The Yummy Mummy’s Survival Guide

For Harry

OK, I know it’s not much, and you’ve read it already at least once, but it’s the gesture that counts. Maybe you could use it to stop the spare room door from banging when the window’s open? Oh, and while you’re in there, is there any chance you could have a quick look at my laptop—it’s gone funny again. Dinner at 6? Love you xx.

Table of Contents

Cover Page

Title Page

Dedication

A small note to begin with, just in case you wanted to know

What is a Yummy Mummy?

PART ONE Before It All Starts

PART TWO Pregnancy—The Early Days…

PART THREE The Middle Bit

PART FOUR Nearing the End

PART FIVE The Birth

PART SIX A Yummy Mummy is Born

PART SEVEN Your First Few Months

PART EIGHT The First Year

PART NINE You

PART TEN Baby Things

PART ELEVEN Life With Your Baby

PART TWELVE New Relationships

PART THIRTEEN Going Back to Work

And Finally…

Details of Stockists, Services, Manufacturers, Organisations

Index

Acknowledgements

About The Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

A small note to begin with, just in case you wanted to know

Here’s the only breathing exercise in this book: I am not a perfect mum (sharp intake of breath). In fact, I have never met a perfect mum (and another), and the chances are fairly high that you won’t turn out to be faultless in every way either (and, exhale). Despite our best efforts at self-improvement, domestic perfection and bum-firming, we are all real, faulty women, and we all come with a certain amount of rubbish-Mum-ness attached. And thank goodness for that, because otherwise it would all be hideously boring, and we’d have nothing to moan about.

My own route into motherhood was fast and furious: while my more sensible university peers went off to make money by getting fast-tracked into one glamorous, exciting career or another, I threw my science degree in the ‘I have no idea what to do with you’ bin, asked Mr Right to marry me (he said yes, thank goodness), and I found myself on my own fast-track to maternity clothes a year later, at the grand old age of 23.

Gulp.

And then the trouble started: the dreary, mumsy parenting books available to me left me, without exception, feeling like a highly unattractive, undesirable, lardy has-been, condemned to a life of grime, grudge and goo. According to these books, I would spend the rest of my days wearing shapeless, stained clothes and sharing vomit and poo stories with other lardy have-beens. My brain would be locked away in a secure vault to which I would be given the key some twenty or so years later.

Oh help! What had I done? Where were the beautiful, funny, appealing books about motherhood, which would treat me like a thinking woman complete with faults, worries and a shoe obsession, instead of like an impossibly perfect mother? Why couldn’t I find a stylish book about motherhood, which I wouldn’t have to hide behind a copy of In Style on my way to work, and which would tell me how my life would change in the coming year?

And that’s where the idea for this book started: I would write it myself.

Alas with a new baby, a sizeable streak of laziness and a Blockbuster video down the road, I didn’t get round to it, and it was soon forgotten, along with a million other ‘brilliant ideas’ I had dreamt up while making playdough sausages.

But now, eight years and three children later, I am coming under increasingly heavy fire from a barrage of questions about pregnancy and motherhood, launched at me by those same old friends, who are finally coming to join me down in the playground. They want honest, practical, relevant information about how to do the Yummy Mummy thing, and still keep their bodies, brains, wardrobes and lives in stylish order, and they seem to think I know…

In a bid to get some peace and quiet, I have written down everything I have learned about pregnancy and what you may experience in the first year of becoming a mother, in the most unpatronising, honest, unfrumpy way I can. Yummy Mummies have complicated, ever-changing lives, and we are required to glide seamlessly between different moods and personalities at the drop of this season’s must-have headgear. To reflect this, I’ve written this book in several different moods, which you can turn to as you need them. You will also find extracts from my diaries, which should cheer you up and offer plenty of reassurance, and there are also strings of pearls of maternal wisdom from gorgeous Yummy Mummies, to whom I aspire daily.

The only thing I ask of you, dear, gorgeous reader, is that you are able to laugh at yourself. The key to surviving motherhood is to have a wicked sense of humour, and never to take yourself too seriously. And that’s it. Enjoy it, take it with a pinch of salt where required, and I hope that some of this helps!

What is a Yummy Mummy?

It’s probably best that we get this rather crucial question answered before we go any further, just so that we are all on the same wavelength.

There are loads of different definitions being bandied about these days, so I shall give my own one here, and refer to it throughout the book when I talk about Yummy Mummies.

Yummy Mummy, n.

A mother, of any age, who does not identify with the traditional, dowdy image of motherhood. While she knows her Gap from her Gucci, she is just as happy with a charity shop bargain as an occasional, very necessary splurge, and doesn’t want to give up on trying to look lovely just because she is a mother.

A Yummy Mummy is a skilled all-rounder: she tries to keep fit and healthy, loves spending time with her children, knows it’s OK to break down and cry and (almost) never forgets to cleanse and moisturise. She can cook, amuse a baby and make work phone calls at the same time but, never one to take herself too seriously, she can laugh when it all goes wrong. A Yummy Mummy tries not to let being a good, loving mother utterly compromise her personal style and outside interests, and is always there to help her friends when they need her. Often juggling family and a job, she finds being both a mother and an independent woman very hard at times, but tries her best to make it work for her family, and for herself.

A Yummy Mummy is the ultimate modern woman.

PART ONE Before It All Starts

Prepare, Prepare: What You Should Definitely Do Before Getting Pregnant (or what you should have done months ago, but could start now)

Growing a baby is like any other form of DIY: preparation is key. How you react to this first section depends entirely on your current situation (and on your sense of humour). If you are not pregnant yet, and you bought this book because you are somewhat curious about what lies around the next Big Corner, or you hope you might get pregnant soon, this is very good news: you still have a few months to play with before the big OFF, and there’s plenty of opportunity to lay down some solid foundations.

If your bun is already rising in the oven, and you are merrily cruising down the road to Yummy Mummyhood, then some of what you read may sound a tad gloomy and depressing, and you’ll be kicking yourself every paragraph or so. (As maternal luck would have it, one of the manoeuvres pregnant women can still do is kick themselves. Where’s the justice?) Please try not to get too cross, and take heart from the fact that much of this preparation is never done by millions of perfectly gorgeous and healthy mothers every year.

For everyone else, like me, here are some things which, if you do them for about six months before you become pregnant, should reward you with an easier and healthier pregnancy, and will make life after the birth a lot less, errr, wobbly.

1. Get Fit

As the perfectly formed people at Nike tell us, JUST DO IT. Even bold, capitals, italics and a forceful-looking font don’t convey the importance of this Top Tip. Obviously, if you’ve never seen a pair of trainers before, then now is not a good time to start marathon running. But, being the self-respecting woman that you are, you probably look after your body well, and are reasonably fit already. This is excellent news, and a great position to start from.

Pregnancy plays the most havoc with your stomach, so if you can get your abs strong and toned before your pregnancy, you’ll carry the baby better and you will get back into shape much more easily. I do speak from experience here: I was least fit before my first baby, and have become fitter and stronger in between each of the others. (Something to do with a growing fear that I’ve been lucky so far, and everything is about to fall apart and flab out all over the place!) My body coped and recovered much better the stronger my tummy muscles were before I started expanding, and it made getting back into some decent clothes much easier. Pain, gain, blah, blah.

Babies get very heavy towards the end, and having strong legs helps with the whole ‘lugging yourself up flights of stairs’ problem. The same goes for your back: strong back muscles will make carrying the baby much easier and less painful.

Something else to start toning up is your pelvic floor muscles. Pelvic what? Ha! Now we’re really getting somewhere. Another of those ‘never heard of them before I was pregnant; will think of them for the rest of my life afterwards’ things, your pelvic floor muscles are the ones which allow you to stop weeing halfway through weeing, if you see what I mean. In a nutshell, they are completely trashed when you give birth, and unless you sit at your desk squeezing them in and holding for a count of three while your computer re-boots, you will never get on a trampoline again without incontinence pants. And Agent Provocateur don’t make those, in case you’re wondering…Strengthen your pelvic floors now, and you’ll be able to jog, jump and sneeze while your best undies stay Martini-dry.

2. Clean Yourself Out

If you’ve ever tried to detox then you’ll know what a joyous, exciting time you’re in for, but, equally, you will know how beneficial it can be. Your baby is going to grow inside you, and if you’re clogged up with toxins then your baby will probably clog up pretty soon too, because anything which is in your blood will get into your growing baby’s blood too. It takes a while to flush all the poisons out of your system, so starting the clean-up well before you become pregnant is a good idea.

3. Become a Health Freak

Your growing baby is entirely selfish, and will have no concern for your wellbeing at all. It will drain all the goodness out of your body, leaving you with the dregs, the cheeky young thing. Because pregnancy puts such a huge strain on your body, the healthier you are before you start, the better you will feel, the better your chances of having a healthy, strong baby, and the more quickly you’ll recover afterwards. And it’s after the baby is born that you need more reserves and stamina than ever…So, eat tons of fresh fruit and veg, up the iron intake (it makes you less tired), drink lots of water, get plenty of fresh air and all that other healthy stuff you know about already. You won’t regret it.

4. Take Folic Acid

‘Top Scientists’ have found very good evidence that taking 400mg of this stuff for the first three months of pregnancy can significantly reduce the risk of your baby developing spina bifida. They now recommend that you get your levels up before you’re pregnant, and that you take it throughout your pregnancy. Not a lot to ask really.

5. Take a Special Multivitamin

Only take a multivitamin which is specifically designed for pregnancy. Certain vitamins are potentially harmful to the foetus if levels get too high, and the pregnancy multivits have just the right amount of everything. Bless those Top Scientists.

Some Good News

One of the best things about getting pregnant for the first time is that it shocks you into being more healthy almost overnight, and once you’ve learned some new habits, and have managed to give up the three vodka and tonics and a kebab on the way home from work, you might just hang on to them for the rest of your life. It may feel like a brutal change of diet and lifestyle to start with, but there are great benefits. There’s a good reason why pregnant ladies are said to ‘glow’ halfway through the pregnancy—anyone who pays as much careful attention to eating well and avoiding all toxins would glow after a couple of months! See your clean-up act as the best beauty routine ever, and it might not feel so hard. In fact, for many of you it won’t be hard at all, as your new body just doesn’t feel like ingesting tons of toxins every day. Anyway, you’ll be back on the double tall lattes before your baby can say ‘Mummy, are you sure you wouldn’t rather have an organic peppermint tea?’

Common Concerns of Future Yummy Mummies

This section is for you if you have ever worried about what it might be like to become a MOTHER (in other words, if you’re just like every woman I’ve ever met). Oh, how we ladies love to worry! The list of concerns and questions all future Yummy Mummies carry around in their heads is breathtaking, and it makes one fret for the future of the human race: will anything make all you potentially fantastic mothers take the plunge and actually procreate? Will any reassuring words overcome your dread of turning into a fat, boring Frumpy Mummy, who fails miserably at every aspect of baby care, and who never sees the inside of a fancy restaurant again?

I seem to spend half of my free time pacifying freaked-out childless friends who are terrified of committing to their perceived life of drudgery, lard and frumpiness. ‘Hang on!’ I cry. ‘Are you saying I’m lardy and frumpy? Did I know what I was doing before I started? Do I know now?’ No, no and no.

However, I have learned quite a few things about what it feels like to become a Yummy Mummy, and I’ll do my best to ease at least some of the stress. Where I fail, watching anything with Paul Bettany in it should relieve any furrowed brows.

Here are some of the most common worries my friends seem to have, and some mildly helpful advice:

I don’t feel very maternal—maybe I’ll be an awful mother

This is a disaster. You will never be a good mother, and you should book in for a hysterectomy immediately. You probably shouldn’t have pets either. Or houseplants.

I’m lying, of course: very few women feel very maternal before they have a baby, and most go on to become fantastic mums. (Many don’t even feel that maternal after the birth, but it’s not something people like to talk about. I like to talk about it a lot, and so I do in Part Five).

It’s not even clear what feeling ‘maternal’ means, anyway. In a similar way to how much libido a woman has, so women have varying degrees of maternal urges, and there’s nothing to say that you should be consumed with the desire to foster every child on the planet before having a baby yourself.

‘Feeling Maternal’ could mean any, or none, of the following:

Wherever you sit on this scale before you have a baby, you will almost certainly sit somewhere else afterwards, and not necessarily at the more maternal end. I didn’t feel the overwhelming urge to have babies before I became pregnant for the first time, and I was quite able to pass babies in the street without drooling. In fact, I was barely aware of their existence until I was at least five months pregnant, and that was mainly because I was checking out groovy pram models.

Happily, something inside my brain changed the moment I held my first baby, and I have been unable to hear a baby crying or see a child in distress since without being overcome with the compulsion to cheer the poor thing up. It’s just Yummy Mummy Nature doing her bit, and luckily it works for the majority of women. I’ve also had periods of feeling very un-maternal, for reasons I’m yet to understand, but these pass and I get back to being sickeningly in love with all three of mine very quickly.

Don’t worry if you don’t think you feel maternal enough: either you will become more maternal when your baby arrives, or you will remain as you are and do a perfectly good job of looking after your baby anyway. Worrying about it now is pointless: you just have to wait and see what happens, and stop telling yourself that you’re not kitted out to be a mother. If you’ve got a heart, a womb, some self-respect and a sense of humour then you’re good to go.

I don’t want to get fat

This seems to be one of the biggest off-putters for my child-free friends. I can’t believe how many pre-pregnant, gorgeous women freak out about this. Why should you get fat? If you’re not fat now, and if you care about how you look, and if you don’t want to become fat, then why should pregnancy make you fat? It’s a bit like saying: ‘I really want to go to Antigua this summer, but I’m worried I’ll get sunburn.’ Pack some sunblock then, stay in the shade and wear a wide-brimmed hat. Bingo—no sunburn!

Seriously, though, worrying about becoming fat during pregnancy is normal, because it happens to quite a lot of previously slimline ladies. But the news is very good: if you are careful about what you eat, if you continue to exercise and if you don’t treat pregnancy as an excuse to eat all the pies, then you will almost certainly not get fat. A little rounder-of-hip perhaps, but not fat. (See You’re Eating for How Many? in Part Three.)

What about the rest of my body? Won’t it be ruined?

No, it won’t. Lots of bits of your body will change, not necessarily for the better, but with a lot of effort most of this is perfectly fixable. If you are really worried about what will happen to your lovely body when you become a Yummy Mummy, then here are some honest truths:

What if I mess it all up?

This is a hard one to answer, because I suppose you might mess it all up; you might be the worst mother ever known; you might leave your new baby in a motorway filling station by mistake because you were busy trying to open a packet of M&Ms and got distracted; your marriage might fall apart because of the sudden droopiness of your boobs; and your children might hate you forever and turn to a life of drugs and crime. You might be forced to spend the rest of your life with ‘The Terrible Mother Who Messed It All Up’ tattooed across your forehead.