Has Maternity Leave Made Me Addicted To My Phone?

When I left my job to go on maternity leave, I was living in quite a secluded place. I don't drive and our house wasn't near any public transport so I relied heavily on family and friends. I lived out of town though, so obviously I couldn't expect them to transport me around all the time. It was very lonely, I'd have days where myself & Isabella wouldn't even get out of bed. Because I just couldn't be bothered to sit and talk to a sleeping baby who didn't even smile back at me (oh the newborn days). Fast forward 4 months, we are back at K's mums which is a short walk from the town centre. I have more real life mummy friends than ever, however I can never put my phone down.

I am guilty. So so guilty of always being on my phone. It never leaves my side, and it's just too easy to pick up. My baby, as fun as she is getting now can't talk to me. If I'm by myself, I am pretty much just that; by myself. Bella smiles and sometimes giggles, but she can't have a conversation.

I am part of 4 different group chats, with 4 different groups of ladies all covering different topics. I have my real life mummy friends, I have my online mummy blogger friends, and I have 2 separate blogger friends chats. I am on so many mob like mum Facebook groups, where everyone judges each others parenting and argues with everything anybody does. I am also admin of my real life mum friends Facebook group. Then there is Twitter & Instagram. I instastory almost daily, I know it does some peoples head in but the amount of love and support I get for mine & Bella's daily life is unreal. I take a lot of photos. I post pictures of my daughter daily on Instagram and I never miss anything she does, ever. I'm always there with my camera snapping away. I watch youtube, all the time. Finally, I play games. I get bored, especially when Boo sleeps and I am having a sit down. Monopoly is my fave, I am obsessed.

I find it hard to switch off. K gets frustrated because I'm 'always on my phone' which is true. I struggle to just put my phone down for a long period of time, I really hate to admit. I couldn't even tell you why. Maternity leave has made me addicted to my phone & social media, and it needs to stop.

I'm going to try and stop relying so heavily on my phone. I need to stop picking it up every 2 minutes to check social media, because nothing will have changed. I wont miss out on some life changing news, if anybody needs to get hold of me they can call me.

My addiction needs to stop today!

Baby At 4 Months | Isabella's 4 Month Update

Sadly, I have slacked at the blogging malarkey since being on maternity leave. I had visions of me being this blogging goddess, but in reality my maternity leave has been far from that. When I left work before having Bella, I hated life (pregnancy struggs) and spent the majority of my days in bed feeling sorry for myself. When Bella was newborn, although she slept a lot, I spent most of my spare time just staring at her (honestly). Now she is 4 months old, she does still nap but not as much as she used to, and during her napping hours I am usually preoccupied doing other things.. and I regret it so much. I regret not having much of my girls life documented, other than Instagram posts and Facebook status', because I have nothing to look back on. I have pictures, I have thousands of pictures which I am grateful for but I have no written words on my blog except a lot about how much I hated pregnancy. So now on, I am making a conscious effort to write more about my baby! Starting from today.

So my child is now 4 months old, HOW? According to Wonder Weeks, Bella is in the middle of a long ole' leap at the mo. Usually leaps mean bad, baaaad things but honestly, this leap has been amazing to us! This past week or so, our little girly has come on absolute leaps & bounds!

At 4 months, Isabella is now rolling over (front to back on both sides, however she hasn't mastered back to front yet), we have started weaning (yep, early, shoot me. More on this in another post!), she's beginning to sit up, she's become very ticklish and is still the most happiest baby ever. She is obsessed with her jumperoo and her Lamaze toys too.

We are having hints of teething, it doesn't really seem to of hit her hard just yet! She hasn't* hit the 4 month sleep regression either, although I am fully prepared for it to come soon. Lets all keep our fingers crossed that she just doesn't reach it, shall we? If you follow my Instagram stories you'll probably be well aware that we moved back to K's mums recently and Bella went in to her proper cot, amazingly her sleeping hasn't been affected too badly. She slept through the night from about 2 weeks, however now she's got in to the routine of waking once for 1-2oz of milk at about 4am. I can deal with that! Long may it continue!

Any tips & helpful advice regarding traditional weaning is appreciated massively!

*I have 100% just jinxed myself. Cheers!

Daisy xxx

MY HAIR TRANSFORMATION @ NO.48 BURY ST EDMUNDS

Valentines Day was always more of a one sided thing for me & K. I mean, he isn't exactly the most romantic of people at the best of times! But this year he absolutely blew me away by surprising me with a voucher to have my hair done and not only that, he had actually booked me an appointment the same day. I had been dropping hints for ages, as one of my mummy friends had re-opened the salon. K has very selective hearing so I doubted that he took any notice but the boy came through!!! Major brownie points.

I had never actually been in the salon before but I can't praise the interior enough. I genuinely think it would probably be very similar to the way I would decorate if I had a salon myself. There are lots of different textures and patterns, which all work amazingly together and my favourite part, lots of rustic wood around the place as you can see from below.  

They are a small team, made up of 4 lovely ladies who all in fact knew each other before opening the salon which gives it such a lovely vibe as you can tell they are all genuinely good friends. I knew my stylist Amy from school so we just spent the whole time catching up which of course was lovely! Also, as if this place wasn't ticking the boxes enough, for Valentines Day they were offering prosecco & orange juice along with heart chocolates! WINNING!

K had booked me in for ombre/balayage, which again I was surprised he remembered that was what I wanted. I'm not going to pretend I know anything about hair so won't be able to get very technical I'm afraid, but I know I had it curled and look how pretty it looks!! #HairGoals.

I am absolutely in love with my new hair, I'm going to be going back in a few months to get it even lighter but for now, this is as light as my hair will get without damaging it. You can find their website here, their Facebook page here, and the most amazing Instagram here where they are always posting the best before & after pictures which I am obsessed with!  

*Disclaimer - I haven't been paid  to post this, nor am I receiving anything in return  for posting! K paid for this in full

MY EXPERIENCE WITH RIGEVIDON CONTRACEPTIVE PILL

 I have decided to be a bit more me on my blog this year; when I say more me I basically mean just posting whatever the hell I wanna. If I wanna write about beauty, I will. If I wanna write about parenting, guess bloody what?! I will. I'm not a certain genre of blog any longer and I will be writing whatever I want. So, with this new found mentality I recently put a poll out on Twitter weather you'd like to see a post regarding my experience on the Rigevidon contraceptive pill. 

I feel like contraceptive pills, for some reason are a bit of a taboo. Its one of those things, I used to hate going to my local clinic/doctors to pick it up, I felt awkward, I don't know..maybe it was because I was fairly young but I mean lets face it, contraceptives of any sort are used by ladies of all ages and it shouldn't be a taboo subject. Recently when I was going through a terrible time (which I've since found out was due to the pill), I couldn't find very much real life information online other than doctors advice and I wasn't getting much response via social media.

Before having Bella I was on the Microgynon 30 pill, which is a combined pill that you take for 21 days and then you have a 7 day break which would be generally when your period would take place. Obviously, I have a baby now but I must stress this wasn't due to the pill failing. I was irresponsible with taking it and wa-la, a baby was made. Moving on..

To those who don't know, after having a baby mum has a check after 6 weeks to make sure everything is all okay mentally and physically. This is also the time where you will discuss your method of contraception with your doctor (or as I felt, an appointment literally to discuss contraception - boo). There was no doubt in my mind that I would be going back on to a pill of some sort. I wasn't having anything to do with needles so that was out of the question, I didn't know much about anything other than needles or pills and she didn't try to convince me otherwise. I was told that my doctor didn't stock the Microgynon however there was a pill called Rigevidon which was pretty much the same thing. Cool, I'll have that then - cheers! 

Off I went with my new pill and started taking it then next day. I took it for about a week or so and all was great. I had never had one problem with the Microgynon so I had no idea what kind of side affects these pills could do to you. After literally what could of only been a few days, maybe 4 or 5, I woke up on a Monday morning feeling very strange. The first thing I noticed was that I couldn't type or talk properly, it was like I couldn't find the words I needed to say. I was trying to talk (or in my case text) and it was gibberish, it made no sense. I still don't know what I'd call it, not memory loss quite but it was weird. I had numb and tingling sensation in my hands, mouth and nose. I was scared. K was at work and couldn't get home, my mum was half way across the world so I quickly rung my bestie who luckily is amazing, came and picked me & Bella up and looked after us both for the day. When I got to her house, I went for a sleep.. but when I woke up, I had a killer migraine. I managed to get an emergency doctors appointment because I was so worried, I spoke with my doctor who put it down to exhaustion. I didn't feel exhausted, my baby is amazing and sleeps all night, she never cries - was I really exhausted? I didn't feel exhausted, but I was told it might be more a sub conscious thing although I wasn't totally convinced.

K was working crazy hours that week, so on the Tuesday I decided to go to my nan's for a few nights to get a bit of help. I didn't feel right in myself so I was almost worried I wouldn't be able to cope on my own. The Tuesday I was absolutely fine but it was still nice to have a few extra hands. On the Wednesday I decided to take Bella to a weigh in clinic on my nan's estate and I also arranged to meet up with a few local mummies. Whiles out, my sight started to go funny... I had two big orbs in both of my eyes which was affecting my vision and I also got the same numbness/tingly feeling in my hands and mouth. I swiftly headed home to my nan's After I regained my vision, I had another killer migraine which I slept off. I stayed at my nan's for another night, until K finished work the next day and picked me & Bella up at about 9pm.

My mum was on holiday in Mexico for most of the week, normally she would help me out massively especially if I was feeling unwell. She was flying home on the Thursday night so I knew Friday, Saturday & Sunday she could help me if I needed it. I had no symptoms for the whole of the Thursday but I had a feeling it wouldn't be long before I wasn't well again.. Yep, the next day. Friday morning initially I woke up feeling fine, and had arranged for mum to pop over then we were going out for a drink however as the morning went on the worse I felt. I could feel my sight was going funny and a migraine was starting, so I rung mum and asked her to come over and whiles I waited, I took myself & Bella up to bed. I had about 30 minutes sleep, and I did that the minute it started which I think saved me because I didn't go in to full blown blind-numbing mode.

Then whiles I was sat talking to my mum that afternoon, something came over me. I had been taking this pill for a little over a week. It couldn't be that, could it?! I quickly googled side effects, and did a little research in to the symptoms I had been having. As soon as I read a tiny bit in to it, my mind was made up - it was the pill that was making me so poorly! I decided to stop taking it straight away, and get an appointment with my doctors ASAP. I managed to get one on the Monday, I went and explained everything that was going on. She agreed it sounded like this pill was giving me serious side affects and that I did the right thing by stopping taking it. I haven't taken it since then and to this day I've had no more issues. She also advised I probably shouldn't take any combi contraception, as it sounded like since being pregnant my body no longer agreed with it, which means I'm left with only two options now; mini pill or the injection. No ta!

So where I'm at now. I'm currently taking nothing as I am waiting for another appointment to be prescribed a new pill. I have also been referred to a specialist eye clinic at the hospital, due to the sight loss, they would like to investigate it further as it could be a deeper issue with my eyes. I have my appointment in a few weeks.

Have you had any bad experiences with a combi pill? I would love to hear your stories! 
xxx

BLOGMAS | Christmas with I Love...

Available from Boots, Argos, Sainsburys & Asda - not online

I was super lucky to be sent some of the gorgeous Christmas range from I Love... I remember I Love from when I was in school and I always got the gift sets for Christmas. I think I even got my youngest step sister one of the sets for Christmas last year. They really are great for any age. All the scents are SO mouth wateringly delicious! 

I think my favourite is the Raspberry & Blackberry scent. I've tried this before so I'm very familiar with this set, I love it. 

I've never tried the Strawberries & Cream range, but if you're a lover of sickly sweet scents this one is for you. I'm a sickly sweet lover (think snow fairy x10) so this is one I love.

Lastly there is the new (I think?) scent, Chocolate & Caramel. You should all probably know I'm a bath bomb lover so these are right up my street, and in fact these smell so chocolately, my dog was licking them when I got them out. The Miniature treat box are also such lovely gifts, they would make perfect secret santa presents! And how gorgeous are the heart shape soaps?! They'll keep you going for a while! 

Unfortunately I'm not sure of the prices of these, and I can't find them online anywhere! Most of these are exclusively available to buy from Boots.

xxx

BLOGMAS | Introduction & Christmas Decorations

NOEL WOODEN DECORATION | RED PHONE BOX BAUBLE | SKIIER BAUBLE | PINE CONE DECORATION | GOLD PINEAPPLE BAUBLE | LONDON BUS BAUBLE | GRAND CLOCK BAUBLE

So, call this a massive cop out but I really didn't think about how hard Blogmas would be with a newborn. I'm not kidding when I say I've been trying to write this post ALL BLOODY DAY! It's not even a real post! How has it taken me so long?! Anyways, I promise I do intend to make the rest of Blogmas better so please bear with me... oh and if you haven't already realised, I'M DOING BLOGMAS!! 

(how nice are all these decs????)

xxx