gurgle.com blog

Yesterday (6.03.08) the mayor of London, Ken Livingstone announced a new priority scheme so that people on the tube were encouraged to give up their seats to pregnant travellers. Apparently this move follows research carried out by London underground which surveyed 500 new mothers and found that those given a seat while pregnant had to wait for an average of five stops before getting one. (5 stops - lucky them!)

Ironic really since last night I was the only person standing and wasn't offered a seat at all. I am now nearly eight months pregnant and there is no mistaking the bulge in my belly as anything other than a growing baby. What I wanted to do was shout, (to the mostly male passengers buried in their papers), 'What if your pregnant mother/sister/wife had to stand all the way home - would that be OK?' My problem of course is that I should speak up and be more assertive, but a year ago I saw a pregnant women standing on a tube and when she spoke up, everyone ignored her! Since when did the world get so rude? I know you can't always tell if someone is pregnant or not and people don;t want to offend in case the women is a 'larger' lady, but what's worse - your embarrassment or my health?

As well as common courtesy and manners, it's definitely a matter of health. For this reason I am welcoming Ken's new scheme, but I doubt it will work. It has to rely on the same situation - people being prepared to give up their seats. If it doesn;t work now, how is a sticker going to help? Everyone feels like they have a right to a seat on the tube because they have had a hard day at work and pregnant women are by no means at the top of the seat pecking order. I think a better idea would be to make taxi's free for pregnant women (and all you have to do is show a card that confirm you are pregnant) and the government pays the bill - Ken take note...

gurgle is growing and expanding everyday as much as my pregnant belly is. We're busy updating all our articles so that you are reading the most recent information. New and interesting groups this week include: Recipes for babies, toddlers and families, Dads corner, London mums group.

Alternatively, help other mums out this week with their queries on: VBAC or C-section for 2nd baby, frequency of dirty nappies and is_sex_ok_in_early_pregnancy?

Unless you live in the country and either have a midwife visit you at home (what bliss!) or your antenatal clinic is somewhere rural, catering for a few pregnant women, you are likely to have the same 'hell' as me every time you have a check-up. It's my fault for living in London, but every time I have a check-up I have to wait for a minimum of an hour and a half to be seen! This is obviously awkward as I am a working mum and editor of gurgle.com so having to spend all morning at the clinic is very frustrating. Furthermore lots of people bring their husbands/mothers/sisters to these appointments, which is fine and fair enough, but these 'non-pregnant' people should NOT take up all the seats. Am I ranting? Shall I start on how annoyed I get when people without children park in the mother and baby parking places in the supermarket...? Instead read how it upsets other gurgle users in our chat forum!

On gurgle you may have noticed a few more teething problems this week including the site being a little slow, problems uploading photos and problems getting to gurgle from google! We are aware of these bugs and have fixed them - we apologise if you couldn't use gurgle when you wanted too.

We hope you enjoyed Mother's Day and uploaded your Mummy and Me pictures onto our baby gallery. Our winner for February's baby of the month has been voted for and chosen, but you can enter your baby in our new baby of the month: march gallery to win £200 Mothercare vouchers next month...

Can I also remind you all to upload an image to your profile page so we can see what you and your baby look like!