When I write on social affairs I often wonder if the resulting article helps in any way at all. Can journalism make a difference, or am I essentially being exploitative?
It's hardly an original dilemma, and is surely experienced by every journalist and photographer. It feels a bit naive and studenty to still be asking myself the question, to be honest, but all the same.... it niggles. I make some of my living interviewing people in pretty desperate situations. An assignment I was commissioned to do for a national children's charity campaign illustrates the issue.
I'm asked to drive to south Wales to interview one of the charity's clients, a single mum with five kids. I'm pleased to get the work. It's well paid and interesting. Arriving, I find that she lives in a house where black mould spreads thickly across the kitchen ceiling and down the back wall... where one of her daughters, a little girl with asthma, sleeps in a pink bedroom so icily cold I feel my skin shrink when we look in... where the picture of a baby lost to cot death is unobtrusively placed among the many, many photos of her other children proudly displayed in the front room.
There’s a housing association building site at the end of the little terraced row, but this woman can’t get hold of the £400 deposit she needs to secure one of the warm, dry family houses that will soon be available. I leave feeling angry and hopeless. I write my piece, and still feel angry and hopeless. My fee for this work is more than the money she needs for the deposit. I wrestle with the thought that I should give it to her. I don't. A year on I still wonder if I should have done.
That £400 would have helped her family more immediately than any charity campaign. This is hardly war reporting, but these are people living on a front line. Does this kind of journalism change anything about this woman's life? I don’t know. It’s what I do, what I can do, what I have time to do. It’s not enough.
Friday 30 December 2011
Wednesday 23 November 2011
Why I wanted a Caesarian
In September last year, I was seven months pregnant. I had given birth to my first baby two years previously at 33 weeks by fast, frightening emergency section. Second time round I knew I wanted a calm, planned elective Caesarian. According to NICE guidelines, this was my right, as there are small but significant extra risks associated with vaginal birth after caesarian. But I had to argue hard and consistently over a number of weeks to make my case, and was reduced to tears by a consultant obstetrician who was clearly opposed to me having any choice at all in the matter.
The business of how you give birth seems to be all very ideological for those who aren't in the position of having to go through it. What makes me angry still is that the guidance cited by NICE - if you read the long version on the website, rather than the short leaflet you're given by the midwife - states in the very first sentence of its recommendations that "the risks and benefits of vaginal birth after c-section compared with repeat c-sections are uncertain." This statement comes after pages of detailed evaluation of the evidence from many studies.
So why did I have to find myself sitting in front of the consultant feeling furious and increasingly upset at her patronising refusal to allow me to make a choice over the kind of birth I wanted? It didn't matter how much detailed explanation I gave of my reasons for not wanting to risk another emergency section. She and the midwife seemed determined that I would give birth naturally.
My fears were not irrational: around a quarter of women who attempt a vaginal birth after a c-section end up with an emergency Caesarian, which inevitably holds greater risks than a planned one. Having experienced the emergency variety I wasn't keen on a one in four risk of another. But my midwife and obstetrician weren't going to bother giving me the full picture of risks associated with each method of giving birth; they simply trotted out the mantra that a natural delivery is better for mum and baby.
It feels to me that, whereas in years not so long gone, women who'd had sections were bossily told they couldn't attempt a natural birth, now, through cost pressures and natural birth targets, someone with good reasons for preferring a planned section over a very reasonable chance of ending up with an emergency one may well have their wishes pooh poohed. Worse, I was at no stage informed of any of the risks of a vaginal birth after a section, only told about the possible benefits of a faster recovery time. Nobody ever mentioned, for instance, that the death rate for babies delivered by vaginal birth after caesarian, while still very small, is ten times that of babies delivered by repeat c-section. Given my previous experience of giving birth to a very poorly premmie, that was a particularly salient factor in my decision-making.
It feels like when you're pregnant, nobody listens to you - presumably they think you're too emotional, too confused or not well enough informed to make a sensible choice. I'm appalled that my consultant and midwife didn't give me full information - instead they pushed their preference at me despite that preference holding undisclosed risks of its own.
Obstetricians and midwives simply cannot rely on all women having the support, resilience and wherewithal to research and argue their case; the vulnerability I felt trying to express myself in the face of an obdurate consultant badly upset and stressed me until I got myself referred to another who understood my concerns. That's why I'm glad that women in future won't have to battle to give birth in the way that's right for them. Whatever my consultant would prefer, it wasn't ever going to be her giving birth to my baby and having to choose from a variety of risks - it was me.
The business of how you give birth seems to be all very ideological for those who aren't in the position of having to go through it. What makes me angry still is that the guidance cited by NICE - if you read the long version on the website, rather than the short leaflet you're given by the midwife - states in the very first sentence of its recommendations that "the risks and benefits of vaginal birth after c-section compared with repeat c-sections are uncertain." This statement comes after pages of detailed evaluation of the evidence from many studies.
So why did I have to find myself sitting in front of the consultant feeling furious and increasingly upset at her patronising refusal to allow me to make a choice over the kind of birth I wanted? It didn't matter how much detailed explanation I gave of my reasons for not wanting to risk another emergency section. She and the midwife seemed determined that I would give birth naturally.
My fears were not irrational: around a quarter of women who attempt a vaginal birth after a c-section end up with an emergency Caesarian, which inevitably holds greater risks than a planned one. Having experienced the emergency variety I wasn't keen on a one in four risk of another. But my midwife and obstetrician weren't going to bother giving me the full picture of risks associated with each method of giving birth; they simply trotted out the mantra that a natural delivery is better for mum and baby.
It feels to me that, whereas in years not so long gone, women who'd had sections were bossily told they couldn't attempt a natural birth, now, through cost pressures and natural birth targets, someone with good reasons for preferring a planned section over a very reasonable chance of ending up with an emergency one may well have their wishes pooh poohed. Worse, I was at no stage informed of any of the risks of a vaginal birth after a section, only told about the possible benefits of a faster recovery time. Nobody ever mentioned, for instance, that the death rate for babies delivered by vaginal birth after caesarian, while still very small, is ten times that of babies delivered by repeat c-section. Given my previous experience of giving birth to a very poorly premmie, that was a particularly salient factor in my decision-making.
It feels like when you're pregnant, nobody listens to you - presumably they think you're too emotional, too confused or not well enough informed to make a sensible choice. I'm appalled that my consultant and midwife didn't give me full information - instead they pushed their preference at me despite that preference holding undisclosed risks of its own.
Obstetricians and midwives simply cannot rely on all women having the support, resilience and wherewithal to research and argue their case; the vulnerability I felt trying to express myself in the face of an obdurate consultant badly upset and stressed me until I got myself referred to another who understood my concerns. That's why I'm glad that women in future won't have to battle to give birth in the way that's right for them. Whatever my consultant would prefer, it wasn't ever going to be her giving birth to my baby and having to choose from a variety of risks - it was me.
Wednesday 7 September 2011
The childcare debt spiral...
There's not much comfort in knowing you're not alone as you stare at the big fat minus sign on your bank statement.
That minus sign comes in front of a figure that is getting steadily bigger because of the vast sums of money we pay for childcare. For the last four months we've had to cough up more than a thousand pounds for three days childcare for two kids. That's way more than our mortgage. It's more than many people's yearly wage. So it's hardly surprising that we, together with a quarter of working parents surveyed by the Daycare Trust and Save the Children (see here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-14806886) are having to cope with increasing levels of debt incurred just so we can work.
Let's break down the figures. Our eldest has just this month started getting 15 hours free childcare. We'll still pay out about £800 a month for him and our nine month-old. This year, before tax, my partner and I will between us have to earn about £15,000 in order that both of us can work. That's about a quarter of our joint income. And god help anyone trying to pay for childcare on their own. There is some financial help if you're on a lower income, but the Daycare Trust says that "a quarter of low-income parents said they had given up work and a third had turned down work because of childcare costs. More than half (58%) of these families said they were no better off working and paying for childcare."
We don't have the option of giving up work - we are better off after paying for childcare and we need that money. But I did the sums yesterday, and even with the subsidy, now we've had a second baby, we're going to be between £250-£350 a month short.
It's frightening to think that you can be on a very respectable joint income (which takes you just outside the bracket for any tax credits), and have structural debt built into your monthly budget. I monitor this minutely and regularly for slack, without finding anything approaching a saving that would amount to £3000-£4000 a year.
There'll be no additional state help, clearly, to make trying to earn a living less expensive. So we'll just have to find more work. No problem. There's loads of it around.
That minus sign comes in front of a figure that is getting steadily bigger because of the vast sums of money we pay for childcare. For the last four months we've had to cough up more than a thousand pounds for three days childcare for two kids. That's way more than our mortgage. It's more than many people's yearly wage. So it's hardly surprising that we, together with a quarter of working parents surveyed by the Daycare Trust and Save the Children (see here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-14806886) are having to cope with increasing levels of debt incurred just so we can work.
Let's break down the figures. Our eldest has just this month started getting 15 hours free childcare. We'll still pay out about £800 a month for him and our nine month-old. This year, before tax, my partner and I will between us have to earn about £15,000 in order that both of us can work. That's about a quarter of our joint income. And god help anyone trying to pay for childcare on their own. There is some financial help if you're on a lower income, but the Daycare Trust says that "a quarter of low-income parents said they had given up work and a third had turned down work because of childcare costs. More than half (58%) of these families said they were no better off working and paying for childcare."
We don't have the option of giving up work - we are better off after paying for childcare and we need that money. But I did the sums yesterday, and even with the subsidy, now we've had a second baby, we're going to be between £250-£350 a month short.
It's frightening to think that you can be on a very respectable joint income (which takes you just outside the bracket for any tax credits), and have structural debt built into your monthly budget. I monitor this minutely and regularly for slack, without finding anything approaching a saving that would amount to £3000-£4000 a year.
There'll be no additional state help, clearly, to make trying to earn a living less expensive. So we'll just have to find more work. No problem. There's loads of it around.
Friday 2 September 2011
Twitter angst
Twitter is making me feel inadequate. There. Said it. Having signed up somewhat belatedly I've found that I love it, and at times am glued to it, but I do sometimes feel like I can't quite cut it with the rest of the Twitterati.
How do all these people find the time to scan, read and analyse the world's websites, academic journals, policy papers and acts of parliament, then tweet all day about the nuggets of fascinating info they've gleaned - and still hold down a job?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not scoffing. I'm admiring and grateful and I've learned a lot by clicking on all those links. But it's as much as I can do to get my two small monsters to the childminder of a morning, clear up the crap left over from breakfast, write whatever I've got to file soonest and grab a quick kip to make up for the broken nights I thought we might have been done with at nine months, Baby M....
I tweet the odd feature I've written, or, more often, comment on something in the news that has hacked me off or made me grin. Hell, I told the world about my first hot chocolate of autumn the other day. (A low point in my Twitter career to date.)
But I'll have to hold off tweeting my personal analysis of the education revolution hitting our country until I've interviewed two academics, transcribed what they've said, written up the article, washed the baby's bottles, pitched another couple of ideas to an editor who probably won't have the space to run them even if they're any good, tried them elsewhere to other editors who don't have any money to run them even if they've got the space, had a consoling cup of tea, constructed a conference programme, designed a training course, paid the childminder, picked up the kids....
Mmm, yeah. That analysis... it won't happen, will it? Guess I'll just have to keep clicking on other people's Twitter links and pop on a bit of lipstick to bolster my self-esteem.
How do all these people find the time to scan, read and analyse the world's websites, academic journals, policy papers and acts of parliament, then tweet all day about the nuggets of fascinating info they've gleaned - and still hold down a job?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not scoffing. I'm admiring and grateful and I've learned a lot by clicking on all those links. But it's as much as I can do to get my two small monsters to the childminder of a morning, clear up the crap left over from breakfast, write whatever I've got to file soonest and grab a quick kip to make up for the broken nights I thought we might have been done with at nine months, Baby M....
I tweet the odd feature I've written, or, more often, comment on something in the news that has hacked me off or made me grin. Hell, I told the world about my first hot chocolate of autumn the other day. (A low point in my Twitter career to date.)
But I'll have to hold off tweeting my personal analysis of the education revolution hitting our country until I've interviewed two academics, transcribed what they've said, written up the article, washed the baby's bottles, pitched another couple of ideas to an editor who probably won't have the space to run them even if they're any good, tried them elsewhere to other editors who don't have any money to run them even if they've got the space, had a consoling cup of tea, constructed a conference programme, designed a training course, paid the childminder, picked up the kids....
Mmm, yeah. That analysis... it won't happen, will it? Guess I'll just have to keep clicking on other people's Twitter links and pop on a bit of lipstick to bolster my self-esteem.
Thursday 18 August 2011
On staying alive
There'll be some ecstatic teenagers glowing over their A-level results today. And there'll be others feeling desolate.
Horrifyingly, there'll be a very few who believe they've failed utterly and will - just typing the words makes me shaky - decide it's not worth going on with what, at this moment, they can't see are their unbelievably precious and full-of-potential young lives.
I didn't get the grades I thought I would. I also didn't get the place at drama school I tried so hard for, nor, three years later, the degree result I'd thought was a foregone conclusion. A series of small, and not so small, devastations.
This is just a little post to say to anyone whose world has caved in and who thinks there is no way past the feelings of humiliation and inadequacy - you can have a fantastic future. You don't have to believe it, you just have to stay alive to give that future a chance.
This quote was pinned above my desk for many years:
"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan, 'press on' has solved, and always will solve, the problems of the human race."
Calvin Coolidge
It's spot on. Resilience is all.
Horrifyingly, there'll be a very few who believe they've failed utterly and will - just typing the words makes me shaky - decide it's not worth going on with what, at this moment, they can't see are their unbelievably precious and full-of-potential young lives.
I didn't get the grades I thought I would. I also didn't get the place at drama school I tried so hard for, nor, three years later, the degree result I'd thought was a foregone conclusion. A series of small, and not so small, devastations.
This is just a little post to say to anyone whose world has caved in and who thinks there is no way past the feelings of humiliation and inadequacy - you can have a fantastic future. You don't have to believe it, you just have to stay alive to give that future a chance.
This quote was pinned above my desk for many years:
"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan, 'press on' has solved, and always will solve, the problems of the human race."
Calvin Coolidge
It's spot on. Resilience is all.
Monday 8 August 2011
How not to work from home
I've just placed an ad in our post office window. It requests - well, begs - any kindly person in my village with a room going spare to rent it to me one day a week. This is because attempting to work from my attic office with a three year-old beating on the door wailing hysterically "where's my mummy?" is not going to result in any kind of income worth speaking of. It may also, if it carries on, lead to the breakdown of my relationship and/or me rapidly going out of my mind.
The alternative to this scenario has so far been to boot my partner and our two small monsters out of the house for as long as he and they can take. Understandably, he's not that keen on this, particularly given all the accoutrements required to service the demands of a baby and a toddler for the duration of what I am desperately trying to make an eight hour working Monday.
The other alternative is that I get out. I've tried working from cafes. I've perched myself and laptop at a hotdesking place near where we live. I once decamped to a friend's house. It's always been a bit of a disaster. Great for eating muffins. Pants for filing copy.
I base myself at home because I've found I can't effectively function from an office - or indeed anywhere I can't pootle and faff and have a snooze when I get stressed/overwhelmed/fed up. I need to pootle and faff. Make tea. Make more tea. Faff some more. It looks aimless. In fact to anyone else it probably looks mindless. But it works for me. It just doesn't work when you have your kids at home one day a week.
Hence, last Monday, a ferocious row. Which of us would be banished this time? In the end, in a stinking temper, I flung myself out of the house. And got about a third of my work done.
Do the same thing, get the same result.... it's coming autumn, the smalls can't spend every waking hour out in the snow and ice.... a proper solution has to be found. A garden office would be perfect, but would also cost around £15K, so that's not a goer.
What I'm hoping is that someone round this neck of the woods can't wait to rent me a tastefully decorated, wifi-enabled, be-kettled and sofa-enhanced room of my own. I've had no responses to my advert yet, weirdly. Still, it's only been a few hours. Doubtless the offers will soon be pouring in.
The alternative to this scenario has so far been to boot my partner and our two small monsters out of the house for as long as he and they can take. Understandably, he's not that keen on this, particularly given all the accoutrements required to service the demands of a baby and a toddler for the duration of what I am desperately trying to make an eight hour working Monday.
The other alternative is that I get out. I've tried working from cafes. I've perched myself and laptop at a hotdesking place near where we live. I once decamped to a friend's house. It's always been a bit of a disaster. Great for eating muffins. Pants for filing copy.
I base myself at home because I've found I can't effectively function from an office - or indeed anywhere I can't pootle and faff and have a snooze when I get stressed/overwhelmed/fed up. I need to pootle and faff. Make tea. Make more tea. Faff some more. It looks aimless. In fact to anyone else it probably looks mindless. But it works for me. It just doesn't work when you have your kids at home one day a week.
Hence, last Monday, a ferocious row. Which of us would be banished this time? In the end, in a stinking temper, I flung myself out of the house. And got about a third of my work done.
Do the same thing, get the same result.... it's coming autumn, the smalls can't spend every waking hour out in the snow and ice.... a proper solution has to be found. A garden office would be perfect, but would also cost around £15K, so that's not a goer.
What I'm hoping is that someone round this neck of the woods can't wait to rent me a tastefully decorated, wifi-enabled, be-kettled and sofa-enhanced room of my own. I've had no responses to my advert yet, weirdly. Still, it's only been a few hours. Doubtless the offers will soon be pouring in.
Thursday 21 July 2011
Who does the school run?
Apparently Nick Clegg is "killing himself" to take his children to school in the morning. But he does at least make the effort. I've just listened to a conversation on BBC Woman's Hour with an Express journalist idiotically suggesting that if people want a highflying career, they'll have to give certain things up, like, um, spending an hour at the start of the day with their kids.
What a depressingly uncreative mindset. There have got to be ways of managing your work to ensure that your children - surely the most important thing in your life - feel you're participating in the structure of theirs.
Negotiate your hours with your bosses. Don't ask, don't get. Nobody's pretending it's easy asking a reluctant boss to be flexible, but it's certainly becoming more acceptable, even if not to numpties like Express woman. I interviewed a chief exec of a major charity a few years ago who said she'd just appointed a senior manager - a man - who had made it a condition of his accepting the appointment that he could take his children to school on certain days and pick them up on others. She wanted him, so she said yes.
My partner goes into work early one day a week so he can pick our two up from the childminder. I do it two days a week, he does it once. It means I can work late or do a long day out on a story.
Before even having a baby we both decided to work four days a week so we would have them in childcare for fewer days than they're with us. We take a financial hit, but it means we spend proper time - exhilarating, frustrating, amusing, knackering time - with our kids.
Could we be more, er, highflying than we are? Weeeell, possibly... ! If we didn't have small children, there'd be more freedom to do exciting assignments abroad, travel for work, attend events that would help us network. But we don't do too badly - I write for national publications and have multiple deadlines weekly. My partner works for a wildife magazine and is in the same situation.
The point is that it wouldn't work if we didn't share the load pretty equally. And that means that we both do stuff like the childminder-run, bed-time, bath-time, doctors appointments and taking time off when one of the children is poorly. Over three years we've rethought and renegotiated the way we do our work to make that possible.
It's not perfect - in fact at times it's very stressful. It takes a lot of goodwill from each of us, a small adjustment on the part of my partner's work, and some careful diarising. To help us and parents like us, it's absolutely vital that people like Nick Clegg continue to demonstrate that with considerable commitment, having time for your kids is doable at (almost!) the very top of the career ladder.
What a depressingly uncreative mindset. There have got to be ways of managing your work to ensure that your children - surely the most important thing in your life - feel you're participating in the structure of theirs.
Negotiate your hours with your bosses. Don't ask, don't get. Nobody's pretending it's easy asking a reluctant boss to be flexible, but it's certainly becoming more acceptable, even if not to numpties like Express woman. I interviewed a chief exec of a major charity a few years ago who said she'd just appointed a senior manager - a man - who had made it a condition of his accepting the appointment that he could take his children to school on certain days and pick them up on others. She wanted him, so she said yes.
My partner goes into work early one day a week so he can pick our two up from the childminder. I do it two days a week, he does it once. It means I can work late or do a long day out on a story.
Before even having a baby we both decided to work four days a week so we would have them in childcare for fewer days than they're with us. We take a financial hit, but it means we spend proper time - exhilarating, frustrating, amusing, knackering time - with our kids.
Could we be more, er, highflying than we are? Weeeell, possibly... ! If we didn't have small children, there'd be more freedom to do exciting assignments abroad, travel for work, attend events that would help us network. But we don't do too badly - I write for national publications and have multiple deadlines weekly. My partner works for a wildife magazine and is in the same situation.
The point is that it wouldn't work if we didn't share the load pretty equally. And that means that we both do stuff like the childminder-run, bed-time, bath-time, doctors appointments and taking time off when one of the children is poorly. Over three years we've rethought and renegotiated the way we do our work to make that possible.
It's not perfect - in fact at times it's very stressful. It takes a lot of goodwill from each of us, a small adjustment on the part of my partner's work, and some careful diarising. To help us and parents like us, it's absolutely vital that people like Nick Clegg continue to demonstrate that with considerable commitment, having time for your kids is doable at (almost!) the very top of the career ladder.
Monday 18 July 2011
Chocolate buttons
There is a special place in hell for mummies who eat their toddlers' chocolate buttons. Especially when they have been promised as potty training treats.
There are no more chocolate buttons in our house right now, and the potty trainee is due back any minute. Nothing but chocolate buttons will do, I know this already. So I might as well stop prevaricating and get my nasty chocolate button thieving self down to the post office sharpish.
There are no more chocolate buttons in our house right now, and the potty trainee is due back any minute. Nothing but chocolate buttons will do, I know this already. So I might as well stop prevaricating and get my nasty chocolate button thieving self down to the post office sharpish.
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