Baby, wait

Maybe it's because I'm a man, and will never experience the joys of weak bladder control, elasticated waste-bands and the sensation of excreting a living human being out of my extremities, but pregnancy doesn't sound like my idea of a good time. As Rita Rudner once said, "Life's tough enough, without having someone kick you from the inside."

But actually, pregnancy is the easy bit. You get to eat all sorts of crap and blame it on the 'cravings', double your portion size because you're "eating for two" and always get a seat on public transport.

The hard work begins after you've had the baby. But it's not the sleepless nights or interminable conversations about the smell of baby sick that seem to get women down. It's the expectation that they'll snap back into shape like a rubber chew-toy.

It can't help matters that celebrity sprog-droppers manage to drop the weight in less time than it takes to hand the baby over to the nanny and order a car to Mahiki. For many famous mummies, the weight loss is quicker than the labour itself. What nobody ever seems to mention is that many of them book themselves in for an eight-month C-section (before the major weight-gain kicks in) and have the fat sucked out while they're still in the stirrups.

But is this really the healthy way to go? Not according to Julia Llewellyn Smith, who's written a coruscating critique of the trend in today's Mail. She feels "deep unease" at the sight of Denise Van Outen "cavorting on a Dubai beach in a leopardskin bikini" just five months after giving birth. If she thinks that's bad, she's obviously never heard her sing.

She laments the fact that "we’ve had to endure every female celebrity from Nicole Kidman to Myleene Klass flaunting their fabulous figures almost hours after giving birth." And she puts this unhealthy trend down to the celebrities' 'overweening narcissism' - although she's at least grown-up enough to acknowledge that these extra-yummy mummies work "in an industry that judges women on their bodies, and pictures of skinny post-natal celebrities are nothing new."

She's right - they're nothing new. In fact, it seems as though every day brings with it more paparazzi photos of famous faces (and their bodies), just weeks after straining to the point of constipation and screaming for epidurals. And where do those pictures appear? In Julia's paper of course.

Try searching the words 'baby weight' on the Mail's website, and you'll find an astonishing 4930 articles on the subject. 247 pages of them.

You can read all about Tamzin Outhwaite's magic pants, Halle Berry's flat tummy, Colleen Rooney's weight loss, Katie Holmes' slimmer figure, Nicole Richie's diet, Rebecca Loos' bikini, Octomom's trim new shape, Tina Hobley's makeover, Natasha Kaplinksy's work-outs, Javine Hylton's new body, Bethenny Frankel's post-baby look, Myleene Klass' return to modelling, Christina Milian's divorce diet, as well as good old Denise Van Outen's beach adventure.

If Julia wants to know where this unhealthy trend originated, she really needs to inspect the glass house she's throwing stones in.

The Mail seems to have invented an entirely new idiom - it wants to have its cake, eat it, and then purge. Bulimic journalism, it's the way forward...

Family values

Say hello to Jim Bob (seriously) Duggar, and his wife Michelle, owner of the most prolific non-rodent uterus in existence. This nauseatingly sanctimonious couple are household names in the States, thanks to the fact that their family needs a school bus to visit the supermarket.

In the last 21 years, Michelle has squeezed out an astonishing 18 children (although to be honest, the last five or six could have crawled out of their own accord). And it doesn't stop there, as the proud parents announced recently that Michelle is expecting a nineteenth bundle of joy, due in March of next year.

Whether you want to gawp at the ridiculousness of their situation, or simply marvel at how smug some people can be, your prayers are answered thanks to TV shows on the Discovery Health Channel and The Learning Channel. Featuring such high-points as the kids having their wisdom teeth removed, and Michelle undergoing a C-section for baby number 15, the shows have positioned the Duggars as the clean-living, scandal-free version of the Gosselins (currently undergoing a bitter divorce).

Showing a tremendous lack of creativity, the Duggar's have also chosen to give every one of their children a name beginning with the letter J. Unfortunately, this causes a number of problems - twins Jedidiah and Jeremiah sound like characters from Children of the Corn, and daughter Jinger will forever have to spell her name over the phone. More importantly, the sameness of the names means that even Michelle had trouble remembering who was who in a recent appearance on The View.

Jim Bob and Michelle are deliriously happy with their vast litter, and dedicate whole sections of their website to giving viewers the inside track on how they function as a family. Unsurprisingly, home schooling and extensive Bible study takes up the majority of the day, interspersed with regular tidy-up sessions. Here, an older child and their 'buddy' have responsibility for their jurisdiction - which is either the name of one of the other siblings or a pre-designated section of the vast 7,000 sq ft homestead.

According to the plentiful pictures on the family's website, the children lead a happy existence, with slides, playrooms and even an indoor climbing wall. But you have to wonder how effectively they're being prepared for the outside world when their education on law, science, medicine and history is based on the Wisdom Booklets of the ATIA curriculum.

Thankfully though, the family is well-provided for, thanks to Jim Bob's commercial property investments - which is good since it's doubtful the Duggars will produce any doctors, scientists or lawyers. And let's not forget the considerable sum of money that the Duggar's make from inviting the Discovery and TLC cameras into their fun-packed home.

However you feel about home-schooling or professional baby-making, you can't deny that the Duggar's seem like a happy bunch. They clearly believe that the good Lord has blessed them and they listen to his every instruction. Maybe, just maybe, if we all pray hard enough, they might also consider listening to a hairdresser. After all, miracles can happen.