Chez Moi

Ok I missed Episode I of this year’s series, shuttling as I was between Marne de Vallee / Chessy and St Pancras stations. But thanks to Guardian blogs and BBC’s excellent iPlayer, I have been brought up to speed. And I have to say, the actual viewing of the missed episode paled in comparison to Guardian’s Anna Pickard’s lively piece. The girl is undoubtedly hilarious!

I actually thought I would steer clear of this year’s quota as it was getting a bit stale. A scowling Surallen, the latest crop of Britian’s Supreme Twats and the po-faced trusty sidekicks was too much deja-vu. But typical of car crash telly, one cannot keep away, right? And when you can get quality television, thanks to the supremely arrogant tools on the show, why deny oneself eh?

Last year’s show was made interesting as 1. I could discuss it the next day with my team at work and 2. we had a sweep of sorts to predict the winner. (I gotta say, I never would have chosen Simon Ambrose in a million years!) So this year, I am looking to my lovely readers and my reluctant uni mates to make it all interesting.

So, BBC 1, Wednesday at 9.00 pm - mark it!

Just got back from our holiday last night. Nightmare, food-wise. Being preg and a proper veggie is a hellish combo as far as Disneyland food is concerned. See leaves, stuff your face, seems to be the thinking. I shall get into that later.

But for now, I am steaming. I had some coleslaw one night and have been worrying ever since about the ‘eat no raw eggy product’ preggie rule ever since. This morning has been spent in trying to speak to a midwife who can appease my mind and essentially say ‘you had just a couple of spoonfuls? now quit worrying!’ to me. So far, I have drawn a blank.

I live in, let’s say, Booville and have decided to have my baby in the nearby Bashville. But my GP surgery, when giving me the choice of hosps between the one in Bashville and another in nearer Rroomville (ah jeez!) didn’t tell me that their midwife supports only those that chose to have their babies at the latter hosp. Now, I rang my hosp who said the antenatal appointments are the GP’s concern. GP says as I am going to have my baby at the Bashville hosp, their midwife cannot help me as she cares for those deliverables at Rroomville. So I am stuck in some sort of ante-natal no man’s land. Just peachy, eh?

I wonder why people act surprised when I say I want to leave this brilliant place for the shores of home, where at least I can be assured of some decent medical care as long as they know my money’s solid! *sigh*

 
The last time I was pregnant, I was woefully unprepared, physically, mentally and psychologically. I felt totally out of control and worse, beyond extending any sort of control over my situation. I just decided to go with the flow and hope that it got me and my baby through to the other side.

It did. I emerged with a few scars and a firm belief that I will not go through it again. Of course I changed my mind. But being older and wiser (ha ha!), I decided that this time, I will not be caught unawares. This time, I will prepare myself mentally and physically for the labour and beyond. This time, I have not just one baby but two depending on my stability - the last thing I want to become is a stranger to my beloved son and make the whole thing more difficult for him.

So the first three months have been spent in research. Whilst I firmly believe that a little science is dangerous and so did not succumb to reading up on labour room war stories, I have been, however, reading up on alternative methodologies and therapies in relation to  labour. In particular, the form of labour called active birth.

Last time around, I spent my labour in the classic position - flat on my back, legs in stirrups, with a midwife, a midwife-in-training, an OB/GYN who was called in due to a last minute complication, a nurse and some lady who was insistently waving a paper in my face and saying something. I was too zonked out to know what she was going on about. S thinks it was about storing the cord blood but I am not sure.

This time, I am going to make my wishes clear well beforehand so I shall not be told about fledgling research and other assorted stuff at the last minute. Also, so far, I have been classified as a low risk pregnancy (touchwood) - I hope and pray that this remains throughout, in which case, I can sign myself in to the midwife-run ward, which does not believe in anything stronger than pethidine injection by way of pain relief.

In an effort to understand what the active labour deal is all about, I have been educating myself chiefly by means of the Buddha Bellies DVD and website. The concept is all about using yoga to help you deal with the rigours of pregnancy and labour. I started the DVD just this week (week 14 - the DVD advises you not to start before) and find it soothing and calming. Clear instructions make it easy to understand and follow.

Buddha Bellies believes in ‘giving birth back to women’ and goes to great lengths to demystify this frightening rite of passage. The woman behind it, Nicole Croft is a qualified Yoga teacher and conducts these ante-natal classes in Oxford. For women like you and me, who aren’t lucky to be residents of that city, we can arm ourselves with the DVD and reap the rewards. Her website contains quite a lot of information on the various stages of labour, water birth and a lot of other related issues. It all makes for fascinating reading.

What’s more, I quite like her concept of letting the woman be and not “dehumanise” her (as the Mad Momma put it whilst describing her own labour stories). Please do visit the site and read the articles - if anything, they do not scare the jeebies out of you and make you run for the hills. The matter-of-fact way of describing everything actually calms a person down. Even if you are too late into your pregnancy to get hold of the DVD and practice the asanas, these articles at least put your mind at rest and provide you with a set of options in dealing with your labour.

I hope to continue doing the exercises, following the DVD and would dearly love to see what sort of effect it has on my labour. However it turns out, you will read about it here!

 

A few weeks back, a top television presenter was caught on camera doing 70 mph on a busy motorway - chatting on his mobile phone. Jeremy Clarkson is well known to Britons and to see him chatting away whilst driving his Merc was too much for the public to bear. A vigilant passerby took a picture of him gabbing away and passed it on to the Daily Mirror. The papers took him to task royally and furious members of the public wrote on public forums everywhere, asking for a serious reprimand.

When I read the article the following day, a few words stuck in my mind.

And a police insider warned that if guilty, the popular Top Gear presenter could expect the same treatment as the thousands of other road users nabbed for the same offence.

The source said: “At a time when the Government and police are clamping down on motorists putting safety at risk by using mobiles at the wheel, it’s vital that police are seen to be taking action against all alleged offenders, no matter who they are.”

Fast forward to this morning, when I came across this article on Chennai Metblogs. I mean, what do you say to this respectable member of the press, who uses his press credentials to get away scot-free and then say, ‘Some police!’! There is no point blaming the traffic cops for their ineptitude if every Johnny carries some form of a ‘Get out of jail FREE!’ card or the other. Granted, I am no major fan of the said police, after the shabby way they treated my scared brother after a drunken bastard crashed his car into my hapless brother’s but this time, I am forced to question what choice do we leave them with, if we tie their hands so, for every pitiable reason?

We constantly say ‘we are like this wonly’ when quizzed about the lax Indian attitude to most things under the sun. Are we like this wonly or are we making sure we are like this wonly?