Working from home? Or working at home?

I remember when I was at work (physically), I used to meet my husband for lunch. It was cute back then, an Italian BMT to share, a bag of Sensations and a drink… to share, just simple but enough. And then lockdown was bestowed upon us, and now sharing a bag of crisps is just the tip of the iceberg. 

We used to have a rule in our house. We weren’t allowed to mention the ‘W’ word before 9pm on a Sunday when the weekend hit. Yet now I find myself talking about it all the time. It’s not about having to work, (although it wouldn’t hurt to win the lottery once in a while), it’s more about trying to find that line between work life and home life. How do you stop them merging into one?

Before, it used to be easy to walk out of the office and leave everything at the door. But times have changed, and so has the way we work. Home is where your comfort is, where you zone off and where you get your ‘zen’.. and now.. it’s where you work. 

For me, the lines have become blurred and I’m switching between roles of mother, wife and employee all in one day. Where I had time to focus on my work and give it my sole attention, I now have to juggle between entertaining a 1 year old and partially a 31 year old. Luckily, Cbeebies have supplied us with the goods, and Hey Duggee’s ‘stick song’ is forever a vibe in our house, for both of them. 

Working from home and managing a little human is definitely hard work. Where I used to be able to freely spend my time doing what I wanted on my lunches, all my time now revolves around the little whirlwind in our house. There isn’t much of a break, and when ‘nursery day’ comes, I get a little sigh of relief, because I know. I know I won’t be drinking lukewarm tea today! 

Every weekend I convince myself that a routine will be in order from Monday, we’ll try things a different way I’ll say, I’ll have ‘me’ time every week and we’ll make a meal plan for the baby. Then I strut around the house, 100% confident that I’ve solved this dilemma only to find myself in the same position next Sunday.  

The truth is there’s going to be days, weeks, or what I can confirm to be months where things just don’t go to plan. Sometimes you’ll do a weekly shop and end up having 4 takeaways that week, and sometimes you’ll cook everyday and pretend you have a YouTube channel (don’t lie, we all do it).

Recently, rather than bringing myself down for the things I haven’t done, I’ve started to take glory in the things I’ve achieved over this ‘unprecedented’ time. I’ve painted 3 walls of my living room, and realised that 60 minute makeover was a lie. I’ve actually sat down and enjoyed a whole cup of tea without it going cold and I’ve organised half of my kitchen with ‘fancy’ storage (thank you Home Edit) to make it pretty. 

I know these aren’t massive life impacting things, but they’re enough to make me feel good about myself in this situation. And that’s enough.

We’re all trying to cope with lockdown, and with the changes but sometimes we focus so hard on what hasn’t been done, we forget what we’ve achieved. Whether it’s a big thing or small thing, if you’ve done something that makes you feel that little bit better, then I’m proud of you. It’s another day you mustered the strength to understand that you can handle this. 

-n

There Ain’t No Hood Like Motherhood

Whilst sipping on my 500th coffee this morning I realised I’d not actually slept properly since the last week of August. It’s November folks, it’s nearly Christmas and Mariah Carey should damn well know that all I want for Christmas is not you, it’s a solid 8 hours of sleep!

Every morning, when I get the chance, I scroll through Instagram and see all these posts of new mums with adorable pictures of their little potato (let’s be honest, we all have some Grant and Phil look-a-likes when they’re first born, my little human looked like a turtle) and I am one of those new mums. I post the super cute pictures, with the super cute quotes but funnily enough these little humans aren’t sunshine and rainbows every day. SHOCK. 

You read books, you go to antenatal classes and you prepare for everything to come, but those first two weeks? They humble you. Remembering the first two weeks of my son being born was the equivalent of an Ibiza weekender. I don’t remember anything and I woke up every morning with what can only be described as a hangover even though I hadn’t drank. Baby cried. A lot. I cried. A lot. It was all very tense, but they don’t tell you about these stressful little things called hormones and how they’ll creep up on you after you’ve had the baby. That’s right, it doesn’t stop once you’ve popped.. It’s only just begun.

Honestly, hormones are so unpredictable it’s like what shade of sass will I be wearing today? Am I going to be happy? Am I going to be sad? Am I going to go batshit crazy at my husband for moving my pillow slightly to the left (it only happened once and I had good reason to yell at him about it) or am I going to bawl my eyes out whilst watching the Venus advert because I saw another pregnant woman on TV. Yep. I cried at an advert that sells razors … for hairy legs. Let’s face it, these hormones sometimes get the better of us and when it starts to get a little bit too much it’s so important that you remember to vent it out, because if you don’t? It builds up into this big grey cloud behind you and before you know it, there are thunderstorms, so LET (claps) IT (claps) RAIN (claps).

Speaking to other mums and with conversations I’ve had, I’ve learned that there are so many pressures on new mums. The two biggest that stood out to me were breastfeeding and to lose the ‘baby weight’. I take these two pressures, raise them and throw them in the bin because they’re absolute garbage. 

One. Breastfeeding isn’t easy, yes once you’ve got it, it works amazingly but they don’t tell you about the difficulty of trying to latch, they don’t tell you that there would be days where you couldn’t produce enough milk. Breastfeeding is always pushed and shoved in to each new mums face but the alternative of formula is never offered. At the end of the day if you choose to breastfeed, hats off to you but if you choose to formula feed, HATS OFF TO YOU TOO! Fed is best, regardless of whether it’s formula or breast milk.

Two. There have been days where I look back at pictures of me and my old life. You know the ones where you thought you were big, but you could probably have slipped through a crack in the floorboards. Those days when you could slide into a bodycon dress without your bulges looking like a 10 pack of Richmond sausages. I’m not going to lie, it did make me feel quite down because I had my own life, I had control over my body and then I was handed a little human and left the hospital with a body that hadn’t been mine for nine months. It was a major change and although it’s taken me quite a while the more I think about it, the more proud I am of what my body has become. I grew a little human and carried him for nine months in my stomach. My body may not ever get back to the size it used to be, my hair has gone from the thickness of Nicki Minaj’s thighs to malting like a labrador (damn hormones), and yes I’ve got stretch marks pretty much around the whole of my stomach but why should I care about trying to lose this ‘baby weight’? Shouldn’t we be embracing it? These stretch marks are your story. They’re a beautiful reminder of how you changed your body to create a life and bring it into this world. So forget the diet, forget people’s unnecessary opinions, embrace it and show it off. Your body is your crown, wear it with pride.

All I can say is motherhood isn’t about being the perfect mum, it’s about being a happy mum. It’s about understanding what’s right for you and your little person, and in my case, it’s normally about having 100 muslin cloths on guard because I don’t want him to puke milk on his nice clothes. The struggle is real and we are tested on a daily basis but when things get tough, it’s important to talk and use the support around you. Don’t let that cloud turn into a thunderstorm, there are so many of us going through the same thing, we’re all in the same boat and we can rain dance it out together!

-n