College Lake with a Back Carry

In which I do my first walk with the Chap on my back, find a different path to take around College Lake and continue to assuage my nursery-guilt with knitting.

Map: None Used (routes are available at College Lake if you're desperate, but it's very much a case of following signs!)
Distance: 4k
Time: 1 hour

Rating: Easy Walk
This walk was a first for me, because it was the first time I did a walk with the Chap on my back. It's been coming on for a while - I got to the end of Willen Lake and thought "oof, my back", so I've been working up to doing extended walks with the Chap on my back, and this was the first 'proper' walk I've done with him there. It takes a bit of practise to get them up there - I have found it easiest to 'Santa Toss' him over my head rather than scooting him round my side, as he's just got too tall to fit comfortably under my arm. However, I can get him up there without incident now, so long as he isn't wearing anything big like a coat that tend s to get rucked in the back and make the back of the Ergo sit a bit low, but I now know what that feels like, so it can be dealt with.

However, I still wanted to build my confidence, so I went for College Lake. It's an easy walk, it's not a long way or difficult terrain, and it has a visitor centre so nappies and so on can be dealt with.

We started as we start most walks these days - with the two of us walking. We use the reins for this a lot as the Chap can accelerate in an impressive manner - fine of you're in a flat park, but not so good if you're in an area filled with rabbit holes or on a train station or similar.

On leaving the Visitor Centre, turn left and follow the path round. It starts on gravel and then quickly becomes a packed earth path, and the Chap seemed quite happy to toddle along that rather than dashing off into the undergrowth, so I let him off his reins to tootle about in that purposeful manner that toddlers have.

Soon enough, however, he stopped and asked to be carried, so I threw him over my shoulder and into the back carry and we continued forward.

The line of trees soon breaks and you start to get views over the lake. The path splits shortly after this - the orange trail continues on the flat path suitable for prams, but we chose the purple trail bearing right and down a slope. This leads down into a tree-lined dell, and then up again to a narrow path. It's a quieter path and easier if you're wanting to see some birds or other wildlife than the main orange trail.

Also a week of firsts, I have finished my first cardigan for the Chap! I am amazed that it not only looks like a cardigan, but it also appears to be wearable! I put it on him this morning (before I had sewed in all the loose threads) and was also delighted to see that, although a bit big at the moment, it will fit him and appear to be in proportion when he gets big enough for it. I am amazed it actually looks like it's supposed to! It took weeks, however, but I'm really pleased with it. And at least it gave me something to work on while we worked our way through the Lord of The Rings extended box set.

I find knitting terribly comforting. When my sister-in-law asked why I had started knitting, the answer was simple - guilt. I hate putting him in nursery, but I find knitting helps me ignore it.

"Ah-ha," she said, in that knowing way that people with psychology degrees have. "So it's a case of 'I'm leaving you, but I've got you this."". I've thought about it, really, and that's not quite right. It's not about leaving him so I got him something. There's a world of plastic dinosaurs and cars that could fulfil that function. It's something about the effort, the activity. It's not really about the fact you get a cardigan at the end of it, although that is in itself satisfying (and surprising!). It's more about the activity; the performance aspect. If I think about it, even though I enjoy being at work (which is something I never thought I'd say, but that's what having a year's maternity leave lead me to conclude), I still feel that by going to work I am doing something unutterably selfish. It doesn't matter that we can't afford for me not to work - I think it's a case of the Terrible Shoulds. I feel I should be at home looking after him, and therefore any other choice is Doing It Wrong.

You will shortly reconnect with the main trail, and we continued along this until we saw the gate leading off to the left through the fence, marked with a 'permissive footpath' white arrow. As this was somewhere I hadn't been before, I decided to go and have a look and see where it took us.

I really enjoyed this part of the route. It feels a lot quieter than the main path, and takes you along the edge of the nature reserve through the trees. It was also completely deserted apart from a photography crew who were taking promotional pictures for the reserve, who grinned as I went past with my load.

  

In wearing the Chap as I go for walks, I manage to do what I want at the same time as feeling like I'm ticking the 'Proper Parenting' box. It was the same when we went and enjoyed the dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum the other day - I enjoyed the dinosaurs before I had a child, but now I'm not just indulging myself. I'm Being A Parent. In knitting, I perform the role of being his mummy, even if what I'm doing is just sitting on the sofa drinking beer and shouting "Oi love 'ee, Mr Frodo!" at various opportune moments at the TV. Now, obviously this doesn't mean I'm not his mother when I'm doing this, but it seems to me that again, this is a self-indulgent act when what I should be doing is watching him sleep and composing odes to his restful slumber or similar. Left brain knows this is tosh. My left brain understands that one can still be someone's mother as you cry "You were robbed of that Oscar, Mr Serkis, robbed, I say!". So, knitting is a salve to the incoherent babbling of my right brain - I am performing the act of being a mother, therefore it's fine. It doesn't matter that I am knitting because I enjoy it, or I like the challenge - if that wasn't the case, I wouldn't do it. I enjoy it, but it also helps on the occasions when he comes home from nursery knackered, goes straight to bed and I hardly see him. It's either knitting or watching little videos we've made of him and crying. I know which option is provides a more conducive household environment...

The path then leads you back onto the main route, giving you good views over the lake. We continued forward, and then took the first right hand turn. This area is definitely not suitable for prams - there are steps and gates and narrow pathways and it would all be very awkward. I like this route, however, because there have some interesting things to look at along this way. This way has information about the history of College Lake, starting with old machinery left over from the days when it was a chalk quarry and going all the way back to the dinosaurs.

We then took the path leading up and off to the left back to the main route. I also wanted to have a look around the second hand book shop that lurks about the Visitor's Centre - I am indeed one of those people who can never resist the lure of a bookshop. I have a particular fondness for women's advice manuals from pre-1960s. None exist in this bookshop, but I did pick up a nice children's book about an elephant who is pen-friends with a penguin.

Children's books acquired, we then continued back to the Visitor's Centre, then home.

Things I Learnt

• After I changed to the 'santa toss' method of getting the Chap on my back, all my back-carrying problems have been solved!
• I can knit, it seems. My next plan is for something a bit more proper than a beginner's pattern... something that involves a tension square to start off with...
• You can get a number of quite varied walks out of College Lake. When I first went, I was pretty sure it was a straight march around a circuit job, but I am glad to find that there's a good amount of choice. It's also good for building up confidence if you're not used to baby wearing for walking.

Pitstone Common (Ashridge - Circular Walk)

In which the sun comes out and my tree painting friend and I wander around Ashridge on a brief tour of some Significant Trees of Awesomeness, and I am oddly grateful to be back at work.

Map: None used (eek!), although it's on good ol' Explorer 181

Distance: 2 miles (guesstimate)
Time:  45 mins -1 hour

Rating: Easy Walk

This walk wanders through part of the Ashridge Estate, and although I've tried to make it as accurate as possible I would like to place a small health warning on this walk - as my friend had to take me off the path to show me Significant Trees of Awesomeness several times, I may be a bit woolly here and there...

Starting at door the Bridgewater Monument, walk down the left hand side of the road towards the actual Manor house. After - maybe- 200m or so you will see a pond to the woods in your left, and bearing left into the woodland there is a signposted path. This is the one we took.

The path leads around to the left and you join a wide avenue through the trees. My friend seems quite happy to wander off into the woodland in search of exciting trees, which is probably why she paints them so well. I, however, am not so keen to bimble off into the woods without a map. I really like walking through woodland, but as long as I'm with people. If I'm on my own it often feels pretty menacing - probably some old evolutionary hangup I have. Maybe I have ancestors who were menaced by wolves in the woods.

Interestingly enough, I feel a lot happier if I'm in woods with water. Subconsciously I think this may actually have less to do with wolves and more to do with my atrocious sense of direction. To me, woodland looks like woodland looks like woodland, but if you have a river, you always know which direction you came from. It's harder to get lost.

Once you're in the woods having followed this path, you get a wide carriageway looking kind of path, rutted in places with the tracks of 4x4s.

The sun was shining and it was moderately warm, our children were being quiet and everything was pleasant. We had a bit of a moan about the usual things we moan about - people who seem to present that everything is amazing with being a parent, the judgement we perceive from others if we don't seem to be towing the line. It's not that we don't like our children, we do, we think they're great, I just think we're less inclined to wax lyrical about it. I knew this woman and I would get along the day she cocked an invisible shotgun at her son who had been awake 3 times in the night. Mothers rarely do that in public. We're all usually pretending we're brave little soldiers, then going home and crying.

Of course, I am now failing to tow the line by having gone back to work part time. Society seems difficult to know how to deal with us, really. It nods in approval at us for going back to work, and it also nods that we are partly sacrificing our careers for our children, but at the same time there is the sense that society sucks its teeth at us for exactly the same reasons. All I can say is that I think part-time work is best for me. It might not be best for everyone, but oddly - and unexpectedly - I'm really grateful to be back at work. At work, there are rules. The hours I'm supposed to be there are clearly delineated, and the expectations of me are made clear. People tell me what to do, I do it, they don't give me shit. What they don't do is throw 4 different advice books at you, conflicting Health Visitor advice, and no-one spends time posting articles on Facebook about how what I've been doing is wrong.  It is, I must admit, a refreshing change. If the Chap didn't howl every time I dropped him off at nursery, I would be completely satisfied.

In due course, pass a turn off to the right and then take a marked path to the left further on. Continue along this path and (this is where is gets a bit hazy, so forgive me) I think it will eventually lead you left to one of the Significant Tree is Awesomeness much admired by my friend. This was her daughter's Castle Tree, and it sits in the middle of the path along what used to be a boundary line for the old Roman farms that used to exist on Ashridge. Standing next to this tree and looking to the left and right, you can see the bump of the earthwork that indicated the boundary lines. The trees all along it are really old and gnarled, and - so I was told - are all pretty old because, being on the boundary line, were all left to indicate... well, the boundary.

Middle right, the rooty hand clutching at the soil...

We then took at detour off the path to view another Significant Tree - heading right from the Castle Tree, you pick your way through the undergrowth to a huge rooty thing that was festooned with blue rope for swings. It's hard to explain quite how big it was. I was also particularly menaced by the fact it clearly has a five-fingered hand grasping onto the Earth. I am half convinced it uproots itself and night and wanders round the woodland.

Back on the path with the Castle Tree, we followed the path through Pitstone Common until a path marked by a post with a mushroom on it branches off it. This path bears right and I was surprised to find brought us back to the other side of the pond we had gone past about 45 minutes earlier, and lead us back to the car park. It's a nice wander, on the whole, made even more pleasant by sunshine and a spot of putting the world to rights!

Things I Learnt

• The woodland at Ashridge is all pretty new, as the land was farmed for a long time after the Romans stopped. The oldest trees are the ones along the boundary lines.
• My sense of direction, poor at the best of times, completely deserts me in woods.
• For a couple of years I have been a total wazzock with regards to Ashridge, taking the same dull path every time. I am really excited to have been shown other routes and find other things!

Slings or Pushchairs? A UK Mother's Day List of Pros and Cons

This is a special post for UK Mother's Day :)



I found myself in a Sling Meet saying something that as a Mother™, I Should Not Say. It was this:



"To be honest, I don't give a sod how beneficial it is for my baby or not. It's me who has to use it, so sell it to me, tell me how it's going to make my life easier, and then I'll think about it"



We mostly use a expensive sling (we use a £95 Ergo, but there are loads of others out there to suit every size, shape and wrapping ability!) and a cheap pushchair (£40) which were both bought new. Below are my experiences of various situations you can find yourself in, and the advantages and disadvantages of using both types of child transportation. The internet is full of gubbins about how one way or the other is beneficial or not to your child. These are my experiences with my child, and how both methods of transport can make your life easier as a parent. Or not.

Situation	Pram/pushchair	Sling
Stairs	You are a Dalek. Discover how poor wheelchair access is in your current location. See my brief complaint about the access to my local station on my first trip into London with the Chap.	As normal.
Rambling/Hiking	You are confined to accessible routes. Little opportunity to ever feel you’re really in the great outdoors, if that’s your thing.	You have legs – off you go! Once you’ve tackled the first stile and you’re confident with that, you’re laughing.
Christmas Shopping	Those who favour the pram for this usually own a pram with a large capacity tray beneath and the gumption to drive your pram like a tank along the high street. Can be highly effective.	Greater manoeuvrability, particularly in crowded shops. A godsend if you’re in the sort of shopping mania where goods are left on the floor of shops (Primark being a particular example in the UK) where driving a pram over that stuff is a right old faff. You can also use your familiar routes in shopping centres – stairs & escalators hold no fear for you.
Grandparents / Family	May quibble over the type of pram you buy…	You may have to bear the disappointment of grannies who have been waiting a long time to push their grandchild to the shops. You may also have to spend some time explaining why you’re not using a pram.
Buses	Awkward. May not always be somewhere you can put your pram. Bus drivers and other passengers can sometimes be delightful and really helpful, other times they can be just plain rude.	Step on bus. Pay fare. Take seat.
Rain	Locate rain hood, try to remember how to fit rain hood, put it on upside down, get wet, swear, turn rain hood right way up, realise that now the child is dry you have no free hand to hold an umbrella. Hair now ruined.	Use an umbrella as normal. Hair remains intact.
Weird looks or comments	Probability for this happening because you’re using a pram – low.	Probability of this happening because you’re using a sling – high. Mostly people are nice – “Ooo, he looks comfy in there”, or just curious and ask you if it hurts your back (unless you’ve got them on your back, and then they want to know how you get them up there). It’s never happened to me, but I have had friends who have had people bitch at them in the street (e.g “He’ll never learn to walk/ he’ll grow up clingy”). Just smile and carry on…
Cooking	Younger babies may not want to be laid down while you cook and may kick up a stink to be held. Older, cruising – walking toddlers may spend a lot of their time pulling on your trouser legs and howling because they want to see what you’re doing.	Once you’ve mastered the back carry, it’s not a problem. Use your common sense – if you have one that likes to lean and grab, do your chopping away from any pans of scalding liquid!
Doctors	I had a lot of unpleasant gynaecological gubbins to go through in the first 6 months post baby (to those expecting, please let me stress – this is not typical!) . Attend surgery, wheel in pram, derobe, assume all manner of inelegant positions for impersonal rummaging.	If you’re baby is pre-rolling, place child on floor, carry on. Much more awkward if you have a roller/crawler/walker as they are not contained and can begin to roam…
Holidays (depends where you go and what you want to do. We like to go and look at points of historical or cultural interest, sit about in cafes or do a bit of shopping)	Bulky and takes up luggage space in cars, and can often be the last thing to appear after plan travel. Unfamiliar areas can include cobbled streets (cue much bouncing if suspension isn’t all that great), stairs, restricted access to certain monuments & museums. We went to France and found out how poor wheelchair access can be… How bad? Bad. Versailles claims you can take in prams and then makes you park them just inside the door, and we took our pushchair to Dijon and found that the whole of the upstairs of the Duc’s Palace is off limits if you’ve got wheels… Parasols are available to keep out the sun.	A sling also takes up much less luggage space, and doesn’t need to go in the special whoojit on planes. You might like to consider the thickness of the material of your usual sling and hire something thinner from a sling library if you’re going somewhere hot. The people who run the sling library should be able to offer advice to find the best sling for your needs. You might like to consider using an umbrella or parasol as well as the usual sunhat, suncream to protect your child.
Underground/Metro/ Subway	Can be awkward navigating ticket barriers, getting down to station platforms and negotiating the actual trains.	As normal, off you go, off you go!
Restaurants	If the baby is asleep, you don’t have to move them. Pushchair can also be used as impromptu highchair.	If they are asleep, learn to drink coffee sideways (so as not over the head of your child). The whole business I found to be just plain awkward. Some people can sometimes do something clever if you use a SPoC (single piece of cloth sling), but we don't have one and so never managed it!
Teething	Can be used to rock the baby to sleep? Never tried it, so can’t really comment…	Putting him in the sling and wandering around the house with him gave me some much needed peace and quiet. Don’t know how it works, but it worked like magic. Worth the price of the sling on its own to save my sanity at times!
Snuggles	You’re up there, they’re down there. You can still have a nice chat, though.	The contact and ability to sniff or kiss your child’s head at will is very pleasant, particularly if, like me, you can’t breastfeed but want more snuggly bonding time.

Do what works for you, and what makes your life easier. For me & the ChapDad, it's been a sling, and I'd recommend them to everyone. But then I would say that - our house is at the top of a set of steps.

Happy Mother's Day!

Willen Lake (Circular Walk)

In which I find Willen Park in Milton Keynes to be filled with interesting things, enjoy a wander round a pagoda, and conclude that all parenting gurus are best avoided.

Distance: 2.5 miles
Time: 1 hour

Map: None required - just follow the edge of the lake! 

Rating: Easy Walk

Every now and again, someone hands me an essay to mark that makes my heart sink. The students are always pleasant, well meaning, perfectly nice people; they are attentive in class, and have tried hard. Unfortunately, they hand in total bilge. I find myself desperately trying to find something nice to say about their work. You've structured this very well, I might attempt, even though I gave them a piece of paper saying what they should write in each paragraph. You've used a variety of short and long sentences to create interest. Sadly, Milton Keynes brings to mind these sorts of essays. I really like your planning. I find myself wanting to say. You've really tried to do something different here. They've tried, they really have, but the whole place always feels to me as if it is one step away from falling into a J.G. Ballard novel.

This week's walk was in Willen Park. It is based around a lake that has been divided into two sections - the South Lake, for the noisy, excitable youth where you can do things like wakeboarding, outdoor adventuring and submit yourself to some sort of horror that is known as the Willen Park Trim Trail, where you are invited to jauntily do some exercises on brightly coloured outdoor gym equipment. The North Lake is aimed towards the more tranquil  visitor, with a Buddhist temple, Peace Pagoda, labyrinth and bird sanctuary. My plan was to walk all the way around the two parts and to see what I could see from the edge of the lake.

Starting at the South Lake car park (£1.20 for 2 hours, and with the ever important baby change), I made my way to the path at the edge of the lake and turned left, following signs when they cropped up towards North Lake and the Peace Pagoda.

After Wednesday's post about the Daily Mail's contradictory reporting of Gina Ford, I've had some interesting conversations. The one I've found most thought-provoking was a friend who said:

"The very fact that some new mums are so vulnerable and desperate for a manual is why they should be protected from some of the tripe that these baby help books spout forth, especially ones by the dangerous ill informed divorced former nursery nurse who has never had children. Its irony heaped on irony that women who have fought so hard to reclaim maternity back from male doctors who have never experienced childbirth are willing to accept the same one size fits all advice from someone who has never had children! So I'm not going to leave that awful woman alone!"

I've been thinking about this. I knew I wasn't going to follow Gina Ford when a friend read out one of her schedules that dictated that you and your child should be dressed by 8.45, after a feeding session that outlined a strict 10 minutes of left breast followed by 10 minutes of right. Seeing as  we have generally held a 'be dressed by Woman's Hour' policy in our house, I could see following dear Gina would be unfeasible, and I didn't pursue her books further. I didn't even get them out of the library to give them a proper critique as I didn't want her to get the library fees...

But then people started recommending I read Dr Sears' books. After all, there I was, a homebirthing babywearer attempting to breastfeed. But again, the advice makes me feel uncomfortable. The whole focus on the word 'natural', as if to suggest other ways of parenting are unnatural. The urge for you to be 'instinctive' and 'follow your baby's needs' while producing books and websites on how how to follow those instincts...

Both the gentleman who made the comment above and I agreed that most parents, if they are going to use a parenting guru, choose one that agrees with them. I think why I've never followed one (apart from my refusal to read the books) is that I don't seem to fit. I had a homebirth, I enjoy baby wearing, but turfed the child out of our bedroom at 5 months when he started squawking in the night. I tried to breastfeed, but by the end of my second pint I can be heard expounding that formula milk has been one of the greatest liberators of women, along with the washing machine and the contraceptive pill. I thought the ability for my husband to also share in the closeness of feeding a baby was a fantastic thing, and it also meant I could go to sleep. I could follow Dr Sears, but I wouldn't be doing it 'right'. I like a routine, and I like things to be convenient and set by me, but I also don't want my life to be dictated by the routines I set. I want my child to sleep, my God I want him to sleep, but I can't face the controlled crying route. I'm still unnerved by the dark, so the thought of waking up alone and crying out for someone and no-one answering fills me with a cold dread. So Baby-Whisperer stuff, or Gina Ford, again, I wouldn't be doing it 'right'.

But come on, I hear you people cry. No-one is asking you to be a martyr to the gurus. You fillet them for the advice you find works for you, and carry on.



Once you have passed under the road and headed towards North Lake, follow a sign bearing left that leads you towards the Buddhist temple. I went to a few when we lived in China (although this is a Japanese style affair), and was keen to compare. Sadly, however, the door to the shrine was locked, so we enjoyed the Japanese style garden and went on our way.

Upon leaving the Temple grounds, turn left and the white marshmallow of the Peace Pagoda soon hoves into view. Follow the path around and the steps up to the pagoda, flanked by lions and - at this time of year - a row of daffodils soon comes into sight. If you have a pram, there is a pram & wheelchair route up to the pagoda available a little further on.

The pagoda was the highlight of the park for me. I was sorry I couldn't get into the Temple, but there is a real tranquility to the whole area. Decorated with a large golden statue and scenes from the life of Siddhartha, the place had the sort of atmosphere that used to exist around the temples and shrines in China. I don't know how it would feel on a hot Bank Holiday weekend with people all over the place, but with me and a napping Chap, it felt lovely.
Next to the pagoda is the Labyrinth. I was eager as ever to idly bump into the Goblin King and see I was in a position to help him out with those jodhpurs, but sadly there are no walls, men with birds on their heads or Bogs of Eternal Stench - just some lines on the floor and a tree in the middle. It's probably fantastic to send a small child running around on a hot day.

Once you've enjoyed these sights, there's nothing more really to do at North lake beyond walking around the perimeter of the lake and head back towards South Lake, so I did just this.

The Pagoda across North Willen Lake

There are some nice views as you walk, dependent upon you looking in the right direction. If you ignore the noise from the M1 and the roads running alongside the park and concentrate on the Peace Pagoda across the lake, it's very pleasant.

Regardless of the sense of peace and tranquility you may have fostered at the pagoda and temple, it can be easily shattered by some new Government issued declaration on how we're rubbish. Or if it's not the government, it's some other body funding research that shows how we're making a hash of it. Once you have a baby, there's feeding, washing, weaning, nappies, teething, transporting, clothes, pain relief, sleeping, entertainment and education - whatever you choose to do with your baby, I can guarantee someone will post an article on Facebook which will tell you how what you're doing is damaging your child on a fundamental level. Whatever you do, someone has produced a piece of research to tell you that you're doing it wrong.

The path along the top edge of South Lake.

I was coming home on the bus this week, and I was a couple of seats away from a lady who I used to teach who is now in full time care of her grand-daughter. There was I with my organic fruit smoothies and my selection of picture books to entertain my son for the hour's journey. About twenty minutes in, after some wriggling from the granddaughter, I saw the lady reach into her bag, remove a chicken nugget and hand it to the 18 month old. She then followed this by tipping some of her coke into a sippy cup and proffering it to the child, who began gluggling greedily.

I will confess, I was wearing my Judgey Hat when I saw this. I had some Opinions. I pondered socio-economic dynamics and so forth. Anyway, we both got off the bus at our destination, and I helped my former student with her pram. And as we did so, she said to me "God, I couldn't believe I gave her a chicken nugget and the Coke. But I knew we've run out of food cos she's been really hungry, and I didn't want to her to kick off on the bus, and I thought, if anyone says anything, I'll just say, sod you.". I had been sat halfway across the bus when she'd got out the chicken nugget, I hadn't said anything to her about it, but here she was, justifying herself unbidden. And I felt a bit of a swine about my Judgey Hat. If I'd been in the same situation, 20 minutes in to an hour long bus journey and when all I'd had had been chicken nuggets and Coke, I would have handed them over to the Chap too.

Returning along the shore of South Lake

And this is the crux - we are terrified of other people's judgement, but we do it all the time. It's taken me a long time to just be able to say 'We're on formula. We tried to breastfeed but it didn't work." rather than give them the whole industrial-milking-machine, nipples shields, up for an hour and a half each feed speech to prove to them how hard I tried to breastfeed. What the speech was saying wasn't about how breastfeeding didn't work - it was five minutes of me trying to give the message "Don't judge me! I really tried!". I have seen people wince (really, wince. Like I'd poked them with a pin.) when I've said we sometimes watch TV together. I don't mean we're cracking out the Tarantino, I'm not asking my child if he thinks Marcellus Wallace is a bitch, I'm talking In The Night Garden maybe once or twice a week. One of my friends commented the other day that although she, like me, does the whole babywearing, non-controlled crying, mostly let your baby set their own routine thing, that she's worried 'when I talk to naturally-minded baby rearing friends [that] it's only a matter of time before they find out that I'm not longer breastfeeding and I don't use cloth nappies....'.

And this is why we like parenting gurus, because when we do feel judged, we get to outsource our guilt. Don't blame me, we say, blame The Baby Whisperer! From before the child is conceived we are told we are not good enough, and so it is not surprising that these gurus are so popular; they exist not only to shore up our faith in our own parenting, but also to give someone to point to when the rest of the world tells us we're doing it wrong.

Enthusiastic Noodle Boy!

Oddly enough, this whole Doing It Wrong thing was confirmed by a woman looking absolutely horrified as (having left the park and gone to the shopping centre for baby foot-measuring and a spot of lunch) I fed the Chap yaki soba and duck gyoza from my plate in Wagamama. I like this walking baby. He eats with a gusto I have not previously seen, and hoovered up soba like there was no tomorrow. Experiments at dinner later on also suggest that while he rejects many foods proffered on a spoon, he will accept them when offered on chopsticks. Thank goodness for chopstick skills!

Things I Learnt

• Regardless of how cute you think your child may be, nobody looks good eating noodles.
• Milton Keynes has Buddhists.
• I would go to Willen Park again. It's a bit spoilt by the noise of the roads and the views of the cars hurtling past, but they've really tried, and there's lots to see and do. It can't help the fact it's in a city.

An Open Letter To The Daily Mail : Please Back Off Gina Ford

For those who have missed it, this week there has been a Twitstorm over a Daily Mail article, headlined "Don’t say no to sex, even if you are not ready, childcare guru Gina Ford tells new mothers". This is my response.


Dear Daily Mail,


First of all, please let me explain that I am not a devotee of Gina Ford's Contented Baby series; it's not really my cup of tea. However, being a new parent can be a confusing and frightening time, so I can see why people might turn to the books as a way of managing. As people endlessly say to parents in the first few months, babies don't come with a manual, so I'm sure some would find that the provision of a manual a welcome thing. As I say, it's not my cup of tea, but I wouldn't presume to suggest to those parents who follow Ford's advice that they're doing it wrong. They're doing what's keeping them sane and working for them.

Babies, fine. They are delightful, but they are also confusing, alienating and even a bit harrowing at times. Let's be honest, none of us know what we're doing; we're all just muddling along as best we can.
But I find myself in a position I never thought I would be, and I have a message for you - Dear Daily Mail, back off Gina Ford. Stop it.


Of course, now she has a new book out and is sticking her oar in to the myriad of pro- and pre- scriptions that are ladled out to new mothers, I can see you were delighted with this article-fodder. Makes a change from finding things to complain about other than house prices, immigrants and Liz Jones' spunk-burglary, and there's always a danger that without that, you may have to report on the Leveson Inquiry. I've been doing a bit of reading around, you see. It's difficult to see what's Gina and what is part of the Daily Mail's enormous wooden spoon used to stir things with. You report that Gina Ford appears to suggest that a new mother shows 'sexual interest in her partner 4 - 6 weeks after giving birth'. That's a very specific timescale. However, one article implies Ford said women should 'grin and bear it' and in another article says someone on the contentedbaby website said it. One article uses the headline "Don’t say no to sex, even if you are not ready, childcare guru Gina Ford tells new mothers", yet another article that came out on the website 8 hours later reports  "Ford told The Times she would stop short of advising women to have sex before they are ready to." Of course, that comment doesn't get in the headline like the first one, does it? Oo, you're little tinkers, aren't you?


My problem, dear Daily Mail, is that I'm a feminist. I believe in choice. I believe in the choice to marry and the choice to remain single, and for both of those to be valued and respected as the decisions of a grown up. I believe in the choice to have children, and the choice to remain child free. We should see both states as personal preferences. And I also believe it is my choice -nay, my right- to deploy my Ladygarden as and when I am comfortable with it. I know you don't like to mention that ladies over a size 12 can form relationships and be sexually active in a way that isn't compulsive or an indication of 'goatish appetites', but um, sorry - there's a lot of us out here. We are neither compulsive nor goatish. We're just people.


Of course, you wind us all up. You refer to Gina Ford as 'the divorcee' and 'Miss Ford', just to highlight how she doesn't have the experience of, not only child rearing, but also the ability to maintain a successful heterosexual relationship (and you do like to peddle the myth that a woman's highest goal is that of marriage and motherhood). You wind us all up and then watch the message boards explode; you're really very good at it.


Here's a puzzle for you, be it Gina Ford or the commentators on the contentedbaby website (whoever advised to 'grin & bear it', or whoever made up that headline). What's the connection between Thor, Downton Abbey, and having a firework painted on your face? Give up? Well, I'll tell you. All three of these gave me a panic attack/strong feelings of anxiety relating back to experiences of childbirth. I know! Downton Abbey! Thor, for crying out loud. You wouldn't think these were in any way connected would childbirth, would you, but that's how post traumatic stress works, you see. It's not a respecter of logic. You can't expect that, say, the shot of a hospital band upon Chris Hemsworth's shapely wrist is going to remind you of the hospital band on your wrist and set you off. You can expect that seeing someone being slid from one bed to another while Downton Abbey is being used as a military hospital will make you have a funny turn. And you really, really don't expect that while on a friend's Bonfire Night hen do, the need to hold still while someone does something to you (in this case, face paint a firework) will make you feel a bit funny and need to do your breathing exercises to calm yourself down. It was a mild form of Post Traumatic Stress. You don't suggest that veterans of war with full blown PTSD 'get over it' with a course of clay pigeon shooting, and I'm not sure how effective it would have been had I tried to get over my milder case by inserting anything up my Under Henge.


Have I told you about the dreams, Dail Mail/Gina Ford/contentedbaby? For a while I had a run of dreams in which my husband and I would try to -ahem- become intimate, and it would come apart. A dream isn't real, I know, but there are some that stay with you. Dreaming about your foof breaking - that one sticks around. I used to wake up in the night crying - not just because of the dreams, but also just because dealing with a newborn is so very, very hard. You would probably have suggested that my husband left me to cry it out and that would have stopped me doing it in the long run, but that's not his style of husbandry.


So what I'm trying to say, Daily Mail, is that I wasn't ready at 4 - 6 weeks. I wasn't ready at 4 - 6 months. Now, whether or not Gina Ford or one lone contributor on her website advised to grin and bear it, it doesn't matter - you whacked it out as a headline, which suddenly started popping up on links all over the Internet. You must be delighted at the traffic! But what you're doing by peddling these headlines is by spreading continuing pernicious myths about male and female sexuality and you're making us all miserable. You are, I would suggest, the equivalent of the bully in the school playground whispering to girls that boys won't like you unless you put out. But I've got an earth shattering revelation - you don't have to have sex with people in order for them to like you. Have your staff on the Femail tried talking to men? Really, they're very interesting. They've got some good things to say. But you wouldn't want to suggest that men and women can communicate, would you?


To sum up, suggesting that men and women might be able to not have sex for long periods of time, and be fine with that, and still love each other, doesn't fit into the Daily Mail mission statement. That wouldn't fit in to the 1950s style values of lying back and thinking of England, looking down on the gays, and sneering at immigrants. There's vintage, darling, and there's retrogressive, and I think we all know upon which side of the line you reside.


Regards,


Bettiboots.

Baby, I want your socks

I have finished the socks!

I will be honest, one is a little bigger than the other, but (I hope) not disastrously so... They are at least one of my rare crafty type projects where they have actually turned out looking like the should do (I am scarred by years of CDT and Art at school in which nothing ever looked like it should), and I am awfully pleased with them.

Next step? To learn how to knit socks in the round so I don't have to do a lot of faffing round with the tapestry needle once I've finished them...

Four Things To Make You Feel OK About Leaving Your Child In Nursery

So, I survived my first proper working week, but I'm afraid there has been no walk as - in classic fashion - I picked up some horrible germ and have been too ill to leave the house. Boo!

Work itself was ok, although the Chap wasn't in nursery as he was running a temperature. Obviously him being unwell isn't a good situation, but it has been quite a nice opportunity for me to ease myself back into work without having to worry about him being in nursery at the same time. I don't have a problem with me leaving him going to work, but I am still very unhappy about leaving him in a nursery, and it's still the hardest thing I've ever done. Worse, even, than my A Level year, and The Year Of The Really Horrible Job, which is something worth saying.

There  are things, however, I have found that don't make it better, but do make it more manageable...

1) Lots of people put photos of their family on their desks to make themselves feel better.

This is not an option I have chosen. If I see a picture of my son, I will feel so awful that I will have nothing to do but run to the nursery and take him out and go home right then. This is not practical. Therefore, I have instead printed off this picture and stuck it on the partition on my desk.

Oddly enough, I found Hogarth's Gin Lane to be very comforting while pregnant, too. There are so many Pronouncements thrown at you while pregnant (eat this! Don't eat this! Take that! Don't go near that! Don't even think about drinking that!), I found Gin Lane to be quite reassuring - look, all these people are living in poverty and off their heads on gin, and they have managed to have babies they can then allow to fall head first off the steps. Now I am a mother, it's quite nice to have a gentle reassurance that yes, there are much, much worse things I could be doing than putting my son into nursery for two days a week...

2) Talk to other women.

Specifically for me, this has had to be other women who have gone back to work. I love the ChapDad dearly, but it's not the same for boys. Their experience is different because there are - unjustly - fewer expectations placed upon them by society. No, that's not right. There are as many expectations, they're just different. I used to really get my goat when people used to see my husband changing nappies and say 'aww, isn't he good', where it wasn't anything that people used to say to him about me when they saw me doing the same thing. So, while in most other situations, he's a very good person to talk to, in this situation it doesn't seem to work. When the little creature has ripped it's way out of your haa-hoo, and you've then got up three times a night to stay awake for an hour and a half trying to breastfeed, only to then have to spend a further half hour on a breast pump, and then it's taken seven months for the aforementioned haa-hoo to have all its stitches removed, and everyone having an opinion on how you should feed/clean/carry/dress/behave with your child, and all very keen on telling you on what you're doing as a mother and how your should be doing it better, your view of the world is different. I think there is so much opposition it forces you  into quite a strong little unit - you & your baby -, because you do have to reach the point where you have to just stand up, look the world squarely in the eye and say "Yes, I am formula feeding this child, and I'll carry him in a sling, and I will put him in a pink shirt every now and again and let him play with my Hello Kitty, and I will occasionally threaten to put him on eBay, and if you don't like it then I suggest you Go Get To Know Yourself Better". Boys don't have to do that, as far as I can see. They have their own societal crosses to bear, don't get me wrong, but they get less of a Thousand Yard Stare from the first year of childrearing. Other mothers know this, and they also know that having to give your child to someone else to look after can feel a lot like the bit in His Dark Materials when Lyra gets separated from her daemon. It's worth talking to other women to know you're not the only one who feels like this.

3) Feel like you're still a mummy

I mentioned last week that a lot of the feelings I have around nursery and leaving my child to go to work stem from the fact that I feel leaving him in a nursery means I'm not performing the role of his mummy. One way I've found around this has been to make sure I read the Chap a book before I go to work - for some reason that makes me feel like I've performed part of the act of being a mother. I've ticked a box. The other thing I've gone for has been a displacement activity to stop me stewing, combined with a bit of gender performance. All of a fluster, I went out and bought a knitting magazine last week and have been spending my time distracting myself by knitting my Chap a pair of socks. It's going quite well, and I'm having my first experience of knitting something that isn't a scarf. Good old Youtube for explaining the difficult bits in the patterns...

Go on, admit it - you covet my Doctor Who project bag.
You can get them from my lovely friend at Nicsknots, you know...

4) Wear all your nicest clothes.

The Good Shoes have come out, as have skirts & tights; I have worn a full face of makeup. It's been nice. Shallow, but nice. A one year old doesn't care if you're wandering round in tracksuit bottoms and a USSC Nostromo hoodie (which is part of their charm, certainly), but it's nice to get a bit dressed up and click clack along corridors pretending you're all efficient. And it's also nice to be reasonably confident that no-one will come along and wipe their snotty nose on your shoulder halfway through the day...