Mami Rhedeg

  This Cristmas has been tough, for many reasons, but not for the ones that many people who know me will probably expect. This year's pre-Christmas build up was especially hard, as we weren't able to do pretty much any of the things I've done with my lg for the first 5 Christmases of her life - not because we didn't have the time, but because chance would have it that she wasn't with me for those days / weekends this year.  (That and not being able to ice skate whilst 6 onths pregnant!).  So this year, there was no trip to the Llanerchaeron Christmas Fair to see Santa, no Santa at the Old College, no electronic card making, no pre-Christmas cinema trip and no visit to the Garden Centre either.  That, in itself, has been hard - and it's taken its toll on me (and those closest to me too).   We did manage to make it to Crib Service and Christmas Parkrun though.  Both much needed and enjoyed family activities.   But we did manage to ...

When I was pregnant with my lg (7 years ago now... Eeek). I never felt like I belonged in any way to a pregnant Mam club. None of my friends were pregnant nor had babies at the time. I was 100+ miles and 2.5 hours away from family, and never really got to feel the excitement of being pregnant. If I'm honest, I hated it. Lots of comments about how big I was, how I'd never manage to lose the baby weight if I ate certain things, how friends with older children were still carrying weight years later, made me paranoid about eating. I had no one to talk to who was in the same boat as me... And 7 years ago our ante natal classes were geared towards factual information about the logistics, not a chance to meet other parents with babies due the same time. By the time my lg arrived, and I was ready to face the baby groups, it was the summer holidays and everything stopped. I wanted to stay home, but that wasn't an option. So I went back. I cried a LOT. I juggled. The co...

Promises don't necessarily start with the words 'I promise to...', but do we actually think before we make a promise to someone?    Our lives, it seems, are constantly changing and evolving ... we've nearly all been responsible for breaking promises (however big or small) to someone, and felt the hurt from being the one that has been on the receiving end of a broken promise.  But, although life can make it hard to keep them, maybe the answer is that we need to be more realistic in the promises we make to ourselves and others.   Our lives seem to be propped up by casual promises, statements like: "I'll message you to organise lunch later."  "Let's go for coffee next week." "Come to ours for dinner next week." "I'll let you know next time we're going, and you can come with us." How often do we say these things, but don't stick to them?  Do we ever think of the effect that not sticking to wha...