Slagging Off The Childcare Gurus

[susanmt]

I'll not start it, I just created the thread!!

Oh, bloss, sorry you're having a rotten time. Hope things are getting better.

Bloss, I hope ds is feeling much better and you are over the worst, it must have been stressful all round. take care. J xx

Sorry that you have had such a stressful time Bloss. Please be assured I was not trying to stereotype anyone. When I read the thread back myself it didn't come across very well to me either and I wrote it
Hope everything settles down soon at home. Take care, mears

Bloss, so sorry to hear ds has been ill and you have all had a rough time. Hope he is fully recovered soon.

marina, welcome back! could have done with your good sense and calming influence on this thread a few times when feathers got ruffled - mine included! are you back to work yet?

Ks - not sure, don't know which one you hate the most! Aloha - both skinny and unnaturally tanned.

Just a quickie: even up until last week I've beaten myself up about why my baby won't sit happily in the kitchen while I peel potatoes. Makes you wonder what P. Leach really did with her boys .....

Another one to agree with Aloha about the composition of breast milk being the same regardless of diet. And thank goodness, because some mornings, breakfast is nearer 10 in our house than 8.

Slug at bitchy Nigella comment: agree about the Italian eggs. For goodness sake!

V funny spoof of Nigella doing her tax return on Dead Ringers on R4 last week - 'Just here, I put my mark in the box. I like to use an English pen, fully engorged with ink, which oozes as I apply gentle but firm pressure, then I stroke, stroke, stroke, until the taxman is completely satisfied...'

Re P Leach, I suspect gin.

"Take a sneaky peek inside the envelope and then whip it out..." lol aloha I heard that too. Reminded me of the Alistair McGowan impressions of her!

Just to add a comment that is doubley not relevant here (!) my second best book( ie I'd tell any pregnant mum to at least skim read it) was Life after Birth by Kate Figes.
No she isn't a child care guru and no I'm not slagging her off - but since when has a Mumsnet thread had to saty on topic!
Yes the book is pretty negative ( tho not entirely so) and to be honest I didn't suffer half of the neagitive things that she describes - BUT ( and I appreciate this is a very personal thing, and I would explain this in outline before recommending it to anyone) for me, knowing the worst that it could be and how I could feel - and knowing that was 'normal' meant that I felt my actual experience was incredibly positive - whereas I think someone with a naive, rose tinted idea of what the early bits of motherhood are like could well have a 'hard' landing when the reality arrives...
One small example - she quotes figures on how many mothers actually feel less then elated when they first hold their child, I'd had a very emotionally distant pregnancy ( after 3 miscarriages) and felt great relief but no over whelming gush of intense love when I looked at dd the first time - adn having read that in LAB really helped.
And just so that you all know that I'm completely bonkers - my BEST book was GF by far!!! (Despite having thought the woman was AWFUL pre dd when all I'd read was the hype.....)

I bought the Kate Figes book whilst p/g and only read one page before I stuck it on the shelf in horror - I felt really alienated by it. After dd was born I read it and got so much from it, perhaps the biggest thing being, 'at least I'm not feeling that!' I would buy it as a gift for a new mum esp. if she was feeling down but I wouldn't give it to someone who's p/g. I am disappointed that she didn't cover the feelings surrounding breastfeeding esp. not breastfeeding in more detail though.

I couldn't stand A Life's Work by Rachel Cusk though. Heard it on R4 (yes, I'm an addict) every day when I was in hospital before ds was born, and I kept thinking, what a self-indulgent snob! The way she talked about other women with children as if they were some inferior species to her made me boil. Really rude description of pregnant women at an antenatal swimming class and a blithe assumption that everyone except her became bovine and stupid the minute they had kids. No wonder she felt lonely and isolated! I kept thinking, join an NCT tea group and open your mind, woman.

I liked Kate Figes too, very much.

But also re Kate Figes, I read it a while after ds was born. I think it would have scared the s* out of me had I read it before! Must re-read and see if I still like it...

Yes I can see that she could be a bit scarey - as I had had the miscarriages and been trying for 2.5 years by that time I was so desperate to have a baby that no amount of telling me how awful it was going to be was going to 'put me off' - my only fear was still that something would go wrong - I really didn't care how awful it was as long as the baby was ok. I can see tho that if I hadn't had that utter desperation for a baby the 'whole truth' as LAB has it would have been a bit much.

an article in this week's Observer hinting that a certain spiky and sugary tv chef doesn't actually eat that much...

Am I really thick? I am just not getting it. Who is the chef with the eating problem?

Demented, The cover of The Observer Food Monthly says:
"Gary Rhodes' survival tips - How TV's first superchef stays lean and hungry..."

I just wanted to apologise here! I know this has settled down now, but there have been times over the last week or so where I have been sorry I ever started this thread - it came out of a bit of joking I had with someone else on yet another one where people could have a bit of a laugh and a moan about stupid things they had read, but very quickly got far to personal for my liking! So I am very sorry if it has put folk off Mumsnet, or that people have been offended by it, which would be the last thing I would like to do, Mumsnet has been so good for me! I actually got a smack on the wrist on another site I post on for referring people over to Mumsnet where the advice was superior!!
Sorry if anyone has been offended. I'm actually fairly inoffensive in real life, as long as you like my folk music ......... !

susanmt, I thought it was a great idea for a thread! Don't apologise for starting it! OK, so it got a bit heated but people do seem to get like that about Gina Ford (JOKE! JOKE! JOKE!) As someone said on the MMR thread, mumsnet is usually a very civilised and friendly place but sometimes the tone can be lost or words misinterpreted. Let's hope we can all get on again and agree to agree sometimes and disagree at others.