Them vs Us

Another controversial post for you today... It's something I've been thinking about ever since I got pregnant. And something I perhaps shouldn't confess to but, you know me, I like to be honest. And overshare. And tell people things that are best kept to myself. Hmmm.

But, anyway, it's Sunday after all. Confession time. Here goes: before I got pregnant I used to view women with children in a rather unsisterly way. I don't know what it was, but a part of me thought they'd kind of failed the feminist movement somewhat by conforming to biological stereotypes rather than going out there and changing the world (I am aware of how ridiculous this sounds, it's not like I was changing the bloody world either). But I thought they'd taken the 'easy option' by choosing motherhood over furthering their careers. And I was aware that lots of women did manage to further their careers while becoming mothers but they seemed to be in the minority and seemed to spend the entire time banging on about how hard it was, which just struck me as showing off.

It may sound absolutely insane. Like I said, it was just a small part of me - I'm not completely inhuman, I did also understand that they were sacrificing many of their wants and needs for the future generation. But I would roll my eyes if I was on a train and heard two mothers chatting about some aspect of their child's care as though it was the only thing that mattered. I'd get irritated if I heard them complain about how tired they were (you CHOSE this life, I'd think, very uncharitably, suck it up). I'd hate the women with pushchairs in shopping centres who'd ram past me to get to where they wanted, completely oblivious to my existence. I'd tut out loud at children having tantrums in supermarkets. I'd do a SATC Samantha at badly behaved children in nice restaurants. I'd inwardly judge women who decided to be stay-at-home mums with fierce prejudice. I'd even be a bit pissed off if a pregnant woman without a bump yet barged past me on the tube to grab a seat.

I know, I know.

It really did feel a bit 'them vs us' - the childless (or childfree as I liked to think of it) versus the mothers. How horrible of me. But I don't think I'm alone in feeling like this*.

If I'd had a difficult day at work, I used to think how easy mothers had it, being at home all day watching This Morning and online shopping. HA! One thing I have learned: there is nothing mentally harder than being at home alone all day with a young baby. Single mothers have my utmost respect.

One of my friends said that having a baby is like joining an epic worldwide club. A club of overtired, empathetic women. It's so true. You suddenly feel sorry for the pregnant woman on the tube who knows she has to grab that seat because at ten weeks she feels lightheaded standing. You offer her yours gladly. You feel deep sadness for the poor woman trying to have a nice meal out while containing a bored hyperactive toddler. You wish you could help. When you see a woman pushing a hooded pram with grim determination you notice her eyebags and stained leggings and you wonder how old the baby is, and how much sleep she had the previous night. You want to reach out and hug her and tell her that it gets easier, it really does. When you hear women chatting about childcare, you feel great relief that you're not the only one going through such things and often end up joining in (motherhood is a great way of getting talking to ANYONE!). You feel these women ARE you, they belong with you, you GET them and you like them even if in your former life you would have had nothing in common. It is actually one of the best bits of motherhood - this sudden deep solidarity with other women.

I wonder why the old me felt so scathing of mothers. I wonder if it was jealousy, or some kind of defence mechanism. I always worried that I wouldn't get around to having children and that I'd regret it long term - was this my own survival instincts prepping me for the future? Telling me somehow that that life was crap, that I'd had a lucky escape? I don't know. I do know I feel a bit ashamed now. It doesn't mean I don't look back on my old life and think, god that was a great life, I had so much freedom and time and opportunity. In many ways I miss it. I miss being one of the childfree. Because without a child, you ARE free. I am aware of motherhood's limitations. I don't think that there's a clearcut winner in the 'having a baby' versus 'not having a baby' life choices. Both have their difficulties, both have their advantages.

But at the same time, this new empathy, this new KINDNESS and respect for others that I've developed since having Daphne. That's something I didn't expect, and something I'm so grateful for.

I guess the short version of this post is: motherhood has made me a nicer person.

* It may be that EVERYONE feels like this before they have kids, in which case, I feel much less sociopathic. 

First birthday party ideas: Bubblegum Balloons

Just a quick post from me today because - yay - it's nearly bank holiday weekend and I'm sure everyone has more exciting things planned than reading blogs. But I just had to give a massive plug/mention to Bubblegum Balloons. If you follow me on Instagram you've probably already seen that for Daphne's first birthday we bought her a personalised balloon, filled with confetti. That, along with a car seat, was her only present from us. Bear with me...

When my sister turned one (she's now 32 so that's a loooong time ago) my parents filled her cot with balloons on the morning of her birthday and there's a photo of her waking up completely mesmerised by these rubbery things all around her (luckily not freaked out, as I fear Daph would be, but Sophie is a little bit more fiesty). So for some reason I got it into my head that I wanted to do something similar for Daph - but something maybe a bit less scary.

I can't remember where I heard about Bubblegum Balloons - probably on Instagram, but they are the loveliest UK company and they make beautiful balloons for all kinds of swanky occasions - weddings, press launches, fashion shows etc. It's such a simple but genius idea - STYLISH balloons that you can personalise. Most of them are filled with confetti (as the one we bought Daph was) and have beautiful little 'tails' attached, and are perfectly weighted so that they sit quite happily on the floor (they're filled with helium). Better still, they come tissue wrapped in a simple white box - watching Daph's face as we opened it and the balloon floated to the air was just a magical experience. And she LOVES it.

We've had hours of fun out of it already - her pulling the tail to bring it down, headbutting it, watching it twirl about... it's almost better than her plastic piano (current favourite toy du jour). She laughs her head off when she sees it. We bought her a pretty confetti balloon filled with hearts, clouds and stars, but we did notice after there's a circus one (she LOVES elephants) so I think next year we'll go for that one. It wasn't cheap, at £36, but it was worth every penny. A week on and it's still going strong too!

As well as the helium balloons, Bubblegum also sell super cute mini balloons on sticks and conventional ones you blow up yourself. The customer service was great too - I realised I had ordered Daph's balloon to be delivered the day after Daph's birthday - well done mummy - and they brought it forward without any bother. Have a look at the website - highly recommended!

The Fear

Tomorrow, Oli is leaving for Edinburgh, where he'll be staying for just over a week. He's going to be doing a show at the fringe with the wondrous Chad Lelong - a reinterpretation of David Bowie songs - if you're at the festival and fancy popping by, then you can find out all the details here.

But this post isn't really about that (sorry Ol). It's about me (so far, so predictable). You see, it'll be the first time I'll have been left alone with Daph even overnight, let alone for a week. And I have a confession: I am absolutely terrified.

I've known this week was coming up for months - I think Oli agreed to do the festival back in January. But it seemed so far away and I thought as Daph would be one it would be OK. I assumed by now we'd have a really lovely easy routine and rapport going on, and of course it never occurred to me that she would still not be sleeping through the night every night. *bitter laughter*

At present, I know I'm a spoilt cow because Oli is around a lot in the day - he works evenings obviously and so I've always got help with the childcare. I've never had to be a traditional mum, stuck at home all day on my own with a baby. I get to say things like: 'Can you just hold Daph for a sec while I pluck an errant chin hair/straighten my hair/have a twenty-minute toilet break?' I've got used to the lie ins that I get every morning (I think I mentioned in an old post that Oli and I struck a deal - I do all the night feeds, and he gets up with her in the morning so I can catch up on sleep). I usually wake up about 8am. But this week, I'll be doing the night feeds AND getting up at 6am and giving her breakfast and then looking after her all day until she goes to bed. I am afraid. Very afraid. Of the following things specifically:

1. Bathtime. How will I coordinate running the bath/ getting her ready/stopping her from drowning while she's in the bath while I turn around and grab her towel? We have a SYSTEM goddamit: Oli gets her ready for her bath, I give her the bath, he watches her while I get all her towels ready and then I lift her out of the bath and bring her to him to get her into her nightime nappy/pyjamas. Then I read her a story and give her her milk and she goes to bed. It works! It's a process! If one of us is missing, it's no longer a process; it's a health and safety violation.
2. Mealtimes. These are my most hated of all parenting duties, due to Daph's rather fussy nature (read: tendency to scream and squirm and try to climb out of her highchair after one mouthful of food). And I will have to do all of them. Worse still, I will have no one there to distract her/pull funny faces while I try to shove food into her unsuspecting mouth. And how am I meant to prepare the actual food when if you leave her in her playpen for more than about ten minutes she goes batshit crazy?
3. Playtime. I guess I am a terrible mother because... *whispers* ... I find playing with my own child monumentally dull after about twenty minutes. Oli is BRILLIANT at playing with her, and comes up with voices, names and characters for all her animals etc etc. All I have managed so far is voracious quacking as I squeeze her rubber duck in the bath (which barely even registers a response, truth be told, let alone a smile). I feel so ashamed but I just don't know HOW TO PLAY. I love her to death - I think I've got loving her down to a fine art and have mastered the art of cuddling and kissing her and soothing her when she's sad. But more than ten minutes of stacking bricks that she just knocks over in favour of barging towards my handbag/mobile phone/any hard surface on which to bonk her head and I just want to stick her in front of Teletubbies and hide behind my laptop. I try reading to her, but she just yanks the books out of my hand and closes them. Apparently trapping Mummy's fingers in the pages is more fun than watching Mummy point out where Mr Tickle is.
4. Going to the toilet. How. How. How.
5. Having a shower. The only time I'll be able to do this is when she's having her first nap at 9.30am. But on Thursday I have to go to work and my mum is going to babysit. So again, how, WHEN am I meant to have a shower before leaving for the office? At 5.30 before she wakes up? When I've probably been up at 4am anyway. Maybe the answer is NEVER GOING TO BED.

I so wish I was better with children - I've never been very good with them, and much as I adore my amazing little daughter, I find spending long periods time with her now she's older and more aware (and more opinionated) really quite challenging. I know you're not meant to admit that, but I hope I'm not the only mother out there like it. I love the days when Granny comes over and I can sneak off and waste some time doing fun adult things like, y'know, replying to my emails. Or writing blog posts. The most challenging thing by far about being a mother is not having time to get things done. I hate that it takes four days to fold the washing because any spare second is spent firefighting the essential chores like emptying the nappy bin (you don't want to leave that overflowing in August; LESSON LEARNT).

I am not complaining - I mean, it's hardly a hardship to be at home with my child like many mothers up and down the country whose partners work abroad. But I AM scared. I think this week will be an interesting learning experience for me (and Daph, poor mite). I am hoping it'll turn out better than I expect. I've arranged trips out for us every day, to make sure I don't go insane with loneliness. But I'm frightened. I hope that doesn't make me a horrible person. Wish us luck!

One year baby BODY update!

I wasn't sure what to call this post, or indeed, whether to write it at all, but it's been niggling in my head for a week or so I decided to just do it. Please skip if it's not your kind of thing, but for those of you who are curious about how having a baby changes you physically... read on. I love a good overshare, me. I also love reading these kind of posts because pregnancy affects everyone so differently - I find it fascinating.

So, deep breath, here we go...

My weight

Daph was born a year ago and I am kind of perversely proud to say I have not lost all my baby weight yet. Shock horror. I haven't actually weighed myself since we moved because we've lost the bathroom scales somewhere in the melee, but you know how you know your own body... I would give a rough guess that I currently weigh about 9st 9 (on a good, non-period day, first thing in the morning after a wee). I'm 5ft 7 just to put that in context for you. When I got pregnant, I was about 9st 3, but I was actually the lightest I'd been in a while because I'd been on a bit of a fitness kick and had been going to the gym a few times a week for about six months. Earlier that year, I was about 9st 7, and that was probably my base weight for a couple of years.

So yes, I am not back down to 9st 3 (I was nearly 12 stone at my heaviest when pregnant!). I wanted to get back to 9st 7 but I haven't even managed that. I have mixed feelings about this to be honest. I think - if I wanted to - I COULD get back down to that weight relatively easily, by doing a few runs each week. I started running earlier in the year when Daph was younger and weirdly I was less tired (somehow smaller babies are less tiring because despite the night-wakings, they're less demanding during the day and nap a lot). But I gave it up when I started working again, when she was about five months old. Now when I get some time to myself I have to do my freelance work, and exercising has definitely taken a back seat.

Interestingly, when Daph was first born I was desperate to lose ALL the baby weight and really worried about it, but, now I can honestly say I don't care! It's quite liberating. The only part of me that really wants to lose the extra pounds is the part of me that sees myself in jeans, as they're not as flattering as they were, but otherwise I am quite happy floating about in maxi dresses. The extra weight is all across my thighs - the inside of my thighs mostly, and a little bit on my tummy and arms. It's not terrible. And on that note...

My tummy

The good thing about having a long back is that you also have a long tummy. Which means it usually looks pretty flat - there's plenty of space to spread out the fat y'see. I also have a tummy button that goes in a lot which helps it to look flatter (blimey, this is a weird blog post). So my tummy actually looks pretty normal at first glance. I didn't get any stretch marks (thankfully) when I was pregnant and the skin isn't loose. What is different, is the - now excuse me here cos this is also a bit weird - texture of my skin on my stomach. It's kind of squishier than before. I guess, it's because it stretched and it's now fatter, but I think it's actually also cos my abs separated and I am fairly sure they haven't joined back together yet. I think there are exercises I can do to sort this, but I can't really be bothered to be honest. Maybe if we go on a bikini holiday next year I will do something about it. The main thing is that my tummy is pretty much the same as before, just a bit... softer.

My general shape

My mum doesn't believe this, but my hips are definitely wider than before. You know how they stretch a bit when you are pregnant thanks to the ligaments relaxing? I really don't think they go back - fitted trousers and dresses I wore before I got pregnant just don't look quite right now (and no, it's not just the extra weight - I can tell the difference). My waist is also less defined - that whole area is a lot more 'square'. But it's not terrible. I feel a bit more 'mumsy' shaped and dare I say it - middle aged?

Oh and my feet. My feet are still bigger. Not swollen any more but bigger, and most of my pre-pregnancy shoes are now uncomfortable.

My boobs

As you may know, I didn't breastfeed really - just pumped for six weeks then gave up. After I stopped pumping my boobs shrank back pretty quickly to their previous size. They look the same now as before, honestly, but they are pretty small and inoffensive (I fail the pencil test) so maybe that's why. I reckon they're a bit lower than before, but that's probably ageing more than anything else. I don't know if boobs change more if you 'properly' breastfeed, would be interesting if anyone wants to share!?

My hair

This is the weirdest and most annoying thing. A year later - my hair is still not the same. It's still darker (although I noticed my first few greys coming in - AAAAAH!) and even more weirdly, I seem to have developed a strange kink on one side. At first I thought it was the way I was wrapping my hair in a towel, but no, it turns out it's actually gone a bit curly on one side. My hair has always been poker straight, and now if I leave it wet, it goes into a really unattractive wavy mess. Annoying.

My down-belows

Yikes, I can see my mum reading this and thinking I've truly lost my mind. However. I can confirm that all is functioning as before in this respect! No discernible changes AT ALL, despite my second degree tear. Your body is designed to give birth, and seems to make a really decent job of recovering from it. Or maybe I just got lucky. Either way, there's been no leakage (SORRY!) or problems of any other nature... *stops talking before everyone I know disowns me*

Baby brain

Has gone! Hurrah. Apart from being eternally knackered, I feel my brain has returned to its previous level of functioning. If anything, I reckon it's better - I'm certainly better at remembering things, multitasking and all that jazz.

What else what else... In general, I look older. A lot older than before. I am pretty sure this is all down to lack of sleep however, and not the baby per se. Oh and y'know I'm 35 now so it was to be expected.

So there you have it. My most navel-gazing post to date. Literal navel-gazing. I can see loads of you rolling your eyes and sneering at the sheer self-absorbedness of it. I may be full of regret at publishing this. But I think the point was really to say that yes, my body is different from before and no, I don't actually care. I know all that gubbins about seeing your body differently after you've given birth sounds annoying but it's SO true. It does put stuff into perspective. It does make you respect it more. It doesn't stop you wanting to eat ice cream and sugar all day to cope with your three hours of sleep. But one look at the little person you made, and their PERFECT BOXFRESH skin and PERFECT SOFT hair and it's a sacrifice that feels both completely natural and well worth making.

One year baby update!

Daphne is one! Well, she will be in 45 minutes time - right now a year ago I think I was in the last stages of proper hideous pushing - the bit when you feel like you are ripping yourself in half but you really, really don't care. Anything to get them out. All a distant memory now thankfully. In fact, I said early on that I'd go through labour again twice over rather than have to endure the agonising six weeks of 'breastfeeding' that I attempted. Labour was incredibly painful and exhausting but it was still the biggest natural high I have ever had - much like how I imagine people who climb Everest feel. It is amazing what your body can do if you, er, make it.

But enough about me. Daphne is one and what a month it's been! We've moved house, and thankfully she seems to love the new place just as much as the old place. She settled in straight away - in fact my biggest worry was her freaking out about being somewhere new but she seemed to love her new bedroom from the very first night. I think a lot of this has to do with the Flensted elephant mobile* she has hanging over her cot - she absolutely LOVES it, and as soon as I put her in her cot in the new room and she looked up and saw the elephants there, she smiled and rolled onto her side and went to sleep. The only problem with this 'sleep prop' of course is that it's not very portable, so we've undoubtedly made a rod for our own backs there, but it was a godsend in keeping some sense of consistency for her when we first moved in.

The biggest change in the last month however, is that she is now crawling! She started to crawl at exactly 11 and a half months. It was amazing - just totally out of the blue one morning she just 'got it' and now she happily crawls everywhere. She's also started trying to pull herself up but in typical Daph style, hasn't really got the logic down yet and instead tries to push off by sticking her bum in the air and straightening her legs while in a crawl position - a kind of downward dog type affair. It doesn't get her anywhere of course and she just gets frustrated. She sort of tries to climb up on furniture but not really, she can get onto her knees but then she loses interest. I'm not so worried about any of this anymore - I know she's a little 'behind' what all the books say but she's definitely progressing in her own way and I have no doubt she'll get there in the end. The crawling is ace though - she's so pleased with herself as she comes scuttling towards you. It's a nightmare, of course, logistically - we were very used to being able to leave her in one position while we did something but now of course that's impossible. Thank god we have a bigger house now - at the moment she uses the (pretty much empty) dining room as her main exercise track and has all her toys out on the floor.

What else is new? She's finally started sleeping in a bit later - now she wakes up at 6.20 ish, which is much more bearable. However, she has still, never, ever, NOT ONCE IN HER WHOLE LITTLE LIFE, slept through from bedtime at 6.30pm to 6am without waking up at least once for a drink/cuddle. I have tried SO hard to wean her off the milk (I know she doesn't need it at night at this age) but nothing bloody works. I've diluted it so that it's just 90% water, given her just water, given her less milk... doesn't make any difference, she will still wake up at some point the next night and demand to be picked up, reassured by a bottle (it's about 30 seconds of 'drinking' each time!), and put back to bed. Any tips on this gratefully received! She usually goes straight back to sleep so it's not been TOO annoying (and it's usually at a reasonable hour like 11pm so I'm awake anyway), but for the past two nights I fear we have hit a new 'phase'... I think it's maybe a mini regression, but she's woken up later than normal - at around 12.30am - and then stayed awake for an hour and a half each time, crying the second I leave the room. And not just a few whimpers, but proper howls. The heartbreaking ones. So I guess this is more separation anxiety at work - oh joy. Last night I was a bit despairing and even brought her into bed with us (I couldn't get out of her bloody room without taking her too and quite frankly I just wanted to lie down by then) where she decided it was all rather funny and started giggling and jumping about. So she went straight back to her cot. Eventually she kind of wore herself out and went back to sleep, but honestly: WTH! Babies are so badly designed. This sleep nonsense is The Worst.

Another challenging aspect at the moment - food! Daphne takes after me (at least when I was young) and seems to now find eating a boring waste of time that gets in the way of all the exciting things she could be doing like going through mummy's handbag or pulling all the tissues out of a box. The only way to get her to eat at the moment is by distracting her and then shovelling food in her mouth as she concentrates on something else - it's amazing how creative you can get when you need to, and how entertaining you can make the wax bit of a Babybel. We've tried letting her feed herself but all she does is pick things up, turn them over in her hand and throw them on the floor - she hardly ever puts things in her mouth. It's like she has zero interest in food. Unless - and here's the caveat - I'm having a chocolate bourbon with my cup of tea. Then she's suddenly desperate for a bite and a swig from the mug (don't worry, I never let her do either. Promise. Ahem). Oh and she will happily munch on a rice cake in the car or in her buggy. She hates being fed from a spoon but will take things from a fork - again I think this is because she's seen us eating from a fork. Mealtimes are exhausting and take hours.

The best bit about Daph at the moment though, is her understanding. I keep desperately googling what's normal for this age because I find it absolutely mindblowing, as she seems to understand everything. Well, she understands the names of everything. You only have to tell her once and she'll remember what something is called - and now we can ask where blue dog or her phone or her piano or mummy's computer are, and she'll crawl off towards them and then bring them to you or pick them up to 'show' you. She knows what the car is, what houses are, what grass is, where the garden is, where her books are etc etc. She'll also come to you if you ask her to, although she has yet to hand you something you ask her for. I think she must have at least 50 words in her receptive language already. However, she doesn't say any! She speaks a lot in her own funny goobledegook, and often sounds like she's saying 'Daddy' (not to anyone in particular however!) and 'Eeeeeee' which she says if she sees me or the cat. But no proper words, and not a snifter of a 'mama'. Huh. Today, though, I swear she said 'up' after me (I was picking her up and said it as I did so, and she parroted it back. Might have just been a random fluke thing however!).

Most of all, Daphne age one is absolutely the most entertaining and lovely she's been so far - I LOVE this age so much! She's so happy and funny - a real little character. I'm much less worried about her than I was, and if only we could crack this sleep thing, I'd say life as a mum was pretty perfect right now. Happy birthday, my little lovely Chip.

* not a sponsored link, nor did I get it for free! 

Eleven month baby update

I know, I'm meant to be having a two-week break from blogging, but it's Daph's eleven month birthday today, and I couldn't not do an update. My goodness, she has changed so much since my last post. In fact, let me go and read it to compare and contrast...

Right, back now! So I don't think I mentioned before that Daph was booked in to have a hearing test thanks to her lack of proper babbling. This was arranged ages ago but we had to wait for about ten years for an appointment - eventually we got a cancellation. It was at St Helier Hospital in Sutton (finding a space in the car park was fun. Not) and was quite a random affair, consisting of a woman trying to distract Daph with toys while another woman behind a two-way mirror played sounds from two giant speakers either side of the room. I *think* the point was to see if she would turn around for the sounds or not, but it was quite hard for even me to understand what was actually going on, so not sure how a baby is supposed to cope with it. Daph found the whole thing rather boring and started doing her screeching thing after twenty minutes or so, but was a brave little soldier when they put some strange headphones on her and started staring into her ears. After the test, we went to see the consultant who said she had passed with 95% and that they couldn't rule out partial hearing loss in one ear but that she can definitely hear, and her hearing was not affecting her ability to babble. They scheduled another appointment for us to come back and have her ears test separately in September (seems a bit pointless TBH, 95% is good enough in my book!).

The consultant then said she would refer us back to our GP, to get her referred to a developmental specialist about her lack of balance (she still falls backwards when sitting sometimes) and lack of babbling. The referring thing is quite bizarre - not sure why she couldn't have referred us directly herself. But anyway. We went away feeling a bit depressed - the consultant wouldn't really give us any indications what she thought might be 'wrong' with Daph but did trot out that old line about all babies doing things in their own time blah blah.

Then, about a week later when we first got the keys to the new house, Daph was sitting in her new bedroom while we were ignoring her and chatting about wallpaper or something and, as if to stick two fingers up at all of us, she decided to START BLOODY BABBLING.

Properly babbling too. I don't think I've ever been so relieved about anything. And since then, she's been doing it most days, usually when she wants to get someone's attention. It's so cute, the cutest sound in the whole world, after her squeaky giggle. Since the babbling began, she has also started making more obvious word-like sounds, and will now happily 'chat' away with us in her very particular brand of gobbledegook, as well as 'talking' to her toys.

So. We then had our GP appointment. I felt a bit stupid when we turned up because the babbling had been my main concern. He took one look at Daph (he's a paediatric specialist) and declared that she seemed completely normal. In fact, he said she seemed very bright and alert and that she was probably - and I have to cringe a bit here - just LAZY. 'She's realised she's going to spend the next 80 years or so talking and walking so she's decided not to bother just yet. And why should she when you two are waiting on her hand and foot?' I could have kissed him. He said he didn't see any need to refer her to a specialist yet, as he was sure she would do everything on her own schedule, and implored us to help her out a bit less so she had to try harder. He remarked on her impressive fine motor skills and said the fact that she screamed her head off in fear when he examined her was a positive sign of stranger anxiety (which is a great thing to have apparently!). He said he couldn't 'guarantee' that there wasn't an issue but he was pretty convinced she was totally fine, and we are coming back for another review with him in September. After that, he'll refer her if he thinks it's necessary.

And since that appointment, she's suddenly been coming on leaps and bounds. There's no sign of actual crawling yet but she gets herself into a crawl position all the time and reaches forwards with her hands, and she's also started bum shuffling to get to things she wants. I can no longer leave her in one spot and assume she'll still be there if I come back five minutes later. She's falling over a lot less from sitting too, and has even pulled herself up into a sitting position from lying on her back a couple of times, by grabbing onto things nearby. I feel like she's maybe just a few weeks away from crawling now - possibly even less. Which is a bit of an EEEK as well as a YAY.

Oh god, this is all a bit serious and heavygoing. Apols. But it has been a real weight off my mind. In my darkest hours, Dr Google convinced me that she had all sorts of things wrong with her and it was so frustrating to see all her NCT peers already crawling and climbing stairs, when she couldn't even sit independently.

So onto the more exciting stuff. I feel like in the last week or so specifically, we have finally started to communicate properly. Daph now responds to commands - it is the weirdest thing! Her memory is developing too - so now if I ask her to find her favourite book or toy from a pile of things, she will rummage through them until she finds what I've asked for, then wave it triumphantly at me.  This is kind of epic, I have to say. When you first have a baby it feels like they are just a little alien blob, and although you feel so protective of them, you don't really have this kind of connection because they basically haven't got a clue what the hell is going on. But now, Daph knows when it's tea time, knows when we're going for a walk, knows when I'm going to change her nappy or give her milk. She knows who I'm talking about when I mention Granny or Daddy or the cat. It's such an incredible thing, seeing her brain develop in real time, and I absolutely adore spending time with her at the moment.

Other things... Daph is a lot more clingy nowadays, and will cuddle up when sitting next to me, or put her face against my chest if she sees someone she doesn't know and feels shy. She's also started trying to climb on to my lap if I sit next to her to play, which is really really sweet.

As for sleep. Ha. It is still shit, quite frankly. It's also totally inconsistent - some nights she'll sleep through, others she wakes up at 3am for no reason just crying, and will only stop if I go into comfort her. She doesn't particularly seem hungry, so I wonder if it's separation anxiety or she's having bad dreams. She's not teething at the moment, I don't think, and she hasn't had much of a growth spurt this month. The worst thing is the waking at 5am and wanting to start the day - this is STILL most mornings for us and it's such torture. I just don't know how to stop it and nothing has worked so far. I'm just praying for the darker mornings to start as I am sure the light at 5am doesn't help. The saddest thing is that the sleep deprivation has put me right off having another baby. I genuinely don't think I could go through this again (I mean, I know I technically could, but the idea of it fills me with dread) and the idea of having two kids to look after on this little sleep seems like some kind of awful hell that I'd rather save myself from...

We're moving into the new house next week and after that I am seriously starting to consider a sleep consultant. Oh, and in case anyone suggests it, we have tried leaving her to cry but my god is she persistent. Also, our neighbours downstairs have complained twice about the noise (ouch) so we are really wary of pissing them off further. (Although to be frank, the snoring I touched on in a previous blog ought to be a criminal offence. Bloody hypocrite!)

I've probably missed a million things as I can waffle on for Britain when it comes to Chip, but this is already ridiculously long so I shall wrap up here! And just to end on a positive note - despite all the worry and the lack of sleep, I think I am 'enjoying' Daph more than I ever have done - this is such a wonderful wonderful age, and I can already see what she'll be like as a toddler. It's so exciting, and every day I feel more teary eyed and proud of her!

Ten month baby update

My little Daph turned ten months old last Friday. Except, she's not my little Daph anymore. She might be better called my giant Daph seeing as (to me at least) she looks about eight now. She's so tall - at our last check up the health visitor said she was only on the 50th percentile for height and weight but I somehow can't believe it - I swear she is bigger than most of the other babies her age. She's now wearing clothes age 12-18 months and even some of these are looking a little too small on her (dresses especially - I guess she would be tall given that her dad is 6 ft 3). It's all kind of funny looking back now and thinking a year ago I was so worried about how tiny she was going to be - and she was, when she was born, but she has certainly more than made up for it now.

As well as being tall, she is the least babyish baby I know - instead, she's all opinions and frustrations and demands and fiercely independent already. It's lovely, but also kind of heartbreaking - I really feel already she's more of a child than a baby now. If I try to bring her into our bed for a cuddle in the morning she squirms and whacks me in the face and wriggles and generally lets me know that cuddling is off thank you very much, she has far more important things to be doing. In fact, the only time I get cuddles are when I pick her up after a nap and she's SO happy to see me - she puts her little arms around me and her face against my neck and it's just lovely. Oh, and in the middle of the night when she has her dream feed - it's the only time she's truly relaxed and she'll sit there drinking softly in my arms like she used to as a newborn.

I feel like in the last month or so she's suddenly really developed in her personality - she knows what she wants and when she wants it, and if she doesn't get it, then basically all hell breaks lose. My mum has already warned me she is going to be a drama queen. I started googling a bit (I know, I know) to find out whether tantrums were possible in babies so young, and apparently they are - hurray! I wouldn't say she has full-on tantrums yet but she marks her frustrations loudly and often. Mostly by shrieking at the top of her lungs and mostly in public where I just want to die of embarrassment. The only thing that stops her shrieking is giving her what she wants, which of course we do, because she's still a baby even if she doesn't think she is, and too young for discipline; or by distracting her with something shiny or more interesting. She really really doesn't like being a baby and is desperate to do everything herself. I suppose I'd always had that impression from the second she was born - what with the colic and refusing to breastfeed - so it's not really a great surprise. Her latest thing is hating being spoon fed - she wants to do it herself - and again she shrieks if we try to feed her. Apparently it's an actual 'thing', called spoon refusal - but it's really really annoying and means mealtimes are taking forever!

She is best described as feisty (and I think some people call babies like Daph 'spirited') - an utter delight when she's happy and things are going her way, a bit of a handful when they're not.

Anyway, even though she's hard work and I look at friends with so-called easy babies with more than a touch of weary envy, I actually love the fact that she's already got her own thoughts and opinions about stuff. I sort of admire her for not being content with her lot and I tell her every day that she's going to change the world. Time will tell!

In order to curb her frustration at not being able to communicate, we've been going to baby signing classes - I'll have to write about that separately, but she does love it. And she already understands most of the basic signs (although she can't sign them yet) and it definitely helps to be able to ask her if she wants milk by signing and seeing her reaction. She also understands quite a few words now and will look at whatever you're referring to - the cat's name (she loves the bloody cat), 'trees', 'daddy' etc etc.

Developmentally, she's coming on slowly but surely. This week she said her first consonants - 'ba' and 'da' FINALLY. I nearly keeled over in shock when she just casually threw 'da' into the mix when I was driving back from my parents' house the other day. She didn't babble it, but the main point is that I now know she *can* make that sound if she wants to, and again, the fact that she doesn't doesn't surprise me much - she clearly can't really see the point. She has also been making lots more obviously vocal sounds - all kind of crazy but definitely attempts to talk, and we can have lovely weird 'chats' back and forth. I feel less worried about this side of things now but of course, there's still that thing at the back of my mind that she's behind a little - but I'm trying to relax and just let it go, and see how she is when she turns one.

She's also started to wriggle about a LOT more when she's sitting down - twisting and putting her arms forward into a crawling position. She still gets mightily pissed off if you put her on her tum for tummy time however, and rolls straight back onto her back, but we've been trying to trick her a bit by holding her legs in a wheelbarrow position and getting her to try to 'walk' forward with her hands. And she's obsessed with standing up - she just wants to be held up standing all the time (another reason for her meltdowns if I try to sit her down). But she can't stand alone yet. I am sure her general mood and disposition will improve a lot when she is finally more mobile and able to get to where she wants to be without any help.

One last thing I must mention is her sleep! It's gone a bit shit, to be frank. She was so great for about three months, sleeping through the night every night and just having a dream feed at 10pm. Then we dropped her third nap, as she stopped being tired at bedtime, but that had the knock-on effect of her being exhausted by 5pm and having to be asleep by 6pm. She seems to be able to do 11 hours at night with only one wake up for a feed, but because she's going to bed at 6pm, that means at 5am she's awake and NOTHING will persuade her to go back to sleep. Instead she lies there every morning screeching and talking to herself until we get her up - we usually manage to ignore her (with a quick check to see she's OK) until 6am, when Oli goes in and gets her up for the day, but being woken up at 5am EVERY DAY is truly horrid. We can never get back to sleep after she wakes, and it means she's exhausted by 8am so all her naps have to happen early, and thus the cycle continues! It also means she doesn't want her last bottle before bed as it's too close to her tea, which means she's now started waking up twice for milk in the night. We're kind of at our wits' end with it, and I've now decided (after last night/this morning when as a Father's Day gift she decided the day should start at 4.30am) that I'm going to let her have a very quick micro nap at 5pm every day and move her bedtime back to 7pm. Fingers bloody crossed!

Oh and one last thing - she has seven teeth. Four on the top and three on the bottom, but the fourth bottom tooth seems to be MIA. Its twin came through ages ago now. All the others came through in pairs so it's a bit peculiar - I hope it doesn't mean it's never going to appear!

Daphne's favourite toys

One of the ladies in my NCT group asked us to share what our babies' favourite toys were the other week, and I thought what a good blog post it would make. I'm super nosey myself and love to know what other mums have found to entertain their babies. So here goes!

I would say that Daph has two absolute favourite toys - one is a small dinosaur rattle, the other is a soft book. They were both gifts from friends (thanks Amy and Sophy!). The dinosaur rattle is called Steve the Steg, and he's a cockney barrowboy who's on his last legs, having worked on a market selling fruit and veg for years. We reckon he's around 70 now and he wheezes a lot thanks to the cold. (Yes, this is what happens when you live with a trained actor). Steve and Daph regularly have conversations (well, he talks to her through Oli, and she squeaks and shouts back) about his hard time on the market today because of the weather or what have you. Anyway, aside from his scintillating conversation skills, Steve is a hit with Daph because his stubby little legs make him very easy to grab and throw about. Oh and he's knitted, so he's very tactile too.

We named him Steve the Steg almost straight away but then realised he's not actually a stegosaurus, he's a triceratops. Oops.

We liked Steve so much that we bought two other dinosaurs - a diplodocus (Dave, Steve's son, who helps him out on the market) and an actual stegosaurus (Cedric, who sells cheese and wine and thinks he's a cut above the others). Steve, Cedric and Dave are all by Best Years.

Moving on slightly (am afeared we are coming across as rather peculiar...) to her other favourite toy - a book. Hurrah! She's going to be a bookworm. Or a writer. The book in question doesn't have any actual words in it, but it does have a squeaker thing disguised as a beehive, and a plastic fish attached by a cord that makes a great teether. Anyway, it's the book Daph gets to play with after she's eaten her meals, and she flaps her arms up and down and lights up at the sight of it. As you can see above. It's by Tiny Years.

I also bought her an activity cube from John Lewis which I've already blogged about and highly recommend - it's been the perfect toy while she's been getting better at sitting independently as it gives her something to lean forward and reach for. The snob in me loves the fact it's wooden too.

What do your babies love? Let me know in the comments below!

Nine month baby update

Daphne turned nine months old this week - I've officially had her now for longer than I was pregnant (actually, the maths of pregnancy always confused me so... hmmm, that could be complete bollocks). In some ways it's like she's always been here, in other ways it only feels like a few weeks ago that we were bringing her home from the hospital. Gah, how cliched. How true.

But yes. She's nine months old and the last few weeks have been pretty challenging as she's dropped her third nap. So her schedule, which was beautifully reliable before and actually bloody great as she slept through every night, has gone a bit haywire. For the last week or so she's been persistently waking at 5am (oh so fun!) and refusing to a) go back to sleep and b) shut up. She doesn't cry, bless her, she just kind of shouts and squeals and makes general noise which means there's absolutely no way we can sleep through it. She has double double blackout blinds in her room (blackout fabric suction-cupped to the window, a blackout roller blind on top and then blackout-lined curtains) yet still a tiny chink of light seems to find its way out (mostly at the top and bottom) and hence she decides that when the sun gets up, so does she. It's exhausting! HOW we managed for months of her not sleeping through the night I have no idea because my tiredness levels have been reaching epic proportions thanks to this early morning start.

To counteract the lack of third nap, she's now going to bed at 5.30-6pm - which I know sounds ridiculously early, but she can't stay awake any longer - if she does then we get into that godawful screaming-like-she's-being-murdered overtiredness thing, where literally the only way to settle her is to put a muslin over her face so she can't see anything (sounds horrible and it is), hold her little arms down to stop them thrashing, and shush and shush and shush until she falls asleep. Ugh. It's like I'm torturing her and I HATE it, but for some reason she just cannot settle herself if she gets overtired. Does anyone else's baby get like this? My mum seems to think it's a new phenomenon as apparently I never did it, but a few of my RL friends have had similar experiences with over-stimulated and over-tired babies.

She now naps from 9-10.30am and then again from 1.30pm to (ideally) 3pm. She often wakes up from her second nap a bit early though, but I can't push her to go down later than 1.30pm as by then she's red-eyed and whiny. I swear you could study baby schedules at degree level and still not get to grips with the ridiculous algorithms they seem to work to.

In other news, we had her developmental check up today. I will be honest here, I requested it a bit early (I think it's supposed to be between 9-12 months and most people have it at around a year) as I've been really worried about the fact that she has never, ever babbled. She can make plenty of other noises (screeching and growling are her specialities) but she has never made any 'babababa' or 'mamamama' noises. Of course, I asked Dr Google what this meant and the number one cause of lack of babbling seems to be autism. So that broke my heart, and sent me into a week-long spiral of obsessive googling, sleeplessness and Youtube-watching of autistic kids trying to see if Daph had any of their characteristics. I took her to the GP who suggested it might be a hearing issue and has referred her for tests but I am pretty sure she can hear really well as she responds to whispers and even someone creeping in the room behind her.

Anyway, she's also behind on her gross motor skills - most specifically sitting. She can sit alone perfectly and reach for stuff etc, but if she starts to lean back while seated she will always fall onto her back. I can't leave her alone sitting, when really at this age I should be able to. She sometimes falls sideways too. Of course, she can't crawl or pull up to stand or anything even vaguely advanced, but I am more worried that she can't sit alone - although I am noticing she's getting better at this day by day. Whereas the babbling is not improving (or starting!) at all.

My mum's friend, who's a speech therapist, suggested she may be dyspraxic, and the symptoms do sound really like her, but again, it's really too early to tell.

I asked for a check just to see if there was anything I could be doing to try to help her progress a bit. Anything other than tummy time that is - which all health professionals seem to think is the answer to every problem. However, it doesn't work so well if your baby rolls straight back onto her back every time, yes, I'm looking at YOU Miss Daphne Darley. Of course, the health visitor (bless her - lovely lady but as Oli said, it was just like getting advice from a maiden aunt, rather than an expert) was not really any help at all. She said she'd never heard of any baby not babbling by Daph's age, and just said wait and see how the hearing test turns out, and bring her back in three months for another review.

We had to do this massive questionnaire thing (Ages & Stages) which was quite interesting - she scored really highly in most sections - she's ace at the fine motor skills (picking stuff up, feeding herself etc) and good at problem solving (finding hidden toys) and also her personal and social skills were excellent (understanding 'no' etc), but she fell off the chart for communication (which is all about babbling) and was just below par for the gross motor stuff.

I'm relieved that (although of course it's far too early really) she doesn't seem to be showing any other early signs for autism as she's great at the joint attention things - she follows your finger if you point at something, has amazing eye contact and looks at you when playing with toys trying to get you to join in. She's also started trying to clap and wave. I realise now I sound totally neurotic, and I have in fact been told off by several family members and other mothers for googling too much. But it's just my nature to investigate things - I'm a journalist, I can't help but try to find out as much as I can about a subject. Even if it does just mean I'm worrying myself stupid for no reason.

But despite all this, and despite the Wonder Week Leap 6 being THE WORST SO FAR (for those who don't know about the Wonder Weeks, then check 'em out - only if you're a parent though, they're very boring otherwise), Daph is just so wonderful at the moment. She's super smiley, loves interacting and playing and has suddenly got a lot more sociable in the past few weeks. She's also started to get separation anxiety when I leave the room which is annoying but awfully cute and makes you feel very loved back.

And, truly, corny though it sounds, her little quirks and crazy attempts at growling 'vocalisations' (we're trying to resist the urge to nickname her the Exorcist baby) kind of make her a bit special, and make me love her even more...

In response to my post on sharenting, you'll notice I've just put up one pic of Daph this time... I realise this means you're faced with a wall of text to wade through though. Sorry and thanks for making the effort - have a gold star from me! 

Midweek Musings: Sharenting

sharenting-lifebylotte

Before I had a baby, I used to roll my eyes a bit (OK, quite a lot) at people who endlessly shared pics of their children on social media. I mean, everyone loves to see pictures of newborns and there's nothing nicer than congratulating someone who's just pushed a small person out of their bits. But the endless pictures clogging up my FB feed of kids in fancy dress, on their first day at school, eating a piece of toast etc etc did get a bit tiresome. For the uninitiated, the media calls this 'sharenting' - smug journos do love a portmanteau.

I always swore I'd never be like that if I had a baby.

HA HA HA.

When Daph was first born, Oli and I had a Very Serious Discussion about whether or not we would upload pictures of her to Facebook etc. We both agreed that we'd rather not (Oli is ridiculously private about everything which is quite tricky when you're a singer with fans - he gets some lovely emails from folk who always want to know more about him). But then when she was first born, obviously I blogged about it (given that I blogged throughout pregnancy it would have been a bit weird not to), and then put up an album on FB because - genuinely! - people asked to see pics (it's only for friends and family right, so allowed?) and then before I knew it I was non-stop Instagramming her.

Because to me, of course, she's the most beautiful baby that ever lived and I find so much pleasure in taking and looking at pics of her that I just want to share this pleasure with the world. The fact that the world does not feel the same way about her as I do does not really compute. It's like a weird compulsion. And Oli, private though he is, is also her adoring parent and so when I put up pics of her on Instagram and show him, he smiles his mushy smile and we both bask in a wave of oxytocin, our first conversation long forgotten.

But I do realise now that I've started to sharent. My god, I even blog about her. Although I really hope blogging is slightly different as I hope that my posts about baby-related things actually help mothers in similar situations. They're less about showing off and more about solidarity. And also, a way for me to look back on this time and remember stuff that I will inevitably have forgotten. At least, that's my intention.

I read an article this weekend about how kids these days have a digital footprint before the age of one, and it really got me thinking. Am I invading Daph's privacy by plastering her all over the internet before she's old enough to consent? Am I behaving as though I 'own' her? Is it actually really selfish? But then again, seeing as most people do it is it actually no big deal? Considering some parents make a living vlogging about their babies is what I'm doing relatively insignificant? Will babies whose parents didn't put up images of them online grow up feeling insecure and unloved? I am so in two minds. I have never pinned pics of her because the idea of someone repinning pictures of my baby creeps me out, but then again anyone can pin them from this blog should they wish (please don't!). I started watermarking some images of her before uploading them but then got lazy. I thought about doing that thing of only shooting her from behind or out of focus but... but... but... that means you don't get to see HER BEAUTIFUL FACE! I also thought maybe I'd just stick to only putting photos of her on FB and not on Instagram but then I might as well delete my Insta account because let's be honest, I have a baby under one, my whole life at the moment revolves around her.

It's a conundrum. I wish I could ask Daph want she thinks and it's frustrating that the generation of babies whose parents have been oversharing them since they were just an ultrasound picture aren't quite old enough yet to let us know how they feel about it. I take some solace in the fact that I can delete the pics I have put up of her at any time - I've never used images of her in a professional capacity.

I would LOVE to know your thoughts on this topic - please leave me a comment if you're a parent and let me know what you've decided to do and why. For now, Oli and I have tentatively agreed to stop posting images of her (at least on public sites such as my blog and Instagram) once she turns one. I'm not sure why but it feels like a good cut off - after this point she's no longer a baby (sniff) and more her own person. I just hope I have the willpower...