Silent Sunday

AWOL

Those of you who read this blog regularly might have realised that my posting has become somewhat infrequent of late.  Subsequently my blog reading has been sporadic too, so please don't be offended if I haven't visited you in a little while!

So why have I been AWOL? Well I'm sure you will understand and excuse me a little once I fill you in on what I've been up to:

• I'm working 40 hours a week 4.00-12.30am for a few months as a short term measure to bring in a bit of cash now I have officially left teaching (woop!)
• I'm still looking after Babyzoid full time - no picnic now she is an energetic totally mobile 2 year old who is even worse at sitting still than her mum
• I'm trying desperately to finalise the launch for my Social Media business, which is kind of ironic as it is meaning that I have less time to spend on social media for personal use.
• Having been rather slow at getting wedding stuff prepared I now find myself with lots to do and only 7 weeks to do it in.  I haven't even got the invites out yet!
• I'm still campaigning for Bliss, of course.
• I'm trying to brainstorn the start of a charity myself and mummypinkwellies are starting (more at a later date).
• I've been incredibly social going for cakes with Mummypinkwellies, Sarah le Bristolian and our darling offspring.

Basically, there just aren't enough hours in the day!!!

Hopefully though I will be back with a special post tomorrow as we are attending the 1st birthday party of Littlebit, Mummypinkwellies' precious prem and I hope to have enough energy to mark the occasion with a blog.

So please keep checking in, I'm stupidly busy, but this blog is important to me in so many ways and I'm grateful for every visitor.  And with my new smartphone (being delivered Tuesday) I should be able to blog and tweet on the go.  Yay!

A huge thank you to Claire!

Today's blog post is a very special one.  A good friend of mine and Daddy Beadzoid's ran the Great Scottish 10K run just over a week ago and chose Bliss as her charity, raising hundreds of pounds in the process.  We are really thankful to Claire for doing this as she knows how close the charity and the care of premature babies is to our hearts.    We were also highly impressed that she managed to complete the 10K in an amazing time of ‎1:09:03!!!  This is something I don't think I could ever do, given that my speciality at school was the 100 metre sprint and that 200m was frankly, too much effort - which segues nicely into a brag that along with two girls Salma and Selena I was the fastest in my school year!  But stamina, well to this day I possess none. But back to Claire... Claire is not only a lovely lovely person but a marketing professional who takes her running very seriously.  She has taught me lots about all manner of potions and concoctions (all legal!) that help to keep energy high and post-run aches to a low.  I am so inspired that I'm contemplating taking up running again.  We'll see!  

Claire has kindly given me permission to lift these lovely photos off her Facebook:

Modelling her lovely Bliss running top!

Awww!

 Thanks again Claire! x

Silent Sunday

Silent Sunday

Happy 2nd birthday, darling daughter!

An open letter to my labour midwife at the George Eliot Hospital, Nuneaton

Dear Midwife,

I can't remember your name as it has sunk into one of the many black holes that render the memory of my daughter's birth incomplete.  I don't even know if you would remember me were you to read this but as the second birthday of my cherished daughter approaches you are once again heavily on my mind.  You see, you put my daughter's life seriously at risk because you thought you knew best.  You were convinced that I wasn't going to give birth anytime soon as the dilation of my cervix hadn't progressed from the time of my being admitted to the start of your night shift.  You ignored the fact that my contractions were increasing in frequency length and intensity.  How could you not realise that I was going to give birth?

I think you thought I was a waste of a bed.  You certainly didn't check on me very often, and every time you did I felt foolish because it was plainly obvious that you weren't taking what I was saying very seriously.  I was telling you that my contractions were deepening and getting more frequent, but you told me that if I was going to give birth I'd be "making a lot more noise".  Do you remember saying that?  I do, because it's been burned on my consciousness for almost 2 years.  You seemed to think that the answer to everything was to bring me a cup of tea and look at me impatiently as if to say "what now?"  It didn't even concern you that I'd had a horrendous pregnancy where I'd been in and out of this very floor of the maternity unit with Hyperemesis and that I was seriously worried that I must have damaged my baby in some way.  My daughter was but 26/27 weeks.  But you still knew best.

You showed no compassion.

You didn't listen.

You let me lie alone and terrified in the dark, in agony in the advanced stages of premature labour ALL NIGHT.

You put my baby's life at risk.

If I hadn't found a last shred of strength and defiance and INSISTED that I needed examining again, the ventilator might not have been ready to help my daughter breathe.  All those people who filled my tiny hospital room who were apparently necessary might not have been able to get to me in time.  My partner would have missed the birth of his fragile daughter, his daughter that might have died had everything not just have been put into place while I was pushing.

But everything worked out.  And I guess that would be your defense, wouldn't it?  But what about the next time?  What will you do when a woman in labour tries to tell you that something isn't right?  I hope that you will listen, that you will have felt bad about having failed to listen to me and that you will follow the rule "better to be safe than sorry".

Because the results of the trauma I experienced that night have stayed with me.  They caused me to break down with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  This meant that I was unable to work and haven't been able to return.  I'm not really blaming you for the ending of my career, but that night, that night where you were negligent in your duty of care towards me set in motion a chain of events.  And instead of being at school where I would be delivering my first sixth form lessons of the year, I am sat at home, still on heavy medication, trying to lay to rest the hurt and the anger that I feel towards you for good.  I'm not proud of this, not at all.  But this needs to be done if I am to move on.  I have healed, truly I have, but this last thing I need to do to resolve these feelings of anger.  But make no mistake, much as I am letting go of that which I have let fester for almost two years, I will never ever forget.  And in this I have no choice.

Yours sincerely

C.

The Gallery - Shoes (Yay!)

Oh yes yes yes!!!  This could not have been timed better.  The theme at the gallery is.... you've guessed it! Shoes! *squeal*

Now in spite of my gender I'm not often prone to hyper-excitement about shoes, and I pretty much loathe the whole trying and buying process.  But this week I received delivery of my very first pair of proper designer shoes - well, peep toe platform shoe- booties, to be exact.  And the reason for this 3 figure extravagance?  The forthcoming November nuptials!  See much as I love my (black!) wedding dress (cause it's black - did I mention that yet?) it wasn't dear.  Indeed it came in at under £300 - therefore I figured I deserved to spend roughly the same again on a pair of bitchin' kickass Terry (the Rock n roll cobbler)  De Haviland heels.  Woop!

So here are my photo entries.  A teaser if you will...

So posh they come with a bag...

.....AND a box!!!!

Check out the Svarovski... bliiiiiiiiiing!

Behold.

I know I have a girl because...

• She tries on all mummies shoes and persists in trying to walk in them even though she keeps falling flat on her behind
• She inspects new clothes she is to wear with an air of quiet approval, except when her daddy chooses her outfit, of course
• She plays up when being forced to go round B&Q
• She tilts her head at an adorably coquettish angle when climbing onto her Daddy, that she never does when she climbs onto my knee
• She has finally shown interest in a doll!
• She refused Grandma and mummy's attempts to buy her the grey trousers instead of the lurid pink ones
• The gruff monosyllabic grunts have been replaced by girly tot-babble
• She squeals with excitement when she realises she's going to have a bath
• She loves chocolate far too much

However,there are signs that there still lurks a little tomboy underneath the blonde curly-haired exterior.  My little darling loves nothing more than digging through a tub of compost with her bare hands and the daredevil willingness to be thrown around in the air by Daddy (mummy's too weak) remains.  She's still impossibly clumsy and not at all light of foot.  She also displays some pretty nifty skill on the ball, and I'm seriously considering entering her for the Olympic shot putt team of 2028.  

The perfect mix of girly tomboyishness.  Wouldn't have her any other way!

Beeswing by Richard Thompson - Oh Mammy's Monday Musical Meme (Week 3)

I love music. I do.  I've neglected finding new music of late, but every now and then I love delving deep deep into my inadequate music collection (inadequate to a would-be completist had she the money) and rediscovering old gems.

So this morning I give you a shiny diamond in the rough.  A veritable gem of a ditty that has been haunting me over the last few days as I find myself once again 'moving on' to pastures new.  Well, moving on in the career sense by temporarily going backwards to move forwards.

And I often feel like I'm a flitter, a busy bumble bee who will never settle.  Thankfully the chains I refuse are not those of meaningful relationships, but the shackles of career commitments.  I need to be free.  I can only do that working for myself.  Otherwise, well, I'll forever be the lost child running wild.

Beautiful sad song.  I wish this wasn't me.

AWOL - An update on what I've been up to!

Green shoots of recovery/New spring growth

Depending on how often you visit my little corner of the blogosphere here, you may have noticed that I've been a little absent of late.
Has a case of the old lazybloggeritis kicked in?  Have I ditched online in order to live a more fulfilling offline life?  Have I simply contracted a little mummy bloggers block?  A combination of these and more, I'd say.

Mostly, I've been working my arse off trying to get my new social media business up and running, so I guess it's kind of ironic that my own social media participation has suffered as a result.  The name is already registered and incorporated with Companies House and I've set a launch date of October 3rd which means I'm busting a gut trying to make sure I'm ready.

Babyzoid and I have also been socialising a lot more with the mummies and babies of Hinckley and Burbage, which has been fab, but of course leaves less time for blog-updating and tweeting seeing as my current phone contract doesn't allow me internet access on the go (boooooo!)

I've also been frantically readying myself for our wedding, which will take place on November 12th (yippee!) and I went for a job interview, which means that for the next few months at least, my time will be precious as I will be working full time evenings, and being a full-time mum during the day (don 't tell me, I know).

So it's going to be an exhausting few months in the run up to Christmas.  It all could have been a little easier had I gone back to teaching and only worked 2 days a week for nearly as much money as I'll be getting for full time hours at my partner's place of work, but after an 8 month absence, having only been back for just over a term I felt that I just couldn't go back.  It's a shame as the management had been really supportive of me, but when I go back it won't be the management who I'll have to deal with day to day.  It will be a department of people who, in a couple of cases, have not been the easiest to work with.  It's a shame as I get on with people nearly everywhere I go, but the last four years have been pretty horrendous, truth be told.  I haven't been able to teach the way I've wanted to teach, and it's killed my love for it.  Yeah, I could have gone elsewhere and tried again, but not after the year I've had.  I need a fresh start and I need to do what I trained at university to do - run my own business.  I just need to go backwards a little, which they say you should never do.  But sometimes you have to before you can go forwards, and ultimately a happier and less stressed me will be a better mother, partner, campaigner and friend to those in my life.

So here's to new beginnings!

Silent Sunday