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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think Call the Midwife is too depressing

294 replies

jewelledsky · 24/02/2013 20:03

for a Sunday night and to almost be tempted by Top Gear as a light viewing alternative? Where is Downton Abbey?

OP posts:

kimorama · 26/02/2013 11:37

My BB likes it, I dont really get it. I mean they have come to 1950s now. Not too credible

JackieTheFart · 26/02/2013 11:50

*Last week I mean the one with the backstreet abortion.

JackieTheFart · 26/02/2013 11:51

No idea what your comment means kimorama.

LRDtheFeministDragon · 26/02/2013 11:56

They've been in the 1950s all along, haven't they?

It's got me talking to my dad actually - he was born in the outskirts of London in 1950, not the same thing at all, I know. But what I'd been noticing was how slim all the women were, even when they were pregnant, and he reckons that's realistic, that people really were a lot smaller then. The bit where the rat bites the baby left out in the pram sounds quite likely too. Scary.

Tansie · 26/02/2013 12:01

I must admit, having just watched latest episode, the TB one, on iplayer, I was shouting at the telly a bit about the mass Xray van thing! I am prepared to be corrected- but I can't imagine they'd do a chest xray on someone complete with a complete nuns habit (and crucifix!) on, not check anyone for stuff that might produce artefacts, and not get them to breath in and hold it- which seems pretty fundamental for a chest xray!

That's why DH won't let me watch ER or Holby City, or Casualty, as well

CinnabarRed · 26/02/2013 12:05

The women were all slim because rationing had only just ended.

mrsjay · 26/02/2013 12:06

It has always been the late 50s though

mrsjay · 26/02/2013 12:07

well they wouldnt have had the same amount of food if they were poor and had loads of children

LRDtheFeministDragon · 26/02/2013 12:15

Oh, I'm not suggesting it's inauthentic they'd be slim, I was just wondering if it'd been that noticeable. In old pictures we've got, my dad's mum isn't especially slim and my other granny is, but then she always was until she got quite elderly. So I was interested in it.

tansie - ok, admittedly not a chest x-ray, but only 20 years ago my brother was x-rayed and the tech couldn't work out what the strange ring-shaped object was. He'd forgotten to tell my mum to take off her wedding ring while she was holding onto him.

mrsjay · 26/02/2013 12:18

I have seen old family photos of my nana who was slim until her mid 40s then the spreAD STARTED I guess she stopped having babies by then and could eat something ,

Martha75 · 26/02/2013 12:22

CTM is set in the 1950's (which I can remember!) so the NHS was in existence then (started after the war c1948). Before that they would have had to pay for the midwife and the doctor. Don't forget this is set in the slums, so not all life was like that in the 1950's - not that we had much compared to today. I haven't seen the women out scrubbing their doorsteps every morning though - and having the cleanest doorstep was a matter of pride even in deprived areas like that.

Martha75 · 26/02/2013 12:27

Oh, and they were slim because they didn't have so much food and of course they had to walk everywhere, housework was harder, no washing machines etc

PolkadotsAndMoonbeams · 26/02/2013 12:28

Some of it is sad, but I like the way they temper it with 'normal' things too, like Jenny putting Trixie's hair in rollers last night, or the bit taking the photographs for the baby show.

I also really like the music

Martha75 · 26/02/2013 12:33

Yes, the music's great - takes me back! I used to like Heartbeat for the music.

LRDtheFeministDragon · 26/02/2013 12:36

Yes, I hadn't thought, walking everywhere would be a big thing. I remember in the books she mentions how a lot of women had varicose veins because they had to bump their heavy prams up all those flights of stairs - ouch!

I like that about it too, polka.

And though it's so sad, I am really impressed with the storyline about Sister Monica Joan. I can't think when I've last seen a storyline about someone who's gradually failing that's managed not to be patronizing but also to show how gradual and difficult it is.

AmberLeaf · 26/02/2013 12:50

Stubornstains I am sure that if you have a home birth even now there is a 'flying squad' on standby! I remember a friend telling me about it when she had a HB about 7-8 years ago.

Peevish I agree re the broken biscuits, when I watched that I just thought huh? because when I was small and certainly years before that buying broken biscuits cheaply was something that lots of families did, a few of my family members worked at a biscuit factory in bermondsey so you got first dibs on the packs, they came in a white paper bag with one side of sellophane. we loved getting them, as you say a real treat!

The books are much harsher than the TV series though.

My Mum grew up in Bethnal green too BadmissM from what she tells me it does reflect how things were.

The poverty and conditions were appalling, where my Mum lived the only water they had was a cold tap in a small scullery at the back of the 'kitchen'

Housing conditions were pretty awful for lots of people.

AmberLeaf · 26/02/2013 12:55

I remember my Nanny saying that there were no fat people during the war!

Also, when a meal was served the pecking order was the Dad first and the biggest portion [as he worked a manual job and 'needed' more food!] then the children, then the Mum.

Bread with every meal to fill you up too.

pumpkinsweetie · 26/02/2013 12:56

They were slim, as rationing had only just ended. There wasn't as much food as there is now.
People were poor, and when they had lots of children to feed, there wouldn't be as much.
No junk food then either, whereas it's everywhere now!

Really love the music, some of it is lovely

ppeatfruit · 26/02/2013 13:02

Well pumpkin the fast food of the day was fish and chips wasn't it? I read somewhere that it was a real treat because they didn't have many freshly cooked proper meals otherwise just bread and marge or jam (not together either!).

AmberLeaf · 26/02/2013 13:05

ppeatfruit, that reminded me, My Mum said often for dinner they would have bread and dripping, some of the white fat spread on bread, then a thin spreading of the black jelly stuff on top of that.

ppeatfruit · 26/02/2013 13:08

Yes but that was for the rich richer people who could afford MEAT!!!

LRDtheFeministDragon · 26/02/2013 13:10

Fish and chips isn't that unhealthy though, is it? I mean, if you were working hard physically, fish and chips is a good slab of protein, plus some carbs and fat - that's probably just what you needed.

ppeatfruit · 26/02/2013 13:10

Can you imagine how expensive it was to feed 8 DCs and DH a lot of meat ? Meat wasn't cheap then. (it shouldn't be now IMO but that's another thread!)

ppeatfruit · 26/02/2013 13:11

No it was healthy compared to bread and marge LRD

LRDtheFeministDragon · 26/02/2013 13:14

Crikey, yes. Meat for eight people.

Mary Beard's blog has a post at the moment about food in the past. It's got a really unappealing picture of tripe and onions as the illustration.

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