March 2008

PostingSchool for thought

"What about trying this place," suggests Va-vay, as we debate a school for our two-year-old daughter Beanie.

Though he would never admit as much, Va-vay is basing this idea on Alexander McCall Smith's 44 Scotland Street novels, whose young hero Bertie is forced to attend the same institution. I cannot help thinking that Va-vay has slightly missed the point here: Bertie is miserable at being made to go to school there. But at twenty five weeks pregnant, I choose my battles carefully.

The next day I call the school.

"Allo, yes?" says a Germanic accent on the other end of the phone that sounds like a parody of itself.

"Err, hello, could you put me through to your admissions secretary?"

Silence. No farewell niceties, just a click on the line. Another voice answers.

"Hello. What can I do for you?" I feel like I've broken a rule by knocking on the staffroom door at lunch break and she's torn herself away from a sandwich to see me.

I explain I am looking for a school for my young daughter. My voice is cracking up slightly and I swallow nervously.

"Very good. I'll put a copy of our prospectus in the post. And we have a tour of the school on 1 May for prospective parents. Can you attend that?"

"Yes, I think so. Let me just check my diary," I reply, feeling slightly crushed, as if I haven't done my homework on time or forgot to wash my PE kit for games. "Yes, that should be fine."

"I will put your name down then. Will your husband be with you?"

I haven't mentioned a husband. How does she know I'm married? Is this how they go about 'nurturing the imagination' and fostering 'keen thinking and questioning skills' as promised on their website - jumping to conclusions about people's private lives?

"No, he won't be," I explain, feeling inexplicably nervous. "But I'd like to bring my daughter along, to show her the place. See her response."

"That won't be possible," says Madam, sounding ticked off. "We don't permit young children to come on tours. They're too disruptive."

I force myself to state the obvious. "But it's my daughter who would be at the school. I need to see how she takes to it." Or not, I think, silently.

"No, children are not allowed. We take tours into classrooms and young children of her age would disturb pupils who are working."

I remember that these people are proposing to charge us many thousands of pounds for educating Beanie. A flame of anger jumps up in me.

"Oh, okay. I see. Well, look, I think in that case we might just leave it then, thanks all the same. This isn't really what we're looking for."

I hear a click on the other end of the phone and the line goes dead. Even these people haven't had the cheek to suggest they'll be teaching pupils much in the way of social skills.

Later that day I recount the experience to Beanie's granny, a former teacher.

"Why is it that so many people in teaching don't actually seem to like children very much?" I ask her. "Don't they know they'll be with children all day long if they go into teaching?"

Granny just shrugs. "Don't know. Some people go into it because they want to reform children. It gives them a moral uplift. There's a power dynamic there, you know."

Even if it turned out Beanie adored the place, I wouldn't want to set foot in it.

Posted 27 March 2008 15:56 | Number of comments: 12 | Comments

Edinburgh Granny

PostingCheers

Pregnant women are being advised not to drink any alcohol during the first three months of pregnancy by a health watchdog that last year said would-be mothers could drink a glass of wine every day.  What is it that makes every man, dog and government quango think they have the right to pontificate on how about pregnant women and new mothers should manage our lives? And why can't they at least make their minds up about what they're telling us to do?

The Department of Health said in May last year pregnant women should stop drinking altogether. But the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence said a few months later there was no evidence a small glass of wine every day caused any harm after the first trimester. The obstetrician who chaired the group developing the latest abstinence guidelines has admitted the latest guideline changes are not based on any fresh scientific evidence, saying: "There's no evidence of definite harm of drinking that level of alcohol per week [a daily glass of wine] but we are unable to guarantee women that there will be no harm." As if pregnancy isn't hard enough already, you get bombarded with conflicting advice from medics more interested in covering their backs against lawsuits than in looking after vulnerable pregnant women.

Posted 26 March 2008 21:46 | Number of comments: 8 | Comments

Guilt Health New baby

PostingEaster break

MelroseEasterMarch2008019_Small.JPGSo, our Easter break in the Scottish Borders. First, the good bits: daffodils, teashops, time with husband and child, ruined abbeys, Easter eggs (Beanie's egg is pictured left) and cherry cake. Plus I managed to drive us there and back - a big deal for me, as I must be one of the most timid drivers in Scotland. And the bad bits? Freak weather conditions: hailstorms and snow. Va-vay and I arguing about the route. And about my driving. And - worst bit - a group of fifty 10-year-old boys invading our youth hostel on Saturday night, banging on the door of our family room, rattling the door handle and shouting at us, forcing Va-vay, Beanie and me to flee in terror to a local hotel at 9pm. Though in a way, moving to the hotel was one of the good bits, because it (unlike the hostel) had central heating, lavender toiletries, coal fires, wood panelling, good cheer, tranquillity, attentive but unobtrusive staff, ensuite bathrooms, a television and top-notch bedding. I will never take any of these for granted again. Not after Schoolboy Saturday. And yesterday, Va-vay came home bearing a new piece of geekery - a Sat Nav system for the car to avoid further map-reading arguments. He has already had hours of fun programming it and is now talking excitedly about future trips. I should have known the way to win him round to driving was via technology. I had best get back to my (paid) work to find funds to pay for it all.

Posted 25 March 2008 12:08 | Number of comments: 10 | Comments

Activities Car Holidays

PostingNo fool like an old fool

A 57-year-old woman is due to give birth to her first child this week, after doctors misdiagnosed her pregnancy as ovarian cancer. The story made me wonder yet again about claims the NHS devotes too much money to older mums. Maybe it does overspend, but I have to say it's not money well spent. Doctors couldn't even get it together to clock this woman was in the family way; the best they could manage was that the baby was a 'hard abdominal mass', a statement of the bleeding obvious if ever I heard one and no doubt uttered in tones of patronising condescension. I was also mildly disgusted at the story. The pregnancy follows attempts by Susan Tollefsen, a special needs teacher who spent most of her adult life looking after her mother (beginning to see a theme here?), to have a baby via IVF in foreign clinics (most UK clinics draw the line at treating women over 45 and the NHS will not fund women over 40). "I just feel incredibly excited," Tollefsen is quoted telling one paper. "I know that when [the child] is ten I'll be 67 and I do wonder how she will feel about that, but we'll have to cross that bridge when we come to it." There'll be other tricky conversations: Tollefsen will have needed to use another woman's egg to become pregnant at her age, something that might also take some explaining ('You see darling, post-Soviet economics being what they are, this obliging Russian lady is, well, um, actually your biological mother, though you know that of course I'm your real mother. So now at least you know where you get those lovely Slavic cheekbones. Now tell me, been having any more trouble with the school bullies of late?'). If I were Tollefsen, a lady whose frumpy wardrobe makes little attempt to hide her post-menopausal status, I could lose my sense of humour at being taken for the child's grandmother. If I were her child, I'd be counting the days till I was old enough to put as much ground between me and her as long-haul flights permitted. Vancouver, California, somewhere like that. Miles away from Mum's sheltered housing complex. And given the health risks to women of repeated IVF 'treatment', some of which are only now emerging, Tollefsen might be wise not to bank on too extended an innings. Having children 'fashionably late' is one thing, turning up after the party's over something else. It's sad that Tollefsen now feels regret at devoting her prime years to looking after her mum (a theme that looks set to continue in the Tollefsen family) but she can't bring back those years when she was meant to be having children. She would have done better to resign herself to that. 

Posted 24 March 2008 12:30 | Number of comments: 5 | Comments

Fashionably Late - the book Older mother

PostingWomen 'unprepared for childbirth'

WomaninLabour_Small.jpg Many women are going into labour underestimating how painful it can be and overly optimistic they will be able to manage without drugs, a study suggests. Researchers at the University of Newcastle found 'discrepancies' between women's expectations of labour - and their actual experiences. In England, around a quarter of women who give birth end up having an epidural, the spinal analgesia which eliminates the pain of contractions, although many did not plan on having one. "Of course it is important to have hopes for how you would like your labour to be. But those involved in providing ante-natal sessions, while listening to these, need to make sure that women are aware of how things may go and help them construct realistic expectations," says Joanne Lally, who led the research. "The problem with some of the courses out there is that they concentrate so much on doing it naturally that inevitably women feel as though they've done something wrong when those techniques aren't enough for them." The BBC quotes Anna Davidson of the Birth Trauma Association suggesting women should be less competitive with each other about how they give birth. "Ante-natal sessions do need to be more realistic - perhaps including women who have given birth and had very different experiences. But mothers themselves need to stop being so gladiatorial about what they managed to endure. We sometimes seem to forget that while childbirth is natural, women in the past regularly died as a result of it."

Posted 20 March 2008 16:53 | Number of comments: 15 | Comments

Childbirth Childcare Health

PostingStitch in time

s273_Small.jpgI have started knitting again. I say 'again' deliberately. Maybe I should explain: when I was pregnant last year I started knitting a baby blanket and jacket. Then I miscarried at 11 weeks. And my knitting stopped. All I have to show for that pregnancy are some blanket squares. When I hold them to my face they smell of lavender after months at the back of a drawer. I still cry at the sight of them. An unfinished beginning that I haven't the heart to throw away. For years I never understood how devastating miscarriage can be. Until it happened to me.

In this pregnancy I have - up until now - refused to do any knitting. In case I jinx things with my optimism. This is irrational. I am now 24 weeks pregnant. Every scan has given good news. I should be confident by now about this baby: even as I write I can feel her swimming across my stomach, kicking me as she goes. We have a name for her, scan photos, even a 15-minute DVD. She is a reality. But I remain nervous. Too nervous to think about buying baby equipment. I've managed to start knitting again, though. A sleep bag (like the one pictured above). That's something.

Posted 18 March 2008 15:44 | Number of comments: 14 | Comments

Miscarriage New baby Pregnancy

PostingBBC Three Counties Radio

For anyone interested, I'm on BBC Three Counties Radio tomorrow at 10.15am to discuss whether anybody would be mad to start a family in their twenties these days. As I was saying to the producer, I never planned to have children a bit later in life. In all honesty, I would liked to settle down sooner than my late thirties. But my taste in men ran more to the Daniel Cleavers of this world than good old Mark Darcy. And so I remained single.

Also, frankly, I blame my husband Va-vay (definitely not a Daniel Cleaver type). There he was, living not a million miles away from me in London, both of us working in similar organisations, both of us loving word games, nonsense and hill walking, perfect for each other. But it took us until we were in our mid-thirties to bump into each other at an airport and fall in love. Most inefficient of him.

I love being an older mum, mainly because I'm very grateful it's happened after all this time. But the truth is that being pregnant, working and looking after our beloved Beanie is knackering, and I do wonder if it would be the same for a younger woman. I trudged home at lunchtime today with the shopping for our tea, hardly able to put one foot in front of the other. I didn't even dare buy more than a pint of milk, for fear I wouldn't be able to carry a two-pint bottle all the way home. I was so out of breath with lugging the shopping upstairs to our flat I had to sit down and have a glass of water. Please don't get me wrong, I know it's a blessing to be pregnant. But is it this hard being pregnant when you're in your twenties? Or do you have more stamina and energy then?

Posted 17 March 2008 14:54 | Number of comments: 7 | Comments

Fashionably Late - the book Older mother

PostingPramface babies

pramface460_Small.jpg"Is anyone ever ready for their first baby?" asked a teenage father in last night's Pramface Babies, which followed teenage mums giving birth in a Merseyside maternity ward. Granted, it was one of the few sensible things he had to say for himself, but he did have a point. Watching Pramface Babies I couldn't help but imagine the producers behind the cameras, you know the type; would film their grandmother in her death throes if they thought there was airtime in it. They found an easy target in the young working class mothers who starred in this show (one of them is pictured above), especially since the women were mostly filmed while in labour. No doubt the producers, with names like Annabel, Gemma and Charlotte will conceive to order at the correct ages, somewhere in their late twenties or early thirties, being neither too young or too old. Pity those of us who don't fall into the 'correct' timeframe for childbearing. Too young, and you're a feckless fool. Too old? Oh, a selfish career bitch.

I have worked and went to school with many women like the Annabels, Gemmas and Charlottes who produced this show. But personally, I have more time for the women ('pramface' is council estate slang for teenage mums) in front of the camera. They weren't the ones making money out of poking fun at other people. They showed love and dedication for their children. Sure, they were a bit daft and naive about what motherhood and relationships involved. But so what? You could see they were so desperate for affection after neglected childhoods, they'd fall for the first half-decent bloke who came along.

You could put together a grisly documentary on posh girl mating habits, that would make far more disturbing viewing than Pramface Babies. Many girls I studied and worked with were frank about marrying for money and status. One woman I knew admitted she was marrying her husband for the Norfolk manor house, opportunities to open church fairs and status as wife of a senior naval officer and had no plans to give up her female German lover in London.

In contrast, the women in Pramface Babies might have been clueless (of course they were, they didn't have the education or experience to be otherwise), but I respected them. They were determined to be the best mums possible to their babies. They believed in unfashionable concepts like 'love' and 'affection'. They were capable of warmth and kindness (not generally a posh girl forte). And unlike many of us (I include myself in this) they didn't waste time agonising about the work/life balance, or the 'right' time to have a baby. They just did it. The only thing that stops me, an older first-time mum, from greater sympathy with them, is that most of them got their figures back within months of giving birth. Now, it would be nice if the same were true for me....

Posted 14 March 2008 13:24 | Number of comments: 8 | Comments

Childbirth Fashionably Late - the book Older mother Pregnancy

PostingOther people's children

The friend of a friend has just given birth to her first child. "How did it go?" my friend asked Sharon. "Brilliant, just brilliant," said Sharon. "No drugs. I just had faith in my own body to give birth and being so positive got me through it." As I remembered my own childbirth experience (let's just say it involved a lot of drugs), I tried to remind myself that Beanie arriving safely was the important thing, that jealousy is a sin, that my delivery could have been much, much worse, but a sense of inadequacy crept over me.

Looking after Ben has proved a breeze, at least if Sharon is to be believed. "He doesn't cry. No, really, he doesn't cry. And he's slept through the night ever since he was born." My jaw fell open when I heard that and I had to fight the smirk that crept across my face. "Really?" I managed. "That's.... unusual."

"And how's feeding going?" asked my friend, adopting her most determined smile. "Really well," replied Sharon. "He latched himself on as soon as he was born and he's been feeding for up to an hour at a time. In the day. He's never hungry at night." Baby Ben woke up at this point, perhaps aware that his food intake was under discussion. His gusty cry somewhat belied what mother had said earlier, but we pretended we hadn't heard and said nothing. After all, she had just been through childbirth, even if it was a doddle and she really had given birth to a child destined to be the next Dalai Lama.

At the sound of Ben's cry, Sharon eyed him like one might a wild animal, picked him up, shuffled her bottom around, reached for one boob, then seemed to think better of it, yanked up her jumper on the other side and gingerly unclipped her nursing bra. As she did so, folds and folds of saggy stomach flesh fell out over her maternity jeans, and I began to feel sorry for her. After some seconds of further fumbling under her jumper, she extracted a disc of sodden tissue that she placed on the floor next to me, at some distance from herself and the howling infant. I tried not to look at it, in case it put her off what was proving to be quite a delicate procedure.

After all this, baby Ben, now very wide awake indeed, decided he wasn't really peckish after all and refused to latch on. But eventually, Sharon persuaded him to feed. An expression of intense pain flashed across her face. All bragging, indeed any talking at all on her part, ceased. About three minutes later Ben lost interest and detached himself from his mother's chest. I swear a roguish grin crossed his two-week-old face. As for his mother, a look of disappointment and guilt replaced the furrowed concentration on her face. "Feeding's going really well, but still, I'm thinking of going to a breastfeeding support clinic on Friday," she said. Truly, I am a horrible person. For at last, when I heard that, I started to warm to her.

Posted 13 March 2008 12:19 | Number of comments: 11 | Comments

Angst Breastfeeding Childbirth Childcare

PostingChasing butterflies

butterfly_Small.jpgAt the weekend I took Beanie to a place called Butterfly World, on the outskirts of Edinburgh, the city where we live. She has been talking about it ever since. Oh, that feeling of being able to do something that made her happy. Wonderful. Butterflies (Beanie calls them 'flies') fluttered overhead in an old greenhouse converted into a sort of tropical paradise. Followed us, pirouetted, swooped out of nowhere. Beanie stumbled towards them,  hands held out in greeting. Trays of oranges hung from the ceiling. Butterfly nosh?

We threw money in a wishing well, inspected carp, goldfish and a catfish, eyed up iguanas, looked at terrapins and had a quick look at the reptile and creepy crawly section in a room at the back. Being there made my skin crawl. But Beanie and I both loved Butterfly World. Something alarmed me, though, as I bought my ticket. Sellotaped to the counter was an advert. It read: "For sale. A large python. £40 ono. Friendly and easy to manage."

Posted 11 March 2008 14:07 | Number of comments: 9 | Comments

Activities Daughter Edinburgh Out and about

PostingBack on the buses

When I was a childless Londoner I used to sneer at  bureaucrats who wanted to take our beloved  Routemaster buses off the streets. Those open platforms. Too dangerous, they said. Dangerous? Hardly, I would think, hanging off the edge of the 19 as we travelled along the King's Road, a barrage of rain, wind and grime blowing in my face.

150pxRootmasterCafe2_Small.jpgToday whenever I see a Routemaster (the one pictured left has been turned into a cafe) it reminds me of a vanished era of first jobs, flatsharing, overdrafts, friendships and early love affairs, of a time when I was unafraid of life. Of my first, often bungled steps towards becoming a grown-up. Standing on the open platforms, holding on with one hand, I felt, well, I felt free. Almost as free as the occasional bedraggled pigeon that used to fly on board  to join us. Arriving in London from provincial 1980s Edinburgh, there was a thrill to standing on the open platforms, careering through the streets of the metropolis. Able to hop on and off at will. No need to wait for officialdom to release us at a bus stop.

They phased out the final Routemasters a few months after I got married, left London for good and became pregnant. It was Ken Livingstone who got rid of them. The same Ken who once said, "Only a dehumanised moron would get rid of the Routemaster".

This weekend my husband Va-vay was in London and brought back a wooden Routemaster bus (No 43 to London Bridge) for Beanie. To her father's dismay, she was more interested in the body lotion he brought back for me, discarding the bus after a cursory inspection and spending half an hour annointing her cheeks and arms with jasmine and ylang ylang cream. As well as her eyes, mouth, hair and tongue. She gave me a pitying smile when I pointed out to her that her two-year-old skin didn't require hydrating. The same way I ignored my mother when she told me I didn't need full make-up, aged 13.

As for me, all I could think of as I looked at the bus was how hard it would be get a buggy on board one of them (an issue close to my heart). How frightening it would be if the buggy rolled back off the bus onto the road. Whether the brake would be strong enough to keep baby and buggy safe. Spiritually, you see, I have become as one with those bureaucrats.

Posted 10 March 2008 11:01 | Number of comments: 6 | Comments

Buses Edinburgh Out and about

PostingDon't let the baby drive the bus

250pxLothianBusesNumber25_Small.jpg When I posted about my parking nightmare a couple of weeks ago some bright spark said in the comments thread I had no 'need' to drive, since I am lucky enough to live in a city centre. I decided to put this to the test by leaving the car at home and taking Beanie by bus to a Tiara Party at the Children's Bookshop here in Edinburgh. I am five months pregnant at the time of this experiment.

The 23 bus pulled up a few minutes after we got to the bus stop. Unfortunately for us, it was one of the many old-fashioned buses (unlike the one pictured) still in use, with steep steps at the entrance, bisected by a large handrail. Not very buggy-friendly.

I took Beanie out of the buggy, a big three-wheeler all-terrain (while holding Beanie's tiny hand firmly in case she tried to run into the road), folded it, then looked around for help with getting the buggy onto the bus. Only the driver looked like a possible. Everyone else looked like they'd give themselves a hernia trying a stunt like that.

The driver pulled on the handbrake, got out of his cabin, grabbed hold of the pram and lifted it high enough to clear the handrail, grappled with it a few moments, twisting and turning it above his head, then dumped it down in the passageway of the bus. I thought I heard a 'tsking' sound from some quarters at the delay. I clambered up the steps behind the driver, holding Beanie, (nearly two) thinking of my first pregnancy when I followed all the rules about not lifting heavy objects.

Edinburgh buses have strict rules about not leaving buggies obstructing passageways, so I knew I needed to get the buggy into an official storage space. I wouldn't be able to do this while holding Beanie. I shouldn't really have been doing it at all, being pregnant, but didn't feel I had much choice (getting off the bus wasn't much of an option by then). So I gave Beanie to the driver to hold. He looked a bit put out. "It's 20 years since I've looked after a wee one," he said. "I'm sure it'll all come back to you," I said sweetly. Then I turned to the buggy. It looked very big there on the floor. "Please don't move off yet," I called to the driver, who was sitting in his cabin with Beanie, as I was frightened of falling over if he moved away suddenly while I wasn't holding a handrail. Beanie looked delighted, like she might have a chance to drive the bus. She was pushing at buttons and levers with great enthusiasm.

I accosted a young schoolboy and asked him to help me with the buggy. Motherhood has made me so bosssy. He did as requested. Then I turned back to retrieve Beanie. To my horror, the bus driver's arms were empty. A woman passenger said: "Don't worry, dear, she's right here." I picked up Beanie from her, gave Beanie a kiss, and we sat down side by side in two seats that an old lady vacated for us, tottering down the passageway so we could sit down more easily.

The Tiara Party was worth every moment of hassle. Author Vivian French entertained a crowd of little girls with stories of the school for princesses. Even though Beanie was easily the youngest there, Vivian French and bookshop owner Vanessa Robertson (you can read her blog here) made a big fuss of her and welcomed us both. The girls made their own tiaras with a glorious array of stickers, colouring pens and glitter and invented princess stories with help from Vivian. It was a great success. Other author events coming up at the bookshop include children's author Cathy Cassidy, (tomorrow, 4 March at 5pm, some tickets still available). Beanie and I plan to be regulars at as many of them as possible. That said, transport-wise we chickened out and took a taxi home. Some battles are just not worth fighting.

Posted 03 March 2008 11:55 | Number of comments: 10 | Comments

Buses

PostingWelcome to Guardian readers

guardianlogo_Small.gifWelcome to anyone who's found this site through its mention today in The Guardian in its weekly Guide. I'm delighted to be included in the paper's Internet section in a column on Blog Roll Mums, where I feature alongside The Baby Juggler, Mommy Has A Headache, Parenthacks, Strife in the North and Sarcastic Mom. If anything on the site strikes a chord with you, please leave a comment. And if any of you became a mum over 35, drop me a line. I'm researching for my book Fashionably Late so would love to hear from you.

Posted 01 March 2008 12:29 | Number of comments: 16 | Comments

Blogging Fashionably Late - the book Older mother