DECEMBER 2011 the final countdown (in honour of OI)

[kri5ty]

Sorry for the new thread and crap name but i needed to start one oi how are you doing good luck xxx

I have fallen off the face of MN for a week or so and have loadsss to catch up on! I have been busy doing coursework and seriously nesting!!

PGP is awful, to the point of making me cry, finally got a pyshio app, but not for another 2 weeks :( doesnt seem much point. OH continues not to even attempt a massage if i ask and rolls his eyes.

Been having really bad shooting pains that take my breath away, but seems as though baby is head down (and very low) im guessing its a nerve he is on.

Very strange and TMI... but earlier (when i went to the toilet) i could feel what felt like the head bulging on the outside, through my lady garden lol... freaked me out!!

Good luck oi !! Fingers crossed

tye glad you took the sick advice!!

Hey Ladies,

had a lovely treat last night - dinner at our local Thai restaurant - could eat their tamarind duck all the time and then went to listen to some live music - we've booked the band for our wedding

This morning I was also treated to a cooked brekkie yum yum and then nipped into the supermarket and picked a few things up as we've got friends popping round for dinner later.

Re: waking a baby, DD was ff but woke every 3-4 hrs at first then after 3 weeks slept thru the night 9pm - 6am.

I've decided I'm going to BF when the baby is first born and then express when my milk comes in. Mentally hard for me to get that in my head but I know will be easier to do.

Seven hope you feel better soon

honey I am also self employed but I am still to send the MA forms in , I keep forgetting to ask for the MATB1 form from the MW. Also need to finish the self assessment forms. I am officially taking mat leave at 38 weeks which coincides with the school holidays as I am hoping to spend a bit of time with DD before baby arrives.

Just bought some lovely material to make curtains for DD's room as well as a patchwork quilt as one of her Christmas presents.

Darcies Sounds like a plan, hope it works out well for you:)

Thanks mmmcheese, reassuring to know you've been feeling the same and baby hasn't arrived yet! I'd rather she waited a bit longer(preferably until 36 weeks) but wouldn't be too concerned if she arrived now, this is the same day my sister had her DD.

darcies glad you've come up with a plan, and you never know you could still completely change your mind about BF.

fusam I'm jealous. My grandma used to make amazing patchwork quilts, we have one which is about 1.5 times the size of our double bed. Sadly I didn't inherit the creative gene :(

yawns I am exhausted! Swimming this morning, food shopping (because of course something had to be missing from the delivery!), batch cooking, the round to PIL, ran home and have just finished dinner.

The batch cooking makes me hungry, did the pasta sauces, sausage casserole and chilli today. Four more lots of dinner to make tomorrow along with lots of banana muffins and flapjacks.

seven I have been sick and twinge central today...it isn't good, but hopefully a good nights sleep will have us both feeling better tomorrow.

darcies I hope your plan makes things easier for you, the way you have decided to do it should make the expressing a lot easier.

With baby sleep, I'm convinced it is simply personality. DD1 was dreadful, DD2 slept through every night from about 10 weeks and did it fairly often before then...both co-sleep and were bf on demand and held all of the time.

Thanks msbuggy. I just thought it was odd as its so out of character, thankfully sickness just isn't something I've suffered from this time.

I'm very impressed by all of the batch cooking! I have the cupboard stocked with lots of slow-cooker friendly tinned pulses and bags of pasta.

I confess... I can't be ar*ed to batch cook! I intend to exist on brie and pate sandwiches, leftover turkey, and the occasional cheeky takeaway.
It doesn't help that our freezer is rather small, and we're about to spend all our spare cash on the new car, I really should be more economical!
Also, due to stupid preg hormones my tastebuds are still up the creak so I don't enjoy cooking the way I do normally.

Tyel, forgot to say, I'm so relieved your mum is being more sensible (and sounds as if the MW was very illuminating/reassuring for her.

And the NCT sale was great: I nattered to all the other helpers who were very nice about Widget, and picked up a BabyBjorn for DH for £8 in a nice "manly" colour, a stripy blue Totseat for £4, a funky rainbow SnuggleBuggy cover for £4, two dress-up disney Princess dresses for a fiver and a bag full of "Harry and his Bucket of dinosaurs books" for the DDs for £2.

Tonight I'm washing a few reuseable nappies that need pre-washing, and vegging out.

Does anyone have cravings still or have you left them behind? I'm still drinkin Yoghurt lassi by the pint and craving all manner of spicy food!

aethel sounds like you got some great bargains, especially a BabyBjorn for £8! I had a coffee cake craving last week but I generally haven't been having them badly for a while now.

Does anyone else only feel BH right at the top of their bump?

Hi, all.

Day at MIL's today: out at the park, which has been re-done with a zip-wire, gazebo and all sorts of great "equipment" made out of tree trunks. Later,I did lots of sewing felt ornaments for Christmas presents, while DS gaped at CBeebies, but then had a massive strop at the idea of turning it off after Justin's House, so DH and I had to intervene and turn it off even before the end of that. It is a vile programme - I am really shocked that something so pantomime-y and noisy and pointless was made. JF is capable of so much better programming (his Something Special is absolutely lovely: really gentle, involves disabled children, whom I've never seen on TV anywhere else except CBeebies, lots of signing). He must just be burning through his credibility: Gigglebiz is pretty obnoxious, too. Time for another TV detox, I think. A couple of weeks with no TV whatsover does wonders for DS's mood in general. Just a bugger it has to coincide with my being non compos mentis for the baby!

A little bit of food stockpiling here, but mostly freezing, so very little practical advice for you, aethelfleda, apart from the store-cupboard necessities of chopped tinned tomatoes - THE best tinned thing (tinned chick peas are also brilliant, as they don't need soaking).

Sorry people aren't sleeping. We're not doing well on sleep in this house, either. That was the case last pregnancy, too, which is frustrating, as I was a mess when DS was born - no idea whether I was awake or asleep and actually thinking my dreams were real (in one dream, I was woken up, started feeding DS, then DH came in to wake me to feed him, and I had "lost" him in my covers, panicking, convinced he was hidden somewhere... when he was still in his Moses basket, and I hadn't started the feed after all). I now realise I did a lot of things wrong that first time, and also may have had a bit of PND which I never realised, but in those days, all the "training" I had was antenatal classes, not like after I found MN! I think that's been the greatest help, in teaching me to formulate what might not be right.

Apologies for the long post; the idea that it is all about to happen again (new baby, hopefully not the other crap) is on my mind...

Evening all.

I was reasonably efficient for the first half of the day. Exchanged some Christmas presents, sorted a couple of new ones out, did jobs and wedged a serious amount of milky de-caff into my system. The afternoon was a bit of a bust though with a bit of a wobbly mood session. Up and down so fast that it has been quite painful to deal with. I think that e hormones are making my underlying condition worse:( I should have been expecting it really. Had a nasty couple of days with panic and paranoia last week so i should have been paying attention >_< I have a psychiatrist appointment next week I seem to recall, so I'll see what's to be done then.

My bastard braxton hicks have kicked in, and although not overly painful seem to strike when I least need to be startled/shocked by them. The parasitic octopus also appears to be made of meccanno so each prod and poke is chuffing hurting. And the activity has increased recently too.

Never did get the crib ordered. Oops >_<

I did treat myself to a 'new' game for my DS though (w pre-owned copy of the ird professor layton game) and a 49p book for my kindle in order to try to relax. So I'm about to head to bed with my freshly tumbled sheets and my gadgets and am hoping to calm myself down. I may even push the boat out and take a bottle of orange and pineapple squash up with me.

Hope you all have a good night, and I'm sorry for the grumps. I'm having a mental health wobble but the fact I can see that is reassuring me, if that makes sense?

Have you had a "conscious" "wobble" before, LittleMissFlustered? If it helped then, to know that you weren't feeling something "normal", then this sounds like good news ... though of a bittersweet sort.

Hey LMF, no apologising needed for grumps of any sort! Haven't you noticed we are all doing it too? And I agree with plu, being concious when your mood isn't right is a huge plus for you, being able to take active steps to help settle yourself is even better. (((Cyber hug))) . (I seem to remember someone commenting a way back that mumsnet HQ says we're not meant to, but stuff that. See me snub my nose at the system.)

Did that anti-hug thing actually come from MNHQ, aethelfleda? Gosh, I thought it was an idea either stemming from MN "coolness" and scorn for socalled "nethuns" , or as a reaction to meaningless "((hugs))", when more practical responses are actually more helpful? After all, we are so far away from one another (and are about to become more physically isolated as we go through the newborn phase and don't want to leave the house!), so words and ideas are how we really connect. And we have been trying to connect and engage with one another here, haven't we? To the point, actually, at which hugs are not actually meaningless, as we've already been proving to one another that we're not insincere .

I have fifteen years of misdiagnosed mental gymnastics behind me. Working with the perinatal team and a CBT chap to sift through the detritus that passes for a brain:) Im more aware of the mood swings than I used to be, but then again I'm now working on the basis that I am wired wrong, not suffering from a reactive condition which is what I had been led to believe until earlier is year. Sadly I had to wait for a referral though the maternity services to get access to somebody other than a GP or an entry level counsellor in order to 'discover' this. Kind of sucks. Fifteen years of wrong attitude, medication and reactions. Pretty hard to get into a newer groove but we're working on it.

Sorry for the mini-essay. I have had coke, this is a bad thing as caffeine and sugar should never be permitted to metabolise together in my body:o >_

So only being pregnant has enabled you to access a different kind of psychologist? That's not even postcode lottery...

CBT - is that cognitive behavioural therapy, about training yourself to react in different ways to stimuli? That always did sound to me like laying down new neural pathways and associations; is it helpful? It certainly sounds like a great hope - good to see something so idealistic being developed, after all the horrible "fixes" tried in the name of therapy, over so many centuries!

I was referred to the perinatal team, who weren't convinced their service was right for me, so referred me to their resident psychiatrist to see what he thought and where I ought to be referred to. Pure chance that my midwife decided to refer me to somebody other than my own GP really, and that the Dr I did see spotted my issues for a more complicated mix of problems than just a purely reactive set.

Your assessment of CbT is correct. It endeavours to try to change either the way you react to things, or how you think about things, which then colours your reactions. It is hard work, it often involves homework and I do not like it at times. I'm hoping that even if it just helps with the smaller issues it will free up some of my mental capacity to deal with the bigger ones. If that makes sense?

You have to love mental health :s

What a blessing of a child you are having, then!

Baby shower was lovely. Ate a lot of ridiculous food and had a fabulous waitress friend serving up lethel non virgin and virgin cocktails. Brilliant to see everyone and the 5 kids. Husbands and partners "stayed out of way" ie. went to the pub. They are downstairs squawking now. Think15 people helped clear up while I have sloped off to bed...
I have done version of CBT in the past and found it really useful

Morning! squeeze

All of the batch cooking is affecting my brain...last night I dreamed that I had to cook 15 cherry clafoutis.

lmf 15 years of misdiagnosis is ridiculous, however I'm not surprised as my misdiagnoses (erm, not sure of that plural!) stand at 9 years. For me, it was only when DD1 was diagnosed with ADHD that alarm bells started ringing for me and I demanded to see an adult ADHD specialist (that was over the summer) I'm not officially diagnosed with ADHD yet but it is looking more likely than anything else. I've been told it is everything from bipolar disorder to anxiety disorder to depression.

jo great that you enjoyed your shower!

Hi all, seven and msbuggy are you feeling less sick? I think part of my sickness is hunger but i physically cant eat much as my stomach is so squashed.

I ended up going to hospital yesterday as the baby didnt move at all for 3 hours after the chocolate! Of course, as soon as i was hooked up to the ctg she went crazyband kicked and squirmed for an hour. Oh well, at least shes ok. Took 3 hours for them to find a dr to let me go home though even though i was the only one in the maternity asessment unit! Dread to think how long i would be un for if they were busy.

Stilk only getting a few hours sleep, and still getting irregular but painful BH. If i do go into labour soon i dont want to be half dead from tiredness already!

lmf that does sound frustrating. Hopefully you are on the right track now though.

Glad you had a lovely time jomouse!

LMF, it's quite variable with GPs ( I'm allowed to say that due to my job!) it's because there are different personalities in every job, brusque, kindly, practical, thoughtful, matter-of-fact... This goes for GPs too, some (especially the older male ones who trained with five-minute-appointments focussed on the practical) may have not had much insight into mental health issues, or just not be as good as picking up on non-verbal cues.
Years ago it was noted that mums developing severe mental healt issues
around the year of childbirth (puerpural psychosis is the most severe condition, where mums develop scary delusions about their babies and can sometimes be lifethreatening for them and baby) and a centralised effort -ie a pot of central funding- was made to start identifying mums who might have undiagnosed or misdiagnosed mental health issues, this is why all midwife services now contain a midwife with mental health special interest, and most services can access psychologist support and are able to refer to psychiatric teams. Its also why they now screen for postnatal depresssion and ask at antenatal checks if things are going OK. A lot of health care in the UK is dependant on funding and access: in this case the cash is there, so the service does happen.

Ahem. Sorry for long convoluted post! Am taking the DDs to a Remembrance Sunday wreath-flinging at the war memoraiL- they have a little parade and pipe band :)

Morning all! Squeeze indeed - I may make an effort today. Aquanatal has been cancelled for the last 2wks, so I'll be back there this morning squee-ee-eezing.
Glad the baby shower went well Jo.
I've had back pain throughout the night, not intermittent, and so many people have told me that that's how their labour started slowly over days... I wonder if that's what's coming. I hope so ( although I don't welcome pain), but I can't bear my tummy being so itchy, my feet being so swollen, and being so huge and incapacitated!! Bring in on, let's get it over with! I'd like the baby now please. The lady at aquanatal will show us some labour-inducing moves.
Have a great day everyone!
And can I just say how well we've done? We're all between 32 and 38 wks, and we've only had one birth on the thread so far. That's really good going! Special congrats to those who are more pregnant than they've ever been.

mmm thank you for asking! Erm, no. Got up this morning, DD1 put tweenies on and I had to turn it straight off as they were talking about bins so I threw up! Then I did have a crap nights sleep again, it will probably be better when I'm not so tired!

Thanks mmm, I'm fine again now, although i just don't have an appetite any more and my BH seem to be getting more painful by the day. Sorry you're still sick msbuggy.

oi I'm also amazed we've only had one birth so far, we'll all be popping them out soon enough :)