Mommies and drink. Oh dear. Mix those two words in the same cocktail shaker and you're guaranteed to stir up a bitter-tasting backlash from those who think they know best. But the author of a new book, entitled Mommies Who Drink never let disapproval from any quarter deter her from her alcohol-fuelled misadventures, which even motherhood couldn't halt.

These days being a domestic goddess seems to be in fashion -- supermoms and yummy mummies are all the rage. And although the Mommies Who Drink brand of mothering should come with a health warning, it's refreshing to find a mother who so honestly and publicly admits to finding new-motherhood tough.

There's an expectation that new mums will gleefully and easily adapt to their new role. From the get-go, visitors expect to see the stereotypical first-time mother, gushing and sighing contentedly -- not knocking back the gin and tonic with all the gusto of a seasoned 'It girl'. Though how exactly the author of Mommies Who Drink did find the time to get up to any post-baby high jinks, I really can't fathom.

For me, becoming a mother for the first time was a huge transition from a carefree career girl, to (shriek!) a mother with responsibilities. Actually, 'transition' is probably too tame a word, it was more like a WWE wrestling match taking place over several months in the confines of my own head.

Don't get me wrong, I've indulged in a fair amount of gushing and contented sighing since my baby was born.

But that doesn't mean I've had a lobotomy, or even a personality adjustment. I am the same person as I was before, albeit with a new perspective, a few extra kilos and body parts that actually produce milk.

But being the same doesn't necessarily mean behaving the same, especially when it comes to that thorny old issue of alcohol.

Before becoming pregnant I enjoyed having a few drinks, within normal social limits, within normal social settings.

I have been known to overindulge on occasion, but never went so far as to hide a bottle of vodka in the cistern or behind the bookcase -- honest.

But pregnancy is a long nine months when the merest sip of alcohol is laced with guilt. The prospect that at some time in the not too distant future I could once again enjoy a few carefree glasses of wine on a Saturday night was something I relished. I didn't realise then that the question of when, where and whether a mother should enjoy alcohol is, like much to do with motherhood, a minefield of guilt.

This starts pretty much as soon as your life as a new mum begins and the bottles of celebratory champagne, one of the greatest ironies of birth, are presented. Sitting in my bed, baby in arms, I was flooded with so many emotions -- great joy, gratitude and relief that my little one had arrived safe and well -- that I really didn't care if I never had another drink again.

But as it was there and the mood was celebratory, I raised a glass to my lips, only to see the smiles fade away as the assembled well-wishers averted their eyes. They may have given me the champagne, but they didn't actually want me to drink it.

To them I was no longer the same girl. Now I was a 'mommy' (people really do stop using your name), and a breastfeeding mommy at that. And the expectation seems to be that mommies don't drink.

In search of solace and advice on this and many other mother-related issues, I attended a local baby clinic for the first few months after my baby was born. It was actually a 'breastfeeding support group', but that name seems to induce bouts of giggling in the uninitiated. Admittedly, there was a bit of sitting around talking about the state of our nipples. But mostly we made heroic comparisons about the hours of sleeplessness we had endured, reassured each other that it was perfectly normal to need at least one good cry to make it through the week, and swapped tips on keeping our babies happy and ourselves sane.

With the weight of the entire medical profession pressing upon us the importance of breastfeeding for as long as possible, it's unsurprising that the amount of alcohol allowed when breastfeeding was a recurring theme.

But even amongst this group of new mothers there was a touch of the taboo about the topic, and whispered conversations about alcohol were couched in secrecy and guilt. One person divulged some research she'd unearthed that only 0.01pc of alcohol consumed makes its way into breast milk. Did that mean a few glasses were okay? Another recommended the 'one glass with dinner' rule that most of us applied during pregnancy. The nurses smiled nervously and were diplomatically non-committal, sitting as they were in a room of hormonally-charged new mothers; one said a glass every now and again couldn't do any harm, another warned that more than two glasses would not be advisable.

Those mothers with a wedding or some other event to attend spoke in hushed but urgent tones about 'pumping and dumping'. Apparently, in hotels all over the country new mothers in their party frocks are sneaking into the toilets to express their alcohol-contaminated milk and promptly throw it down the sink.

Meanwhile at home, the babysitter is stocked up with bottles of breast milk which mother expressed, ounce by careful ounce, for several days preceding the big night out. Doesn't she deserve a glass of champagne?

So, a few glasses of wine here and there along the way and several months later I weaned my baby from the breast. Seeing her take her first step towards independence left me feeling both regretful and proud and with mixed emotions, so I opened the bottle of champagne I'd been hoarding in the fridge since she was born. Maybe it was the lingering tiredness, or a dose of the guilts that I didn't breastfeed for the mammoth two years recommended by the World Health Organisation, or maybe just the length of time the champagne has languished in the fridge, but the bubbles seemed a bit flat.

Weeks passed and I adjusted to the fact that my body was my own again. I promised myself I would organise a proper night out, a good old knees up. I'd do it soon, I kept saying -- once the baby started sleeping through the night, once I got a chance, once I fitted my clothes, as soon as I caught up with myself. More weeks passed, and eventually, finally, 18 months after the little test thingy turned blue, I headed out for the night with two other new mums in tow.

We behaved exactly as we used to pre-baby. We ate a bit too much, drank a bit too much, talked a bit too much, laughed a bit too loudly and stayed out much too late. We had a great time, made all the sweeter by the fact that it might be another six months before we got to do it again. Eventually, I made my way home and, giggling like a college girl, stumbled into bed. At 6.30 that morning, I realise that giggling like a college girl is all fine and well, if you happen to be a college girl. I, however, am now a mother. I lie in bed listening to my baby's happy babble from the next room. It rises in pitch as I come to terms with my situation. I am tired, a little tender, and desperately in need of another six hours sleep.

As I creep out of bed, a feeling creeps up inside me -- a vague feeling of unease. Something is amiss.

A phrase echoes in my head, an ad -- 'Is your drinking affecting their thinking?' I imagine a face, my mother's, disapproving. I look at my baby's beautiful blue eyes, innocent and trusting. For flip's sake -- one night out in 18 months and how do I feel?

Guilty.

Mommies Who Drink is a collection of stories by American actress and mother-of-two Brett Paesel.

Lamenting her carefree past of drink, drugs and wild parties, Paesel finds she hates her life as a mother. All she really wants is "an evening doing half a gram of coke in the back of a limo with her girlfriends".

Instead she heads to her local bar for happy hour every week to share drinks and tales of woe with a group of other mums. Paesel's sketches of her frazzled life are set to become a television series as Mommies Who Drink has already been optioned by HBO, the company behind Sex and the City.

- Anna Murphy