Michelle Tant

According to government statistics, 96% of women drink less alcohol once they get pregnant. So why is there this 'tar with the same brush' mentality to making recommendations about alcohol consumption? I'm certainly not negating the seriousness of fetal alcohol syndrome but I do think that the women who are going to drink to excess whilst pregnant will do so regardless of the governments well meaning guidelines. The vast majority, yes, safe to say, almost all women take a sensible view to alcohol drinking when pregnant if the figures are to be believed. In fact a third of that 96% actually give up alcohol entirely. There's a part of me that thinks that the whole thing smacks of a nanny state, driven to reactive government styles. Women are more than capable of making these decisions. We are not defenseless, ill-educated dolls hanging about waiting for someone, anyone to please tell us how to look after our bodies and children because really we have no idea. ...

This year has felt like one attack after another on breastfeeding. There's been the ongoing Facebook debacle; photos of breastfeeding being removed while Playboys pages are continued to be allowed to flaunt more flesh than a whole convention of breastfeeding mothers. Then there was the ridiculous opinion piece in the British Medical Journal which many newspapers, including The Daily Fail regurgitated as fact, further undermining the benefits of breastfeeding. Just this week I saw a short piece in Practical Parenting magazine about the Chinese developing GM cows to produce human milk! One sentence says the milk will have more nutritional content in it, though its unclear whether it means than breastmilk or than formula milk. And now this. http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/campaigners-livid-as-whitehall-axes-breastfeeding-week-2287445.html Our beloved government in its wisdom has cut national support for National Breastfeeding ...

We recently went for a walk in the woods and after taking this gorgeous picture of the three men in my life, it occurred to me that they rarely get a look in on my blog so here they are. A beautiful day spent with my most favourite people in the whole world. One of those days when you remember to count your blessings, each and every one of them. Published with Blogger-droid v1.5.9

I'm not exactly Alan Titchmarsh but I have this vegetable plot in my back garden and I grow bits and pieces in it and its been an, up to now, 'Mummys stuff, don't touch!' area. And actually that's been just the way I've liked it. However Jayden (5) has been asking questions about growing things and so in a rash moment I said when I next go to the garden centre he can choose the things we can grow. He drew up a list. On the list... carrots, potatoes (fine) apples (er...) bananas (hell no) so it was with a certain amount of trepidation that we set off. They naturally enjoyed the ride on the trolley and actually the choosing of seeds etc wasn't quite as painful as I'd envisaged. We left with potatoes, green beans, rhubarb, spring onions, a raspberry bush, a vegetable multipack and a herb multipack. That was apparently the easy part. The hard part it turned out was relinquishing some sort of control over the plot itself. In the name of 'family t...

Today I am thankful. I have literally held my breath since September, the date 11th February hanging heavily over my head. The day we find out. I didn't realise that I've been walking round with a constriction around my chest, watching, waiting. Seeing symptoms where I now know there to be none. Because that is what worry does to you. That is what being a mother does to you. And I'm not generally a paranoid type. So I heard with my own ears. Saw with my own eyes that he is fine. My beautiful boy, the little boy that people keep saying to me 'has something about him' is in possession of a beautifully healthy heart. As if I didn't know... Published with Blogger-droid v1.5.9

10 days from now I'll be back in the world of employment.10 days from now I'll be leaving my children for 11 hours per day, 3 days per week. 10 days from now I'll be joining the army of women doing the same, every day. I've been sitting here, really thinking about how I feel about this. People ask me now with increasing regularity when I am returning to work. For some time I enjoyed saying "not until next year!", but now the time has come and I am counting the remainder of my maternity leave in days rather than months. My childcare is sorted, and might I say at this point that I am blessed with angelic in-laws without whom our lives would be very different (read, worse) so in that respect we are beyond blessed. My eldest is now at school, my middle child spends the afternoons at nursery and my daughter lives it up with cuddles galore at Grandma and Grandads. Perfect. When I left work last year to come onto maternity leave, there was a lot of uncertain...

As a mother to three gorgeous children, the way I look at the world has changed somewhat. As I’ve explained before, I’ve always been concerned about world and environmental issues, but now it’s not just about the world that I live in, it’s the world that my children, grandchildren and great grandchildren will live in. More to the point, will there be a world left for them? In my attempts to live a greener, more environmentally aware everyday life I don’t always succeed, I am not a perfectly green person but I am doing the best I can. I guess what I’m trying to say is just do what you can; whatever you do, it is one more person doing one more thing and all those one things add up. This is not a wishy washy philosophy, there is power in numbers and I really believe that. It does still mean of course that I have to get up off my chair and do something. Here in the UK, the buzz phrase for reducing waste is REDUCE, RE-USE, RECYCLE . How can I REDUCE? • The landfills in the world can’t take...

Reuben started his first afternoon session at nursery today. He'll be going Tuesday to Thursday afternoons then 8.45-3.15 on Fridays. He loves it there and has been getting on so well and then today we arrived, he was excitedly taking off his coat, throwing his bag in the box then went to the name tag table. He got there and stopped. Stood staring at it blankly. It took me a moment to see what was wrong, and a millisecond to see what was coming next. He turned and looked at me, confusion written all over his little face. He looked back at the table. Frozen. He literally couldn't move on because he was stalled. His next move had been unexpectedly taken from him and he was now totally thrown. Surely Mummy can save the day? Apparently not. I asked what happened to his name tag and they replied that they hadn't been able to find it and they'll probably have to make a new one. Tried explaining that one to a child who has limited understanding and even less communic...

That's how this whole thing with Reuben feels right now. An eclectic mix of the two. He had an ENT appt yesterday (Ear, Nose & Throat) in Eastbourne hospital. He was seen by the consultant rather than the registrar due to his severe speech delay and after checking his ear drums again, he said he wants to schedule grommets surgery straight away, can we come in next week. He said that though Reuben can hear generally, its muffled, so not much clarity and this is likely to be having an effect on his speech development. The window of real opportunity for speech development is 0-5 years and he said that as his speech is so affected he doesn't want to delay at all. But here's the kicker. We are whizzing through some surgery stuff and heart issues are mentioned and I asked would it be ok... consultant looks at his notes... there's nothing there about Reubens heart. So he then says obviously he can't do the surgery without a go ahead from the consultant anes...

In a few days I will be thinking about what to pin down as my new years resolutions. Never mind that every year they invariably fall by the wayside mid February (cough... January) but I like to remain optimistic and make them anyway. Starts the year off with an excellent sense of purpose I always feel. However today, we are in the middle of what is known to some as Crimbo Limbo. That awkward space between Christmas and New Year. No one really knows what to do with themselves, the kids are going nuts because nowhere is open for us crazed parents to take them and I can't (read 'wouldn't inflict on myself willingly) take the children shopping with me to bag me some bargains in the sales. So now seems as good a time as any to reflect on the past year. There's been some highs and lows as with any year. A big high goes to giving birth to my beautiful baby daughter on 1st June. Unexpectedly at home and what an amazing experience. And what a delightful child, so sunny ...

When I was pregnant I had a vision in my head of our new daughters first Christmas. She would be nearly 7 months old and by that point she would have tried a few tastes of pureed vegetables and fruits, certainly enough to make up to a Christmas meal. I decided that I would puree them separately so she had a variety of tastes then for dessert perhaps some stewed apple and raisins for a festive finish. That was also other peoples expectations of her Christmas meal and in fact any of her meals, I frequently feel like I'm being watched. My Nan came out with it the other day... "isn't she a bit young for that?" when I handed her a rice cake with a slice of cheese and apple. I was at that point a bit fed up of constantly explaining our choice to allow our daughter to lead her own journey to weaning. So I just said "watch her!". So she did. And was amazed to see her happily eat the lot, barring obviously the little bits that get tucked in unexpected plac...

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I was worried about Wednesday. My husband was still working from 9am and then leading the carol service in the evening so wouldn't be home until late. All the friends I would normally meet up with were busy sorting out Christmas stuff. So *gasp* we would need to entertain ourselves. All day. Not really that bad, but I did have chores to do in the morning, but turns out the kids wanted to watch Wallace & Grommit so happily lay out in the sofa in the morning and I got loads done. To say I was surprised is an understatement. Those of you with kids will know how hard it can be to get the jobs done with children hanging round your ankles. At lunchtime I realised I hadn't bought any 'lunch' food as we won't be in much this season. So we went to the local shopping centres cafe. All three behaved so beautifully! They picked out what they wanted and sat down and we talked about whether we wanted it to snow again (yes because Jayden didn't get to make a snowman...

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Yesterday we went to a Christmas party and I took with me a small tub of chopped veggies and rice crackers. At least I thought I did because when the time came, turns out I'd left it on the counter at home. Bad mummy. I was naturally dubious about feeding my 6.5 month old daughter party food but in the end she munched her way through some boiled egg, cucumber sticks, bread sticks and some cheese & tomato pizza cut into small finger slices. The thing that got me this time was the way she was picking up one thing and chewing on that for a while, then catching sight of something else presumably more interesting, then discarding what was in her hand and picking the other thing up. She was picking and choosing her food and having a great time. One challenge is convincing my boys not to put food on her tray. They see her eating normal food and obviously don't know the thought that goes on behind the choices so think its ok to give her food. Not all of which is appropriat...

This afternoon I went to an appointment with Daisy at the children's hospital. It was a follow up for the storm in a teacup rustled up by my health professionals. They initially decided she had early closure of the anterior fontanelle so we were referred straight to the hospital as the implications of this are quite serious often resulting in cranial surgery. Thankfully the consultant said that wasn't the case, that he wasn't worried at all. Turns out its highly likely my health visitor measured her head incorrectly. Either way I was intensely relieved ad you can imagine. So imagine my disbelief when they decided that she was too small for her age!!! I held my tongue, after all, this country is renowned for coming down hard on people who DON'T have a problem, and leaving those WITH a problem to get on with it. Anyhow, I digress. So blood tests ensued along with weight monitoring. All along I maintained that she was perfectly healthy, just not massive, afterall...

When we started this babyled weaning onto solids journey, my only clear aim was that I wanted to follow Daisys instincts and to go at her pace and I have been surprised daily with her progress and at how well she has done. She is really eating as part of the family now, joining in our roast dinner on Sunday and showing us how much she enjoys it with her beautiful smiles and giggles. Watching my lovely bonny breastfed baby, I've become convinced that if she is left to her own devices as with how she controls her breastfeeding habits, then she will find her own way so I have been following her lead. If she looks interested in something I have then I've been letting her give it a go (salt and sugary foods excepted) and that's how she came to try the corn on the cob and loved every gummed morsel. It has been with some debate then that I considered using a spoon at all. Inevitably though I figured that cutlery will ultimately form part of her eating habits so I gave her...

The surprise was that she tried it! I had it in my hand, she took it off me and started chewing it like she'd been eating forever. I've noticed that when I try to give her something directly into her mouth, like I gave her a bit of mashed banana once and some yoghurt and it came back out pushed by her tongue. When she puts something to her mouth himself, it generally goes in and stays in. She instinctively works her mouth in harmony with her hands and its working! I'm amazed! I still attribute it to breastfeeding, it rocks! Published with Blogger-droid v1.5.9

My new latest phrase that I save specially for me and my husband is that we're in this parenting lark for the long haul. Every day we have decisions to make about how we bring up our children. Some are small and seemingly inconsequential, others are bigger and the value of them is apparent. I do strongly believe that I need to carefully pick my battles. Endlessly picking at children will just result in them feeling got at, hassled, resentful and ultimately erode their natural in built confidence. It's ok to 'let it slide' every now and then on the small stuff; the decision does need to be made about what we consider to be the 'slidable' small stuff. I can't say what that might be for anyone else, but for us, the 'small stuff' includes things like shoes still on feet on the new sofa for example.... but for some people that might be a deal breaker. But for us, some small stuff is the important stuff. The pleases, thank-yous, sorrys, basic m...