This morning I got up, procrastinated for far too long over whether I should do my exercises… eventually decided to do them… had a shower, was washing my hair (feeling pretty proud of my achievements so far 🤣) and then noticed that I appear to have morphed in to a giant moulting Labrador. Like, seriously, WTF!!!

Just incase the –

*Stretch marks

*Raging hormones

*Destroyed vagina/sliced open core

*Pittance that is maternity pay

*Postpartum body (which feels completely disconnected to you)

*Mom guilt about returning to work/not returning to work

– aren’t enough, someone obviously thought us women needed a bit more to deal with… cue the postpartum hairloss!

Isla is 19weeks old. I thought I’d got away with this shit!!

I’m telling you if this chunk of hair doesn’t weigh a stone I’m not going to be a happy bunny!!!!

Isla is not the only one who’s been a brave girl this week!!!

I think there are very few people who know me who would describe me as shy – I work in HR so talking to people is a big part of what I do, HOWEVER, I do really struggle with my confidence at times, and I’ll be honest, it’s at an all time low after having Isla.

I have a weird fixation on whether people will judge me by how I look, so when I’m not feeling great in my body I have a horrible habit of not really going out much. Logically, I know it’s ridiculous and I know that no one other than me really gives a shit about how flabby my tummy is, but I just can’t shake it off. (I was like this pre-Isla – I put my midwife appointment off for as long as I could in the hope that I’d lose a few pounds before having to step on the scales!! My postpartum body is just making it worse!)

Up until this week I hadn’t booked or taken Isla to a single baby class (she’s 18 weeks old this week!). In a moment of braveness I have booked up our September!! We’ll be going to baby massage on Tuesdays and Rhythm Time classes on Thursdays. Even braver still – I saw a post on our community Facebook group for the local mums to meet up and have lunch… and… I went!!! All the other mums already knew each other, in fact, they’d just all been to a baby class together, so it was extra nerve wracking being the new girl, but I didn’t die, Isla got to meet some other babies for the first time and – dare I say it – I had a lovely afternoon!

I didn’t catch anyone looking at me in disgust once 🤣 everyone was really lovely! And today we’ve had an invite for Isla to a first birthday party pushed through the door from one of the babies ♥️♥️♥️ Too cute!!!

I may just dodge becoming a hermit yet 🙌🏼

 

We had Isla’s check up for her hips today… and we’ve been told she can go to 4 hours out of her harness every day now!! Even better is that we’ve only got to do this for 2 weeks and then we can go to nighttime only wear 🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼 I am so, so proud of her, she’s done so well in it (I know she doesn’t actually have to do anything but still 🤣)

As happy as I am that we’ll hopefully be saying goodbye to her harness very soon, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous about it too! We can have the 4 hours out however we want – so can do 1 block of 4 hours, or split it in to 2 x 2 hour blocks or 4 x 1 hour blocks, etc, by the time I got back from the hospital today the only option left was one long stretch… and it ended in tears!! I think she gets so excited about being out that she feels like she has to kick her little legs as fast as she can – ok for an hour, but after 3 hours of it she was exhausted! Tried to get her to nap, but it’s literally like she can’t control those little legs 😂😂😂 ended up putting the harness back on half hour early as she was very grumpy and overtired. I’m sure she’ll adapt to it fairly quickly (I hope so anyway!!)

What I really, really hope though is that she continues to love wriggling! And that I never, EVER take it for granted how lovely it is to watch her do it! The hour out of her harness is by far my favourite part of every day (maybe paired with waking up and seeing her lovely smiles – god knows where she got her morning person attitude from cos it definitely isn’t from me or daddy!!). I don’t ever want to forget how special it is, or lose any of the joy I get from watching her! At the moment it’s an hour filled with so many smiles, giggles and more recently happy tears (goddamn hormones are wreaking havoc at the moment!!)

I can’t upload videos to here (you have to pay extra to do that – my pittance of SMP doesn’t stretch to that 😂) but if you go on my Instagram ( my account name is firsttimemumming… orrrr this link might work! https://www.instagram.com/p/B1wT2pGlIdn/?igshid=1p7pnxfaa8xs8 ) you’ll see just how happy she is wriggling! It’s literally the best thing ever ♥️♥️♥️

That being said – I am SO EXCITED that we’ll finally be able to take her swimming now!!! Eeeeeeeek!!! Fun times ahead 🥰

I’m on a roll now. I’d just like to share mummy vs daddy’s morning routine…

We’ll start with daddy’s because it’s easier…

– wake up

– go get coffee

– make self bowl of cereal

– bring cereal upstairs and eat it in bed whilst playing with phone

– moan at mummy that he doesn’t know why he bothers making her a coffee because she never drinks it

Vs mummy’s…

– wake up

– change Isla’s bum

– Express breast milk

– warm bottle

– feed Isla

– change Isla’s bum again after her morning poo

– continue to feed Isla

– go to drink coffee then realise it’s gone cold

This is standard. But today… ohhhh… daddy disappeared for half hour… Mummy ASSUMED he’d gone out to collect the shopping and get her the breakfast he’d told her he would on his way back… after 30mins daddy shouted upstairs to ask if mummy needed anything when he was out.

Intrigued, mummy started walking down the stairs at the same time as asking daddy what he had been doing. Daddy told mummy he’d been doing the washing up, but mummy heard him turn the tap on as he said it. When mummy got downstairs she found daddy having himself a second breakfast without a care in the world.

Mummy was pissed off. Daddy couldn’t understand why. Mummy considered stabbing daddy, but at the last minute managed to restrain herself.

GIVE. ME. STRENGTH.

 

*RANT ALERT*

Just before I launch in to this, you need to know that I’ve held off writing this down for a good 2 weeks… that’s how long this has been simmering! I feel like I use all of my patience up on my little one and there’s not much left for anyone else. I wasn’t going to write it down, but if I don’t I think I might actually self combust. So here goes…

Few weeks ago we took Isla to see the mother-in-law, now I do need to mention a few things here… (although you’d probably be more in my favour if I didn’t 🤣 ) She is 81. She has been widowed 4 years. And she has cancer which cannot be cured. Also, my husband is an only child, and she doesn’t really have any other family. Anywayyyy… despite all that, I am really, really, REALLY struggling to bite my tongue with her at the minute.

I get the same few comments every time I visit, they include:

“She always cries when she comes here”

“I don’t think she likes coming here”

“She doesn’t like me”

“Do you think you can force a smile out for me?” (Isla, not me 😂 )

On our last visit though she really outdid herself. I took Isla’s playmat with us so that she could have her “wriggle hour” (hour with her pavlik harness off) at her gran’s house. I thought she’d like to see it, well, cos it’s freaking adorable. Turns out I shouldn’t have bothered, as I had a few additional comments thrown in…

“Her feet are cold, she should be wearing socks” (the harness has little booties attached so no, she should not!)

“Should you be doing that? You’ll damage her hips” (when I wriggled my daughter’s legs while we were playing)

“Are you supposed to give her cold milk?” (It wasn’t cold, I’d expressed it before we left the house, but that’s besides the point)

And the icing on the cake…

“I have never, NEVER known a baby to cry as much as Isla” (she cried for like 2 minutes after happily wriggling for 30mins because she was hungry, and well… she’s a baby and can’t talk yet!!!)

So, at this point I’d lost my cool, and I’ll admit I answered back, not how I wanted to, just with a strained laugh and the comment “well how many babies do you know?”

Anyway, all of this led to a text message to my husband to say that she was “devastated” after the visit as the atmosphere had been so terrible, he went round to see her and told her that sometimes her comments could be upsetting, she caveated this with “is Becki ok? Do you think she has postnatal depression?” 🤬🤬🤬

Anyway, I knew I needed to be the bigger person here, was happy that hubby had told her her comment had upset me, and so I text her to arrange to go round… this is where it gets fun!!!

I’ve been round this week, and instead of the apology that I was naively expecting I got…

“I was worried about you the other week, you seemed stressed” to which I said “well, my dad HAD just had a heart attack and there were just a few comments that upset me as you know” to which she replied “well, when you asked how many babies I know, I have known lots of babies in my time. And as for your dad, well I have cancer, you have your mum, your dad, Paul and your brother, I have no one (I can’t remember the exact words of the next bit but in my head they translated to “so it’s not as bad as me, get over it”) I was also hit with “I always wanted a big family, 4 boys, although what’s that saying? ‘A daughter is a daughter for all of her life, but a son is only a son until he finds a wife’ and that’s very true”

So yeah, I’m smiling and nodding and possibly rocking in a corner by now too and slowly burning from the inside.

I know I’m going to hell for bitching about this. I’ve accepted it. It’s fine. So yeah, give me strength!!!!

 

🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯

 

 

Ok, so sex… That will be what got most of us in to this mess!!! And yet it’s still a surprisingly controversial topic of conversation. We MIGHT talk about when the best time to do-the-deed is to conceive (when the smiley face flashes on the ovulation stick… no need to waste those swimmers any other time 😂🤷🏻‍♀️) we might even talk about sex DURING pregnancy, but we don’t really talk about it after the baby is born – other than the awkward conversation with the dr at your 6 week check up where you’re informed it’s now medically safe to do it, and do you need any info on contraception. So it’s back to business as usual. A private, behind closed doors business!

Except it’s not really business as usual is it? For what it’s worth, this is what I think about it…

1. In the words of Sweet Brown… Ain’t nobody got time for that!!! I mean, seriously!!! Babies take up A LOT of time. And when you’re not feeding them, burping them, playing with them or soothing them to sleep I can bet that you’re running round tidying up after them, maybe showering (if you’re lucky) or possibly feeding yourself (if you’re really lucky). Orrrrr you might be sleeping yourself. And I can tell you now there’s no way I’m giving up my much needed sleep or (not so much needed) food! And sex without showering is just gross!

2. If/When you DO decide to take the plunge (or allow your partner to, so to speak!) it will probably require a bit of planning. For a number of reasons really, if you’re anything like me you’ll want to make sure that you’ve planned in a some time for a good shower so you can shave, as that may have slipped off your self maintenance routine (I’ve got showering down to a fine no-longer-than-5-minutes art and shaving is NOT a part of that!) It’s not quite the military operation of trying to conceive sex, more like planning a surprise party – it’s not a natural turn of events, it requires planning, everyone knows it’s going to happen, including the “surprised” person, but everyone’s happy to go along with it and act their part

3. It’s a bit like a game of operation – touch the wrong bits and trust me you’ll know about it! Breastfeeding??? Remember when your nipples were just for fun? Yeah well now if you try and get them involved in this party they’re gonna make a mess. I mean milk baths might be your thing, in which case crack on!

4. It’s kinda like losing your virginity all over again. Having a baby has seriously knocked my (already pretty shit) body confidence! So using my body for anything other than caring for the tiny human that destroyed it was genuinely nerve wracking. Ridiculous really given that my hubby literally saw me cut open in the operating theatre… even a big mum tum overhang is an improvement on that, right?

5. It’s also kinda like the Sahara desert… it’s a mirage. You THINK there’s fluid on the horizon, but it’s just an illusion! 🤷🏻‍♀️ Seriously, it feels like everything’s functioning as normal right up to the point that you realise it’s not!!

And if all that’s not enough you also have to prepare yourself for the fact that at some point during the act your little one WILL make some kind of noise. It might be a cry, it might be a giggle, it might be a fart… I can’t tell you what noise it will be but I CAN tell you whatever it is, it WILL be off-putting!!

There are times when I feel a bit guilty that there’s been such a disruption to my husband in the bedroom department… but then I remember that men just have to have 10minutes of fun to make a baby. Us women have to spend 9months growing the baby, stretching our bodies to their limits in every sense. That we bear the marks and scars of it forever. And when I remember all that I don’t feel so guilty anymore. In fact I kinda wanna parade round naked as a method of punishment – like “LOOK WHAT YOU DID TO ME!!” But then I might need his help in making another one at some point, so best not 🤣🤣🤣

Yesterday was a good day! I was invincible!! I got up, fed Isla, put the washing on, went on the treadmill, fed myself, pegged the washing on the line, had a shower AND took Isla to her hospital appointment! Clearly, yesterday, I had superpowers!!!

Fast forward to today however…

It’s 17:00. I have JUST had my first bit of food. I’ve not showered. I’ve not brushed my teeth. The only reason I’m dressed (I use the term loosely… *read: have thrown a creased up dress on) is because about an hour ago I caved in and put Isla in the car seat and stuck her in the car to go for a drive to send her to sleep in the hope that when she woke up she’d be in a better mood.

This is what I’ve got!

That look says “I’ll play without crying mummy but don’t think I’m going to enjoy it!”

I have strong mummy guilt today!!! I keep asking myself why she seems so unhappy all of a sudden… is it something I’m doing? Is it something I’m not doing? Is she in pain? Is she sad? Is she going to grow out of it? How do I maintain enough patience to make it through an entire day of crying without sighing when she starts up again? How do I not murder my husband when he comes home and tells me he’s had a tough day at work 😂🤷🏻‍♀️ (joking… maybe!) … so many questions!

Thing is, even on the worst days she’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me but mannnnn it’s difficult at times!!! And yet… I know she’s just got to give me just one of her gummy little smiles and today will be a good day. Oh to be 3.5 months old and have so much power.

Pray for me 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼