October 2012... PELVIC FLOORS!

[Londonmrss]

Ready...
Steady...
And squeeze!

[squidkid]

How cute is this. I want to go. I may have to kidnap my nephew.

Teddy Bear Hospital

I can't wait to have an older child.

[squidkid]

Oops that was last year's link, but same thing is happening tomorrow...

[Cherrychopsticks]

I want to go to the teddy bear hospital, what a great idea!
I'd also like to come to yours for dinner Squid.

I wonder if an 85 year old's milk taste different from a 30-something year old's?!

Love the new acronym, London, I think it might get a lot of use.

[Londonmrss]

as I'm moving house tomorrow, it would be unreasonable not to eat absolutely everything we have in today, right?

[Angelico]

Gah. Another multiple wake up last night. Help!!!

Problem as I see it... a) bean gets totally distracted during day feeds so has started taking snack feeds all the time. I've even tried feeding under giant muslin, creating tent effect and she pulled it down to see what was going on. b)Bean therefore needs more calories at night but keeps only having short feeds and then conking out - so wakes a few hours later. Tried to wake her last night to make her eat more and she was having none of it

Is there such a thing as 20 week growth spurt?! She's lying in cot practising her chat (which consists of some bwa-bwa-ga-ooh interspersed with the screeching of cats). She is full of energy. I on other hand am half dead!

[squidkid]

Absolutely Londonmrss, and good luck with the move. xx

[Londonmrss]

Angelico, my only way to feed my very easily distracted bean is to
-feed only when she has just woken up from naps during the day. Literally, the second she stirs. Sleepy feeds are always much easier because she doesn't fully open her eyes until she's finished feeding.

• feed only lying down in a dark and silent room. As soon as there is any noise or anything going on, the feed is over for her.

Or you could maybe express and bottle feed a couple of times if she is more likely to take a good amount that way? Sorry if you've already tried all this...

[Angelico]

Thanks London. She loves her bottles and has one a day now of expressed milk. Just googled 20 week growth spurt and there was a MN thread from ages back came up - can apparently go on until 6 months but a lot of people found it passed in a week or so. I'll give it a week and if no improvement will try her on a bottle of that hungry baby formula ON!!! She just dozes off again after a couple of mins whereas I then have to go back to sleep.

Hope the move goes well - make sure you keep the kettle handy at the other end so you can grab a :)

[crazypaving]

I am having a bad mother day. just one of those days where ds1's constant, repetitive stream of crap chat makes me want to scream and ds2 thrashing about in the sling makes me want to drop kick him as far away as possible. I want peace and quiet and nobody to bloody well touch me!!! argh!!!!!

so I left ds2 screaming his guts out on his mat whilst ds1 chatted crap endlessly over lunch I could cope with one, not two, and I can't leave ds1 alone god I'm a shit mum sometimes.

by the time I picked up ds2 he was beside himself. feeding him now and he keeps choking cos his breathing is all panicky

and ds1 is up in his cot playing with a bloody annoying toy which sings a stupid song. I normally have a rule of no toys in bed, especially as he needs to go to sleep quickly as we have a Dr appointment to go to this afternoon, but he had a tantrum when I tried to remove it and I just don't have the energy.

that song over the baby monitor is going to turn me into some kind of maniac in a minute. arghhhh over and over again......arghhhhhhh

[Londonmrss]

and breathe crazy. you are not a shit mum, you are a brilliant mum. we all have these moments and most of us only have one little shit little one to deal with. hope you manage to get them down for naps so you can have a little break to breathe. you are doing a great job love.

[Beccus]

crazy, u r not a bad mummy. anyone looking after more than one is a hero & in dire need of a break from time to time. hugs

[Angelico]

Crazy as others have said - you are not a bad mum. You are a human being juggling the (frankly impossible) demands of looking after 2 children at the same time! Another hug here x

[crazypaving]

thank you for being so kind guys. I just don't know how other people do it - I struggle some days so badly, have little patience and quite worrying anger issues. other days I can breeze through. I feel very alone sometimes.

[Orenishii]

crazy you're doing the best thing you can do...giving voice and air to your struggles and worries. I also think it's important to tell your children how you feel, even if they have no comprehension. It seems to help - I regularly say to DS "I'm feeling very stressed and angry right now. I know t's not really your fault...but I still feel these things, and I guess that's OK...you get inexplicably angry too..." I dunno, then it just makes me laugh to think of this little red Hulk.

But seriously, say these thoughts/feelings out loud, know they are valid, and then let them go, drifting off into the ether :)

[YompingJo]

Crazy, you're not alone. You can be my anger issues buddy if you like? I am trying cbt to help with mine. My main trigger is crying, which dd does a lot, the instant something happens that she doesn't like or wasn't expecting, and it escalates to desperate "help, I'm dying" type crying within about a millisecond and I lose my rag because it's so bloody unnecessary and out of proportion!

Does anyone else's bean sort of hum while feeding? She needs to learn not to talk with her mouth full

[Londonmrss]

I too get the angry feelings and have to leave the room at that point. I like oren's rational idea of saying it out loud, although mine is more asking the lines of "I'm feeling pissed off right now because it seems like you don't want me to sleep. I know I am being irrational but i currently feel like drop kicking you out of the window and because I love you and I would never hurt you, I'm going to ask your father to take over until I am ready to come back in and apologise to you for my irrational angry feelings".

Yes yes yes to the humming while feeding. It's on every swallow. I quite like it as it sounds like a happy noise of satisfaction but it can be embarrassing in public.

[crazypaving]

thanks again. orenishii I like that idea and might try it as I've been stressing about being a negative role model for ds1 with my obvious anger sometimes. hope it helps. sometimes it's so hard not to swear, god you really need to be a saint to be a good mother.

Jo ds2 crying is my trigger too - exactly the same with ds1. babies are so sodding unreasonable and when he's yelling all patience with ds1 goes out the window. and then I get more angry because I feel like ds2 is making life worse for ds1. how awful is that?

oh man, sounds like ds1 just rolled over in his sleep onto that stupid noisy toy how long til he starts shouting for me...

[Katla]

Hello all. Wow, another thread, what prolific posters you all are.

This week we have had visitors from Norway (they went home yesterday). It has been a bit stressful trying to tidy scrub the house clean for their arrival and then keep them fed and entertained. I lived with them in my early 20s and worked on their horse farm. They had a daughter my age but she died aged 23 of cancer but I have always kept in touch. They call Erin their 'Scottish granddaughter' which is nice and brought her a lovely hand knitted hat with sheep on it. However, the lady is quite opinionated and wasn't impressed with Erin's daytime sleeping habits and kept telling me 'in Norway the babies all go outside in the pram in all weathers, wrapped in wool (not these nasty man-made materials...) up to minus 12 degrees and sleep outside'. Not, as Erin does (if I'm lucky) sleep on a pillow on the sofa or godforbid in my arms. Luckily we had a few outings in the car which avoided too many demonstrations of her terrible day naptime habits. Nighttime was OK but I ended up with her in our bed a few times (I think therefore I must normally let her bawl a bit in bed to self settle in the night) but was trying to avoid waking them up in the room next door so this avoided that.

Smiley sorry to hear about the reflux issues and I hope you find something to help.

October I have only been to two baby groups - Erin likes shouting during the singing and looking at the other babies. But I do struggle to speak to the other mums much - just stick to commenting how beautiful their baby is, asking how old it is etc. I only know one person from the antenatal group. I think I am quite antisocial though naturally and have to make an effort to speak to others.

London hope the house move goes well. I am sure your bean will settle in well if their usual stuff is there and smells familiar.

Lisbeth re no sleep lost on the cyst!

Elpis yes, your DH is a total nobber Here and

Angelico your description of your bean chatting made me smile - Erin likes to shriek and yell in her cot in the morning - she's not unhappy and will wriggle about making noises for half an hour - as I am hugging the duvet leaving it until the last possible second to have to get up.

Crazy sympathies, I totally get the feeling to drop kick the baby out the window too. You are doing a great job

For the last two days, I now have a napping baby in the daytime in the pram - if I bump her down the road for 15 minutes then she will stay in there for at least an hour when we return. Previously she woke up 5 minutes after it stopped moving. So I am loving the baby free time (finally have time to start up the computer to post). Yesterday I actually had to wake her up from a nap as it was 4:30pm - so this is amazing, hopefully not a fluke. But she has been in the pram again since ten to 2pm and I might just have to wake her again today!!! Not a chance of napping in the cot but one step at a time ... and the exercise must be good for me and the dog.

[crazypaving]

elpis belatedly adding my oar to the mix to say hiban of the highest order. and how does he think his children will feel if they ever get wind of his thoughts on their existence? it makes me so so sad

[Zara1984]

So I went and viewed creches today. Decided on the one that's about 20m from our front door. It's beautiful, very professional and unfortunately also expensive. But did not give off the baby-prison vibes the others did, left me with a warm fuzzy feeling inside.

Still it makes me die a little bit inside when I think of leaving my precious tiny boy there. Even though I know it'll be good and stimulating for him and will mean I can keep a foot in the workforce.

Now to negotiate a 3 day a week return in September/October with work. I've got a pretty god shot given it's the heart-wringing NGO sector but it still makes me a bit anxious thinking about it.

When DS screamed for 90 minutes this afternoon I did wonder if the creche would take him today

[YompingJo]

London I know what you mean about the humming on swallowing but now during some feeds she hums all the time, not just on swallowing! It's like she can't bear to stop talking even to feed!

Today she has been nuts, really chatty and smiley and wide awake, impossible to settle for some sleeps and very difficult to settle for others and she is now totally exhausted and had a meltdown after her massage when I dressed her. She hates having her vest and sleepsuit put on most evenings but this was a new level of protest.

DH has been ill and I am irrationally livid at him because of it. It's stupid, I know it's not his fault but I'm jealous that he can just spend the day in bed recovering when I don't have that option more, if I'm ill I still have to look after dd and if he's at work he can't always take days off so I have to do it by myself whilst feeling crap. This is his rest days, I was expecting him to take over for a bit too give me a break but instead he has been ill so I've had do everything by myself including the nights as he has slept in the nursery. This was at my insistence try to avoid either dd or I getting ill as well but I am still cross about it! Nobber me.

[OctoberOctober]

zara when are you talking to work about going back pt? I am also hoping to return sept / oct time 3 days a week but hadn't considered raising it yet. Unfortunately I'm in corporate sector that have recently clamped down on pt working so not a given by any means.

As a complete aside, I am seething after reading bastard Tory welsh sec banging on about same sex couples being unable to raise children in a 'warm and safe environment'. Seems to be under misapprehension that gay couples cannot biologically have children and also the small minded view that we are not fit to raise them. It saddens me that my children will grow up in a country where these views are still commonplace, but I do not for one moment think they will lack a loving and supportive home environment where they are treasured and nurtured.

[Zara1984]

October don't worry about Tory bigoted eejits. Whenever I hear those kind of views I always think "ah, but soon they will die". Imagine in the 60s and 70s etc moronic gits were banging on about how women's place was in the home and all this feminist stuff was dangerous. By the time your children are adults, homophobic views like that will be completely unacceptable!

Re: talking to work. When I was pregnant I told work (stupidly) that I'd let them know in February when I was coming back (that seemed so far away!). I didn't mention part-time. However another woman came back on part-time hours so there is precedent (however she is more senior/has been there longer than me). If they don't agree then I will threaten to leave. Need some big balls to do that....

[Beccus]

bollocks, dropped 2 percentiles :-( hv suggested formula, but she's never had her length measured since she was born, so i insisted they take that today & we will go back for review in 2 weeks. it annoys me that they bang on so much about breast is best but will suggest formula at the drop of a hat without even doing a full assessment. she then suggested i supplement with ebm- i don't get it, what's the point? isn't it more efficient just to feed her more often? i do feed her ALOT though during the day, she sleeps through 10-12 hrs at nite. so much day time feeding i actually thought it was a bit odd, thought they should be going 3-4 hrs now btn feeds. it's v. rare we would stretch to 3 hrs. not really sure what to do...will go see lovely b/f lady for advice. kellymom had some stuff re weight loss once b/f established, to do with dodgy latch....might spend tomorrow doing skin to skin, feeding to try & fatten her up & build supply

[Londonmrss]

Fuck em October. Bigoted wankers who just haven't quite evolved yet. Remember while we still live in a world where people are racist and homophobic and sexist, all rational people think their views are stupid and in many cases, the views are illegal.

I am sometimes thankful that I live in a part of the world that has largely evolved beyond the horrific treatment of minority groups. I read an alarming statistic recently about South Africa- a 15 year old girl in SA today is more likely to be raped than to learn to read. Also more than 80% of men there believe there can be no such thing as rape within a marriage. Awful. Anyway, waffling again.