Mum’s the Word: the shit they don’t tell you about parenthood until it’s too late
By: Rebecca Oxtoby
Tags: Mother, Humour, Parenting, Pregnancy, Baby

For Isabelle Rose:

There’s nobody else I’d let shit on me

Welcome to the club

So, you’re knocked up. Well done. However it happened — IVF, fertility drugs, behind the back of a Wetherspoons — I congratulate you. You’re in for a treat. Becoming a mum is a glorious privilege and, lucky for you, I’m here to give you a sneak peek into the slobbery, shit-stained, sleepless world you’ve signed yourself up to.

My husband, Danny, and I are new parents to Isabelle Rose, born 25.06.2019. She is incredible; a little fluffy-headed milk guzzler with big eyes and the sass of a teenager. She’s turned our world upside down in every kind of way.

Before parenthood, I was an enthusiastic career woman working as the Clinical Lead for Stroke for Speech and Language Therapy at an inner-city hospital.

Now, 8 months in (or 37 weeks, because, as you’ll soon realise, all new parents must count in weeks for no reason whatsoever), my enthusiasm peaks at sweeping the kitchen floor with my foot and a tea-towel, or being arsed to spray dry shampoo onto my sick-matted hair.

Disclaimer: in case you hadn’t realised, I’m a parenting novice. In fact, I can’t even keep plants alive. So, if you’re looking for parenting advice (or horticultural advice for that matter) you’ve wasted a fiver.

So no, this is not a parenting manual. Lord knows I haven’t the faintest fuck what I’m doing.

Instead, I’ll be revealing the biggest secrets of post-spawn life; the highest of highs, and the bottom-of-the-nappy-bin lows. Because let’s face it, it’s both ecstasy (not the drug) and misery that makes a mother.

Truthfully, writing this book has been an attempt at preserving my sanity in what has sometimes felt like a very, very long year ‘off work’ (note: ‘off work’ is a lie. Just think of it as moving to a new department where your job is unpaid, for 168 hours a week, with no training. Oh, and your boss shits on the floor).

So, grab a seat. Keep your arms, legs and bump inside the vehicle at all times. Oh, and hold on tight, it can be a bit of a rough ride.

A

Accidents

…happen. The initiation ceremony to becoming a parent is actually pretty brutal. Even with the best intentions, you’re guaranteed to sob your heart out because you not only woke the baby getting her out of the car seat, but you also accidentally smacked her head off the car roof.

Even months down the line, when you think you’ve finally cracked it, the kid reminds you that you’re completely out of your depth; faceplanting a dirty play-centre floor when you were convinced that she could sit up on her own.

I’m pretty sure I could have started a foodie Instagram account showcasing the culinary delights I’ve dropped onto her face during a feeding multi-task fail.

But I take comfort in knowing that thankfully it’s not just mums who screw up. I took perverse joy in watching Daddy’s face drop through his arse when he playfully lifted her into the air and smashed her head on the pendant light in her bedroom (Don’t worry, Isabelle was fine. She actually slept through that night — a mother’s guide to the Big Bang theory).

But nothing comes close to what happened tonight. I’m pretty sure I’m going to have long-standing PTSD. I’m so sorry Isabelle.

Tonight, Friday 13th March, will be forever etched in my memory.

My brother and his girlfriend came around for tea. 8-month old Isabelle sat patiently in her highchair, listening intently to our conversation and babbling away in response.

As time went by, we decided to move into the living room, so Danny lifted Isabelle from her chair and noticed that one side of her leggings was moist from hip to knee. In his naïve and child-free state, my brother offered to change what he thought would be just a wet nappy.

Bless.

I sat by Isabelle’s head to give him morale support as he removed her pants. It was evident that he was shocked at the amount of crap seeping from the side of the ‘leak-free’ pull-ups, so to further prove the point, I held the shit-filled leggings out to showcase the mass of poo inside them.

In slow motion, the contents fell from the leggings and onto my beautiful daughter’s open-mouthed face.

I dropped shit in her mouth.

I’m so sorry baby girl.

Arguments

A baby brings more joy than you could ever imagine. But along with cooing, lullabies and snuggles comes exhaustion like you’ve never felt before. And that, my friend, is a catalyst for a fight.

Before Isabelle, I genuinely liked my husband. Not all the time, but I could bear the sound of him breathing and didn’t want to shove a Tommee Tippee bottle up his arse every time he spoke.

Nowadays — since that tiny lodger moved in — we can’t stop bickering, and it drives me mad.

First off, that man is adamant that he is more exhausted than me, and yes, he works full-time, but 24/7 with a drooling, sleep-deprived little monster sucking on your tits until they are raw is hardly a holiday (though it does sound a lot like Kavos 2010).

And then we have the night feeds. They’re notoriously tough going, yet rather than acting like grown adults and agreeing some kind of turn-taking system, we both lie completely still in bed whenever she cries; waiting with baited breath in the hope that the other will cave first.

Occasionally, I’ll even let out a snore or a bit of dribble for authenticity. It’s all in vain though, as, by some strange coincidence, it’s almost always Mama who is left holding the baby. Literally.

Isn’t it funny how my darling husband just cannot hear the screaming cries of a hungry baby bellowing through an amplifier next to his face, but he awakens at the sound of my head lifting from the pillow?

‘Oh, oh [rubbing his bastard eyes] is she awake? Are you getting her babe?’

Arsehole.

Of course, I’m onto him, so I get out of bed with the grace of a labouring rhino, which, on occasion, has unfortunately woken Daddy too.

Oops. OK, it doesn’t make me less tired and it definitely doesn’t get the baby back to sleep any quicker, but it still feels good.

And, before we go there, I’m ready with a nappy sack grenade for the person who suggests ‘Mummy should do in the week because Daddy is working’. I’m hardly sunning it up at a Sandals beach resort; I barely have the time to wipe my own arse.

The little point-scoring bickers spanned the first few months of parenthood, and followed every sleep regression (you didn’t read the parenting T&Cs either did you? Sleep regression is a get-out clause allowing the kid to wake up whenever they fancy in the night, for no reason whatsoever), new tooth, and day when Isabelle was generally being a dick. Those days, and those fights, still rear their ugly heads, like a spot on a first date or a nursery bill.

After weeks of arguing, my poor husband offered a truce with a beautiful bunch of my favourite freesia — ‘oh great thanks, something else to not let die’

#prayforDanny

B

Baby Brain

At first, I definitely used this as an excuse for, well, pretty much every mistake I’d made whilst pregnant.

Forgotten to put the bins out? Baby brain. Forgotten to send a birthday card? Oops, baby brain. Forgotten to set your alarm for work and turned in 2 hours late? Morning sickness.

It bit me on the arse though when I was unfortunately diagnosed with the condition (thanks to Dr. Google) during my second trimester. I must have caught a pretty nasty dose as it has lasted well into the first year of parenthood.

Since her birth, I’ve found the remote control in the fridge, left my car door wide open whilst I sat obliviously in a restaurant, and climbed out of the living room window because I’d convinced myself I‘d lost my house keys, which, incidentally, were in the living room.

Last Wednesday, I arrived home from an afternoon at the garden centre to find my front door completely ajar.

Leaving Isabelle safely locked away in the car (windows down, Judge), I called my friend for morale support as I braved walking into what was undoubtedly the aftermath of a burglary.

The friend I chose to call lived in Northern Ireland, so there was fuck all she could do if I was actually confronted with an axe-wielding madman lugging my tele under his arm, but still…

As it turns out, there was no baddie and my TV was safe. I’d simply left the house that morning, put Isabelle in the car and driven off, without even shutting the god damn front door.

What a knob.

Luckily, nothing was taken (not even that bastard stuffed rabbit that whines for a carrot every 20 seconds), it was all just slightly glacial thanks to the gale-force wind running through the hallway. Danny wasn’t overly impressed.

These spells of idiocy started with an absolute corker when I was pregnant. In an equally moronic attempt at luring the emergency services, I — the bun-in-the-oven trophy wife — prepared a roast for us both one Sunday evening whilst Danny was at work. Smug with my efforts, I made a brew and sat in the lounge until he got home.

Rudely, he barely acknowledged me as he walked in. Instead, alerted by a charring scent, he ran straight into the kitchen, where he found a raw chicken perched proudly on top of the stove and a tea towel on fire in the oven.

He cooked after that (every cloud…).

Baby Monitors

I love it when she’s awake, but I love it so much more when she’s asleep.

Nothing defines ‘bliss’ like that golden hour when she has finally given it a rest and is out cold in her crib (not dead obviously, just asleep).

Each night I waltz back downstairs, grinning with delight at the thought of my first hot drink of the day (at 8.30pm) and one or two (packets) of chocolate digestives to celebrate us both surviving the day.

The only thing that tarnishes the peace is the distraction of a grainy black and white monitor screen. You see, it’s frowned upon to just leave her upstairs without having one eye on what she’s up to at all times, even when she’s doing fuck all because she is fast asleep. I guess a mother’s work is never done.

The problem is, horror films of the noughties have evidently scarred me for life. I can barely look at the monitor without visions of her being pulled leg-first off the screen to her inevitable bloody murder by a paranormal demon.

It’s recently been plastered all over the news that hackers can access baby monitors and subsequently spy on your child whilst they sleep. Horrifying I’m sure. But, if you are a hacker and fancy keeping an eye on her for me so I can watch Black Mirror in peace, please get in touch.

I swear the devices are factory-fitted with phantom cries that set the noise sensor lights off every few hours. Either that or some guy in Japan is sitting at his computer pissing himself laughing at my expense, because someone in that room is crying, and it’s not my kid.

If that wasn’t enough, my monitor has started invariably switching the screen into blackout mode for just long enough for me to convince myself that there is a man with one hand over the camera and the other smothering her face. I’m adamant that when the screen comes back on her bed will be empty and a ransom note will be pinned to her cot; my absolute worst nightmare as we’re saving for the garden to be landscaped.

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