We start The Village with a fairly chunky topic: how does our identity shift and change when we become mothers? For the purpose of the WhatsApp community, I will try and keep these weekly posts succinct, so that where possible you can read them in a couple of minutes on your Monday morning. As recently…
Body Lessons 3: Flesh and Blood, Heart and Soul, Muscle, Bone, and Milk
Before I became a mother, I was able to use my body for specific and delineated periods of time. I would get it out for my morning yoga practice and my walk to work, before sliding it into the background for the next few hours, putting my mind in the driving seat as I answered…
When I became a mother for the first time, I had many moments during those early months when I felt irritated and confused. Why had nobody told me how wonderful this was? All anybody has told me about motherhood was how incredibly hard it was. This, the single most perfect decision that I have ever…
Forward Motion: 28 January 2023 @ LDN East
On Saturday, I went to the launch of a new party called Forward Motion, with one of my closest friends. Some of you who have followed me for a while, will have read a couple of my party and music-related pieces such as Low Frequency Love: 4AM Freedom, but I know that this isn’t the…
The Village – Week 9: Crying
I know, ‘crying’: what an uplifting topic. This isn’t the piece that I was planning on writing to welcome you all into the new year, but as I spend most of my time navigating the very different emotional worlds of a 10-month-old and a 3.5-year-old, crying – and how we feel about crying – has…
6 Months of Frankie
My son Frankie has just turned 6 months old. If I had known the strange combination of joy and difficulty that these past few months would bring, I am not sure how I would have felt exactly, holding his perfect little body in the operating theatre where he was delivered onto my chest. I suspect…
The Village – Week 8: Breastfeeding
When Ella was 5 days old, I called one of my best friends’ mum from my bed in tears. She was a volunteer for La Leche League*, and despite me asking for (and getting) help with latching Ella every few hours in hospital and every day at home, something wasn’t working. My nipples were so…
The Village – Week 7: Mothering as Radical Work
Greetings Villagers. I am so pleased that we have arrived at this topic. I wanted us to be fully in the flow of these weeks before we approached it, but then on day 1, as we all introduced ourselves, it quickly became the topic of conversation. Zoe wrote ‘I really lack the language to talk…
The Village – Week 6: Rest
As we progress through these six months of The Village content, you will notice that “sleep” does not feature at any point. What sleep looks like, and what sleep is available to us as new mothers is so wildly variable and depends on so many things – our baby’s temperament and health, whether we have…
The Village – Week 5: “Mum Guilt”
If you are somebody who consumes any level of motherhood content, from writing to podcasts, it is likely that you have heard the idea of ‘mum guilt’ being discussed. ‘Mum guilt’ has become a catch-all term for anything that makes us feel bad as mothers, from the light (fish fingers again) to the heavier (missing…
The Village – Week 4 Part 2: The Pelvic Floor
Hopefully by now those consuming this content as part of The Village, have read and digested my thoughts on both the physical and emotional significance of pelvic floor health, and some simple principles to keep in mind for rehabilitation and strength work. Here, in our final week on the pelvic floor, I have set out…
The Village – Week 4: The Pelvic Floor (Part 2)
In our first Pelvic Floor week, I laid out what I find to be a helpful, foundational, and holistic understanding of the pelvic floor. Based on a combination of anatomy, Chakra theory, and yoga, I believe this helps foster reverence and discipline for the recovery and continued care of this part of our bodies and…
The Village – Week 3: The Pelvic Floor (Part 1)
After having my daughter Ella, I changed the first question I ask new mums. Instead of ‘How’s the baby?’, ‘Are you feeling okay?’ or a more general ‘How are you doing?’ I now usually go with ‘How’s your vag?’ (by which I mean, how is that whole area of vagina and pelvic floor). Honestly, this…
The Village – Week 2: Conflicting Emotions
(Formerly published as Body Lessons 5: In Two Minds) My friend Daisy said something to me recently that got me thinking. We were checking in with each other during lockdown as we do most days; we both have baby girls the same age and in this strange time it is a relief to share the…
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