gosh, so many posts to answer,
so i have donned my hard hat to return and try to answer a few questions
fisrtly, the smoking, i did try very very hard to give up, nothing more i wanted to do really, but found it so stressful, that on both my doc and midewife's advice i managed to cut down from 40 a day to 5 or less, the stress was causing my blood pressure to go sky high and it was felt that a couple of cigs a day were better than ott bp. and yes, thinking has changed now a days.
ok, molly coddling was perhaps the wrong phrase to use, was trying to think of a phrase perhaps our grandmothers might have used.
i wasn't boasting, or bragging, and i did pose the question, did my daughter grow up well because, or inspite of the things i did wrong and right.
re the baby rice, i did not wean her at 3 months, let alone 3 weeks, as someone said, she had small amount of baby rice in some of her bottles, on the advice of my hv because little one was hungry, would drink bottle after bottle of milk and then have the most awful colic, and i mean, poor little thing was doubled up and screaming in pain.
and i never, at any stage left a filthy, unchanged, hungy baby to cry, i left a changed, clean, well fed, warm baby to cry, and not for hours, i just didn't pick her up everytime she even wimpered.
wibble, i find your post offensive in the extreme, we are not posh, we are not rich, my daughter had a pony, we scrimped and saved to allow for that, i used the pony and the riding as an example of allowing my child the freedom to explore, to grow, to mature, to learn self relience, is that such a bad thing.
brest feeding, i wanted to bf her, but after several days of trying, the pain, the frustration, the howling baby, the starving baby, led me to use a bottle, again on the advice of the mw, it wasn't something i did lightly,
mrs deveree, i am sorry, i don't know your story( except the gym/ bungalow/ planning story), and none of my posts were aimed at you, if my posts have caused you any pain, i am truly sorry.
insecure, defensive, no, not at all, as i said in my op, it was merely musings.
yes, i have been made to feel bad about some of the choices i made, not by mumsnetters, but by people in real life.
i find the comment that my daughter might have done a levels rather than a diploma if i had looked after her better really rather nasty, she took a levels, but had a very hard time at 6th form, she was badly bullied proberly by people just like you ( that is aimed at the poster who said it) she actually got fairly decent results, but, chose to go on to do a diploma to better her chances to get into uni. she has mostly self funded through college, and will do the same at uni, although, she will get the loans and hope to pay them off once she has her degree and starts work.
my daughter has great empathy, is sweet natured ( most of the time), is brave, happy ( again, most of the time) and is a credit to herself. i fell justly proud of her sporting abilities especially as she has overcome quite severe birth deformities ( deff not my fault, inherited from her dad, and that was medically confirmed by her peads ortho)
the op was tongue in cheek, i did say that at the begining, i wasn't standing in judgement of anyone else, or how they do things, it was more an observation on how things change, and how some things we do can not change or influence the outcome. and yes, it was about not sweating the little things, if i have missed anything out, i'm sorry, i am not trying to avoid any one's questions,
and, for the record, i was a part time stay at home mum, part time working mum, and as to my spelling and punctuation, that is deff not my fault, i am dyslexic.