Grump

Today is a fed up day. One of those where there is no apparent rhyme or reason why but you just feel a bit pants. And that is me now.

Partly I feel a bit deflated after my family left after a weekend visit, and a little bit horrified at myself that within hours the place looked a tip again and I was lacking any energy or motivation to do pretty much anything. I had a nap on the rug next to Wriggles who battered my ear with a toy tambourine. She is very much trying to be on the move and has developed a system of pushing herself backwards on all fours and then sitting up, swivelling on her bottom and reaching for things before going backwards and getting stuck under the sofa/bookcase/dining chair again. It is lovely but a little bit of me misses having a baby happy to have cuddles and play all day together. I think as much of this is I simply do not know what to do with myself when she is blatantly happy amusing herself.

Partly I am a bit miffed that an attempt to try and come off/cut down on anti-depressants has ended with a huge fail and a big blunt realisation that if I want to be a good mummy, an interested daughter and friend, an attentive worker and a human being then they are my one option for the time being. I am lucky in that they suit me with no side effects and importantly, work, but part of me resents that without them I just can't function day after day. I become a big heap of bluuuuurggghggmf that can't sleep, eat or muster up any interest in anything whatsoever. Some days, that includes my daughter, and that breaks my heart.

Partly I am beginning (for the millionth time) to get naffed off with questions about dear Wriggles' development and effects of prematurity. It's a constant barrage of 

"Is she crawling/walking/talking/eating yet?" to which to answer is NO. Well apart from crawling; that is very nearly because she is very very clever. When I have to explain we have commitments to go to physio and still have regular consultant input as well as other services, people look at me as if I am mad. I am not an over anxious mother, I want to scream at them. I fully believe she will "get there in her own time" but the fact remains, there are some lumps and bumps to be smoothed out and the medical services believe they should be involved. Do you think I LIKE spending time in outpatients? Do you think I find it FUN? Do you think we go to things JUST BECAUSE? And how exactly do you know it will be alright in the end? Do you have a crystal ball? If so, please give it to me to give me some respite from a little bit of worry. It may all look easy peasy but nothing is straight forward. Our beloved childminder is retiring in the summer and I am looking at nurseries which has turned into a bit of an exciting game as Wriggles' comes under some "additional needs" due to not eating solids, having physiotherapy for gross motor skills and we are awaiting a referral for speech and language input also. She is being fitted for gaiters to help her legs and hips and will be assessed to see if her left leg may need a splint as it is a bit all over the place. Sometimes I feel like life is just waiting as I know the consultants have not ruled anything in or out regarding movement but I do know they are keen to book her for an MRI scan around her second birthday. And what a treat that will be. Now some time has elapsed people forget and say things that niggle me; preconceptions about prematurity, disability, mothering skills. Stereotypes about single parents on low incomes and their abilities to bring children up; "oh but we don't mean you". 

Partly, I am just grumpy today.

My Letter

Dear Me,

It's ok to have a bad day everyone-everyone else does.

It's ok not to be perfect. Who have you met that is? Brilliant, yes. Perfect, no. Your mum was not perfect. Your nanny was not perfect. So why do you have to be?

A good family is not always two parents. It is a loving household.

A good home is not a big house (by the way, you will not live in a council flat forever)

Few people want to go to work.

Everyone has a tough time sometimes.

Tomorrow is a brand new day.

You live in a happy house. 

You have a happy and contented and clever baby.

So you must be doing something right. That means that you can relax.

Love from,

Your more rational brain 

x

A Confused Mummy

Today I am a confused mummy. Well,  most days I am a confused mummy but today I am struggling with some of my feelings.

I wonder what it is like to have an "average" baby.

I wonder if there is such an encompassing thing as an "average" or "normal" baby or experience of having one.

There are daily reminders that I have a premature baby who has had some struggles. She is brilliant and amazing and as feisty as the next temperamental feisty madam but as sole parent and carer I am feeling a bit swamped at times both with all the information I have to take on board and all the running around to appointments I still have to keep. Is this normal?! I frankly have no idea any more. 

Wriggles, or her new temporary nickname Noisebag, is a little over 16 months and 13 corrected. To date we are currently under neonatology, paediatrics, neurology (luckily her consultant paed doubles up as this to reduce clinics!), dieticians, physiotherapy and are awaiting the referral from speech and language. Thankfully we have now been released from community nursing, respiratory and social work, (which we were automatically under as she had spent a certain period of time in hospital so you automatically get a helpful form-filler-er, not because I am incompetent; at least that is the information I was given....). We also have to attend very regular weigh-ins as Wriggles/Noisebag still generally refuses solids or gags about 70% of the time and as I have had a few blip-y moments along the way, I have to report every now and then to the GP and Health visitors to affirm I have no intention of jumping off a cliff or do not wander about Sainsburys wringing my hands and howling for England. My HV has decided that obviously it has all come about because I do not regularly attend infant massage groups. I can tell her that I have no concern about my bond with Wriggles but am just exhausted from weekly hospital visits until I am blue in the face but she still keeps turning up at my front door with a grubby plastic doll and sunflower oil trilling about the benefits.

 At present, excepting the weekend, every day I am not at work, I am attending an outpatient clinic for Wriggles, ferrying around to appointments or pacifying a nude Noisebag in the community scales at the Postnatal Centre. Now time is moving on, we have started receiving invites for groups of "additional needs" children also, which gives me very mixed feelings. I do not see Wriggles as having additional needs. Lags/delays yes, I fully accept that, but additional needs? She doesn't need extra care or specific skills to look after her at present. She might be doing things at her own pace but so far there is nothing I think she won't do and as far as I am aware this view is shared by the doctors. It really is a hard one; obviously I wouldn't give two hoots if she did need extra care and help, as she is my star and I love her unequivocally. I don't want to seem selfish as I am very aware we are lucky to be in 'the system' and in an area where there is a range of activities for children of all stages and have some professionals that go above and beyond their jobs. It is great that there is help to nudge her in the right direction and iron out some bumps as they show up, really it is. Honest. I'm sure if we didn't get these opportunities then I would be on my soapbox grumping about exclusions and worrying frantically that she wouldn't catch up or ever eat more than a bit of mashed banana once a month.

The "problem" if indeed there is one and I am not utterly crackers, is that when we go to a "normal" Mother and Baby group, I still often feel like I am from another planet and when we go to a "special" group I feel a complete fraud. Throughout year one of having a little creature, I spent the first two months in hospital followed by three months as a hermit with a baby on oxygen in the winter months when RSV was rife and my road was closed off due to snowdrifts and ice. There was then a marvellous hiatus of a few weeks when I began to go out and about, had more visits from friends, began to wean her with success and began to address the impending return to work. Then we abruptly wound up in intensive care and spent the next six months being in and out and in and out and in and out and in and you get the picture. Thankfully things have calmed down after birthday numero uno and I have deliberately made two term-long booking at baby groups on my days off to make sure that we get out, socialise and do normal things between the dreaded appointments. We have been for coffee with mums and babies and began to find our feet on days off together and it is a teeny weeny bit scary but marvellous. Tentatively, I have even told the 'story' to fellow mums I see, against my HV's 'advice' that I will scare them off and they will avoid us-so far this has proved to be utter codswallop and no one picks friendships in this way, especially given that whatever has happened, what is happening now is that we all have increasingly chaos-inducing mess-making becoming-independent darlings/monsters/I-could-have-sworn-she-was-a-tiny-baby-only-yesterday's and all feel like a bit of a joke every now and then even with a beautiful house and a Mr Darcy lookalike husband. I just wish there were more days in the week, or that no one had to work, to be able to spend more time doing this and less time sat in the waiting rooms clutching medical notes. I miss the year I lost out on swanning around to groups and gazing into my baby's eyes as it feels like I spent a lot of it sat anxiously at a cot-side in hospital.

I know in my heart of hearts that most people feel like this. So many of us are torn between mummy duties and well, the rest of life. Faced with the media, literature and swathes of advertising portraying Perfection, all parents, all people stumble around trying their best and adjusting their ideas like crazy to find their own corner of reality.

The main thing is I have a very nice baby and generally, life is pretty good.

So my new New Years Resolutions are: 

1. spring-clean brain

2. stop grumbling
3. look forwards not backwards (you WILL trip over or walk into a proverbial lampost)