Be Ready to Parent

Running antenatal courses for twins, paediatric first aid courses and training days for maternity nurses - Courses include: working with mothers who may be suffering from PND, Looking after babies with reflux and early allergies, Sleep in children and sleep training, breastfeeding and working with twins and more!

Three under three

This is an article I wrote in August 2012
I wanted to say thankyou to everyone who helped me through my journey,
it is very honest.

I want to start off my saying how wonderful it is to have 3 under 3, actually we had 3 under 18 months at one stage!
It is rewarding, fun-filled and full of adventures. However, I must admit to it not being always like this. I want to be honest in this article but also positive. We have 13 month old identical twin girls, Miriam and Leila, and a son called Joey who is 2 and a half. The girls are delightful, charismatic, busy and beautiful. Joey is charming, sensitive, affectionate and both scooter and book mad in equal proportions!

The first 3 months were actually ok, the girls were born 4 weeks early and they did a lot of sleeping from what I remember, being identical they were similar in their patterns and breastfed without any problems. My son did not seem to remember being an only child and took to his role as big (although I was very careful at remembering he was not so big really) brother superbly.

The difficulty is that this honeymoon stage does not last forever, the girls needed more attention as they developed, and rightly so, they also developed silent reflux which went undiagnosed for a while, and help soon started to disappear after the first few weeks. If I could have done things differently it would have been to organise proper help to start a few weeks into the journey, to help with the running of the household and to help with the twins, giving me proper time with my son and also giving me some well needed rest.

The sleep deprivation I had led to a very low point in my life, and thankfully one I have worked through, and got help with, as well as having a supportive husband, family, friends and an amazing woman called Janne Harrison, a troubleshooter and sleep consultant, that helped. But all this when I personally knew how to navigate the NHS and knew how things worked, being a paediatrician, married to a psychiatrist, of all things. So you can see I am being very honest.

Thankfully the girls and my son are all healthy children, I cannot even begin to imagine what other families go through if they also have lots of hospital appointments as well. Help arrived in abundance while I was not so well and as I recovered I was able to take more control of life, my children and house.

I read somewhere in a twins book that “a visitor is not a guest but a helper” and this motto really applies here. I probably did not take this to heart, and took on a bit too much all round, in addition to the breastfeeding which I stopped at 3 months.

One thing I have learnt is to trust your instincts – by this I mean your maternal ones, you know if something is not right with your children, I wished I had listened to mine a bit more regarding their silent reflux, and this from a paediatrician! Janne Harrison listened to me, really listened. Try and rest, really try and don’t be a super woman, it just won’t pay off.

Saying all this, there is not one inch of me that regrets having them so close in age, it is just fantastic and I love being a mother to my 3 adorable monkeys. They are just delightful, they play together, they eat together, they sleep at the same time both at lunchtime and at night, they swim together – just such fun and I am so glad I have been able to overcome my challenges and can enjoy our children and reap the benefits of having them so close together.

My journey has made me a different person, I can honestly say that hand on heart, and not in a wishy-washy touchy-feely kind of way. It really has made me more sympathetic, confident, insightful and determined; I now know even more what is important in life. I know the value of true friends and family and I am now passionate about supporting others through their challenges.

And our journey to “Be Ready to Parent” – running antenatal courses, paediatric first aid courses and training days for maternity nurses.

Janne Harrison is a night nurse and troubleshooter and sleep consultant. She was recommended from a friend and she was the one who really listened to me and got us all back on the road to recovery. She organised for a maternity nurse to come and live with us for four weeks – she was kind and thoughtful and never judgemental. Her help gave me enough time to rest and recover quicker and a chance for me to strengthen my bond with the girls.

This support was invaluable but without Janne I do not know where I would have looked or how I would have known what I need – in postnatal depression you cannot make a decision, everything is an obstacle and for me, someone who was use to making quick and on your feet decisions, this was just unbearable.

Once recovered, I found myself wanting more time with the children and took a gap from the NHS. I kept being asked for advice about twins or breastfeeding or the NHS or Postnatal depressions and so it seemed the next step was to put my knowledge into a business and to run antenatal courses, designed to empower parents with knowledge. Janne had longed to run courses for maternity nurses and between us we knew many professionals that have since come and taught on our courses, from consultant paediatric gastroenterologists to mothers who run PND support groups, to speech therapists to a consultant psychiatrist.

Here are the links for information on the courses we run and the program of speakers:

http://www.bereadytoparent.com/

"Training days for maternity and night nurses, run by Dr Ella Rachamim (paediatrician) and Janne Harrison (Babycare consultant and sleep trainer). Days include: caring for twins or more, reflux and allergies, sleep in children and sleep training, postnatal depression and breastfeeding.  Outside speakers invited who are influential in their field, full resource packs given, certificate of attendance provided. Based in North London. Very reasonable cost. Please see our list of courses:  http://www.bereadytoparent.co.uk/courses/  and contact us if interested,ella@bereadytoparent.com   There is a £5 course discount for our members - find the discount code in your members section!

Dr Ella Rachamim
ella@bereadytoparent.com

https://twitter.com/bereadytoparent

https://www.facebook.com/beready.toparent

If you like to keep on top of new ideas, new products and new inventions, chances are you watch ‘Dragons Den’ and if you do, you will be no stranger to the product we have been reviewing this month.

We have been testing the ‘Snugglebundl’ the world’s first lifting blanket for babies.

Made of super soft cotton, the Snugglebundl is predominantly designed to make lifting your baby easier, which is fantastic news for parents who have mobility issues, bad backs, or who are post surgery, especially post cesarean section.

The Snugglebundl has two handles, which support a sling like structure. Inside the sling is a small hood to cup your baby’s head and support them during the lift. A baby can be transferred gently from one place to another, fully supported and barely disturbed – perfect for getting sleeping babies out of their car seat and into their cot or visa versa.

You can view the product in action here

Here's what our members had to say:

"My client had had an extended labor and emergency cesarean section, which had resulted in severe discomfort and an extended hospital stay. She was unfortunately having to rely heavily on people passing her baby to her, which robbed her of any independence she might have enjoyed in those first few days. With her baby in the Snugglebundl, she was suddenly able to easily lift baby from the hospital cot beside her bed, straight into her arms, smoothly, comfortably, and with one hand! The benefits were immediately clear without putting any of Snugglebundl’s other applications to use. "

"Although there did not seem to be an immediate benefit when lifting a baby from the floor (you still have to bend down to gather up the handles) There was a fantastic difference when lifting the baby from a cot, car seat, pram, trolley etc. The angles were far less awkward, and lifting was far easier and more comfortable for myself, and the clients who tested it with me. These benefits alone make the Snugglebundl worth the money! "

"I immediately took it to work, where I was taking care of little premature twins.  Whilst the Snugglebundl certainly made transferring the babies from cot, to pram or car seat a very easy process, with the twins being so tiny, they were engulfed in a lot of excess material. Having said this, they still felt safe and secure, and the upside would be that the Snugglebundl would certainly last them quite a while!"

You can find the full reviews from our members here.

This product has been awarded out recommended logo and we are proud to support Snugglebundl.

We are very lucky to now be able to offer members a 10% discount on sleep workshops with Millpond.

Several of our members who have already been to the workshops speak highly of the day, which are lead by experienced professionals and have a very practical approach. Participants are also provided with a lovely book which covers the principals of the training, as well as course material and case studies from the day. They also provide refreshments and a light lunch.

Below are more details on their training workshops, Members can find their discount code by logging into the members area.

A workshop for professionals in the community

Helping parents solve their children’s sleep problems

 Workshop content:

Our workshops are firmly grounded in evidence based practice. We have been delivering training for health professionals since 2007.  We have developed the workshop content and delivery to be highly engaging, interactive and relevant to all community staff working with families with young children experiencing sleep problems.

The workshop aims to provide a forum for the discussion and exploration of children’s sleep problems. Why sleep problems arise, commonly used techniques, assessing a problem and planning a sleep programme.

Millpond trainers:

There will be two trainers on the day, led by Mandy Gurney, founder of Millpond. All our trainers are registered general nurses, registered midwives and health visitors. Each typically has over 25 years’ experience as a trained health professional supporting parents through health and behaviour problems and is an experienced Millpond sleep therapist.

Workshop feedback:

Millpond has trained hundreds of health professionals both in our London and Birmingham sites as well as within numerous NHS Trusts and Children’s Centres across the country, many returning to train additional staff.

Delegates attending our training sessions are generally, health visitors, community nursery nurses, family support workers and children’s centre staff.  All of our sessions are evaluated and the feedback we have received has been extremely positive with 100% of participants saying they would recommend the session to a colleague.

“I recently attended the Millpond sleep workshop and it was one of the best study days that I have ever attended. It has had a huge impact on my clinical practice, as I now have a better understanding of sleep cycles, preventing inappropriate sleep association and how to reset body clocks and feel more confident in supporting parents with children with sleep problems.”  N Murray, Health Visitor.

"I wish I'd had this training as part of my Health Visitor training."  H Hubback, Health Visitor, Cardiff & Vale.

“A very valuable study day; well structured, informative and easily digested.  I will return with more confidence and knowledge.” W Saunders, Community Nursery Nurse, ONEL Children's Services.

 Millpond Children’s Sleep Clinic

T: 020 8444 0040

sleep@millpondsleepcilinc.com / www.millpondsleepclinic.com