February is Heart Month over at Little Green Blog. The idea is that a number of guest bloggers post articles about maintaining a healthy heart. There have been a variety of topics and today is my turn. I am sharing my mum’s story, hoping to show that the warning signs of heart disease aren’t always obvious.
Category Archives: Random Thoughts & Life Stories
Watching Family Videos from 20 Years Ago
I lost my mum 11 years ago. My children have never met her. They have seen photographs and I talk about her a lot but they don’t really understand who she is.
With this in mind I asked my dad if I could borrow the DVD footage he has of her so that I could show the children. This starts in 1992 when we had our first camcorder. I was 21 years old.
My expectation of watching the video was that it would be really difficult and that I would spend the evening blubbing into my pillow. In fact it had the opposite effect. Watching a family party featuring my mother, grandmother and great aunts who are no longer with us made me feel really warm inside. It brought back memories of large family gatherings and the characters within them that could be so easily forgotten.
Watching myself was interesting too. I was surprised at how little I said even in comfortable environments. I could feel how I might be perceived by others and it gave me a useful insight into myself. Not that I think I still behave like my 21 year old self but it made me think a lot about the importance of communicating (something I have been reflecting on a lot recently).
It also made me think how lucky our children are. They have the capacity to record their memories on film so that their children will not only be able to see what mummy looked like when she was young, but they will also be able to watch events and see how she behaved at them. They can preserve those everyday moments that are so quickly forgotten. I wonder whether in the light of this our perception of history will change? We will have a clear picture of what it might be like to live as an ordinary person during a given age in addition to learning about key historical events.
It was a great exercise to watch these films. My children were fascinated by my parents’ wedding film (no sound as it was transferred from cine film). They could see how quiet the roads were, how the cars were different and that my dad once was a young man with hair. There are members of my family that I only ever remember as being old, how precious it would be to see them when they were young, not only in photographs but also how they behaved. My parents told me what their grandparents were like, but I never had a clear picture. My children will be able to hear my stories but also see what their grandmother and great-grandmother were like . How precious is that?
One of the main reasons we made the decision to have our own wedding filmed was that the footage would include family and friends who over time would be gone and we felt it was a special way to preserve their memory.
I must make an effort to take more video of our family. Filming the everyday things and not just special events because they tell us so much and jog memories that would be more easily forgotten.
I am a Writer
When people ask me what I do, I stumble to explain …
Well, I come from an early education background….. but now I am home with the children……I write a blog about early education and parenting and I’m trying to work out what to do next.
STOP!
What have I been doing for the past year since I started my blog? Writing.
What do I do during the evenings and when the children aren’t around? I write a blog.
When I am not writing my blog what do I do? I write articles for websites, write children’s stories, write poetry and write diaries.
What do you do when you are not writing? I research things to write about, read and take photographs of things of interest (oh yes and look after 3 kids).
So I don’t get paid for any of these things but it is what I do.
I am a writer.
I have been writing since I was 6 years old. I would absorb myself so much in story writing that the words couldn’t hit the page quickly enough and would move in a diagonal fashion away from the margin. I was always being told that I needed to improve my handwriting. As a teenager I wrote poetry and short stories and enjoyed writing essays. My English teacher called me her shining star. I always kept a diary and often wrote letters. I studied English Literature at University (I preferred English Language but there was no degree option for this) because I loved to read and write. On my honeymoon I wrote a journal of our trip and have kept a diary of pregnancies and the early years of my children’s lives. I had mostly A grades for my essays during my Masters Degree.
I am a writer.
A few years ago I read a book by Ken Robinson called The Element. The book talks about how finding your passion changes everything. Everyone has their ‘element’, some have more than 1 and some people never realise it. I wondered at the time what my ‘element’ was and now I know, it is and always has been writing.
I am a writer.
People tell me they like what I write, people tell me they like the way that I write, people even sometimes tell me that they are inspired by what I write.
I am a writer.
I may never get paid for my writing but that won’t stop me. If I keep writing and sending things to publishers and publications maybe one day I will become a professional writer. Even if I never make a penny as long as I keep writing and people keep reading .
I am a writer.
Grooving Mums – Shopping and the Little Black Dress
I have recently been joining Kate on Thin Ice in her Grooving Mums feature. This is a way of sharing stories of how mums are doing things for themselves. I’m trying to see myself as more than just a mum and stop seeing doing things for myself as self-indulgence. This week I focused on shopping.
Before I had children clothes shopping used to be something I loved. Being slim I was lucky to be able to wear most things and I knew exactly what suited me. This began to change when I fell pregnant with my eldest daughter. After the initial excitement of buying maternity clothes for the first time, I soon came to the conclusion that everything I tried on made me look like the ballet dancing hippos from Fantasia.
After she was born I hadn’t considered that my shape would stay changed for such a long time. I had to go out and buy new tops because my chest had expanded from an A cup to a DD. Having always been flat chested I had no idea what suited a full breasted figure, and of course anything I wore had to be easily accessible for breastfeeding. Gone were my days of wearing pretty summer dresses and I would wander around the shops looking with envy at all the pretty feminine clothes that I used to wear.
Over time shopping became a chore. I could never find clothes that I thought would suit me, I would try things on and come out deflated and disappointed. I hated looking at my shape in the changing room mirror and would come home frustrated and empty-handed. It wasn’t that I was overweight but my shape had changed and I had no idea what to wear to flatter that shape.
Those of you who have been following my story so far will know that since the birth of my 3rd child I have taken up running. As a result I am now happier with my figure than I have been in a very long time. I noticed that many of the clothes I have been wearing over the past few years are looking baggy and old. I decided to do a wardrobe purge and throw out anything that was too big or had lost its shape and start afresh.
A large proportion of my clothes I’d had for a very long time, some were bought on my honeymoon 9 years ago and a few things were even older. A lot of the other things came from charity shops or cheap shops, a sign of my belief that spending money on myself is self indulgent. On the plus side there were many things in my wardrobe that I had given up hope of ever fitting into again and they all went on with ease.
I made a decision to go out and buy a few things that were modern, fitted properly and made me feel good. I had my 3 girls in tow and almost abandoned the attempt but instead plumped for sticking to one shop, finding some things I liked and trying them on. My 7 year old helped me pick things and I explained the styles that just don’t work on me. I was pleased to find a number of things I like ( a good start) and took them to try on. As I was going in I spotted a girl with a little black dress, I loved it and it reminded me of exactly the style of clothes I used to wear, so I vowed to find it when I came out. I chose a few things that I was happy with and went to find the dress. On my way I spotted a lady carrying a pair of shoes that I also loved, I added them to my collection. When I eventually found the dress they didn’t have my size but I checked the changing rooms to see whether the other girl had bought the dress. Fortunately she hadn’t and it was in my size. By this point I couldn’t bear the thought of going back to the changing rooms with my 3 year old rolling around the floor so I bought it without trying it on.
Later that evening I put on the dress with the new shoes and stood back to look in the mirror. It was like looking at the old me, the young single me who always wore dresses, dressed up and felt good. I looked at myself and it almost brought tears to my eyes ‘hello you, I haven’t seen you in a long time’.
I haven’t had occasion to wear the dress yet but I think a big girls night out might be in order – it would be a shame to just let it sit in the wardrobe.
My Miscarriage Story: why miscarriage care needs to improve.
Friday 15th October is Baby Loss Awareness Day. 1 in 4 women suffer miscarriage, so there is no doubt that the majority of you know someone who has been through this painful experience. I am one of those women. This is my experience.
In 2004 I gave birth to a beautiful, healthy baby girl, I had conceived easily and had an uncomplicated pregnancy. Naturally when we decided to try for our 2nd child we expected the same pattern to follow. At first it all seemed to be going to plan, I conceived quickly and easily as before and we began to get excited about a new addition to the family. At 13 weeks I had a small bleed. I was worried, so called the midwife who assured me that it was fairly common but that she would book me in for a scan at the early pregnancy unit. This was on a Saturday and as they didn’t perform scans at the weekend she booked me in for Monday morning.
Monday morning at the early pregnancy unit is not a very reassuring place. It was full to the rafters with all the weekend referrals and we had to wait hours before we could be seen. When we were ushered to the waiting area for the scan, I was shocked and upset to see most of the women coming out in tears, some sobbing uncontrollably. We thought we were only there for a routine scan.
When we were finally seen, the radiographer announced that she could see nothing there. This was very confusing – was I still pregnant or not? The radiographer said that there was something showing on the scan but that it wasn’t a foetus and they were unsure what it was. We were then taken into a room to see a nurse who was very sympathetic and took some details. We were then taken into another room to wait for the consultant to talk to us. We were in there for some time without really knowing what was going on. I had gone in as a pregnant woman and now I was being told that I wasn’t pregnant anymore.
Eventually someone came and got us. It appeared that they had forgotten that we were there and everyone else had gone. We were ushered apologetically into another room to see a junior doctor. She took blood and measured my hormone levels and said that they would need to test again in a few days to see whether the hormones were dropping. She explained that it might be a molar pregnancy but I wasn’t given any further information on this.
I went home thoroughly confused and devastated. I looked up molar pregnancy on the internet and was shocked to find that if this were the case I wouldn’t be able to try for another baby for a year. I had to return to hospital again and go through the whole waiting process to have my 2nd blood sample taken. The consultant rang me the following evening to say that the hormone levels were dropping but that they would need to book me in for an evacuation of retained products. From this they would be able to determine whether or not it was a molar pregnancy. He was the first person I had spoken to who I felt spoke with any authority on the subject.
I was booked in for the operation, I can’t remember how long I waited but I think it was about a week. I was in a ward with lots of other people and had the feeling that some of these were having terminations. It felt a bit like a factory conveyor belt. I stayed in hospital for a few hours and then was allowed to go home. They told me that if I didn’t receive any results then it wasn’t a molar pregnancy. I wasn’t offered follow-up care , support or counselling.
My memory of those first few days post miscarriage is of lying in bed feeling like I couldn’t bring myself to face the world. Hugging my little girl and husband, crying a lot and struggling to move. 2 days post operation, I started to experience an intense shooting pain like someone was stabbing me with a piece of glass. I went to my GP who said that I had an infection and gave me antibiotics and painkillers. That night I went to the theatre with my husband. I could barely walk from the car park to the theatre and had to lean on my husband’s shoulder and shuffle like an old woman. After a few days the pain eased but still hadn’t gone, I saw a different GP who gave me a different set of antibiotics. It took weeks for the pain and bleeding to go and subsequent trips back to the GP.
The molar pregnancy went unconfirmed and when I finally healed we started to try again for a baby. It didn’t happen as quickly this time and as each month went by the hurt deepened. After 7 months I finally had a positive pregnancy test. However, at 10 weeks I started to bleed. This time the sheer volume of blood and the cramping reminiscent of labour pain meant I was certain I was miscarrying. I rang the midwife who said to get to my GP. The GP I saw was fantastic. She was worried because my pain was more concentrated on one side so sent me straight to hospital with a possible ectopic. We weren’t really prepared and I had nothing with me so my husband went out and bought me pyjamas and slippers. I was given a private room and the staff were really helpful and friendly. I had to stay overnight as the radiographers had gone home for the day so I had to wait until the following morning for my scan. I remember being quite relaxed, this time there was no confusion, I knew what was happening and I had my own space to gather my thoughts and emotions.
My husband returned the following morning and we had our scan which confirmed what we already knew. It wasn’t an ectopic but I had miscarried. This time it was a private scan with no wailing people in the corridors, it felt very different to the first time. A week after coming home I answered the door to find the community midwife on the doorstep. ‘I’ve come to do your home visit ‘ she said. Nobody had passed on the information about the miscarriage. Thankfully I knew the midwife quite well by this point and I knew the remorse that she showed was genuine.
For the next 10 months the urge to have a healthy pregnancy consumed me. I would watch pregnant women when I was at the park with my daughter and be overcome with jealousy. Each month was like a torture until eventually I resigned myself to the likelihood of us only ever having one child. Soon after I fell pregnant. I was so desperately worried for the first trimester and couldn’t relax until I had passed the 13 week stage. Every little pain sent me into a frenzy and when my husband went abroad for a week I was so worried that I would lose the baby while he was away. My midwives understood my concerns and gave me early scans which were reassuring. I was lucky, this was a healthy pregnancy and I went on to have another. I am now blessed with 3 beautiful girls.
Mumsnet are currently running a Better Miscarriage Care Campaign. This calls for a 5 point code of care.
- Supportive Staff – my experience would have been far more positive if staff had been trained in communication and listening skills and if I had been given a routine follow-up and offered counselling. Counselling should be for both parents as men are often forgotten in this whole process, if the care for women is shoddy then I would say that the men are given very little consideration.
- Access to Scanning – 7 days a week avoiding my experience of Monday morning mayhem.
- A Safe and Appropriate Place for Treatment – separate from women having routine antenatal care and termination of pregnancies.
- Good Information and Effective Treatment
- Joined Up Care – Community midwives are kept informed and concerns are acknowledged in later pregnancies.
I am sure that I am one of thousands of women with a story to tell about inadequate miscarriage care. Miscarriage is difficult enough without these added worries. Please support the Mumsnet campaign so that in the future women will feel supported and informed when going through such a difficult experience.
Getting Your Groove Back – From Non-Runner to Half Marathon
Last week I joined Kate on Thin Ice for her Getting Your Groove Back Blog Hop. This is a way for mums to share stories about how they are reclaiming themselves after having children. My life is full of such stories, some successful, some not, but I’m working on finding a new me.
This week Kate has asked us to suggest a song that inspires you to make changes and to talk about ways of making your body feel better.
I took up running 5 months ago. I had run a little bit after the birth of my 2nd child but never managed more than 2 miles. However, after my third I was determined to get fit again and reclaim the body I had before the children. My husband suggested a 4 mile route, I reluctantly agreed, expecting to walk the last mile. I played gentle music and took it slowly and was amazed that I managed to run 4 miles and it didn’t seem that difficult.
My 4 mile route involves running downhill with views of the sea and then climbing back up to home.
I love being outside and seeing the beautiful scenery, with music and my thoughts for company. I sometimes pass cyclists or other runners and they always smile. I feel healthy, free and able to conquer the world when I run. My usual music is Adele 21, not only is it good for keeping a steady pace but also the lyrics help me to feel that whatever life throws at me, I am important and strong. Sometimes I feel compelled to let rip and sing along at the top of my voice, but haven’t yet been brave enough.
The 4 miles soon progressed to 5 and 6 and I still wasn’t finding it particularly difficult. Couple that with the ability to get out in the sunshine with quiet time to think and the feeling that I could conquer the world and I was soon hooked. At this point I decided to enter the Bristol Half Marathon.
Training continued until I was able to run 9 miles. I had no idea if I would be able to run the half marathon distance, but I wasn’t worried as I was happy to walk a few miles if necessary. I started the half marathon at a slow pace, letting lots of people overtake me, secure in the knowledge that if I kept a steady pace I wouldn’t burn out before the end. After 4 miles I felt good and was still comfortable at 6 and 7 miles. From 8 miles I kept looking out for my family, I knew they were coming but wasn’t sure where they would be. Before I reached 10 miles I had a message to say that they were near the finish, this spurred me on. The 10 mile point started to climb a hill. My usual route is very hilly so I knew that I could tackle it and picked up pace. Also by this point I knew that I would make it and that I would get to see my family cheering me on at the end. I made it to the end it wasn’t easy but I would certainly do it again. I have already booked in for my next one in the Spring.
Running has given me a new lease of life. I have never seen myself as a sporty person but this is something I can do. My figure isn’t quite what it was before children but it is certainly getting there. After I have been running I feel really good about my body and in the summer I got a tan to boot.
So how does going running fit in with looking after young children? Ideally I would like to start the day with a run every morning but I will have to wait until the children are older for that. I don’t run as often as I would like, but I can usually manage at least twice a week and try to use the cross trainer when I can’t get out. After reading an article in my women’s running magazine about how mums find time to run, I am seriously considering trading in one of my buggies for a running buggy. My middle daughter starts pre-school soon and I will have more time with just one child, so this could be the answer to not getting out enough.
I’ve tried lots of types of fitness and never really stuck to anything. What I love about running is that it gets me outside and away from my life as a mum. It won’t suit everyone but it’s right for me. I’m just sorry it took me until I was 40 to discover it.
Goderich, The Prettiest Town in Canada – Before and After the Tornado
I first visited Goderich when I was 16 on a family holiday to visit my uncle. I fell in love with it and remember it being the first holiday when I had to hold back the tears as I left. Goderich is hailed as the prettiest town in Canada, the sunsets are stunning, architecture beautiful, has gorgeous views of Lake Huron and is green and leafy. Since then I have visited my family there many times and have fond memories.
I was shocked today when I received photos that my uncle had taken. At first I wasn’t sure what had caused the devastation, but it transpires that a tornado hit the centre of Goderich on Sunday. The tornado lasted around 10 minutes but the damage it caused is tremendous. People have lost homes and businesses and there are no trees left around the historic town square.
The bank
Treeless roads
This is my uncle’s old house, where we stayed on our holidays.
My uncle’s workplace.
My heart goes out to the residents of Goderich, how awful it must be to have your home town destroyed over night, like tearing down your memories. It has been on my mind all day, so strange when this happens in a place you know well.
Turning 40 – Aging Well? Comparing Photoshoots 10 years on.
When I turned 30 a friend bought me a photo shoot as a gift. The photos were stunning and I’ve always kept one on my wall as inspiration for how I would like to look when I had finally finished my childbearing days.
When I was 30 I felt pretty good about the way I looked, I had just got engaged, was going to the gym regularly, eating healthily and was happy. More recently however I have come to the conclusion that I have always been too self critical and never really accepted how amazing I looked.
This year I turned 40. As clichéd as it is, I see this as a turning point. I don’t want to have anymore children so I now have the opportunity to get my body back in shape, to build a career and to become me again. I have just returned from a photo shoot for my 40th birthday. In the past 10 years I’ve had 3 kids and 2 miscarriages, I’ve got more wrinkles and spend a lot less time on looking good. I rarely get a haircut and lots of my clothes are past their sell by date. However, I have finally stopped beating myself up for not being as slim as I was in my 20’s. For the first time in a very long time I feel good about the way I look. I think for a 40 year old with 3 kids, the youngest of whom is only 9 months , I look pretty damn good.
I kept the cat suit from the first photo shoot – I never really believed I would ever be able to wear it again, but today I proved myself wrong. Ok, I’m not quite as slim as 10 years ago and I did need a bit of help from some Bridget Jones pants but I did it and I think I look pretty good .
So here are some of the photos from my 30th
And the one’s I had taken today proving we can still look fabulous at 40
For anyone who wants a special gift for a special birthday I can highly recommend New ID Studios for a makeover photo shoot. The shoot includes a hair wash, cut and style, makeup and the photoshoot. A lovely day out and a great way to boost your self esteem.
Listography – 5 Things I Would Change About Myself
I’m new to listography – often having perused other bloggers’ offerings but never adding my own. This weeks topic however struck a chord with me. I’m going through a big period of change at the moment and feel that I have had to re-evaluate every aspect of my life. Couple that with turning 40 and I’m considering who and what I want to be in the next 10 years. I therefore thought this exercise might be therapeutic and serve as a focus for my journey to a new me.
Having read Kate’s list I was a little unnerved to find that her list could so easily have been written by me. So here’s mine – the same but different…
1. To Be More Demonstrative – The comment Kate made about the feeling of discomfort when a close family member hugs you resonated with me. I think I’m pretty good at giving and receiving hugs and telling my nearest and nearest I love them. However, I would like to be more verbally demonstrative. I have always felt awkward when people do or say nice things not knowing quite how to react. When a person close to me has done something that I’m really proud of I understate my admiration because it feels uncomfortable to greet them with a flourish. I don’t know how to react when people give me amazing presents so often don’t show how much it means to me. I’d like to be more able to speak my mind.
2. To Be More Confident – I suppose this is quite a big one – ‘more confident at what?’ I hear you say. To have more confidence in my own ability and not to feel that other people are better/have more to offer than I have, which I think holds me back in lots of areas . To have more confidence in talking to new people, expressing my thoughts and putting myself forward.
3. To Be Tidy and Organised – I hate clutter and would love to have a beautifully clean and organised house and garden but however much I tidy it never seems to make a difference. I try to be organised but still end up losing things, getting out of the door late and forgetting things.
4.To Be More Exciting – I see myself as a fairly ordinary boring person. I’d like people to look at me and say ‘Wow you do that?’. I think I’m interesting but my life is not, maybe I just want to be Superwoman.
5. To Be Able to Ask for Help – I often have friends and neighbours who say ‘If you ever need any help just ask’. They probably hear my usual stressed tones in the mornings as I struggle to get 3 kids out of the house and stop the dogs from barking at all and sundry. There are few people who I go to for help, I think I feel that I am putting on people if I ask them for things, or maybe it is just that I think I should be able to do everything by myself – quest for superwoman again.
So there you go – a few things to work on…. One step at a time.
Barry Island – A Strange Phenomenon
I am completely intrigued and bemused by the phenomenon that is Barry Island. I grew up in Barry and Barry Island has always conjured up a Morrissey lyric
This is the coastal town that they forgot to close down.
So when my friend’s 13 year old niece greeted me with great excitement and a multitude of questions after telling her that I grew up in Barry, I was a little taken aback. Of course it is all fueled by Gavin and Stacey, a programme that I absolutely love and somehow Barry has been given a chance to redeem itself.
Barry used to be a thriving resort full of day visitors and holiday makers at the Butlins Camp. As a child we didn’t visit Barry Island much because my dad hated sandy beaches, bemoaning how he got sand in his sandwiches. We spent most of our time at the other pebbly beach in Barry scrabbling for the tiny piece of sand that emerged when the tide went out. Going to Barry Island as a child was a huge treat – oodles of sand, arcades, funfair, tacky shops – a child’s dream. We had a children’s party once on the penny machines and the arcade with the historic slot machines displaying 1940’s film stars was a huge hit for those on a small budget.
As teenagers we used to meet at the amusement park for a night out, go for day trips to Butlins and trawl the arcades in search of ‘foreign’ boys. As 6th formers we loved the Warehouse nightclub and Pebbles but by the late 80’s early 90’s the holiday camp had closed the nightclubs were mostly boarded up and anything that was still open was forced to close at midnight.
During the 90’s I worked at Barry Island and often went for walks to the sea front on a Sunday afternoon. It was still busy but not quite what it had been in its heyday. We took my daughter to Barry Island funfair as a toddler – I was amazed at how little it had changed from when I was a teenager, it certainly hadn’t moved with the times.
I still think I was extremely lucky to grow up by the sea, to be able to make going to the seaside a regular occurrence and to be able to sit and look out over the sea when I needed thinking space. We took it very much for granted as children. Now I live by the sea again but we don’t have any particularly nice beaches so I do appreciate more the ability to walk to the beach on a regular basis.
I think it’s great that there is a new sense of excitement about Barry. It’s become a popular location for many television programmes including Being Human (filmed in my cousin’s street), Dr Who (our Wedding Venue featured in an episode) and of course Gavin and Stacey. I just hope that it lives up to the hype.
So for me, a small town Welsh girl, the idea that my home town has become a phenomenon is very strange, but I’m getting used to it.
photographs courtesy of Augusta Trussell
Right from the Start 