Pride Angel Journey - Food

With babies, food is simple: it’s just very messy. We did baby-led-weaning which means avoiding spooning mush into them and pretty much letting them feed themselves with whatever we happened to be making for ourselves that meal. They fed themselves, their bibs, their chairs, the table, the floor and anything within a 2-metre radius. Messy.
With toddlers, food is less messy, but it is complicated. As the messiness subsides, the complicatedness increases – mathematically, it is a case of negative correlation. For us, it probably started with a mild unwillingness to try new foods. But other issues arose. Like the problem of foods mixing on the plate or contaminating each other. Porridge must be served flat. VERY flat. Where relevant, food items should be served whole: chopping constituent parts to cool them or prevent them being a choking hazard can be hazardous in itself. Some foods are always edible. Butter, for example, which is best consumed in isolation and in quantity, ideally straight from the packet in large bites. I would consider placing a bet on Willow’s ability, given fifteen minutes to locate (and consume) a raisin in any room. Chips trump anything and the wily toddler having finished his or her own portion in seconds, will develop a range of tactics designed to separate other, more naïve diners from their own share. I’m sure it wasn’t coincidence that a fairly rare occurrence of the word ‘please’ arose in the sentence “Willow, please may I have your chips?’ Willow meanwhile, fearing their imminent loss, rammed all five chips on his plate into his mouth at once. All of this is further complicated by friends and relatives occasionally coming out with ridiculous old classics like “you can’t have any pudding until you’ve eaten your main course”, as if pudding is some sort of reward for making it through the drudgery of savoury food. And amidst the imperious demands of “I want…!” and the horror-stricken cries of “Don’t cut it up…!”, I wonder…messy, then complicated…then calm and straightforward? Somehow I doubt it. Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 10th April 2016

Lesbian non-bio mum wins IVF daughter appeal

The girl was taken to Pakistan after a relationship ended - but now a court could work to bring the seven-year-old back to the UK.
A lesbian woman battling with her ex-partner for the return of her IVF-born daughter from Pakistan has been given hope by a Supreme Court ruling. The girl’s biological mother and sole legal parent took her out of the UK in 2014, three years after their relationship ended.
But the woman who won today’s decision also considers herself a de facto parent to the seven-year-old - who was conceived by IVF in 2008. Her efforts to force her former partner to bring the girl back to the UK had been blocked by the High Court and Court of Appeal.
They said they could not intervene because the girl was not habitually resident in Britain when the legal action started. However, Supreme Court justices have now overturned those rulings - deciding she had been resident and allowing the woman’s appeal.
The case now goes back to the High Court for a judge to reconsider whether to take steps to bring the girl back from Pakistan. Lawyers say the ruling has important implications.
Maria Wright, from Freemans Solicitors, said: "The consequence of the Supreme Court's decision is that the English court can properly consider what is in (the child's) best interests and, if appropriate, order contact or (the child's) return to England."
Article: 3rd February 2016 www.news.sky.com

Pride Angel Journey | What do lesbians and babies have in common?

They all come out in the end... I was eight days overdue and the pressure was mounting – but unfortunately only metaphorical pressure rather than the literal pressure that might signal labour was imminent. Despite our hopes for the birth centre, induction and the labour ward was once again looming. Then, at bedtime, I sensed change. A slight abdominal ache, back pain, a heaviness between my legs. The next morning brought some splotches of a creamy, bloody stuff and I knew the time was nigh. I had a labour-inducing acupuncture session booked for that morning and, lying on the couch wired up, watching a muscle in my hand quite disconcertingly twitch of its own accord, I mused on how the £38 could perhaps have been more usefully spent. Back home, there was an ominous atmosphere. Looking outside, I expected to see a sky expectant of a storm, heavy and murderous, but the clouds were white and calm as if unaware of what was surely beginning inside me. Preparing lunch, I doubled over briefly – a sudden shooting pain in my abdomen. Just like I sometimes got with my period. Sudden and then gone. And then again, half an hour later. I made myself comfortable in the conservatory with a wheat pack on my abdomen and got my knitting out, ignoring the inkling that such behaviour merited my immediate removal to a retirement home. 8pm. After a shuffle round the streets for a bit of fresh air, we got the tens machine attached and settled down with a film - To Kill a Mockingbird - and popcorn. The pains were sharper now; when I felt them coming, I knelt on the floor and leant over my birthing ball. By 10pm the noise of the film was distracting and the popcorn was starting to make me feel sick. 11pm. The pains (I suspected they were contractions, but was reluctant to use the 'c' word in case they weren't) were stabbing and sudden and I was beginning to rethink my minimum pain-relief birth plan. Sally packed the car and ran me a bath. She phoned the midwife and explained that her partner was in labour (once again 'coming out' which it seemed happened every few days for one or both of us towards the end of our 'lesbian pregnancy'). The midwife told us it could be three or four days yet, so at midnight, we settled down in bed to try and get some rest. Article: by Lindsey, West Yorkshire 1st December 2013