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.