It's Time to Hang Up The Guilt of Motherhood

It seems guilt should be in the job description when you fist visit your midwife.  Your new role automatically means you are guilt ridden, from day one, there is that sinking feeling that whatever you do will be wrong.  That little glass of wine when pregnant, that catnap you had whilst feeding your baby, that first day back at work.  Motherhood seems to now mean guilt ridden days.  Whether we work or stay at home we are judged by other mothers never mind politicians, journalists and anyone who thinks they have something to say on the subject.  Yesterday I sat with friends at uni and we talked about feeling guilty for studying at weekends.  All feeling that we are not doing the best as we are studying or on placement all week so our weekends should be spent entertaining our children. Yet here we are trying our hardest to retrain and give our children a better life.  They will reap the rewards of a second income, yet we feel guilty for being away from them to study.  

Well quite frankly I've had enough of feeling guilty and being made to feel it.  Yes I was a stay at home mother, I chose to do this, it was the most perfect time of my life but also the hardest years of my life.  But I do not ever feel guilty for not trying to further my career when my babies were small.  I high five any woman who can juggle a career and a baby or toddler. Sleepless nights, teething and a job, you are amazing.  Staying at home reaps rewards but can be the stuff of nightmares so I applaud anyone who has chosen to take a career break.  As for juggling children and working from home, running a business.  I have done this and it is a miracle I kept those balls in the air for so long. No job is easy, but the hardest is being a mother, no matter how many children you have.

So whether you are working, staying at home, studying, retraining or running your own business stop feeling guilty.  As long as our children have clean clothes, three meals a day, are at school on time, have practised their spellings, flute or Spanish we can smile.  Yes that's right, smile because we are doing it, juggling and actually not doing a half bad job.  Motherhood should be more like a sisterhood, less bitching about who has the hardest day or life but applauding our successes, which may just be making it through another day. Hang up that guilt and start reminding yourself that you are achieving something every day, no matter how small that thing is.  And I am sure one day our children will appreciate what we have done and not even resent us for feeding them spaghetti hoops every so often!

Until next time, take care 

Zoe

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The Need To Focus

I returned to lectures last week and boy it's been a tough week.  The work isn't beyond me but the brutal realisation about the amount of work I need to do before the beginning of June has been horrid. To be perfectly honest I have spent the last few days feeling really quite fed up, panicky and not quite sure how to go forward.  I know I can easily write a study schedule, planning when do to what, but a vital ingredient to make that work is time.  Obviously being a mature student with a family means time is not something I have lots of.  Whilst I may finish lectures at 3.30 I then have evening clubs to run the children to, help them with their homework, sort the washing ( a full time job in itself), dinner to cook if it's my turn, make sure the children have baths, read stories, oh the list goes on! So it is often after nine o'clock before I can think about studying.  

I know I am not alone and yesterday thought about the comparisons with women running their own businesses or working and studying too.  With or without children, there is always something else to do.  Never mind all those ideas we have, the ones that we want to try now.  I am my own worst enemy when it comes to ideas.  I always seem to have amazing ideas when I'm at my busiest.  

Yesterday I had a tutorial with my personal tutor, trying to workout how I can make it through the next four months, with as little grey hair as possible and still married and friends with my children!  My husband is amazing and incredibly supportive but I know how stressy I can become and test even the most patient of people.  Anyway, speaking to my tutor has really helped and one thing she said was like a light switching on.  She suggested when I want to go off and research something interesting from a lecture to first consider if it will be beneficial for my assignments.  If it is then go ahead, read up about it. If it's not then keep a list and return to these at a later date,when I have completed my assignments.  I realised that I needed to focus and not just in my studies.  I could apply this way of working to other ideas too.  So if I have a fab idea for my book idea, my husbands business or my other writing, I will keep a list.  Then I can return to this list when I have time to think them through properly, to consider them as realistic ideas to be grown or just binned.  

A huge sense of relief has washed over me now and I feel more confident in completing my assignments.  I truly believe that there is a way we can balance our lives, getting to do most of the things we want, but we must focus on the tasks that need to be done first.  Do you struggle with focusing on the task in hand too? I would love to know I am not alone!

Until next time, take care.

Zoe

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Planning a Career Change - Taking Those First Steps

image source

So it's almost the end of January and you have trudged your way through another month of work.  Or maybe your children have headed back to school and you are seriously thinking about what you want to do, now that time is a little more available.  Making the decision to retrain can be very easy, most people know what they want to do.  But the bravest part of the decision is to actually do something about it.  Taking that leap of faith onto a new path can be the scariest thing ever.  For me the scariest part was walking into a room full of strangers on the first day of my course.  The moment I stepped into that lecture room, amongst seventy other future radiographers I knew my decision to retrain was now very real.  Few of us knew anyone else, we were all in the same boat.  Some fresh from sixth forms around the country, some like me, changing career. Yet we all had one thing in common, we were all brand new first year students.

Making that decision to retrain is one of the best I have ever made.  Yet it wasn't easy and certainly didn't happen overnight.  I was cautious, I deliberated, I kept persuading myself that I was too old to retrain. Obviously the last statement is only relevant if I was trying to enter a career that only younger people were allowed.  I spent months considering what I wanted to do, what I could do.  Options were limited by finances and location.  With a large, young family I had no intention of relocating for the course that sounded the most exciting.  Neither could I afford to fund a more vocational course.  Brainstorming became a big part of life.  Sheets of paper were filled the ideas, some crazy, some doable.  This is the most vital part of your retraining plans.  These initial ideas will be insightful and don't be afraid to let your imagination run wild. Scribble down all the things you love to do, all the types of jobs you would like to consider.  Imagine you are in Class 2 again when Miss Smith asks 'what would you like to be when you grow up?'.  This initial stage of planning your future career is vital.  

So if you are considering retraining I urge you to sit down this weekend and brainstorm.  Get a large sheet of paper and start planning your future.  Stop talking, take that first leap because it is better to be scared than bored!

Until next time, take care.

Zoe

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Cervical Cancer Awareness Week

To be perfectly honest I hadn't realised it was Cervical Cancer Awareness Week until I saw people talking about it on Twitter.  I know I should probably be aware, especially as oncology and cancer treatment is such a huge part of my degree, yet some things do pass me by.  As women we all know about the national screening programme for cervical cancer and am sure we all dread that letter every three years.  But that few minutes of being uncomfortable every third year could save our lives.  Yet still a fifth of women are ignoring these letters, even more in the under thirty age group.  In our modern world I have to ask why? This test can mean the difference between changes being detected early, before the word cancer is even a part of the sentence spoken by a doctor, to the cancer invading.  A smear test ensures cell changes are found early, to stop them growing.

Sadly cervical cancer affects about 3000 women in the UK every year.  Yet I believe this number could be reduced if more of us were a little braver, a bit less flippant and had a smear test when requested.  Treatment for cervical cancer is gruelling, but I will not go into scaremongering with the details.  But believe me, a few minutes of being uncomfortable is far preferable.  Every time I go for mine I just think I have had five children, nothing is more embarrassing and uncomfortable than that, so I can survive this!

Whilst smear tests are the main way to detect changes it is also important to see your doctor if you are experiencing bleeding between periods, after or during sex, or anytime after the menopause.  However I don't want to panic you, these symptoms can be caused by other things too.  Perhaps you are worried you will have to sit and discuss this with a male doctor. Every surgery should have a female doctor so request this when you make an appointment.  

If you are worried the following websites are very helpful. They also offer support for people with cervical cancer and their families.

Cancer Research UK 
Jo's Trust 

Macmillan Cancer 

I shall step off my soapbox now. 

Until next time, take care.

Zoe

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Encouraging Creativity - Writing Prompts for Children

I thought today I would share a fun little exercise I am trying out with my own children.  My daughters love to write little stories and of course are entering the 500 Words competition on Chris Evans Breakfast Show. But were suffering a little from my writers block so I thought of a way I could help them get those creative juices flowing.  This is when I remembered a little exercise we used at uni many moons ago when I did my first degree, as part of the creative writing module.  We would be given a person, a place and a thing and then had to write a short piece of prose including these things.  They can be the most bizarre of combinations, sometimes these are the ones that work best.  So whether your children are writing for the 500 Words competition or they have uttered 'I'm Bored' this can be a fun way to spend an afternoon.

To get you started this weeks words are :
An Alien
A School
A tin of beans

I will try and share Lucy, Amber and Kitty's stories, if they let me, in the next couple of weeks. I would love to hear from you if you have used this idea for your children or your own writing.

Until next time, take care.
Zoe
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100 Happy Days

In a bid to be more present, to appreciate the little things I have decided to join the 100 Happy Days project.  Everyday for 100 days I will be posting a photo on my Instagram stream of something that has made me happy that day.  This is not a competition to see who posts the best photos, has the best day, the greatest view.  It is a chance for all of us to stop and appreciate something little from our day.  You can use Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or Tumblr to join in.

To find out more visit http://100happydays.com/
See what's making me happy on my Instagram feed @InspiredDecor

Until next time, take care.
Zoe
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Reading - The Gift Every Child Should Be Given

image source - giddykipper - not on the high street

Since my children were about six months old I have read to them. Obviously I don't read to the older ones anymore but every night I am blessed to snuggle up with Amber and Kitty and sometimes Lucy to read stories.  This means I also get to expand the type of books I am reading too, with favourites at the moment being David Walliams and Frank Cottrell Boyce alongside Princess Poppy stories.  I also encourage all of my children to read, I even brought Jack a book for Christmas, in the hope he would sit and read again.  It seems some teenage boys aren't the avid readers they were when they were younger, devouring a book before breakfast!  

Now I will hold my hands up and admit, I am a bit lapsidaisical when it comes to making sure I listen to Amber and Kitty read their school reading books, but I do reguarly listen to them, just not always school books. I have to admit that I am pleased we are past the Biff and Kipper stage, yet I appreciate the repetitiveness of these aid in the job of learning to read.  Those first tentative steps in learning to read can be scary, difficult and I know from helping at school listening to readers many children would actually like to just give up.  They want to play, not sit and try and make sense of the letter shapes on the pages of first reader books.  I can understand that, I have days when I would rather be doing something else than reading a textbook or journal article.  But every child should be encouraged, helped and taught to read.  This is the best gift we can ever give them.  Reading opens so many doors for them, I don't just mean later in life when they join the rat race. Every sentence can help their vocabulary grow. Every page can take them on adventures that real life may never lead them onto.   Every chapter could help them understand that they are not the only one going through a tough time and may even give them the courage to ask for help or talk about their feelings.  

So I have signed up again to pop into school once a week until I head back out on clinical practice to listen to children read.  I have been doing this for several years now and I love it.  I give up an hour and half a week to sit and listen, to help the adventure of reading begin and continue.  Listening to children getting excited about the stories they are reading makes this time so worth while.  But even more so when a child who has struggled improves, their confidence growing in every page read.  This truly makes me smile.

Most schools welcome helpers to listen to children read.  They may ask you to be CRB checked, which they will pay for, but the requirement seems to vary with different schools.  Whilst parents are encouraged, grandparents, aunties, uncles and I expect godparents too, are welcomed.  Just imagine the difference you could make by sitting for an hour a week listening to children at your local primary school read.  

Until next time, take care.

Zoe

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