Nine Months of Roshan

Hello again. I am emerging from the other side of sleep deprivation, blinking in the light, after Roshu had his FIRST NIGHT OF UNBROKEN SLEEP last night. EVER. After a couple of months of sheer torture when he regressed to waking hourly which led to him sleeping next to me and drinking a sip from his bottle every hour all night, we resorted to controlled crying. As hard as it was, particularly the first night, it worked and Roshu is so much happier and more settled for it. As am I. I felt like I was going mad for a while, but that is simply what intense sleep deprivation can do. I remember a woman in Ikea telling me that she was loving being a mum to a baby the same age as Roshu, and my heart broke because I realised at that point that I couldn't say the same thing. Now I understand that I was just utterly, utterly exhausted.

Anyway, six months have passed since my last update on Roshu. He is still the brilliant, happy, sociable baby I wrote about then. If anything, he's happier and more sociable! He is simply a delight to be around and he loves and is loved by all who meet him. We are still little (we remain snugly on our 2nd centile) and at nearly 10 months, just transitioning into 6-9month clothing with some 3-6 month stuff (M&S your sizing is HUGGGE!) But he's got chubby, rosy cheeks, and is very, very strong (he was kicking on his change mat so hard that he hurt my ankle earlier). 

Roshu's weaning story goes up and down, he does get bored of food quite easily and prefers to move, play and talk rather than eat lots and lots. But in the last couple of days he's started vocalising his enjoyment of foods - particularly oranges, hot cross buns and yoghurt, which are his favourites. But mealtimes have to be accompanied by mummy singing (I have invented many, many verses for The Wheels on the Bus and Old MacDonald has branched out into zookeeping) and many toys as well as finger foods to keep his attention. When he gets a cold (which is often) he goes completely off his food which is understandable, but always stresses me out a bit. I must remember that it sucks to eat when you can't taste anything!

He is chatting away all the time now, with hand gestures and frequent raisings of his highly expressive eyebrows. We are treated to "mama", "bababa" and "da" sounds most frequently, and he definitely says "mama" when he wants something or isn't happy (I suppose I am the person who "fixes" him!). His voice has a unique, rather duck-like quality, with the odd dinosaur/monster growl and very high pitched squeal thrown in. In the last two weeks he has learnt to shake his head, but it's a proper "Indian" head shake accompanied by much smiling as though I'm attempting to haggle with him and offering a ridiculously low price. I love love LOVE the fact that sometimes he hugs me back with his tiny arms around my shoulder, nuzzling into me. We still have no teeth (I feel rather embarrassed about getting excited at the drooling and chewing at 3 months now), but crawling is imminent as he is flipping onto his stomach and pushing himself forward and backwards all the time now. He is also standing quite confidently against furniture. I'm really proud of him for his mobility given that he has spent so much of his young life with his legs braced together, flat on his back, because of the talipes.

He is so brilliantly used to his boots and bar now, though it does concern me how deeply focused he becomes when I strap his little feet into them, as if he is trying to work out how to undo them! His feet are perfect now but need the brace to stay that way, and I have built the boots into his bedtime routine so solidly that I hope he'll just think that boots = bedtime when he's older. Fingers crossed!

Roshu loves books - if you give him a bunch of toys and one book, he'll reach for the book. It's so much fun reading with him and watching him follow my mouth and expressions and eagerly turn the pages. That said, he loves interactive toys, my phone and my netbook with a passion and spends ages just opening and closing the "baby laptop" my mum got him. He loves his jumperoo too but requires an appreciative audience while bouncing in it, which rather defies the point of it. So there's much mumbling of "that's brilliant bouncing, Roshu" that goes on while I try to squeeze some work into my crazy, busy days.

He also LOVES to go out. He gets ridiculously excited when I start to put his coat on, as he knows this is the signal that An Adventure (possibly involving Trying Foods One Shouldn't Really Eat or Making New Friends or BOTH) is about to begin. I've started using the proper seat that comes with my Urbo rather than the car seat facing towards me as he is much more interested in seeing the world than his mum now. On the downside, the view is so very interesting from his buggy that it takes an absolute age to get him off to sleep in the buggy, if at all. (It's so very flattering that I was so boring in comparison!) He loves going on swings (and going alarmingly high) which suggests to me a thrillseeker daredevil type in the making which he definitely does not get from me. When out, he will do his level best to befriend EVERY person in a 10 metre radius, and gets a little irked if they resist his many, many charms. 

Over the last few days I have really found myself enjoying life so much more. I've loved Roshu and enjoyed being with him from day one, and even before, but with the alopecia (I now have no hair whatsoever), the pain and symptoms from my tear, the talipes and the sleep issues, I was finding it so unbelievably difficult to cope and get through each day.  I felt like each day was a battle, that I was just scrabbling to keep my head above water. I'm so glad I had family support and friends to get me through (thank you, grandparents and Hipp Organic formula, combined you have given me many nights of precious unbroken sleep), and a sensible health visitor who enabled me to take steps I needed to get Roshu to sleep better. Because it's sleep that we both needed to get to this happy place, and sleep we are now getting. Finally.

So nine months of Roshu. It feels a strange milestone, I was pregnant for nine months, he's been in the world for the same length of time. We've had so many challenges, and we're overcoming them one by one. He's tough and hardy, so resilient and cheerful even when ill and exhausted that he inspires me to be strong and bright too. He is a magical child who, true to his sunny name, continues to light up the lives of those around him, and I'm so glad I am his mum.

RIP, Mane: Alopecia Arreata and Me

Today, I finally had an appointment I've been mired in an eighteen month battle with my GP, medical secretaries and NHS booking lines for. It was with a dermatology consultant, regarding the hair loss that has slowing been chipping away at my self esteem, sense of identity and confidence. (Hence no beauty or fashion posts from me for a long, long time).

It confirmed what I already know: that I have severe alopecia arreata, a little understood, barely researched and underfunded condition where (it is believed) that my immune system has attacked my hair follicles, meaning that I have now got large clumps of bald areas all over my head, as well as complete loss of all arm and leg hair (I never thought I'd miss that stuff, but I do, I really do). Along with the physical symptoms, the unknowability of it, and the fact that it affects a part of your appearance crucial to most people's sense of their selves (recall your last bad haircut, or even bad hair day, and think about how it made you feel), it's been fairly harrowing. Every morning, waking up and brushing out the knots caused by hairs detaching themselves overnight, looking down into the sink and seeing a mass of blackness, stomach sinking. Every day, artfully arranging remaining strands to try to cover the bald patches, only to realise in precious photos of me with Roshan that it didn't hide anything whatsoever. Slowly chopping my once waist length hair shorter and shorter in order to lessen the daily strain of witnessing the sheer masses I'm losing. Tears, so many, many tears.

I'll be the first to admit it: I've always been really vain about my hair. I was blessed with a thick, unruly mane, and since the age of fifteen, there's probably only been two or three (accidental scissor-happy hairdresser related) incidences of me having even mid-length hair. It's always been long, it's always been very thick.

But now I'm facing the prospect of it never returning - I have a 1 in 10 chance of a full recovery. And that's very, very hard to take. The problem with alopecia is that you never feel like you have the right to be really upset about it - most people (with the best will in the world) keep reminding me that I could have it so much worse, that it's only hair. But as I await a wig-fitting appointment, I'm struggling to put a brave face on this. I miss my hair. I just don't feel pretty without it.

As traumatic as it has been, the process to even get the appointment confirming my diagnosis has almost been as stressful. After seeing doctor after doctor at my surgery who dismissed my concerns ("there's nothing to be done, sweetie", "it's probably just stress, relax and it'll come back", "it's your pregnancy" - the last completely illogical given it began before I was even pregnant), I finally hit upon one that actually listened to me and agreed to refer me. That was in July. A month later I finally received an appointment - for December. Ringing the dermatology department, I was told that was simply the earliest appointment they had. My GP was outraged (finally found a good one, there) and immediately expedited my referral as urgent. Since then, I've been engaged in a merry (read: not merry AT ALL) dance with rude, huffing medical secretaries who jobshare and don't speak to each other, a bookings department that doesn't ever seem to be able to receive a fax, and GP secretaries who promise to fax things and then don't. It's been hell. I simply do not understand why it has to be this way - the NHS must be the only organisation still running predominantly through faxes (how many of us when on work experience many moons ago used to feel a little ill when handed a bundle of documents and phone numbers, knowing hours of frustration and earpiercing whistles of fax-sendings, or rather, failings, awaited?) Why can't emails suffice? Surely they're more secure, efficient and easy than bits of paper flapping about for anyone to see or intercept?

So after two months of phoning almost every day, I finally got given an appointment for this morning - I think in part because the bookings line manager understood that sheer incompetence had ensued. But again, another harrowing experience awaited me, as the very sympathetic, but entirely helpless consultant informed me there's very little treatment that works, and that the NHS doesn't fund much research into this area because failure is so high. This strikes me as a deeply flawed logic, a horrible catch-22 for anyone suffering from a condition that has been deemed a waste of NHS time. Perhaps I'm not very, very physically unwell - but the emotional impact of losing all your hair as a 34 year old woman is - well, I can't even put it into words. And here, I've really tried.

But I'm considering my options. I've never been able to do fancy 1940s hairstyles, so I've treated myself to this number in order to vintage-up my style. The bonus of having jet-black hair is that it's easy to choose wigs and know that it won't look too fake. I've been using hairbands and braided false hair-headbands, but now it's getting a bit too bad for that, but they've been invaluable and I think will also look nice with wigs. I might venture into the world of coloured hair, which I've always been tempted by, but never had the courage to do. I'm awaiting steroid injections to the scalp (fun!) and my consultant and my sister are looking into research trials I might be able to join. Who knows, I might be that one in the ten who's lucky. But I can't hide away forever and I can't sob my life away if not. So I'm going back to posting beauty and fashion - and my face - here, even if I might look a little different to how I used to.

Formula feeding - my story

Please help. I have six packs of Boots Breast Pads taking up room in Roshan’s nursery and I don’t have a clue what to do with them.

And that’s because despite best intentions (as pregnancy bulk buying of above breast pads should indicate) and a lot of effort, Roshan is a formula baby. I am a formula mum.

I started a version of this post with a guilt-laden, confessional tone. And then I scrapped it. Because, you know what, there’s far too much guilt and judgement of formula mothers as it is. It’s suffocating. And last week, at the health visitor clinic, I mentally turned a corner. The HV asked me how Roshan’s feeding was going and I apologetically shrugged my shoulders and said “well he’s a formula baby now”. The HV responded “oh that’s fine! But how is he doing on it?” – and I realised that she wasn’t interested so much in what he was feeding, but the quantity and quality of his feeds. I realised that I was loading the guilt onto myself, projecting the judgement of others onto myself when sometimes there was none (though many times no such projection is needed). And then I decided – no longer. I’m not apologising for bottle feeding anymore, to others, or to myself.

For every mother I know that has sailed through exclusive breastfeeding (a term I really hate with a passion, designed to make us “lesser” mothers feel like we’re being refused admittance to some elite club we’re too rubbish to be part of) I know of at least four who’ve struggled, mixed-fed or formula fed. There’s plenty of support for mothers to facilitate breastfeeding in the form of groups, lactation consultants, community breastfeeding assistants and so on. But that support network is ripped away when you decide to formula feed – and there’s nothing in its place.

So I wanted to write a post that’s, as controversial as it might seem, positive about formula feeding. I want to write down the things I’ve learnt, two and a half months on, mostly through trial and error, for other women in my situation – things I wish I’d been told in the many, many classes and workshops I attended during my pregnancy but which were never spoken of for fear of inciting women to formula feed.

Incitement to formula feed. The present climate in the UK regarding breastfeeding is such that any lone voice that comes out in support of formula does indeed seem like a pariah. But really, is formula such a big, so very moral, deal? As Anne Maxted points out in what I found to be a saviour of an article, in the developed world, not really. So why the fuss? In my opinion, the hysteria around breast/formula is just an another way for women to judge one another, to load even more pressure on each other, to create another impossible to achieve goal of perfection for us all to strive towards and endlessly beat ourselves up about.

Don’t get me wrong – I think breastfeeding is fantastic. I was deeply committed to it throughout my pregnancy – I set up cosy nursing places, bulk bought those wretched breast pads, and was generally so excited at the prospect of nurturing and nourishing my child.

Two and a half months on, on formula 100%, I am doing that still – but just not in the way I anticipated, visualised, dreamed of. But Roshan’s thriving now, crossing centiles, getting stronger, longer and louder and we are both so, so happy.

It wasn’t always this way. When I say I tried to breast feed, I don’t think I could have done anything more to try to establish it for Roshan. To the extent that I almost put his health at risk. And it still didn’t work out. And what they don’t tell you in those pregnancy breastfeeding workshops is that sometimes that just happens.

I’ve written about my frankly terrifying birth experience. After all of 5 minutes of “skin to skin” (continually interrupted by paramedics trying to keep Roshan alert), I ended up being apart from Roshan for over nine hours due to my surgery. So, it wasn’t surprising that it took some time for my milk to come in and when it did, that it came in tiny, tiny amounts. But I persevered and I mastered latching Roshan within a couple of days. But he couldn’t get much from me, and as I’ve found out, he’s not the most patient of babies even when he’s happy. He began to get so very hungry he’d work himself into a complete state, so much so that he couldn’t feed, flapping his little arms, delatching himself in complete fury. I would sit with him latched for an hour at a time, as he would fall asleep after five minutes of drinking. One night, I recorded my feeding and I had had him latched for a total of five hours overnight. But though he latched, he would fall asleep and stop suckling almost immediately, and then he’d wake up and delatch in hungry fury. It was a terrible, emotionally devastating cycle. He ended up losing 1/6^th of his birth weight, going from 6lbs to 5lbs. He looked like a little prune, drawn and shrivelled, and he couldn’t sleep for more than half an hour at a time because of his gnawing hunger.

In retrospect, I can’t quite believe I held on with the breastfeeding for as long as I did. He did have the odd decent drink, and when I wasn’t around in the intensive care unit, he was given formula with a cup or syringe. But he still wasn’t putting on weight, and when we were discharged I was left with a starving, dehydrated, sleepless baby who couldn’t feed and couldn’t settle. Add my pain from my tear into that mix, and the first two weeks were the hardest of my life.

My health visitor ended up basically ordering me to mix-feed. I also started to express, to help my frustrated, cross little baby consume the “good stuff” he refused to take by breast. But as Roshan was a demanding baby during this time, this meant that when I wasn’t feeding/settling I was expressing and I had simply no time to do anything else. After five weeks I made the decision to stop mixed feeding and switch Roshan to EXCLUSIVE formula feeding. Given that by this stage he didn’t like the taste of breast milk and wouldn’t take from the breast at all (too much hard work!) he didn’t complain at all about this.

But it wasn’t plain sailing – even on bottles, he’d struggle, wriggle and take in lots of air so he was full of wind and in lots of pain from it. It took a switch to Hipp Organic (I feel like such a Hampstead yummy mummy feeding my child an organic formula!) and anti-colic bottles for me to get the happy, smiley and THRIVING little baby I have now. But looking at him now, all chubby cheeks, bright eyes and flapping, strong limbs, I know I made the right decision and we’re all brilliantly happy. So I’m not going to apologise anymore for what was right for Roshan and right for me.

Things I’ve learnt – you can master all the techniques of breastfeeding, but if you don’t have an easy/simple birth experience and/or your baby doesn’t have the right temperament, then it might not work out. Don’t underestimate the power of switching formula – I was sceptical, having read that all formulas now are pretty much the same, but I’ve seen a dramatic change in Roshan’s ability to digest his food. We have no back arching, no pained crying, no hours of coaxing burps out of him anymore. Infacol is a useful thing if your child is colicky. So are wide necked bottles – but for me, Tommee Tippee ones ended up drenching Roshan because of leaks (googling I found this to be a common issue) so we’re using Avent Natural. Teats also make a huge difference – some bottles come with teats for older babies, but don’t make it clear on the box that this is so. If your baby is spluttering out milk – check if the teat’s right. Formula dispensers are ace if you have a crazily impatient child like I do (Roshan would work himself into a frenzy before I’d measure eight scoops into a bottle if I dared to do that when he’s hungry). Burping is important. Some babies don’t like bibs – muslins are softer and more easily tucked into chubby neck rolls (neck rolls! We have neck rolls!)

The benefits of formula? I know how much food Roshan takes, when, which reassures me given his weight struggles. He feeds regularly, and in consistent quantities, so we’re getting close to having a schedule established. He stays over at his grandparents’, giving me time to sleep and time to do other things (gosh, that makes me sound less than devoted, doesn’t it? But it’s important too, I think, for Roshan to have a happy, rested, and fulfilled mother). I feel we – me, Bartimaeus, grandparents, uncles and aunts – co-parent Roshu by all of us being able to feed him. And whilst expressing worked, it (literally) sucked so much time from my day, I couldn’t even play with Roshan between pumping, feeding, settling him and housework. He’s developing brilliantly now I can actually give him proper attention.

So here we are. Happy Roshan, happy me. On formula. Exclusively.

Any tips on how to use up those breast pads would be more than welcome.

A Rather Unusual Delivery: My Birth Story

The spot

Much has happened in Poco Bunny Land over the last few months, most obviously the arrival of the mini Bun at the end of June. To say we’ve been on a rollercoaster of emotions during this time would be an understatement. There’s been profound joy, but it’s also been incredibly challenging, physically and emotionally. In part that’s because of how the mini Bun R actually arrived in the world. One of the first questions you’re asked during medical exams as a new mum is “did you have a normal delivery?” By which they mean, did you have a c-section or not? I didn’t have a c-section. But I also didn’t have a normal delivery, by any means.

Roshan Arjuna Pathak was born on Friday 21st June at 14.52, exactly a week before his due date, weighing 6lb1.

In the weeks running up to my due date, friends told me that just before he’d come, I would get a huge instinctive drive to organise and nest. Both Bartimaeus and I scoffed at the very notion that I would ever have the urge to organise anything. And yet on the Wednesday and Thursday prior to his arrival that’s exactly what happened. I even cajoled my father in law into building a chest of drawers for me so that I could finally sort out our clothes storage and Roshan’s. So when on Thursday afternoon back pain presented alongside the sciatica in my hip I'd been suffering from in the last week, I didn’t think anything of it, and carried on writing my draft conference paper sitting on my gym ball.

At about 4.30 in the morning though I woke up with some twinges and cramps and thought that was rather intriguing so downloaded a contraction timer. The contractions were 20 min apart so I tried to sleep and didn’t wake Bartimaeus. At about 7 the cramps were starting to annoy me and I’d read you have to use your TENS machine early on so I woke Pathik up to set it up for me (I’d only ordered it on Wednesday and received it earlier that day! Which is lucky as it ended up being the only pain relief I got throughout the process until my spinal anaesthetic for my stitches).

I kept timing my contractions but they were erratic – some were 16 min apart, some 5. I called the hospital at 9 and they told me it was far too soon to come in and to wait until the contractions were regular and 3-4 min apart. I wandered about eating cream crackers and telling Bartimaeus to leave me alone. At 12 I started to feel the urge to push and called the hospital again but my contractions were still all over the place and the nurse said the pushing was probably just “the position of the head” and not to come in. (When I recounted this to my midwife her eyebrow shot up and she rolled her eyes, so I’m guessing this was wrong advice.) I was in a fair bit of pain during the contractions and the times I wanted to push (I threw up a couple of times) but I kept thinking it’d get worse because I’ve never given birth before and it wasn’t unbearable (in hindsight, it may be that I share my sister’s incredible and slightly problematic uber-high pain threshold). I figured it’d get a lot worse before I was done. I do remember feeling quite tired at about 1 and telling Bartimaeus that if this was going to go on for another three days I didn’t think I could handle it because I wouldn’t have the energy to keep going, and that I would need the epidural I hadn’t originally ever wanted. (ha!)

Then at 2pm my waters broke and I rang the hospital again and they said that I should come in now. But I was upstairs (and unbeknownst to anyone, actually in full blown labour) so it took me 20 minutes to get down the stairs. My father in law arrived to take us to the hospital but by the time I got into the car, I had a huge urge to push and he crowned. I was totally bewildered and had no idea what was happening. My mother in law and Bartimaeus were shouting that he was on his way and that I needed to push again so I did, and he was born, in the back of my father in law’s car, just outside our house. I was screaming at them to make sure he was ok and for them to give him to me. Bartimaeus gave him to me, wrapped in a towel whilst in the process of also ringing 999. The ambulance arrived in minutes and we were “bluelighted” to the hospital, sirens and all. It was all very dramatic. Roshu was breathing erratically and very blue because it was such a shock entry into the world, and the paramedics were looking concerned all the way there which really terrified me. From the time he crowned to when we arrived in hospital, I didn’t feel any pain. I was just praying to God for Roshan to be ok all the way there and couldn’t think of anything else. He, subanAllah, heard my prayers.

When we got to the hospital Roshan was rushed to intensive care and I was rushed to an exam room. I was fairly distraught at being separated from Roshu and not knowing what was going on with him but I was examined and sent for surgery for the severest degree of tear (the price of not having a midwife about to tell you when and when not to do things!) But the surgical team were very reassuring and kept checking on him for me throughout my surgery so I could stay calm. Once I was stitched up and stabilised, after 11pm, having spent over 7 hours apart from my tiny beloved son, I was actually wheeled in my bed into ICU to see my Roshu, beautiful, tiny, and asleep in his incubator, needle pricks all over his tiny hands and heels, and wires everywhere. I stretched out my hand and held his perfect little fingers (mirrors of mine) in my hand and I cried, a lot. Happy, shaky and overwhelmed tears.

 

Roshu spent the next few days in ICU and I spent them on a ward healing up a bit, with Bartimaeus wheeling me down to see him and spend time with him for hours on end. But he got stronger very quickly, and we finally got discharged after 6 days. Coming home was the best feeling ever – whilst the neo natal nurses are AMAZING I had both great and hideous care on the wards and I was desperate to go home to the point I was just going to walk out if they didn’t discharge us that night (more on that in another post).

I’m still in a fair amount of pain (especially if I overdo things) and I face the prospect of having any further children by c-section (which is a shame, to say the least, because given how quick my first labour was there’s a good chance I would have had very easy natural births). All this, because as a first time mother, the signs my body was giving me weren’t taken seriously by the midwives on the labour ward. They assumed that all first time births take a long time, that as a first time mother I was bound to be overreacting, that I had no idea what my body was doing. I wish I had been in the right headspace to have just gone in anyway, but my mind was a blur (hell, I was in full labour without pain relief!) and I trusted the midwives implicitly. I think back to all that might have gone wrong that didn’t, and I’m thankful – but it was a trauma I’m still recovering from and one which made the first month of Roshu’s life very, very hard for us to enjoy.

Now, though, we are just revelling in our beautiful, wonderful boy. I see the joy he has brought to both our families, how much younger all his doting grandparents seem since he has arrived, and how every day he delights and amazes us in new ways, and I just feel so very blessed to be his mother. Roshan, which means light/sunshine, born on the summer solstice, the bringer a beautiful sunny summer to us all, the light of all our lives.

50 Random Facts

This tag has been doing the rounds and I thought I would take part, mostly in order to cheer poor Charlotte of Lipglossiping up who is recovering from pneumonia. Feel better soon!

1. I grew up wanting perfect teeth and had them for a bit, before they all moved about leaving a gap on one side. But now I love that gap.
2. There's a novel in me, but I need to make time to write it.
3. I love to cook but would live on cornflakes and toast if I lived on my own.
4. I have forgotten how to ride a bike.
5. I had many different nicknames as a child, including Polly. It's a Bengali thing.
6. My favourite chocolates in the world are Ferrero Rochers.
7. I used to collect gemstones and still know quite a lot about them.
8. I look rubbish in all shades of blue (teal and turquoise excepted), and white.
9. I was bullied at school for being short and brown.
10. I predicted my sister was a girl, my brother a boy, and my baby a boy. Just call me Mystic Meg.

11. I passed my driving test on the fifth time but I have a social phobia of driving which means I haven't yet used my licence.
12. When I was fifteen I could sit on my hair and it made a plait I couldn't get my fingers round.
13. I've been able to do a perfect eyeliner flick since I was 17.
14. I have always had a secret dream to be a jazz/blues singer.
15. I can't swim.
16. When you come to my house you will be offered a myriad of different hot beverage options.
17. I own about 150 bottles of nail polish.
18. And three bedside cabinet drawers of makeup.
19. My sister is my best friend. But I love my bro too.
20. But I'm also blessed with a small circle of friends I've had for years now. There was a time I didn't have any at all.

21. I hated everything except learning at school.
22. I used to be ambidextrous but was told off at school for showing off when I used to write with both hands.
23. My chilli paneer is better than Sakoni's, Wembley (legendary).
24. I once cried because the heather in the New Forest had made the whole landscape purple and I was overwhelmed by how lovely it was.
25. Bartimaeus and I have a rather wistful, romantic love story that one day will be made into a Bollywood film.
26. Said film would star Saif Ali Khan and Konkona Sen Sharma.
27. I'm meaner than I seem.
28. Having a medic sister means I'm not very squeamish.
29. I could be tidier.
30. But I'm awesome at finding things people have lost and I never forget anything.

31. Once most of my makeup was high end (MAC, NARS) but now it's probably 75% high street.
32. I live opposite a tiny synagogue and consider myself its out of hours guardian.
33. I have a high squeaky speaking voice, but my singing voice is alto. It means the only songs I can sing along to on the radio are ones sung by dudes.
34. I used to never be able to watch horror films but really like (non-gory) ones now.
35. I am a fantasy and sci-fi nerd, and PROUD.
36. But I've never got into computer games because I'd get too addicted.
37. I'd rather have a glass of Coke than wine.
38. I love my Kindle even though I spent years debating getting one.
39. I'm not a very fussy eater but I am a slow one.
40. Most of my books are still at my mum's because there's just so many of them and I wouldn't know where to put them all.

41. I think there are two types of people in the world - Burger King and McDonalds. I am the latter, and I judge the former.
42. If I'm scowling at you, the chances are I'm grinding my sensitive tooth.
43. I'm a real scaredy cat.
44. I have the most pathetic veins ever and only specialist nurses and doctors can manage taking blood from me.
45. My mum was obsessed with me not being under five foot tall. Luckily, I just made it over.
46. Six years on, I am still completely fascinated by everything my sister's cats do.
47. I do appreciate a nice biscuit.
48. I don't look like me without a side fringe.
49. I loved my uni years.
50. I've always wanted to be a mother and am so excited that I'll soon be able to fulfil that part of me. 

Songs for my unborn #1: Here Comes the Sun (Nina Simone)

Our baby is due at the end of June, a summer baby, like me, and this song has been played a lot in our house of late. I've always love Nina Simone's version of Here Comes the Sun. To me, it's more reassuring and optimistic in tone than the Beatles' original, simply because of the gentleness and warmth of Nina Simone's voice. When she near-whispers "it's all right", it's almost as though she's speaking just to you, and you believe her. I've had a tough year emotionally, and have learnt a lot about myself. The darkness descended last winter, and I feel like I'm only just emerging from the dark and the cold. I can't wait for our ray of sunshine to come into our lives - our sun.

Hopping back

Well helloo there! Much has been going on over the last couple of months at Rabbit-Bartimaeus HQ. Most significantly, we are, as the above image suggests, expecting a new arrival in June! I've generally been struggling with sickness, nausea (er, I'm well into the second trimester and I am supposed to feel "amazing" now?) which partly explains yet another blog hiatus, but other than that I am well and we are so excited.

I've not yet gone crazy with baby purchases but I did have to pick up a couple of things from the Peter RABBIT collection for Baby Gap. I used to read the story of Peter Rabbit to my brother when he was a baby (it began a lifelong dislike of chamomile tea, which was unfortunate as I used to have to drink it for my migraines, bleurgh). I especially like the babygrow, because, being the spawn of Bartimaeus, there's a good chance the Mini Bun is going to add substantially to my grey hairs.

I've been reigning in the clothes spending, for obvious reasons, but I am really enjoying makeup at the moment so expect nail posts and pictures of my mug coming up soon. I've also been putting together a compilation of songs for the baby, and have been reading a lot more, so reviews and bits of music may also find their way here.

How are you all?

Rabbit Recipes: Bengali White Chicken Curry (Rezala) - the original korma? And a waffle on Bengali history...

I think this dish might be the origin of the British chicken korma. I can't say for sure, because I've never eaten one - curry snob, me - but the creaminess and gentleness of the flavours (and the fact that it comes from the region most "Indian" chefs in Britain come from - suggests to me that it might be the inspiration.

I'm always intrigued by the dual personality of Bangladeshi cuisine, which I think might be related to the history of Islam in Bengal. One aspect of Bengali cuisine is almost East Asian - having more in common with the flavours of Vietnam and Thailand than the "curries" we know of in Britain. The flavours are hot, sharp, pungent, with thin broths, a lot of vegetables, fish and seafood rather than meat, and pounded chilli and fish pastes. But then, another aspect is very rich, fragrant and reminiscent of Persian cuisine. I think it's a difference between what's been identified as the atraf and the ashraf sections of the Bengali Muslim population, a division that goes back to the early nineteenth century as historian Richard Eaton has written about - the former, the agragrian, rural population, and the latter, the urban, middle class and notably, for a time, Urdu-speaking section of the community. It would make sense, right? The hot thin broths, wholesome and hearty, eking out precious harvested supplies for as long as possible; the Persian inspired foods created for a wealthier population always looking to aspire to the cultural heritage of Persia and Afghanistan. (Still ongoing - both my sister's and my name are Persian in origin). Now, both cuisines are eaten by most sections of the population - though with obvious regional differences. But rezala reminds me a lot of Persian food, and I wonder if it was eaten by the ashraf as they read their ghazals and dreamt of (and up) their Iranian and Peshwari ancestors.

It doesn't look that special, does it? (My amazingly rubbish photography skills aren't helping it, though, to be fair). But trust me - it really is. This is my sister the spice-weener's favourite curry, and also has made it onto Bartimaeus's short list of "Bengali curries that taste nice to a Gujarati palate" (hmph). It's definitely one for the spice-shy - but that doesn't mean it's not full of flavour. It's rich, made with a base of softened grated onions, creamy and sweet from the greek yoghurt and brown sugar, and aromatic, scented with saffron and cardamom. In Bangladesh, it's usually eaten as a special occasion dish with a buttery pilau or to accompany a biryani, but I made it yesterday, just cos.

My recipe is inspired by one on My Saffron Kitchen, but simplified a lot and adapted via how I know my mum makes it. I have to say, in all my attempts to replicate my mother's cooking, this has come closest! Whilst there's a lot of aromatics involved in place of spice, making for a long ingredients list, this is actually a ridiculously simple curry to make, but tastes like a lot of effort has gone into it!

Whilst you can serve it with pilau for a truly indulgent dinner, I served it yesterday with basmati - just simple, clean, pure. Cream on snow white prettiness. (Just to clarify, we then had spinach dal - there's not a meal in the Rabbit-Bartimaeus household that doesn't feature vegetables! But I always eat my dal last, as is customary.) Either way, rezala makes for a comforting, soothing, winter dinner.

This is yet another recipe that requires 24 HOURS marinading if possible (though yesterday I made it on the spur of the moment, and left it for an hour and it tasted fine). I think if you wanted to make this an easy two-pot meal, chucking in some frozen peas or some spinach a few minutes before it's done would be fine.

1 800g pack of chicken thighs and legs (chicken breast if you wish, but it's generally not good in curries I think as the bones impart so much chickeny flavour)
1/2 400ml pot of real full fat greek yoghurt (none of this "greek-style, fat free, full of sugar" malarkey here please)
2tbsp double cream
2tsp fresh ground black peppercorns
1 3cm stick of ginger, grated into 1tbsp of puree (if you freeze the ginger and then let it thaw ever so slightly, it's much easier to grate and keeps for ever)
1 tbsp of crushed/pureed garlic
2 medium onions, grated (I used my mini Kenwood processor for this otherwise tearifying job)
1 tbsp ghee
2 tsp garam masala
4 cloves
2 bay leaves
1 piece of cinnamon bark
1 green chilli, sliced in half, deseeded
4-5 strands of saffron
2 tsp rose water (not essential, couldn't really taste it in the final dish)
5 green cardamom pods
1 tbsp green raisins (gentler in flavour than dark ones, though you could add 1/2 tsp of those if you can't find these prettiest jewels of dried fruits - they're easily found in Asian and Middle Eastern shops though)
1/2 tsp grated nutmeg
2 tbsp brown sugar
salt to taste

Mix the cream, yoghurt, ginger paste, garlic paste and ground pepper together into a marinade. Mix the chicken into it thoroughly (slashing the meat if you like) and marinade overnight or for 1 hour at least.

Melt ghee in a large heavy bottomed shallow saucepan on medium-low heat. Add the grated onions and a pinch of salt (to stop onions from browning too fast) and cook slowly until fragrant and a soft paste.

Add the green chilli, garam masala, nutmeg, bay leaves, cinnamon bark, cloves and cardamom pods, and fry on slightly higher heat until spices release their scent.

Add the chicken, being sure to pour in all of the cream-yoghurt marinade. Stir thoroughly.

Salt to taste. Add saffron, rose water, raisins and brown sugar, and 1/2 cup of water.

Cook on medium-high until the chicken is cooked through.

Serve to spice-weeners and spice-champs alike.

Silencing my inner critic

It might be fair to say that my mind is my own worst enemy. I constantly think that I'm not good enough, not a good enough friend, not smart enough, not a good enough writer, a bit of a failure at life in general. When things go well, I'm always first to ascribe responsibility to others or minimise my own role in things. When things go badly, it's no one's fault but my own and I chastise and chastise myself.

I live - perhaps have always lived - under the rule that being hard on myself will make me better. Perhaps it was inculcated into me in a school that focused intensely on academic achievement (my favourite teacher never giving me a full A in English, for example, until the very last essay I handed in - despite me coming first in the year pretty much every term). Who knows - I'm not psychoanalysing myself here. Whatever the reason, it's how I operate. With cooking - with work - with friends - with family. In every area of my life, I measure myself. I measure myself - and I never quite measure up.

In my mind, there's always a litany of "you shoulds", "you musts" and "why did/didn't yous" going on. My therapist put it interestingly last week - that I never actually live in - let alone enjoy - the present. I'm flitting between the past (assessing what I did wrong) and the future (what I should do differently next time),

Ironically, writing so extensively and quite critically about my own brain means I'm still doing that. I'm trying to fix my mind in order to be better. So how on earth do I silence this critical voice that's always haunting me?

One CBT technique that has been helping me a lot has been to try to think of myself, and address myself, with an affectionate, kind voice, rather than the cold, self-accusatory tone I usually think in. They suggest to use a nickname - a name that's only been used about you affectionately. It sounds bizarre and rather American doesn't it? But switching mental registers in this way made me realise that we are always engaged in an unspoken conversation with ourselves, but that it's not always necessarily the kindest, most helpful conversation we could be having. Surely to be healthy and happy, we have to be good to ourselves? It seems self-evident and should come easily but it really does not, at least for me, at least not yet.

Another technique that I adopted on my own has been to keep a diary of things I do every day I should be proud of. When I first started CBT, my therapist asked me to list all the good things about me. I was at a low point, but even now I do struggle to list them. Even the positive attributes I can recognise - being a caring friend, being wise, writing articulately, building connections - I always feel could be improved. Sometimes days and days will go by without me feeling like I've accomplished anything of any worth. So I started logging the tiniest things I could be proud of - talking to an elderly neighbour, texting a friend I hadn't spoke to for a while, sorting out a cupboard - so that after a while I could see how every day I live is good in some way.

But it is an ongoing battle. My inner critic is so embedded in my thinking - facilitated by the peer-review culture of academia, no doubt - that I rarely even realise I'm doing it. I suppose that's the "cognitive" bit of the CBT I ought to be working on (again - "ought to be", argh!)

Why am I writing this? I suppose in part, in this ongoing process of "coming clean" with myself and with others - that I am a bit more complicated and struggle a bit more with life than I sometimes am able to admit. But also to ask whether this is something peculiar to me, or whether you struggle with it too. Do you have techniques that help? Have you found a way to silence that voice?

No Worries: for Depression Awareness Month

I had an odd experience today. A somewhat muted version of a “eureka” moment.

I was on the tube, reading my Kindle.  There was a woman on my left, writing things on her copy of the Evening Standard. Suddenly I became aware of the fact that she could – and was – able to see what I was reading. My stomach lurched and I immediately shut my Kindle up. (No, I wasn’t reading that ridiculous book, but much less excitingly, Overcoming Perfectionism, as recommended by my therapist).

In doing so, I glanced over in her direction, at her copy of the Standard. On it she had written words including (I tried not to read-read as it would have been rude, but these jumped out) “I resent myself at work,” “self-esteem,” “OCD” and “not safe.”

For a moment, I felt the world stop. And then I decided finally to write and publish this post, one which I’ve been thinking about for a few days.

What happened when the world stopped? I realised three things:

1. I am incredibly self-conscious about admitting I have mental health issues, I find it very difficult to talk about them and I fear people discovering I have them. I possibly even feel ashamed I have them.

2. My instinctive assumption is that people will judge/criticise/pity me and see me as pathetic/weak/a failure if I do “own up” to the said mental health issues (I now have The Saturdays’ ghastly “Issues” song in my head).

BUT, here’s the thing:

3.  I’m actually far less alone in battling mental health issues than I have ever possibly conceived.

At the beginning of this year I was signed off work for “low mood” for three weeks. I had been having difficulty sleeping, I was crying all the time, and I had started to think some dark thoughts. I avoided going outside because loud noises and cars were terrifying me. I was jumpy. My thoughts were just a chain of worries, peppered with thoughts of how useless I am.

I have been depressed before, which is why I was a bit more able to talk about it with my loved ones, who were able to recognise signs and suggest I go to the GP. I was also very, very lucky to have had an appointment with the only decent GP at my surgery of 5, who gave me 45 minutes (35 of which should have been her lunch hour) in order to talk and be listened to.

I was prescribed anti-anxiety medication and referred to my local Mental Health services. Since then I have had a course of telephone therapy (a half an hour a week call) which I found both nerve-wracking and frustrating, but a step in the right direction. Indeed, for a while, I thought I had sorted things.

But I think my mind is actually in a series of complicated knots, and I’d only begun to untie them. It was quite easy, in the month in which my telephone therapy ended, and whilst I waited for a referral to face-to-face cognitive behavioural therapy, for those knots to knit themselves back together again and things quickly got fairly dark again.

My therapist says I’m a perfectionist. I’ve found this very hard to process – because I don’t think I’m good enough to be one. She thinks this is hilariously typical of a perfectionist. I’m coming around to seeing that my thought patterns are overwhelmingly governed by achievement, striving, and their dark Others, failure and inertia. I basically worry about failing and letting people down, all of the time. It doesn’t make sense, does it? But it rules my life at the moment.

To illustrate, here’s a rundown of a few hours of this week that show what it’s like to have an anxiety disorder combined with perfectionism (at least for me):

Wednesday

1. Think about packing to leave for London trip and speaking event.

2. Feel dizzy at the prospect of doing everything before leaving (washing up, tidying, packing exactly    the right things, not forgetting important things).

3. Put head in sand for a bit.

4. Take head out of sand, look at time, freak out.

5. Pack in a mad dash and leave with just about enough time (10 minutes) to get to the station and arrive eventually at event in time.

6. Undercurrent of nerves buzzing because I don’t feel prepared enough to speak.

7. Make notes on train, which are ok, but then realise as London approaches, that I will only just about make my event on time.

7. Freak out (internally, silently, but also quite intensely).

8. Arrive in London and madly try to update Oyster card and work out fastest route even though I’ve done journey hundreds of times. 

9. Actually end up standing like a rabbit in the headlights for 7 minutes as I can’t decide what to do.

10. Keep looking at different clocks all of which have different times and panic madly.

11. Get on tube, eventually.

12. Try to think that I’m on the tube, I can’t get there faster.

13. Doesn’t work, instead I chastise myself for not being more organised, at the same time freaking out about being late. Visualise the organisers calling me repeatedly, audience assembled, all waiting for me.

14. Get off tube, walk mega-fast to event building, getting sweaty and breathless.

15. Am THREE minutes late, and am told that event won’t actually start until 7.15 (which, deep down, I also suspected would happen).

16. Try to calm down, but then start freaking out about my speech/the possible questions/how I’ll match up (I will not) to other speakers.

17. Event goes well but I think I could have structured speech better. I don’t feel proud but annoyed with myself instead.

18. Adrenaline stops rushing around as everyone goes for post-event meal.

19. KNACKERED. Want to sleep FOR EVER.

20. Morning after – just want to sleep/hide/sleep.

Looking over that, it’s not a wonder now that I’ve been rundown and ill all summer, and that a massive chunk of my hair has fallen out.

Why have I decided to write this? So many people, when I’ve told them I have an anxiety disorder (heck, even some depressives) have asked me “but you’re so happy?” or, “what have YOU got to be worried about?” I know I can come across as a bright, sunny, extrovert of a person. I’ve lived through stuff that’s made me resilient (if not tough), and my instinct is to nurture and look after rather than be looked after. I don’t anymore, wear pain on my sleeve. And because I don’t want to fail, seem weak, or impose on people, it’s almost impossible for me to come back from such responses. I want to say to them: look, it’s not that my life is filled with worries – it’s that my life is all about the worrying. But I don’t. I just clam up. I say I’m doing ok.

But if it was someone else telling me about GAD (how’s that for an ironic acronym for General Anxiety Disorder), depression, bipolar disorder, OCD or something else troubling them, I’d want to tell them it’s ok not to be ok. That’s what seeing the woman on the Tube brought home to me. Lots of people are not ok. My therapist says I’ve put myself on a treadmill, trying to achieve, succeed, be perfect, exhausting myself, getting nowhere. I see now that lots of us are on parallel treadmills, all battling our particular demons, and all thinking we’re the only one on one.

This is a long post, and if you’ve made it thus far I really do salute you. But the point I wished to make is that I’m struggling – struggling to allow myself to just be happy, even to just be. It’s actually far harder than I thought – than it sounds. But I’m not the only one. And that makes it a bit easier. So I just wanted to put this out there for anyone else who’s on a difficult emotional journey:  we are all co-travellers.

Best Things in Life are Free

Ah Janet and Luther, you're righter than I have ever known. For many reasons, I'm going on a complete non-essential no-spend. I need to reconfigure my life and what makes me happy - it's not things, but people, experiences, memories that do that, in the most long-lasting and joyful of ways. So here's a list of things that are free/non-"stuff" based that I can and should enjoy more.

1. Listening to music - on the radio, on Spotify, from my substantial CD collection. Music takes me away from things in a way buying stuff never could, to good places.

2. Reading, especially utilising my local libraries and bolstering my knowledge of the classics, which are more often than not, free on Kindle.

3. Writing/drawing/making/sewing - why do I spend so many hours idly browsing online shops when I could be DOING something that stimulates my brain and makes me feel more positive about myself?

4. Spending time with/talking to friends - I hide away and get lost in my own world, forgetting others need me, and that I need them too.

5. Exercise/cooking - I need to lose some weight, my immune system has hit rock bottom, I'm exhausted all the time and I need to get myself fit and strong again because WINTER IS COMING. And I never feel as buzzy as when I've exercised, which I will need when the days get shorter and I get sleepier. I also want to experiment with healthy versions of Indian classics. I have so many recipe ideas in my head that never make it to the plate - paneer filled steamed dhokla muffins, for one. 

6. Enjoying/contributing to my community. Little makes me feel happier than knowing I belong somewhere, that it's home. I should really celebrate that more and contribute to it. Because that's how you really feel part of something. And our city has so many things I haven't explored, writing groups, galleries, museums - I need to go out and explore all it has to offer, and give something back.

7. Gardening - my little garden is not looking so happy right now. But the little time I've spent in it (mostly pruning the weeds - or de-gardening as we have termed it) has been some of the most relaxing, rewarding and physically demanding work I've done. I'd love my garden to be a little purple floral oasis this time next year, a space we can relax in and enjoy. I'd love to grow plants from seeds and see them bloom. How smileworthy will that be?

8. Remixing and customising my clothes. I'm going through a grungy phase at the moment. So my instinct would usually be to rush out and buy that pricey velvet dress I featured, new makeup, new jewellery. Except I can so easily do grunge with my existing wardrobe anyway. I have heaps of dark, vampy nail colours. I have a black maxi dress I have layer up for winter. I have dark, moody scarves and long snuggly cardigans. I HAVE LONG BLACK HAIR. So I'm not rushing out to buy it after all.

9. Learning more about my faith. I've been on a journey back to Islam this year. It's not something I speak much about either here or to my friends and family. But it has immeasurably enriched my life and helped me through many difficulties this year. So I want to give it the attention and time it deserves from me.

10. Writing my blog - you'd think with all the shopping, I'd be updating the blog all the time. Er no. Ironically, I don't even really like "OMG LOOK AT ALL THIS NEW STUFFS I HAVE BROUGHT OMG" posts (especially not when they commit that heinous spelling crime of crimes) but my favourite bloggers are the resourceful, creative remixers who also let you into their full and rich and multidimensional lives. I love seeing a dress twice or three times on a blog - resurfacing like an old friend. I love trying out a blogger's personally crafted recipe. I love seeing nail art and creative layering combinations of talented nail bloggers. I love to read book reviews - perversely, even of books I'd never read. So all this - this is what I want for my little corner of the internets.

I should be dreading this no-spend. But actually, I'm really excited about it.

The Entrepreneurial Rabbit

I've just begun my first business venture since I was 17 (when I had my own jewellery business and made over £300 in profits selling made-to-order pieces in the office I temped at).

It's really early days but today was market research day and things are looking really positive. I guess I've always been an entrepreneur in some ways since that teen venture (as pompous and Dragons' Den as that noun sounds!) - I've had so many ideas for businesses, but I've never had the guts to see any of them through. I'm an overly cautious person that always sees the downsides in things and I'm very scared of taking risks.

Luckily, Bartimaeus is pretty much my opposite in this respect. When I had this recent idea (more on it when I've got started!) he encouraged, wheedled and badgered me into taking it seriously. Even earlier this week, as I prepped for my market research, I was totally terrified. It's really quite nervewracking going up to random people you don't know asking them if they'd want to try something out and fill in a questionaire.

But, I am so glad I did. The basically-anonymous feedback has been so glowingly positive, I'm beaming from ear to ear. I can't remember the last time I got a buzz like it. My mind is buzzing with ways to improve, build, develop what I've begun.

I'm sure a lot of you also have ideas like mine - things you don't see out there, or, just as importantly, things that could be just that little bit better (one of the most eye-opening things I realised was that you don't have to reinvent the wheel. If something's already been done - it's actually better because it proves there's a market). But too often perhaps we are that Rabbit in the headlights - discouraged by all the possible downsides, terrified into not moving.

So the moral of the story is: listen to your inner Bartimaeus sometimes.*



*when he reads this he is going to be absolutely INSUFFERABLE to live with...

2012 - 20 things I'm looking forward to!

Rather than resolutions which always seem a bit grim and always end in a sense of failure, I thought I would list instead the things I'm looking forward to this year. I'm very excited about the year ahead, for one major reason in particular, that I will be marrying my soulmate and daemon-in-human-form, known to you as Bartimaeus. Nowt can really beat that. What are you looking forward to?

1. Getting married to Bartimaeus
2. 60th anniversary celebrations of the 1952 Bengali Language Movement (more on that soon)
3. The UK arrival of Revlon Colorburst Lip Butters (deeply excited about these)
4. Maintaining the creative writing I restarted after 10 years on 1 Jan this year

5. Reading lots of interesting books on my lovely new Kindle
6. Meeting and making new friends, which has been a wonderful feature of late 2011
7. Adding some flakie topcoats to my nail collection
8. Trying more pretty takes on nail art
9. The Muppets movie
10. Adding to my vintage jewels collection via Hepwrights, Southampton
11. Writing my weekly lists in my new customised Moleskine work diary (tea-themed stickers? oh yes!)

12. Spending time with my beloved friends and family
13. Filling up a fifth of this amazing thing my sister bought me for Christmas:

14. Writing more blog posts on culture and books as well as nails and dresses
15. Tom Ford Black Orchid
16. Getting hold of a star nail magnet
17. Doing more fascinating archival research on East London
18. Getting involved in lots of community events and groups in London and Southampton
19. Downton Abbey series three
20. Being married to Bartimaeus
 
Do comment and let me know what you're looking forward to this year!

Mists and Mellow Cobwebbiness (arachnophobes: spidey alert)

It was an incredibly misty, dewy morning this morning. It was just that perfect kind of mist that's light enough to hang on spiderwebs, which in turn makes the world look like it's covered in a fine layer of lace.

I do hate spiders. I'm terrified of them after years of getting rid of them for my arachnophobe sister (it's true, phobias can be contagious). But I'm completely fascinated by spiderwebs, which I think are beautiful. (When I was a goth, I even had a fishtail long skirt made from black spiderweb lace. Boy I loved that skirt).

I'm not the greatest photographer, and I certainly don't have the greatest camera (perfectly fine, just none of that HD SLR business), but I had to take some pictures. Sorry, fellow arachnophobes, for the spidey pic, but he looked so proud sitting in the middle of his web I couldn't resist. I think I'm less scared of spiders in their habitat (OUTSIDE) than I am indoors (WHERE THEY SHOULD NEVER EVER BE).

 

Why don't black people do vintage?

A provocative title, no? But it's inspired by this article in the Guardian, titled: "Why don't black people camp?" Having just read it, and looked at a whole bunch of images from the Vintage at Goodwood festival (in which there were very few black and Asian people), the two together got me wondering about the current mainstream tide of nostalgia for all things '40s, '50s and early '60s and how black and Asian individuals might relate to it.

In no way am I trying to suggest that "vintage" is racist. I really enjoy looking at retro-blogs, particularly the ones that are very faithful to the periods they choose. But the reason I enjoy them is that they allow me to indulge in a form of visual escapism, into another, simpler, more beautiful world. I'm particularly struck by some US vintage lifestyle blogs, where women not only embrace the aesthetics of the 1950s in terms of fashion and interior decor, but also the "domestic goddess" code of conduct too, in terms of baking, cleanliness, housewifery and motherhood. Some people really think they want to live in the 1950s.

Which is fine if that makes them happy. But all the while it makes me just think back to one of my favourite films of all time, Todd Haynes' Far From Heaven. This sublimely beautiful piece of cinema recreates in breathtaking precision the atmosphere and visual qualities of Douglas Sirk's sentimental films of the 1950s. However, it does this with a contemporary critical eye focused upon race, gender and sexuality. Whilst the film, set, costumes and music are all lush and beautiful, we see 1950s American society as stiflingly conservative, homophobic, sexist and racist. It's not a place you'd want to escape to, but out of. (Pleasantville, Hairspray and Mad Men of course, also explore this tension).

It's hard for me, therefore, as a woman, from an ethnic minority, to fully embrace the nostalgia for the 1950s in an all-encompassing way. I love elements of it: the dresses, the jazz, the flicked eyeliner. But something about filling my house with Coronation memorabilia and flocking to conventions just jars. It's not a heritage I can fully embrace without the awareness of how different life would've been for someone like me in Britain back then (actually, I would hardly even know what it would have been like then, if not for Rozina Vizram's pioneering book Asians in Britain: 400 Years of History).

I wonder just how many black and Asian young people are faithfully recreating Victory Rolls and subscribing to The Chap. Perhaps it is in part due to the vintage movement's close links to the indie scene. But it might also be that racism and chauvinism sometimes get in the way of nostalgia. They're party-poopers like that.

So, to end, let me present some images of the same period - but of an alternative visual nostalgia: