Retale

We have had ASDA in the Mearns for 20 Years apparently. Do you remember the days before ASDA? I do, just about.

I remember the wee William Low with its narrow isles and non-automatic non-conveyer belt tills.

I remember Cakeland, in particular my pleasure in eating a cold pie outside it, sitting on a heavily varnished wooden bench, sipping a wee coke out of a glass bottle.

I remember playing there with my violin group "Fiddlers Free" in dodgy kilts (but at least my primary seven repertoire has served me well over the years.)

 I remember some charity event involving celeb Bryce Curdy? Who he? Whoever he was he had to eat a lot of trifles for charity.

I remember there was a kind of cheapo supermarketty shop at the other end and the trolleys had poles sticking up like dodgem electric things so you couldn't take the trolley out of the shop. What was the point of that?

And it was all a bit dark and dingy, with flecky black'n'white floor tiles and big square plant thingys.

And then ASDA came. And everything went green and glassy.  And then they called The Cross "The Avenue at Eastwood" Not specially catchy. And William Low disappeared and the car park grew.

I hate being in ASDA. It gives me a feeling of whatever the opposite of well-being is and makes me want to leave.

Kanajussay?: WIDEN THE AISLES AND LEARN HOW TO SPELL MUESLI!!!!

But Anyway.

Another retail development close to my heart these days is Silverburn. All the shoppers have a shop each, and a whole level of the multi-storey each. The signs on the way in have taken on a pleading tone: "PUHLEEEZ park in the multi storey" they wail. And I dutifully do. And I can swing effortlessly in, even with the fully stocked double buggy and additional pedestrian child. And the cafes are empty and you have the assistants in M&S to yourself. But the lack of a bookshop is glaring, and this isn't compensated for by the free parking. You'd still need to go to the cross or EK. Come on Waterstones – help give us a one stop shop!  Or Silverburn will become a ghost town…

But the "Avenue" fights on, full to bursting at all times with everyone and their mother and their mother in law. With the huge draw of the baltic but fragrant M&S Foodhall; the NEXT that is so handy for returning things; the boutique "Gillian" I have never set foot in in my life (but it must be doing something right) and Imrie's (first lady or gentleman please)  - and now a real actual coffee shop - -or is it going to go bust like wot coffee shops do? I dunno.

So happy birthday ASDA. But I wish you'd give me room to swing my trolley with gay abandon. I also wish all the residents of the Mearns were chipped and the info kept on a database, so I could tell who I was likely to bump into before I set out, so I could factor in the extra time for chatting.

But until Sainsbury really price me out, I'll keep going there. Nice parking, handy trolleys, wide aisles. If only I could remember my bags ever.

Living by Proxy

I used to think I was living someone else's life. Turns out, certainly recently, that everyone else is living bits of my life. And technically "It's no longer I that lives, but Christ that lives in me". So I am having a bit of an identity crisis.

Someone else cleans my house; someone else does the garden; someone else minds two thirds of my children, three-fifths of the time; other people do two-fifths of my job. And when I had baby three, many, many others made the dinner for me and the family.

And I just sat there, feeding the baby.

So never mind getting the work-life balance right, I am having trouble getting the not-even-taking-work-into-account-right-now balance into balance. Maybe I need to eat some sweet'n'sour chicken to get my yin and yang settled down, doused nae doobt in some shao hsing rice wine (dry sherry will do…).

So, what are my life's priorities? To glorify God and enjoy him forever? To keep the laundry juggernaut moving? To load and unload the dishy? To go to Tesco to ensure the 5-a-day necessities are in the cupboard? To read to the children? To stop them getting sunburned? To shop ethically? To get a haircut? To lose weight and become fit and thin?

Priorities are all well and good, but faced with whatever you are faced with – be it weather, cash-flow, child with a weird rash, clashing arrangements, bumbled journeys, "workmen", hunger, paddling pools, crying child, child with split chin/ skint knees/ lost toy,  – you just have to deal with that at the time. And at the moment, dealing with emergencies keeps me busy almost all the time. Or at least I like to kid on it does. 

So, what is emerging to take up the rest of the evening? Cold ready brek to chip out of the bowl into the bin; toys to pitch into the corner; laundry to move on a base; thank you letters to write; velvet elvis part 7 to review….

But I can't see much of it happening. I think House is about to start. Maybe the ready-brek'll come out easier tomorrow. Maybe not. Maybe someone would care to live that part of my life for me? Och. It's OK. I'll cope.

House Proud

Since I had baby three I have not watched a single episode of CSI. Not one. In the third trimester I was watching one a day at the very least, if not five on CSI Sunday. Post-natally I have been watching an unhealthy amount of House, having discovered that it is on every lunchtime and a good few evenings a week.

But dya know what… I beat House to a diagnosis this week! By half time, even I knew that the alien DNA in the patient's system would be there because he was a chimera. I just dunno why it took House til 5 minutes before the end to figure it out.

So maybe I am watching too much House. It is great to iron to, has smashing characters and makes me laugh out loud. If I am watching TV that is not Cbeebies – the children assume it must be House, even if it is clearly Celebrity Masterchef.

(Scuse the spelling in this next paragraph ok)

So, if you are feeling tachycardic, breathless, hot, cold, are hallucinating, suffering seizures, intermittent blindness, or have rashes, lesions, tingles, numbness, discolouration, have a low white cell count, suffering nausea, amnesia, delusions or whatever – I can tell you now: it'll be lupus, Addisons, endocarditis, rabies, Guillame Baret, sarcoidosis, auto immune…. Just so long as you fess up with all the secret history, including fungi you are brewing under your sink.

Moisturise Me

I know I am getting older. I can tell. You should see the amount of moisturisers in my bedside drawer.

Since I was 16 and sitting Standard Grade Maths with a mouthful of braces, I have been moisturising my face. But in the last year this has leapt to a staggering four moisturisers in regular use to stop myself splitting open or appearing to be a walnut.

Now I have moisturiser for my poor, poor dishwashing, nappy-changing hands; moisturiser for my over-Birkenstocked feet (leave them unattended for more than 24 hours and my heels turn into recently-dug potatoes); moisturiser for my "quite-clearly-the-horse-has-bolted" stretchmarks (futile, but made with cocoa butter so it smells like "holidays"); and of course, moisturiser for my face.

I have it on good authority that this gradual dehydration will continue until I hit 70 and beyond when I will be looking for a vat of Olay to sleep in.

Canny wait.

It Sucks: The Truth About Breastfeeeding

Part 1 Positioning and Attachment

Actcherly I am a big fan of breastfeeding – the healthy choice for mum and baby. However, the whole process and experience is shrouded in myth, lies and guilt; pain and tears; sick, burps and dribbles.

So you have the baby, which is generally as barbaric as you like, and then it is time for the first feed – when they say it shouldn't hurt or you are not doing it right.

A ten pound mammal munching on your nipple?

Eh – it is going to hurt.

But for the first 72 hours there is a false sense of security: It's not so sore –it's pretty constant, but hey, I'll just have another jug of water, and another jug of water.  Funny, having drunk all that water, I don't need the toilet…I'll just and go for a wee sleep…

Aaaaaah! That's where the water's gone. Everything has gone shiny and spherical – can I invent the word melonic? So the melonic irrigation gets underway – but it is like a shark futilely trying to bite an enormous football. The milk is packed beneath the skin in what feels like bladderwrack about to pop. "Jist express a wee bit". Eh, no.

Hot flannels.

Hot shower.

Jist express a wee bit.

Stage 1: Positioning.

In the hospital the chairs are at the worst possible height for feeding with arms on the chairs just where they are in the way, and limited access to footstools. And pillows – which are hopeless when you still have a neo-post-natal bump, so the pillows skite away as the feed goes on. And your upper back aches. And your limbs go slowly numb. And you try to visualise feeding at home and thinking there's no way its going to work without a whole range of various shapes and thicknesses of pillows to tessellate.

Stage 2: Attachment.

Latching on. You want to get the baby latched on but you know its gonna hurt. But if you don't feed it you're gonna get fuller. But will the baby get its bottom lip in the right place? Will the carpal tunnel syndrome scupper the third stage of the "Tummy to mummy, nipple to nose, baby to breast" strategy?

And then it latches wrong and you are stuck there, balancing the pain of continuing with a poor attachment with the pain of taking the baby off and re-latching – with the replay of the first 20 seconds pain.

So, you get latched on – then you realise that you cannot reach anything: a glass of water, a phone, a double decker. You can see these things, just out of reach – the water shining in the glass as you slowly dehydrate. So you edge over… maybe you can just get it… oh… the baby's off… just get re-latched… right… that's the baby on… dya know – the water is still out of reach…

***

If I ever get around to part 2, you'll have the benefit of my comments on leaking, pumps, shields, cabbages, mastitis, burping, bibs, public feeding, bottles...

I am weary thinking about it. 

Too Much Information

Well – it's bound to be isn't it. I think it must be some kind of inbuilt compulsion to go over the birth story as therapy. Although it went very well and was horrible but highly comedic all round. Thanks to the NHS as usual. Great service.

So I went in on the Friday night and got rigged up to a 1960's looking gadget for a while, while listening to some poor woman refusing all pain relief and being in full labour. Then her waters broke and the midwives turfed her out of the ward to go and have it somewhere else.

Then I went to bed – although in late pregnancy, you don't sleep as such – more just go to bed and wait until morning. They expected me to labour over night and I did think I was pretty close but I held myself back from the brink until my tea and toast came at 6am.

Tea and toast had, I was banned from having the real breakfast at 9am and then was taken to the labour ward. They broke my waters and joogled me like a hot-water bottle 'til I was all empty. I was then NHS gowned and sent for a walk to bring on the contractions. So I went to the foyer to phone husband and paced about and paced about. Half and hour later husband arrived and we paced about together and I started to puff and blow but when asked I was still in denial about the contractions. It is a rock and a hard place thing. The last thing you want is to go into labour. But from my perspective, I wasn't going to get any lunch until I had the baby.

So eventually it got pretty painful and puffy and blowy so I asked for some kind of pain relief. And they suggested I have a bath. For someone like me who is big on intervention and total sensory deprivation, this should have rung alarm bells that this was a cunning plan on their part to sidetrack me away from my epidural strategy and hoodwink me into a "natural" birth. However, for some reason I felt the need to be obedient. I was handed a gas'n'air trolley and headed off to the bathroom.

Getting in that bath was the BEST THING EVER. Just brilliant. Every ache and pain disappeared. In previous labours I have HATED the gas and air – but maybe I got the hang of it this time. So I contracted away, all alone, sucking on my gas and air and putting my head back on the side of the corner bath (Sarah Beeny would have something to say…)  - I felt just like a stoned celebrity and began an internal monologue.

I knew if I didn't get out the bath I would progress too far to get the epidural. So I kept thinking I should get out. But then I would have a contraction, suck too much on the gas and air and get stoned and forget I was planning on coming out. I kept promising myself I would come out after the next two contractions… and another two… and another two.

Eventually I rubbed my remaining neurons together and heaved myself out of the bath, back into the gowns and trundled back to the room to campaign for the epidural.

I thought I'd be about 8 centimetres by this point and banned from the total sensory deprivation – but I was only 5 centimetres  - Hurrah – they called for the anaesthetist!

It was the same chap as the last time. Unfortunately for him I was still gas'n'airing and thinking I was DEAD FUNNY. Oh how I laughed. True to anaesthetist form he started with the random questions and the anti-getting-sued speech. I made it quite clear, as per two blogs ago, that I was not a bit interested in the speech but just wanted a needle in my spine and some hard drugs going up it. All through his wee speech I was going "Yup yup yup uhuh headaches…. Yup yup damage your spine… heard it …yup yup… you need to get this speech going a bit faster…. Yup yup yup ….. I know I know I know…." Repeat to fade, while gesticulating a "Wrap this up".

He said afterwards it was the fastest he's ever given the speech. I don't know why he wouldn't keep talking through the contractions – I wouldn't have minded. I don't know why they don't get you to sign a disclaimer promising not to sue. Well I do know – it is all a ploy to keep you from having the blinking epidural.

Meanwhile, inside my own wee head, I was perfectly aware that things were progressing in the centimetre department and I was having to try real hard not to make that primal grunt that gives you away. So I tried my very best and it worked for a while.

Then – horror of horrors – my gas'n'air ran out. They said -  "I'll get you another one." So she trundles out of the room. All my days I have really, really not wanted ever to feel pain like that. A whole contaction at the height of labour with not a jot of pain relief. Felt like crying and had a face of misery. It was sore. So then she comes trundling in with my replacement canister. And I am thinking, "WHY ARE YOU NOT RUNNING, WOMAN???" but I managed not to say anything and concentrate on getting stoned.

Mr anaesthetist then saunters back with his gadgetry and sets about sellotaping bits to my back and putting the needle in. It was pretty hard to concentrate what with my intake of gas'n'air and my resolve not to give away the fact that I was pretty much ready to deliver – thinking 'there is no way I won't have had a baby in the next twenty minutes, before this gadget has been fully cranked up'… So we got it all sited and he put the test dose in…

Then I grunted.

Nightmare. All the midwives eyes lit up, they clapped their hands with glee and said "I think there is a baby coming." The anaesthetist said – " I have only put it one test dose – shall I do the other?"

"Get it in, get it in, get it in." I begged, at speed. But the midwives sent him away with a flea in his ear.

Rats.

So the midwives set about putting their master plan into action. Because of my previous deliveries they wanted to deliver it quicker than the usual way. So they contorted me around like a turkey getting unstuffed crossed with a fish getting dipped in batter. And then, with some very loud roaring that left husband black affronted, I gave pretty much one long continuous almighty push – and out she came. A very beautiful baby girl.

End of Term

For my colleagues and me.

See you on the other side of the weekend hopefully.

Eek.

San’s Hor-Moans

Truly, I am very happy and trauma-free. But left with too much time on my hands I have become self-indulgent and negative. So I shall try to moan myself out of my general malaise and get back to my usual Pollyanna / Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm perspectives.

Pregnancy books. Pfff. Here’s a farcical semi-quote from one: "For most of pregnancy you can wear roomy tops and comfortable, loose joggers- but you may need one or two special items if you get very large". One or two?! One or two? Who are they kidding?

Since October I have been special item tastic and now all my special items are stretched beyond recognition and in a pile of special items that were not special enough. And donations of maternity clothes from kind friends lie untouched because I was too big to ever wear them. And the advice from the magazines is to buy your normal size but in maternity. Where do they get that from? If I had bought size 14s I would not have been able to leave the house since Christmas. Size 16 or 18 maybe.

But now I am in the worst of the worst Special Item joggers that are the only things that cover the bump. And they don’t even go in the tumble dryer, so there is a delay where I am necessarily pyjamified when they are washed. And they are navy blue. If only, if only I had bought them in black. And because they are the only thing that cover the bump I have an unfortunate half-mast ankle-look going on, with my socially unacceptable Timberland slip-on leather clogs that I have been meaning to throw out for years. It’s not a good look.

The other pregnancy book lies are too graphic for the blog I think. But the whole post natal physical recovery pages are lies, lies, lies. And there is nothing natural about childbirth. It is mediaeval, barbaric and wrong. It’s all there in Genesis.

I had a brilliant birth experience with baby 2: epidural sited, drip in, bit of gas’n’air, epidural only partially working, couple of hours and out. And I felt brilliant straight away. If I could have bottled it, I’d be using the same birth again.

Birth plans. Pah! I shall just write on mine - "Do whatever you think yourselves dears". As if there is any choice?! Everyone knows that you don’t want an epidural as such – but faced with excruciating pain, you are going to ask for one – so what is the point of stating a preference on the birth plan?

 I feel there is a market for T-Shirts to sell in the foyer of the hospital: "I want an epidural".

 My least favourite part of the whole process is when you are begging for an epidural and they come and explain the risks. I know the risks. I want the epidural. I don’t want a man taking up valuable minutes explaining that may damage my spine or have blinding headaches.

I want the epidural. In my spine. Soon as you like.

Then there are the ward cronies you may or may not see eye to eye with: People who want out within 24 hours and won’t shut up about it. Or people who sing to their babies ALL NIGHT. Or people who have had a baby like 5 hours previously and hit out with comments like "He’s not usually like this." And the Bounty Ladies who want 40 of your British pounds for a couple of photo-key-rings – with  their clippety high heels and perfect make-up. And people whose partners can’t read the sign about how many visitors you are allowed and end up with a hysterical wife overwhelmed by HIS relatives. Or people that want to self discharge even with high risk of death. Or people breastfeeding with the sole motivation of preventing the social from taking the baby off them, like the previous three…

But back on this side of birth, the general malaise is peaking. My right hand is numb – as I type my hand is not functioning properly. Both hands are swollen. My legs are swollen so I cannot kneel. My lower back aches as the bump is so heavy is it being held at a painful angle. I will be so stiff after this. I cannot reach my feet. I cannot bend in the middle. I am so glad I was not obese before I got pregnant. I am highly motivated to avoid obesity for the rest of my natural life. It must be miserable to move around the way I am having to, as a normal way of life. Everything is so much more of an effort. In addition I easily dehydrate, and if I leave too long between snacks I get all juddery and then over eat and then feel sick. I am waking up many times in the night and going to the toilet 3 or 4 times in the night, in fear that if I don’t I’ll awake at 6am in bladder agony. And my hips ache – although not as much as they did with Baby 1.

As for Baby 3 – internally, he or she is behaving very well and has given me no bother so far. He or she gets a bit restless and limby during the evening, but settles down for a rest through the night. I hope I can give him or her a decent delivery by whatever means into the world and that I don’t stuff up the name thing on a whim. That is always the danger of watching too much TV. The wean’ll end up being called Mack or Stella, Katherine or Gil, House or Stacey at this rate. Or maybe if the waters go during daytime TV it could be Lorne, Anita, Dominic, Tim, Kristian… there’s plenty of variety out there.

Name Crisis

Not that I put my children’s names on’t internet, but I feel that I am in approaching a naming crisis at some point in the next five weeks. I only have three names on my possibilities list, and none of them have even got me all that convinced.

My holiday in Elie was great, but all the while I was concerned that my waters would break and I would end up with a son called "Cellardyke" or a daughter called "Monans"…

So I figure that "Andrew" would have been alright for St Andrews, and in the Aquarium I could have got away with "Ronan", which means "little seal". Then there could be "Sandy" for the beach. I had a hard time at the Deer Park with visions of "Bambi", "Fallow", "Red" ...

However, I escaped Fife unscathed and made it back to the Southside. But now the pressure is on.

On my bladder, my hips, my mood, my blood relatives, my children…

So, namers, any sensible suggestions? Here are the rules:

1.      Avoid M and C/K sounds if possible.

2.    No more than two syllables.

3.    Preferably 5 letters, but not necessarily.

4.    Faintly but not overly Scottish is good.

5.    Faintly but not overly biblical is good.

Ahoyliday Monday

I am beginning to feel like Wordsworth's cloud. Today was a rerun of my trip to Silverburn, except it was the Tall Ship near the SECC.

But where was the rest of Glasgow?

A holiday Monday, a craft activity, a ye olde ship, a bell, deck scrubbers – and we were it, give or take a family or two. Granted, there were 15 of us… but what if there hadn't been? Who would have made the crafts? Who would have bought the plastic pirate guns? Who would have watched the children run about and climb, having just told them about the signs saying: "Do not run or climb"?

So, just as Silverburn is not overcrowded, the Tall Ship felt pretty much abandoned. Which business ventures in Glasgow are drawing in the punters and the cash? Where should we have been?

The free Glasgow Museums are all good – but on holidays you can't move for other people's children. And Edinburgh Zoo is a bit of a hike and my lungs definitely couldn't stretch to seeing the Zebras at the moment. And Son went to Kittochside on Saturday so he was all tractored out. And I am not going in a tractor anyway…

So, a non-school day was successfully put in. But maybe I should have been tucked up the in the Highlands in a luxury chalet – or in Disneyland Paris – or maybe it was in fact the optimum use of a holiday Monday.

Wordsworth's cronie Coleridge also came to mind, when the kids were scrubbing the decks:

The silly buckets on the deck,
That had so long remained,
I dreamt that they were filled with dew ;
And when I awoke, it rained.

Lines from the Ancient Mariner – with the odd use of the word "silly". Luckily there were no zombies or mariners though.