Fell on Black Days

In 2014, Robin Williams died from suicide by hanging. Growing up watching his movies, laughing until I hurt, building so much of my sense of humour around his jokes and many personas, his death hit me hard. He was supposed to be the happiest person on the planet; a man who brought untold joy to millions of people across the world, of all ages. But privately, he was in pain, and one day that pain became too much for him to bear. The public outpourings of grief were many and varied, and for a short time, we talked about depression and suicide more openly, honestly, and healthily. 

Since then, many other notable and influential public figures have died. Some had tremendous influence over formative years in my life, and like Robin Williams, their passings hurt me profoundly. The world continues without them, the sun rises and sets, rain falls, flowers grow, time passes, and people fade from tangible existence into fond but sad memories. Some might say it’s silly to feel so afflicted by the death of someone famous, but I challenge anyone to get from one end of life to the other without feeling moved when someone they admire passes away. 

Art is a perilously undervalued resource, generally by people who are not artists themselves. Film, music, literature, theatre, poetry, paintings and more capture that essence of life that is lost in the daily grind. It’s where we romanticise otherwise mundane tasks, how we communicate abstract experiences like falling in love, what we use to expose our feelings when verbalising them is impossible. It can express extremes of emotion that frighten us - lust, fear, anger, sadness - and help us heal when those feelings cause harm to us and those around us. I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve lain in bed or on the floor, feeling confused and overwhelmed by life, listening to music that enveloped me, protecting me from being overcome by those feelings, and offering clarity where my own words were inadequate. That music and the artists who produced it became important to me as dear friends; confidantes in whom I could put my absolute trust and with whom I could be unashamedly myself, never needing to hold back on whatever I was feeling in those moments. 

The immense healing power I found there helped me through some of the darkest times in my life, reclaiming my sense of self and confidence to carry on facing the world one day after another. That’s something that is overlooked when we talk about depression and suicide - it doesn’t go away. If you experience depression and suicidal tendencies at a young age, it leaves a long-lasting mark on your mental health - a sort of muscle memory, but for your brain. Recently, I learned that the term for this is “passive suicidal ideation” - distinct from active suicidal ideation, in that you don’t consciously wish to die, but will still find that suicidal thoughts will pop up, out of nowhere. Just as you might casually realise you quite fancy a certain sort of biscuit, I will suddenly realise that I’d like to not be alive, and then the moment passes and I resume whatever I was doing. Perhaps I will be in the shower, midway through shampooing my hair and mentally setting out my tasks for the day, when I pause and fleetingly consider how much I would like to simply stop existing, before recommencing the ritual of lather, rinse, repeat. Reluctantly, I have come to accept that this is part of my spectrum of thoughts processes now and that I don’t need to be alarmed by it as long as I pay careful attention to my general state of being.

At 9 o’clock this morning, I picked up my phone to read a news alert reporting the sudden death of Chris Cornell, and I won't pretend that I was anything less than devastated. As many people who were teenagers in the 1990s, his music had played a significant role in my formative years, and Soundgarden had been one of the bands I immersed myself in, letting the music wash over me, his iconic gutteral howl cleansing me of the disarray of feelings that had overwhelmed me in that moment, while the grunge-meets-blues tempo and haunting guitar riffs soothed my distressed soul. 

Throughout today, I have revisited those albums, cautiously allowing myself to remember how and why they mattered so much to me as a teenager, reveling in the time that has passed since, and the occasions too numerous to count where I’ve listened to the same music for the sheer enjoyment of its sound. Heartache tempered with immense gratitude at having been alive at the same time as such a phenomenal artist has taken those of us with a similar relationship to his music on a painful, cathartic journey today. And as new broke later in the day that his death had been ruled suicide by hanging, a deep and profound sadness gripped me somewhere deep inside my chest. 

When an artist you admire passes away, you mourn for the skill they will never again share with the world. Chris Cornell was a breathtaking musician, unparalleled vocalist, and groundbreaking songwriter, but beyond that, there are untold people tonight who are mourning not just for the music, but for the way it touched, or even saved their lives, and for the fact that we couldn’t repay that debt. Because we know those moments, where the world is too big, too dark, too scary - where you can’t bear it for another day, hour, or minute. We know the absolute anguish that smothers you, the blackness that consumes you. Losing someone who saved you without ever meeting you or saying a word directly to you, and losing them to the thing that you’ll always be fighting, breaks your heart.

Chris Cornell, 1964 - 2017

• Samaritans (116 123) operates a 24-hour service available every day of the year. 
• Childline (0800 1111) runs a helpline for children and young people in the UK. Calls are free and the number won't show up on your phone bill.
• PAPYRUS (0800 068 41 41) is a voluntary organisation supporting teenagers and young adults who are feeling suicidal.

Lumps and bumps, aches and pains, and never enough spoons.

A little over 2 years ago, I wrote my first blog post about having fibromyalgia. It's a pretty miserable condition, not least because it's completely invisible, so there's a lot of explaining to people about why you can't walk far, or why you need to lie down for a while because you stood up too quickly. For the most part, people are patient, understanding, curious and good natured about it. But it is still exhausting to explain it, and to some degree I still feel a bit embarrassed about not being able to keep up with my peers over the simplest of things, like going for a nice walk somewhere.

When I first wrote about my illness, I was a stay-at-home mum to four children, the youngest of whom was just over a year old. Since then I've taken up voluntary work with the Green Party, which I absolutely love and in many ways has given my mental health a huge boost by giving me a sense of purpose. The flip side is that it's also shown me just how much being ill limits my capability to function. 

This weekend, I was invited to a training weekend at the Eden Project in Cornwall. Workshops (one delivered by me, eep!), discussion groups, a picnic on the beach and glamping - so much fun, and always wonderful to meet new people with the same outlook on life as me. I even met someone else with fibromyalgia! We had a great time comparing symptoms and having a whinge about everything. Unfortunately I didn't do a great job of taking care of myself, and when it came time for me to go home on Sunday morning, I already knew I would be paying for the exertion of the weekend for quite a while. Sitting on the tube, waiting to get off the train to change at Oxford Circus station, I realised I was bordering on having a panic attack, purely because I realised that my arms and shoulders were so weak and bruised from carrying my bag the few hundred metres I'd had to walk through train stations already that I wasn't sure I could walk any further.

I try not to be a complainer. I try to be upbeat and positive. But I also really value honesty, and I think conditions like fibromyalgia need people to talk about them more - not just to spread awareness of their existence, but also to challenge societal structures that currently inhibit people with conditions like mine from being able to fulfil life goals as an able-bodied person would do.

The temption is always to downplay the pain. When people ask "are you ok?", most of the time they don't want the honest answer of "well actually, I feel sick and bloated, my hips are screaming at me, my legs are bruised from sitting on a chair, my peripheral vision has gone blurry, my chest hurts so much that breathing is a real challenge, and I need to sleep like you wouldn't believe!". And so I smile, tell them I feel good and carry on with acting out the part of someone who doesn't want to curl up and cry. Facebook is a particularly tempting playground for painting a picture of everything being amazing. I can be lying in bed, whimpering in pain, unable to sit up for more than a few minutes, but if I post a joke or a funny cat picture on Facebook, I can at least persuade people that I'm ok and I don't want or need their sympathy.

I want to go back to paid employment sometime soon. I want a stimulating and fulfilling job! I'd really like that to be linked to the Green Party, because I've been passionately pouring my limited energy into it for a year now and feel I have so much more I want to give! But... the fact I need to accept is that my health is so unpredictable that I will make a terrible employee. Some mornings I wake up and can't move, can't talk. Some days, just the ten minute round trip for the school run is enough to end up with me lying on the sofa, dizzy and struggling to breathe. Some days, my legs will bruise and swell up just because I've sat on a wooden bench instead of a squishy sofa.

The reality of leaving the house early every morning, travelling to work, then sitting in an office and being productive for several hours, then travelling back home - this is something that I can't kid myself that I'm capable of doing in any reliable capacity. A day here and there, ok. Sounds good. I've had some trips into London to the Green Party office for training days and meetings, and it's been good. I've then had to spend at least 2 days in bed to recuperate. 

I like to use the Spoon Theory analogy to explain to people why small, everyday tasks take on a whole new level of challenge when you have a condition like fibromyalgia. You can read more about it here - and please do. 

I've spoken to some people with disabilities who say that we view all this upside down - that in fact it's not the individual who is disabled, but society. People have different capabilities that may manifest in anatomical differences, mental health differences, or in "invisible" conditions, such as mine. These are only DISabilities because society is exclusionary - starting with our language and our societal outlook towards anybody whose capacity for economic productivity is below optimal. We ascribe value to people according to how much work they can put in versus how much they take out, so someone with any form of condition that changes that balance is treated as lesser than someone in optimum health.

I want to go back to paid employment, but would any employer be prepared to take me on, knowing that I may be off sick a lot? Or that I may need to work from home? Or that I may not be as efficient as someone who doesn't need to lie down every hour or so? How can we change things to make employment and wider society more aware of the needs of people with disabilities, and more receptive to meeting those needs without making a big song and dance about it? 

My dream job would be as a member of Parliament - but the demands and rigour of the campaign trail when I stood as a candidate in this year's election wiped me out. The job itself involves long hours, lots of stress and lots of travelling. Do I know that I could be a good representative for people in my constituency, given my health and limitations? Why should I be excluded from pursuing this role because of those issues? Currently job-share MPs are not permitted, as my colleagues discovered when they attempted to be nominated as jobshare parliamentary candidates and were refused. 

It's taken a long time for me to come to terms with the fact that fibromyalgia has this big an effect on my life, and that this means I am a person with a disability. Actually taking the time to permit myself to identify as disabled has been very empowering, which I didn't think it would be. I thought that identifying as disabled would be admitting a weakness, because that's how we treat people who aren't able-bodied. 

So as usual I feel tired, sick and am aching all over, and the energy it's taken me to fight off several panic attacks today means I can barely keep my eyes open now. But I also feel determined to be part of a movement to change the way we interact with people with disabilities, and to make our society more accessible, more aware, and more inclusive. Watch this space...

The times, they are a-cha-aangin'....

Earlier this morning, I was idly daydreaming about what the future may hold for me. I wrote a blog post two years ago agonising over what I would do "When I Grow Up", articulating my anxiety at what a career gap would do to my employment prospects and how I felt at odds with my role as a stay at home mother. It suddenly dawned on me that since joining the Green Party, that anxiety has vanished. 

The time I commit to the party now is entirely voluntary, but the experience I'm gaining and the skills I'm polishing have given me a sense of empowerment that I thought I'd lost. Politics is traditionally thought of as male-dominated territory - not just male, but white, upper class, able-bodied, public-school educated males. What could an ordinary working class* woman hope to achieve? 

*delusions of grandeur and a predilection for reading The Guardian notwithstanding!

Shahrar Ali's rousing speech at Green Party Conference earlier this month spoke of the "Politics of Imagination" and challenged us all to take ownership of ineqality within the party and outwards, in wider society.

 "You don't have to be a woman to fight patriarchy, to want to reassure a voter on the doorstep, no she doesn’t have to wait for her husband before talking politics with you. You only need to be Green.

You don't have to be black to want to rail against racial prejudice or persecution. You only need to be Green.

You don't have to be gay to want to march alongside PRIDE. You only need to be Green."

I know I don't speak for all women when I say this; I know that women with a disability, gay women, transgender women, and women of colour experience complex layers of intersecting oppression that I cannot claim to understand - but today I realised what an awesome sense of pride I feel in belonging to a political party in which my gender will never be a barrier to my ambition.

The Green Party's leader is a woman, as is our MP, our peer in the House of Lords, two of our three MEPs and one of our deputy leaders. Six amazing, inspirational women.

I am greatly encouraged that the Green Party is THE future of politics, and represents a truly progressive outlook where equality is the automatic starting point for all people, not just a dream. The people I have had the privilege of meeting and working with so far have restored my faith in humanity and shown that there is a chance for my generation to break away from the oppressive, nasty, divisive narrative that has pervaded politics so far. It is time for the government to stop being the playground for white privileged males and to become representative of our beautiful, colourful, diverse nation.

As today's news is dominated by Scotland's referendum decision to remain part of the United Kingdom, there is a fast-paced undercurrent that sees how people are beginning to reengage with politics and bring democracy home. It is time for us to harness that current and turn it into a tidal wave. It is time to rejuvenate British politics and I am exhilarated to play my part.

Yours truly with Green Party leader, Natalie Bennett.

Depression in the 21st Century

Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life is harsh and cruel. 
Says he feels all alone in a threatening world. 
Doctor says, "Treatment is simple. The great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight. Go see him. That should pick you up." 
Man bursts into tears. Says, "But doctor... I am Pagliacci." 

- 'Watchmen' (2009)

The outpouring of grief on social media when a celebrity dies is a curious phenomenon. I often see this public display of grief derided because we didn't "know" the deceased person personally, or criticised for masking the daily deaths of countless ordinary people. Sometimes the tide can turn when the circumstances surrounding the death turn out to involve substance abuse, and I've seen those conversations turn very nasty indeed. 

Today I woke up to the news that Robin Williams has died, from apparent suicide at the age of 63. Facebook, Twitter and myriad social networking sites are full of grief-ridden posts and videos of fans' favourite moments from his career. In amongst that, I've seen at least half a dozen comments along the lines of "so what, suicide affects hundreds of people every day and that doesn't take over the internet". 

It's a pretty shitty attitude to take in the wake of someone's high profile death, but I can't argue with the fact stated there. 

The World Health Organisation estimates that 1 million people die from suicide every year. That figure has risen by 60% in the last 45 years - some of which may be down to the way deaths are recorded, but doubtless there has been a significant increase in the incidence of suicide.

This number translates to approximately one death around the world every 40 seconds. In England alone, someone dies from suicide every 2 hours, and at least 10 times that number make an attempt on their lives.

Suicide and depression are not intrinsically linked, but according to the Mental Health Foundation, at least 90% of suicide victims suffer from a psychiatric disorder at the time of their death. 

It is said that Robin Williams was suffering with severe depression at the time of his death and had been seeking treatment. His death is no more or less tragic than the hundreds of thousands of people who have taken their lives this year already, but his celebrity status and the sadness expressed by so many on social media could give us all a golden opportunity to talk about mental health and break down some of the most damaging and cruel myths surrounding it.

I would like to take a moment to highlight why I haven't used the common phrase "committed suicide" here. This is how people commonly discuss the act of taking one's own life. We don't talk about any other manner of illness-related death like this. It is how we talk about murder, and other crime. You can commit murder, assault, robbery. By saying that someone who has died from suicide "committed" it, we place their death in the framework of a deviant act that they have enacted against themselves. It is that archaic notion that suicide is a sin, a conscious,  deliberate, selfish and indulgent choice made by someone to end their lives. 

Let me tell you now, that this is not how suicide happens. It is not how depression works.

When I posted on Facebook today about Robin Williams, I described depression as "an enveloping darkness". It is all-consuming. It is heavy and it hurts. There is no logic or reason to how it develops and controls your life. It is indiscriminate and does not care if you're male or female, white or black, rich or poor, privileged or oppressed. 

Robin Williams was known as one of the funniest men on the silver screen. I grew up watching his films and laughing until my ribs hurt every time. And yet he carried this dark secret for so many years, and so do thousands upon thousands of people around the world. Right now, there are probably people in your life battling just to get through the day. Maybe they're open about it, maybe they bury it and try to act out the part of a normal functioning person. But it will be there. 

Buzzfeed published a list of "21 Things Nobody Tells You About Depression", and while the use of cutesy gifs to illustrate this is questionable, the points made are pretty accurate. 

We don't talk about mental health very well in this country. People get awkward and embarrassed about it - and often, too often, people are downright ignorant and cruel. I've lost track of how many times I've heard phrases such as "pull yourself together", "try to focus on the positives", "just try harder", "get a grip" - all in response to people talking about depression. It is not a "really sad feeling". It's not that rational! It's an invisible disease and because of that, people so often dismiss it. 

I was 13 years old when depression found me. At 14, I took an overdose of prescription tablets and ended up under the care of a psychiatrist. Over the next few years, I was up and down. Mostly functioning well enough - I got through my GCSEs and A levels with good grades, went to university for a year. But it was always there in the background, always messing with my judgment and self-esteem, influencing decisions that I now look back on and think "what the actual hell?!". At 19, it took a stronger hold. I left my job and spent roughly 2 months unable to leave my flat - actually, mostly unable to leave my sofa. My then-boyfriend would go to work and suggest that maybe I could try to vacuum and wash the dishes. He would come home 9 hours later and I would be in the same spot, having forgotten to eat or wash, not having been able to do a thing around the house. It sounds like idleness, but there are no words to explain why I couldn't do things. I couldn't. That's it. I would try, but after two hours of trying and failing to get up and walk to the kitchen, I would give up and slump even further into a black hole of hopelessness and loneliness.

The world looked physically different to me, almost as if my entire surroundings had a black vignette effect. People would talk to me and their voices would echo around my head, the words entering my brain but meaning nothing. And I would nod and smile and say words back to them, but my mind was far away, screaming and howling that I just needed to fade away. The panic that set in when I tried to push myself harder to do things was absolutely crippling. I could get as far as getting dressed, shoes and coat on, but then I would find myself curled up in a ball against the front door, hyperventilating with my heart pounding through my chest and limbs shaking at the very thought of stepping outside. And there were numerous days when it got too much, when I couldn't see a way out, when I felt I was just not meant for this world and I needed to get out. And on those days, I would collect together all the pills I had amassed over time, lay them out on my bed, fill a large glass with water and wait for the moment when it felt right to take them all. 

I don't remember how or why my life changed and the cloud lifted. But at some point, the days where I could function outnumbered the days when I could not. I went back to work, and my life carried on. Life has thrown me plenty of shitstorms since then, but blessedly the enveloping darkness has stayed in the background and I've carried on functioning. 

The myth is that you can recover from depression. That's not how it works. Like an addiction, it doesn't ever go away. You learn to manage it, sometimes with medication, sometimes with other coping strategies, but it is always there. It will always be a part of me and I will always be aware that it could take over my life again. I manage this by talking to my husband very openly, and he does his best to understand. 

For others, the fight was too much. For the one million people a year who take their own lives, the next day, hour, minute was too hard. It is not a selfish or indulgent whim. It is an act of purest, agonising desperation. And we can only begin to halt that by breaking down the pervasive ignorance surrounding mental illness and suicide, by abandoning judgment, educating ourselves and reaching out to those around us who are suffering with it. 

So, take a moment today to change something for people with depression. Donate to a mental health charity, offer up your time to someone you know with depression, challenge your own perceptions of the illness and ask yourself what you can do to make a potentially life-saving difference to someone. 

Feel sad for Robin Williams and his family, and also for everyone worldwide who is a victim of this awful, intangible disease.

Mental Health Foundation: http://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/

Samaritans: http://www.samaritans.org/  08457 90 90 90 

Mind, mental health charity: http://www.mind.org.uk/

I'm going on an adventure!

A lentil-y sort of adventure anyway... I have decided to become vegan. It's been on my mind for a while since my mum became vegan last year, and this week I decided to take the plunge and just go for it. I was vegetarian for many years before getting pregnant with my eldest son (whereupon a violent aversion to cheese led me to start eating chicken and then gradually pretty much anything!) so I'm not a complete novice at avoiding particular food. 

Why vegan and not just vegetarian again then? That's the question I've been going over for some time. I spend a lot of time writing about, ranting about and worrying about human rights and the plethora of infringements we witness on a global daily basis. It struck me as just plain bizarre that I don't worry about animal welfare in the same outspoken way. It's not that I don't care; I do. It just hasn't gotten me as worked up as the stuff I've written about people. And I cannot, for the life of me, explain why. The more I pondered this, the more I realised that I've suppressed my feelings on the meat, poultry and dairy industry because, selfishly, I really like the way it all tastes. 

Unlike many vegans I've met, this is not a spiritual matter for me. I do not have an ideological problem with eating meat. Having studied human evolution, I am satisfied that our bodies are intended for the digestion of meat and that we are supposed - biologically speaking - to be omnivorous, as many animals are. I have always maintained that I would only eat meat if I knew that I would be prepared to kill an animal myself. It seems immensely disrespectful otherwise to say "Well I'll eat this piece of flesh, but only if I can distance myself from the fact that it once belonged to a living, breathing creature". No, you have to accept where your food comes from and take ownership of what you're eating. 

For the past decade, that way of thinking has enabled me to push aside the guilt I felt through eating meat. I managed to bypass the farming and industrial element of meat production in my thought process, but now I realise that is where my issue lies.

It's no secret that the meat, poultry and dairy industries are brutal. There is a wealth of evidence to demonstrate that the animals in this process are not happy or comfortable. They are not treated with dignity, respect and compassion. While I don't have a problem with eating meat per se, I do take real issue with mistreating another living creature in the name of making meat, eggs and dairy more cheaply available to the masses. 

Why not just eat organic meat and free range eggs then? Because I don't trust them. The "free range" label on egg boxes is misleading. The hens who lay those eggs are not merrily meandering round a nice lush field, laying when they want to in nice, comfortable coops. In order to qualify for the "free range" label, it is only necessary for the hens to have access to outdoor space for a portion of the day. They may well never actually GO outside, because they're too scared or unwell. I'm not going to get graphic about this or post any of the emotive imagery or video on the matter, but if you really want to learn more, the internet has a vast array of footage. 

Living Vegan for Dummies

This is going to be a huge adjustment for me, basically because there is nothing I love more on a Sunday morning than a bacon, egg and cheese toastie. I've bought a 'Veganism for Dummies' book to ease myself into this lifestyle and already identified many recipes that my husband and I cook together which can be easily tweaked and made vegan-friendly. Fortunately for me, he's very supportive (although he did sulk briefly when I asked him to leave the fish sauce out of the Thai curry paste he was making). 

With any luck, I'll have lots of stuff to bore you with post as I learn more. Wish me luck!

Meet Ted: the Duracell Bunny Baby

The concept of a Duracell Bunny Baby is something I first came across on the Analytical Armadillo blog; it is a neat term for babies who have boundless energy and Do Not Sleep. Naps, night-time - sleep does not come easily to these little fireballs. 

Fifteen month-old Theodore is one such baby. 

Do not be fooled by the cuteness. This was taken at 11pm. He is laughing at my attempts to make him SLEEP.

A year ago I wrote a post about bedsharing and how the first three months of sleeping with Ted in our bed had gone. At that point, I was still confident that within a few months, he would make the gentle transition to his cot as my three previous children have done. The theory is simple: at a certain age, my babies have each started sleeping from late evening through to the small hours of the morning. This is when they are put into the cot; when they wake, I put them in my bed until morning. That's not an ideological thing. I'm just too lazy and fond of sleep to spend hours pacing the bedroom rocking them back to sleep. Eventually, the time between putting them down and them waking again stretches out until they sleep through in their own room of their own accord.

Beautiful, yes?

The other Smalls enjoying their time snuggled in my bed.

Please explain this to Ted! At fifteen months, he still does not nap for more than half an hour at a time and even that is dependent upon being held by someone. Occasionally - rarely - we are able to put him down on the sofa. We've successfully managed an hour or two stint in the cot on fewer than half a dozen occasions but the general rule of thumb is that children one, two and three go off to bed at 7pm and are asleep by 8pm. Ted gets into his pyjamas at the same time and the attempts to make him Go To Sleep begin. It might be me feeding him, Andy walking round the room rocking him, putting him down somewhere and singing/patting/ssshing him. Ninety-per-cent of the time NOTHING WORKS and at 10pm, the little bugger is still literally bouncing round the lounge and giggling at us. 

Last night, it was midnight before he finally gave in and nodded off. 

I don't do controlled crying at all, and even if I was prepared to consider it, it would be a very bad idea for Ted as he's prone to breath holding attacks and goes blue if he cries. There are also three other children in this house who have to get up early for school, so having a crying baby around just wouldn't be fair on them. I've beaten myself up, analysed all my decisions about bedsharing and breastfeeding and blamed myself over and over again for creating the Incredible Non-Sleeping Baby, but then I remembered reading about Duracell Bunny Babies. 

Reading down the list of bullet points on the Analytical Armadillo post about DBBs, it describes Ted to a tee. I'm so relieved to be able to tell myself this is not my fault. This is not a "something wrong" or a way I've broken the baby. It does, however, mean I don't know how to put it right and get this boy sleeping in some kind of vaguely sensible pattern.

Thankfully, once Ted has given in and dozed off he stays mostly asleep as long as I lie right next to him. If I move away, all hell breaks loose but there is honestly nowhere I'd rather be at 2am than lying in my bed, so that's not an issue. It would be MARVELLOUS if he spent some time asleep in his own bed though. I was mentally prepared for six months to a year of bedsharing and breastfeeding, but Ted seems intent on continuing both. He does seem a lot younger - if that doesn't sound daft - than my other children did at this age, so maybe this is just him taking in life at his own pace. 

I must keep reminding myself to just relax and embrace all the little bits of babyhood while I still can. He will grow up soon and eventually forge his independence and then I know I'll miss his evening antics and afternoons spent with him snoozing lightly in my arms while I will the rest of the world to shut the hell up lest they wake him.

This too shall pass.... this too shall pass.... Where's the gin?

Winter is coming...

Something a little more lighthearted for me today!

It smells slightly Autumnal today, and I'm very excited. It's about 18 degrees outside, so a bit cooler than recent weeks and there's a hint of something russet, red, golden and crunchy in the air. 

I love Autumn; it's definitely my favourite season. The colours are so exciting, their warmth contrasting against the bite in the wind. Putting away floaty dresses and tops, bringing out the snuggly jumpers, scarves and boots - it's like that most excellent part of the day where you start to wind down and relax, shaking off the frenetic activities of the day and embracing a quieter, more pensive time. 

I eagerly anticipate evenings spent in twilight, drinking hot chocolate and warming chilled fingers and toes by the fire. 

The long road to diagnosis

When I came back to my blog a couple of months ago, I briefly mentioned that my middle son had recently begun the assessment process for Autism Spectrum Disorder and dyspraxia. The last few months have been quite the emotional rollercoaster while the family adjusts to this, and the most intense hard work hasn't even started yet.

I wanted to start documenting our journey with this because it's something that you just can't imagine unless you have a child with some degree of special needs. Over the years of meeting parents in real life or getting to know them through online forums, I've encountered quite a range of special needs among children but nothing - nothing - prepares you for someone pointing to your child and saying you're going to be joining that club too.

In a way I feel awkward and embarrassed to talk about 'coming to terms' with a diagnosis for Autism. I know people whose children have serious physical and mental disabilities, people who've lost their children and others who have struggled to have children at all. To speak about 'coming to terms' with a comparatively tame issue like this seems almost disrespectful to the other parents going through heart wrenching turmoil. But then again it isn't a competition, and there isn't really any way of comparing one family's experience to another. Everything is relative, and for us this journey is really bloody tough.

Ethan has just turned 7, and since he was a baby we've known he was a bit different. He never did 'terrible 2s', didn't really have a proper tantrum until he was gone 4 years old. He's always been a bit fluffy and dippy, smiley and just away with the fairies. We said that was just his way and when his nursery teachers suggested to me in 2009 that he may be Autistic, I laughed them off and said they were getting carried away with themselves. It didn't matter that he barely spoke until he was 3, and then had a series of non-words that he repeated over and over and over. I brushed off his refusal to engage with other children and aversion to group activities, saying he was just comfortable with his own company and preferred to play alone. That it took until way past his 4th birthday to get him completely out of nappies didn't even occur to me as an issue! I'm not lazy about it, far from it  - come on, who realistically would prefer to keep buying and changing nappies over teaching a kid to take charge of their own toiletting?!

My experience of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) up to that point was of a close family member who has Asperger's Syndrome (often known as high functioning autism). Somewhere in my mind I had kept an eye out for behavioural traits that mirrored what I had seen in this relative as a youngster, but seeing nothing of him reflected in Ethan, it seemed absurd for his teachers to suggest there was anything neurologically atypical about him.

The word spectrum is the key, however. Autism isn't just one set of traits; there's a vast range of behaviours that fit the bill, and people with Autism present with a complex cocktail of them. Two different people each with a diagnosis of Autism may actually have no overlap whatsoever in their traits, the spectrum is THAT diverse.

Ethan's behaviour fits in with the less well known aspects of ASD. He has no issues with making eye contact and isn't withdrawn at all (these are the stereotypical traits most people associate with Autism). He's actually completely opposite to that. If he wants to have a conversation with you, he will. If he wants to climb all over you, lift up your jumper and blow raspberries on your stomach, he will. He cannot judge people's moods by looking at their facial expressions or the tone of a voice. He flaps, squeaks, spins round in circles, and takes everything absolutely literally. I have an arsenal of stories about things he's done that seem superficially very funny, but having taken a step back to look at the bigger picture, I see now that it's all part of the suspected Autistic behaviour.

There's so much to learn as a parent with an autistic child. For one, I don't actually know if it's ok to say "autistic child" or if I should stick with "child with Autism". I don't want to define my son by his needs or difficulties. He is first and foremost a wonderful little person. The extra stuff is just one bit of him. I didn't know that it takes SO long to get a diagnosis! We started gathering evidence and speaking to professionals last December, and it looks like it will take until December this year before we have a firm diagnosis in hand. A whole entire year! Did you know it takes that long? We've seen the Special Educational Needs Coordinator at school, the school nurse, the GP, a Developmental Paediatrician and next we're on to Speech and Language Therapy, Occupational Therapy and the Child Psychologist. All these people have or will spend time with Ethan, take his history from me, watch him "perform" as it were and decide what diagnosis fits him best.

As we carry on down this path, I would like to continue sharing our experience in the hope that other parents starting out will find something useful or comforting here. It's SO huge, SO complicated and frightening - and that's just for me. I couldn't begin to tell you what Ethan makes of it all. If I ask him, he usually beams at me and asks if I'd like to play Skylanders with him. I think that means he's ok.

So no-one told you life was gonna be this way....

Friendships are strange things when you really think about it. How do you decide to align yourself with this person and not another? How many of us have friends that we've known since we were children, people we would trust with our deepest, darkest secrets or could turn to in a heartbeat over a crisis? Or people who feel they have no friends at all? Acquaintances, yes, but not friends. How do you even go about making friends as an adult?! You can't just walk up to someone in the street and say "hey! Wanna be my friend?". It works when you're 8 years old; not so much when you're 28.

What about when friendships turn sour? This week I reached five years since speaking to the person who, for 20 years, had been almost a sister to me. I don't want to dwell on the whys and wherefores of the relationship breaking down, but it occurred to me that five years on from when we stopped being friends, I still feel as raw and hurt as I did when it happened. Isn't that strange? I've gotten over romantic encounters more easily! Heck, one year after leaving my eldest son's father, I was free of any residual hurt or feelings towards him! A friendship breaking down feels somehow more.... I don't know. More something.

ETA: how's this for ironic. I write about this friendship for the first time, and as I log into Facebook for a cheeky break, wham! there's a load of photos of her with a mutual friend. Ha. 

The realisation that I miss this friendship so much got me thinking about what friends actually mean to each other. It's taken me a long time to let my guard down and really open up to other friends but I'm getting there. For a long time I kept the defences up just in case any one of those friendships broke down for whatever reason; I've deliberately distanced myself emotionally from new people and avoided investing too much in the hope that someone might want to be my friend. Don't get me wrong, I have friends! I'm not a loner at all. But it's that difference between having friends you would grab a coffee with and having friends who know you inside-out, with whom you can relax entirely and just be. That's what I miss; that closeness and familiarity. I see groups of friends who've known each other for years and I'm so envious, like I'm standing on the periphery silently howling "LIKE ME! BE MY FRIEND TOO!".

Maybe it's about time I get a grip and just start trusting people. I know some really amazing folk who are great to spend time with and I'm honoured to call my friends. I shall have a stern word with myself and stop pushing people away.

Wish me luck!

Fibromyalgia, innit.

There's not much point in writing a blog or keeping a diary if you're not going to be honest about stuff. It's taken me a while to build up to this post but I think I'm just about in the right place to start talking about being unwell.

I suffer with fibromyalgia.

It's a horrible condition, not least because it's one of those invisible illnesses that leaves you looking fine but feeling at death's door. It is usually triggered by a traumatic event or illness; in my case it was pregnancy.

My pregnancy with my daughter in 2008 wasn't easy. I felt horrendous for most of it. Very lethargic, mysterious aches and pains that couldn't be explained by any of the tests I had. My hips were agony, my chest was constantly tight, making it difficult to breathe, but the more doctors examined me, the more I appeared to be a picture of health on paper. By the time my daughter was born, I was convinced everything had been in my head. It must be otherwise something would have been flagged up by all the blood tests, scans, and consultations I had!

I pootled on through the next couple of years, dismissing each new complaint or incident as just "annoying things my body does". Suddenly developing lactose intolerance out of nowhere, saying goodbye to my previously glowing complexion and welcoming a visage resembling that of a greasy teenager, constant fevers, night sweats, insomnia, anxiety attacks, exhaustion,  joint pain over every inch of my body - all of it making daily life just that bit more of a battle than it ought to be.

When I fell pregnant with Baby T in 2011, I didn't really give too much thought to being unwell again. I had trundled along for the past couple of years constantly feeling A Bit Rubbish but with no individual thing causing SO much trouble that it warranted a trip to the doctor. This pregnancy made that with my daughter look like a Caribbean cruise, however. There were many days when I couldn't even get out of bed; where the dizziness, nausea, aches and pains would leave me utterly unable to function. If I managed to get out of bed, shower, get dressed, do the school run and walk back home, that was a Good Day. If I wanted to have the energy to walk back to school in the afternoon and pick my children up, I needed to lie on the sofa for the remainder of the day. Occasionally I was stupid enough to try and do a bit of housework while I was home - after all, it's bloody miserable to lie down and look at the dreadful state your house is in, knowing you shouldn't try to remedy it. I really regretted it afterwards though. They usually ended with me in floods of tears, sitting on the kitchen floor trying to muster the energy to crawl back to the sofa.

I told myself and my husband that this would end when the baby was born and I would be back to "normal"- my normal anyway, where I feel rubbish but can function for the most part. Baby T was born in May last year and I waited patiently for the pain in my hips and knees to subside, for the breathlessness to go away, the lethargy to ease off and the "morning sickness" to leave me alone. I'm still waiting. It hasn't gone anywhere and I wake up each day feeling like I've just run a marathon before going ten rounds in the boxing ring. Attempts to do housework are met with stern warnings from my husband not to overdo it and break myself. Day trips are carefully planned around the knowledge that it will take me 2 - 3 days to recover. Even a trip to the supermarket can put me out of action for the rest of the day!

It's really hard to explain this to people because I look fine. There's no blood test to diagnose fibromyalgia. No x-ray or scan to pinpoint the origin of the pain. It's what they tell you is wrong when they've ruled out autoimmune diseases like lupus and rheumatoid arthritis and there's nothing left to explain why everything hurts all the time.

My mum also has fibromyalgia, so I have an ally in her and can ring her to complain about the frustration and misery of just wanting to LIVE each day instead of existing and 'getting through' to the evening or the weekend or the end of term. She gets it when I say I just want to give up, or when I get upset with my husband for wanting to plan days out that I know I just can't do anymore.

What really brought it home to me was a trip to hospital with Baby T a few weeks ago. He had had a nasty reaction to his latest round of jabs, culminating in an ambulance ride to A&E whereupon various doctors and nurses gave him the once over before packing us off back home around 2am. I had to carry T round the different bits of the hospital, sit up to hold him, stay awake and alert enough to explain the situation to different medical staff, and then get a taxi home in the small hours of the morning. No big deal, right? After a couple of hours sleep at home, my alarm went off ready to get up for the school run. I couldn't move. Not "didn't feel like moving". COULDN'T move. The will was there, but my arms and legs were dead weights. My husband had already been up and about for a while so he brought me a cup of tea and struck up a conversation. I couldn't talk. The thoughts were in my head but my mouth just wasn't cooperating. I managed to mumble half a word but I'm not convinced it made any sense. My husband asked if I was being grumpy with him over something but it took me a few minutes to process the question and try to respond. That was really frightening, and all because I had had a couple of hours running round a hospital the night before.

Conversely, in 2010 my other son was ill just before Christmas and also spent the night at A&E. I stayed with him 'til we were discharged around 3am, went home, grabbed a short sleep then - this is amazing - I got up and went to work. I can't imagine doing that now. Just getting up without even having to think about it... going to work for the whole day without it seeming like an insurmountable task... These days it's an achievement if I get as far as showering and getting dressed without having to sit for 10 minutes to recover from a dizzy spell.

I miss the person I used to be. It's hard to accept that my life will never be like that again, that I will forevermore be measuring out what I can and can't do in a day. I used to love going to music festivals and am dying to go to one next year for my 30th birthday. At some point, I will have to sit and work out if I could actually do it anymore. Four nights of camping with three days stomping round a field listening to heavy metal? Is it even realistic anymore?

I made a thing!

First, let me point out that I am not creative or arty at all. Neither am I musical, and though I believe I can sing magnificently in my head, the grimaces of my peers suggest otherwise. Long have I yearned to be able to Do Something, to make Beautiful Things that inspire others, and long have such talents evaded me. Until, that is, I discovered crocheting. I don't care what anyone says; it may well be the past time of grannies, the fruits of my labour may well be more twee than a doily underneath a chintz lamp - I don't care because it is bloody good fun and I have finally found something I am GOOD at.

LOOK! Look at the things I made yesterday:

For those who say they can't tell what it is, sod off! It's clearly a heart shape. <sniffle> Ok, so I may be taking slight liberties by saying I'm good at this, but this is the first time I've tried to make stuff without it looking like a postmodern interpretation of pre-schoolers' craft activities. I can bake a pretty mean cake, but having just rejoined Slimming World in another attempt to stop being a massive fatty, I need a hobby that is slightly less calorie-laden. I can't say that crocheting is a fabulous workout, but it does keep my hands sufficiently busy to stop reaching for another custard cream.

It has taught me to stop and appreciate the simple, beautiful things in life. I'm more than a little prone to getting bogged down with the big, bad ills of the world (no! you don't say!) but it's good for the soul to take a step back, smell the flowers, look at the butterflies and turn a bit of wool into a pointless frilly thingy.

To boob, or not to boob.

It makes sense to ease myself back into regular blogging with a familiar topic, but this time I'm writing from a new perspective. Something I've never encountered before. I'm apprehensive about saying the words out loud or writing them down here, so this post feels a bit brave for me.

I would like to stop breastfeeding.

There we are; just six little words that have caused me a huge headache in the last month or so!

This concept is new to me because, although I've breastfed all of my other children when they were babies, they each lost interest by the time they turned a year old. I've never had to wean a baby off before, or find alternative ways to get them to sleep at night! Ted is coming up to 13 months old and still very much my little squashy baby. He likes food, but still breastfeeds half a dozen times a day at least, as well as on average twice a night. He still sleeps in my bed, although we've tried (and failed!) to move him into his cot once he's nodded off. He knows! He can be in the deepest sleep, snoring his head off and the very moment he touches the cot mattress, his eyes fling open and he cries as though he's been abandoned for tigers to eat.

I don't mind him sleeping in my bed for the foreseeable future. He's a lovely, cuddly companion and a big part of me will miss having baby snuggles once he's outgrown us. I don't actually know why I feel I would like to stop breastfeeding. I just would. I've loved every minute of it, never minded missing out on nights out, never felt it was a burden to be his sole source of nutrition for the first 6 months. It doesn't bother me now; people tell me he's only using me for comfort, but that's fine. That's what I'm there for! It's just... I don't know. I'd like my body back. I'd like to be able to buy pretty summer clothes without first evaluating them for ease of boob access and degree of discretion for feeding. It's a vanity thing, pure and simple. I don't mind admitting that. Or maybe I do... I don't want to be called selfish for feeling this way and I don't think anyone with a shred of sense about them would say anything like that, but there's a lingering voice at the back of my mind that knows Ted still needs me, in his own little world.

So! Lovely readers... I need some help. I need some tips and advice for gently easing him off breastfeeding. It doesn't matter if it takes weeks or months, so long as it works without breaking his heart! He's quite fond of his sippy cup but all my attempts to introduce formula or cows milk as a drink (I cannot for the life of me express more than a few drops!) have been met with a look of disgust.

I'm sort of trying "don't offer, don't refuse" at the moment but he's quite persistant and doesn't mind letting me know when he thinks it's time! Dummies get thrown at my head. Bottles make excellent tools for banging on the coffee table, but nothing more.

Any suggestions?

2013!

Hello dear blog! How I have missed you these last... 10 (10!!!) months. I have had so many ideas for posts since my last entry in August, but it transpires that life with four children leaves very little time for writing anything constructive.

We've had an eventful time so far this year; we moved house again after an utter disaster involving blocked drains, a lounge full of sewage and surprise asbestos. Not as much fun as it sounds, and it doesn't sound much fun at all. 

Alongside that, we've started down the long road of assessing my middle son for Autistic Spectrum Disorder. All being well, we should have a diagnosis within 4 - 5 months. That's been quite an emotional rollercoaster already and is something I would like to write about. There is so much information out there and some of the parents I've met through online communities already are incredibly clued up. It's rather intimidating! More than anything, it's a huge relief to finally be a step closer to getting the support my son needs and maybe learning how to see the world through his eyes. 

Finally came my own diagnosis of fibromyalgia. In a previous post, I briefly alluded to ongoing joint pain I was experiencing. To begin with I really expected it to ease off as my body recovered from pregnancy, but at 6 months post partum it was no better. After 8 months, the pain had worsened to the degree that it kept me awake at night. Once I took a step back and put that into context with a bunch of other niggles and minor complaints I'd been treating in isolation, I realised that for the last 3 years I have felt rubbish just about every single day. Some days I just feel a bit crap. Others I literally cannot get out of bed. After blood tests, x-rays, consultations with a rheumatologist and much prodding and poking, the doctors told me that I have both fibromyalgia and early signs of osteoarthritis. I haven't really got my head around either of those yet, but once I do, I'd like to write about that too. 

So there's a great big group of topics right there for me to focus on this year! I've really missed blogging  and have a notebook with dozens of ideas for posts and half-written entries. I'm determined to make time now to finish some of them and get back to what I love doing. 

When I grow up...

Can you believe I started writing this post over a month ago and couldn't get any further than an opening sentence? This is a difficult piece for me to write because it means accepting some uncomfortable truths about myself and how I feel about my life. Quite how you start writing something that says "I don't know what meaning my life has" is beyond me.

About 3 weeks ago, I went to a photo shoot session that I'd been lucky enough to win (that is something else I want to blog about because it was a phenomenal experience). As we were unwinding post-shoot, I asked Andrea, the photographer, how she got into the industry, fully expecting her to tell me how it had been a lifelong passion and something she'd pursued for most of her life. Her story was remarkable and more along the lines that a pivotal event in her mid-30s made her suddenly reevaluate everything she was doing and ask herself what it had all meant, what would her legacy be. When she couldn't answer that, she decided on a total career overhaul, to send herself back to college and start doing something she enjoyed. That path took her to photography and now she produces some astonishingly beautiful art. I walked away from the conversation asking myself the same questions. If my life suddenly ended now and I had to reflect on what I have achieved and what it has all meant, what could I really say I've done?

Recently, I reflected on my role as a mother and homemaker, and somewhat defiantly asserted that I am perfectly satisfied and fulfilled with this as my occupation and that it is no problem for me to have put any thoughts of a professional career on the back burner until my children are all in school. I stand by that, but chatting with the photographer last month really started me thinking about WHAT I will do when my youngest child starts school and my days are my own again. 

When I was a youngster, I had dozens of ideas about what profession I would undertake when I grew up. When I was 9, I wanted to be a vet (until thoughts of having to put animals to sleep deterred me). When I was 12 I wanted to be a journalist, much to my grandmother's horror! At 15, I wanted to go into law and actually spent a week's work experience in a solicitors office. Realising that I'm not ruthless enough to be a good lawyer put paid to that ambition, and from there I cycled through archaeology, anthropology, teaching, nursing, midwifery - actually, I've lost track of all the career possibilities that have fluttered in and out of my What I Want To Do When I Grow Up spectrum. So here I am, 28 years old, wife and mother, and absolutely naff all idea of what I want to do When I Grow Up. 

I know that I want it to be meaningful. I've always said I wanted a "career", not a "job". I want to make a difference to other people's lives, and set an example to my children that nothing is beyond your reach if you work hard enough. But do I have the courage to see this through? I have friends and family who do Important Jobs, and have Offices and Letters After Their Names. I confess to being more than a little intimidated by listening to my family chat about this, that or the other development with their workplaces. Will I ever be able to contribute to that sort of conversation? 

How do you measure "success"? If my children are happy, well adjusted individuals with a loving, secure family background, can I realistically ask for anything more? Without wanting to get into an existential conundrum (to which I am exceptionally prone), why does it matter in the grand scheme of things if I live my life quietly, without a high-flying career? My childhood best friend and I used to dream of all the wonderful things we would achieve, and while she is indeed off being Important now, my life is much more subdued and domestic. Nobody beyond my immediate family will remember me after I'm gone. My name will never be in history books. That doesn't bother me but it also doesn't help this lingering feeling that I ought to have SOME idea of what I'm going to do When I Grow Up. 

Perhaps this is a common feeling amongst stay at home parents. I'd certainly welcome any feedback from others in this position, and especially any tips on how to deal with it. I have a couple of friends who've recently returned to work after taking time out to care for small children and I'm dying to pick their brains about how they found it. 

The big bad "B" word - bedsharing

I'm going to try and resist the temptation to write a load of "for" and "against" points in this post. There is a wealth of evidence that sleeping in the same bed as your baby is perfectly safe as long as you observe a handful of safety points, all of which are nicely summarised here. This post is simply my personal experience of it, particularly in the last 3 months since my youngest son was born. 

I first discovered bedsharing quite by accident. My first son was about 3 weeks old and I was beyond sleep-deprived. He was not an easy baby by any means, especially when it came to sleeping. He hated his Moses basket, screamed if put in a cot, snoozed briefly in the car seat as long as you stood up swinging it back and forth but woke the moment you put it down. After 3 weeks, I was deranged with tiredness. My friend's mum, a wonderful midwife, came to visit and asked me if I'd tried lying down on my bed to feed him. She helped me get comfortable, pointed out the safety do's and don'ts and left us to it. He went to sleep! And he stayed asleep for hours. AND I SLEPT TOO! When we woke up, I felt like a new woman and resolved to stick with this marvellous practice every night. When my second son and then my daughter came along, there was no question of where and how they would sleep, and the same applied when this baby was born. 

What differed this time was the attitude of the health care professionals I encountered. Previously I felt I had to play down the role of bedsharing in our lives, or print out studies demonstrating that it was safe as responses to the concerns of health visitors. Lying in bed on the postnatal ward after Baby T was born in May, however, my eyes were drawn to a little A4 poster on the door (which I cannot for the life of me find an online edition of!) containing a drawing of a bedsharing mother and baby, and a summary of the safety advice. It seems that finally the medical profession is recognising that most mothers will, at some stage and sometimes only for one night out of desperation, have their babies sleep in bed with them and that rather than put forth blanket advice to not do this, it is far more sensible to at least tell parents how to do it safely. I'm surprised that I actually feel SO much better for being able to come out of the closet and talk openly to my health visitor about bedsharing!

So what have the last 3 months actually been like for us as a family at bedtime? Well, mostly pretty good. T is, for the most part, a great sleeper. On average he wakes 2 - 3 times a night to be fed, at which point he turns half onto his side, snoozily latches on and then falls asleep again when he's done. I am very pleased to not have to leave my bed in order to tackle the night feeds! Recently he's taken to falling asleep around 8pm at which point we put him in the carry cot downstairs and then I move him to his cot in our room when we go to bed, where he'll sleep until around 2am. I have to confess that for the first few nights he did this, I couldn't sleep. I felt very anxious even though he was only a few feet away! When he's lying next to me, I can quickly check that he's still breathing, he's not too hot or cold etc. When he's in his cot, I worry that I wouldn't immediately know if something was wrong. Plus when we fall asleep in bed together, I like to hold his little hand and I miss that when he's all the way over there in his cot! 

It's not all sunshine and daisies though. My hips and back are struggling with lying in the same position all night. Left to my own devices, I like to sleep on my front, limbs sprawled out as much as I can! Definitely can't do that with a baby in the bed. Lying on my side is my least favourite sleeping position. We've also had to contend with a bed that isn't really quite big enough... we only have a 'small double' bed, not a full double. It's a squeeze with me and my husband in (both sprawly, inconsiderate sleepers!), but adding the baby to the mix makes it a combination of uncomfortable and not really safe (baby gets too hot in between the both of us, or is too close to the edge of the bed if I lie in the middle). So in order to make it a safe sleeping environment, my husband has taken to using either the air bed in our room or the spare room, or sleeping on our (admittedly very comfortable and big) sofa. We've had to put a lot of work into replacing that lost intimacy of sleeping next to each other but we're doing alright with that. We both know it won't be forever that the baby is in our bed, plus we know that if it became a real issue for our relationship, we could simply invest in a bigger bed and then all snuggle in together safely!

As much as I'm looking forward to getting my bedspace back and being able to sprawl again, I know I'll really miss waking up next to a little baby face. My older children all abandoned my bed by their first birthday (apart from occasional nights if they were poorly or had a bad dream) and it was a sad moment for me to realise that I wouldn't curl up for a snooze with them again. My husband and I have said repeatedly that we're really throwing ourselves into embracing all the hard work of a baby's first months this time because we know Baby T is our last and if we wish this time away, we will regret it.  So yes, bedsharing has its bad points as much as its good points, but I wouldn't give it up for the world. 

A little thank you...

As I'm approaching 2500 hits to my blog, I wanted to take a moment to say thanks to everybody who's stopped by to read my stuff.

Deciding to keep a blog was scary to start with; I wasn't sure who would want to read what I had to say, who would look it over and decide I'm an idiot, and how quickly my long-suffering facebook friends would tire of me posting links and asking them to read my latest post!

Since January, I've really enjoyed writing and am looking forward to honing my blogging skills, getting to grips with shaping the form and content to be more easily digestible and hopefully producing stuff that at least another 2500 people want to read!

So, thank you for stopping by, reading and putting up with me forever tweaking the layout and style of my page! This is for you lot:

Month one of breastfeeding...

As part of my mini-series of blogs giving a warts 'n' all account of my first few weeks or months (whenever I get bored of writing about it or you get bored of reading it!) of life with a new baby, it seemed appropriate to include something about breastfeeding, particularly with National Breastfeeding Week coming up at the end of this month. One of my pet peeves (I have a few) about how we treat breastfeeding is the lack of transparency and realism used in promoting it to expectant parents. Most of the literature pregnant women receive about breastfeeding contains beautifully shot photographs depicting calm, romanticised scenes of a laid back mother and a content, snuggly baby. Very lovely to look at, very lovely to imagine yourself doing. Not entirely representative of the early days establishing breastfeeding, and thus not actually terribly helpful.

When my first son was tiny and I was trying to get to grips with feeding him, I struggled. He didn't latch well, I felt awkward holding him, my arms ached from lifting him and holding him in position to feed, my nipples were sore, I developed mastitis, I felt self-conscious about exposing bits of wobbly postnatal belly when lifting my jumper, I leaked milk everywhere between feeds and from whichever side I wasn't feeding from at the time - never mind the fact that he CRIED. A lot. I was certain that there was something wrong with what he was being fed, either the quantity or the quality. Why else would he cry?? I remember loudly lamenting to my midwife that boobs really should be see-through and have little marks down the side to help keep track of how much milk babies had taken! Looking back now, I see that comment as sadly indicative of how far we've marginalised breastfeeding and normalised bottle feeding in its place.

 It wasn't a snuggly and calm experience, and I thought I must be doing it wrong because it didn't feel like the pictures suggested it should. The remedy to this was chatting with a bunch of other breastfeeding mums I knew from baby groups and realising that we had all experienced varying degrees of discomfort and awkwardness, worry and frustration. I wasn't weird and certainly wasn't doing it wrong! That's just what it's like trying to learn a new skill when you're already tired and uncomfortable from having given birth days or hours before. Imagine trying to learn to drive when you haven't slept properly in days, then giving yourself a hard time for struggling to coordinate your hands and feet to control the vehicle!

So. This time would be fine for me, right? I've breastfed three other children for around a year each. I'm a trained peer supporter and have read an almost absurd amount of stuff about how breastfeeding works. So I wasn't going to have any problems getting to grips with feeding this baby... HAHA. How wrong was I.

The very first time I fed him was lovely. Ok so I may be remembering that through rose-tinted glasses. I was still very uncomfortable after the birth, covered in blood and sweat (I promised honesty!), still high from the pethidine and gas & air, starving hungry and really, really tired. But he latched like a pro and quite happily munched away for about half an hour while his Dad & I cooed over how beautiful he was. Later on when we had settled into the postnatal ward, I tried to feed him again. He promptly clamped his mouth shut and wanted nothing to do with me. "Alright", I thought, "that's fine. You've been born with plentiful fat stores to keep you going, you're probably a bit zonked from the pethidine. This isn't a problem". I held him and he went to sleep, so I lay down and snoozed for a while myself. Throughout the following morning I tried again to feed him, anxious to tell the midwives that he was feeding well so we could go home at some point that day. No matter what I did - all the tricks in the book about stripping his clothes off, tickling his feet, skin to skin contact, changing feeding positions - he wasn't interested. Even when we got home that evening, he didn't want to know. I was still reminding myself that this is ok, he was very awake and alert but just preferred to be held and look at faces.

Around midnight, something happened. I don't know what, but it's like someone flicked his 'hunger' switch on and peaceful snoozy baby morphed into Screaming Booby Monster. He fed and fed and fed and fed for three hours straight. I knew he wasn't latching properly, I could see that his mouth wasn't opening enough when I was putting him to the breast and I could feel that something wasn't right as I was feeding him but he was busy munching away and I didn't dare disturb him in case he resumed screaming. After 3 days, I was at the stage of toe-curling pain when he started feeding. Every now and then, I'd manage to get him to open his mouth really wide and the pain would be virtually non-existant for that feed, so I assumed that the issue was purely my laziness in getting him to latch properly and all I needed was to really concentrate on getting him to open his mouth wide enough each time and we'd be onto a winner. Oh, and to apply lashings of Lansinoh in between feeds. Not to digress, but I really do love that stuff, perhaps too much. I remember day five, waiting for family to come and visit and being in floods of tears because that particular morning he had fed solidly from 6am to 1pm without more than a few minutes break, and I felt like I was either going to lose my mind, or my boobs were going to fall off. I dreaded having to try and explain that he was just having a fanatical feeding day and I was fine with this, potentially having to field suggestions to maybe give him a bottle or justify why I didn't want to do that. Thankfully he mellowed out just as our visitors arrived and was mostly lovely company for the afternoon.

Through a series of clerical mishaps, we didn't see the midwife again until Baby T was 10 days old, at which point they weighed him and announced that not only was he back to his birth weight, but he'd actually exceeded it by a further 3 ounces. That was very exciting news to me and reassured me that although latching him on still hurt quite a bit (less so since I'd taken to smearing myself in Lansinoh!), he was clearly getting enough milk, so it was all worth it. I casually mentioned the discomfort to the midwife, but said I wasn't worried because he was gaining weight really well, had masses of wet and dirty nappies so everything must actually be going fine. She decided to check him over anyway and within seconds had spotted that he had a tongue tie. This was a relatively new concept to me as tongue tie wasn't as widely known about when I did my training or when my other children were babies. If you feel underneath your tongue, you'll find a tiny thin bit of flesh attaching your tongue to the bottom of your mouth. In babies with tongue-tie, that bit of flesh is too short and/or attached too far forward, preventing them from thrusting their tongues forward and thus latching on to the breast properly.

I can't tell you how thrilled I was when she said that to me. That may sound really ridiculous but I was starting to lose faith in myself. As I said before, I've breastfed three other children, trained in breastfeeding support and spend an inordinate amount of my spare time reading up on issues surrounding breastfeeding. Establishing breastfeeding with my own baby should have been a doddle! Admitting that I had sore nipples from a poor latch was pretty embarrassing to be honest, so being told that it wasn't my fault was music to my ears! Best of all, it was something that could be remedied! She rang the community midwives office to ask for a referral to our resident lactation consultant, who happens to be a bit of an authority on tongue tie, and I was astonished for her to then ask if we were available to pop in and see her the following morning for a consultation and possibly to have Baby T's tongue tie divided. That's pretty fast moving for any NHS procedure, but in the context of what I've read of other parents waiting weeks to see someone, battling to have a tongue tie properly diagnosed or even find a doctor who recognises that such a thing exists, this was absolutely monumental.

As the evening wore on, I started to feel nervous about the morning's appointment. The excitement had worn off, and instead apprehension about the idea of dividing his tongue tie crept in. It's a tiny, tiny procedure. It takes half a second at most and the staff who do it are very well trained. From what I'd read, it's less distressing to a baby than the standard heel prick test almost every baby in the UK has at 6 days old, or the vaccinations at 2, 3 and 4 months old. But still... something about the idea of anyone sticking a pair of surgical scissors into my baby's mouth to snip a bit of flesh... Well quite frankly the very idea of it brought me out in cold sweats.  I prepared myself mentally to argue every which way against having it divided until I was absolutely certain that it was necessary and that doing so would improve Baby T's wellbeing.

The appointment was actually much less alarming that I'd convinced myself it would be. The midwife was lovely, very comforting but also straightforward and no-nonsense. She went through the assessment paperwork with us and explained how they determine the severity of a tongue tie in terms of how it impacts a baby's ability to feed. We also talked through how long and frequently Baby T had been feeding - not easy considering that I hadn't been paying attention and just fed him if he wailed! I pointed out that I was very reluctant to have the procedure done as my pain and discomfort was reducing through me really concentrating on getting his latch right, and he was clearly getting enough milk because his weight gain was really good. It wasn't until we looked again at his feeding pattern that I realised his weight gain was so good because I had probably spent about 70% of my time doing nothing but feeding him over the previous eleven days. Newborn babies are supposed to feed a lot; their tummies are tiny - walnut sized really - so they fill up quickly and also empty very frequently! I had simply put down his frequency and length of feeding to normal newborn behaviour, but actually from the midwife observing him feed, we could both see that he wasn't getting a lot of milk in one go, so needed to feed for ages on end to fill up. Closer examination of his mouth showed us that his tongue tie was actually pretty bad and he could barely move his tongue around - certainly not enough to ever be able to latch on properly to be fed. Although his weight gain had been great so far, that would most likely tail off quite quickly and he'd start to struggle. I didn't want to leave it until he was older to have the tie divided because it would be more distressing to him then, so we decided to go for it. I wimped out of holding him and asked my husband to take over while I got ready to feed him. The moment it was done, he squawked a little but he was handed back to me immediately and settled down to feed. I promptly burst into tears and gripped him fiercely but once I calmed down it dawned on me that I couldn't feel any pain from him feeding!

For the next couple of days, I carried on really concentrating on getting him to open his mouth wide and latch properly - the midwife had warned that he'd effectively need to re-learn what to do with his mouth now that he could move his tongue properly - but the real surprise was how much shorter his feeds suddenly were. Whereas I'd previously sit for half an hour or more to feed him, he would now either fall asleep or un-latch himself after something more like ten minutes. I haven't had him weighed again yet, but he's outgrown a handful of his first outfits and started to develop chubby cheeks and thighs.

Since having the tongue tie sorted, I've tried very hard not to worry about anything breastfeeding related. I'm no longer in pain, Baby T is most definitely putting on weight and becoming more alert and interactive, he's sleeping well (that's another blog in itself ;-) ) and is generally wonderful to be around. Aside from a couple of days feeling under the weather with mild mastitis, all has been much smoother for the last two weeks. The health visitor is coming again this Friday and will weigh him again so I'm looking forward to seeing how well the weight gain is going now - especially as there is a small part of me competing with a friend whose baby is the same age and is gaining weight like a professional!

If there is one thing I would hope an expectant mother to take from this post, it is to accept that the early days are not going to be a picnic - and that that's ok! Read lots, talk to other breastfeeding mums and health care professionals, but also accept that when you're sore, aching, exhausted and bewildered by a tiny, wailing creature for whose wellbeing and survival you are entirely responsible, all that preparation will go out of the window and even the most seasoned breastfeeder will falter without the right support at hand. Without the local midwives and lactation consultant really knowing their stuff and reaching out to offer me the help I needed, this last month would have been infinitely more troublesome than it has been. I think we've just about settled down now and I feel confident and comfortable with breastfeeding. Now all I have to sort out is my wardrobe! Finding summery tops that I can breastfeed in comfortably is harder than it sounds - particularly as 'comfortably' for me absolutely has to mean that I don't worry about flashing bits of wobbly belly at anyone. So far I've favoured the two layered approach with a vest top underneath a baggier top, so I'm exposing the minimum amount of flesh possible. That's fine while the weather is so grim, but if it warms up over July & August, I'm going to have to go shopping!

While I'm on the topic of breastfeeding, I'll take the opportunity to shout out to a few other blogs worth reading if you're a breastfeeding woman, or pregnant and want to read more:

For great tips on fashionable clothes and breastfeeding (because I'm still a girl and still love clothes!): Milk Chic Breastfeeding Fashion blog and website

For amazingly eloquent and stirring pieces on new research or responses to coverage in the media:
The Analytical Armadillo blog (from a certified lactation consultant)

For great info and more bare-bones truth about breastfeeding:
Dispelling Breastfeeding Myths blog

Edited to include the lovely Kim of the Little Leaf (I've just discovered her blog and am a little bit in love with it)


And a list of helplines from the NCT is available HERE

One final edit - I saw this just now and needed to share it!

Next time - Bedsharing!