The Unmumsy Mum

by The Unmumsy Mum

  Second time around, however, I felt more confident about the new-friends thing. I knew what I was looking for and I felt braver. I’d discovered I could manage the ‘Do you fancy a coffee sometime?’ approach because, after a couple of chats at Bounce and Rhyme, I had usually ascertained whether or not I would get on with someone or other. It’s not an exact science, but when I’ve said, ‘God, having a newborn is like torture, isn’t it? Roll on, bedtime!’ and been met with a puzzled frown, I’ve made an on-the-spot assumption that the mum I’m chatting to might not be the best fit for a park date. When she has replied, ‘They can be such sods,’ ‘I need a glass of wine’ or, better still, ‘Do you fancy going out for a glass of wine?’, I’ve made an on-the-spot decision that the mum could be a friend for life.

  I’ve met mums who are borderline professional in their diary management of play dates – mums who have an impressively large number of friends. My Mummy Wolf Pack is very modest in comparison, but I’m happy. The ones I have are keepers. It’s true I originally flinched at the very thought of ‘mummy friends’ and ‘play dates’, but both have proved pretty essential to my survival these past few years. I’m quietly relieved that I now have a few close mum friends to my name who can talk to me about significant mum-related things like pelvic-floor issues and doing it (you know [whispers], sex). I once feared I would find those motherhood conversations as dull as dishwater. Turns out I love chatting about stretch marks and post-partum intercourse as much as the next person.

  Power to the mummy friends.

  * * *

  ‘Sod the glowing faces of new mums splashed on mags and those discount codes for expensive shops you’ll never shop in again: what mums need is a bit of “Don’t panic, you’ll be fine, we’re all giving it a go, and we all think we’re shit at it.”’

  Annecy, Hampshire

  * * *

  Mum Appearances Can Be Deceptive

  Part of my Mum Friends journey (I’m just embracing journey now) has been the realisation that ‘Mum Stereotypes’ are just that: stereotypes. My experiences of meeting and talking to hundreds of mums (both mums I’ve met in person and those I’ve met virtually, via the blog) have shown me just how narrow-minded I was before.

  I remember, mid-way through my first pregnancy, I was out on an appointment and having a conversation with one of my customers about her sister, who’d recently had a baby. ‘She’s one of those, you know [lowers voice] earth mothers,’ she told me. Despite having never met said customer’s sister, I instantly felt that I knew the sort of mother she must be. An earthy one. That meant she’d be all cloth nappies and baby-led (organic) weaning and Fairtrade clothes, right?

  When Henry arrived and I plodded off to those baby groups for the first time, I almost wanted to discover some good old-fashioned stereotypes: Earth Mothers, Career Mums, Stay-at-home Mums, Yummy Mummies, Slummy Mummies. It’s just easier if you can put people into boxes, isn’t it? I didn’t feel very earthy, I definitely didn’t feel very yummy (but hoped I wasn’t entirely slummy), so I just guessed it would be best to make a beeline for the other non-earthy, non-yummy, non-slummy parents waiting outside Monkey Music. You know, the normal ones. And that is what I did: I chatted to the mums (and dads) who I thought looked ‘normal’.

  I realise now that this makes me sound like a totally judgemental knobhead (and that would be a fair assessment), but I think I was anxious about being judged by the other mums. In my tired and self-protective emotional state, I assumed that anybody earthy, for example, would judge me, mainly for my reliance on disposable nappies and Ella’s Kitchen strawberry pouches. It was much easier to pluck up the courage to chat to (and make friends with) the mums who looked a bit like me (i.e. slightly dishevelled, with baby sick and/or Dairylea on their leggings – nearly always a promising start).

  And it is true that occasionally the mum stereotypes of myth and legend will prove a little bit accurate. Times when, despite ignoring the stereotype warning sign and trying to find common ground, there just hasn’t been any. Once I tried talking to a mum outside one of Henry’s baby groups who was doing some crocheting (granted, not my cup of tea, but I decided to strike up a pre-baby-group convo, anyway). I nodded along to her chat about crochet patterns and the family’s ‘totally organic’ lifestyle and how she would never go back to work again or indeed drink alcohol again because she just felt that there was no need to do either now she was a mother. I remember quite clearly that she said ‘mother’ and not ‘mum’ and I wondered if I would ever describe myself as a ‘mother’ in conversation. Said mother also told me she didn’t much like prams, and there I was detailing how I’d never attempted crochet, didn’t much care for the price of all things organic and couldn’t wait to return to work (as I wheeled my pram in, daydreaming about the bottle of wine in the fridge …).

  But – and it’s a pretty big ‘but’ – that’s genuinely the only time I can remember thinking, ‘Well, this is awkward.’ Because, by and large, the snap judgements I have made about other mums based on just one or two snippets of information have been way off the mark.

  Like the time I secretly labelled a mum I’d met a ‘Career Mum’ (she was going back to work, full-time, to a very good job), and she later told me it was all about the money and their mortgage repayments and that they were actually considering downsizing so she could take a hit on the salary and work fewer hours.

  Or the time I secretly labelled a mum a ‘Happy-staying-at-home Mum’ because she had no plans at all to return to work but who later explained that she simply couldn’t pay for childcare costs on her low salary and she would, in fact, have liked nothing more than a part-time job.

  Or the time I met a very ‘Yummy Mummy’ (everything seemed designer – seriously, everything – and she always looked immaculate) and I later discovered she lived at the dodgier end of town. Exactly where she lived was, of course, irrelevant, but it was wrong of me to assume at first glance that she was well off and living in luxury. I’d pictured her doing the school run in a Range Rover Evoque. She didn’t even drive.

  Appearances can indeed be deceptive.

  I know it’s impossible not to do it, to subconsciously categorise other parents based on the limited information we have (their appearance, usually), but I do make a bloody big effort not to do this nowadays. Not just because I have since made friends with mums who the pre-parent me might otherwise have avoided (okay: definitely would have avoided), but also because, even if no long-term friendship blossoms, it just makes life more interesting. How boring would it be if we were all the same? Some of the most hilariously frank and candid chats I’ve had about motherhood have been with mums I could so easily have written off as being ‘not my type’.

  I recently had the pleasure of meeting another mum I totally would have written off from afar. The mum in question, Zion, had just finished writing The Ultimate Guide to Green Parenting, and it’s safe to say that, prior to my conversation with her, I had never given any thought to how green I was as a parent. To be ‘green’, we’d surely have to abide by the aforementioned earthy way of life, get rid of the TV and start worrying about parabens? There was no way she would be ‘right up my street’.

  What I actually discovered when I met her for coffee was some quite fascinating stuff about the health benefits and cost savings (hurrah!) of all things green. We chatted happily about our children and our shared love of being outdoors. I’d never even considered our daily park trips and walks into town as being particularly ‘green’, but I suppose our love of escaping the house on foot makes us at least partially greenish.

  It was naive of me to assume a self-labelled ‘Green Parent’ would be in some way judging me for my crimes against greenness. The chat inspired me to take action (well, to fish James’s discarded empty yoghurt pots out of the bin and list a couple of baby items on local selling sites; items which, if I’m honest, I would previously have taken straight to the dump). It’s unlikely I’ll be ditching the TV or checking the ethical consumer r
ating of all my toiletries any time soon (because I love watching Corrie and I like the smell of Pantene). But it’s fine to dabble in green parenting if you fancy it. It’s fine to dabble in earthiness, too. I try my best to dabble in yumminess every once in a while, and I’ve definitely experimented with slumminess.

  I’ve started to doubt whether anybody belongs firmly in any one camp. Parenting is not like the General Election – you don’t have to pick a side.

  In hindsight, I have been foolish to steer clear of certain ‘types’ of mum. Foolish to try and mentally affiliate myself with a type. Having put quite a lot of thought into my own parenting classification since baby Henry arrived in 2012, I have mostly just concluded that I’m not any type at all, unless ‘That’ll Do’ is a recognised style of parenting. I’ve probably dipped into all the stereotypes at some point.

  All hail the dabbling!

  I still don’t get the crochet thing, though.

  * * *

  ‘When my boy was about six months old I went out for dinner with my NCT group. I assumed everyone was thinking what I was thinking so I said it, the thing we must never say: “It’s a bit fucking boring, though, isn’t it?” You could’ve heard a pin drop. Tumbleweed blew across the restaurant.’

  Helen, Cheshire

  * * *

  My Babywearing Incompetence

  ‘Have you tried babywearing?’

  ‘Sorry?’ Three months into motherhood and I still had that rabbit-in-the-headlights look whenever anybody asked me a baby-based question. This particular mum was being helpful – I had been complaining about my baby, who would not stop moaning unless he was in some way attached to my person, and she was offering a potential solution.

  ‘You know, putting him in a sling or a wrap?’

  Oh, that. I’d been calling it baby carrying, like a complete novice. I would soon discover that my limited knowledge of baby carriers (i.e. the ones with clips and buckles your parents had in the 1980s) did not even scratch the surface of this babywearing movement I would be introduced to. A whole new world of woven wraps and infant slings and back carrying I never knew existed opened up to me. It’s not just about sticking the baby in a BabyBjörn and heading out for a quick dog-walk any more. Hell no. There are babywearing websites, and organised sling meets, and Facebook pages for sharing babywearing tips and accessories. Mind = blown.

  Having received advice from some very kind mum friends, including my stepsister, who is a babywearing pro, I purchased my first wrap. I say ‘wrap’, but what I actually purchased was a piece of material not too dissimilar from one of those fabrics aerial gymnasts hang off. I’m not shitting you, it was at least three hundred yards long. I remember thinking, ‘What the hell have I taken on?’ as it unravelled.

  But I had it covered. I’d witnessed mums using these slings and wraps before, and on one occasion two proficient babywearers had even given me an impromptu intervention (wrapping me up in one of their wraps). It looked pretty simple. Something about finding the middle of the material and making sure the edges weren’t twisted. Over one shoulder . . . over the other . . . the slack could be adjusted before something got tucked somewhere . . . how hard could it be?

  It probably isn’t hard. But I was clueless. By the time it had arrived I’d forgotten everything from that informal lesson, and when it came to our first babywearing trial I resorted to the font of all knowledge that is YouTube. I vividly remember standing in my kitchen one evening with the iPad propped up on the worktop, watching a video of a very calm woman using a doll to demonstrate the ease of a simple FWCC (that’s a Front Wrap Cross Carry to you and me). I tried following her steps in real time but, as I stood there, getting sweatier by the minute and entangled in sling material, I changed tactic and started pausing the video at crucial moments. Finally, I’d done it and braved positioning a slightly startled Henry in the wrap I hoped was the perfect imitation of the woman’s in the YouTube clip. I called James in to assess my achievement. ‘Ta-dah! Does it look like hers does from the back?’ I asked him. He looked at the paused iPad and the woman’s neatly wrapped pretend baby and then back at Henry, who was housed in what can only be described as a baggy mess of material. The woman’s ‘baby’ was snugly tucked in against her chest, with just the optimum amount of slack. Mine was slacker than a slack sack (100 per cent still talking about the wrap), and Henry was suspended awkwardly somewhere around my belly button, crying. I took a deep breath in, removed the baby, put the video back to the beginning and begged James to help. We’d tackle this bastard wrap together. Let’s be having you. It wasn’t the most exciting video we’d ever watched together (steady), and the pair of us attempting to wrap a crying baby that evening in the kitchen was one of our earliest ‘How the fuck did this become our life?’ moments.

  My babywearing incompetence was so ridiculous it should have been funny. LOL and at least one ROFL. But I wasn’t laughing. I had sweat patches. In fact, I got so agitated and flustered that the YouTube kitchen masterclass culminated in me crying (standard) and attempting to throw the ‘piece-of-shit stupid wrap’ on the floor. (I didn’t even manage that convincingly, because I was still tangled up in the bloody thing. Grrrrrrr.) My armpits feel hot just thinking about it.

  Some weeks later, I cracked it. Well, I cracked getting Henry into the wrap, provided I had twenty minutes to spare and was standing in front of a mirror. I still looked like a sweaty octopus as I launched the material over my shoulders, but I got better at adjusting the slack. It was initially a bit of a revelation, to be honest: free hands, no cumbersome pram crashing into shop doorways, a squishy little face free to vomit down my bra without anybody noticing.

  But I never got any better at the unwrapping and rewrapping when out and about and under pressure. I just wasn’t skilful enough. I used to find myself leaving Costa with a partially wrapped baby and achy shoulders. Or standing by the boot of my car, having parked up somewhere, attempting to adjust the all-important slack and ending up in a state of sweaty distress. They should add wrapping baby slings to the Sure ‘It won’t let you down’ advert.

  So my babywearing career was a short one. I later dabbled in a few further slings/wraps/carriers, including a side-carrying contraption and a fabric crossover one which fastened with Velcro but I fell out with and swore at them all. I still look wistfully at other babywearing mums and dads (as I crash the pram into somebody else’s ankles outside TK Maxx) and think, I need to revisit this, but after our most recent attempt (an expensive clippy contraption that Jude hates – he tries to beat the shit out of my breastbone whenever he is in it) I think I’m done. I’m told no single babywearing option fits all, and I’m sure there is a suitable alternative out there for me. Perhaps I just haven’t found The One. Perhaps I should burst out of the comfort zone and drop into a local sling meet for advice on trying Pocket Wrap Cross Carrying. Perhaps I’ve never recovered from the crushing sense of failure experienced during YouTube Kitchen Wrap-gate.

  More than likely, I just can’t be arsed.

  ‘I misplaced a breast pad in the ball pool once.’

  Your Day versus His Day: Why Nobody Is Winning

  When morning comes around, I sometimes look at the day stretching out in front of me and think, Oh God. James’s alarm goes off, he gets up, has a shower and gets ready for work. My alarm these days is Henry, who loudly shouts, ‘Are you awake, Mummy? My pyjama bottoms are wet. I can’t find my fire engine. Can I have some Weetos?’ If I’m particularly lucky, a series of recorded Minion farts will be the first thing I hear when I wake up, as the fart blaster from Despicable Me 2 is activated next to my head, waking Jude, who promptly performs his first dump of the day. FML. And so the morning circus begins …

  ‘Have a good day,’ I sneer at my husband as he leaves the house. On time. Without juggling a car-seat-and-pram-base combo into the car. Without worrying if he’s got enough baby wipes and a clean muslin that doesn’t smell of cheese. Occasionally, listening to actual music on an iPod. Bastard.


  Back in the land of the living room, at least one half of my offspring is kicking off and I am left wondering whether 8.35 is too early for Toy Story 3, or whether I should wait to see what’s coming up on Lorraine instead . . . And, more to the point, I’m left pondering the same daily conundrum: what the actual fuck am I going to do with them all day?

  ‘You don’t appreciate how lucky you are, going to work,’ I tell him. ‘I wish we could swap.’ Maternity leave housed the worst of this resentment, but even after returning to work part-time my two ‘days off’ (grrrr) often prompted some spiteful comparisons and I still find myself getting proper mardy towards my full-time-working spouse. In theory, this part-time pattern is only temporary, to see us through the baby years, but I’m four years in now and it doesn’t feel all that temporary. My weekday pattern has morphed into something unrecognisable from just a few years ago, and his has not. This irritates me. The problem is, I know it irritates him, too, because the flip side is he’s working his arse off five days a week and I’m spending two days at home with our lovely boys.

  ‘I’d happily swap!’ he tells me. ‘I’d love to work three days a week.’ He isn’t being spiteful or provocative when he says this – he genuinely likes the idea of a part-time working week.

  ‘Ha! You have absolutely no idea!’ I scoff. And on it rumbles …

  Well, I have come to realise that an ongoing ‘my day is harder than your day’ debate is ridiculous. And pointless. It doesn’t make either of you feel any better and it’s largely unfair to all concerned.

  When I was on maternity leave for the second time, I began to grasp that my jealousy about his freedom to leave the house had been somewhat ill informed by the memory of what working life was like before we had children. Work may well be like a holiday at times (see SAHMs, I Salute You, here) – and I bloody love working – but it is still work. And, with a baby plus threenager at home, James has to get through his working day on significantly less sleep. Then, after work, when his shift is finished, he doesn’t return to a tidy, quiet house, put on Sky Sports News and have a cold beer, like he sometimes used to when I was working late at the bank. He comes home to me. Stressed. Me sitting scowling amidst mountains of shitty plastic toys and possibly a shitty nappy. Telling him how much I hate being at home. How much I hate my life (the dramatic licence of arguments!). Telling him I am at breaking point and no, I don’t know what is for fucking tea because I haven’t even had a shower. At times, I would simply show him a video recorded earlier in the day of one or both of the children screaming and comment: ‘My whole day.’ I’m surprised he didn’t sign up for an additional evening job.