On Authenticity….

If you’ve followed my blog for awhile or if this is your first time reading (thanks & welcome) you will know that I’m constantly striding to be my most authentic self. 

I remember one of the very first blogs I stumbled across was a Mom    Amber who wrote from her heart about her struggle with post natal depression, it was insightful, honest and authentic, it was also inspiring. It led to months of deliberation as to how I could express what I thought and be ‘ok’ with putting it out there. {Check out Amber’s blog “when depression creeps into motherhood”  Read it here! }  

It’s amazing the connections we make in the virtual world through authenticity and today it’s got me thinking, how do we encourage our real life peers to be their most honest selves? How do we get people to see that by them showing us their imperfect self it leads us to love them even more? 

For example, there’s another working Mum who I’m becoming friends with, last night we ‘bonded’ over our untidy homes and how our friends need to overlook this when they visit!  In reality they probably aren’t that bad, but we’ve made the conscious decision to leave constantly tidying for spending precious time with our kids.  

It gets me thinking, when we have these REAL interactions with people and friends, how much better does it leave us feeling? I love it. But then how are we best to approach friends who aren’t being real? You know the people who present their lives like everything is perfect 24/7 – when we all know that having kids, toddlers or babies is not plain sailing all the time, there’s ups and downs and it’s all normal. 

So how do you encourage real and authenticity in your relationships? 

Real Mumma’s

How refreshing are “real” mummas?! I love it when you hear Mums being real with each other. 

Today we were at a 1st birthday party and while the majority of the mums are onto their 2nd or 3rd baby there was one mum there with a 3 month old. I overheared one of the experienced mums give some support by way of sympathizing with how challenging the 3 month stage is and ask the mum directly if she’s had her exhaustion induced “break down” yet? 

I loved hearing a more experience mother put a new mum at ease by normalizing what we all go thru at one time or another. So many people are so intent on putting up these beautiful “walls” of “everything is ok” they forget we are all in the same boat and experiencing very similar things. 

I love REAL MUMS! Let’s all be real or get real. 

Pregnancy Phobia

So it turns out Pregnancy Phobia is a real thing. It also turns out that a woman at my workplace suffers from it (is “suffers” the right term? I don’t know) but anyway incase you missed it – I’m a pregnant woman. 

I’d never heard of this phobia before and when my colleagues warned me about our other colleagues phobia I didn’t really take it seriously. You see, at work I’m there to work. Sure I’ll have a chat to my colleagues about whatever but I won’t instigate speaking about my pregnancy. That’s just a bit weird and personal. Although I have been asked some awkward questions from time to time and I try to give the best awkward/TMI responses to those! 

Anyway so we managed to get to about 19 weeks before I wore a fitted top /it was obvious and then things became weird. 

It’s a bit of a shame really, because as a person I thought she had a great personality and I thought we clicked. But the obvious avoiding is now in its 2nd week and honestly I don’t understand it. I want to say just pretend I’m getting really fat! We can ignore this, just go back to being normal. 

Has anyone else experienced this? Or has a phobia of pregnant women, if so give me some tips! 

A new project needed!

I’m at the stage where I think that I need a new project/interest. All I know is that I need something new. 

It’s funny because after the last few months I’ve had no time at all to do anything remotely fun. It’s all been about survival and in the lead up to Christmas it’s about doing what I would have over about 1 month, to do in 1 weekend! Oh my. Anyway that’s tomorrow’s challenge. 

But in the meantime I’ve decided with another stint of maternity leave on the horizon I’m determined to put that energy into something. 

[Ha! Im laughing at myself – who am I kidding, energy. What energy]

What I’m meaning is that after the first 3 months of Maternity leave with my number 1, after the newborn fuzzy days were gone and we got ourselves into a routine, I couldn’t help but get myself sucked into the drama of what was a mothers group. I can see the benefits of that companionship, don’t get me wrong, and gosh I missed my adult conversation that I’d get each day at work, I missed the problem solving and using my brain in the way that you do at work (which is different to being at home). So this time round I think for my sanity/keeping things healthy and positive that I find an interest/hobby/maybe even a part time online gig to use that little bit of downtime in a productive way. 

So it’s lucky I still have 6 months to figure this out. 

Do you have any ideas? 

Goodbye Miss Positive!

A few weeks ago I wrote a post, to be published at a later date, right before this one, when we hit the 2nd trimester. That post if you’ve read it is a chin up, you’ve got this, little miss perspective and positivity cheerleader type post. 

This week as I’m edging closer and closer to the 2nd trimester miss positivity has left the building. 

I’m fed up. 

I’m fed up of early bedtimes. Needing to be showered and in my pajamas horizontal in bed by 8.45pm or I’m gagging, heaving, eye watering, spewing mess. 

I’m fed up with my body only being able to stomach carbs and fruit. I’m tired of sneaking the odd bit of spinach into a smoothie like I’m trying to hide it from my two year old. 

I’m fed up with people asking if we are going to have another baby or if I’m pregnant and feeling like we have to lie. 

I’m fed up with feeling so useless around the home. I am not contributing whatsoever to the upkeep of our home and my husband is carrying the load at the moment. 

I’m fed up that as these days of having just my sweet little girl are flying by and she is missing out on energetic Mumma. These days we aren’t getting back. 

I’m fed up that I used to live for Coffee. Now the thought of a coffee makes me screw up my nose. 

So you can see I’m fed up. I know it’s temporary and this will all change, hopefully sooner rather than later. But in the meantime while I am grateful to be in this state, I feel guilty, useless and miserable. 

I know my positive perspective will come back soon, but in the meantime this is how it is and I’m so tired of being “all roses” when anyone asks how I am. The first timester can be a very lonely place. 

6am conversation

Don’t you just love waking up and have a few moments to actually wake up in peace and quiet before you start your day? I know I did … until about 2 years ago. 

At least things have progressed from newborn cries, to the yelling out Mummy/Daddy, weekday mornings my husband moves Miss 2 into our bed when he leaves for work, he gets a sleepy morning cuddle & it usually allows an extra 15 minutes shut-eye for me. 

Wake-up time varies from “Mummy wake up” accompanied by a bop to the head, or a nice cuddle or the secret sneak – the 2 year old thinking I can’t hear her creep out of my room. This mornings 6 am conversation blew me away. Actually it made me laugh that hard on the inside (with a straight face on the outside). 

Miss 2: it’s a bit stinky in here. Mummy have you been doing poppies (farts) ? 

Me: No! (In all seriousness I hadn’t) 

Miss 2: it must’ve been Daddy. It stinks. 

Me: it must’ve. (Except I couldn’t smell anything at all!) 

Ah yes a laughing the morning is exactly what you need to kick off your day. A day that by 8am I had been wee’d on and phlegm’d on – all before school drop off. This is the life ladies! 😂

Announcing News

If you’ve read my blog for awhile you’ll know one of my pet hates is Facebook related bad behaviour. 

In this segment of my blog/rant (sorry in advance) you’ll read about another Facebook etiquette slip up far too many people (in my opinion) partake in. 

The Facebook announcement of news… That isn’t your news! And let’s take that one step further, the people’s whose news it is hasn’t announced it yet. Yes.. those announcements. 

To set the scene, Couple A are having a baby. Yay for them. But they aren’t a public announcement type of couple, 100% their choice. 

Their MIL takes it upon herself to announce it on Facebook. Ok, so this first faux pas you could excuse as soon-to-be excited grandparent behaviour, so you maybe let that slide. 

Roll on the day of the baby’s birth. The new parents inform their family of their new arrival and they get down to business of getting to know their beautiful baby and becomming a family. 

Enter MIL – announcing the birth of the baby bearing in mind said MIL is “friends” with almost everyone in the town where the new mother grew up.

I just don’t understand. 

Facebook is a great – don’t get me wrong, I waste far too much time on there. But, if it’s not your news and you haven’t been specifically asked to announce news by the person whose news it is, then don’t announce it. 

That’s it rant over. If you made it this far I thank you 😉 

No way Jose!

So I can thank the recent visit of my MIL for the next level of sass my 2 year old has. 

My darling MIL thought it was cute to teach Miss 2 the saying “no way Jose”. I can’t actually think of what was running thru her mind, or how she thought this phrase would be used. But unluckily for me it’s in context and used at exactly the right time that totally windes me up. 

A message to that girl in her late 20’s-early 30’s

You say “I’m not having kids because I’m career oriented”, I highly doubt that’s actually what you think. Maybe your struggling with fertility or your just not ready or maybe you just don’t want to. That’s ok, because it’s your life and your choice. 

But I’d ask you please, don’t say it’s because your career oriented. There’s enough stigma associated with women returning  to the workforce after having babies and they work their arses off to prove they are just as valuable employees as they were pre child. They make choices and sacrifices to have a career and a family. Both can be done and they can be done very successfully. So please, don’t make excuses for your life choices, it’s your life and you don’t have to justify your decisions in any kind of way. 

When you say you don’t have children because your career oriented then you imply that women who do have children aren’t. So please stop it 

Parenting Fails

This afternoon my husband and I failed. The epic-ness of our failure was so monumental I thought it was important/funny to share with my blogging mummas/papas. 

So … To set the scene… 

We’d all arrived home after work/daycare and decided to make the most of daylight to head down to the park to kick a ball. 

We all hurry out the door and head off to the park. Well it wasn’t that simple, there was the conversation with the toddler about the pros and cons of wearing running shoes over flip flops – she elected flip flops – so we just went with that. Followed by the insistence that she had to take her bike – then she refused to pedal and wanted us to push it. All before getting out of the driveway. But you get it. 

Anyway so fast forward 20 minutes and instead of kicking the ball we’re playing chase. I catch her, swing her up and next minute she’s peeing on my hip/back. 

Yep …. We forgot she wasn’t wearing a nappy and that we’re in the midst of toilet training. 

So the next minute I’m helping her/showing her how to wee on the grass. Life101 in the middle of a suburban park with commuter traffic rolling past. Yes that was us. 

I would’ve much prefered if it’d been while bush walking or camping with no toilets or crowds in sight. But with this parenting gig we don’t get the luxury of choice of when these awkward things happen. 

At least night time I don’t think I’ll forget we’re toilet training!