Charlotte Delaney has sworn off men. After one relationship disaster after another- including turning a guy gay!- Charlotte is so over the male species.
Isaac Fletcher had his heart cruelly broken. Yes, it was years ago. No, he never got over it. I...
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With Isaac being back in work, I was finding myself feeling increasingly isolated from the world. I was constantly on my own with Sera, which isn't terrible, but it was fast becoming exhausting being a full-time parent and constantly stuck in the house. The doctors had told me that I couldn't drive until six weeks after the c-section and I was missing the freedom and independence having a car gave me; Sera and I were limited to what we could do so we visited the park opposite our street a few times and we even managed to get to La Petite on Friday but now, we were once again stuck indoors.
The health visitor visited on Thursday to check up on us and she was happy with the progress Sera was making. She hadn't put on as much weight as we'd hoped due to her heart condition but it could be worse, I was told. They would monitor her weight gain carefully and see if Sera improved, otherwise, we'd need to look at having a feeding tube fitted. The announcement freaked me out slightly and I got straight on the phone to Ben, the paediatric doctor, who told me that he didn't think that would be necessary. We had an appointment booked in with him in a few weeks, anyway, and he'd be able to see for himself how Sera was doing but he reassured me that everything was fine. He wouldn't lie to me, he said, because Bob would fire him on the spot for lying to his favourite surgeon's girlfriend. I had to smile at that.
Today, however, Sera and I were stuck at the house and I was thoroughly bored. There was only so much I could take of nursery rhymes and watching Cbeebies programmes. I'd been told that having a baby was amazing because you could legitimately watch Tom Hardy do the bedtime stories on the channel but so far, I'd yet to see one and apparently he only had one more story to air before he'd stop reading them out. So much for it being a highlight of motherhood.
My biggest problem, it seems, is that I am bereft of friends who have children. Since becoming pregnant, I've lost touch with a lot of my friends from before and none seem that interested in meeting with me now that they'll know that I'd have a baby in tow. It's their loss, really, because my baby is freaking gorgeous. That said, I miss having grown up conversations.
There were a few mother and baby groups nearby but I'd been warned that they were full of nannies looking after the children of wealthy mothers who have somehow wandered into Harrods on the way to the group. While I have nothing against nannies, they weren't going through the same experience I was; they didn't have any insight into how I was feeling and while they could give me some hints and tips, was it really the same? I needed mothers. I needed first-time mothers.
"Ok, this looks promising," I tell Sera as I scroll through my Google search results. "Fancy going to something called Jellybabies?"
Sera stared at me and then turned away, her darkening eyes fixated on something else. She's far more aware of her surroundings now than before and she likes to watch things with the utmost interest. With me, she stares at my earrings but is far more interested in Isaac's nose. Sera can never take her eyes off Martha's lips and if my father is around, Sera sleeps. With everyone else, though, Sera loves to just look at their eyes which is perfect as everyone loves to look at her eyes just as much.
