Not a Fictional Mum

Today Zoe speaks to Not a Fictional Mum, a mother, wife, blogger, shop owner, and self-confessed perfectionist.   She says her life’s greatest accomplishment is her adoptive son and blogs about the good, the bad and the ugly! The latter mostly coming from ignorance and a society not set-up to normalise families in all forms.     KEY TAKEAWAYS   Not a fictional mum has always wanted to remain anonymous so she doesn’t use her real name at all, just NFM. She also refers to her son as ‘Nemo’, you can read more about why in her blog. NFM met her partner and fell in love very quickly, they got married after two years and then started trying for a baby. After a year they were sent for fertility tests and found out that they would never conceive a baby naturally. As soon as you say you can’t have children, people become obsessed with finding out which partner has the ‘problem’. It’s for this reason NFM never states whether it is herself or her partner with the fertility problem. NFM and her husband were able to have one cycle on IVF, it was unsuccessful so they ended up spending 25k on more cycles. They suffered a miscarriage and decided they couldn’t do it anymore. NFM believes that adoption as an option should be brought up much earlier in the infertility process. She feels that we are stuck in the past with our attitudes around adoption as a society. It’s something she is advocating to normalise. They then started looking at adoption and chose to go through Barnardo’s. When they were accepted they felt so much hope for the future. When adopting you are ‘exposed’ to difficult scenarios so that you can be prepared for support your child may need. They ask you what kind of situations you think you could handle and you have to be really honest with them about that. The amount of checks and balances in place for adoption are so necessary. They just want the adoption to work for both you and the child so need to make sure you are well matched. The moment NFM fell in love with their little boy was through a difficult time. Nemo connected very well with her husband but not her. He was very upset one night but didn’t want to be comforted by her but after some time he put his little hand through the cot bars and reached for her. It was an incredible moment for them both. NFM has created many things for companies to try and normalise and change the perspective of society on adoption. She has written pieces for retailers, created cards and more.   BEST MOMENTS   “It’s another route to parenthood, it’s an option for you”   “Why isn’t adoption an option sooner?”   “I laugh at how naive I was, no matter the age of the child they will have suffered some kind of attachment trauma”   “I’ve had my beautiful moments, they’re just not what you see in the media, tv and film”   “It’s just another way to be a family, I’m just trying to break some barriers”   VALUABLE RESOURCES   www.notafictionalmum.com www.shopnotafictionalmum.com www.barnardos.org.uk   www.petalscharity.org www.tommys.org www.arc-uk.org www.sands.org.uk     ABOUT THE GUEST   IG @notafictionalmum www.notafictionalmum.com www.shopnotafictionalmum.com www.barnardos.org.uk     ABOUT THE HOST Zoe Cresswell Devoted mother of two (and a big hairy dog), UK trained midwife, doula and personal trainer, specialising in pre and postnatal fitness. Zoe was born in the UK and before moving to Dubai in 2013 and worked as a midwife in central London, both in a birth centre and a very busy NHS hospital. Although late to the scene, Zoe is an aspiring athlete having won numerous triathlons and representing Great Britain where she placed within the top 10 on the world stage. With her husband James, the couple will soon be launching their cloth nappy company, Bop & Bee, where they hope to inspire families to swap a few disposable nappies a day for the more planet friendly option of cloth. Zoe’s goal is to share her knowledge and experience, tell real life stories, manage expectations and open up those often difficult conversations. Zoe’s own motherhood journey has been full of twists and turns as she put everything on hold and went through numerous miscarriages and rounds of IVF.   CONTACT DETAILS Instagram : @zoecresswell_me Facebook: Zoe Cresswell LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/zoe-cresswell                        This show was brought to you by Progressive Media