The Hospital Bag: What (not) to pack

Posted on June 2, 2012 by

Tomorrow I’ll be 37 weeks pregnant and if the baby were to make an early appearance, she’d now be considered full term. So it’s about time I pulled my procrastinating head out of the sand and started taking some notice of the bossy pregnancy book that keeps telling me to pack my hospital bag.

This is the most peculiar form of packing, and doing it with any accuracy requires the psychic powers of Mystic Meg. How am I meant to know what to take on this mystery mini-break? For a start, I don’t know how long it will last. If everything is relatively smooth, like last time, then I shouldn’t be in for long. Like most hospitals, mine aims to chuck mums out 6 hours from giving birth if all is well. Then again, if things are complicated or, like last time, they are so understaffed that there’s no-one to discharge me, I could be in for a few long nights.

At least this time I’ve got the benefit of having done it before. Any romantic notions I may have previously held of lying in my hospital bed in a pristine nightie, a sweet-smelling babe in my arms and midwives tending to my every need, have been replaced with vivid memories of the noisy, sweaty, grimy post-natal ward and my attempts to flee it as soon as possible. In mini-break terms, we’re talking three days in the wilderness with the natives rather than a spa day at Babington Hall; I’m A Mum, Get Me Out of Here rather than Bridget Jones’s Diary. And this time I’m going to pack accordingly.

Here are the main things I’m going to take:

  • Just one bag: Last time I took so much stuff that we ended up with three fairly substantial bags which had to be dragged from triage to birth room to post-labour ward. I never knew what was in which and didn’t need half the things anyway. This time I’m being ruthless and just taking one. If I need anything extra, we only live 20 minutes away. Failing that, the hospital’s in central London so there’s not much we won’t be able to get hold of.
  • Things to wear for me: Stuff that’s comfortable, dark coloured and that I’m not too attached to. Tops need buttons or other easy breastfeeding access and bottoms need to be loose enough not to depress me about my post-baby belly. Now is not the time for vanity, and no-one’s going to be looking at me anyway. It’s all about the baby. Which brings me onto…
  • Things to wear for the baby: Against my better judgement, I’ve ended up buying quite a few very sweet newborn things for the baby. This is in spite of the fact that we’ve got a ton of neutral newborn things in very good nick which we had for Little Boy. So I’ll put a few of the new bits in the bag and will no doubt be cursing myself when I realise that they’re hugely impractical and that two-day-old babies do not wear dresses.
  • A variety of pharmaceutical products to soothe, absorb and numb: All of which are pretty obvious and will be coming to me, along with some newborn nappies, via a rather large Boots order.
  • A pillow: I was glad I took my own pillow last time (with a bright coloured pillow case so it didn’t get mixed up with the hospital ones). Hospital pillows are rubbish. I found mine was useful for breastfeeding and for when I was attempting to get some sleep.
  • Something to block out the sound and light: Trying to sleep on a post-natal ward is like trying to sleep in the zoo at feeding time. Some of my neighbours made calls on their mobiles throughout the night, while others were big snorers. The crying babies were angelic in comparison. This time I’m packing an eye mask and some ear plugs, but I bet I still don’t get a wink.
  • Nice things to eat: If someone had just run a marathon or two, you’d offer them more than a bowl of soggy Rice Krispies to make up the calorie deficit wouldn’t you? This was my underwhelming post-labour ‘meal’, and was followed by a variety of flavour-, texture- and vitamin-free offerings over the subsequent couple of days. So I’m going to pack a stash of snacks to keep me going, and will send OH out regularly to replenish it if I have to stay in for any length of time.
  • A mobile charger: If I can’t communicate with the outside world, I’ll go mad.
  • A camera: All the pictures from Little Boy’s birth were taken on the iPhone but I wish we’d brought in a proper camera so our record of his first few days weren’t so grainy.
  • Hospital notes: Now I’ve gone to the effort of writing a birth plan (aka: find Word doc from last time – change the dates – print), I’d be grateful if someone would read it.

And here’s what I won’t be bothering with:

  • Massage oils and similar: Last time I took bottles of lavender and other essential oils for ‘relaxation during labour’. Anyone who’s been through labour – or witnessed it first hand – will know that it’s anything but relaxing, and that no amount of flower oil will help. Added to that, I was inclined to punch anyone who came within five metres of me, so the idea of enjoying a soothing massage while giving birth is a no-no.
  • A video camera: People in real life actually sometimes allow themselves to be filmed giving birth! I know! And some of them even allow it to be broadcast on national television, but the less said about that the better. This is not for me – I’ll stick with Photoshopped stills, thanks.
  • A book: Ever the optimist, I always take a good book or three if I’m going away for the weekend in the vain hope that I might have time to read. Inevitably they never leave the suitcase and are returned, unopened, to the bedside table upon my return. I might as well face the fact that reading is going to be off the cards again very shortly for a few months, unless I can master a better reading/breastfeeding technique than before.

And that’s about it, unless you can remind me of anything I’ve forgotten. After that, it’s just a waiting game.

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Silent Sunday

Posted on May 27, 2012 by

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Tips for a healthier pregnancy

Posted on May 25, 2012 by

This week, thanks to the lovely Richmond Mummy, I was lucky enough to attend a preview of the new film What To Expect When You’re Expecting. Based loosely on the best-selling pregnancy guide of the same name, it’s a romantic comedy that charts the journey – from conception to crowning – of five couples embarking on parenthood. It’s predictable fare, but thanks to the all-star cast (Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez and Chris Rock among others) and my insatiable fascination with all things baby-related at the moment, I really enjoyed it. As much as I might think myself immune to the Hollywood manipulation machine, I was still crying my eyes out by the end. Blame it on the hormones.

The screening was part of the NHS Start4Life campaign which has just been launched to help mothers-to-be have healthier pregnancies. The little sister to the long-running Change4Life campaign, it gives lots of tips and information on life with a bump and baby, from nutrition to exercise, smoking and drinking. If, like me, you’re the sort of person who gets your five-a-day before lunchtime and does a decent amount of exercise every week, you might wonder whether there’s any point to all of this. Surely everyone knows that they should take folic acid if they plan on getting pregnant and that smoking and drinking alcohol is bad for the baby? Apparently not.

Last year, for example, 13.5% of mums smoked throughout their pregnancies (Stacey Solomon can at least take comfort in the fact she was not alone). If they knew of the increased risks of miscarriage and stillbirth, I’m sure they’d think twice before lighting up. I know of a mum who wasn’t aware of the advice on folic acid and has just given birth to a baby with spina bifida. She loves him dearly, of course, but cried every day of her pregnancy after receiving the diagnosis. If only she’d had the information, there’s a chance her son may have been born healthy. On a lighter note, the sooner the eating-for-two myth is quashed, the better. One friend ate a Snickers as a mid-morning and mid-afternoon snack throughout the first 12 weeks of her pregnancy, and by the time of her first scan was unable to get her jeans on beyond her knees! She was still wearing maternity clothes when her baby was six months old, and was constantly berating herself for piling into the pastries while she was pregnant.

I’m nowhere near as fit and fabulous as the pregnant Cameron Diaz in What to Expect, but so far I’ve had a good pregnancy with very few problems. Here’s what I’ve done to try to keep fit and healthy:

  • Stop drinking: Although pregnant women are officially allowed 1-2 units a week, I find it easier to go cold turkey on the alcohol front. If I can’t have a large gin and tonic and really enjoy it without worrying, then what’s the point? I have to confess to the odd sip from my husband’s glass of wine, but other than that I’m saving myself for a big, post-natal glass of Pimm’s.
  • Walk, walk and walk some more: Trying to fit a pregnancy exercise class into life with a toddler just isn’t going to happen, so I try to build it into the day. My commute includes a hilly 40-minute walk which I’m still doing now, but at a slower pace. I work in an office with an unhealthy eat-lunch-at-your-desk culture, so I walk up and down the stairs (five flights) at lunchtime to make myself move about. I’m now having to pause on the landing occasionally, and I get a lot of strange looks, but I always feel better for it.
  • Swim: It seemed a bit odd to sign up to a gym membership at 8 months’ pregnant, but I thought that easy access to a pool while I’m on maternity leave would be a good thing. I’ve already used it a lot, and it really helps me relax. Each swim also makes me feel better about the decreasing cost-per-use of my extortionate maternity swimming costume.
  • Eat well and moderately: I read the other day that mums carrying girls eat less than mums carrying boys, and that’s certainly my experience. When I was pregnant with my son I was constantly grazing, but this time around I’m no more hungry than normal. I’ve been spared any unhealthy cravings, too, other than a longing for stodgy bread products during the first 12 weeks. I’ve never had a problem eating healthily and as a vegetarian my diet is mainly veg, fruit and pulses so I haven’t really had to make many changes. Goat’s cheese is off the menu, of course, as are my beloved poached eggs, but that’s about it. I’m no saint, though, and still enjoy some lovely sweet things. I tend to bake with my boy on our day off together, so I choose a not too unhealthy recipe and then we have homemade biscuits, banana bread or something similar for the rest of the week.

Most of it’s common sense, but until every pregnant woman knows the little things she can do to help make her pregnancy a healthy one, campaigns like this must be a very good thing.

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Baby on Board

Posted on May 21, 2012 by

At 35 weeks’ pregnant, my baby is now apparently the size of a large cantaloupe (for melon novices, that’s the juicy one with the orange flesh that always seems to be on special offer at the supermarket). This, by association, means that I am now the size of a semi-detached house with garden and off-street parking. Although I don’t feel that big, there’s no doubt that my belly is that of a woman who’s 8 months’ pregnant. Optimistic attempts to squeeze into my normal, non-maternity, clothes are futile and met with cries of ‘That don’t fit, Mummy! Take it off’. People in shops stop and ask me when it’s due, colleagues give me a running commentary of how much they think I’ve grown overnight, and the staff at Little Boy’s nursery look at me with increasing sympathy.

So you’d think I’d be offered a seat on a busy train, right? Wrong.

Like most Londoners, I have the misfortune of relying on public transport to get to work and back. Fortunately I’m spared the rat-run of the Tube, making my way by London Overground instead. It’s a 25-minute train journey, sandwiched between a 20-minute walk at either end. As commutes go, it’s fairly civilised by London standards: a brisk stroll followed by an air-conditioned train journey above ground and then another walk to the office. Pre-pregnancy I quite enjoyed the combination of exercise and time to read on the train, but the daily battle for a seat in the last few months has turned it into a nightmare.

Before it became too depressing, I kept a tally of the number of times I was offered a seat. I‘ll spare you the stats, but let’s just say that you can usually find me swaying between the people sitting in the so-called priority seats who are pretending that they haven’t seen me. Which is like pretending that you haven’t noticed that a hot air balloon has landed in the middle of your living room. Don’t try telling me that your copy of Metro is that engrossing. Friends have suggested that I ask for a seat, but (a) my beloved fellow passengers don’t always look very approachable, (b) this would break the golden rule of silence between commuters and (c) why should I have to?

I didn’t start my little survey until I was well and truly showing because I understand entirely why no-one would want to risk offering a seat to someone who may not be pregnant. I’ve been in a carriage when a seat was offered to a woman who was just a bit bloated and it was hugely embarrassing for everyone within earshot. In the early stages I was never offered a seat, but I was fine with that – I wouldn’t have offered one to me either, just in case. I’ve also been too embarrassed to ever wear the Baby on Board badge that I ordered in anger at one point. A friend wore one when she was pregnant and got nothing but aggro from fellow passengers, even being accused by one woman of ‘shoving her fertility in everyone else’s faces’. Badges aside, for the last three months or so, only someone with severely impaired eyesight could possibly think I’m not pregnant, and it’s made no difference.

Before I’m accused of being precious, you should know that I’m not one of those pregnant women who think they should be treated like some kind of untouchable goddess of fertility. Everyone’s different, but so far I’ve been healthy enough to be able to carry on life pretty much as before (minus the fun stuff like drinking alcohol and eating soft cheese with abandon). I walk and swim and do all the stuff I was doing previously, albeit a bit more slowly. So it’s not out of some inflated sense of entitlement that I think I should be given a seat on the train. In fact, if I’m only travelling a couple of stops then I’d often rather stand because it’s not worth trying to manoeuvre myself in and out of a seat for the sake of a couple of minutes’ rest. But on longer journeys I’d prefer to be sitting down in case the train comes to a sudden, juddering halt between stations, as it does with alarming regularity. Not too much to ask, really, is it?

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Silent Sunday

Posted on May 20, 2012 by

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Silent Sunday

Posted on May 13, 2012 by

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My 21st Century Boy

Posted on May 10, 2012 by

The second thing that my son demands every morning (after a cuddle and before CBeebies) is “photos, Mummy”.  By which he means that he wants to sit in our bed and flick through pictures and videos of himself on my iPhone. He can navigate to the right app, adeptly move through hundreds of photos to find the one he wants and zoom in to see things up close. Videos pose no greater problem: he can start, pause and stop them (again and again and again…how interesting can a ten-second clip of a ladybird sitting on a leaf really be?).  Aside from a few heart-stopping incidents when at 6am he’s accidentally called old colleagues that I haven’t spoken to for years (I now put my phone into airplane mode before handing it to him to avoid further embarrassment), he’s as proficient with the iPhone as he is with his jigsaw puzzles. I’ve actually hidden my new iPad from him or I’ll never get it back.

He’s a true child of the 21st century, and I’ve been thinking recently about how different life will be for him than it was for me. So many things that have been integral to my life are now, or soon will be, obsolete. The mere idea of milkmen, CD players and newspapers will be consigned to the mists of time. I hope he lives to be over a hundred, and that they find a cure for cancer during his lifetime. But I can’t help feel a bit wistful about some of the things he’s missed out on:

  • Mix tapes: How my heart would leap upon being presented with a compilation tape made just for me by a friend or, better, a love interest. Nestled in a squeaky plastic box with a scruffy piece of A4 listing titles and band names, this was a palm-sized piece of joy. Neither the fact that it had to be turned over half way through nor the snippets of the Top 40 DJ introducing the song over its first few bars could break the magic. MP3s are fantastic, but it’s all just a bit too perfect.
  • Penny sweets: There was something that appealed to my sense of order (and my northern attitude to personal finance) about being able to take 20p to the corner shop and get twenty penny sweets in return. I can’t imagine you’d get much for 20p now, and most of the penny sweets of my youth have probably been banned or radically altered due to their bad-behaviour-inducing ingredients. Organic cola bottles just aren’t the same, and you certainly won’t get much change from a pound.
  • Missing something on TV that you really wanted to watch: Remember a time when you’d have to decide between a night out with your friends and staying in to watch something you loved on TV? Never having mastered the complexities of the video recorder – even after the introduction of the apparently simple Video Plus system– this was a common dilemma during my teenage years. Should I stay in and find out whether Ross and Rachel would get back together or go out drinking? My boy, in contrast, has already worked out that Show Me Show Me is effectively always on TV (even if I try to tell him otherwise) because I’ve got a backlog of them recorded in case of emergency. He now seems to think that he is lord and commander of the TV, able to hand-pick his schedule at will, which is not a good thing. On the upside, I console myself that at least I can exercise some sort of quality control over what he watches (and the less time that any of us is subjected to Waybuloo, the better).
  • Landline phones: The only people who call us on our landline are my parents, the in-laws and overseas call centres who like to try to sell us their wares at teatime. By the time Little Boy is old enough to be filling in forms, I bet they’ll just ask for his mobile number. Phones that need to plug into the wall somehow will be a thing of the past, and he’ll know nothing of the delights of a novelty phone in the shape of Mickey Mouse or a big pair of red lips.
  • Endless holidays in the UK: Up until my teens, holidays – as they were billed by my parents, even if they had few of the constituent elements that I thought a holiday should, like sunshine – were all UK-based. A few days with the grandparents or a camping trip to Scotland, which had more in common with a Bear Grylls documentary than an episode of Eldorado, was as exotic as it got. Air travel was expensive, so fair enough. At the age of two, our boy has already been abroad more times than my grandmother ever did (not hard, given that she never had a passport). We’ll mix and match holidays at home with trips overseas as the cost difference between the two is minimal. It’s great that he’ll get to experience other cultures earlier than I did, but we’ll try to make sure he enjoys the simplicity of the British seaside and countryside too. Nothing beats trying to build a sandcastle out of stones or a big mug of hot chocolate at the end of a long walk in the Lakes.
  • Boring trips to the supermarket: The weekly trip to the supermarket of my childhood, with all its inevitable arguments and negotiations, is a tradition I’ve culled for my children. Online grocery shopping is a godsend. Why waste all that time, energy and imaginative bribery when, for a small fee (less than you’d be harassed into spending to keep the kids quiet in the aisles), a nice man will bring all the shopping to the kitchen? This is the future at its best.
  • Books: Most alarming of all, physical books are likely to play less of a role in my son’s life than they have in mine. Although his bookshelves are piled high and currently he loves nothing more than flicking through them himself or being read to, it’s only a matter of time before he spends more time reading from a screen than paper. The whole experience of reading a book – the cover, the feel of the pages, finding a place for it on the shelf, lending it to a friend – is something that can’t be replicated digitally in the same way. While I’ll try to encourage him to value books by always having them in the house, I suspect I’ll just have to be happy if he reads, however he chooses to do so.

Being a 21st century boy (or girl) should be a lot of fun. The world is at their fingertips in a way that it hasn’t been for previous generations and, global economic meltdowns aside, the possibilities are endless. Even sky-high university tuition fees and the driving theory test can’t take the sheen off that.

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