Michelle Tant

There has been a call from Lesley Backhouse, chair of The Breastfeeding Network to scrap the slogan. No its not a backtrack on policy, its an attempt to shift the balance towards breastfeeding being the normal and usual way to feed a baby, rather than formula being the norm and breastfeeding being something slightly out of reach and unusually exceptional. "We've got to knock breastfeeding off this pedestal," said Lesley Backhouse. "It implies something special, whereas breastfeeding is the physiological norm, and suggests that formula is the standard way to feed babies. "Breastfeeding is the only case where the biological norm is expressed as the exception rather than the rule,". Of course breastfeeding IS exceptional, ie its amazing properties, its extraordinary ability to sustain and improve life, to improve life prospects even in terms of surviving childhood, reducing obesity and common childhood illnesses, right up to reducing pre-menopausal bre...

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. ...

So its happy 1st birthday to my beautiful little girl. Where on earth has that year gone? From what seemed like the longest pregnancy in history, to the fastest 365 days of my life to date... We took the 3 of them out for a meal and she polished off a whole childrens menu meal for herself, gone apparently are the days of snaffling a few bits and pieces from Mummys plate. A big girl no less. The boys were definitely more excited about her birthday than the birthday girl herself who was distinctly underwhelmed by the whole experience. She sailed through the day as if to say "well of course all this attention directed my way is normal". The way she just takes it all in with a beautific, if not a little cheeky, smile, is so telling of her character though so far. Perhaps its something to do with being a third child, perhaps not, but either way she is so easy and happy. The boys adore her and she charms everyone she encounters. So *cheers* Here's to another year of cu...

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 ...

I appreciate that the title of this blog post sounds a tad on the self centred side, but do bear with me. At work today I had a bit of a 'moment'. I found out things I wasn't happy about, hadn't been consulted on and to add insult to injury I felt that I was being dumped on work load wise. In my job we do manage our own day to day work, in that I have an amount of tenancies to 'look after' so how I manage that time is up to me so long as the net result is the same... I achieve the targets set. So when I realised today that yet again a colleague was expecting me to do their work for them despite them being able and available, I guess I threw all my toys out of the pram as it was the straw to break this camels back. Fuming and very upset to boot I rang my line manager. 10 minutes later I came off the phone even more frustrated and upset than before. What happened? I explained how I felt, the circumstances as I saw them and the response I got was excus...

In January 2010, a massive shattering earthquake hit Haiti with the epicentre in the capital of Port au Prince. In Haiti now there are an estimated 1.2million orphans. Entire communities were destroyed in the space in seconds and families devastated forever. In my church we have a couple who are involved with the charity Direction for Life, him as a Police Chaplain and they responded to the disaster by going out there with a team and making contacts, channeling aid and welfare to the people needing it most. They now have a vision to create a community for some of the orphans.10 x 3 bedroom houses with 'house parents' to become family to children. School as well. These things cost money and so I've been thinking how to raise a bit of cash. Kev and I haven't been able to travel for some time now. I know some people travel all the time with their kids, it just hasn't happened for us. Anyway, we've done a fair amount of travel in the past and we've a...

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