When my daughter was a baby I didn’t have a fancy phone. Just three years ago, I survived with a brick that had limited internet access. Back then, my time was devoured by a beautiful baby who cried for milk on-demand and constant entertainment. My phone just lived on the kitchen counter, occasionally ringing when someone wanted to talk to me. Some days I didn’t even answer it.

But then, in 2012, I got a new iPhone. It was a revelation. Finally, I could check my emails on the go! Log into Facebook whenever I pleased! I even joined Instagram, eagerly taking snaps of cups of tea and putting trendy filters on them before sharing them with the world. I started to see my phone as a lifeline to the outside world, wondering how I had never lived without it before.

Fast-forward two years and I’m starting to loathe my phone. It’s like having a newborn baby in the colic phase, forever. The baby needs supervision, reassurance, attention. Lots and lots of attention. I even find myself taking my baby phone to the toilet, lest it gets lonely without me. 

Time was, I would sit down at my computer, log into my emails and work would begin. When I finished, I was safe in the knowledge no one could reach me unless it really was an emergency and they needed to call. And you know what? They rarely called.

These days things are a bit different. The thing I used to love about having that instant connection has become the very reason I sometimes dread looking at my phone. Facebook groups and emails and tweets… constantly.

I love my job. I’m lucky enough that I get to mainly work from home around my daughter. But there are times when work (and that blasted phone) butts its way into those moments with my daughter. A notification on Facebook that I need to respond to. Or perhaps an email that needs to be replied to. And even if it doesn’t need to be replied to asap, I still know it’s there, waiting for me.

Just like that, whatever conversation I’m having in real life, whatever task I’m trying to do, is instantly derailed. I need to see to my demanding phone and put everything else on hold. The newborn baby is crying again, but this time it’s not even cute or cuddly.

I wrote about Phubbing over at The Motherhood recently. While my argument for that piece still stands – I’m sick of being made to feel guilty by experts saying mums who pick up their phone in front of their kids are BAD – I do recognise that maintaining the right balance is a tricky one.

For example, I still like the fact I can check my emails on the go. It makes working as a freelancer that bit easier, juggling motherhood with paying the bills. But it’s oh-so-easy to lose sight of what’s important when you’re checking your phone – those things that need an immediate response and the bits that can wait until later.

When was the last time you picked up your phone to check your inbox, only to find you’d been tagged in a conversation on Facebook?

The scenario goes like this: tootling over to Facebook to see what’s being said, an interesting article catches your eye, shared by one of your Facebook friends. You read the article and watch the accompanying video – something promising to be The Best Thing You’ll See All Day! and BOOM. You’ve just lost ten minutes of your life. That’s ten minutes that could have been spent unloading the washing machine, cooking tea or – *gasp* – playing with your child. I’m not pointing the finger here, I am more than guilty of falling into this trap myself.

Recently I’ve started leaving my phone downstairs when I go to bed. It’s just a little act of rebellion against the phone dictatorship, but it feels kind of liberating. Instead of letting my demanding phone sleep beside me, waking me for night feeds with its angry flashing, I now turn it off and put it in a drawer. If I wake up at 3am I don’t have the urge to check my phone. I just go back to sleep. Simple.

I’m not sure what the answer is to the rest of the day though. I try to stay away from my phone as much as possible at the weekend, although that’s not always easy – especially if I’m expecting an email. I sometimes wish I could have two phones, one for work and one for real life. But then, I know I’d end up just having them both on all of the time and it would be like having newborn baby twins, rather than just the one.

Do you ever feel like you’re being ruled by your phone? How do you manage the balance?

[Photo credit: Caroline Gue at CP Photography]

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Why? Oh, you know – I JUST WORKED OUT HOW TO USE A PIECE OF TECHNOLOGY.

Sorry. But this is kind of a big deal for me.

Despite being a fully trained broadcast journalist, technical stuff really isn’t my strong point. I’m OK with it once I’ve been shown how it works and which plug fits where. But I’m not, well, a natural.

So imagine my utter astonishment when I was asked if I’d like to review a MiFi on Three. I am the woman who once walked into a café and asked if they had free “wee-fee” afterall.

But never one to turn down a challenge, I readily accepted. They told me this MiFi thing was great for mums like me (busy ones I mean, not short-arse blondes with slight love handles and a penchant for Take That and wine). Apparently, the MiFi on Three would give me more time as I’d have access to the internet “on the go” and would be able to cram more things into my hectic life. It takes multi-tasking to a whole new level.

One MiFi on Three and one hand

Now, for all of you who are rolling your eyes right now and mouthing “she is so behind the times, why hasn’t she got an iPhone?” I take your point. I don’t have an iPhone. And this is something that reduces me to tears on an almost daily basis. It means I am stuck in the Stone Age of not having access to Twitter every second, or access to my blog, or access to my emails. These are all things I didn’t realise I would need to use so much 12 months ago when I was deciding which phone to have. Back then, I just needed my phone to be a phone.

But now I have a blog. And I have a freelance career in journalism. And I have a baby. These are all things which take up lots of time and don’t always complement each other. So the MiFi device was very attractive to me. “Oh, I’ll be like all those modern people and check my emails on the go” I thought.

I didn’t read the small print though. The MiFi on Three obviously doesn’t connect with dinosaur bricks phones like mine. You need a smart phone. So, for the last day I’ve been using the (self-proclaimed) Northern Love Machine’s snazzy iPhone to test out the MiFi on Three.

And it’s really rather good.

The MiFi on Three instantly gives you mobile Wi-Fi, which can be connected up to five devices. This means if you have a phone without 3G technology, the MiFi corrects this problem. It also means you can use your laptop, phone, iPod touch (of course I don’t have an iPod touch – I don’t even have an iPhone) to the MiFi to make the most of the internet connection.

The device itself is around the same size as a small phone and is all soft and smooth, like a lovely pebble. If you don’t want to enjoy its pebble-like qualities in the palm of your hand all day you can pop it in your pocket – it’s light, so you’d hardly know it was there. The battery lasts around four hours before dying. This is just the right amount of time to pop off to the park, have a go on the swings, buy an icecream for your baby, get said icecream all over you, change a disgusting nappy, realise you’ve forgotten the baby wipes and deal with a huge tantrum from your icecream-soaked poo-covered child. All the while keeping on top of your emails and tweeting the latest poo incident to your followers. Perfect.

The downside to the MiFi on Three is that it’s dependent on 3G coverage (well it would be wouldn’t it?). This means that the internet connection is a “slow” broadband speed, not as fast as ADSL. The other thing is that if you have a smart phone with 3G technology already, you probably wouldn’t need the MiFi – unless you wanted to connect other devices to the internet too. There’s also little point having one if you’re just going to sit around at home all day, because if you’re lucky enough to be doing that you may as well just use your laptop with its super-fast broadband connection.

That said, I still think it’s a great device. I’m seriously considering getting a pay-as-you-go smart phone when my contract runs out and this could be a handy addition. The MiFi tots up your data allowance so you can keep track of your usage and avoid hefty, unplanned bills. Three also do a pay-as-you-go deal with the MiFi.

You can find out more about the MiFi and the On The Go Mums campaign here. (It’s worth clicking on that link just to get the time-saving tips and see the competitions they’ve got running. Just saying.)

I didn’t receive any payment for this review. I didn’t even receive the MiFi – I have to give it back tomorrow. Gutted.

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