Going viral

Yesterday was a bit of a shock. 
All I did the night before was post this on Facebook

In case you can't read it I'll spell it out for you. It's a leaflet that came through my door from Lynton Yates (Leicestershire County Councillor for Glenfield) and it says

"We could remove six million cars from the road if benefit claimants were not driving. Why do they have the privilege to spend the tax payers hard earned money on a car when those in work are struggling to keep their own car on the road.

These people really could catch a bus."

I shared it on my personal profile with a few friends and shared it on a page I've sent articles to before ATOS Miracles

Then I went out. 

While I was away some friends put it on Twitter and by the time I got home with my kids at 6pm it was trending and my original post had had over 50,000 views been shared 500 times and I had messages from 5 journalists, including 2 from national newspapers and one from the BBC. But I also had people who claimed to be senior members of UKIP telling me that I'd faked it and some highly abusive messages telling me I was not just anti-British but also a paedophile.

Here's my opinion: It's my understanding that the largest chunk of the welfare budget is spent on pensions and that of the remainder the majority is paid to people in work. Furthermore, Mobility allowance for the disabled includes an element to get a suitable vehicle to get around in. So it would seem that Councillor Yates suggestion is not only ill-informed and unworkable but born out of the unthinking prejudice that all benefit claimants are able-bodied, urban dwelling, middle-aged layabouts with no dependents and nothing to do. As for the suggestion I faked it, why would I bother? They shoot themselves in the foot as a pastime (or possibly past-time as written in his leaflet). Is it official UKIP policy? Not as far as I know, but then neither are half the things that come out of Nigel Farage's mouth, it was written by Councillor Yates (or at least one of his minions) and put out under his name, it therefor counts as his opinion and I'm not going to pull it off the internet now, nor could I even if I wanted to.

And all this less than a week after I'd talked to my 8 year old about being careful about sharing photo's over the Internet and other devices (I'd found her using a chat app while at a friends house).

I have to be honest the girls and my husband don't know whether to be scared or proud. Neither do I. The number who have viewed the post is now over 72,000 and the total of abusive messages up to 6. So no I'm not going to stand up on national media and give my real name, I have my kids to protect (not to mention my career). But I am proud that I stood up and called out unthinking prejudice and that my little pebble of news caused big ripples on the media pond, at least for five minutes. I can make a difference and now if you'll excuse me I'm going to be the difference to a small group of new mum's who need some breastfeeding support.

Yours, as ever,
Mumjuice

Hotels and healthcare

While listening to the radio today I heard someone suggest in a very sensible voice that while NHS health care should remain free that perhaps a charge could be made for board and lodging for someone who has to stay in hospital? They said that perhaps a charge of £75 per night would be sensible and affordable. I didn't really hear the rest of the report as my emotions caught up with me so forgive me for not knowing who they were or why they thought that.
You see I was listening to the radio while in the car, while driving away from the hospital having just seen my husband readmitted. Of the last 40 nights he's spent 20 in hospital. Not through choice, through a very serious infection resulting from gallstones. I consider our family to be reasonably well off, my husband has a good job and I make small sporadic amounts from free-lance work (anyone want to buy an article?) But could we have quickly found the £1500 that this illness would have cost us if this charge was to be levied? No. In fact it would probably have questioned whether to readmit him this afternoon really was a good idea. Quite quickly I would have found myself having to choose between my husbands health care and food or heating for my children, and we are not alone. According to another report I heard on the radio sometime back more than 50% of working families are less than 3 missing paychecks away from homelessness and poverty. But I live in a village where more than 25% of the children are living below the poverty line. Every day their parents have to choose between 'eating and heating' and that's not to mention the pensioners. A 'bed and board' charge would certainly bar them from health care they might desperately need.
Food and rest are not 'bed and board' they are nutrition and restoration, they are essential aspects of care and if we forget that then we have lost our compassion and humanity.

Tips for going to the Dordogne on Holiday

A member of one of the Facebook groups I'm in asked for tips on taking a family holiday in the Dordogne, since I've done this for a number of years I thought I'd impart some wisdom and then I thought "why not blog it?" So here I am.

The journey down.

We live near Nottingham, we like to cross over to Peterborough, then Cambridge before heading down the M11 to the M25 and beyond to Dover. I prefer this route as a) I know it well and b) it's saved us from some pretty nasty jams on the M1 and M25 in the past. So long as you get past Barr Hill nice and early in the morning your only major hold-up will be the Thames river crossing. We can do the journey in 5 hours but this is on a clear day with no stops. For 'family' journeys allow at least 7 hours. Get petrol at a Dover supermarket then take your pre-booked ferry crossing to Calais.

From Calais  follow the following route - Abbeyville - Rouen - Evereux - Dreux - Chartres. This is the limit of what we can do in a day, we pre-book a night in a family room in the Novotel. The biggest hold-up this side of the Channel is likely to be Rouen, avoid the central bridges if at all possible and be aware that after Evereux there is a shortage of toilet stops.

By the way while the service stations in France are often beautiful by comparison and the picnic/comfort stops plentiful we find motorway food (and ferry food) in France to be almost as bad as the UK i.e. in-edible, so we always take picnics. Where in follows my next tip, when you leave the Novotel in the morning head for one of the nearest supermarkets, get a breakfast, something to eat on route and fuel for your vehicle.

Now head down the N154 for Orleans, then the N20 for 'La Ferte-St Aubin' and Vierson. At Vierson get on the A20 and head for Chateauroux. When you get off the A20 is up to you, but if you can leave by J53 you will avoid the peage. All the driving this side of the Channel should only have cost you about 10 euro, as opposed to over 50 on the main motorways. It also avoids central Paris and all the delays that ensue from there. You are welcome.

And just for the record we DVD and MP3 player alternately on the journey. Its the only way we can survive. The girls can't cope otherwise and we can't handle that many repeats of 'Frozen'.

Eating and drinking.

If you are eating out go for set meals at lunch time it is a lot cheaper than evening meals and more pleasant in my opinion. However my top tip for family evening meals is the Marche Producteur http://www.marches-producteurs.com/dordogne  they are basically local farmers markets with a BBQ facility thrown in for free (though some of the smaller ones don't so watch out). The set up varies but the chips seem to be ready at about 8pm and the grills are normally hot by then too. It is an incredibly cheap way to eat out and it's good fun too. Our family has a lot of food allergies and we find our limited French invaluable in talking to the producers who will happily tell you exactly what is in their sausage/bread/ice cream etc. It's even possible to eat well as a vegetarian but always take a salad in your picnic hamper just in case and everyone should take something to drink.

I'm not going to recommend places to go or stay, the area is vast and the choice wide. If you have found this page you probably already know many of them, go, enjoy and have a glass or two for me while you are there.

The journey back.

We pretty much reverse the route going home  but stop in the Loire for a couple of nights to do a Chateau or two and the Garden Festival which is amazing http://www.domaine-chaumont.fr/en_festival_festival. Then it's back on up to Orleans following the reverse route home until we get to a B&B or hotel in the Somme area for the night and catching the ferry home. 

One last piece of advice, have a stop for fuel long before Calais and once you approach the city do not leave your car, keep the doors, boot or hatch and windows locked and have every space in your vehicle covered or filled. There are some poor desperate people out there who will do anything to get to a better life in the UK. Don't let yourself fall victim to them 'hitching a lift' seen, or unseen in your car. Whether you know about them or not you will get fined and a criminal record. That said please don't feel  this part of the journey is particularly dangerous, it's like a night out in Nottingham - know the risks and what to do to keep safe.

Have a lovely holiday!

Like a pebble on a beach...

This is my pebble.
I collected it on a beach near where my in-laws live.

The red is sandstone, it's a sedimentary rock formed in the Devonian era (not surprising then to note that the in-laws live in Devon).  As rocks go sandstone is not the hardest stone you will ever come across, while not exactly soft it is easily eroded by the action of the environment (in this case the waves and tide).

The white stuff is quartz, it's an igneous stone formed by volcanic action that used heat and pressure to push it into the sandstone.  Quartz is hard and when all the rest of this pebble has been worn away the quartz will still be there in flakes.

I feel like I can identify with the pebble,  bits of my personality were made under the intense heat and pressure of some difficult situations, they are hard, rough edges but they hold the rest of me together. Other parts of my personality are softer and are more easily worn away and like the pebble, the adult I am today was formed gradually over time.

It's taken me time to understand that these aspects are not flaws. The pebble is interesting precisely because it has these different features. 

And if I am not the only pebble on the beach?
Maybe then I can be a little bolder.

Take me to the water

I've had a few 'health journeys' in my time, either by choice (like a fitness or weight loss programme) or by necessity (like an illness which involves regular trips to the doctor) and one question I'm often asked is 'are you drinking enough fluids'. Its a fair enough question, bodies perform better when they are fully hydrated and drinking more is an easy lifestyle change to make. If you are in the UK the NHS recommends you drink about six 200ml glasses a day.

As it happens I do drink plenty, it's only 10am and I estimate that I'm already well into my second litre. I like to drink, it helps my brain work and if I'm honest I also use it as a way to suppress any hunger pangs. (Did I mention that in the last year I've lost over 2 stone?) Do you know that many people can't actually tell the difference between feeling hungry and feeling dehydrated and that that skill will diminish with age, the elderly are at particular risk of dehydration.

Unfortunately many of the drinks we like to have are not actually hydrating, tea and coffee for example, alcohol will also drive water out of your system. Pure fruit juices are also so stack full of sugar that they wont help hydrate you either, unless you add extra water. I also try to avoid squash for similar reasons and I don't think the 'no added sugar' squashes are a great alternative either as the artificial sweetener can leave you feeling hungry (think about it, how many skinny people do you actually see drinking diet soda?) And so called 'flavoured water' you can buy in the shops is usually just colourless diet squash with added sweetener.

Re-hydrating isotonic drinks are fab (provided they don't have sweetener) but they can be VERY expensive, over-the-counter oral re-hydration sachets to add to water are not much cheaper.  No, there really is no better drink than water. But even I'm prepared to admit that it can be a little dull at times so here I'm going to share my favourite water 'recipes'. Things that can give the water just enough flavour to make it different and interesting.

• Sliced fruit - be it citrus like lemons or sweet like sliced strawberries just a touch of sliced fruit mixed in with the ice can make the water seem even more refreshing. Also cucumber works really nicely.
• Herbs - many herbs are great in water. I often use rosemary (which by the way is BRILLIANT with a slice of watermelon, so refreshing) but I also like all sorts of mint, thyme and sage (which is great with some blackcurrants) . The list goes on. Give your herb some gentle scrunching to release the flavour and float on the water.
• Flowers - my girls love a flower or two floating in with the ice and water. Rose petals, elderflower, nasturtiums, marigolds. Any edible flower looks great and if it's scented like roses a little sparkling water added to the mix will help bring that out.
• Herbal and fruit teas - I'll often make a peppermint or chamomile tea and drink it hot or let it cool and add ice. Go for quality bags or loose tea with no added 'black tea' and no artificial sweetener. My all time favourite tea is a few thin slices of ginger with a dash of lemon juice.
• A dash of.. - lemon juice, lime juice, vanilla, cider vinegar or Angostura bitters all work well when added to water.
• Home made oral re-hydration therapy - to one litre of fresh clean water add half a level teaspoon (3 grams) of salt and 3 level tablespoons of sugar (18 grams). 

If you want to look really classy any of the above frozen into ice cubs will look great but of course until the ice melts you will have less flavour.

As I type now I am looking forward to a blistering hot weekend, the weather man just told me that the last time it was this good was the first week in July 2006 - I remember it well, it was the week my first daughter was born (and no it wasn't a water birth). 
Have a great weekend! xx

My breastfeeding journey

As I've spent the last week helping locally with Breastfeeding Awareness Week I thought I'd share my breastfeeding journey with you. 

When we started trying to build a family I had just turned 29, we’d thought about it for years and were very ‘active’ in trying to conceive. Unfortunately this wasn’t to be and before long we were at the hospital receiving various cycles of IVF. I was 35 when a cycle finally worked and we were expecting our first baby. I felt that we’d tried so hard to have a baby that we owed it to ourselves to be the very best parents we could so I read a great number of books on pregnancy and early baby-hood. When I learnt that breastfeeding could potentially reduce the chances of developing food allergies I knew I had to breastfeed. I have a number of food allergies myself and felt that anything I could do to spare my child from these was well worth doing.

We went to NCT antenatal classes and while ‘breast is best’ was constantly repeated the actual focus of ‘how to breastfeed’ was probably only one hour of the course. I expressed concern to my sister (who already had children) who told me not to worry and that mum would ‘sort me out’ as she had done for her.

When my baby was born, I had a difficult time in getting her to latch on. I’d had an induction and an epidural as well as some gas and air and had eventually delivered my baby by ventouse. No-one had explained to me that anyone of these procedures might make the early stages of breastfeeding difficult and added to this I have very flat nipples (everyone was calling them ‘inverted’ but I now know they were just flat) and even my mum couldn’t get me breastfeeding.

My problems were exacerbated by a migraine at 24hours post delivery where I could barely lift my own head never-mind concentrate on feeding my baby. I was heartbroken when the nursery-nurse took Rosa for a blood glucose test, told me her glucose was dangerously low because I was starving her and immediately ‘administered’ 40ml of formula.

I decided to go for a shower at this point. Once in the flow of water I let the tears run, I was still blubbing when I stepped out and cursed myself for crying so much my feet were getting wet. When I finally dried my eyes of course I found that it wasn’t my tears making my feet wet it was my milk. I remember just then I heard a baby cry out side and my milk stopped dripping and started pouring, I could have filled a teacup a metre away. I put my clothes on as quickly as I could and went out and told the nurse that there was no way I was starving my child and demanded she get me a breast-pump.

In no time at all I had produced 40ml of breastmilk and came to a deal with the nurse, I would pump for each feed, I would show her or a colleague that I had produced at least 40mls. They would then test her blood sugar and then I would feed her my milk from the bottle (no one ever mentioned cup feeding and I certainly didn’t know about it).  If we passed 36 hours without going under a particular level of blood glucose I would be allowed home, where I already had a breast pump, bottles and a can of formula (which I’d bought just in case). I gave up on direct breastfeeding at that point I just wanted to get home. Once at home my mum and a number of good friends tried to help me get her to latch on instead of bottle-feeding expressed milk.

My mum suggested stripping baby down to her nappy as she’d been told to do with me. We mistakenly thought this was because warmth was making her sleepy, we didn’t realise it was skin-to-skin contact that was needed so I kept my nursing vest on. It was a very hot summer so I was even feeding in the direct line of a fan, just to try to keep her awake to feed. It sort of helped but the breakthrough came when a friend who’d had similar problems told us where we could get some nipple shields from. My husband and mum (who had suggested shields from the start) were duly dispatched to the shop and came back with some silicon ones. I have to say that at that point those shields saved my breastfeeding relationship. Baby liked the shields and I found I could control the mess they made (they filled up and dribbled in no time) with a well-placed towel.

I always intended to come off of the shields but again I was let down by poor advice as everyone, midwife, health visitor, my mum and many others suggested ‘cutting the shield down’ with a pair of scissors slowly making the hole bigger. Baby out rightly refused to let them back into her mouth once she realised they had been cut as try as I might the cutting always left sharp edges. The friend who’d originally told me about them admitted she’d never come off of them either in her 6 months of breastfeeding and so at about six weeks I resigned myself to using them for the rest of our breastfeeding. That was when I went to my first La Leche meeting.

Another girl from my NCT antenatal group had had problems with her baby too and had already sort out their help. Problems largely solved she had been invited to the meeting and wanted a bit of moral support going in so I said we’d go too. I have to say that first meeting was a bit of a shock, I’d rarely seen a sling before, and I’d certainly never seen a child over six months being breastfed, seeing a 3 year old do it blew my mind! However I was willing to admit the children all seemed very happy and healthy and the welcoming friendship of the other mums encouraged us to go back for the next meeting.

It was on my third meeting that I discovered ‘The Breastfeeding Answer Book’ had a section on shields. I learnt then that the ‘cutting down advice’ applied only to rubber shields and not silicon and that if I wanted to wean off shields then what I needed to do was essentially put a piece of sterilized cloth in the shield to make it more difficult for her to get the milk and then show her how easy it was to take it straight from the breast. I gave it a go and got into a terrible mess, milk everywhere, a rather sore nipple and a screaming daughter. Subsequently I gave up on the whole idea and decided I would continue using the shields.

La Leche changed how I felt about long-term breastfeeding. When I went back to work I carried on feeding baby when I was with her and I had wanted to carry on feeding until she was 2 however I also wanted a larger family and we had a time limit (at that time they would only keep frozen gametes for IVF for 5 years and we were already 2 and a half years in). My IVF consultant was not particularly understanding about my wish to continue to breastfeed but I thought we’d come to an arrangement where we would try implanting during a ‘natural cycle’ without medication. However that message didn’t get communicated to the staff and in the hospital on the day of the transfer I was suddenly given an injection and my breastfeeding abruptly stopped.

I was in pieces (well I just been given a syringe full of hormones!) and I called several LLL leaders who did a brilliant job in counselling and encouraged me with the thought that a sudden stop in breastfeeding can lead to an element of ‘super fertility’. Whether it was that, luck, brilliant fertility treatment or a mixture of all three I don’t know but 2 weeks later the pregnancy test said positive and it all seemed worth it.

When my second baby girl was born I thought I would be able to crack the breastfeeding quickly and settle down to two years of feeding. How wrong I was. She just wasn’t the same child as my first and clearly hadn’t read the books I had, on top of this I had terrible SPD and many health professionals were telling me that to continue breastfeeding would just continue the SPD. Thank goodness I didn’t listen to that advice. However after less than a week of trying to feed both with and without nipple shields my nipples were exceptionally painful and I made the decision to just feed with shields. Quickly the pain dissipated and I resigned myself to never doing ‘normal breastfeeding’, except that once again she had different ideas.

When she was about 6 weeks old I settled down to feed her when her big sister wanting help with a book, interrupted me. As I leaned over her she very gently helped herself to my uncovered nipple, I didn’t even realised she’d latched on until I leaned back. She looked happy so I pulled her a little closer and let her continue. At the next feed she just pushed the shield away and we’ve never looked back.

I had intended to feed her for just the NHS recommended 2 years but as ever she felt differently and I realised that I could just let her ‘self wean’, so that’s what we did.

On the eve of her third birthday she decided she was a big girl and wouldn’t have ‘num-nums’ any more. By the evening of her birthday my breasts were nearly bursting so I decided to hand express into the sink, she quickly realised this was a waste and said she would help me by feeding! Shortly after this however I decided I’d just had enough of the constant night feeding and negotiated a deal with her that she would have extra playdoh time with mummy in return for not feeding at night. (It wasn’t exactly a reward system, I explained I just couldn’t cope with the lack of sleep and that everyone needed a ‘happy mummy’.)

When she was about 3years 8 months I developed ‘nursing aversion’ but after working through my feelings decided that if I could drop the evening ‘going to sleep’ feed (which by now was actually hurting as she had a tendency to chew as she went to sleep) I could carry on.  However this really was the beginning of the end.

Daytime feeds quickly disappeared and in the early mornings she would complain ‘there’s not really much there any more mum’. Again as she approached her birthday she told me that once she was 4 she would be a big girl and wouldn’t need it any more.

Just before her birthday we went on holiday. In the evening we let the girls stay up late and consequently mornings got later and later. In addition to this the gite had a satellite dish and the girls found a kids channel they loved. In the end it seemed breastfeeding just couldn’t compete with ‘The Winx Club’ and she stopped climbing into my bed for a morning feed. When we came back to the UK she did climb in on a few mornings, even on her 4^th birthday she wanted ‘num-nums’ first then presents, but I think I’ve only fed her two times since and on both times she told me there was no milk coming out. Recently she told me she thought it had stopped because it knew she was a big girl.

Looking back on the early days of my breastfeeding I clearly had an over active milk ejection reflex which was pumping out such a large amount of milk it was making my babies gag. The nipple shields didn’t sort out my perceived flat nipple problem, they slowed the milk down to a flow my babies could cope with. Biological nurturing would have been a great alternative (the ‘up-hill’ position slowing the milk down) and that together with skin to skin that would have helped to stimulate my baby to feed. Looking back at pictures of my first girl I can see how her head was so pulled out of shape by the suction, I bet it really hurt her to move her head at all. If the me now met the me then I would have had me expressing small amounts of colostrum before the birth to cup feed baby when she arrived. (It was a planned induction and epidural, it could have been anticipated that these would cause problems).  I’d also have suggested biological nurturing or cup-feeding when I had the migraine and I think that showing me how to feed lying down would also have helped a lot. Finally I’d have thrown away the Gina Ford and Claire Byam-Cook books and introduced Dr Sears and the Womanly Art of Breastfeeding a lot earlier. Of course hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Meno-what?

A spot! I have a spot!! Several actually. I had a horrible time with acne as I was growing up and I think it's coming back. I suspect that now just as then, changing hormones are to blame. 

Yes, if there is one thing I really hate about heading into the menopause it's the spots - oh and the hot flushes. Honestly yesterday I had a 'personal summer' that had my face glowing like a beacon, it actually hurt. And the sweat, ugh!! I was watching my girls do their gymnastics and I'm sure the other mums must have been wondering what on earth was up.

Yes if there one thing I really hate about heading into the menopause it's the spots and the hot flushes - oh and the mood swings. The mood swings are awful. Not just bad but really f***ing bad! I can go from sweetly talking to the birds while I garden to full on RAGES in less than 60 seconds. Sometimes I go absolutely MAD about the tiniest little thing and goodness help anyone who gets in my way.

Yes if there is one thing I really hate about heading into the menopause it's the spots, the hot flushes, the mood swings. Oh and lets not to mention a change in the old pelvic floor! Things just are not what they were (don't worry I'm not going to go TMI on you but I do intend to talk about this more in another post).

Yes if there is one thing I really hate about heading into the menopause it's the spots, the hot flushes, the mood swings and the pelvic floor issues. Oh and let's not forget the 
um, 
ummmmm, 
ummmmm 

....


I'm sorry, what was I talking about? 
You know if there is one thing I really hate about heading into the menopause it's the short term memory loss. 

Now where were we??




BTW I'm sorry I've been away so long, a badly strained wrist made typing very painful!