It’s Only When You Become a Mother…

… that you can fully appreciate what an incredible achievement it is that we grow up to think of our toilet habits as second nature.

It’s a Fine Line Between Pleasure and Pain…

There is joy in picking up random publications abandoned by other commuters on the Underground. This week I picked up the Guardian’s G2 supplement (Wednesday 18th March, 2009) with a sort of disinterested apathy that was quickly replaced by serious pondering.

 

Have you ever heard a group of newly-birthed mothers talk? It often works like this:

 

‘I was in labour for 52 hours! 52 hours! She was completely stuck in there, poor thing! The surgeon kept hovering over me with a scalpel but I threatened to disembowel him if he dared come within 20ft of my bed. Thank God for the Epidural, though. Did you tear?’

 

 

‘Yah, I tore a whole 6 inches but I was soooo not going to have an Epidural, darling. I wanted my birth to be sacred, little Hermione was born sans anaesthesia. We had Annabel Karmel come in person to my water birth to stir-fry the placenta with Tofu! So nutritious! Really the BEST for breastfeeding, darling. How about you, Dotty, how was your labour?

  

 

‘It was really, really hard… Unlike anything else…  I pushed so hard  that I shat myself.’

 

It is said that childbirth requires as much energy as running a marathon, so it’s no wonder we treat it like a race. Women can get more competitive about it than they would about the girth of their thighs. But Viv Groskop reports a whole new trend in one-upwomanship about to sweep the planet: THE ORGASMIC BIRTH.

 

YES! Women, you no longer need to be afraid of genital mutilation or protracted pain! We now have people who want women ‘to break through their fear and have a beautiful experience of birthing’. Well, birth IS a beautiful experience, although for some this beauty is not dissimilar to that of Munch’s ‘The Scream’. Most of us will come back home with a child we do not wish to flush down the toilet straight away.

 

According to Marsden Wagner MD (should that read ‘Male Douchebag?), ‘It’s got to be how it is when you make love with someone. It’s got to be safe, secure and uninterrupted.’ I am guessing his sex life is an insufferable bore.

 

Humour aside for a moment, I can almost see how this phenomena could be more than a myth created by smug Earth mother types. Contractions rise, peak and wane  just like orgasms, and trust me, leave your eyes just as watery and your head just as fuzzy. And it is true that ‘the noises women make are similar to those of love-making – which can embarrass their partners.’ Maybe some EXTREMELY FORTUNATE women have a little switch in their brains that makes all these feral sensations shift from excrutiating pain into excrutiating pleasure. Remember Barbarella, when she is in the ‘Excessive Machine’(thanks, Posie for reminding me of that one. Good thing old Barbie showed Durand Durand who is boss)? Hmmmmm. Hmmmm. Hmmmm.  And who doesn’t like a gentle little bite on the nape of the neck? Or a little crack of the whip? Or like, when something hurts but it’s a nice kind of pain, a really nice kind of pain? Or when… Ah, I digress.

 

I just know that when the Epidural kicked in, the feeling of pain sweeping away from my body was like being on cloud 9 with a battery operated Johnny Depp and beautiful sunsets and wonderful music and exploding ecstasy for ever and ever and ever.

 

 

Until the bloody thing wore off, of course.

How do you Like your Lies for Breakfast?

A good friend of mine posted this link on facebook. It is an essay by Paul Graham about the lies adults tell children about the world in order to raise them from childhood to adulthood. It reminded me a lot about my constant battle with the joys and tortures of postmodern parenthood.

 

I remember an event some years ago, when I was still an angry, rebellious teenager. I had just been beaten up for no reason by strangers for the first time. I was growing more and more bitter with the world, moving further and further away from the open hearted tree-hugging hippie country girl I had been. Dismayed at realising that so many people seemed irrevocably evil, I asked my  jaded best friend whether she thought we would be better off telling our children the truth about the world so that they would be tougher early on. And she said ‘No. I think we should let them have their dreams.’

 

This was a long time ago but I still remember it vividly. And now as a mother I agree with her. The only difficulty is determining just how much wool parents should pull over their children’s eyes before they cross the line between protecting them and harming them.

Up Shit Creek Without a Parenting Book.

I know I keep alluding to postmodern parenthood, with its joys and pitfalls, and you must be wondering what I’m yakking on about.

I’ll explain: 

Gone are the days of the Grand Narratives. The lines between male and female roles are finally blurred. In fact, even the line between genders is blurred. The line between ‘right’ and ‘wrong’  shifts from whichever perspective you choose to look at it. Every ideology has its crack, thank God. But I don’t even know if I believe in God. Isn’t it great? You can decide what you want to believe in.

 

And then you have a kid.

 

Suddenly your world is turned on its head and you desperately need to find your bearings.

 

 

The first role that generally comes into play is the traditional, patriarchal family. Mummy dearest reigns supreme within the confines of her immaculate house. Daddy comes home from the office at night to a home filled with the delectable aroma of hot food, and smiling children with impeccable table manners throw their arms around him and say Grace before tucking in. Even today there is something aspirational about this image, but when you start zooming in, the whole thing begins to unravel.

 

Well, for starters, who is mummy dearest? Me, that’s who.

 

And I am currently under enforced domestic incarceration(i.e. unemployed). I love cooking though, and if Daddy dearest dares suggest I overcooked the broccoli, he gets a slap round the face. In the rare occasions I manage to get my house to look immaculate, it only lasts for five minutes. I am MESSY. I wasn’t made to be a housegirlfriend for prolonged periods of time.

 

And don’t get me started on the kid. He’s the biggest conundrum of them all. All these different schools of thought:

 

There’s the foodie brigade, who say the key to bringing up kids is to slave over the oven and feed them nothing but organic everything, even if the only thing the bloody child will eat is packet noodles with fish fingers.

There’s the Gina Ford brigade, who chastise the soft-hearted mother that cannot bear to let her newborn baby scream itself to sleep for two hours straight, and demand that she runs her life rigidly by the stroke of the clock, no excuses.

There’s the religious brigade, who will avert their eyes at my lovechild and fear I’ve chained him to the gates of Hell.

There’s the middle-class, middle-aged mum in Wandsworth brigade, who treat me as if I were the nanny.

There’s the paragon of virtue brigade, who spend their days pulling flashcards out of their pockets, looking on serenely while their angelic children garner ridiculously high I.Q.s that will doubtlessly make them future World leaders.

There’s the… uh, you get the picture.

 

 

WHO IS RIGHT? No one is completely right, so I should be happy to find my way and muddle along, right? There is no right, there is no wrong, right?

WRONG. The Karen Matthews school of parenting is definitely wrong.

 

NOW FOR A LITTLE ANECDOTE:

I took my son to the supermarket yesterday. I thought I was doing ok. He only ran off a little bit, and kept coming back for me. I went to the till, basket in hand. He then runs off behind a corner, I run after him, customers start looking pissed off, I drag him back, impatiently.

 

With absolute composure, the woman behind the till commands him to come back and stand next to mummy, that’s it, what a good boy, wait until mummy is finished, well done, what a good, good boy, here you go, have a green plastic coin. He looks on, sweet as an angel, and starts naming the items cutely as she packs them in a bag.

 

Thanks, I mutter under my breath. I feel crushed. An absolute stranger has a better grip on my child than I do. I am a TERRIBLE mother.  I undoubtedly have been lax with his discipline. Those of you who know me personally will laugh at the thought of be taking on the role of the stern disciplinarian. And why would I want to be a stern disciplinarian? But then, what if I’m raising him to become a hellraising thug? Am I condemning him to getting an ASBO? Should I start taking him to church? I want to be a good mum!

 

Can someone tell me the way? Please?

That Cold-Hearted Tyrant, the Yummy Mummy.

Oh, postmodern parenthood, where do you eclipse those enduring voices of Capitalism and Mysoginy?

Although not all of us professional housegirlfriends and wives will experience these issues with such intensity, I have found an article that examines what appears to be a new cultural phenomenon, but to me is just yet another case of old wine being poured into shiny new bottles. This is all rather serious brain-grinding, folks, so if you were looking for a bit of ha-ha-ha-ha today instead, I suggest you look here.

Now, if you’re feeling a little like you’ve been failing miserably in your tireless pursuit of the Joneses, have a look here.

Kid’s Rock

Finally a solution for not being able to get children’s music out of my head! (The ‘Peppa Pig’ theme tune is a particularly horrible one to get stuck on).

Where on Earth to Take the Kids?

Is a question every professional housegirlfriend across London asks herself on a daily basis. How on Earth will I get through London transport with a pushchair and luggage safely within the time bracket between morning and evening rush hour? Which stations have escalators or lifts? Where should I change underground lines so that my journey flows with minimum hassle? And, when I finally reach my destination, where the hell can I go for a coffee and chill out from all the bloody stress while the children are safe and entertained?!!!!!

 

FEAR NOT!!!! From the ashes, here rises http://babyaboutlondon.wordpress.com !!!!!

 

Sometimes(most of the time), it is very hard to know what to do with yourself when you have a toddler in tow. I can’t help thinking that a London guide for mums who, like me, get a bit tired of watching paint dry, is sorely needed. So, I am starting a new blog where contributors will be asked to review any child-friendly facilities such as restaurants, playgroups, activities, cafes, bars, pubs, etc. around the Big Smoke with the intention of making such decisions less stressful. Evidently any contributions will be duly credited. I often find it very tiring trying to come up with creative ideas of where to go and meet people, and trawling the internet is often not enough to ascertain whether a particular cafe is going to be the icing on the cake or Hell on Earth.

 

So let’s get together, parents, nannies, childminders, professional housegirlfriends of London! Get the party started, let the games begin. Send your reviews to professionalhousegirlfriend@yahoo.com

Jumpin’ for Joy

You would never guess from the sight of the ever-deepening lines of my once balmy and youthful visage that I am regressing in mental years. I blame it on children’s television. It has permeated the corners of my brain with such insiduous precision that I have only just taken account of the fact I seem to know every single theme tune available to the under aged spectator. No more cool underground music knowledge for me. No more knowing who is ‘the next big thing’ before anybody else.  And who would think? I even gave up on waiting for Axl Rose to release Chinese Democracy.

 

Tell you what, though. This one here is a corker. When I’m lying in my bed cuddled up with my son in the morning watching Milkshake, pulling my pillow over my head, this song will come on and before I know it I am up on my feet, doing a silly dance. What a tune!

The Chicken and the Eiger

So Gordon Brown decided to pull out a particularly shiny trumpcard this week. A vain attempt to rescue his ever waning popularity while the rest of us have to re-use our teabags in order to pay the gas bill? Clearly. But I wanted to hug him when I heard that he plans to introduce State funded childcare for two-year-olds.

 

Evidently, the likelihood of this measure being implemented before my own two-year-old son is in school is nil, but as a young mother desperate to return to work I have to applaud our rotund, unpopular Prime Minister.

 

I returned to University last year to finish my degree, when my son was fourteen months old. I could only afford(‘afford’ here is an euphemism for ‘I nearly died’) to put him in childcare for the days when I was actually in lectures, which meant that the time I had to read the sheer material required for a BA in English Language and Literature, as well as writing lengthy essays, was seriously compromised.

 

And now I find myself, at 25, with some office experience and a fresh degree in the bag, eager to grab a career by the horns and regain control of my life. Except for one *small* detail…

 

To send my son to my local nursery, where I feel confident that he will be cared for with genuine commitment and affection, will cost me a whopping GBP 938,00 per month, full time.

 

Now consider that I will be getting myself an entry level job in the media. I will NOT whore myself out for less than 20k, which limits the amount of positions somewhat. So, let’s say I’ll be earning approximately 1.2k a month after tax. After nursery fees, that leaves me TWO HUNDRED AND SIXTY TWO POUNDS A MONTH TO PLAY WITH!!!!!!!!

 

YOU WOULD THINK THIS IS SOME SICK FUCKING JOKE, WOULDN’T YOU?

Add to the considerations that I, as well as working for a pittance, will be putting myself through the heartwrenching decision of letting someone else look after my son for 70% of his waking hours. Add travel and food and I am torturing myself and my family to be 100 pounds better off a month.

 

 

When I look at it like this, I just want to say ‘FUCK THAT!’, but I am actually going to do this, in the hope that one day I will earn a lot more. But is it any wonder why single mums around the country remain on benefits? Too bloody right. It makes me sick with anger to know that there are millions of women in the same position as I am today.

 

 I hope Mr. Brown can fantasize about what good it might do to our desperate, swooning economy to encourage us professional housegirlfriends and wives back into the workforce. Grrrrrrrrrrr!

Dancing with the Dark Knight

Last night I had the pleasure of going to the cinema for the first time since I was eight months pregnant, which makes it… uh… 2 years and three months without jelly sweets and popcorn.

 

A funny thing happened when I gave birth, and that is that I became a total wimp. Previously a horror movie fanatic who knew every line to ‘The Shining’, I suddenly developed an aversion to anything even mildly thrilling.

 

I think it was a consequence of hardly being able to balance my enormous womb and suddenly having to be one of those slow-walkers who clog the pavements of London on a daily basis. I felt like an old lady, stiff and frail. Then my son was born and he was this outworldly, tiny little creature, and the world outside the confines of my living room just seemed bigger and badder in comparison.

 

I suddenly developed about a million phobias; I was afraid of crossing the road, of being in a car, of flying, of drinking, of watching the news or disturbing films. And I was the queen of disturbing films! The more fucked up the film, the more I enjoyed it.

 

Fortunately, as I eased into motherhood, the crippling fear I felt started to ease, but I am ashamed to confess that as I sank into my dark seat and stared at the big screen I found myself feeling aprehensive as to whether I could sit through a film with a 12A classification. What had become of me?! I shifted nervously in my padded chair and waited for the movie to start.

 

Now, as soon as Christian Bale appeared on the screen I remembered how much I enjoyed the last Batman  movie. He is definitely the coolest Batman, like, ever. Cor, I wouldn’t even mind being his Robin if the chance ever befell me. What a hottie too. My anxiety suddenly vanished and my greedy eyes got ready for more. I wasn’t entirely convinced at first that Heath Ledger’s performance hadn’t been overhyped in the wake of his death, but as the film unfolded it became clear that the rumours were true, and his Joker was sicker, more psychotic and sinister than any of his predecessors. And he was still hot, even under all that make up. Why oh why do fit men die?

 

Now, much as I loved it, there was an annoying (if brief, compared to other superhero movies) ‘damsel-in-distress’ moment. C’mon people, isn’t it time to cut down on these cliches? Is this not the 21st Century? And why is Maggie Gillenhall the only female to have more than 3 lines in the whole thing?

 

Anyway, I DEFINITELY want a batmobile. Hell yeah. The best part of the film for me was when the batmobile is basically completely ruined after driving through a billion explosions and Brucey Batty is expelled on the sickest, most poisoned motorbike ever.

 

I wish he’d taken me for a ride.