Mum Truths: Being a Mum but still being Me

Let me explain...
Hi readers!! I couldn't come up with a title to this blog that I felt explained well enough what I am going to write about so I am going to explain. When you become a mum that is fully what you are 24/7 a mum, everything is about the baby and you are mum. This being one of the biggest honors in the world, being able to be a mother is a privilege but at the same time you still are you, your still a person aside from your baby and sometimes this get's lost and mothers (and fathers I am sure experience this too) can feel guilty when feeling upset that by having a baby they don't feel themselves anymore. This is a feeling a lot of mums get including myself and not something to feel guilty about, so today that is what I am writing about. Keeping your sense of self/identity and having me time.

There is no shame....
Why the guilt? Why the shame? This should not exist. Having a baby is amazing and rewarding and as I said in the previous paragraph being a mother is something to be thankful for as not everyone gets this amazing opportunity. But people must remember that before a mum became a mum, they were just their own person with dreams, hobbies and opinions. All these things are still there when a woman becomes a mum but it can sometimes get lost and its okay to want that sense of self and time to be you away from your baby. In fact in my opinion this shows how much of an amazing mum you are, I myself want to show my daughter my dreams, my opinions and my hobbies. I want to show her that Mummy has a strong sense of self and on top of being your mum has goals of her own. Having a desire to find yourself again after having a baby doesn't make you a bad mum, it makes you human.

My experience...
I have always valued my independence and my ambitious nature. Since I was younger I have always had goals, dreams that I wanted to reach. Strong opinions and hobbies that I could list for anyone that asked. When I became a mum as much of a gift that was after a few weeks I did realise that I was feeling a bit lost. I adored my baby and being a mum had changed my life for the better definetley but I felt like if someone asked me my hobbies I wouldn't be able to answer or if someone said what's your goals in life I would be stuck for words. My blog really helped me as this was something that was mine but even most of my blog posts are about me as a mum for other mums and sometimes I would go weeks without posting. And as a lot of other mums do, I felt guilty for wanting my sense of self back, felt guilty for wanting to have me time to be that ambitious 20 year old I was and still deep down am.
Even though this was a concern for me to honest until recently I didn't have time to deal with it. Obviously Ella-Grace is my top priority and I was, still am adjusting to being a new mum. Some days I struggled to have a shower while Ella-Grace is napping let alone have some me time and find my identity again.

One step at a time...
The past few weeks as Ella-Grace has gotten a bit more independent (happy to sit or play for a while without my constant attention) and she has been a lot better when she is with Reece when I'm not there, I have managed to fit in me time. I started with just taking long baths which I have always loved to do (especially with a LUSH bathbomb, YES!) then I started to blog a bit more frequently, started exercising again, joined a creative writing class and as of yesterday I have officially applied to do my degree ( English Literature and Creative Writing) through Open University starting in October- this being something I have always aspired to do, get a degree. Obviously I didn't jump from having a long bath to Open University overnight, I had been thinking about applying since I was pregnant I just had lost that ambition being so focused on being the best mum I could be.

Why I don't feel guilty...
I have explained this a bit already but to make it personal to me, I did not feel guilt because I do everything I do not only for myself but for my daughter. I want to show her that you can do anything you put your mind to, you can be a mum and also get a degree (something many people tell you is impossible). I want to show her that you can look after your family and enjoy me time. I want her to know it is okay to think about yourself and that looking after your self physically AND mentally is good for not only yourself but the people you care about to. You can do your best when you are feeling your best and it is okay to make sure of that. A lot of mums and dads reading this might have different ambitions to me, they might not care about a degree and want to stay home with their children which is amazing! My point is you are showing your children that you know who you are, you make your own choices in your life and you look after yourself as well as others. This being a very, very important lesson to children and will in my opinion be key to their confidence and happiness in later life. I want my daughter to have a strong sense of self and never feel guilty about loving and taking care of her own needs, something society seems to make us feel bad about which is why this is so vital.

Hi I am....
So to conclude... Hi, I am LauraJane Bethune (soon to be Webster) I am 20 years old, engaged and have a daughter called Ella-Grace who is 3 months old. My hobbies are reading, writing and socialising. My goals are to get my English Literature and Creative writing degree and hopefully get a well paid job from this, I aim to be a good mum to Ella-Grace (and maybe another baby one day),get married to Reece, hopefully move to Edinburgh one day with my little family, go abroad with Reece and Ella-Grace for the first time and hopefully get rid of some baby weight (although not top on my list). I have strong opinions on equality and feel that my best qualities are being open-minded, kind and ambitious. I struggle with anxiety and can be a bit of a control-freak but I work on this everyday.
That's me and I am thankful I know who I am and as I have already said, I can show my daughter that this is important. I hope all you readers, anyone who might feel a bit lost finds your sense of self soon or even just finds a hobby they can do once a week that is a baby step. Comment below who you are? What are your hobbies, goals or opinions? I love to read your comments and feedback! Till next time readers (which will be very soon, I am super prepared this week haha)

Stay Happy Everyone :)! 

Ella-Grace : 3 Month Update!!

Tell them about yourself...

"Hi, My name is Ella-Grace Angela Webster! I am 3 months old and have grown/changed a lot since I was born. Mummy looks after me everyday, we have lots of fun singing songs, playing with toys and going on walks. Daddy comes home every night and is off 2 days a week, he is the best at bath time and makes me laugh when he reads me stories. I am growing very big and don't fit into my 0-3 month clothes anymore, Mummy just switched my clothes round to bigger sizes and I am now in size 3 nappies. My favourite things to do are listen to stories, sing songs, nap, have a bath, eat and I am very chatty especially to Mummy and Daddy. I don't like lying down I prefer to sit in my chair, I don't like when my hands or feet are covered I'm always kicking the blanket off me when mummy puts it on me and I especially don't like getting dressed, I prefer to be naked haha! I have learnt lots of new things since I was born and I am currently working on reaching my feet, they look so fun to play with! And that's all from me I think, Mummy will tell you more"

Where has the time gone....

Time really flies when you are having fun... or changing nappies, feeding the baby and all the other things you have to do as a parent. I am so grateful to have such a wonderful daughter and I have enjoyed her first three months so much, watching her grow is amazing but as most mums and dads I'm sure would agree part of me wishes she would slow down and stay my tiny baby for a bit longer!
The other day I put up a post asking for suggestions on what I could write about in my blog, I had many wonderful ideas and thank you so much readers for that I will be taking all of your thoughts on board. One of the things asked for was updates on Ella-Grace (which I am going to do ever three months) so here is her first update at 3 months old. Enjoy.


Feeding...
Since my breastfeeding post a lot has changed with Ella-Grace's feeding (if you would like to know more on my experience please go to my Mum Truths:Breastfeeding blog post). To slightly recap, Ella-Grace is lactose intolerant and even when I cut out dairy she was not keeping my breast milk down, because of this I had to change to bottle feeding her at 2 months. I loved breastfeeding Ella-Grace and really tried getting her back into it but after having bottles she was getting confused, my supply had dropped significantly despite pumping as often as I could and as I said the breast milk unsettled her tummy so to my disappointment I had to stop breastfeeding. I struggled with this as I really wanted to breastfeed her till at least 6 months and I felt like I had failed but as a very wise friend said to me "Fed is best!", to be honest as well she is a lot more settled on the formula and can digest it a lot better. For those interested we get 'Aptimil Lacto-free formula' on prescription for Ella-Grace (luckily as the formula is expensive and in quite small tins compared to average formula). Bringing it back to her update for 3 months she is currently getting 180ml of formula every 3-4 hours. That's all there really is to say on feeding (I will be going into more detail about switching to bottle feeding in a separate blog post as requested).

Sleeping...
Sorry to all the exhausted parents out there who's baby is up all night but Ella-Grace sleeps pretty much all night (still in our bedroom in her swinging cot) depending on what time we put her down, how much she has napped through the day and so on. Our routine with her at the moment is when Reece comes home from work around 7pm he has his supper then we bath her (two days a week), put her in her pjs, read a story then put her to bed with her toy giraffe (cannot forget that giraffe haha) and her dummy. Often she can take a while to settle because she spits her dummy out or rubs her eyes so much she wakes herself up but once she is out she sleeps pretty much all night, the most she will get up is once at about 2am for a bottle then back to sleep. The only worry we have when she is sleeping is the risk of cot death, my brother died when he was a baby of cot death which can mean she has an increased risk but we take all the necessary precautions and have a special alarm to monitor her breathing levels so thankfully she is fine, healthy and we don't need to stress too much. We are so lucky and as I said for the parents who are struggling with sleep I apologise and hope you can get some sleep very soon!

Teething...
Ella-Grace has only just started teething so not much to say about that yet, its a bit of a struggle as she has not quite yet got the co-ordination to hold a teething toy in her mouth so we are having to hold it there for her to chew then she will decide she wants her dummy to suck on instead and then switch again (can be a long process to get her settled). Apart from that and the excessive drooling we haven't had to give her any teething gel or anything like that yet but I know its on its way! Wish us luck, better get ordering those amber beeds I hear they work wonders.

Development...
Oh my goodness I am so proud of our little girls development! This is not to show off or put anyone else's baby down if they have not done some of these things yet- all babies are diffeent and develop at different stages/times- just giving an honest update on how Ella-Grace is getting on and thankfully she is developing well. So far she has laughed, smiled, can roll over from her stomach to her back (not quite mastered the back to belly roll yet, gets stuck on her side), she can grab things, hold her head up and is trying ALREADY to stand! I look at her every day and just think wow she has come so far from that tiny baby in the hospital and I couldn't be prouder. There are things we need to work on with her for example holding toys, messy play, sitting up etc. but all this will come in due time and I know that babies should meet certain milestones by certain ages but in my opinion she will do things when she is ready and able. But yeah at 3 months they are the things that she has developed so far.

Bonding...
As I have said in my previous blog posts I have thankfully had a very strong bond with Ella-Grace since she was born which has helped me through the stressful times in being a new mum, every day I love her more and more. It's hard to describe the bond with your child to someone who hasn't had children but for any of my readers who dont have children and want to know what the bond is like the best way I can describe the bond between me and my baby girl is that it's like we are one person, from the day she was born I have been with her and she has been with me and I feel like we are just one person or unit hence why it is so hard to leave her with someone even her Dad, we are inseparable and I love that. I realise that sounds a bit strange but that's the truth. She is my bestfriend, my little buddy for life. Especially with my anxiety I used to have panic attacks whenever I was alone but now I always have her by my side and I am obviously always busy so she has thankfully made my anxiety better in some ways, making our bond even bigger cause I feel I need her just as much as she needs me.

As for Reece the bond from birth wasn't as strong as mine was with her- which is common for Dad's as they are usually the one's at work, not the main caregivers- but it was always there. Over these past few months they have grew closer and she is gradually becoming more of a Daddy's girl (smiling when he comes home from work, wanting to go to him, letting him put her down to sleep). This gradual bond that they have gained over the past few weeks is in some ways even more special than our instant connection cause I feel that she has learned to love him and appreciates his presence a lot more than mine because I'm mum, here everyday where as she can miss him. This is not me being negative about our bond at all of course I love that she can rely on me to be there everyday, I just think its special that she has a different kind of bond with Daddy.

 We both love her very, very much and we are very fortunate to have a strong family bond.

Allergies and more...
Reece (Ella-Grace's daddy and my fiance) has a list of allergies (allergic to animal hair, hayfever, eczema) and on top of that he has asthma. Ella-Grace - not to our surprise- has developed hayfever, eczema and possibly (still unsure but it is likely) an allergy to animal hair. This on top of her lactose intolerance and reflux/constipation makes things a little difficult and we are constantly checking her breathing ect. as she has a risk of asthma. Luckily none of these allergies have severely bothered her as of yet and we have medicine to help with her constipation (Lactoloose) which she gets every night. As a parent your are constantly worried your child gets ill or hurt so her having these conditions does put me a big on edge but she has always been a little fighter and like her Mama wont let anything put her down. A very strong little lady we are bringing up and I love that about her. There is always the hope she will grow out of some of these allergies so we will just have to wait and see in the next update if they have improved.

Hopes and fears for the next three months... 
I hope for the next few months that Ella-Grace has continuing health and her development continues to go well. To be more specific I am hoping to try her with her first proper food and hopefully learn to sit up but as I said earlier I just want her to go at her own pace and she will do things when she is ready.
I am keeping positive about the future but as a parent you always worry. Ella-Grace has her second set of jabs coming up and she got quite ill the last time so I am a bit scared about that and also teething I am scared she will be very unsettled by and it might interrupt her sleep pattern. Hate seeing her in pain and my anxiety always is at it's peak if she is ever in distress so any kind of shake in her routine always gives me a bit of nerves but we will get through it.

Thank you for reading...
So that is Ella-Grace's 3 month update I hope you enjoyed reading, learnt a little bit about my daughter and maybe related to some of the things going on with her. As always please leave feedback, advice or maybe tell me how your baby is getting on? in the comments I love to read them. Till next time readers.

Stay Happy Everyone :)!

Mum Truths: Post- Pregnancy Body Image

2nd Blog post this week wow....

Hello again beautiful readers and welcome to the SECOND blog post this week (thanks to Ella-Grace having a long nap right now). So since having Ella-Grace I have been watching a lot of morning TV including Loose Women, this is a show I only usually watch occasionally but these past few weeks they have started a campaign which they have called 'Loose Women: Body Stories' and  today I will be telling mine. My Body Story and to be more specific be talking about Post-Pregnancy Body Image and as always a genuine view on how I've felt about my body since my baby was born. Hope you enjoy reading!

Before Baby Girl...
So before I was pregnant I was relatively happy with my body. I have always been around a size UK 10- 12 and as most people I go through stages of "I'm going to go to the gym and tone up" which never seems to happen and I end up with the usual attitude of "I don't care what other people think I'm happy the way I am". So overall before I was pregnant I never really thought about 'body image' that much I mean I would have anxious times about it but of all the things my anxiety usually effects this wasn't a major one (thankfully). I would go out in town with my friends as wear whatever I wanted as anyone should do- crop tops, skirts, tight dresses.. all these things I was confident to wear. Then I got pregnant and I couldn't see it at the time but now when I look back at photos of me with a bump I always think, wow I looked really nice! I loved showing off my bump so was still able to wear a variation of what I did before to show off the bump (maybe not the crop tops but you know what I mean haha). All this mostly positive image, after baby things changed.

What is my body...
So after having half my body numbed, not being able to walk because of the pain of the c-section and you know the massive responsibility of looking after a new born baby, the way my body looked wasn't the first thing on my mind in fact it wasn't on my mind. A few days later however I just remember getting out the shower and looking in the mirror at my body for the first time, my once perfect baby bump that was holding my precious little girl was an empty, now useless lump of flesh. Being very honest here as always because otherwise whats the point, my belly was sagging - something I had never experienced before- I don't know what I was expecting it to look like to be honest but it wasn't this. So this even though a shock didn't immediately make me upset and I went and carried on with my day. Later on (not sure if the same day or few days later) I asked Reece to look at my c-section scar just to make sure it was doing okay. Lifting up my top I waited for him to tell me what it looked like... silence... "Em babe I need you to lift your baby skin a bit", oh goodness that was a bit awkward. I mean as sweet as Reece was calling it baby skin instead of the many other not so nice options he had, hearing your fiance ask you to lift your belly doesn't exactly make you feel beautiful.
Even after this awkward encounter I wasn't feeling too bad about it, as I explained in my other blog post on baby blues the first two weeks were full of bonding with my baby and dealing with baby blues not thinking about the way I look,
Weeks had now past, Ella-Grace was almost a month old and I had started to notice little things. The sag of my belly you could see when wearing leggings and I had to wear long tops to hide it, the majority of my wardrobe was full of clothes that I couldn't wear, even maternity stuff just made me look either fat or about 6 months pregnant which was not the look I was going for. The fact that I didn't really know my body or how to dress it anymore was starting to get to me.

Tears in Primark...
Ella-Grace now over a month old, Reece being his usual lovely self he came home with a bunch of roses and asked me if I wanted to go on a date (He's a keeper) to which I obviously said yes. It had been organised for my sister to babysit for us and we were going to go for our first meal out since having our daughter. Although anxious about leaving Ella-Grace for the first time I was excited to have a night that I could dress up and spend some one on one time with my fiance. A few days before Reece, Ella-Grace and I went into town for lunch and Reece offered to buy me an outfit for our date as he knew I was having trouble fitting into my pre-pregnancy wardrobe. 10 mins looking round Primark and I told Reece I just wanted to go home, he tried to get me to stay but as tears built into my eyes he knew it was time to go. I'm not sure what exactly triggered my mini breakdown but I just remember looking at all the clothes I liked and thinking I can't wear that and feeling like I had to just find the baggiest thing possible which of course I didn't like. I felt like the style I liked and had always worn I would have to change and I was no longer able to be me in a way. Being a mum is the BEST thing that has ever happened to me but I still have an identity away from my baby and I felt like that had been stripped away from me.
All this sounds silly now I'm saying it considered it had only been like 4 weeks and it was just clothes but that's how I felt in that moment. I didn't speak the whole way home, poor Reece must of been so confused. (Despite this I would like to say I did end up finding an outfit and we had a lovely date night- picture below).

First night out and Confidence Building... 
So for a few more weeks I felt quite crappy about my body and no matter how many times people said "You look great" or how many times Reece insisted "Your sexy" I was still down about the way I looked and my vast reduction in clothing choices- baggy or nothing that's it. Then a few weeks ago I had my first night out and again a few day s before I braved the shops- this time on my own as Reece had some daddy , daughter time with Ella-Grace- it took me 3 hours and a lot of trying on things (the shop assistants must of thought I was mad)  but I found an outfit, When the night out came and I had the chance to get dolled up and re-discover my carefree 20 year old self for a few hours I was feeling a lot more body confident and within a few hours I just wanted home to my baby girl so I went home very early but with a newly found sense of body confidence. I scrubbed up well considering my saggy baby skin haha.
(Picture Below)

I Love my Mum Bod.... 
Yes, I am eating healthy (as best I can) and just starting to workout again but I love my Mum Bod and with Ella-Grace being my main priority getting a Kim Kardashian figure is not top on my to-do list. After getting all dressed up I really put things into perspective. I JUST HAD A BABY! Of course your body is going to change, it just grew a human being in it and my sagging skin and stretch marks are not something to cry about they are to be celebrated, they are something I should be proud and privileged to have. Because of this change to my body I got my beautiful daughter. Yes of course I sometimes it still bothers me but over all my body confidence has vastly improved.

Stop Comparing yourself...
Now referring back to the stimulus for this blog post- Loose women Body Stories. This was my Body Story, as for all your body stories I hope they all end with you feeling confident in yourself. Feel too fat, too thin, ugly, spotty, too tall. too short, one leg, heck if you are green skinned with eight eyes YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL!! There is only one of you, work it and be confident. As a society we are diseased with comparing ourselves to others, don't do it, you are you and that is amazing and I can guarantee you might be comparing yourself to someone else thinking they are prettier or thinner ect. but I bet they are also comparing themselves with someone else too- its a vicious cycle that must stop. Find something you love about yourself and focus on that and as for the mums like me who might feel like they are losing themselves in their role of being a mum.. 5 minutes.. find 5 minutes to do your make up or hair or whatever makes you feel like you look on fleek and you will feel so much better.

And that's another post finished... 
Thanks for reading hope you enjoyed it and it maybe was something you could relate to, please feel free to comment what was your post-pregnancy body experience? What is your body story?
Before I go (I can hear Ella-Grace stirring think its feeding time) if you haven't seen the Loose Women: Body Stories its worth a look- a very positive campaign which I think is needed and also speaking of body confidence why not make someones day and give someone a compliment tomorrow, today, within the hour whenever- it might just give someone that boost they need to be confident and go from body conscious to body confident. Till next time readers.

Stay Happy Everyone :)!