sane.

I have taken on the appearance of a relative of Wurzel Gummage. We have no shower so baths are a rather grim affair at the moment on day 5 of our loss with a rather disgusting little game of 'avoid the clots' before I vomit. Needless to say I cannot and will not wash my hair in the bath at the moment as I would usually do. The Husband (bless) has offered to help me wash it over the bath side, however he fails to finish playing Mario Karts (for The Child, obviously, honest) in time each evening to actually undertake the task. I resemble a chip pan. I could also strike a match on my leg stubble, needless to say razors are top of Mondays shopping list as until Monday we are paupers (as usual). Aren't I the milf of the year.

The Parents are flying home from España today and no doubt mother dearest will positively fly round here to comfort her daughter (who's birthday she buggered off to Spain for, ditto her anniversary when she was supposed to be babysitting) . I can't say I'm enamoured with the prospect. I try very hard to hold it together and pick myself up, for my children and for my own sanity and she'll want me to be broken again because I'm her daughter and I'm not supposed to fix myself, that's part of her job description. I don't do 'broken' in company. I'm a loner when it comes to the depths of my emotions and reactions through years of depression and anxiety. I can't collapse publicly. At the end of the day there's nothing she can do. It's happened. It's shit and awful but it's happened and I'm dealing with it. Nothing can stop it happening and nothing can give me my baby back. I become brittle and withdrawn in a most acerbic manner when people attempt to prise emotional responses out of me against my will.

Nick Jnr is the parent of choice today (for a change)

I need a holiday.

& ice-cream.

Shit happens

2009-06-27T12:09:00.000+01:00

Sometimes you remain cynical and profess a lack of faith in the universe due to the constant occurrence of bad shit happening to good people and yet some small crevice of our emotional manor is reserved with that tiny flicker of hope, because without hope we sink with hope being the one float and weapon that we have in this life. It glows like a shard of someones soul that you once borrowed and never gave back instead you carry it in a pocket of your heart as a torch to ward off the darkest places you travel through. Everybody needs to believe in something.

& yet sometimes that light gets snuffed out, irrevocably so. You begin to lose faith and you start to rewrite the autobiography of the universe in which it is unveiled as the archetypal villain that you never quite wanted to believe it was.

Miscarriage doesn't just rob you of a baby, a dream, of hope, of completion, of potential it digs and burrows further, excavating to the depths of your plundered heart until it starts to hack at it's very foundations and removes it's innocence.

With pregnancy comes an air of innocence, you fear the worse but it is over-ridden by the joy and expectations that the odds are in your favour and that no matter how much you fear, it will be overcome. Until the worst happens it remains the unknown something that's shaded and blurred at the edges as you lack the knowledge and experience to sketch in the vivid details. When you've had one or two or even more successful pregnancies under your belt the fear only intensifies and yet it also remains more abstract the stringer it gets the more detail it loses because the comparison, the success, is real and tangible and overpowers it. No matter how much you fear somewhere, this faith in the universe prevails and you believe, that things will be okay, because they have been before and because they have to be again.

However, once this faith is broken or should i say smashed it takes with it this exuberant innocence. The excitement of a BFP turns into some morbid petrifying start of an unknown journey that's stripped of light and becomes dark and eerie. The fear is now real. The fear is now everything. The knowledge of it going wrong is now stronger the the hope of a happy ending. Hope becomes at one with the faeries and daydreams and fear takes root and strengthens and that becomes your reality. Reality always wins over the dreams. Instead of squealing with delight and bubbling with nervous excitement that you have achieved a bfp the thought of it is now just the start of a journey which is weighted with a sadness so great that you can still feels it's once raw bruise turn hard and sharp inside you. The moment is now edges and bladed waiting to cut through. Before every twinge you feared was a miscarriage, afterwards every twinge is just the start of the end. You've lost that quintessential hope that bobs you above the fear that turns the inevitable into the malleable changeable hope, that things will and can be okay. The prospect of a future pregnancy is no longer exciting, it's something you must face and endure without that torch to guide you through it, without the innocence that can blinker your eyes. You're forced to walk down that path with your eyes pinned open, unable to even blink for a second from the fear as you wonder, can you revive hope? Can the need to believe that things could maybe be okay resuscitate and re-inflate that which gets us through?

So you wait, with baited breath and swollen heart for the universe to realign and correct itself and you realise that maybe, just maybe you had a tiny shard of hope hidden all along and the only question that remains is...is it enough? enough to see us through this?.

Is the need to believe strong enough to overcome the death of belief?

& like a soldier we have a choice we can flee or we can fight asking yourself do you believe enough in the cause to stay and fight? Do you believe that you can change things?

Somehow I believe that I will have another baby so I'll fight, with tooth and nail because I want one too much to not fight. I guess to overcome our fear, we have to face it.

Without our innocence.

& with the realisation that, shit happens.

Love is ...

2009-06-26T12:45:00.001+01:00

...when you're four years old and sick and you say to your daddy 'If you are sick down here too, i will run over and let you use my sick bucket'

This is my truth.

2009-06-25T13:06:00.000+01:00

When I first started this blog is was never supposed to be a journal,it was supposed to err on the side of being somewhat decidedly impersonal, more a mocking commentary on daily life so to speak.

However, I'm finding it difficult to detach and comment upon the now without indeed being very much personal.

I know it's impossibly awkward to read about difficult topics such as miscarriage but I would be doing myself and the death of a baby disservice through not writing about it. I make no apologies for frankness and debilitating honesty yet remember always dear readers, you have control and choice, you can choose to not read. It is neither pretty nor eloquent, I cannot wrap it up in witticisms or bows.

The Husband and I got married 5 years ago today, i was 32 weeks pregnant with The Child at the time. Five years later fast forwarding to today and The Husband is bone tired, I'm still in the process of miscarrying, The Child is off school ill and The Toddler has a squirty bum (probably not at all helped by her fruit fetish, yesterday alone she consumed a banana, a pear, a punnet (yes as in whole) of blueberrie's some more blueberries, some blackberries and two kiwi's, not bad going for a 2.5yr old) I've been bleeding too heavily to buy The Husband a card and we don't even have the pennies to have a takeaway tonight. Obviously this is not the Ideal anniversary, quite far from it.

My heart is broken and yet the pieces of it keep breaking too.

One minute i'm muted and rendered rigid by the grief and the next I find it hard to reach it, to touch it and I feel monstrous for feeling okay so soon, and then like a wave it crashes over again.

I feel emotionally raw and swollen swinging like some shivering pendulum between a grief so thick and so black that it crushes me in it's blackness and a numbness, so acute that I want to smash my bones into pieces.

It wasn't just losing my baby it's all the hope, dreams and potential that a pregnancy represented.....it was hope...hope that things can get better, hope for a new start, hope for fixing me, hope for completing our family...and hope that maybe, just maybe something could go right for us. I was happy for the first time in so long. I feel like a massive part of me has died. I can't stop crying. Is it possible to have loved someone *too* much?

I am well aware that in some sense I could indeed count my so called blessings so to speak. I have two beautiful children and yet how does it make it easier? to know how perfect it turns out when pregnancy goes right? Surely it serves only to increase the intensity of this because you are most aware of exactly what you've lost? I'm thankful that i've been saved some of the physical trauma through losing so early and yet it does little to minimise the tragedy of it. If an 8 year old child died, would it be any more tragic then a three year old? So in that vain of thought it should thusly follow that a 6 week fetus is just as meaningful and emblazoned the same raw potential and capacity for inspiring love as a ten or 12 week one.

Like most events in life this one too holds it's own soundtrack and that is 'Fix you' by Coldplay. I try so hard to appear okay for the sake of the children, so late at night is my turn, when I curl in bed and collapse into the grief, rendered paralysed and voiceless by it as the song plays on loop with the masochistic film playing behind my eyelids starting when I first saw them two precious lines on a test, I can tap into the excitement ,the happiness and it's in such vibrant technicolor and in sentimental flashes this short journey drops like treasured polaroids onto the floor of my mind....right up until the end, until now and every day just adds another scene. I still have the tests.

I can't believe this is happening to us and yet part of me knew, knew that this always would happen to us. I always knew this was lurking in the proverbial shadows of our discontent, to strike us down.

The Husband says we can try again. The Husband says he really wants to try again.

The epu said that we have to wait three months?! 'so that we don't see you back here with another miscarriage' Well that was thoughtful of them. Upon researching however, there is no solid actual evidence for waiting any allotted amount of time if you've had a complete miscarriage other then to make it easier for the medical profession to 'date' a future pregnancy.

This grief will always be here, it will never ever leave me. I don't want to replace this baby but whether i wait 1 month or 1 year i'd still hold grief for *this* baby but it doesn't mean I can't *love* another baby too. This grief will own a part of me forever. I'm scared of seeming callous for thinking about the future already when i feel so choked up in the now, i'm scared people will think i didn't love this baby..that i'm not broken in pieces because of this baby if I am thinking of having another so soon. I want that sense of completion, that hope and potential of a pregnancy again....you can have many kids and love them all, it's not like a husband dying and then remarrying the next month....it will be a whole new pregnancy and baby, and will never ever ever ever erase the one i've lost, but is that so wrong? to have both? To still grieve over what i've lost and yet to want something new? a future? Some positivity? is it wrong to even be thinking about this whilst i'm still in the process of mc'ing? I'm not for one instant implying i'm ready to start again, only that surely the only basis of readiness is ones own feelings after taking things one day at a time? I guess in my mind the baby i've lost and pregnancy are separate entities that can co-exist.

So I guess perhaps in all this for records sake I should include the bare bones of the facts, for posterity. You may want to stop reading, about now. This may get physically and emotionally graphic.

I have two fabulous kids The Child (4.5) and The Toddler (2.5) and i finally after a lot of arguments got The Husband to agree to have a third. I was breastfeeding The Toddler up until about ten days ago and as such didn't get a visit from old Aunt Flo from Nov 2005 (when I got pg with her) until about March this year and that was then a 56? 58? day cycle. So imagine my surprise when on day 39 of my next cycle i got a bfp on the 8th June! Over the moon doesn't even begin to describe it. It was a faint line on an cheap strip test. Took a FR and got definate line. In that week I took that one IC, 4 FR (each day they got darker) and 2 cbddigi's.

I got insomnia (first pregnancy symptom i get in pregnancies) , nausea, tender breasts, hormonal, forgetful, cravings for chicken, wee'ing loads ....classic pregnancy symptoms.

On Sunday (22nd) I got blood streaked CM when i wiped. Great thing to happen on fathers day. Obviously I panicked but I had pink spotting and spotting like this with The Toddler and scans at 8w and 11w showed she was fine and I still had pg'cy symptoms. The next morning I had it again so I went to the doctors who then got me a scan for 2pm that day (Monday). On the way to the hospital (two buses) i didn't feel nauseous for the first time in over a week (i'd been getting awful nausea when traveling) and the symptoms just didn't seem there but i wondered if it was because I was so scared.

At the EPU they scanned me. By my dates I was 5+6 (adjusted date as i knew roughly when I ovulated and it was long cycle) but off that wheel of doom they use they said i was 7+3. They tried an abdominal scan (which i knew would show nothing) and she said i had a retroverted uterus (my uterus is retro, how positively funky). She did an internal scan and couldn't find anything, not even a sack. Nothing. She tried to check my ovaries to rule out ectopic but could only find one of my ovaries so thus couldn't rule out ectopic. I remember joking 'Anything else missing in there? the count is so far at one baby and one ovary missing' They took my blood. They called later that night and said my hcg level was 116 and I had to go back in on Wednesday, 48 hours later, to repeat and see if they raised or lowered.

When I got home i had a lot more bloody cm and wondered if this was from the internal scan poking round in there.

I laid in bed last night crying, crying so hard...I knew it wouldn't stay, i knew it was leaving me and yet i was begging out loud...begging for it to stay, to not leave me.....because I love it...because i love it so so much...i had my hand on my empty womb trying to hold in what wasn't there anymore. & when i woke up, i was bleeding. I wanted to catch the blood, i wanted to hold it in....to try and physically keep my baby....and crying only made me cough and coughing only made me bleed more

Since then it's just got heavier. I remember sitting on the toilet and just howling, these primal sobs that picked me up under the skin by my bones and dropped me again and again until I broke against the floor of grief. I'm thankful i'm not in too much physical pain but it is like a very heavy period messy period that just keeps getting worse and worse and worse . It is getting heavier, I'm too scared to leave the house in case it soaks through my clothes....everytime i stand up or cough i feel a small gush.

& i'm seeing babies everywhere, especially on tv. You think it's bad when you want to ttc and everyone seems pregnant or has a baby but can't...and it seems bad when you are ttc and everyone has a baby or a bump....but that's nothing compared to having it in your grasp and then having it taken away. To love someone so much, too much....and never meet them. To have hopes and dreams and aspirations for them.....and then they die. I hate the word miscarriage ...my baby DIED. F*cking died before it even had a chance to live.

It's not fair.

There, I've said it. it's not fucking fair.

If dreams fix your heart, what fixes you when it's your dreams and your heart that are broken?

"When you try your best, but you don't succeed
When you get what you want, but not what you need
When you feel so tired, but you can't sleep
Stuck in reverse

And the tears come streaming down on your face
When you lose something you can't replace
When you love someone, but it goes to waste
Could it be worse?

Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you

And high up above or down below
When you're too in love to let it go
If you never try you'll never know
Just what you're worth

Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you

Tears stream down on your face
When you lose something you cannot replace
Tears stream down on your face
And I...

Tears stream down on your face
I promise you I will learn from my mistakes
Tears stream down your face
And I...

Lights will guide you home
And ignite your bones
And I will try to fix you"

-Coldplay

This is too hard.

2009-06-24T00:09:00.001+01:00

Goodbye my precious baby 23/06/2009 - - - You were loved too much.

I said too much, such an emotional whore.

2009-06-21T08:58:00.000+01:00

For someone who never actually liked Enid Blyton I've always had a nauseatingly Blyton-esque dreams for my children's childhood.

I have these fleeting dreams of making elderflower cordial to pack up whilst we go catching newts and butterflies with the wind in our hair and the sun shining out of our eyes full of wet fizzy giggles as we go home to make lemonade from scratch and brownies before twirling until our eyes water whilst holding ribbons out to the wind.

I have all the ideas of what a 'good mother' should and could be doing with and for her kids and yet I fail on the very simplest of levels to achieve any of it.

I find painting too messy especially when The Child gets silly and naughty and it will end in arguments, ditto to baking..and sticking/glittering.

I get bored of rolling cars across the room and due to no funds and no car I feel somewhat stranded and suffocated.

I suppose I should actually touch upon my biggest issue here and that is I am a self-confessed Net-Junkie and have been since my teens. I rely and cling to the internet. It's far too comfortable and easy to spend most of my day online then it is to actually get up and become the mother want to be instead of lamenting over the mum i have become.

It's such a self-fulfilling prophecy, for fear of being a rubbish mum you infact become one.

Now I will not tell a lie, I will openly admit that depression and anxiety fuel this apathy and lack of motivation whilst feeding and clothing the inner demons that make you believe you can't do any better and that you're a failure and always will be and that your children will suffer through your own incapabilities.

& yet somehow I have managed to produce so far two extraordinarily beautiful, clever, inquisitive, expressive little ankle biters with another on the way.

I suppose I should rectify here for the record that I do not neglect my precious darlings in any way. They are loved more then any child could ever be loved. I may be online a lot yet my children are never alone, The Toddler will play around me all day, we'll chat and laugh and cuddle. She has my attention whenever she wants it and more love then she'll ever need or recognise. I practice Attachment parenting (yes darling, that crunchy lentil weaving stuff) and take pride in the fact she's grown, through my love and attention, from a timid shrieking baby into an intelligent and happy toddler. & yet how come The Children, My life, still can't stop me from logging on as soon as I get out of bed? it can't break through this maudlin melancholy and dis-associative apathy.

It sounds trite and silly but i'm hoping our final baby will be the making of me. there will be no 'next time' this is my last chance to get it right. To break through this dastardly veil of disgustipating apathy and depression. To try and break this soul crushing anxiety that has altered the very autobiography of my soul and turned me into something and indeed someone that I do not and cannot recognise nor understand. I'm insular and withdrawn, frightened and self loathing..paranoid and petrified of people, life, myself and this has to stop. It's consumed my 20's and the very beginnings of my children's life, it's an injustice and disservice to let it devour anymore.

I need to become the mum my children deserve and the person I want to be.
I always have reasons and excuses for all that I do not do when I actually have two of the biggest reason I could ever dream for to change...My children. Why isn't it enough to fix me? I am not who i'm supposed to be. I need to find where and when I lost myself and how to get her back. I used to have friends, I used to be witty and intelligent. I used to sparkle and draw people in. I've spent too long being dead inside.

This is another reason BunBun (yes you may have the sick bucket) must stick. There is no alternative. This baby represents one last chance to fix myself, this baby is hope. Hope for me, hope for my children and hope for my husband that I can function, that i'm not irreparable and forever damaged. I've waited to long for the rest of my life to start....

Oh pissflaps, I promised myself to keep my journally stuff out of my blog. Another fail ;)

The Prego Brain strikes back.

2009-06-20T17:01:00.000+01:00

Time seems to be standing still in some cruel game of life. I feel like I should be at least 10 weeks pregnant by now but alas, no, here I am still teetering on the vulnerable cusp of the first trimester, tip toeing around the rim of excitement and fear at 5+4. I shall warn you, it is after all only fair, I only get worse.

Already I have had the attack of the killer pregzilla hormones with bouts of irrational spiky anger interspersed with isolated incidents of bawling my heart out. Grey's Anatomy is definitely not healthy for my mascara, darlings. Still it's an improvement on my last pregnancy when I'd burst into uncontrollable tears every time The Child (then The Toddler mark 1) had Fireman Sam on the television.

Then there are the adventures of my missing vocabulary followed by the sequel 'where is my mind?' (not by The Pixies...although it would make a rather fitting soundtrack)

So far this pregnancy:

* When trying to express that it keeps raining what I actually said was 'It keeps weeing'

* I (a grown up, allegedly) put my boots on the wrong feet and failed to notice until I stood up.

* Whilst carrying out the mundane and seemingly simple task of making dinner I had two pans with water on the hob. One of the FL ring and one on the BR ring. Now the one on the BR started to boil, as it should yet the one on FL remained unboily despite me poking it, alot. Turns out I'd turned the BL ring on instead. Oops! So I turned it off and turned the FL on again. same thing happened. It transpires that I'd once again turned the BL on! I'd turned it off then turned it back on again!

* Sometimes whilst bathing The Toddler I leave the window open in my room to let soem fresh air circulate. however, usually I close it as soon as The Toddler is in bed so a) the house cat doesn't fall to it's doom and b) ditto to The Toddler. The other night I went to bet so cold my teeth were chattering, I just couldn't understand it! That was until The Husband discovered the window was open, and had been open for about 5 hours!

Still, I'm doing well. last pregnancy I managed to burn my bump (impressive scar it was!) and set a kitchen roll alight narrowly missing setting the kitchen on fire. Oops.

No wonder The Sprogs are such clever little buggers, they leach my intelligence through pregnancy. I used to have a brain, I did. I did! I tell you.

Now you must excuse me, The Toddler & The Child are moshing to Anthrax and I need to go hunt a chicken....damn these cravings.

On turning 29...

2009-06-20T15:35:00.000+01:00

The Husband has redeemed himself from any ill's he may have done in his past through letting me have a four hour lie in this morning, yes you heard it right, 4 hours...and a one hour soak in the bath! He's a nice chap really, well...sometimes. However, I do believe it will require payment later tonight in the form of me getting lock jaw, if you see where I'm coming from.

I suppose I should briefly recap on that 'other' recent event, mainly being the tiresome inevitability of me turning 29 which is one year away from 30. Oh dear life, where have you gone? I miss you so. Needless to say it was a fairly non scintillating event or should I say non-event what with the absence of friend's (no really, i am the official Billy No Mates) alcohol, money, sex and drugs. My parents are in Spain although they did kindly leave me a card and some money before the departed and to her defence she did remember to ring up on the day. Both my brothers however failed to send cards. Seeing as money is something we don't have The Husband got me a card (The Children made me one each) and promised to 'be my slave for the day' which in theory sounds most satisfying however factor into this that I had to go out (in the rain, the rain I tell you! scandalous!) with The Toddler to stop The Toddler and The Child from killing each other (Due to The Child being off school with another pesky flare up of the dreadful affliction called Mesenteric Adenitis). So quite how I get a slave for the day when i'm somewhat evicted from home is quite frankly beyond my comprehension and the words 'short' & 'Straw' spring to mind.

My days expedition was somewhat brave of me as it involved the fortuitous event of finally kicking ones own arse into touch and meeting up with an old friend who i've only seen once in around 6 years due to my best friends Anxiety and Depression crippling me in the social sense (along with their acquaintance, Obesity) Unfortunately The Toddler went into her usual 'I don't know you' mode and rendered herself mute, if only she was I tell you, if only! I jest, I do so love my little chatterbox. Honestly. However, she appears to be getting a cold of doom and awoke from an impromptu nap in her buggy to serenade us with a meltdown complete with a side order of extra gooey snot and super thick tears.

The bus journey home was interesting in so far as I had to struggle with the ever increasing motion sickness that I get through traveling on buses when cheggers, a very chatty Toddler (see! oh how she talks...!), several bags and an awkward folded buggy propped up by my feet.

The highlight of my Birthday (there was one, honest...) was The Toddler and The Child performing 'Happy Birthday' to me, acapella, whilst I was trying to ~~drown~~ soak in the bath in the morning.

On another happy note I now have shiny slut red nails. rar. All is not lost. Oh the glamour.

hello.

2009-06-19T20:26:00.000+01:00

It's been such a dreadfully long time since I've said hello and unfortunately I have no epic tale of woe or tragedy nor any novel expedition of fun and discovery to tell you. I've simply been sitting with my dear friends melancholia and no-motivation.

However things have indeed changed as four are to become five. I am up duffed, cheggers, knocked up avec une bun in the oven. Oh and before you ask yes it was indeed quite planned thank you very much although I won't bore you with the ins and outs of my plumbing and the titillating mind numbingly tmi details of my fertility or more specifically the long awaited return of it. Yes despite being planned it was somewhat of a surprise as I was convinced we'd be trying for a lot longer. This is always a good thing that i'm proved wrong as I make a rather rabidly maudlin TTC'er with obsessive tendancies.

Naturally i'm now pregzilla, worse though..pregzilla who should be on Prozac but isn't so hyper drive anxiety with all the not-so-nice mind wanderings about all that can go wrong as I'm only 5weeks and 3 days and my dating scan isn't until 11weeks and 2 days. How will I ever survive? More importantly how on earth will my dear husband survive? Afterall, he's the one that has to put up with me!.

Yet this is where my other personality comes into play, whilst the dominant one is positively drowning in the misery of worry the other half is skipping about planning what delectable and oh-so-cute cloth nappies to buy whilst drooling over slings. Yes, I'm rather 'crunchy'.

Controversially for some we have actually told The Toddler (when does a Toddler stop being a Toddler?) and The Child that there is a baby inside mummy's tummy which has consequently led to some rather interesting tea time conversations by an over inquisitive child who's absolutely fascinated at the whole idea of mummy and daddy making a baby and how it actually happened.

Unfortunately this hasn't affected my appetite which has now gone from over eating into I am a piggy pig, the piggiest of all the pigs.

Alas The Husband has declared that this is our last and final baby, ever. Conversation is turning once again to the old knob and two bricks idea. Now that is crunchy (and oddly youtube worthy, don't you think?)

Fuck. I'll have to actually think about getting my degree in a few years then. Shitsticks.

Yucky little boys

2009-03-28T09:31:00.000Z

I'm vastly disliking little boys. We have a female house cat who has the dastardly habit of 'spraying' up doors and walls and occasionally over clothing and furnishings when she's on heat (as well as wailing and howling like a wanton whore with her arse in the air in a decidedly 'oh do me! do me! manner). Recently we have been finding urine in the bath, which we put down to the cat. This of course has meant extra and frequent disinfecting on my behalf however as disgusting as it is it is rather preferable to places that aren't so easy to clean.

So, Imagine my complete horror when we found out this morning that it is actually The Child doing this.

It was genuinely a true 'WTF?! moment.

I think little girls have the right idea 'boys are gross!'

Or 'Minging' as The Toddler would say.

LittleSunFlower

2009-03-28T09:19:00.000Z

Massive thank you to LittleSunFlower for the very generous free Amber teething necklaces she's sending to people. It's beautiful.

Crabs & Winkies

2009-03-28T08:52:00.000Z

The Easter Holidays are looming and I must confess that I'm rather terrified of the prospect. I wish I had a cupboard under the stairs so that I could hide from the Children, obviously such a cupboard with a bed inside and a fully stocked bar would be even better.

My poor darling girl was rather upset last night when she woke up at midnight and wee'd in her pull up. So off to the toilet we trotted where upon she announced that she wanted to wee Daddy and The Child. I tried to gently explain that they wee standing up because they have winkies and we as girls do not and therefore cannot (I rather wouldn't go into the details right now with a 2.5yr old of how it is actually possible to wee standing up but is simply rather not the preferred nor cleanest way of having a wee and is rather unnecessary when you are not wearing a nappy yet are sat on a toilet) She piped up indignantly 'NO mummy I mean when i'm a grownup' to which I had to explain that even when she's fully grown she won't have a winkie. Her response? She dissolved into tears oh dear. Oh to have a winkie.

The Toddler also keeps having a tickle in her throat which makes her sound rather croaky and illicits the cute little 'I can't talk properly' phrase. She was quite delighted when The Husband told her all about frogs in throats so much so that yesterday she croaked 'I can't talk properly' insert small pathetic cough 'I have a crab in my mouth' My Toddler has imaginary crabs. Is this our penance for being such illustrious heathens?

The Child, what with the nearing of Easter, is once again singing 'Goddy' songs brainwashed into him from school, which by and by is supposed to be somewhat religion neutral. This is of course dispersed with random bouts of Iron Maiden and Black sabbath.

We shall be expediently investigating the area of self defence for The Child as he seems to be getting a little bit of bother from an older child at school, thankfully not his classmate who at 5 years old is already learning KickBoxing, need I really say anymore? It seems so grossly inappropriate. The Husband is determined that The Child will not be labeled a softlad (read: highly strung and rather sensitive prone to random displays of bezerker rage and absolute tears) and should carve out his status in the playground whilst he still has chance to be fore being labeled. Needless to say we've had countless arguments over the to hit or to not hit back variety.

However, as The Toddler has just proclaimed 'Bang! and the dirty is gone!'

"I'm Gloomy" said Eeyore

2009-03-19T13:55:00.000Z

Oh dear, I must confess to feeling a trifle melancholy. In fact if the apathy wasn't quite so thick I rather like to think I'd feel exasperated by it.

If only one could cry. Ho Hum. Onwards and ever upwards I suppose.

The Grandparents took me and The Toddler to Cost-Co yesterday where The Toddler had a glorious time flashing. 'Look at my beep-beep!' (Navel) 'Look at my boobies!' (I positively dread the teenage years in the future!) This was of course after the small matter of a rather large meltdown in the loo's as she insisted on taking her coat, shoes, tights and pull-up off despite my rather futile and virulent protests. She then had the audacity to whinge about the lack of a stool for her feet so I've now to assume the position of kneeling at her feet in public conveniences to hold her royal princess feet.

Buggersticks. I guess I should do something with The Toddler before The Child gets home from school and madness ensues.

Spring is here

2009-03-17T12:39:00.000Z

I'm officially advertising the position of my immune system as vacant, lord knows it's certainly wanting. Yes, I'm ill again, what is this the 6th? time in 2009. I'm rabidly unimpressed. Perhaps even more frustrating is the fact that The Toddler is sharing my illness which sounds awfully quaint but i;d really rather she didn't, as if I don't get enough sleep as it is! Rather predictably The Husband is in full sulk mode because he wants to be ill for once, it's just so unfair. My heart bleeds. No really, it does.

The Child made a card with haste this morning for his dear teacher who is commencing maternity Leave after today and being replaced by a Norwegian teacher called Miss Murphy. he also woke The Husband up at ridiculous o'clock this morning to play the Wii as he was promised a one-off play this morning for actually behaving himself for once last night. Shocking parenting, we know but it works so I really wouldn't knock it. Besides, it's frightfully amusing to watch him him tantrum just like his daddy when he doesn't win. I'm also secretly smug that The Husband (he who detests messy things) was the one who had to supervise the card making.

The Toddler has finally succumbed to the girly delights of pretty hair clips and no long shrieks like a scalped baboon dropped in boiling water when approached with the almighty implement of torture, also known as a hairbrush. Having convinced her that Faerie Princess' wear pretty clips she now near begs for her hair to be played with on a daily basis. Of course it would help immeasurably if I actually had an ounce of patience and didn't make a hash job of it. Still it has a certain rustic charm and could possibly be perceived as being artistic and alternative at a stretch.

The Child has taken to randomly shouting 'Satan' in a high pitched voice which coupled with his charming smile is positively ruptures the sense of humour, almost on par with the sheer glee that The Toddler displays having mastered the devil horns with her fingers. Both are alarmingly showmantastic at air guitaring and even a la Steve Harris put a foot on their imaginary monitors.

Spring is most definitely here finally, the sky is blue, the birds are in chorus and random daffodils are sprouting as unexpectedly as virtue in our lawn, okay..mud patch. It's a 'work in progress', only without much of the progress element. When on the school run down the tree tunnel there's the vibrant burst of crocus' amongst the rough and wasteland and last week the children were most entertained by their daddy's lucky find, a frog. The Toddler named the frog 'Arm' this is not surprising seeing as she tried to make us all call her 'Sofa' over the weekend.

The Child is demanding to be taken up to Winter Hill again, The Grandparents took him last year and he wanted to see the sheep, however upon seeing they had teeth he ran a mile and settled on his chosen picnic spot. Needless to say my parents appetites swiftly disappeared when they discovered it was adjacent to a dead sheep which they had to craftily maneuver their backs towards to prevent The Child from seeing it.

Bugger. There was a man supposed to be arriving this morning about a fence, mainly The Fence in the garden that is held up glamorously by some old paving slabs and threatening to fall over and decapitate The Dog. I think it goes without saying that he hasn't bloody turned up. Oh Arse.

Alas, i've neglected The Toddler long enough and really should go and do 'stuff' which revolves around glue and glitter and a whole conundrum of mess, oh damn I mean creativity.

Hallelujah

2009-03-04T22:49:00.000Z

& whilst The Toddler has been serenading the local people on the bus with fetching renditions of Black Sabbaths 'Electric Funeral', The Child started singing about bloody Jesus, again, tonight. Oh dear. He's also been playing Zombies at school although he's not awfully sure on what they are..apparently the rozzers have them and they wear uniforms and have guns and make you DIE. This comes from the kid that was recently crying at the Backyardigans. I despair.

Lurgyville

2009-03-04T22:35:00.000Z

I have fallen ill for the 5th, yes 5th, time in 2009 and am not at all a happy camper. In fact I don't even like bloody camping. The current affliction is a dastardly bad case of Tonsillitis which is just utterly ghastly and required a mercy mission to a NHS Walk-In centre on a Sunday to see a perfectly nice nurse who happened to be totally clueless on medications and Breastfeeding. Oh, and she also had a curious nack of not digesting anything I said to her. Joy.

Thankfully it would appear that The Toddler has escaped this latest lurgy of mine as has The Child. However, The Child did do a rather endearing interpretation of the exorcist the other evening and got himself into such a blinding rage he ended up uncermoniously vomiting. Charming.

The Toddler has decided that the potty is for the weak and i'm most gracious for this as i'm sorry but unless you've potty trained before you will be unable to comprehend the total grimness of the whole sorry affair. She has opted instead to use the big girl toilet. Unfortunately, when the mood strikes she opts to use said toilet a hundred times an hour. This wouldn't be so annoying if she hadn't proven on several occasions that she can actually go allnight dry however she has a rather quaint OCD relationship with washing her hands after using the loo which incurs even more loo visits just to indulge said relationship. Oh to have a downstairs lav. She has been treated to some darling little Peppa Pig knickers yet she'd holding firm for Diego underpants, apparently.

The Husband is as ever strong as a bloody Ox and whining incessantly about wanting his turn to be ill. Never mind 'illness' per se but i'm sure I could arrange an injury, or two, if he persists.

Love is...

2009-02-14T10:24:00.001Z

Me: 'I love you'
The Toddler: 'I love Dora'

How to have a morning nap

2009-02-06T22:17:00.000Z

How to sneak a nap after your lie-in failed:

* Ensure The Toddler has a clean bum and is dressed
* Deposit The Toddler down stairs with The Husband
* Ply The Toddler with food
* Say as quickly as you can and in one breath 'she'sfedanddressedwiothacleanbumi'mgoingforanapbye!'
* RUN before The Husband can interpret what you've said and thus demand you stay.

Success! :)

Sleep?

2009-02-06T09:18:00.001Z

How not to have a lie-in:

* Allow your 29 month old to co-sleep in your bed
* Ensure said 29 month old is a total boob junkie
* Try to ignore said Toddler whilst she harasses you endlessly screaming for booby
* Wither with woe when The Toddler peeps through the curtains and realises it's not night anymore
* Close eyes tight and pretend The Toddler isn't running round the room and bouncing on the bed like she's on crack
* Try not to vomit when The Toddler secretly shits, takes her own nappy off, tries to wipe her own arse then smears said shit-caked arse all over your bottom sheet
* Chase The Toddler round the room getting increasingly miffed at her whilst trying to successfully wipe her arse
* Realise resistance is futile, life is unfair and The Toddler is a total minx...a lie-in is not going to happen.

Parents evening

2009-02-05T23:43:00.000Z

So the snow was coming and then..changed it's mind which was awfully uncouth of it. I've given up scrutinising the various '5 day' weather forecasts provided by the BBC and the Met Office seeing as they change daily and vary wildly from 'heavy snow' to 'no snow' which isn't terribly helpful. I wish they'd make up their minds I mean either it's coming or it's not! However, the lack of snow did enable my parents to land safely at Liverpool airport although I do rather suspect that my Mother would have quite preferred to have been stranded in Spain still and quite frankly, I can't say I blame her.

We are slowly sorting out The Toddlers bedroom with the view of her going into it and The Husband finally sleeping in The Bed again although I must admit to dragging my feet somewhat as she's just so damn cute and snuggly and not to mention the fact that at the ripe age of 29 months she has yet to sleep through and it's so much easier to just leave her snaffling for boob then it would be to brave the cold and have to actually go into a different room to settle her. Besides, The Husband is far too prickly and The Toddler smells a lot better and never steals the duvet. I should imagine if The Husband see's sense and grants me with another baby then I may see fit to evict The Toddler slightly quicker. However, The Toddler does actually seem to adore her room (sans bed, which is in my room) as it's pink and 'hers' and is a real novelty to play in (as demonstrated by making me play in there for a whole hour today)

The Toddler is becoming more like a grown up each day, she took dr suess 'one fish two fish' to read on the toilet yesterday (apparantly Potty's are soooo passé).

Tonight was parents evening for The Child, and his teacher (avec baby-bump) couldn't praise him enough, but then we already knew he was brilliant. Must say I'm enormously impressed at how she managed to heap so much praise onto him whilst he and The Toddler were running around the classroom like they were on speed (I'm becoming suspicious of bananas, I'm sure they're sneaking E-Numbers into them)

Oh Arse. It's still not the weekend.

Sweetheart

2009-02-03T21:36:00.001Z

So The Child keeps lecturing The Toddler on the general state of the lounge and it's lack of tidiness when he returns home from school telling her that she really ought to ensure it's tidy before he gets home.

As The Husband was on the school run picking The Child up I had the following Conversation with The Toddler.

Me: 'Help me tidy up before your brother gets home'
The Toddler: 'No.'
Me: 'Please...?'
The Toddler: 'Okay then my special mummy'
Me: 'Oh, thankyou darling!'
The Toddler: 'You're welcome, my best friend'

She really is such a sweetheart (sometimes).

Fucksticks

2009-02-02T12:43:00.000Z

In a previous life, BC (before children) I had what is called a gutter mouth insofar as to say I swore, somewhat incessantly to a point where when The Husband was just the mere Boyfriend, he thought I had tourettes. Oh how sweet it is then when The Toddler says to me 'You're a Tosser' (yes really, out of the mouths of babes) that it was a direct copy of what her dad had just said to me.

I'm also not convinced that him saying 'Oh Shit' and then making out he actually said 'Oh Ship' is quite cutting it with The Child who has now taken to muttering 'Oh Shit' to himself when something doesn't go his way.

However, it is charmingly good fun seeing The (heathen) Child offend old ladies with his dramatic outbursts of 'Oh.MY.God'

Aww

2009-02-02T12:36:00.000Z

In a familiar attempt to delay going to sleep I heard The Child call out to The Husband as he was sneaking an escape 'Daddy, I have a question for you!' curiosity piqued The Husband briefly returns to hear The Child Say "Daddy, even when I'm naughty and you're shouting at me, I still Love you"

Bless.

Baby it's cold outside

2009-02-02T12:29:00.000Z

Oh Buggerfuck. We have snow and yet not entirely enough snow to actually be useful and pretty. I mean if it has to snow surely it could have the decency to snow enough to obliterate the daily ins and outs as we know it? I mean come on! We're 'up norf' and yet our southern counterparts are the ones with the decent snow. Oh snow, please reconsider, this is sheer lunacy. I'm here and waiting high up in the hills waiting for you to blanket us and all you can do is 'drizzle' a wee bit of snow. The Southerners don't even know what to do with it for heavens sake!

I'm becoming hideously addicted to Twitter at the moment, it's a fabulous way of stalking the rich and famous, not that I do that of course, honest. Brownie honour.

The Husband has now expanded his 'No More Children' repertoire to include no more cats or dogs either. Grumpy Bastard! However, I shall have my wicked way, don't you fear.

It's now February and I'm still ill and The Toddler (previously known as The Baby) still has slug like greenies crawling down her nose, delightful it is not.

Had I been a good Mummy I'd get my lardy arse off of here and dress her up and take her for a trundle through the snow however I'm fiendishly lazy and I'm sure she thinks the TV is 'mummy'. Besides it's all a bit too much effort.

Operation 'stop being a fat bastard' isn't going too well, well it isn't actually 'going' at all. If i could just stop eating all the time, I may actually reclaim long lost slimness.

Now where's the biscuits....

Woe is me.

2009-01-31T21:22:00.000Z

I know, I'm so heartless for abandoning you for so long. You must be utterly distraught. Fear not I'm still here, just. I do believe I'm becoming terribly sick of being sick. The Husband decreed a long time ago that I am a 'demic'. Having had a 48 hour dose of the noro virus i've now had a week long chesty cold which is insuffereable and down right revolting. The Toddler is teething and has a cold of doom complete with slug like bogies of bright yellow and The Child's voice keeps going squarky.

So far I don't much like 2009.

Poxy

2008-12-23T23:20:00.000Z

I'm not quite dead. Yet. Life is however working on it.

The Child has survived the Pox and we're on daily pox watch with The Baby. The same baby who has had the same flu that I have had. It's one thing being sleep deprived and another being ill but when you've been both for over a week, well fry me my brain and serve me up an omlette.

The husband has been talking about the bricks again and I've now taken to asking him if he wants them gift wrapped.

Only two more sleeps till Christmas. Oh Arse.

Grave Digger

2008-12-09T21:57:00.000Z

Sundays are spent at my parents house, The Child and The baby, without The Husband. My Dad is not at all educated on the ins and outs of "Monster Jam" (Monster Truck tournaments etc) which has been the topic du jour for several months now as far as The Child is concerned. He was dancing round their lounge proclaiming "I'm a Monster Truck" when The baby decided to exclaim "I want to be a Grave Digger". My Dad blanched thinking that i'd had a relapse in my recovering Goth status and had infected The Baby with gothyness. That was until I informed him through splutters of laughter that Grave Digger is one of the champion Monster Trucks. Duh.

Rock Star in the making

2008-12-05T23:08:00.001Z

I must admit I think school for 4 year olds is quite horrific for parents. The school get your child every morning and keep them until mid afternoon where they then hand you back a Gremlin, Lord only knows what they actually do with your charming and gorgeous child that you entrusted them with.

So tonight the precocious little Gremlin aka The Child who was rampantly overtired decided to throw severe screaming ducky fits at the TV as he was having his evening 'treat' of being allowed to play on the gamescube whilst his bath was running. Usually it winds him down, The Husband will join in with him and they have a chatter and giggle. The Child is terminally competative, hideously so just like The Husband.

Having had three 'calm down now' warning The Husband turned off the games cube. The Child smugly turned it back on. The Husband turned off the TV. The Child kicked the tv. Yes, he bloody kicked the TV. Crikey, one Rock Star in the house is quite enough thankyou without a complimentary mini-one. There was an awkward second where myself and The Husband gawked in suspended disbelief trying hard not to laugh at the quite frankly sheer absurdity of it. Needless to say The Child was put in his room. Now he's pushed me, shoved me, hit me and kicked me but i'm sorry, how every dare he abuse the TV! The sheer cheek of it. Honestly. Children today....

Chunky Monkey

2008-12-05T18:17:00.000Z

The Baby is still insisting that sleep is for the weak and The Child is in agreement. I think it's a conspiracy. Arse.

The Baby is also a snot factory which yes, is as unpleasant as it sounds. She has Medicine to take which she happily takes downstairs yet should you try and administer it when she wakes up screaming in the night you would think we were skinning her alive. Needless to say nobody will need their ears syringing within a 20 mile radius for a considerably long time. Somehow I think "Love Thy Neighbours" won't come into it. Never mind, can't say I like them much anyway.

She decided to jazz up the nightmare that is bedtime the other night and proceeded to vomit exorcist style, thankfully mostly over herself. When your offspring vomits, is a true test of your love. You sit paralysed with disgust and repulsion staring at the horror that was your bedding or even worse, maybe your clothing too and then you look at the shivering blubbing vomit coated offspring and coo soothingly at them whilst cuddling them and removing their vomit sudden clothes when actually you're dying to mutter " you revolting little cretin..my bedding! Look at my bedding!" whilst realising that oh dear God, you have to actually touch them.

You spend the rest of the night hovering between sleep and wakefulness afraid to give in to slumber in case a) there's a repeat performance or b) you missed a bit on operation fumble cleanup in the middle of the night and accidentally lay on a chunk or two whilst inhaling the not so subtle aroma of fruit and hotdogs, regurgitated. Yum.

New Pants

2008-12-03T12:01:00.000Z

The Child has decided to become obsessed by Spiderman. This may not strike you as being at all odd, afterall he is a four year old boy, however please take into account that he has never ever actually seen Spiderman. Ever.

However, his Best Friend at school likes him so now The Child does too, by proxy.

Catching me at one of my weaker moments whilst shopping yesterday he excitedly informed me that "We" simply must buy these Spiderman underpants he'd found. He then commenced, upon returning home, to model them to myself, The Husband and The baby and then to Nanna and Grandad.

He's awfully proud of his new pants.

So proud infact that not only has he wore then to school today but he's insistant that he's going to show them to his Teacher too. Oh dear. I hope it doesn't send her into premature labour.

I should imagine she won't be the only person he'll be flashing today.

I blame The Husband. Not for any special reason other then it can't possibly be my fault so it simply must be his Paternal Genes.

He's a bright wee lad though. That's from his Maternal Genes. Obviously.

Potty Antics

2008-12-03T11:53:00.000Z

The Baby has decided to show some interest in the potty so is currently running around trouserless, I'm surprised her bum isn't blue, it's that cold. And we have the heating on. We always have the heating on. Sorry Dad.

I have declared that for every wee that goes in the actual potty she will get a sticker and when she has ten stickers she can have a present.

Apparently she wants "Spiderman Underpants" just like her brother has. Damn. What will I do with the "Dora" knickers I have for her upstairs?

So the delightfully cunning and clever little sod has decided that rather then do long wee's she will split each wee up into several short wee's in a short space of time, thus gaining maximum sticker collection. Bugger.

Foiled by a two year old. Again.

How very dare he

2008-12-03T09:07:00.001Z

The Husband is daring to Yawn. What has he to yawn about I ask you? I've told him I've been awake all night. I don't think he cares.

It's times like this when i'm secretly glad that he has the sofa whilst I and The Baby have a kingsize bed.

That's the thing with parenthood, it gives you a terminal case of competitive tiredness syndrome with your Other Half. You spend half your time dramatically insisting that you actually are more tired then them whilst glowering at them and refraining from shouting "Oh Fuck off then"

Parenthood brings back your teenage petulance.

Socks & snot

2008-12-03T08:54:00.000Z

The child is doomed to have wet feet. The snow is now slush and ice and I told The Husband to put The Child in his snow boots, but no, The Husband knows best. So off to school they go in his school shoes, through the slush. can you see where I'm going with this? Am I the only one who can see that The Child will have wet feet by the time he gets to school? So I packed them off on their journey with a spare pair of socks and strict instructions to check his feet (or face my sleepless wrath of doom)

The Husband has just returned, he said The Child's feet were dry. That will mean they're wet then. That will mean he didn't bother to check.

Head, meet desk. thud.

The Baby is currently trampling all over the sofa sans nappy scratching her arse, all she needs is a bottle of Bud and she'll officially be one of the lads. She certainly farts like one.

I'm about to hibernate for an hour seeing as The Baby deemed it entirely necessary to keep me away all night with a hungry and verbally demanding mouth and a snot factory nose.

The joys of parenthood. Quite.

The Babyisms.

2008-12-02T18:33:00.000Z

The Baby says the strangest of things for a 27 month old. Today's excerpts include amongst many others:

Nanna: "Shall I come round and see you tomorrow and we can go out?"
The Baby: "No. So Tough! I'm staying in."

Whilst setting up a game of "Pairs" she tells her dad, whilst referring to her brother:

"I'm not playing this with him because he's naughty when he plays it"

The husband offered to help her set it up to which she replied:

"I'm doing this, so don't help me."

It's not just her vocabulary, it's how she's so spontaneous with her speech and instigates conversations. She even has attitude. You can have entire conversations with you. She's very opinionated. Sometimes I have to remind myself she's The Baby. The Child at this age was only just stringing two or three words together maximum and only really spoke to label something or else fullfill or express a need/want, however by around 30 months you couldn't shut him up he chatted that much!

It's the thought that counts.

2008-12-02T10:52:00.000Z

Having removed my stripy over the knee socks from my personage due to them being saturated (as are my boots) from excessive snow, The Baby picked them up, ran over to me and said "You need these on to keep your feet nice and warm!" Bless. She looked so earnest that had my toes not shriveled away in fear whilst turning blue I may have been soft enough in the head to oblige and put them on. Still, It's the thought that counts. It's nice to be looked after, even if it is by a two year old.

Snow Day

2008-12-02T10:42:00.000Z

School is closed due to snow. Oh Arse. how utterly unthoughtful of them to lumber parents with manic 4 year olds on a school day.

We then had a delightful two mile round trip on foot in the thick snow to the doctor's only to find out that there is only one doctor working today and she wasn't even in yet as she was stuck in snow traffic and there were five people before me. Oh double arse. So we canceled and trekked all the way home again with The Child whining that his Tummy Hurts. His tummy always hurts. I can sympathise though, life makes my tummy hurt too.

The baby's buggy is not made for snow so thankfully The Husband struggled terrifically with it as opposed to me having to do it. The Baby thought it was hilarious, have to say I thoroughly agree. It's always good fun to watch one's husband struggle. Oh and I swear it wasn't me that threw a snowball down his neck. Honest.

Ditzy

2008-11-30T18:31:00.001Z

You know you're having a bad day when you put your jacket spud in the microwave........on defrost and make fairy buns, forgetting to put any butter in the mixture.

At least I didn't set fire to the kitchen. I suppose that's one good thing, right?

Bah Humbug.

2008-11-30T16:43:00.000Z

The Husband (AKA Bah Humbug) begrudgingly ventured into The Loft of Doom today to get down our meager and measly Christmas trimmings. This literally consists of a very small and tatty cheap tree (Just looking at it makes me need a drink just to commiserate with the poor tree and share it's woe at being so, well, naff) and some very tangled lights.

This year is The Baby's first Christmas that she'll actually be aware of seeing as she's now Two. However, I'm rather perplexed at her galloping around the room, trouserless whilst singing very loudly 'Happy Birthday to You!' at the tree and the lights and the small inflatable snowman that no matter how much you kick and punch will not lie down an die. Oh the hours of fun.

Happy days, a Christmas with a probably Satanist, a probably Pagan and two very crazy Heathen children.

Still, I do love fairy lights.

Rebel Rebel

2008-11-29T21:21:00.001Z

Whilst wrecking his room and wreaking havoc in the process having been put in "Time Out" in his bedroom, The Child decided he meant business. Not only did he empty all his drawers of clothes, empty his book shelf of books, upturn all his toys and peel decor from his wall he actually un-paired all of his socks too. How's that for rampant detail when making a point?

Hellspawn

2008-11-28T20:50:00.000Z

I hate tea yet have plenty of it and yet I like gin and have none. Tell me how is this fair?

The Children are darlings and beautiful even if i do say so myself. However, they are also the sole reason for The Husband saying with increasing frequency that he has a strong desire to go hunting for bricks between which he'd like to smash his lucky charms.

His current catchphrase that reverberates around the house with increasing volume and venom is "We're not having any more"

Still, I figure one more couldn't hurt, right? I'll humour him for a few years then when he least expects it, I'll invite him along to a scan or something. It'll be like a weed, it will grow on him.

Pairs

2008-11-28T17:43:00.000Z

The Baby has just finished setting up the game 'pairs' on the floor.

The Baby: "Come on Daddy Pig it's time to play"
The Husband: "It's okay I'll watch you and Mummy"
The Baby: Whilst extending a tiny yet perfect hand beseechingly, eyes saucer wide "but pleeeease Daddy Pig"
The Husband: "is this called emotional blackmail?"
The Baby: "No. It's called pairs"

Spots

2008-11-27T23:47:00.000Z

The Child was adamant that he didn't want his doting dad to bath and put him to bed tonight. When we asked what was actually wrong with his Dad he replied "I really don't like his spots"

I suppose it's a good thing he didn't throw the question back at me, I fear nobody would have gone to bed for a long time and The Husband would petition for divorce. Unfortunately He can't afford one. A Divorce that is. This makes it all the more terribly fun to antagonise each other. It's my only hobby.

It's a good job we love each other. & we do. Honest. Sometimes.

He owes me an all over rub and instead of petulantly yet rightfully demanding it I'm letting him sleep. This is Love.

I wish I could afford to be an alcoholic.

Doctors

2008-11-27T23:34:00.001Z

In other news I have to somehow muster the courage to make an appointment to see a doctor and admit that I'm irreparably broken inside and am not a functioning human who is worthy of existance and at times don't actually much care for existing. Happy days.

I wonder if they can prescribe Gin?

Maybe if i say please?

In the still of the night.

2008-11-27T22:45:00.000Z

At some point in the night, a small sigh punctuates the darkness as her perfect hands knead and fetter upon my spine. I shift feeling her warmth, a jig-saw perfect fit as she completes me. Turning towards her, nimble fingers grab and need against me until she finds her bounty and settles into the slow rhythmic suckle of a midnight snack. Her perfection is like pure sunshine glittering on to the night. I love her. I tell her so. I tell her again in tender whispers. She murmurs back. She loves me too.

I still love her two hours later, and two hours after that. I just don't like her as much those times.

I lay adrift in the night with only the digital display of the alarm clock for light as it mocks the passing of my life minute by minute. I Fade into the lullaby of her breaths and wait for sleep or morning, which ever claims me first.

I should miss The Husband in my bed but I think I'd miss The Baby more. He shall share my bed until we're creaking and old, until we sleep and do not wake. & She shall share my bed until she sleeps through the night finally or drives me utterly insane, whichever comes first.

& Maybe I don't love him either

2008-11-27T22:42:00.000Z

I'm getting rather tired of The Husband telling me to "shut up typing" because the keys are "too noisy" Maybe I should remind him that his very existence is "too noisy"

He Loves Me Not

2008-11-27T11:10:00.000Z

He however loses brownie points for a) insinuating I'm insane and b) not knowing the song when I was prancing round semi clad in cellulite and bra singing the theme tune to the Littlest Hobo.

He Loves me

2008-11-27T10:46:00.001Z

The Husband decides that whilst i'm in the bath he simply must go to the toilet, who said romance was dead? Personally I think it's a sneaky tactic to stink me out of the bath and downstairs to my mother who's being fawned over by The Baby.

I'm unceremoniously trying to pin a too-small towel around my vastness with my elbow whilst brushing my teeth when The Husband proclaims "you've put on fat on your stomach but not on your bum?" Frothing at the mouth with Colgate, brush buzzing, my eyes bulge at him in miscomprehension. He clarifies "You still have a small bum"

I think he's lying. He must love me.

Slobetta

2008-11-27T00:17:00.000Z

I'm sure there is a latent irony in reading about all the quaint 'Good Mother' activities you could be doing with your spawn, whilst you allow them to sit conversing with The Wiggles, that happen to be on the TV..........and have been for most of the day.

If these activities are so simple, why is it I still never get round to doing them? Do people really spontaneously whilst grinning like a maniac with their gnarly toenails poking out of birkenstocks in winter gather up their spawn and set up treasure hunts and dare I say, go on outdoor escapades all in the name of fun? It's grim outside. Then again it's always grim, this is Lancashire. Collecting Autumnal artifacts could easily turn into a treacherous game of mind the dog shit whilst dodging the fat grey rain that falls like dead bodies.

I do try, honest. I tried painting but never again, i quite like my kitchen units white thank you. I tried baking yet got overly anal and tetchy when The Child deemed it would be a good idea to mix so furiously half the mixture ends up on him, me, The Baby and the kitchen floor (Of Doom). Then there's the craft time, only The Child is a little over zealous with the glitter and my god you'll find glitter, several weeks after the event in places you forgot you even had (however it does add a new sparkle to find the sausage, ahem. Silver lining and all.)

I convince myself that whilst I'm a sloven and slattern-like house wife who is allergic to housework with a deadly addiction to the internet, my children are learning the vital art of entertaining themselves.

Is it really so criminal to have your catchphrase being 'in a minute!, just a tick!' whilst inwardly groaning at the prospect of yet another mindless game of rolling toy cars across the carpet and lining them up at the other end?

They seem happy enough. & oh how they're loved. I think they love me too, sometimes.

Sweet babe o'mine.

2008-11-26T23:34:00.000Z

Bedtime with The Baby has deteriorated once again into a hostage situation. The hostage namely being me and the Husband conveniently being 'out' so nobody to pay my ransom.

The baby raged. Insert much screaming, gasping, shrieking, shouting, screaming, sobbing, demanding, begging, near vomiting, distress, anger..and that's just from her. Oh Arse.

Two hours. Two bastard hours it took for The Baby to a) Go to sleep and b) stay asleep so I could exit the room.

She lulled me into a false security and appeared for all intent purposes asleep. That was until I dared to leave the room then all hell broke loose, again.

I don't do 'controlled crying' and nor do i do 'crying it out'. I'm sorry but you do not want to broach this topic with me, you really don't. I'm tired and depressed and am a breast feeding Ninja who can shoot from 40 paces. However seeing as The Baby is technically a toddler I do let her have a little shout and scream only relenting to walking back into the hostage situation when she persuades herself out of anger and into the realms of being genuinely upset bestilling my throbbing fury in to repentant guilt.

It bemuses me how she can tumult my emotions from the heights of mental instability to the aching pits of undying love in vast pendulous motions again and again in the space of minutes.

How can this darling child who's laid in her bed armed with a pink rabbit whispering 'Pop goes the Weasel' and 'Two Little Dickie Birds' to herself, massaging my swollen heart with her sweet baby breath seemingly inflating it, also be the same child who moments before and moments later had me tearing clumps of my hair out whilst negotiating an escape route straight out the bedroom window in search of expensive breakable things to smash whilst practicing some of my own screaming techniques?

I'd forgiven her for the two bastard hours it took to get some semblance of the evening to myself. That was until she woke up crying approximately ninety minutes later.

Oh hoorah. The Husband (who has now returned avec un Scouse) has miraculously managed to get her back to sleep. On.His.Own

Bugger. That will be another blow job I owe him now.

Exile.

2008-11-26T23:12:00.000Z

I feel like an exile from who I used to be and from the life I should have.

I'm not saying I deserve the best, just that I don't deserve this. After all, I'm pretty sure I've never raped, pillaged or killed anybody, lately.

Him Indoors

2008-11-26T22:58:00.000Z

As much as I love him, I don't much like The Husband sometimes. These sometimes are vastly becoming mostimes. I abhor the way he so easily exists in this horrid life unto which because of him we've been thrust and forced to live in. I'm irritated by how unaffected and complacent he is with life and I begin to wonder, will he ever rescue us from this? Does he even want to?

I'm more then a little envious with the ease and luxury he has to exit on a hard evening when the children are being hellspawn knowing that I as always, will deal with it purely because I have to.

The Children adore him however one night this week when he attempted to settle the Baby she came up with this pearl "Go away Daddy. I don't like you" I stopped myself from agreeing but I did allow myself a somewhat churlish smile that I bit down upon in the dark. He responded with "I thought we were friends?" to which she proclaimed "No. Not anymore" Oh how my private audience in my head clapped.

She loves him really. Just like me. We just like to pretend we don't sometimes. It's a bit like playing Happy Families only without the Happiness.

Naps

2008-11-26T11:06:00.000Z

Me: 'Let me know when you want a nap' (because I'm bloody knackered)
Baby: 'I don't want to go to sleep, I want to wake up now'
Me: 'Well we didn't get a lot of sleep last night did we darling? So maybe we should have a snuggle and a little nap?' (You kept me awake all night you toddlerous cretin and now I want to go to bed)
Baby: 'Don't want to sleep, I'm watching The Wiggles'
Me: 'Ok well maybe afterwards then' (you WILL sleep)

Naps have become a military operation in precision. No naps will equal hellchild after tea tonight. A nap too late will equal a bedtime so ineffectual that I will be forced to throw myself out of the bedroom window and scream, or else curl up into a ball, rock and drool lots whilst randomly mumbling various concoctions of vowels.

Baby: 'I want to go to bed, turn wiggles off and then go to bed'

Result!

Sweet boobs o'mine.

2008-11-26T10:43:00.000Z

4 Year old is at school and for once managed not to fall over. This is a cause for rejoicing. Husband is at the Jobcentre and Baby is enthralled by the wonderful Peppa pig. I love Peppa Pig purely for this reason.

I feel shortchanged as my Mother can't come round today so i'll have to actually pretend to do some parenting, on.my.own. Bugger. I wonder if I can find any more Peppa Pig...

I'm tired and unimpressed. Baby decided it would be a good thing to once again feed every hour throughout the night. Baby is actually 26 months old. Yes. I'm one of those mums & I don't even like lentils.

I tried to covet my boobs just for myself this morning, mine mine all mine. Baby was not impressed and commenced operation cryathon. I gave in eventually. I always do. Thus rendering entire attempt at being stern totally useless and without a point. Double Bugger. I'm great at making baby cry for something I refuse to give, then when she's all snotty and pouty I give it to her anyway. I think mayhaps i'm a closet sadist. Oh well, it passes the time.

Baby pig is demanding cuddles. Snort.

I quit.

2008-11-25T22:49:00.000Z

That is it. I resign. I hereby officially hand in my resignation of Wife and Mother.

Or at least I do for the next five minutes until baby Cries, Husband grunts and the Child starts singing about bloody Bethlehem in his sleep again.

Tomorrow I shall break the news to him that we're not Christian.