20 crazy things that only London mums do

It’s stressful being a London mum. Like being on a hamster wheel… once you’re on it, you just can’t stop being sucked in to the whole ridiculousness of life as a parent in the capital.

Here, one London mum (for now, at least) lists 20 crazy things we do in the name of our children.

1. You have to park your car so far from your house that you must decide which child to sacrifice/leave in the car while you carry your favourite one into the house.
2. You send your children to ‘forest school’ in a miserable park bush.
3. You know the exact distance (in metres) from your front door to the nearest Ofsted outstanding primary school. You will also pay a hefty, non refundable deposit to your local private school, as a back up in case you don’t get in, along with the first term’s fees.
4. If you don’t live in the “catchment” of an outstanding primary school, you will spend all your money moving to a house that will guarantee you get in. This will cost you £1.5 million, which would have paid for at least the first few terms of private school.
5. You wait patiently for swings in the park and shit on any mum/ nanny/ toddler who jumps the queue.
6. You set an alarm and get up early in order to be first in the online queue for swim lessons/ playball/ gym JUST so you can rebook the same lesson you already shitting do!
7. You only go to playdates with friends who have off road parking or convenient resident parking restrictions.
8. You shitting hate the word playdate.
9. You only go on day trips to places near tube/rail stations with lifts (there are about 5 on the whole tube map) and then you have a melt down when the able bodied station worker tells you that he can’t help you up the steps due to ‘health and safety’ but happily watches you single-handedly carry a pram, baby, toddler and scooter up 5 flights of stairs.
10. Your 12 week old foetus is on the waiting list for the local Montessori (and you’ve paid a non refundable £150 for the pleasure) but they still won’t get a place until they’re 4-and-a-half.
11. You tap up everyone you meet in a vague childcare capacity (mascots at Lego Land/ neigbour’s window cleaner) to babysit for you.
12. But you never share details of your favourite babysitter/ironing lady/cleaner in case they get poached.
13. In June you booked up to see Santa in Ely’s shopping centre. Your child bloody hates it and refuses to go into the grotto.
14. You receive frantic what’s app messages saying things like ‘Quick! puppet extravaganza tickets on sale now’
15. You get turned away from Tumble Time with two excited kids at 9am (it doesn’t open until 9.30am) because it has sold out. Who is buying these tickets and how??
16. You feel like the queen bee/bitch who Has It All when you’re invited to join the ‘members-only-no-nannies-or-carers-or-chavs-allowed’ playgroup in the church hall.
17. You get told off by the mad park lady for feeding bread to the ‘diabetic’ ducks and swans (who aren’t hungry anyway because they’ve eaten so much of everyone else’s sourdough).
18. You have a break down when you realise your child’s nursery class are all doing Kumon in their spare time.
19. You meet your mum friends in eye-waveringly expensive cafes with supervised soft play so you can drink coffee and have an adult conversation. But your kid won’t stay in the sodding soft play unless you’re in there with them.
20. You accept that your baby’s third word will be babyccino and cringe when they loudly ask for one outside of London. God forbid you get judged on your fancy London ways.