So what do you do all day???

If you have ever asked a mother what she does at home all day, chances are, she is still reeling at the audacity of your question. How could anyone ask such a question? Isn't it blatantly obvious at how busy we are? Clearly not.

Sure, you see the mums at the cafés, catching up over lattes, baby's in tow. But what you don't realise is that that is probably their only outing that day, sometimes for that week. They aren't talking about future holidays or all the designer clothes they are buying, they are talking about their kids, their husbands, the mess they left at home and they are rarely talking about themselves. 

So to those of you that think that as mums all we do is catch up with other mums over coffee here it is. A real day in the life, my day in a nutshell. Nine months in, we are busy, we are random, we are chaotic and we can experience every emotion in the space of one hour. There is no set plan, we play each day by ear, our routine is vague and sometimes nonexistent, so here it goes... Welcome to our life.

6.50AM: We are woken by Leo stirring on the monitor, I check the time, what a luxury, he let us sleep in. Leo sounds happy so I snooze.

7.10AM: No longer happy, up I get and straight in to Leo's room, he is standing in his cot, his mobile pulled down, proud of himself he greets me with his big smile.

7.12AM: Nappy change.

7.16AM: Play time while I am still waking up, by this stage, Duncan is now out of bed and having his breakfast.

7.30AM: Coffee time. Oh and breakfast for Leo and myself.

8.05AM: Breakfast is finally finished, time to clean up and get him out of the chair.

8.12AM: Duncan leaves for uni, he has work tonight so won't be home till after 7PM, long day ahead.

8.20AM: Shower. My hair desperately needs a wash but that won't be happening today, I lock Leo in the bathroom with me and have a quick shower.

8.30AM: Makeup, it's a good day so far I have successfully washed and made myself presentable. 

8.45AM: With Leo not letting me move without him being attached to me I realise that I have woken up to a super clingy baby this morning. 

8.50AM: I put Leo with his toys in the lounge room, cranky and grizzly but I need to brush my teeth.

8.52AM: He finds me in the bathroom.

8.58AM: I give in and breastfeed. My intention of holding out until 9.30 clearly isn't going to work today.

9.22AM: Leo is asleep, too scared to move him I let him sleep on me while I check Facebook, Instagram, emails and watch morning TV.

9.40AM: Awake. That was not long enough but he is all smiles.

9.43AM: Nappy change and time to get him out of his pyjamas.

9.54AM: Leo is clean and dressed, making the most of his post sleep good mood I get the first load of washing on and quickly run to make our bed.

10.00AM: Find Leo's missing sock, put it back on and bring him into the lounge in time for my guilty pleasure, reruns of 7th Heaven. I catch up on the lives of the Camden's while playing with Leo on the floor. Leo is a climber so most of this play time consists of me chasing and lifting him off the couch and only seeing about 60% of the episode, luckily it's a pretty slow show so I am able to follow.

10.46AM: In preparation to leave the house I offer another feed. Not interested.

10.57AM: Nappy change. With a strong and rolling baby this is becoming the hardest part of my day. If it were summer we would be doing a lot of nappy free time outside.

11.03AM: Load up the nappy bag, find a jumper for Leo. He throws a slight hissy fit, so I wrestle him into the pram. 

11.08AM: We make it out the door, off to meet my much needed and much appreciated mothers group. 

11.15AM: Coffee and catch up with the girls.

12.58PM: Realise what time it is and start walking home, Leo is overdue for his lunch, hence the slight crankiness.

1.08PM: Leo has fallen asleep. Exhausted from his play date with his little friends.

1.11PM: Arrive home, the sudden stopping on the pram tends to wake him up so I quickly park him in the lounge and put the now well and truly finished load of washing on the rinse and spin cycle.

1.17PM: Still asleep. Looks like his lunch will be late today and I might actually get a chance to eat slowly rather than at my usual fast 'child is trying to steal my sandwich' pace.

1.35PM: By some miracle Leo is still asleep, I prepare his lunch and clean up the mess from mine.

1.42PM: Washing machine is finished but yesterday's washing is still on the line, time to get that off and fold it.

1.50PM: Stirrings in the pram. Leo is a awake, looks like I'll hang the washing later.

1.52PM: Quick nappy change.

1:55PM: Lunch time, I sit with him, watching his every mouthful as he slowly makes his way through his meal.

2.15PM: No longer interested in food, I clean him up and free him from the high chair.

2.19PM: Post lunch outfit change, for me not for Leo. Somehow I have managed to be covered in more banana than he has.

2.21PM: Washing with my little 'helper'. It's a nice day out so we play out there for a while, exploring the grass and the dirt.

2.45PM: Now extremely dirty, we come inside for another wriggly nappy change and a change of clothes. 

2.50PM: Practise our waving in the bathroom mirror, our latest trick proving to be very entertaining.

2.55PM: Leo has solo play time while I put on yet another load of washing and tidy up the kitchen.

3.20PM: Nappy change.

3.30PM: Afternoon tea time, which, after a later lunch, quickly turns into a game of throwing everything on the floor.

3.43PM: Sticky afternoon tea = Sticky baby. Clean up time.

3.50PM: With a change of pants we catch the last ten minutes of Playschool.

4.00PM: Find the missing sock, put back on and head out the door for walk number two for the day.

4.55PM: Home with a sleeping baby, make the most of the opportunity by hanging second load of washing on clothes horse and getting a start on dinner.

5.00PM: Dinner not started, Leo is awake. Maybe we will read for a while instead.

5.20PM: Momentary distraction allows me to sneak off into the kitchen and leave Leo in the very capable hands of Giggle and Hoot.

5.34PM: Not long and my 'helper' has returned, this time acting as kitchen hand rather than laundry maid.

5.55PM: With the contents of my kitchen cupboards all over the floor Leo's dinner is ready. 

6.00PM: Leo's tea time. Messy but fun.

6.25PM: Bath time. Supposedly used to calm some babies down before bed, bath time in our house tends to do the opposite, Leo gets so excited and amped up during his bath. It is both gorgeous and hilarious.

6.35PM: Out of the bath and into pyjamas, definitely the biggest wrestle of the day, psyched up from his bath Leo is rolling all over the place.

6.45PM: A few more bedtime stories.

7.00PM: Start the last breast feed of the night. Leo is not really interested.

7.07PM: Duncan is home, YAY!!

7.11PM: Leo spends some time with his Daddy while I clean up after Leo's dinner and finish preparing ours.

7.37PM: Duncan and I eat our dinner in shifts, while one eats the other one plays with Leo.

8.00PM: Feed Leo, or at least try to, he is not at all interested so into bed he goes. Dishes for me.

8.08PM: Eight minutes of crying and no sleeping baby, I feed again.

8.24PM: Bedtime, hopefully for the night. Either way that's it for me. I rarely feed over night nowadays so when Leo wakes it's Duncan's job to settle him. 

8.25PM: Cup of tea, couch time with Duncan and something mindless on the TV. 

There it is, that's my day, and that's it every day, or at least a version of that. Some days are easy, some days hard. There are no days off, no sick days, that's just what being a mum is. You get paid in cuddles and belly laughs, it's busy, it's hectic and it's awesome. 

So next time you wonder what mums do all day or you scoff when you hear a woman state her 'job' as a stay at home mum, just think, her day at home is probably a hell of a lot busier and a whole lot more testing than yours was at work. 

Labour pains

Some women will tell you child birth is empowering, a beautiful and magical experience where they felt like they could conquer the world. I am not one of those women.  I appreciate the beauty in the moment that is bringing a child into this world, trust me; I am a mess every time I see a child being born on TV.  I understand what an absolute miracle it is that this perfect tiny human has grown inside you and is now in your arms, but after the birth of my son I was not empowered, I was exhausted. I felt like I had been hit by a truck and then forced to run a marathon.

In hindsight I wasn’t mentally prepared for labour.

My whole pregnancy I had avoided that section of the pregnancy books. My husband and I never really discussed what we wanted to happen in the delivery room. My birth plan consisted of 1. Get the baby out and 2. Keep us both safe. I did not have big ambitions for a peaceful, calm and drug free birth, I just wanted the baby out and if possible no scissors or forceps would be used. I did not want an epidural, not because I wanted to experience the feeling of labour, but because the idea of a catheter really freaked me out.

As a pregnant woman I would swing from being scared of labour to being excited about it. It was never fear of the pain, I knew it would hurt, although I couldn’t have imagined how much, it was always more fear of the unknown. What was about to happen to me? How would my body react? Would I stay myself, or would I transform into someone else, swearing violently at the doctor and my husband? Or the worst thought of all, would I be one of those urban birth myths that you hear about, the horror stories of emergency caesareans and blood transfusions?

Forty one weeks into my pregnancy I was no longer scared of labour, I was praying for it. I spent majority of my last day of pregnancy bouncing on a Swiss ball, watching Revenge and telling my baby it was time to come out. When my legs were too tired to bounce anymore I laid on the couch and there it was, my first contraction. My husband, Duncan, was at work. Panic, I didn’t want to be home alone when this was happening. He raced home and there we were, me in labour and Duncan checking the chart that the hospital had given us, trying to match my contractions and pain levels to see how far along I was. Like I needed a chart, I knew this was it, the baby was coming.

My preparation for labour did consist of hiring a TENS machine and for that I was grateful. We put it on at home and despite the initial shock I received from having it on the incorrect setting, I found it helped. It kept me at home for four more hours. When we finally made it to the hospital it was 1am, I was a private patient in a public hospital and because of that the midwife would not examine me. I was devastated. She couldn’t even tell me how far along I was, couldn’t give me an idea of how well I was doing or how long I had to go. That’s when the vomiting started. Violent and uncontrollable. It was disgusting. I lasted until 2am before they had to call my doctor for permission to give me an anti-nausea injection. It was my saviour. Now all I had to worry about was the contractions. Easy, right?

By this stage the TENS was no longer working, the hot water could not get hot enough to help me and the gas made me feel like I was going to faint. I wanted and needed something stronger, Pethidine. The drug that made me see little French speaking bugs on my bed also gave me a rest for an hour or two. The edge was taken off and both Duncan and I were able to have a break. Somewhere in my drug affected haze the doctor had come in to break my waters and conduct MY FIRST examination of the night. A process that can apparently be quite uncomfortable I hardly felt, thank you to the inventor of Pethidine for that one. I was 9cm. Not much longer now… Or so I thought, it was 5.30am.

I was going into this stage of labour with false hope. About a week before I was due to give birth a very cruel person had told me that once you get to the ‘pushing part’ of labour it doesn’t hurt anymore. I was holding on to this. I was in labour telling myself, just get to 10 cms and it won’t hurt anymore. After experiencing what it is like to push a child out I am now calling bullshit on this person.

Twelve hours after that first contraction on the couch I had finally reached the time where my body was ready to push this baby out. This would have to be one of the most frustrating things I have ever done in my life. I really did not know what I was doing and I think the fact that I was pushing for an hour and a half before we had any progress showed that. Body position at this point in labour is crucial. Nothing was happening until I moved on to my back legs in the stirrups, a position I was trying to avoid because I was told it was not an easy way to deliver, proving there is no one right answer for childbirth. Whatever dignity I had left was now gone.

With every contraction the midwife used the Doppler to check my baby’s heart rate, a process I begin to find extremely annoying as I didn’t want anyone to touch me. I was clueless as to how to push for long enough to move him anywhere. In the end I was asking the midwife who I had previously asked to please stop touching my stomach to tell me when I was having a contraction. I reached the point where I told Duncan I couldn’t do it anymore, I was just so tired. I honestly don’t remember much else from this stage of the labour that is until 10.50am. Someone had come into the room asking my doctor when he would see patients at his clinic in town to which he said ’11.30’ that meant I had 40 minutes to get this baby out. At 11.00 he said to me ‘three more pushes and if it’s not out I’m getting it out’ he pulled back a sheet that was hanging over a surgical trolley and I could see the scissors and forceps. That was it. We had a baby in three more pushes, 11.15am on the 13^th of November my baby made his entrance into the world.

When I think of my labour I can’t remember exactly how it hurt but I remember that it did hurt. Looking back beyond the point of what happened after Leo was born is actually pretty hard because once he was born, the getting there part doesn’t really matter anymore. When I think of the delivery room I don’t think of the pain I felt or how I spent most of the night pacing the room in and out of the bathroom, I think of the moment I had a slippery and perfect baby on my chest. I found my son beautiful but I did not find the labour beautiful, I found it undignified, long, tiring and frustrating.

I am not the one to tell you how horrible labour is, as you can see I do not have a horror story. Duncan and I got through it with minimal psychological scarring, I will do it again and he will come with me. I wear my labour story like a badge of honour. I am proud of the fact that I delivered a 9lb 13oz baby naturally, it is only now, months later that I am able to see how wonderful that makes me feel as a woman and mother.