Category: Cows Milk Protein Intolerance

Punctual, Proud and Peeing…


The Girl has started school. The school do a very gentle induction of half days for a whole week. Which is of course a total nightmare for childcare and for my child who is used to 10 hour days at nursery. It is somewhat painful all round.

Anyway, accepting this, Phil rose to the parenting challenge and took some annual leave. As did I, as I wasn’t missing the first day of school obligatory photo shoot either! But on the Friday I had a course to go on.  

So I swanned out of the house at 7.30am being a strong and independent woman, going to work and leaving Phil to have the Stay-at-home-dad experience. As we have long established, time keeping is not Phils’ strongest point so I left him fully briefed and and crossed my fingers. 

But I needn’t have worried. Phil is a new age independent man. He’d got this. And he really did. He dropped the girl off. He fed The Boy, he returned at lunch time to collect The Girl. He told me with great delight that he spoke to lots of the mums at the school gates, he tells me he was a proud dad and he didn’t stick out like the only dad at the gate, he did the school run and enjoyed it. In fact he was so on time that he managed to collect The Boy’s prescription milk (because cows milk makes his insides bleed) from the pharmacy before he went to the school. 

The Boy’s milk supply comes as 7 tins of formula. Which they kindly put in a box to make it easy to carry. 

So Phil went to the school gates and mingled like a pro with a huge, bright purple, clearly labelled, Tena lady incontinece pads box under his arm. 

Now when I realise that this has happened I have mixed emotions. 

Firstly I’m mortified that every parent at the school gates is going to think that I have incontinence issues. I’ve had two children, including a 9lb 1 chunk of a boy so it’s not entirely unreasonable that people would think this. But I actually don’t. I’m lucky enough to have a husband who is a urologist and therefore kindly offered frequent reminders to do my pelvic floor exercises. Which to date have proved very effective in maintaining my ability to pee on demand. 

But then again. Why should I be so distressed that people are thinking my husband is collecting my incontinence pads? I mean what a guy to do that?! 

And, so what if I do need incontinence pads? What’s the big deal? It’s a common problem, why should I be embarrassed? Why shouldn’t we say it loud and proud “I carried 2 children and popped them out of my fanny. My body is amazing. So let’s cut it some slack and forgive it for being a bit leaky.”

Maybe Phil proudly chatting away with the Tena Lady under his arm will make someone else think. Maybe it will normalise this. Maybe it will encourage someone else to seek help. Maybe us ladies should stick together and breakdown the stigma. Maybe we can help each other out. 

And maybe we should all just do our pelvic floor exercises now. 

Right now!!! 

But maybe, just maybe, nobody noticed the Tena Lady box after all….

Domestic Bliss

It’s Sunday morning. Phil is on call and hasn’t been seen since Friday at 7am (although the evidence suggests that he did make it home to reheat his dinner on Friday night at some point) and it is November. And, being the domestic goddess that I am, I know that we should make the Christmas cake.

During the week I bought some ingredients I could remember we needed but it’s going to be a bit hit or miss. The problem is that I have said to The Girl that we will make our Christmas cake, therefore it needs to happen. And it needs to happen now. Right now. 

So we get out the Delia Smith complete cookbook. This is the only recipe I have ever made from this book and I have done it 3 times before. It seems to have worked in previous years so I persevere with the same one. 

This year however, The Boy introduces a new dynamic, he is “dairy free” – not because it’s trendy, but because if he eats dairy (including through my breastmilk) then he poops blood, which even as a trained medic I find somewhat alarming. So, I’ve introduced a “baking block” – a generic non-milk based butter alternative – something I am 100% sure Delia would not approve of…Much like my lack of fresh nutmeg would no doubt not go down well, nor would the lack of orange rind (which I have rather cunningly substituted with slightly ‘past it’ satsuma skin  who knew it’s not that easy to grate the skin of a satsuma? It just sort of peels itself). It also turns out my candied peel’s use by date was last year and my eggs are not large. 

I could, and perhaps should, nip to the shop but it’s 10am, I was up 3 times in the night, none of us are dressed and I can’t be bothered to take the gang to the supermarket (this would also mean my trip to the butcher’s yesterday to buy the most expensive chicken in the world “it is grain fed and free range” was entirely avoidable as I could have bought one at the supermarket for half the price). So I don’t, I crack on with the cake baking, with all of us in our PJs. Well, I’m in my bra and dressing gown as The Boy did some sort of epic projectile vomit down my PJs before we got out of bed this morning, and I’m yet to locate some spew free clothing. 

But it all goes rather well, The Girl sneezes, narrowly missing the mixing bowl and The Boy requires 2 nappy changes mid-bake. At one point The Girl describes my slightly curdled butter, sugar, and egg mix as “looking like a nappy- but smelling nicer” which I accept as a charming compliment.  

She does however temporarily bamboozle me when she informs me that the treacle “looks like Mike”. The only Mike we know is Caucasian with mousy brown hair and a fairly solid rugby player type, so I’m unable to see how she is making this association. But with further discussion “it’s Mike that daddy spreads on toast”. Marmite. She means Marmite. 

Anyway after an hour and a half of prep (with a very much preheated oven, as at Delia’s request we turned it on at the start of this venture) the cake goes in, and half a day later comes out resembling a fruitcake. 

A fruitcake which is now going to be heavily laced with booze for the next 6 weeks to disguise its short comings, a fruitcake which is definitely not chocolate flavoured (despite what The Girl is insisting) and a fruitcake which is not to be eaten for the next 6 weeks. A concept that The Girl is having significant trouble understanding. 

Next year I’m just going to brave the supermarket, buy a reasonably priced free range chicken and a ready made Christmas cake. In hindsight, the better option.