Mum's The Word! The Parenting Podcast - A Special Announcement!

Episode Date: September 25, 2022

We start this new season with a very special announcement from Ashley on what to expect in the coming months!Get in touch at [e-mail]--A Create Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

well hello again i am back and i actually have some very exciting news i wanted to share with you guys before anyone else and that is baby number two is on the way i I am pregnant. I've been so nervous to say this, but I'm really excited. So I thought I would fill you in. I've actually just come from my 12 week scan. So it's official. Baby is here, healthy, very active, it would seem. And I was deciding how I wanted to tell people and you guys have been here with me we've been on a journey together let's be honest so I wanted you to be the first people to know I feel a whole range of emotions like part of me is like what on earth am I doing doing it all over again after the the up and down journey that we've been on and I think that was one of the reasons why I decided to keep it secret um I'm actually

a big believer in being able to tell people whenever you want so not waiting till that 12 week uh landmark and actually we told uh close friends and family a lot sooner because I do think there is something a bit weird in the tradition that you should keep it a secret because let's be honest the first trimester it's not a joke obviously different people have different symptoms but you tend to feel tired a bit sick a bitous, but also it's this idea that if you do experience loss, that that should be a secret as well. And I think anyone should be empowered to make their own decision of their own timelines and when they feel comfortable telling people. So for me personally, I had quite a fear of loss in this pregnancy just because obviously I experienced

an early loss a few months ago. Also to be honest I needed time to process all my different emotions and to feel like when I told people I was in a place to be excited about it. Obviously, I feel very fortunate and grateful to be pregnant and to get pregnant as quickly as we did. As you probably know from the last few podcast episodes before the break that I went on, it was really playing on my mind, like, should I just have ALF or should I have another one? And for a while it was like replaying in my mind. And I know lots of parents feel this, like, would I want to do it again? Should I do it again? Can I cope with it again? Can I afford to do it again? And really for us, you know, I spoke to so many different people and for the record, I think it is a hard decision. I think you could be child free

and be really happy and complete. I still feel like, you know, my early thirties, I'm so happy that I got to be single and travel and do all of those things that I really wanted. I didn't wait for anyone to come along to live the life that I always wanted to live. And it's luckily that I did do all those things like traveling and, you know, going to all the places I wanted to, because who would have predicted that Tommy would then come along and then A, we'd get locked down in a global pandemic and B, we'd come out of it with the baby so if I'd waited to do all of those things then they probably wouldn't have happened so I think you can be happy and complete child free I think you can be so happy and complete

one and done and I really want to stress that and so in my own decision making process there was like a huge part of me thinking, I'm so happy with the idea of one, you know, you have more time for them, you have more money. I liked the idea of maybe when they were older, being able to take their friends on holidays, they still have that company. But one thing really struck me, and that was actually speaking to my friend's mom. And again, this is like personal for every single person, but she said to me, um, something along the lines of where do you see your life in 10 years, in 20 years, in 30 years? Cause she said all of the things that we find really hard about motherhood at the beginning.

And there are lots of things that we find hard about motherhood and, you know, the sacrifices that we make and the things we miss out on. She said to me, when you get to my age, so I think she's late fifties, early sixties. She said, when you get to my age, there is a very little difference between my friends who are child free, my friends who have one, two, three children. She said, we can all sleep in, we can all watch Netflix, we can all travel, we can all do all of the things that we want to do. So she said, when you speak to people around your age about, you know, do they regret parenthood or do they find parenthood hard? The answer will be yes, because they are the sacrifice years and it is hard and it is tough. And you do have to deal

with sleep deprivation and expectations and all of these things. But she said like, when you get to my age, it's really joyful when you're dealing with whether it's failing health or your parents being sick or, you know, just all the things that happen in life she said I now live through my kids and I find joy in my kids and also I feel connected to the younger generation through my kids and it just made me think a bit more about life as a whole like the next year the next two years even the last five, they are a blip in the ocean of life, a blip, a drip. I don't know what the phrase is, but you know what I mean. So that really made me think not so much about the short term, you know, like I feel like it's so easy to get caught up.

And I did this with Alf at the beginning when you're not sleeping and it feels so hard and you're breastfeeding and your baby won't take a bottle or you know all the things that we all go through I did feel that it was a very permanent state and I think I can go into this second pregnancy knowing it's going to be bloody hard but also knowing that it won't last forever and you know my journey with alpha has proved that like, I personally love the toddler stage. I am aware that the twos are going to come along and there will be the, all of those challenges, but I love getting more back from him and the relationship that's

developing between us, between him and Tommy, between us as a family. Um, I just find so much joy in that. And I didn't feel that in that six to twelve month mark when I felt so low and so I'm excited because in you know three years four years five years to think that we will be a family of four and that's what I want for me. And like I said, every person will be completely different and that they are all valid and everyone's circumstances are so different. But I feel happy and excited for the next few years and beyond. And the next thing I thought I would discuss is, obviously, we have decided that we would have one more baby. But after that, we are done. I think, you know, for us personally, and it's ironic because I'm from, I've got three.

I've got a brother and a sister. So there's three of us. Tommy has four siblings. But for us and, you know, the life that we want to live and being able to still travel and you know do all of those things we've decided that we only want two so with that is um I spoke quite openly about gender disappointment with Alfie and funnily enough this time round I don't know the sex yet by the way of the baby this time around I feel a lot more calm about it I feel like if it's a boy um then it's kind of like my fate to be a a mum a boy mum and you know maybe maybe that's my role to bring good men into the world and I know and hope that they will be close

in age and hopefully get on well but there is an element of me that will mourn the girl that I'll never have I would love to be able to experience being a girl mum and I think the big thing is, is this huge adventure that I've been on in life and all the lessons I've learned around, I don't know whether it's feminism or dating or boundaries or self-love and, you know, all of the things that we experience as women.

I would love to like bestow that knowledge and wisdom onto a woman but we shall see but there is that consideration to come like I said I actually feel happy with whatever outcome I'm just so grateful to know that the baby's healthy as I found out today and that's been such a huge weight on my mind thinking that I just didn't want to get too excited just in case. And I didn't have that with Alf. And then I suppose I just wanted to fill you in on the first trimester because it's been, it's just such a weird one, isn't it? To have this total mental and physical life change and nobody really know about it so I felt really sick

not like you know some of my friends are sick a lot and I'm very fortunate that I've actually only been sick twice once when I was chopping garlic just really randomly actually this weekend I was making the lasagna but I always feel very grown up and like I have big adult points whenever I cook because it is a rarity um but yeah I had to be like top me and I just ran to the loo and then once when I was changing our snappy I have such a sensitive sense of smell like my sense of smell is so heightened I haven't been able to do many pooey nappies because it sends me over the edge and then it's just the tiredness and I did have the tiredness with Alf but it's really hard to compare because I don't know if I feel as tired as I did last time

or if tiredness has just been a lifestyle ever since I came along. And it is very different this pregnancy to last pregnancy because, well, number one, we're not in lockdown. Number two, it's not a first experience. And I feel that, you know, with me and my attitude towards it, with Tommy and his attitude towards it, but also even when we tell friends and family, they're like cool it's obviously the first time I think it's a lot more of a surprise and a shock and um but also having a toddler it just goes so quickly like you I feel like for the first pregnancy it was very much you know like I was like thinking about me and the baby and my body and not doing any lifting and looking after me and my body. Whereas now I just don't have that luxury because

I've got a toddler to look after and obviously I'm working. So it's nice in a way because it does go very quickly. Like I cannot believe it's three months. I feel like you still can't really tell um although I have to say there have been lots of people guessing on Instagram that I have been and weirdly quite a lot of like negativity around that so a few people I've seen in the comments I'm not going to focus too much on the negativity because this is a really positive thing and I feel very blessed and grateful at the same time as shitting myself and all of those things but there's been lots of people saying that I've been pregnancy baiting which I actually had to google and apparently that's when you're teasing people that you're pregnant without telling them and I think that's such a weird thing because nobody owes anyone a pregnancy announcement so

there's been no deliberate dropping of hints but naturally I am pregnant so if I've been quieter or I've been saying things like my body's changed and my genes don't fit that could apply to pregnancy or weight gain or fluctuating hormones so many things it's not necessarily me trying to tease maybe I'm pregnant um so anyway that's been interesting but the secret is out and I've been really really excited to share the news with you all uh as I did in the last pod I say the last podcast it's the same podcast but obviously I'm back with new news. I will share just all the honest, the highs, the lows, the all of it, you know, being pregnant, what that's like, all my thoughts and feelings and fears. A big thing that I've been going through is obviously trying to deal with the trauma of my last birth and you know trying to

prepare for the fact that I have to do it all over again and trying to see it as a new experience so I definitely want to speak to various experts on that as well as parents that are also multiple parents multiple parents can you be a multiple parent parents of multiple children um so i i will take you along on the journey and of course sharing um all of the day-to-day stuff with alf as well whether it's the child care juggle or dealing with a toddler and all of the things that i've always talked about so that is it that is my news uh i'm really like i said happy to be able to share it with you guys first and yeah hopefully it's very gonna be very exciting and thank you for listening I'm really happy to be back by the way I've missed you all I've missed sharing my life so thank you so much for listening

to Mums the World Parenting Podcast I don't even know whether to call it part two anymore we just carry on but um make sure you do hit the subscribe or follow button if you want to make sure you never miss an episode and as always I do love to hear from you so now that I'm back and by the way I'm back bigger and better than ever. I have a shiny new studio. I've got so many amazing guests lined up this time. And yeah, I'd love to hear from you. So make sure you get in touch on WhatsApp. Obviously, you can send a voice message like some people have before.

It's completely free. You can leave it anonymously if you want. And the number for that is 075-999-27537 or of course you can email askmumsthewordpod at gmail.com and of course a very easy thing to do if you're listening on apple is to leave a review i'll see them so if there's comments i can read out but also it just really helps other people find the podcast um and i will be back with another episode same time same place next week