It's almost Babs' first birthday. It's played on my mind for months that I never got round to writing to the head of midwifery and the director of maternity services where I gave birth, to feed back on my experiences. I don't want to complain; really, I just want to let them know what happened, where there were failings, and where some of their development activity should focus. Everyone whose birth stories I have heard in the last year have included aspects which disappointed them - apart from the women who were able to give birth at home. Now, possibly this is because the home births, by definition, required the least intervention - were the most 'natural' - but it is not intervention per se that causes dissatisfaction (disappointment, maybe, but that's a very different thing). Dissatisfaction comes from the way we are spoken to, consulted (or not), treated, and the mis-match between expectation and experience. Sometimes this mis-match is due to the degree of intervention: I think it's reasonable for decisions to be taken without laborious explanation and formal consent when the degree of risk requires fast, decisive action. Hence I have little sympathy for the indignance of my contemporary who was not consented for an episiotomy when the baby clearly needed to be delivered as quickly as possible - but this post hoc indignance could have been mitigated by some sensitive and informative explanation following the events.
Partly, the problem could be attributed to the 'empowerment' of women by encouraging them to write a birth plan, without fully preparing them for the deviations from normality that could indicate wide deviation from this list of hopes for their care. Our antenatal community midwife ran through the ways some of my points might not work out, and encouraged us to think flexibly; she tried to impress on us that things might not go smoothly, and so, for example my desire for no epidural might not be realistic. I could accept this; but I (unlike so many others) was able to think flexibly because I was well prepared for many of the possible deviations from normality because of the work I do. For several years, I have worked with midwives and doctors and have become well acquainted with the work of the delivery suite, the language of maternity, the roles and responsibilities of the different professions and the ways that even initially straightforward labours and deliveries can be complicated. But for this experience, my understanding would have been patchy. Were it left entirely to the PCT (the primary care trust, which organises and delivers primary care in an area approximate to the borough) and the antenatal classes they provided, it would have been woefully limited.
The PCT provided a 4 week programme of antenatal classes. The first, 'normal labour' was reasonably useful and complete. The second 'deviation from normality', given by a different midwife, was appallingly inadequate. The scheduled 2 hour session lasted barely an hour. Deviation from normality covered precisely one possibility - the need for induction of labour. And even this did little to explain what might occur, and over what timescale. (Only when my induction was booked when I was >40 weeks was I told I would need to attend the night before.)
Anyway, this lengthy preamble is to introduce the letter I have finally, belatedly, hopefully sent to the hospital I gave birth in. I have so far only sent it to the PALS (patient advice and liaison service) team, because there was no address for the head of midwifery or the director of maternity. Because of the way maternity care is structured and funded, I should also send it to the PCT maternity lead. I would seriously urge others to feed back their experiences - importantly, good and bad - to the people who organised and delivered their care. In the climate of chronic underfunding, poor staffing and competing priorities, it's important to lobby - hard - for attention here.
Dear ...
I gave birth at [hospital] in March 2008 after a transfer from home, and though my experience was reasonable, there are several points on which I think Maternity Services requires feedback.
I had two brilliant community midwives overnight, and they persuaded me by the early morning that due to my slow progress, it would probably be best to transfer to hospital for syntocinon to speed things up and an epidural for a bit of a rest. My labour had been long and slow and I totally saw the logic in reserving energy for pushing (ie, intervention now might save intervention later).
I transferred in by ambulance at about 6am, and my care (after a while, possibly via the labour ward co-ordinator) was handed over to Midwife1. Midwife1barely acknowledged us when she took the handover, and this lack of eye contact and engagement with myself and my partner set the tone of the care she offered and the experience we had with her.
A cannula was put into the back of my left hand reasonably quickly and I was kept supine with the CTG - something the community midwives had tried to avoid when we arrived: they had put me on the CTG but standing up, to try and keep things moving. Mariam barely talked to me about what she was doing, never told me why things were necessary. I was not treated as a partner in my care. I was the object of a course of treatment/action.
Given that we arrived at around 6.30 or 7am, I was surprised when, at about 11am, Mariam started doing something with the drip. I asked her what she was doing and was told she was putting the syntocinon in. I couldn't believe this was only happening now, hours after we arrived. No explanation was given, so I don't know whether this represented a delay or whether this time lag was normal. It would have helped considerably if she had talked to us when we arrived about what needed doing in what order and how long the process might take. Given that I was transferred to speed things up, this felt like an incredibly long time for things to be taking.
At one point, without warning, while I was talkling to my partner on my right, Midwife1 picked up my left hand, and did something which sent a fierce, shooting pain into my hand and up my arm. I was alarmed, and asked what on earth she was doing. She told me she had had to flush the line; end of story. No further explanation was given of what this meant or why it was indicated. But more shocking than the pain was that she did it without gaining my attention first, let alone my permission.
Later, when I started to shake, I worked out that I hadn't eaten since 8pm the previous evening, and thought it could be low blood sugar. I knew (through common sense, not from Midwife1) that because of the chance of going to theatre, I could not eat, and framing it thus, I explained I was hungry and asked if there was any glucose in the drip. She told me I couldn't eat, so I explained that I understood this, but that I was concerned about my energy etc, and again asked if there was glucose in the drip. She told me she didn't know. This in itself is slightly concerning - the qualified midwife doesn't know what's in her client's drip - and she read the bag to see. It was Hartmann's solution, and I now know what that means. My concern is that, again, no explanation was given when the drip went up of what it was or what it was for. Midwife1 couldn't engage with me further about my hunger; I tried to tell her I was shaking and I hadn't eaten; she told me it was labour. I sent my partner out to ask for the co-ordinator, and she came and also told me it was labour. Nothing was done to address the issue that it was now more than 12 hours since I had eaten. (I have since found out that shaking in labour is not unusual, but neither the midwife of the co-ordinator explained this to me satisfactorily).
After this series of events, I was so fed up I asked my partner to ask the co-ordinator for a new midwife. Midwife1 was sent for lunch and reassigned on her return. As she left she engaged with us for the first time in the way I would have expected a midwife to behave all along, telling us she hoped to be back to see the birth. Fortunately the next midwife was brilliant; engaged, supportive, discursive, informative and friendly. Everything the previous midwife wasn't.
I realise it's almost a year, and Midwife1 may not even be working at the hospital any longer, but my complaint is not about her per se; I really just want to highlight, with concrete examples, how the service can be disappointing. Clearly this midwife needs some direct performance management; her communication skills and professionalism were lacking. I was lucky - empowered because I am articulate, knowledgeable, and undaunted about challenging poor practice. Not all the women in the catchment area would be able to challenge this, and without complaints poor practice is able to continue.
My experiences with the post-natal midwives and the limitations of their breastfeeding support (my baby could not latch on) were also disappointing. I requested the support of the breastfeeding leader, which was documented in my notes, but I never saw her; I was discharged with no further mention of it, and unclear about what or how much to feed my baby. I think it was just assumed that she would eventually latch on or that in my sleep-deprived and hormone-addled state i would be able to figure out formula feeding - even though I had made it clear I wanted to breastfeed and the PCT breastfeeding talk had discussed nipple confusion, so I was (and told them I was) adamantly against bottles. I was desperately confused on discharge, and though I made extensive use of the breastfeeding network in the few days postnatally, I had no formal support, my baby absolutely could not latch on, and she undoubtedly suffered because we were discharged home at 4pm with no idea how we were going to feed her, or how much and how often she needed to be fed.
I hope that these comments will be of use to the service. This is absolutely not about pointing the finger at particular members of staff, just about highlighting areas for development. I understand that there are competing priorities for training, x days mandatory training have to be undertaken, the service is short-staffed, making backfill difficult, etc; but there is clearly a need for training on breastfeeding support, and making sure that no woman leaves the service as I did, with no way of breastfeeding and no resources for expressing (no one showed me how or even mentioned it) or feeding by other means (eg syringe).
Yours faithfully,
Saturday, 14 February 2009
Monday, 2 February 2009
Winter Walthie
Pretty in our backyard, and baby was fascinated. So sweet.
Inches on top of the birdfeeder!
Unfortunately, the only tube line in London that's completely underground (and therefore works) is the Victoria line. So daddy's gone to work, but it's still snowing so we're hoping he'll be home in time for tea. There are lots of people playing in the park at the end of our road. It really warms the cockles.
Inches on top of the birdfeeder!
Unfortunately, the only tube line in London that's completely underground (and therefore works) is the Victoria line. So daddy's gone to work, but it's still snowing so we're hoping he'll be home in time for tea. There are lots of people playing in the park at the end of our road. It really warms the cockles.
Sunday, 1 February 2009
Bullying the bereaved
Or, 'Should lenders be able to repossess when probate is outstanding?'
Redstone, a sub-prime mortgage lender which is open about the securitisation of their mortgages (one of the antecedents of the recent (indeed, ongoing) financial turmoil), were generous enough to offer my cash-strapped dad an interest-only mortgage of ~£220,000 on a property he bought for ~£250,000 in 2006. Unfortunately, daddy didn't insure himself or his mortgage and his pension died with him, so when he died in summer 2008, the mortgage interest was barely dented, the capital untouched, and no more money was due into his estate.
I was surprised the mortgage companies were even allowed to charge their hefty non-payment charges to estates awaiting probate; particularly since the financial watchdog put its foot down over the banks' unfair penalties a year or two back. It seems particularly unfair and really easy money to charge penalties for non-payment when probate* typically takes 6 months to obtain: we're sitting ducks. Where exactly are the repayment monies supposed to come from each month we await the grant of probate? Anyway, our solicitor informed us that this unethical practice is not illegal, and so we watched the debts rack up.
In October 2008, my father's two year fixed-rate deal ended and the mortgage reverted to Redstone's standard variable rate (SVR). Now, SVRs are typically pretty rubbish, which is why in the last decade or so many people scrambled at the end of their fixed rate deals to remortgage to another similarly good fix (prompting fierce competition between lenders, decent rates for most buyers and, during the really good times, free switches** as banks were so desperate to steal their competitors' customers). Interestingly, at exactly the same time, my own mortgage rate (a base-rate tracker from the still-mutual Nationwide Building Society, tracking the Bank of England rate +0.24%) was tumbling, as base rate was cut and cut by the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee in attempts to stave off the impending recession. In October 2008, Redstone's SVR, to which my dad's mortgage reverted, was around 8 (yes, eight) per cent. At the same point, base rate was 4.5% and so my mortgage rate was 4.74%.
Currently (February 2008), base rate stands at 1.5% and our mortgage at 2.24% (because of the 'floor' imposed by Nationwide that means they don't pass on cuts to base rate below 2%). As far as I am aware - I have had no correspondence to the contrary - Redstone's SVR remains at 8.45%. The statement of arrears that arrived on Friday indicates that the monthly repayments (interest-only, remember) on the £220k borrowed are currently over £1,800. Ours (a capital repayment mortgage) on £210k borrowed are £927.
Because my dad died at the end of June 2008, we have now (February 2009) missed 7 monthly repayments. Redstone were informed of my dad's demise within weeks of his death. According the the blurb from their solicitors, Redstone take steps towards repossession after an account has been in arrears for two months. Damn straight. Despite the fact that they know the mortgage holder has died and that the estate cannot be administered until the grant of probate, by the autumn, they were being heavy-handed with their demands for repayment and threats of repossession. In November and December 2008, our solicitor made several overtures first to Redstone and then to their solicitors, informing them that probate had not yet been granted - due, in part, to Redstone's tardiness in supplying a redemption value for the probate application - but that our intention was to discharge the arrears as soon as possible thereafter. But there was no acknowledgment of this, just the mulish continuation of their action.
And so, when I went to collect the post from my dad's house on Friday, at the very end of January, there was a letter from the solicitors informing us that possession proceedings had indeed been commenced. And on Monday, another letter confirming the court date in a month's time. Our solicitor had written the same week to inform them that the grant of probate is anticipated in February and that we intend to discharge the arrears immediately. It is likely this crossed in the post with the letter informing us proceedings had commenced. Let's see whether they acknowledge these facts. On past evidence, it is unlikely.
It's unfortunate that just as these proceedings have commenced, potential tenants have been found for the house. If we can't get Redstone or their solicitors to accept that we intend to repay the arrears in all likelihood within the month, we are probably going to have to let them go. The rent would only cover half the mortgage repayments anyway.
I went to the inquest into my father's death more out of curiosity at what was involved than anything else. I shall attend the possession hearing similarly out of curiosity, but also because I really hope to witness a judge put a flea in their ear. And then I'll take this to the FSA and the financial ombudsman. I can totally understand a company wanting to recoup losses when a mortgage is defaulted, but issuing possession proceedings following a death, prior to probate and alongside assurances from a solicitor that the arrears - and the associated charges - can and will be covered in time is heavy-handed, to say the least.
*The grant of probate allows the executors to 'administer' the estate, i.e., get hold of the assets and distribute them to address the liabilities, with any leftovers going to the beneficiaries of the estate.
**Banks would pay the conveyancing fees (ours were around £800) and mortgage administration fees (anywhere between £500 and £1500 once the good times ended).
Redstone, a sub-prime mortgage lender which is open about the securitisation of their mortgages (one of the antecedents of the recent (indeed, ongoing) financial turmoil), were generous enough to offer my cash-strapped dad an interest-only mortgage of ~£220,000 on a property he bought for ~£250,000 in 2006. Unfortunately, daddy didn't insure himself or his mortgage and his pension died with him, so when he died in summer 2008, the mortgage interest was barely dented, the capital untouched, and no more money was due into his estate.
I was surprised the mortgage companies were even allowed to charge their hefty non-payment charges to estates awaiting probate; particularly since the financial watchdog put its foot down over the banks' unfair penalties a year or two back. It seems particularly unfair and really easy money to charge penalties for non-payment when probate* typically takes 6 months to obtain: we're sitting ducks. Where exactly are the repayment monies supposed to come from each month we await the grant of probate? Anyway, our solicitor informed us that this unethical practice is not illegal, and so we watched the debts rack up.
In October 2008, my father's two year fixed-rate deal ended and the mortgage reverted to Redstone's standard variable rate (SVR). Now, SVRs are typically pretty rubbish, which is why in the last decade or so many people scrambled at the end of their fixed rate deals to remortgage to another similarly good fix (prompting fierce competition between lenders, decent rates for most buyers and, during the really good times, free switches** as banks were so desperate to steal their competitors' customers). Interestingly, at exactly the same time, my own mortgage rate (a base-rate tracker from the still-mutual Nationwide Building Society, tracking the Bank of England rate +0.24%) was tumbling, as base rate was cut and cut by the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee in attempts to stave off the impending recession. In October 2008, Redstone's SVR, to which my dad's mortgage reverted, was around 8 (yes, eight) per cent. At the same point, base rate was 4.5% and so my mortgage rate was 4.74%.
Currently (February 2008), base rate stands at 1.5% and our mortgage at 2.24% (because of the 'floor' imposed by Nationwide that means they don't pass on cuts to base rate below 2%). As far as I am aware - I have had no correspondence to the contrary - Redstone's SVR remains at 8.45%. The statement of arrears that arrived on Friday indicates that the monthly repayments (interest-only, remember) on the £220k borrowed are currently over £1,800. Ours (a capital repayment mortgage) on £210k borrowed are £927.
Because my dad died at the end of June 2008, we have now (February 2009) missed 7 monthly repayments. Redstone were informed of my dad's demise within weeks of his death. According the the blurb from their solicitors, Redstone take steps towards repossession after an account has been in arrears for two months. Damn straight. Despite the fact that they know the mortgage holder has died and that the estate cannot be administered until the grant of probate, by the autumn, they were being heavy-handed with their demands for repayment and threats of repossession. In November and December 2008, our solicitor made several overtures first to Redstone and then to their solicitors, informing them that probate had not yet been granted - due, in part, to Redstone's tardiness in supplying a redemption value for the probate application - but that our intention was to discharge the arrears as soon as possible thereafter. But there was no acknowledgment of this, just the mulish continuation of their action.
And so, when I went to collect the post from my dad's house on Friday, at the very end of January, there was a letter from the solicitors informing us that possession proceedings had indeed been commenced. And on Monday, another letter confirming the court date in a month's time. Our solicitor had written the same week to inform them that the grant of probate is anticipated in February and that we intend to discharge the arrears immediately. It is likely this crossed in the post with the letter informing us proceedings had commenced. Let's see whether they acknowledge these facts. On past evidence, it is unlikely.
It's unfortunate that just as these proceedings have commenced, potential tenants have been found for the house. If we can't get Redstone or their solicitors to accept that we intend to repay the arrears in all likelihood within the month, we are probably going to have to let them go. The rent would only cover half the mortgage repayments anyway.
I went to the inquest into my father's death more out of curiosity at what was involved than anything else. I shall attend the possession hearing similarly out of curiosity, but also because I really hope to witness a judge put a flea in their ear. And then I'll take this to the FSA and the financial ombudsman. I can totally understand a company wanting to recoup losses when a mortgage is defaulted, but issuing possession proceedings following a death, prior to probate and alongside assurances from a solicitor that the arrears - and the associated charges - can and will be covered in time is heavy-handed, to say the least.
*The grant of probate allows the executors to 'administer' the estate, i.e., get hold of the assets and distribute them to address the liabilities, with any leftovers going to the beneficiaries of the estate.
**Banks would pay the conveyancing fees (ours were around £800) and mortgage administration fees (anywhere between £500 and £1500 once the good times ended).
Thursday, 29 January 2009
January drinkies - roll call
Waitrose Food Illustrated lied. I may have to take it up with the editor. January 09's Lancashire Cheese Straws were alleged to take 10 minutes' preparation and 10 minutes' cooking. Lie. A single egg yolk was deemed sufficient to bind 200g flour, 100g butter and 100g cheese. Another lie. With the rolling and breaking and moistening and re-rolling, 17 cheese straws somehow took 40 minutes to prepare and almost 15 minutes to cook. I was planning to make a second batch, but I abandoned that idea as the dough crumbled for a second time and all my edges feathered. Still, they looked ok, they tasted reasonable (a bit dry; short, maybe. I don't really know what that means), and they all got eaten. Along with:
Feta filo parcels. Fresh filo better than frozen - frozen a little floury. Easy to make but a bit on the dull side. Currently seeking new filling ideas. Comments, please.
Spanish tortilla. Served in cubes, which surprised the half-Span guest. Thanks, Rebato's. Nod to Marina for the prep tips. (Marina's (Spanish) way? Nothing like the Good Housekeeping way. No turmeric, for starters. Yes, she was as confused by that as I was.).
My staple salsa. Too chunky for crisps; best eaten with a spoon.
My staple guacamole. So long since I catered, I almost forgot how to make it. Fortunately had bought lemons... I belatedly remembered the lime. Not sure I actually tasted the guac. Boo.
Tyrell's ready salted hand-cooked crisps. Never tasted.
Sainsbury's 'mozzarella cheese straws' - mozzarella in their 'Signature' (TM) crumb. Awful. Oozed on heating, tasteless and rubbery mozz.
Sainsbury's 'garlic and cheese bites. Still in the freezer.
Crostini with pesto and roasted tomatoes. Yummy, easy, but the ciabatta not toasted enough.
Chocolate sandwich cake, with raspberry jam. I'm so over the jam filling. Back to buttercream for me.
Chocolate cornflake cakes. From the Woman's Own Cookery Book, 1968. Quadrupled the quantity; made 24 bigguns. Delish. Steve asked how old I am, 12? Killjoy. (He's from Manchester. Says it all.)
Dates stuffed with marzipan (resembling hot dogs) like my mum used to. They look so anachronistic, I was quite embarrassed. But people liked them, clearly didn't remember them from the 70s and it meant Flesh had a little more to eat than the plain ciabatta that was otherwise the only thing I had bothered to concoct for a vegan.
Not a bad spread, I think, but the table was in the corner, and people sat rather than milled, so it was hard to nibble without someone constantly offering plates around. Always happy to fulfil a stereotype, our American friend, S, ignored everyone else's reserve and the lack of plates and napkins and asked for a napkin so she could carry more back to her place on the sofa.
I stupidly didn't buy any soft drinks, but had invited a clutch of drivers and a room full of parents of under-ones, so I forced booze onto most of them, or they made do with water.
Next time, I will ditch the ready mades, find more stuff I can make the day before (5 hours in the morning was not long enough), remembere the soft drinks and I might try these cheese straws instead.
Feta filo parcels. Fresh filo better than frozen - frozen a little floury. Easy to make but a bit on the dull side. Currently seeking new filling ideas. Comments, please.
Spanish tortilla. Served in cubes, which surprised the half-Span guest. Thanks, Rebato's. Nod to Marina for the prep tips. (Marina's (Spanish) way? Nothing like the Good Housekeeping way. No turmeric, for starters. Yes, she was as confused by that as I was.).
My staple salsa. Too chunky for crisps; best eaten with a spoon.
My staple guacamole. So long since I catered, I almost forgot how to make it. Fortunately had bought lemons... I belatedly remembered the lime. Not sure I actually tasted the guac. Boo.
Tyrell's ready salted hand-cooked crisps. Never tasted.
Sainsbury's 'mozzarella cheese straws' - mozzarella in their 'Signature' (TM) crumb. Awful. Oozed on heating, tasteless and rubbery mozz.
Sainsbury's 'garlic and cheese bites. Still in the freezer.
Crostini with pesto and roasted tomatoes. Yummy, easy, but the ciabatta not toasted enough.
Chocolate sandwich cake, with raspberry jam. I'm so over the jam filling. Back to buttercream for me.
Chocolate cornflake cakes. From the Woman's Own Cookery Book, 1968. Quadrupled the quantity; made 24 bigguns. Delish. Steve asked how old I am, 12? Killjoy. (He's from Manchester. Says it all.)
Dates stuffed with marzipan (resembling hot dogs) like my mum used to. They look so anachronistic, I was quite embarrassed. But people liked them, clearly didn't remember them from the 70s and it meant Flesh had a little more to eat than the plain ciabatta that was otherwise the only thing I had bothered to concoct for a vegan.
Not a bad spread, I think, but the table was in the corner, and people sat rather than milled, so it was hard to nibble without someone constantly offering plates around. Always happy to fulfil a stereotype, our American friend, S, ignored everyone else's reserve and the lack of plates and napkins and asked for a napkin so she could carry more back to her place on the sofa.
I stupidly didn't buy any soft drinks, but had invited a clutch of drivers and a room full of parents of under-ones, so I forced booze onto most of them, or they made do with water.
Next time, I will ditch the ready mades, find more stuff I can make the day before (5 hours in the morning was not long enough), remembere the soft drinks and I might try these cheese straws instead.
How green am I?
OK, another post inspired by Fleshisgrass. This time more triumphant than last, I hope. Though almost definitely much more smug. But with a dash of embarrassment, and humility; we have a baby, for goodness sake; we ain't that green.
We do, however:
Compost municipally, therefore composting much more than we could domestically. I really don't throw any organic matter - save for baby excretions and chalk and woodpulp nappies - in the bin. They'll take everything but animal bones, and we don't have those in the house.
Use washable nappies. And second-hand ones, at that. (OK, not all of them were second hand, but give a girl a break).
Flush all our baby's excrement down the loo. People don't know it's illegal to put poops in landfill. That's not why I don't. But we plop the poop from the disposables we use at night time as well as the washables we use all day down the loo. It's bad enough we're chucking a 'biodegradable' nappy a day into a place it can't degrade, without sticking the effluent in there too.
Buy ecover laundry liquid and washing up liquid in bulk, and re-fill. It's more expensive (yup), but I'm just that bloody selfless. We have tried the cheaper of the reuseable washing balls on the market, but they may have given me a minor skin irritation. To my shame, I have bought soap nuts, but for that reason, I'm a bit scared to use them.
Re-use bags, like, all the time. I have one of Flesh's unbeloved 'fey' onyabags, a parachute nylon shopper that folds up tiny and clips onto your bag-bag, and we routinely use the bags for life for our big shops and any placky bags we come across as bin bags.
Turn our noses right up at nappy sacks. Heavens above. Is there nothing we stupid breeders won't buy as baby necessities? Well, (shock!) chez nous, we don't wrap our nappies! Unless we need a change when we're out, when mummy always has a stash of bread bags or supermarket veg bags or newspaper supplement bags. Or just puts the dirty nappy (shock!) unwrapped in the bottom of the buggy. Heaven forfend.
Use a Sigg bottle; like Flesh, because it won't photodegrade and saves the money, plastic, energy and pollution associated with the bottled water I would otherwise consume by the gallon, out and about.
Re-use and recycle aluminium foil. Obsessively.
Wash and re-use plastic freezer bags. Obsessively.
Make the baby's food in bulk and freeze in portions.
Strive to throw as little food away as possible.
Buy as few new clothes as I can bear. In 2008 I think I bought: one pair of maternity trousers (taking the total to two), 3 nursing bras (different sizes, as my boobs scaled down), two summer cardigans, two pairs of jeans, one summer top, a winter jumper and 2 winter cardigans, one work shirt. On top of that I bought a pair of canvas shoes, Terry bought me some winter boots, and Babs bought me some replacement slippers (she was sick on mine and I went without for 6 months) for Christmas. This is a short list compared to some, yet it does make me feel guilty.
Dress the baby almost exclusively in hand-me-downs and second-hand clothes; buy organic cotton when I do buy brand new.
OK, pillory me. I could try harder. Nothing on here is particularly ground-breaking, or inconvenient. Furthermore, I have neglected to mention the bad things I do, like occasionally driving to the supermarket, and heating all the rooms in the house most times the heating comes on. I could override Terry and get curtains for the two rooms without, and keep more heat in that way. I could remember to always turn off the laptop at the wall (d'oh).
I'm going to think of the things I could do better, and try and do them better. I need to curb my shopping habit and my generally acquisitive nature. I will get back to you.
We do, however:
Compost municipally, therefore composting much more than we could domestically. I really don't throw any organic matter - save for baby excretions and chalk and woodpulp nappies - in the bin. They'll take everything but animal bones, and we don't have those in the house.
Use washable nappies. And second-hand ones, at that. (OK, not all of them were second hand, but give a girl a break).
Flush all our baby's excrement down the loo. People don't know it's illegal to put poops in landfill. That's not why I don't. But we plop the poop from the disposables we use at night time as well as the washables we use all day down the loo. It's bad enough we're chucking a 'biodegradable' nappy a day into a place it can't degrade, without sticking the effluent in there too.
Buy ecover laundry liquid and washing up liquid in bulk, and re-fill. It's more expensive (yup), but I'm just that bloody selfless. We have tried the cheaper of the reuseable washing balls on the market, but they may have given me a minor skin irritation. To my shame, I have bought soap nuts, but for that reason, I'm a bit scared to use them.
Re-use bags, like, all the time. I have one of Flesh's unbeloved 'fey' onyabags, a parachute nylon shopper that folds up tiny and clips onto your bag-bag, and we routinely use the bags for life for our big shops and any placky bags we come across as bin bags.
Turn our noses right up at nappy sacks. Heavens above. Is there nothing we stupid breeders won't buy as baby necessities? Well, (shock!) chez nous, we
Use a Sigg bottle; like Flesh, because it won't photodegrade and saves the money, plastic, energy and pollution associated with the bottled water I would otherwise consume by the gallon, out and about.
Re-use and recycle aluminium foil. Obsessively.
Wash and re-use plastic freezer bags. Obsessively.
Make the baby's food in bulk and freeze in portions.
Strive to throw as little food away as possible.
Buy as few new clothes as I can bear. In 2008 I think I bought: one pair of maternity trousers (taking the total to two), 3 nursing bras (different sizes, as my boobs scaled down), two summer cardigans, two pairs of jeans, one summer top, a winter jumper and 2 winter cardigans, one work shirt. On top of that I bought a pair of canvas shoes, Terry bought me some winter boots, and Babs bought me some replacement slippers (she was sick on mine and I went without for 6 months) for Christmas. This is a short list compared to some, yet it does make me feel guilty.
Dress the baby almost exclusively in hand-me-downs and second-hand clothes; buy organic cotton when I do buy brand new.
OK, pillory me. I could try harder. Nothing on here is particularly ground-breaking, or inconvenient. Furthermore, I have neglected to mention the bad things I do, like occasionally driving to the supermarket, and heating all the rooms in the house most times the heating comes on. I could override Terry and get curtains for the two rooms without, and keep more heat in that way. I could remember to always turn off the laptop at the wall (d'oh).
I'm going to think of the things I could do better, and try and do them better. I need to curb my shopping habit and my generally acquisitive nature. I will get back to you.
Wow, where did January go?
Blimey, this month just disappeared in a daze.
Recently, I hypothesised to myself that parous women have memory problems (there's a link goes here to an observer news item) for a while post-natally not because we're wired to remember nothing but our babies, or because we go wibbly-brained in the puerperium, or because we're chronically sleep-deprived*, or any other scandalously patronising reason, but because in the absence of work, or school, or other regular activities involving temporal patterns and temporal conventions, and travel, and down-time, and head-space (the vital processing / consolidating type), it's very hard to get events and memories into any sensible order. My head is, post-partum, just in a bit of a jumble, all the time. There's nothing to add order or delineation to my memories. I remember conversations (well, snippets), but can't place when. I don't link things that happened in a day with things that happened the same evening. Weeks are a bit of a blur, and I can't remember what days things happened on, or what I was doing last Friday, say. To me, this is all about temporal signposting. The days have lost their particular meanings - Mondays and Fridays can be interchangeable now; though I have the 'no Terry for 5 days' and 'Whoo hoo, Terry for 2 days' thoughts/feelings - but that's not the same as the Sunday evening terrors and Monday misery and Friday pub elation that were with me week in, week out, for, ooh, 20 years. Not since Babs and I had very regular daily activities when she was 4-16 weeks old, and I knew what day it was by what we were doing, have I really felt part of the world. When my dad died, our weeks changed. I'm not sure how much the two things are related; I just know that after the few weeks of back and forth to mum's I felt wrong, and I worked out that it was that I had no pattern namore.
Anyway, it's now the end of January, and I remember thinking back in September about going back to work on Jan 13th and how close it felt, and yet now Christmas feels like miles away and January has been a blur despite the temporal signposting of work (part-time maybe doesn't make the difference). I don't know, but possibly because, with all the other things going on -
writing the thank you letters
getting cards out (almost) on time to my 8 friends with January birthdays
dispatching ex-tenant
dealing with remaining tenants' anxieties
fixing up flat
angsting about (not) finding new tenant
sorting out house rental
finding new childcare at very short notice
negotiating the childcare contract
writing a coursework assignment
going on more course dates
re-acquainting myself with the MOSES project
likewise the Safety Culture project
sorting out dad's tax return
catering and hosting a little party
oh, and keeping the household going with shopping and cooking (nod to T for some good cookin' for a whole week of early hometimes) and laundry and the occasional bit of cleaning
- I haven't really had the head-space to process, let alone consolidate things.
Anyway, suffice to say, it ain't because I've had a bloody baby.
* Babies do sleep, y'all; and you know what? You can train them: to sleep at sensible times and to stay in bed (going back to sleep) for decent durations.
Recently, I hypothesised to myself that parous women have memory problems (there's a link goes here to an observer news item) for a while post-natally not because we're wired to remember nothing but our babies, or because we go wibbly-brained in the puerperium, or because we're chronically sleep-deprived*, or any other scandalously patronising reason, but because in the absence of work, or school, or other regular activities involving temporal patterns and temporal conventions, and travel, and down-time, and head-space (the vital processing / consolidating type), it's very hard to get events and memories into any sensible order. My head is, post-partum, just in a bit of a jumble, all the time. There's nothing to add order or delineation to my memories. I remember conversations (well, snippets), but can't place when. I don't link things that happened in a day with things that happened the same evening. Weeks are a bit of a blur, and I can't remember what days things happened on, or what I was doing last Friday, say. To me, this is all about temporal signposting. The days have lost their particular meanings - Mondays and Fridays can be interchangeable now; though I have the 'no Terry for 5 days' and 'Whoo hoo, Terry for 2 days' thoughts/feelings - but that's not the same as the Sunday evening terrors and Monday misery and Friday pub elation that were with me week in, week out, for, ooh, 20 years. Not since Babs and I had very regular daily activities when she was 4-16 weeks old, and I knew what day it was by what we were doing, have I really felt part of the world. When my dad died, our weeks changed. I'm not sure how much the two things are related; I just know that after the few weeks of back and forth to mum's I felt wrong, and I worked out that it was that I had no pattern namore.
Anyway, it's now the end of January, and I remember thinking back in September about going back to work on Jan 13th and how close it felt, and yet now Christmas feels like miles away and January has been a blur despite the temporal signposting of work (part-time maybe doesn't make the difference). I don't know, but possibly because, with all the other things going on -
writing the thank you letters
getting cards out (almost) on time to my 8 friends with January birthdays
dispatching ex-tenant
dealing with remaining tenants' anxieties
fixing up flat
angsting about (not) finding new tenant
sorting out house rental
finding new childcare at very short notice
negotiating the childcare contract
writing a coursework assignment
going on more course dates
re-acquainting myself with the MOSES project
likewise the Safety Culture project
sorting out dad's tax return
catering and hosting a little party
oh, and keeping the household going with shopping and cooking (nod to T for some good cookin' for a whole week of early hometimes) and laundry and the occasional bit of cleaning
- I haven't really had the head-space to process, let alone consolidate things.
Anyway, suffice to say, it ain't because I've had a bloody baby.
* Babies do sleep, y'all; and you know what? You can train them: to sleep at sensible times and to stay in bed (going back to sleep) for decent durations.
Friday, 2 January 2009
Christmas Crocker
Well, Christmas passed without major incident. Flesh and M and little Weaver came for dinner and vegan mince pies on the 20th, in a nice boozy evening that involved Christmas bubbles and ended with us taking a hundred photos and me, Flesh and R practising photo faces with varying degrees of ineptitude.
On the 21st, Terry's sister and her family came over an hour earlier than expected, as we were finishing lunch and trying to coax 'just a little more, please' into Babs. They were invited 'after lunch', but when I asked if they'd eaten (stupid, stupid me) R said no and threw me into panic, since we had nothing in. They ignored the mince pies I put in front of them as we all had tea, and I finally cornered Terry in the kitchen and hissed at him to address the lunch situation. Thank god, we had bread in because F&M had stayed over and so Terry had been out for bread for breakfast. Sister agreed to sandwiches but for someone so direct was bizarrely vague about what she wanted, then laboriously picked out all the cheese in her cheese sarnie; niece didn't like any of the options I ran through, so sister told us she'd be happy with bread and butter. Well, sorry, but no-one comes to my house and has only b&b and water. Fortunately she does eat tuna and sweetcorn, so we rustled up a sarnie for her too and while they ate 3pm lunch I tried not to feel uncomfortable about our apparent rubbish hospitality. Babs handled all the passing and the prodding very well but was very happy to go off for an afternoon nap. Although the conversation was fluent (sister is very talkative, unlike father), it was still a taxing afternoon and I was very relieved when they left.
On Christmas eve we took the baby to be weighed, because I was convinced she'd been eating better and must surely have put on more in these three weeks than the pitiful 100 grams in the fortnight before. Well, my mistake: no weight gain whatsoever. So our 10 minute pop was an hour long visit, as they made us see yet another health visitor to tell me something different from the health visitor before. (Conclusion: lack of continuity means lack of tailored and meaningful advice. No single health professional has a real grasp of our habits, routine, or my efforts to get more food into the baby; since they don't read each others' entries in my hand-held notes they don't even get to build up a picture that way. They recommend vitamins almost every time I visit, as though lack of weight gain equals lack of nutrients. She'll eat broccoli for breakfast, for Christ's sake, and she eats better than we do.) To be fair, we did get some reasonable tips: give water when she wakes up at night to reduce the reward and feed her from our plates so she'll eat more, but they did nothing to stop me worrying, in fact they probably made me worry more.
Mummy arrived in the afternoon with fish pie for supper. After a smoked salmon and bagel breakfast we opened pressies on Christmas day until Babs was overwhelmed enough for us to decide to hold stuff back for boxing day, and then we cooked. Terry pulled off a yummy and seriously meaty meat-free stuffed cabbage with mushrooms and chestnuts. I wished I hadn't decided lunch would be at tea-time and was a bit stroppy by the time we sat down at 5 o'clock when I should have been on the sofa for two hours already; the same old bloody red wine/onion gravy was a bit disappointing given it was a special occasion and the potatoes were just a touch too floury to be brilliantly crisp roasties. But, in our usually meat-free household, we had fantastic pigs in blankets - Waitrose perfectly seasoned and traceable pork chipolatas wrapped in their similarly traceable streaky bacon - and Crocker-tastic stuffing balls: seasoned pork sausagemeat combined with the fantastically packaged Kraft (R) Stove Top Stuffing Mix from - where else? - me dad's house! Feeel the quality.
On Boxing day mum and I spent the morning making feta filo parcels (surprisingly easy), vegan sausage rolls and hot spiced nuts, then we all went to join Flesh and M and their families at their house, which meant more pass the baby and yet more confusion for poor Babs. She did a very good job of holding it together while being thrown around by over-enthusiastic wannabe grandparents and had a nap with her new alligator on Flesh's bed.
Meanwhile we got to try the infamous vegan cheesecake, which was good but very sharp; M's dad made me laugh and laugh as usual (makes me feel like a young child and he's the funny uncle); M's granny was good value as only deaf and slightly batty old folk can be; and we got to make off with some decent leftovers for supper. Perfect.
So that was baby's first Christmas. Hopefully next year we'll get Terry's dad as well as my mum, and maybe uncle monkey & mj might make it too. That way it won't pass without incident, I'll get to revert to tradition and cry on Christmas day, and we'll get some decent - turkey - gravy.
On the 21st, Terry's sister and her family came over an hour earlier than expected, as we were finishing lunch and trying to coax 'just a little more, please' into Babs. They were invited 'after lunch', but when I asked if they'd eaten (stupid, stupid me) R said no and threw me into panic, since we had nothing in. They ignored the mince pies I put in front of them as we all had tea, and I finally cornered Terry in the kitchen and hissed at him to address the lunch situation. Thank god, we had bread in because F&M had stayed over and so Terry had been out for bread for breakfast. Sister agreed to sandwiches but for someone so direct was bizarrely vague about what she wanted, then laboriously picked out all the cheese in her cheese sarnie; niece didn't like any of the options I ran through, so sister told us she'd be happy with bread and butter. Well, sorry, but no-one comes to my house and has only b&b and water. Fortunately she does eat tuna and sweetcorn, so we rustled up a sarnie for her too and while they ate 3pm lunch I tried not to feel uncomfortable about our apparent rubbish hospitality. Babs handled all the passing and the prodding very well but was very happy to go off for an afternoon nap. Although the conversation was fluent (sister is very talkative, unlike father), it was still a taxing afternoon and I was very relieved when they left.
On Christmas eve we took the baby to be weighed, because I was convinced she'd been eating better and must surely have put on more in these three weeks than the pitiful 100 grams in the fortnight before. Well, my mistake: no weight gain whatsoever. So our 10 minute pop was an hour long visit, as they made us see yet another health visitor to tell me something different from the health visitor before. (Conclusion: lack of continuity means lack of tailored and meaningful advice. No single health professional has a real grasp of our habits, routine, or my efforts to get more food into the baby; since they don't read each others' entries in my hand-held notes they don't even get to build up a picture that way. They recommend vitamins almost every time I visit, as though lack of weight gain equals lack of nutrients. She'll eat broccoli for breakfast, for Christ's sake, and she eats better than we do.) To be fair, we did get some reasonable tips: give water when she wakes up at night to reduce the reward and feed her from our plates so she'll eat more, but they did nothing to stop me worrying, in fact they probably made me worry more.
Mummy arrived in the afternoon with fish pie for supper. After a smoked salmon and bagel breakfast we opened pressies on Christmas day until Babs was overwhelmed enough for us to decide to hold stuff back for boxing day, and then we cooked. Terry pulled off a yummy and seriously meaty meat-free stuffed cabbage with mushrooms and chestnuts. I wished I hadn't decided lunch would be at tea-time and was a bit stroppy by the time we sat down at 5 o'clock when I should have been on the sofa for two hours already; the same old bloody red wine/onion gravy was a bit disappointing given it was a special occasion and the potatoes were just a touch too floury to be brilliantly crisp roasties. But, in our usually meat-free household, we had fantastic pigs in blankets - Waitrose perfectly seasoned and traceable pork chipolatas wrapped in their similarly traceable streaky bacon - and Crocker-tastic stuffing balls: seasoned pork sausagemeat combined with the fantastically packaged Kraft (R) Stove Top Stuffing Mix from - where else? - me dad's house! Feeel the quality.
On Boxing day mum and I spent the morning making feta filo parcels (surprisingly easy), vegan sausage rolls and hot spiced nuts, then we all went to join Flesh and M and their families at their house, which meant more pass the baby and yet more confusion for poor Babs. She did a very good job of holding it together while being thrown around by over-enthusiastic wannabe grandparents and had a nap with her new alligator on Flesh's bed.
Meanwhile we got to try the infamous vegan cheesecake, which was good but very sharp; M's dad made me laugh and laugh as usual (makes me feel like a young child and he's the funny uncle); M's granny was good value as only deaf and slightly batty old folk can be; and we got to make off with some decent leftovers for supper. Perfect.
So that was baby's first Christmas. Hopefully next year we'll get Terry's dad as well as my mum, and maybe uncle monkey & mj might make it too. That way it won't pass without incident, I'll get to revert to tradition and cry on Christmas day, and we'll get some decent - turkey - gravy.
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