Description

In this video, we talk to the author of the book Yummy Mummy Survival Guide.

Transcript

Wendy Turner-Webster: Welcome back to the Baby Talk on the Baby Channel. I am Wendy Turner-Webster. Joining me now is Liz Fraser, author of the 'Yummy Mummy's Survival Guide', which promises to put the "yum" back into motherhood. Hi Liz! Liz Fraser: Hello! Wendy Turner-Webster: Now I've been dipping into a wonderful book -- Liz Fraser: Good. Wendy Turner-Webster: Yes, and I must admit that from the front cover I thought it would be more frivolous than it actually is. In fact, I look into it, and it is rather an invaluable weighty tome of fabulous advice and tips and knowledge and -- Liz Fraser: Great! That's exactly what you're supposed to say. Wendy Turner-Webster: Thank you. Liz Fraser: That is a very good point. Wendy Turner-Webster: Thank you. You can tell me later. Liz Fraser: A lot of people have said that. I mean, obviously, it looks very beautiful. It's pink and it's green and it's called the 'Yummy Mummy's Survival Guide', which makes you think it's a book just about how to look pretty and makeup tips and how to wear nice clothes. But, really like you said it's so much more than that. It's a small amount and all the way through, that's the image taken all the way through. You are still a women who likes to look okay sometimes. But much, much more than that, it really is -- it's a book which I never had and I wished so much I'd have. Wendy Turner-Webster: Is that what gave you the inspiration to do it, that you saw this gap there in the market if you like? Liz Fraser: Yeah, completely. I've had three babies now, so I've really looked through books. I've had three times nine months. Wendy Turner-Webster: You should know. Liz Fraser: You look and you look and you look and they are so dreary. There seem two things, one of two things, they either assume that because you've become a mother, you are completely happy to just give up on yourself. The fact that you put on three stone, that doesn't matter, that's okay, you are a mom, you'd wear bad clothes, it doesn't matter you don't have. Wendy Turner-Webster: Throw your makeup away. Liz Fraser: Right, or it's tied together into the single scale, which is this unattainable perfect mother thing. I'm neither of those two things. I'm completely in the middle somewhere. I want to look okay three days out of seven, that will be nice, four days out of seven is a different story. Hence the -- scruffy shoes, which I have forgotten to take off today, please never mind -- Wendy Turner-Webster: Liz, you've turned up in your slippers look. Liz Fraser: I remember to at least put some shoes on, but not the ones I intended to, because I did the school and I got distracted by the laundry basket in the way. But, somewhere in between is a huge mass of women, the greatest number of women who not necessarily are mothers yet, or who are, but who just wonder what it's like to be a mum in the beginning of the 21st Century, not when most of the books were written, which was very different, even if it was only 30 years ago. Life was different, jobs were different, transport was different, the way we eat, the way everything we do is different now. I thought, I'm going to write this down for anybody who sits at home thinking, is it just me, is it just me who finds this job really hard sometimes? Wendy Turner-Webster: I mean you've called it the 'Yummy Mummy's Survival Guide', well let's, first of all, say, what is your definition, Liz, of a yummy mummy? Because that means it's really quote on this phrase as of late, hasn't it yummy mummy? Liz Fraser: It has and that's why I called it that. I just thought, because everyone has heard this phrase, it's a nice little phrase that trips off, but it is not at all in my mind, it is not at all, somebody who is rich, who has an au pair and drives the big car and goes on holiday three times a year, that's not a yummy mummy to me. A yummy mummy to me is like me, my friends, like you, like most of people that you probably know or the people watching probably know, someone who's number one priority in life is to be a good mother to their children, but who hasn't forgotten that she as a woman separate to her children, still exists as a person and still needs to be talked to and to be left to do all the things that she wanted to do before. If that's what a yummy mummy is, then I am not. Wendy Turner-Webster: I wonder if it's become more popular as this phrase because women now are starting later, is much more common now to start families in your 30s, so you've already established yourself as a woman, haven't you? Liz Fraser: That's a really a key point, I think, with this whole change in motherhood and the -- with motherhood. Maybe 30 years ago, more women were having babies in their 20s, as I did, I had my first baby at 23. I'm hoping, maybe through there so, through talking about it that more women will think actually it's great to have children young. But what's happened in the last set of ten years is that women have been having their -- like you said, they have their careers, they've got used to a certain amount of money, a certain way of living and they don't want to give all of that up, when they have a family, I do think there is a lot to be said for having children young, I mean, on 30, well now, and I'm pretty much done with the hopes of baby phase. Wendy Turner-Webster: You're done full? Liz Fraser: Yeah, I'm a wreck, why shouldn't you believe in me? But yeah, motherhood is very, very -- obviously, motherhood is the same now as it's always been, there are so many other factors now in our daily lives, that I think -- I just think it was time for a new book which says it like it is now. Wendy Turner-Webster: I really like the way that it's written that you can dip into it so easily. Show everyone the whole book. Take us through the actual format and the structure of it, how you've done it is really well thought out, I feel. Liz Fraser: I did it very much with that in mind. I thought, how many mothers have got time to sit down and read 80 pages of a book? I fall asleep within 10 pages, I'm so exhausted, I'm sure that's true with many other people. So I thought this has to be written in a style that you can pick it up, it will make you laugh, it will teach you something, it will make you feel lot better, and maybe it will make you cry, because some of the bits are very sad. So it deals with many things. I just wrote it down in a very logical order, taking you through the whole sort of getting pregnant thing, because people hang up about that, all the way through pregnancy, the birth, and the whole first year of your life, divided into many sections: so your life as a mother, the baby, what does the baby do, how do you feed a baby, how do you change it, bath it, what do you do with the baby? That was more as mine because there's a chapter that's called, yes, but what do you do with it? Well, how are you supposed to know what to do with the baby? So it takes you through all of that and then you, your life, forget the baby for a moment, you and your relationship with your husband, with your friends, you going back to work, you, who are you anymore. So it covers all of those things in short neat chapters, get in that, read it, learn something, move on. Wendy Turner-Webster: You've also got some nice quotes from celebs in here. Liz Fraser: I have, I had a great time researching actually, that's the longest part of the whole book was finding -- Wendy Turner-Webster: Did you just scan all the material for that and see what they said? Liz Fraser: No, no, no, I contacted all of them directly. That took a long time. Wendy Turner-Webster: Oh did you, to give you a personal quote? Liz Fraser: Yeah, I've really done. That's why I knew that the only people who would get back to me, would be the ones who really cared about that sort of thing. So, for example, Kate Winslet has given me a lovely quote in there and Tina O'Brien and Jane Horrocks, women who are mothers, obviously, well-known for something else, but at the end of the day, they are like you and me, take away all the money and all the fame and everything, they are women for whom being a mother is something really, really important. Turn to the opposite, I didn't want it to be so that ordinary moms like you and me felt that we have to be like them. It was totally the other way around, is that, even though they are these fantastic persons, they're still just a mom. However rich or famous you are, if you have a difficult birth, you have a difficult birth. That's why you get postnatal depression. Wendy Turner-Webster: Pain is pain, isn't? Liz Fraser: Pain is pain, no matter how rich you are, postnatal depression hits you, it's nondiscriminatory. It doesn't care how rich you are. If you get postnatal depression, you get it. I just thought, it will be nice that ordinary moms know while sitting at home, thinking, oh she looks very fabulous, well, quite a lot of times, she doesn't, she finds it hard too and they say, don't beat yourself up, it's the same for all of us really. Wendy Turner-Webster: Well, I thought it would be kind of nice, I ain't going to put you on the spot a bit, but some sort of top tips, you've got quite a few good top tips that you think it might be good for viewers to impart a bit of knowledge with some useful things in here. So do you want to give me a couple of top tips? Liz Fraser: I could do, yeah, it depends on whether you want to do for pregnancy. If asked for pregnancy, I think, a top tip would be, to make sure that it does finish. It comes to an end and it will seem so long and it goes on two weeks longer than you think. That will be my toppest top tip for pregnancy actually, ignore the due date, add two weeks and go for that. Well, we're all two weeks late and those last two weeks -- it will probably come two weeks earlier having said that. Wendy Turner-Webster: The pregnancy, isn't it true that afterwards you look back and think, god, that was the easy bit. Liz Fraser: Exactly, you don't need to do anything, it just does it all for you. Then you have the baby. That's what you need to know. I think, one of the most important tips when being a new mother, I'm talking about first year of being a mother, it's no use saying to people, enjoy it now, it will go past in a flash. Obviously, that is so true, of course, you know that's true, but at that time it's really, really, really hard. But always just remember that the work that you do now, the work that you do in those first nine months or 12 months will come back. They will come back to you. You don't get paid for it, you don't thanks for it. But when your one-and-a-half-year-old goes, "Mummy ducks," and then you go, "Wow! I've been saying ducks for nine months and you just said ducks." It's worth, and you've just got to keep going and always keep some time for yourself, always. Wendy Turner-Webster: Well, I was just going to say, well, what is your take or your advice on the sort of aspect of purely you as a person, now that you've got this little baby with you, what are your tips for a bit of self-preservation, a bit of self-esteem? Liz Fraser: I think, I so totally call to this survival aspect of motherhood to always remember, that just because 24 hours ago, you didn't have a baby and now you do, it doesn't mean that that person has died, you're still there. All of the things you liked doing before, you still like doing now. To ignore all of that and suddenly just become a mother is going to cause you so many problems, because it's like your life has just gone, and you are still that person. You might be single mother, it might be more difficult to get child. But you will find somebody to take care of your baby for one hour, even if it's once a week, go for a walk around the park, go and see a film if you've got two hours, anything, just do something that you liked doing before, if that's sowing, get an hour doing whatever it is. Wendy Turner-Webster: Really good advice. Thank you Liz, loved reading it, I'm going to dip into even more, thank you so much for coming in today. Liz Fraser: Thank you very much. Wendy Turner-Webster: That's all we have time for you today on Baby Talk. If you have any thoughts of any of the points raised in today's show or just any general queries or questions, we'd love, of course, to hear from you. You can get in touch by phoning or texting the numbers on the screen now. Thanks to all of our guests and see you next time on Baby Talk. Bye!