Our second sensory room adventure
Autumn and the ovarian cyst
This post is going to be very difficult to write, but I feel like it’s something I need to do. I have written a short version of this story as a guest post for Rachel Bustin‘s New Mums Series about how it’s never too early to trust your instincts as a mum, but I’m going to go into more detail here. To begin with, repeating this story felt like it hurt me deeper and deeper each time. However, I’ve now had to repeat it so many times that I think it’s now getting easier each time and possibly helping me to heal and come to terms with what happened. Perhaps one day, someone else will read this who is going through the same or a similar situation (thankfully, this is EXTREMELY rare) and can live in hope knowing it gets better.
***Warning: This post is emotional and may be a trigger to some***
A letter to my daughter at 4 & a bit months old
Dear Autumn,
I can’t believe how big you’re getting. Sometimes it feels so long since you were born and you were so tiny, sometimes it feels hardly any time at all. One thing is for sure, I can’t imagine life without you and I’m so glad to have you in it.
Guest Post: My experience of perinatal and postnatal OCD
Today is #TimeToTalk day, a day all about increasing mental health awareness by talking about it and perhaps reaching out to someone with mental health issues to make sure they’re doing okay. Here I have a guest post from a close friend of mine who had her daughter 7 weeks before I gave birth to Autumn and has unfortunately been suffering from OCD since during pregnancy. I’ll be posting about mental health quite a lot on my blog, so I thought it would be interesting to ask her to write a post for me about her experiences so I could find out more about what she’s been going through but also to spread awareness of perinatal and postnatal OCD.
Please be aware that as with lots of things regarding mental health, this may be triggering.
10 reasons I’m #RockingMotherhood
Last Friday I was over at Mummy Miller‘s blog, when a recent post of hers caught my eye; 10 reasons I’m #Rocking Motherhood.
We’re often so tough on ourselves as mothers and parents, so I think it’s important that every now and then we just take a breath and think about all the positive things we’re doing as parents. I enjoyed reading Mummy Miller’s post and at the bottom it said that she was tagging anyone who may be reading it that hadn’t completed this challenge…so, I thought I’d give it a go!
I’m not shy – I’m an introvert
“She’s very quiet, why is that?” I remember my biology teacher asking my parents at a parents’ evening when I was about 13 years old. It was almost as though there was something wrong with me. For as long as I can remember, even as a child, people have called me shy and responded differently to me than they might others because I’m an introvert. It frustrates me somewhat, although quietly, because I don’t think I am shy. To me, I think of shyness as being when someone is afraid of speaking to other people – they want to revert back to that childhood behaviour of hiding behind their parents legs when someone wants to speak to them. That’s the thing…I’m not really afraid of speaking to other people and I don’t see myself as shy.
I quite like Mondays (a post about comping)
“I don’t like Mondays”, sang Bob Geldof in the 1979 The Boomtown Rats song of the same title. Most people would agree with him!
So why do I quite like Mondays?
Well, I’m on maternity leave at the moment, otherwise I’d like Mondays decidedly less. Every other Monday I can get Autumn weighed at clinic, which hasn’t lost its excitement yet – I love seeing how much my little milk monster has grown.
Sunday Review: Quinny Zapp Xtra 2 with birth inlay
Today I’m quite excited – partly because yesterday Autumn discovered her foot and I’m hoping today’s the day she puts it in her mouth (I find it so cute when babies do that) and because today is the start of the ‘Sunday Review’ posts I’ve decided to start writing!
I enjoy reviewing products – in the past I’ve been sent vouchers or products for free in return for reviewing them for companies. These have included Tesco’s Free From Range products, a Veet Easywax, YUM spreads and Dove compressed deodorants. As such, I thought I’d start reviewing products each Sunday here. My current plan is to review beauty products and baby things alternate weeks, but that may change in the future. Anyway, my review this week is about the Quinny Zapp Xtra 2 stroller and the birth inlay that you can use to enable you to use it for babies before the age of 6 months when they can use it without.
The great homework debate
Yesterday, I read on Mumsnet that Gary Lineker has called for homework to be banned. He said:
‘Homework should be banned. All it does is drive a massive wedge between parents and children, because you end up having to do it for them, and it’s stressful. They get stressed and they don’t want to do it’.
When Cassie cat found her forever home
Contains Sponsored Links¦ Back in 2010 when I was 18, my parents decided they were going to adopt a rescue cat from Cats Protection League. I’d practically moved out a couple of months before to live with my then boyfriend, now husband and was disappointed they’d never had a cat when I lived with them as I’d always wanted one but also excited that there was going to be a new cat in the family!
I still remember when my Mum received the phone call saying they may have found a cat for us and going to have a look at her to decide if we wanted her. We had cuddles with her and fell in love.
