So here we are.

It’s been a while and I’m sorry for that. I guess I lost my mojo a little bit (if I even ever had one). I write like people read this but I’m not really sure if anyone does, oh well, I’m going to write something anyway. It always feels good to get words out.

I wanted to talk about something that has been on my mind for a while, something that is very important to me. Arth’s birth was very traumatic, I still believe it was a very big trigger/ part of developing post natal depression and anxiety. It was not at all how I had hoped/planned and everything that I was terrified of happening, happened.

A big part of feeling that heaviness of feeling “weak” and that is was a “bad birth” I think stemmed from having too many people almost boast “I didn’t have any pain relief at all”, “I had a completely natural birth”, or “my labour was 48 hours long”. This may be an unpopular opinion and I am in no way saying how you give birth and labour should not be celebrated. It is bloody hard. However you do it, you are incredible.

Yes, it is natural. Yes our bodies are “designed” for it. But that does not mean it doesn’t hurt, because trust me it really bloody hurts. If you had a natural, pain relief free, short birth, good on you. If you had csection with allll the pain relief, good on you. It’s not a competition. And sometimes I felt during pregnancy like there was such pressure from others to have a “good birth” how others perceived it to be.

It almost felt like if you had an epidural, or an assisted delivery you were coping out. I felt like during Arth’s labour I needed to try and prove, i don’t know to who, but someone, everyone, that I could do it with minimal pain relief. And that I could do it naturally. Like having help, not being able to push was wrong, made me weak and not cut out for giving birth. Writing it down it now just seems so crazy that I thought that way but I did.

When I was pregnant with George I knew I didn’t want the birth to be anything like Arthur’s. It was so traumatic, I still think about it now. I remember talking to the consultant and she explained after a traumatic vaginal birth, having a second one, if it went well could be quite healing. It could show you how positive birth could be. But I couldn’t get past my fears, who knows if I am lucky enough to have a third baby, maybe I will look into having a natural birth again.

But truth be told, I really believe the planned csection with George helped to relieve so much anxiety. Of course I still went into spontaneous labour because babies often don’t go along with the plan but I still had the calm, controlled birth I had always hoped for. Of course birth cannot always go the way you hope. It cannot always be “controlled” because it is something that has aspects that is just out of our control.

However, you can have preferences, you can explain your choices. Use your voice, if you believe that a csection is important to protect your mental health than speak up. It does not make you weak, it does not mean you are not strong. It doesn’t mean your “too posh to push” (hate that phrase). Epidurals, spinal injections, having pethidine, it doesn’t magically take away all the pain. It doesn’t make you heal faster postpartum, none of those things are magic fixes.

Labour is hard, birth is hard. If you find it easy, if you weren’t in hardly any pain, that is awesome. Celebrate that shit. Because that’s amazing for you and wonderful. But don’t use that against other peoples fears, don’t invalidate how someone else feels. Don’t compare, because we are all different. If someone is scared, if someone has questions and fears, listen. That’s what I try to do. I bring in my own experiences if they ask for them.

I’m real about it. Not to scare, not to make people feel afraid of what could happen but just to be real and honest. If you had a wonderful labour and birth that you enjoyed, you are incredible. If you had a traumatic, hard, unpredictable labour and birth, you are incredible too.

And lastly, just because you didn’t enjoy it doesn’t mean you don’t love your baby, it doesn’t mean you won’t bond together in time. If you need to talk someone about your birth, don’t be afraid to reach out.

Hopefully I’ll be back to write some more soon if you want to stick around.

Love, Kate. X

So, breastfeeding, what a journey…

So here we are, Arthur is coming up to 6 months old and it seems now we may be coming to the end of our breastfeeding journey.

It certainly has been a journey. I remember when I was pregnant I said to myself, and everyone else; “I’m going to try breastfeeding but if I can’t do it then it doesn’t matter because I least tried”. Me and Jordan went to a breast feeding class when pregnant and it did feel very much “pro breast” I felt the pressure even before Arthur was here.

But when he came into the world I had this overwhelming instinct that I wanted to feed him with my body. I wanted to breastfeed and I felt incredibly proud to do it. But even from the word go we had problems. Arthur has a tongue tie. This affects feeding sometimes but most of the time they don’t like to cut the tongue tie if they don’t have too. You have to work through it. That’s what we did, we stayed in hospital for a few nights because we were trying to get feeding. We went to the breastfeeding workshop, we got the hang of it. Arthur was a feeder right from the word go. He would feed every 1-2 hours, max 3 and sometimes would be on the breast for 1 hour, 1 hour and half. It was exhausting, but I really enjoyed it.

By the time I became ill I was so sleep deprived. I didn’t really feel human anymore. In A&E, I breastfed but I asked Jord to get a bottle and some formula. I needed a break. Arthur took to it straight away. I was heartbroken but I knew I had to admit I needed help. After exclusively breastfeeding for 3 weeks we introduced two bottles in the nighttime. I started to express and usually he would have one expressed bottle and one formula.

Of course at the beginning I couldn’t sleep anyway but gradually I did start to sleep. I was still completely and utterly exhausted but it was a little bit better. Arthur gained weight like a trooper. But in the evenings we started to have issues, he would scream and scream when I put him to my breast. It started around 9 and gradually got earlier and earlier until it was around 6. We realised we had to give him a bottle. He was hungry but he didn’t want to breastfeed.

My goal was to go back to exclusively breastfeeding but as time went on it slipped further and further away from me. I saw professional after professional. All explaining what I needed to do, many with different ideas and advice, I felt bombarded a lot of the time. Of course they were all trying to help but it was very overwhelming. I tried everything that was asked of me and still, it wasn’t getting better. Arthur would feed wonderfully throughout the day but I felt like I couldn’t really enjoy it because I was already thinking; “right soon it will be around 8/7 and he won’t want to breastfeed, I need to express, massage, this, that”. It was always on my mind. It consumed me.

At this point I had also had mastitis very badly. I woke up one morning and was covered in sweat. This happened quite often and I was told it was quite normal when breastfeeding because when your sleeping at night your body is still working hard to produce milk. So I got up and I didn’t feel well at all. I started to shiver uncontrollably, they took my temperature, it was 38.4. My pulse was around 110, my blood pressure had dropped to the 90s and I felt very sick. I decided to have a quick shower in the hope it would help and it was then I noticed underneath my breast it was red, hot and swollen. I needed antibiotics, it was mastitis and it knocked me for six.

The thing with mastitis is it’s a blocked milk duct so to get through it you need to keep feeding. But I couldn’t face it. I felt so ill. I needed to rest. Devastated and feeling like it was all my fault, Arthur had to have my expressed milk and some formula in the day. It was a very low point for me. After resting, pain relief and antibiotics I managed to express and feed later on that day. Bloody hell did it hurt. Since then I have had mastitis twice more. I caught it earlier both these times because I had it so bad the first time. I knew what I was looking for.

As time went on and we had hurdle after hurdle, Arthur having rotavirus, me having rotavirus and both having norovirus, Arthur twice. The days turned into expressing after expressing, taking a bottle out with us, expressing in the middle of the night, my mind was in overdrive. I was constantly thinking about feeding, when would he feed next, would he breastfeed, when was I going to express??? I didn’t think about much else.

I saw a breastfeeding counsellor. She was wonderful. She made it clear her goal wasn’t to promote breastfeeding, it was to figure out if it was right for us. She asked me – “why do you want to breastfeed? What is it about breastfeeding?” I explained for me, it was that I felt me and Arthur had developed such a bond whilst breastfeeding, I was terrified of losing that. She gave me the idea of just putting him to the breast when he was sleepy, when he had almost finished his bottle, when it was the nighttime and he needed comfort. I didn’t have to stop, but it would mainly be for a different purpose. For comfort, for bonding.

It’s very hard to feel okay with bottle feeding when you feel like most professionals around you are telling you, you need to breastfeed even when your finding it so hard. They would say to me “keep going, keep doing it, it’s all about perseverance, it will get easier”. But it didn’t, it got harder. The hardest part of it all? Having people around me when my son was crying because he was hungry, trying to breastfeed when he clearly didn’t want to, telling me to keep going. I felt like a failure. I couldn’t even feed my son. My heart would break every time I would give him a bottle but he was happy. That’s what was important. He was being fed. He was happy. I lost sight of that.

I remember a lady telling me, she became so focused on breastfeeding and she became depressed and then had to be admitted to the mother and baby unit. Because of breastfeeding. It’s heartbreaking that it can do that. We’re told it’s this wonderful, natural, easy, beautiful thing but that’s not the case for everyone. I think we should be told more; it’s okay if you can’t do it, if you find it too much, it’s hard and it’s exhausting. You have not failed as a mother.

Me and Jord had many disagreements about breastfeeding, it was frustrating, particularly at the beginning because Arthur would just feed and feed. Jord couldn’t do much. I felt like I needed encouragement from him to keep going but he felt like I was becoming obsessed with it. He was right. As time has gone on and Arthur now is mainly bottle fed, a little bit expressed milk but mostly formula, with having a sleepy boob feed once every couple of days, I realise now I let it affect me too much. I lost myself in wanting to breastfeed so badly.

It wasn’t for us and that’s okay. Maybe next time I’ll be able to boob feed for longer. Maybe I’ll decide to introduce a bottle sooner. Who knows? The most important thing is that your baby is happy and healthy. Arthur weighs around 20 pounds, he’s 5 months and 1 week. He’s a trooper. He’s rolling, holding his head, starting to have few tasters of solid food. He’s doing brilliant. I feel immensely proud we made it this far with breastfeeding. I thought we were at the end of the road a lot earlier. But will I let it affect me so much next time? Gosh I hope not.

Somebody said to me once – “A well Mum is best”. You cannot look after your baby if you are not well enough yourself. Whatever you decide to do for whatever reason, it’s your choice, it’s your baby, I hope you can feel proud and at peace. One day I hope the fed argument doesn’t exist and we don’t even think about it. A world where we feed our babies, we’re happy and healthy and so are they. End of.

Breastfeeding – we’ve had our ups and downs and I will miss you. But you ain’t everything, your just something.

Stay tuned peeps.

Love, Kate. X

So here’s my first post.

So as I sit here and type this I have no idea if anyone will read this. I don’t know much about creating a website or making a blog successful. I don’t pretend to be a good writer or super funny. But I will be honest. I will tell you the realities of motherhood, of mental health, of my life. The cliche line of “I want to help people” fits here. Whether I will or not is a different story. But I can try. So I’m still figuring this out so bare with me. My spelling and punctuation has never been great, I was classed as “borderline dyslexic” whatever that means haha. So if anyone does ever read this, please be kind. And remember I am sleep deprived Mama of a 4 month old so don’t be expecting anything to make much sense…

So I guess I should start at the beginning. The very beginning was finding out I was pregnant after not being very responsible. The classic thinking “it won’t happen to us”. (Told you I would be honest) However we now have a beautiful baby boy, so I would not go back and change a thing. I’ve always wanted children, I thought about travelling, getting a car, what career I would like, where I wanted to live, all of it was ifs and buts and changing my mind. But one thing never changed, I wanted to be a mother. It’s not for everyone and I’m not saying if your a woman that it’s a given right of passage that you want a family but for me I’ve always knew. I’ve come from a big family and family means so much to me. So when I find out I was pregnant at 23 there was a huge mix of emotions and feelings. But one was more overwhelming that the others – happy.

My pregnancy was filled with anxiety. I managed it myself and I guess I didn’t really realise this was the start of something. I would take pregnancy tests all the time, convinced something bad was going to happen, I found it hard to relax, particularly in those first 12 weeks. Although I knew taking a pregnancy test did not mean I was still pregnant with a healthy baby, I would find some comfort in seeing a positive test. I was very anxious about what I ate, eating out was very scary for me at the beginning. However as my body changed and I could see there really was a little human in there I did relax a little. The anxiety was still there but it did get better for a while. Then came the little baby movements and with that came more anxiety. I have a very active job as a nurse and it was really hard for me to keep track of our little one moving around when I was on my feet all day. Pregnancy for me was an experience. I did struggle with anxiety, but physically I was really quite well.

I sometimes stop and remember my body did an amazing thing. I grew a human for 9 months! Throughout all the anxiety, worry and the hormones I still look back over pregnancy and smile. It was up and down but it brought me the greatest gift I have ever received; our gorgeous little boy Arthur Thomas. The love I have for our tiny human is indescribable. At the happiest time of our lives also came the very saddest. I unfortunately developed post-natal depression and anxiety shortly after having our baby boy. Oh how our world changed in so many different ways. But that’s a different part of our story.

Pregnancy is an incredibly hard, amazing thing. And I am so grateful I was able to do it. If you reading this and your growing a mini human, here’s some things I want to say to you…

Try to enjoy it as much as you can
You can read as many baby books as humanly possible but no baby is textbook
Enjoy eating and watching your body change, it’s doing something incredible!
Be kind to yourself
Take time for yourself, do what you want to do before babe comes
Try to remember – you are an individual, every pregnancy is different, don’t be worried if you don’t look like your pregnant friend does, you are YOU. And don’t worry about what other people say about your body.
Take what everyone else says with a pinch of salt. Everybody will give you advice, their birth stories, jokes and “you don’t know what’s going to hit you!” This your journey, no two people do things the same, advice is just that, advice. You don’t have to do it (including my advice haha) you can simply smile and say “thank you”or you can do whatever the hell you what haha.

I was I could of told myself these things. So there I was. At the beginning of our journey. Stay tuned peeps.

Love, Kate x