Jenerally Speaking,

Week two; long words, one blood stain, knitted boobs and more long words

I'm not going to lie, my brain is feeling fairly worn out. And my eyes are completely dried out from the air conditioning. They are So Sore. I think I'm going to have to invest in eye drops. 

This week has involved a lot of words. Long words. Words like anterior pituitary gland. And lactocyte. And myoepithelial cells. And areolalobular. I can't even remember the words from days before today, because I think my brain is at capacity tonight (plus I'm distracted by watching season two FRIENDS). 

It's been fun though. I'm really enjoying learning more. It's been a lot of anatomy and physiology, most of it expanding on stuff I knew a bit about, but some of it brand new. My brain has been blown a couple of times, which is always fun. 

On Monday we got to don our uniforms for the first time and go into the skills labs. Moving and handling, HCAI (healthcare associated infections... or it is healthcare acquired infections? Not sure, now I think about it) and hand washing technique and then, saving the best for last, abdominal palpation. That was both interesting, fun and hilarious. The model abdomens are not terribly realistic. When one side becomes concave on the slightest pressure, it's quite clear how the fetus is lying! There was also a fake abdomen which we took turns to wear - that was even worse! The doll kept sinking so low it wasn't possible to palpate the head in the pelvis, so I was forced to pop my head up the fake vagina to hold it a little higher. Unsurprisingly, this looked a bit dodgy! 

On that day, I also had my occupational health appointment, and as a result of my vein failing to stay clotted shut after I'd applied pressure and the traditional little plaster, blood ran down my arm when we were talking, dripping onto the carpet and my brand new white tunic. It really made us all realise that white is a cruel colour of uniform to give a student midwife. We're going to be constantly scrubbing out bodily fluid stains. I'm happy to say that (possibly for the first time in my life) I did manage to successfully  remove the stain, so I'm going to take that whole experience as a bonus bit of preparation. 

We've also been learning about the booking appointment (having had two of those, I felt at an advantage, although the paperwork has definitely got longer since 2014), physiological changes in pregnancy and, today, the physiology and mechanics of breastfeeding. Lots of the important knowledge we need before we head out on practice, and as I said, I'm at an advantage because I've experienced all these things, but there are just so many words for anatomy and processes that I'm trying to absorb and then use. I can only imagine how mind-blowing it is for students with no prior experience to link it all to!

I loved the Birth Conference on Wednesday. I got to listen to two women I really admire, Soo Downe and Sheena Byrom, talking with passion about a topic I get really exciting about (Epigenetics! Microbiome! Compassion!). The other speakers were really interesting and inspiring too, and I learnt from them about areas and organisations I knew less about. 

On Thursday, I opted to be late in as it was Curiosity Cafe with Miss O's class at school. It was a good decision. She'd have been the only child without a parent there if I hadn't gone, as Rachel is still pretty incapacitated by her back.

After an exciting snowy walk to school, Miss O kept turning round to beam at me during the carpet phonics session and we had the best time doing the activities together. Her reading and letter formation really is coming along beautifully. She was so proud of herself. It took me a while in the evening to catch up on the part of the lecture I'd missed in the morning, but it was worth it. 

This weekend my plan is to get Monday and Tuesday's pre-reading under my belt, then go back over this weeks notes, following up on some bits and going over parts I don't quite have down yet. I am thinking that if I just file these notes and don't re-read them at least once more, the majority of the long words are going to drift away from me again. There's also a community tree planting session to enjoy and time to spend with my favourite people.

 

P.S. I really am brain tired. My words are flowing about as well as a leaky tap!

 

A letter to my children in 2040

Dear Master R and Miss O, 

I'm sorry. If you're still alive and well now, you're 27 and 25. Are things bad? I'm afraid, with the way things are going right now, they're very likely to be. 

I'm sorry, because right now, as I type this in 2020, I know. And I have known for some while. Back in 1995 I learnt about pollution and climate change in my Year 6 geography lessons. Lots of us did. I was frightened. Really, truly frightened. But I didn't know what to do. I was just 10. What could I do? 

Now and then, as I was growing up, I would remember that the planet was dying. No, not dying. Being murdered. Being deliberately murdered by a small group of people in order for them to become enormously rich. I'd remember and it would land on my shoulders like a mountain. I would feel depressed and hopeless and couldn't see the point of anything. But then I'd push it to the back of my mind again so I could carry on living. Most of us did.

What were your teenage years like? Was it hot? I imagine it was. The last couple of summers have involved heat waves which have pushed us from the garden to the lounge, to stand in the slightly cooler house, moving as little as possible and still sweating and uncomfortable.

How were the storms? They've started blowing with more energy recently. Our back door has been broken by a gust of wind. My car has needed repairing after I drove over a huge branch which had been blown down by Storm Dennis. The fences are going to need repairing again. I know that's nothing compared to what other people are facing. Floods have submerged homes and cars alike. And that's just in the Global North. 

How's Australia this year? We watched in horror as it burnt this year. The Amazon is on fire too. Even the Arctic Circle has experienced fires. Are koalas extinct yet? Do you remember koalas? 

Today, Master R, you did your homework. You've been learning about Ernest Shackleton, so your challenge was to design your own animal evolved to survive in polar habitats. You created a Snowtropolis; a bird with webbed feet and a hooked beak. Apparently it eats Arctic hares, can live on sea and land and is about the size of an Arctic Fox. We managed to talk you out of letting it breathe fire. Your creativity knows no bounds!

Is there anywhere left that your Snowtropolis could live? Are there polar bears? They're clinging on by a thread at the moment. I don't think they have long left. The ice is melting faster than even the most pessimistic predictions. Feedback loops are speeding it up. 

Are you hungry? I'm sorry if you are. I'm debating whether we should start stock piling food, but we can't stockpile food for the rest of our lives. And anyway, it wouldn't be fair. Other people can't do that. People in Global South are already suffering from famines. I keep trying to warn people here that famines are coming for us soon. These heatwaves are eventually going to cause the wheat crops to fail. And by eventually, I mean fairly soon. But folk look at me like I'm bonkers. Or look concerned, but then push that scary thought away so they can get on with their week. I don't blame them. It's terrifying. 

I'm also wondering if we should move to a house with a bigger garden, so we can grow fruit and veg in our own garden, rather than having it at the allotment. I love the allotment, but when the food shortages comes, as scientists say they will, we won't be able to protect our crops there. They'll be stolen before we're able to harvest them. 

Are people stealing? Is society surviving thus far? Are people managing to go to work and be civil to one another or is it all falling apart? I lie in bed and wonder how we'll cope. I wonder what will get us; the hunger, or the civil unrest... or some almighty storm, blowing down the house. I wondered the other night, as Storm Ciara whistled round the rooftop, whether we should build an Anderson shelter in the garden. The hobbit hole is going mouldy again. Maybe we should just replace it with something more practical. 

I'm so worried for your future. I am fighting for it, I promise. I've spent too long feeling the despair and grief, but not doing anything. Now I will fight. As much as I can fit it in around raising you and studying. I do wonder if it's worth spending three years studying to be a midwife. How long will I get to practice before the NHS crumbles under the weight of either the conservative government or climate and ecological collapse? Would it be wiser to just spend the next three years working for Extinction Rebellion full time? In 2040, if I'm still alive, will I regret that choice? 

Will it be enough? Are we doing enough? We are trying. I'm sorry if it hasn't been enough. I hope that now, things aren't as black as they are currently on track to be. I hope that Boris Johnson and Donald Trump have been consigned to the history books alongside such names as Adolph Hitler, as crazy nutters who somehow conned people into voting for them. I hope your leaders are forward-thinking people like Greta Thunberg and Jacinda Ardern. I hope countries have started working together, caring for one another rather than becoming increasingly isolated and suspicious. I hope people woke up in time and started living in a truly sustainable fashion.

Talking of fashion, is that over? Please tell me people aren't still making money from arbitrarily choosing "looks" that are key for a given year or season, and persuading other people to pay money for this fast fashion. Please tell me that clothes are made sustainably, patched up and re-purposed when damaged and then recycled in a circular system. And GDPR. Is that over? Do we measure our countries success based on how much carbon is being absorbed and how happy people are? 

At the moment, it's all hanging in the balance. I'm trying. We're trying. We're shouting at the top of our lungs that we need to CHANGE NOW. If we failed, I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry that you won't have the chance to live in peace. I'm sorry you're hungry. I'm sorry you're scared. You may not even get to live as long as me. I imagine you probably won't have children. How could you bring them into a chaotic, collapsing world? I don't regret having you. I never could. But I am sorry for what you're likely to go through. I will fight for you. 

With all my love, rage and hope, 

Mama

Scribbling, sculpting and studying

Well, that's the first week wrapped up. Overall, it's been really good. I wasn't terribly excited about the first week, aware as I was that much of it would be fairly dull induction business.

Monday pretty much was, with person after person visiting us in the lecture room to tell us that our brains would be so full by the end of the day they'd hurt, then to inform us of how they could help to support us in various ways. It was good to find out from the IT guy how we could log into emails and brightspace and find our way around. It was interesting finding out who sorts out the placements and how. But my brain did not feel full by the end of the day and it certainly didn't hurt. Plenty of space left, desperate to do some biology!

Tuesday was very much more exciting. We learn about the structure of the course and how we'll be taught and assessed. Writing when our practice taster days and trust induction days would be in my planner really perked me up... they're within reach! 

Wednesday was a VLE day, so I did some of the reading and note-taking on videos on Tuesday evening, then spent the day with the small people and did the rest of the reading in the evening. It was quite a bit of reading, actually, but lots of it was just refreshing my memory of things I either already knew, because going through IUI really enriches your understanding of the menstrual cycle, or had recently read in the Myles textbook I've been slowly ploughing my way through.

It was wonderful to spend the day with Master R and Miss O. Although actually, because I decided to go to Bury for one errand, then decided I should do an extra errand as well, then realised the clonking car really did need to pop to the garage, it turned into a really full day! But we fitted in frisbee and exploring at Nowton Park, lunch at Sainsbury's, and some great block building in the lounge. Some of it while I examined the insides of my eyelids REALLY CLOSELY. 

Yesterday, Thursday, was definitely my favourite day because it involved REAL LEARNING. Group work in the morning, sharing our knowledge of the menstrual cycle. It was rather challenging, but I came out of it with a deeper understanding, from discussing it with others. And in the afternoon we were going over reproductive systems, which was interesting, especially some of the unusual diagrams and slides, the likes of which I've never seen before. We ended with a quiz, which we had to race to answer on our phones, which was unbelievably tense!! I didn't mind until I got a couple wrong, then I was really cross with myself, because this is stuff I do know... but I managed to pull it back towards the end and finished on the podium, so I was relieved about that!

Also, I was astounded that modern phones essentially turned our lesson into a TV gameshow. How times have changed since my day, when we scribbled answers on paper and passed to a friend to mark! Oh god. Could I be any more middle aged?!

Today we had a session in an IT lab, practising searching the library catalogue and learning about referencing. To be honest, considering that you can just click an icon when you're looking at a book/journal/dissertation on the library catalogue and it brings you up a copy and paste text to put in your references section, I don't think there's any excuse for referencing incorrectly in this day and age! When I was at Uni, you had to painstakingly type out all the information and format it correctly! Studying has got so much easier!

During our lunch break... actually... first, can we just discuss this lunch break business? We get a HALF HOUR break every morning; more than enough time to wee and drink a hot drink. We then get AN HOUR, sometimes MORE for lunch. AN HOUR!! I'm finding this both an insane level of luxury, given my previous careers as a mother and primary school teacher. The last time I had lunch breaks this long I was a drama student at UEA! Next week, I'm going to make sure I've got the resources to do pre-reading during this hour, because as lovely as it is to sit around chatting to my colleagues, I'm not wasting five good hours every week!! 

Anyway, during today's lunch break, we had our fittings for our student midwife trousers and tunics, which was really exciting! We didn't expect to be collecting our kits that day, but they'd brought loads of boxes with them, so we we were able to!! I also tried on a dress, and I'm definitely ordering one of those, because I felt very much like a real midwife in it. Especially now I can sketch the levels of oestrogen during a menstrual cycle and describe meiosis! Still a long way to go... but I'm several little steps forward!

We had another group task this afternoon, and I enjoyed it immensely. We were challenged to discuss our experiences and feelings around birth and represent them using paper, pens, plastercine or our own bodies. Unsurprisingly, no group chose to act out a scene or a tableau. In my group, we'd got quite a range of experiences, involving both positive, empowering births, and devastating and distressing ones. We modelled these differences with plastercine, creating a scene featuring an armless, powerless birthing person lying semi-recumbent, while powerful, tall people stood looking down at her and then an empowered woman birthing upright. I think we did quite well to demonstrate how different birthing experiences can be, and how differently they can make people feel. Huge juxtaposition. 

This weekend, we've got a community gardening session to plant five trees to begin our Scattered Orchard tomorrow morning, then nothing particular in the calendar. Master R has some homework to do and I have some pre-reading to do. And there's hoovering, dusting and some laundry to be done too. But I've mopped the floors this evening, so that's already ticked off. Oh, and I'd like at least one lie-in. Not because I'm tired from Uni. A 9:30-3:30 day with at least 1.5 hours of breaks I can cope with. Miss O waking in the middle of the night each night and interrupting my sleep, then waking for the day at 5:30 is rather less welcome! It would also be really good if Rachel's back would release from its current spasmy, ceased-up position, so she can move around a bit more freely. And not just because doing the majority of the jobs around the house is tiring... mostly because she's in such pain! 

The mornings have been pretty easy this week, because since January, I've been making sure I get up at 6:30, so I can fit in all the morning jobs, including a work out and some yoga for me, and still have us all ready to leave the house by 8:30. I've been quite deliberately rehearsing this, slightly less relaxed routine so that by the time Uni came around, I'd know what I could and couldn't fit in. It's worked perfectly, as I've needed to leave at 8:20 to drop the children at their holiday club, just as we'll need to next week to walk to school. Some mornings, I've even managed to wash up the breakfast things! Since November time we've been making sure packed lunches and reading practise are done in the evening rather than the morning, to make getting up and out a little less stressful. 

So far, it's all ticketty-boo! 

P.S. I'm well aware it's not going to be ticketty-boo throughout, so I'm relishing it while it lasts!

End of this Era

Today marks the end of an era. Quite a big era, actually. The era of me being a stay-at-home Mummy. 

From January 2013, when my maternity leave began (actually, it began on the very day Master R was born, since I didn't start it until term started back. Good timing young man!) until today, I've been an almost completely home-based Mummy. 

Yes, I went back to work one day a week between Master R's  first birthday and Miss O's arrival. And I kept myself busy, helping to run the Baby and Toddler Group, starting up Suffolk Mobile Sling Library, volunteering at the University of Suffolk now and then, as a service user, working on the ElmsWild Flowers project and getting involved with Extinction Rebellion. But mostly, I've been reliably about. Present physically for my two small people, if not always in spirit. 

It's been a hard era, I'm not going to lie. Harder than I imagined it could be. The emotional fatigue I experienced, caring for two smaller humans, day in, day out, what staggering. I hadn't realised how important alone time was to me, until I didn't have any. I didn't know it was possible to love your child so much it hurt, but simulataneously long to do something other than play dinosaurs or make believe. This era has been marked by sleep deprivation, childhood illnesses leading to quarantine (ugh, who likes quarantine?!), debilitating insomnia and tantrums. So many tears and tantrums. Many of them mine. 

But it's also been undoubtedly the best era of my life. I became Mummy. Twice. That is quite simply, still magical to me. I longed to be Mummy for so long. I felt like it would never really happen to me. Yet it did. I grew two humans inside me, birthed them, nourished them, slept beside them, doted on them, cared for them, taught them to speak, sign, sing. Watched them grow and learn and struggle and succeed. I now know what it means to love unconditionally. What it means to hold a sleeping child and weep as you beg them not to grow a centimetre taller or a minute older. And what it means to celebrate their milestone moments, even as you grieve for the younger them they're leaving behind. 

All eras have to end eventually. And this one has come to a slow, natural close. From Monday, I'll be a studying Mummy. A working Mummy. A Mummy AND a student midwife. 

It's been really nice to have 4 months to sort my life out. On that first day, having dropped Master R and Miss O BOTH at school for the first time ever, I drank a cup of tea and made a big list. A list of all the BIG JOBS that I wanted to get done, so I could start University with all my ducks lined up. With the house, allotment and sling library all ship-shape and ready to survive three years of me being much busier. (Or at least, differently busy. You can dust or wash up while supervising children, but not while you're on placement at a doctors surgery.)

In the last four months, I've worked hard pretty much every day and I have:

• Sanded down and re-painted the five upstairs doorframe.

• Re-painted all eight internal doors. 
• Created 23 compilation videos, from April 2018-December 2019.
• Sorted out all the photos on my laptop, tidied up our photo collection on Dropbox and deleted unnecessary files and programmes from my laptop, so it's ready for a new lease of life as a student laptop. It now works slightly faster than the previous snail pace it had ground down to. 

• Re-decorated our bedroom. This was a long, long-awaited task and it took us until January to finally decide how we even wanted to decorate it. And it looks so brilliant now, I'm thrilled. It took many hours, but it's the relaxing haven we wanted to create.

• Made a blind for the bathroom, only 9.5 years after we moved in! 

• Finished the pond construction and planted an apple tree in the garden.

• Prepared for and taken part in the October Rebellion. Yes, I played samba in Trafalgar Square with about a hundred other rebels, slept on Horse Guard's Parade with a clear view of Number 11 Downing Street and sang musical numbers while on night watch on the road block. Magical. 

• I also took Master R on the School Strike March in September, and joined a Re-Think HS2 march in December. Plus I've done some sitting in the road in Cambridge. And several samba sessions various places.

• Created four photos albums; Master R's first five years of craft and drawings, our Netherlands holiday album and Miss O's much delayed first and second year albums. 

• Dismantled, emptied, then re-filled the compost heaps at the allotment. Then I spread all the soil over the entire back bed, which I'd previously cleared of weeds, plants and rotivated. Also tidied the back area, created a shelf and sorted all the chicken wire.

Before

During

After

And then after a bit more re-enforcing later

Lovely today shelf. 

• Re-built two wobbly allotment raised beds. 

• Re-enforced an entire fence at the allotment. 
• Built a cold-frame at the allotment, which just needs some gaps filled before we start using it in the spring.

• Collected a load of horse muck, then had another delivered at the allotment. Between us, we've spread it across three raised beds. There's more still to spread, but that can be done at weekends in the future.

• Gone round the house with various tins of paint, painting over all the chips, doodles and sticky finger marks, so it's all the right colour and a lot less tatty looking. 
• Rubbed down and re-waxed the kitchen table.

• Fixed various bits of coving that were falling down, and re-painted them. 
• Taken down, then more firmly affixed two curtain rails which had been damaged by children pulling on the curtains!
• Attended about 15 sling library sessions, and a meeting, to make sure all the paperwork was sorted out ready for me to hand it over to by good friends and colleagues. 

• Fixed the wall in the kitchen where the sling library used to be stored and re-painted all visible skirting boards in the kitchen.

This was just after I'd scratched off the flaky paint! It was quite a state!

• Sorted out the boxes under the bed, got rid of a bunch of stuff and cleared some to the loft so I have somewhere to store textbooks, folders and other Uni kit.

I've also continued with some midwifery related reading, and sourced some kit I'll need. Second hand folders are awaiting filling, books are ready to be read or used as reference material. Oh, and I've also had to dedicate many hours to getting Leo to bond with our new rabbit, Rosie. Just signed her adoption paperwork today, since they're now getting on wonderfully and enjoying life together in the garden. 

I'm feeling quite pleased. Yes, there are a couple of things that didn't get done. I've not extended the accidentally-shrunk hall curtain, but that's only a 30 minute job one day when I finally find some suitable fabric. Then I'll be sure not to wash it again. Lesson learnt! And I didn't do a deep clean and re-organise of each room, but we're essentially quite tidy people anyway. And I do need to try to get my laptop to communicate with my phone and camera, because at the moment transferring photos and videos from either is a ghastly task. I might play with that this afternoon. Actually, I shan't have time. There's the Valentine's Cake Sale at school to help with. 

So that's it. The end of this era. I'll still always be Mummy, of course. And I'll still always have a list of bits and pieces that need to be done about the house or allotment. I'm still going to keep my toe in the Rebellion, because we REALLY need to the Rebellion to work. And soon. And I'll keep in touch with my sling library buddies, and maybe even drop in on them when there's a weekend Baby Fair or something I can visit. 

As of next week, it'll be the start of a new era and I'm excited to get started. Apprehensive too, because I am fairly aware of many of the challenges maternity services are facing and creating for birthing families. But I'm keen to learn lots and start supporting women and their families through the biggest and what should be greatest transformation of their lives.