Cloudbusting moments

When I started this blog I was thinking of my life in the foothills of the Dandenong Ranges, Victoria, Australia. I have since come to realise that life is a series of hills of varying topographical detail; some a barely bumps, others are the hill climb of the Tour de France that the faint-heartened never approximate. I have also come to appreciate the distinct advantage of setting hills in my sights with the aim of seeing life from the other side with a raised heart-rate. My 'comfort-zone' exists to be busted, and I intend to continue venturing far away and beyond my comfort-zones for as long as I have a reason to live. From the foothills of the Dandenongs to the foothills of the Strzelecki Ranges, and still cloudbusting, I hope. It's what I want my kids to do, so I'd better show them a bit about how it's done, and how to push up and over the hills they'd otherwise avoid...

Monday 20 December 2010

'Neigh'-bourhood

Our new neighbourhood and me are gonna get along just fine - I've got loads of people to talk 'horse' with and DO 'horse' with. At the district Christmas party I got to know the locals. One of them is a member of the local club and has offered me a lift to a clinic with Will Enzinger in January...the clinic I thought I couldn't go to because I couldn't get there! So, now I get to go (if there are places left), get to know the clubgrounds and some club members, for when we finally have a float and I can join that club, as well as the neighbouring club, further up the road that I just joined. This particular neighbour just happens to have an older pony her kids have stopped riding that Boy can have rides of, in preparation for when we find him his own pony.
In further horse news, I met Dante's soon-to-be paddock buddy, Nook. A big, black Warmblood/TB, who doesn't like to tie up, but is otherwise quite a nice, fat boy. I put the call out to my new club and one of the members and I have come to a mutually beneficial arrangement. Nook will be on loan to us for as long as we need him, then she can take him back to reintegrate him into her herd. This gives us time to find Tom a suitable horse, Boy a pony and, possibly, my second horse.
On Sunday, I also visited the local artisan, The Gooseneck Pottery. I have been wanting to see the wares since we first bought the farm and I just get ensconced in farm life, forgetting my intentions until we leave again and see the signs. So, I made a special effort and met the American apprentice who lives on site, Jennifer. She took me through the pottery to see the massive, wood-fueled kilns and the workshop. The pottery is just divine, with prices to match the quality and exquisite nature of the work! There IS, however, a bargains and seconds section, for plebs like me who don't see the need to adorn an old caravan and cow shed with fine wares, so take heart.
I'm loving being a farmer, and since 'planting' my Tibetan prayer flags, I feel much more part of it, having offered up my assurances to the elders past that I intent for us to look after the land whilst it is ours to look after.
Now, to get Christmas and New Years over with so that we can get down to the business of MOVING!

Wednesday 13 October 2010

Natural Infant Hygiene (Elimination Communication)

This is a photograph of an element of a key parenting tool we have been utilising since Small Girl was 2 weeks of age. It's a chamber pot, to confirm your worst suspicions. A vintage, enamelled child's chamber pot. It's green. It's a bit chipped. It was a bargain at a local recycler.
I found out about such a thing as Natural Infant Hygiene, or Elimination Communication, not too long after Boy-child was born. I thought of it as a wonderful thing to try, just not something for us. But the concept nagged at me. And nagged some more. So I borrowed a book about it from the library, by Ingrid Bauer. It changed my view on a few things, and I decided that I would implement EC into Boy-child's night continence learning. He was out of nappies during the day by 2 years of age and I didn't like the idea of withholding liquids from him overnight, just to keep him dry; believing it was just dehydrating him, rather than learning continence.
The book backed up my thoughts and Bauer's explanations of the human elimination system and cultural conditioning opened up a new world for me. It explained night-wakings to me and I recognised various moments in Boy-child's life when I could have implemented EC. It was time to begin on night times, at almost two and a half years of age.
It took only a couple of weeks of sleeping in the boy's bed with him to wait for his body to stir so that I could prompt him for the potty. There was initial resistance to this new thing - moving from deep sleep to light sleep and then having pants pulled down and taken to the potty was a big adjustment. Soon enough, he knew what was happening and that it was much nicer to just get rid of the wee into the potty, and, eventually, to head to the loo (right near his then-bedroom) and stumble back to bed. I resolved then that the only major change to how I would parent the next child would be to start EC'ing much, much sooner. True night continence meant that Boy-child could still have his breastfeed or two overnight and also at bedtime without fear of having a wet bed, apart from the odd occasion of a missed trip to the loo.
So, in the lead up to our girl being born I bought a chamber pot. Dr Sarah Buckley writes about EC'ing her babies and that was enough inspiration for me to give it a red hot go. It took two weeks, however, for me to move from my comfort-zone into a new reality. The hardest part, it proved, was starting!
It was the week we decided to sell the house, and the day that we had the newborn photos done by Susan D'Arcy. I had been making my observations of Small Girl's body language and took the plunge.
The first time I caught a wee, and I was so excited that it 'worked'! I kept 'catching' wees so that it was no longer 'fluke' and it was a combination of timing and using cues (a 'pssss' sound to encourage letting go of the bladder function). I started catching poos, too, mainly in the mornings, but also through the days in the early weeks.
Soon enough, pooey nappies were becoming a rarity and more a reflection of the time I was spending attached to my baby via sling than luck or coincidence. I was really in tune with this baby and it was really enhancing this newborn caring that I had been resistant to whilst pregnant with her. 'Success' was also reflected in the significantly reduced washing of nappies required each week. Except that I was having to change my pants a couple of times a day when I missed moments during nappy-free times...ah, well!
The way I implemented EC was just one way to do it, and it has so many variations depending on lifestyle and budget. We have been predominantly full-time nappied, part-time EC'ing, sometimes full-time EC'ing and part time nappied, and sometimes full-time EC'ing and nappy-free, sometimes part time both. I have found that when I have to spend more time studying I rely on nappies more, because my attention simply cannot be on both my studies and on being in tune with my girl. I get sad about this, and it's just the way it has to be for a little while longer.
When we're out, we're able to hold Small Girl over a bush or garden bed. She's still mostly breastfed, so she's pretty organic! She hardly ever needs to poo when we're out, because we catch poos in the morning, as most human babies do, and most human adults will if given the chance. I don't carry around receptacles any more, because I've decided that most places we go have loo facilities I can duck off to with her, and if they don't, then there will be some plantlife that will appreciate a drenching.
When Small Girl was about 8 weeks of age we did our first long drive. 3 hours to East Gippsland. She slept until we got to Stratford, did a wee on the grass and then slept till Bairnsdale, wee'd on arrival and voila! Dry car trip! This has been the way travel has been conducted ever since. If she wakes while we're on a drive, we pull over and let her wee and then we have a happy camper thereafter.
EC'ing works best with babywearing and breastfeeding, but these aren't essential ingredients. EC'ing is another way to have a relationship with your child. For me, it makes sense. For us it enhances the way we relate to our children and is the best thing to happen to my parenting toolbox. It imparts empathy and responsiveness that I previously thought only breastfeeding and/or sling-wearing could do. It also connects me to my grandmother and the wisdom she practiced to raise my mum, aunts and uncles. There was no money for nappies (and I'm talking cloth nappies), no polluting water ways with the washing of soiled baby nappies. I love that when my mum first learned of my intentions to EC she thought it was brave and odd. As I continued and normalised to her what I was doing, her own mum's practices became more apparent to her and memories began to surface for her. We both felt more connected to my grandmother.
I'll split this blog post up and write next about how we've gone about EC'ing at night, EC'ing 'on the hop' and the progression towards continence in Small Girl's first year.
I'll leave it on this note. Yesterday, Small Girl was wandering around nappy-free and I lost track of her. I encountered her in the laundry, sitting on the potty:
And in it, was a respectable, definite, self-initiated wee.
Last night she breastfed about twice overnight and I didn't offer her the chamber-pot once until the morning. She remained dry. And I might mention that she was also nappy-free.
Whaddya reckon? Weird? Time consuming? Effective? I reckon it's a lost art that is slowly coming to the consciousness of more and more parents in our society. And it's truly liberating, for all involved!

Monday 11 October 2010

Head down, bum up

While I wait for a lecture to download I'll pop in a blog entry...
I was about to quit uni this week. After speaking about the logistics, ramifications, implications and risks involved with pulling out with intention to return to the course much later down the track with the postgraduate coordinator, I have decided to soldier on.
This will require doing something I have hitherto avoided - dragging friends into the fray. Expect a phone call, some of you! The next month will be insane. My kids may become temporarily alienated. I may not see much of the farm. I may not see much of humanity outside of Boy-child's activities during the week. I HAVE to do this unit. Then I'll have next semester free before launching right back into it for a final unit...the fun unit of Abnormal Psychology.
Ok, back to it. One day, this being a student caper is gonna get real old. Meanwhile, my lecture is ready to listen to and there is a blanket ban on kids or me getting sick until some time in 2012. OK? OK. I'm going in...

Thursday 7 October 2010

My fella

My fella brings me flowers and gifts, unexpectedly.
He says he loves me throughout the day.
My fella gives me unsolicited hugs and kisses that make me tingle, make me feel luckier than most.
He believes in me, more than I do and wouldn't swap me for another in a heartbeat.
He loves my giving body, unconditionally, and can't wait till I have another baby in my belly.
My fella's face lights up when he comes home from a long day, and he shares with me what he's done.
He asks me how my day was and helps me with my bags.
He hates to see me sad and he knows when something is wrong.
My fella apologises when he upsets me and brings me breakfast in bed.
He loves me in a dress and calls me a princess, believing no others can compare.
He is guilty of ignoring my needs and I often allow him to believe I exist to serve him.
My fella would buy me my dream horse, and ride alongside me.
He likes to photograph me and we laugh at each other's jokes, even the silly ones.
He can be a slob and doesn't always lift the toilet seat, and aren't most fellas?
He forgets my birthdays and can't recall the date we met. Typical fella.
In his eyes I see myself, and after a hard day I am his soft place to fall, and he feels safe falling apart.
Nothing makes me and my fella happier than waking up entwined in arms and legs.
He's a lover, not a hater and charms with his witty, articulate conversation.
I support him in everything he seeks to achieve, encouraging him to trust his instincts.
He brings out the best and the worst in me and he forgives my moods.
I hope I go before he does; life without him would burn my heart to ashes.
Sometimes I am defined by my relationship with my fella, and that's a great honour.
I'm so proud to be my fella's mama.
I held him in arms and slings until he wanted no more.
He watched his sister being born, feeding me water and nuts while I meditated her into water.
He takes from my breast to start his day and will until it's no longer important to him.
We shared sleep for so long and still do from time to time.
My fella and I have a magical understanding, he knows me better than all others.
I love you, boy-child.

Tuesday 5 October 2010

Was good...REAL good

Hark ye your minds back to a previous post I made about signing up for eight Zumba classes (via Jump On It). Well, tonight I bit the bullet, told the household I wouldn't be sitting down to dinner with them, for I had need to be elsewhere for an evening of group exercise at Fernwood.
First of all, I have to mention to you how beautiful Fernwood is. What a lovely environment to enter for one's fitness needs! No smell of man sweat, no know-it-all-about-weight-machines people hanging around specifically to have you feeling decidedly inadequate and way out of your league, and if I decide to do the Friday morning class, I could have a shower AND breakfast. I just wish there were a Fernwood in South Gippsland I could join...ach, well, the local gym offering Zumba will have to suffice.
So, back on topic. Zumba is a nice workout, indeed. It felt like the old clubbing days on my body, and like a collection of women assembling for a fun way to maintain general health and wellbeing in my head. It started out with some basic moves for the beginners in the class (hand up!) and progressed into more wiggly moves. I'm up for wiggly moves...it's the wiggling and then the moving sideways in a preordained fashion that I struggle with, and that also spelled the very quick end to my aerobics life, way back when I used to hold gym memberships (and actually used them, too). However, the latin grooves playing provided that little bit of inspiration to get my act together and give the coordination caper a red hot go. And I did. Give it a red hot go, that is. The coordination I will have to report back on, as sometimes I had it, and other times I lost it. Smiling all the way, though. I had to be careful with my foot and leg placement, as a few times I felt the familiar twinge in my pelvis, from my Symphisis Pubis Disfunction, and I had to modify my steps.
Zumba is FUN. Yes, I've only had one class, and if the first one has me feeling fantastic and wanting to find another 45 minutes in an already packed week to get to the Friday class, then it's gotta be a good thing, yeah? Yeah. That's what I thought :)

Tuesday 28 September 2010

Babywearing


I love babywearing, and knew I would do it well before Boy-child was born. I don't know just where I got the inspiration from, but I knew babywearing was for me. I had seen pictures of Maya women and children carrying babies on their backs in Guatemalan cloths and wanted that closeness for myself.
Whilst studying Developmental Psychology I happened upon a book by Sharon Heller called 'The Vital Touch', that I found in my local library, and it gave a scientific account of the value of babywearing, of co-sleeping and of touch/massage to babies, and the way it builds vestibular sense as well as neural pathways in the brain that are only stimulated by close holding and touch. Prams put babies outside of normal conversation and human interaction and a heavy reliance on them robs babies of a chance to develop their balance and spatial awareness and, thus, co-ordination. The way a baby sees when in a sling is very multidimensional and they are IN their world, not just spectating it. That really spoke to me and the fact that in a sling, a baby can decide when there's been enough stimulation and visual input by tucking in, turning away and having a kip on mummy's chest. Instinct backed up by evidence, and it was done.
I would ask babywearing parents about their slings. I quickly discounted the more commercial carriers and new that I would be looking outside of major retailers for my carrier, particularly for ease of breastfeeding and also because I didn't like the way babies' spines sat in those. Then I started seeing people wearing Hug-A-Bub carriers and a beautiful friend offered to lend me hers. What a wonderful gift that loan was! I was hooked once I started carrying my firstborn and began investigating the next sling for when he got too big for the soft carrier. A few friends from Booby Club (my local Australian Breastfeeding Association) group were using a carrier called The ErgoBaby Carrier and I decided that its versatility was going to be of great benefit to me. I needed a sturdy carrier that was also soft on my boy's spine, that I could easily breastfeed in, that I could just chuck on in a hurry and safely take him with me to my horse. He was big enough for it at 4.5 months of age without an insert because his head control was pretty well established and he was already crawling - the HAB had reached its end of use. Tom wasn't overly pleased that I'd spent about $140 on a sling, and that's considering that I used my 'first time member' discount voucher at Mothers Direct, the ABA shop...but he got over that soon enough when he realised that he LOVED that Ergo! He could use it easily (he had also been using the HAB, but at that stage we weren't brave enough to try it with a back carry) and carry our boy on his back to get things done. AND, the boy settled so beautifully in it that it quickly became a parenting essential. Forget toys, forget cots, bouncers and all those mummy replacers...the sling was all that would do for our velcro baby, as he eschewed all other measures.
We carried him in New Zealand, we carried him at fire brigade, I carried him in paddocks, I carried him on trains, and, finally, we carried him in Ireland. At about 20 months of age he was well and truly not wanting to be carried anymore. He started walking at 10 months, so we did well to keep him carried for so long. I washed my Ergo, patched it up and put it away...till the next time.
For the next time, our Girl Face, I had made for me a woven cotton sling in lovely stripes. It is a wrap that is firmer for back carries and because it is woven it is a bit cooler in summer. I was given another HAB from a beautiful and kind friend who didn't need hers anymore, so I could interchange my wraps as needed in those first few months.
By the time the Girl was about 3.5 months she was also ready for the Ergo and the other slings went into slow and gradual retirement. By about 4 months, once again, we had an incipient crawler, only this one didn't mind being left to her own devices on the floor...no velcro baby! She's nearly one year old now and spends time in a sling when we're walking to the local shops, at the farm walking up the hills, or near cattle, when I'm with my horse, or unwell. I wear her so much less than I did her brother when we're at home. But babywearing is still an integral part of my parenting and she gets worn by her dad and her grandmother...even her brother has had a go, bless!
Today, Girl Face is fighting a fever and feeling under the weather, so as I type, she is asleep in the beautiful Organic ErgoBaby carrier in seagreen. I have lost track of how much she weighs, but it doesn't matter with the Ergo, because it places her in a way that is evenly distributed and EASY.
Next week is Babywearing Week, where parents and carers everywhere celebrate the merits, the joys and ease of wearing their babies. October 6 - 12 are the dates, so when you wear your baby next week, know that you are part of an ancient and contemporary practice that benefits you and your babies in so many ways, not just the convenience of being handsfree!

Monday 27 September 2010

Brigade Life

Something about fire brigades. Volunteer ones, I guess I'm writing about. Warning: this could get sentimental.
I've been in one for over eight and a half years. I guess if I didn't love it I wouldn't be there anymore. Sometimes it's a challenge and sometimes I start to believe the little voices that tell me it's too hard to have two little kids, be studying and be a firefighter at the same time. Then I tell those voices to shut the hell up and that I can make it work with a bit of creativity, and buckets of flexibility in attitude from my fellow firefighters.
Anyway, days like today I especially appreciate being in my volunteer fire brigade. Not because sometimes you lose people, but because when you do lose someone you realise what you've got in who's left, and it's the departed member who has left that gift, among other mementos of their time with us on earth.
Some say a funeral is an unfortunate time to reconnect with old mates and I tend to disagree. I tend to think it's a great thing to come away from a funeral and feel glad that, at least, of all that's happened, you were able to press 'pause' in normal activity and get together to celebrate someone's life. Life does just get in the way of catching up with people. And sometimes death has to intervene to trip the circuit. (I don't think I'll mind, when my time comes, if people get together for a great chinwag and reconnect. That would mean that at least two people would have been there to see me off - woo hoo!). Today it was great to catch up with people that, without brigade, I would never have made a connection with and that, because of brigade, my life is richer for having known.
The thing with the vol brigade is that you get who you get and you just have to deal with that menagerie of personalities, skills, talents and experiences. You don't get selected the way you do for paid jobs - if you're healthy, of a clean police record, and willing then there's a place for you if you want it. After that, you see how you fit in. And most people do, in my experience. I've met vols from all over the state and none of them are of the same mould. All we have in common is that we want to put back into our communities.
As a vol, you see the same people, at least once a week, week in and week out for years. You see this side of them that they bring from home or from work whilst leaving a lot of themselves at home or at work. You get to know a few people so well that you become part of their private lives. Sometimes you might even stop being part of their private lives, for various reasons, and find that you can still work and joke together just knowing that there is that connection you have from the jobs you've attended together, the training you've done together, the skills and knowledge that's been shared. That can't be changed by a partner who doesn't get along with you, because that partner isn't a vol and doesn't know what you two know; how the other person would withstand physical pressure beyond their own expectations just to make sure you both exit a smoking building safely, how the other person has taught you to tie knots, how the other person has taken time to show you how a pump works or how to thread those damn laces on turnout boots. I would hope that most vols feel the way I do, in that no matter what the interaction of our private lives, that they seek to bring out the best in their fellow brigade members. Yeah, it's optimistic, and that's what I tend towards.
Often, I'll find myself telling someone about a friend, only to realise that I don't know that much about the person beyond brigade life, and wonder to what extent I can actually use the term 'friend'. And then I'll use it, anyway, because whilst I may not know children's names very well (something I intend to work on), or what music they like, because when you spend at least a couple of hours with someone every week, then see them at all sorts of hours in an emergency environment and debrief with that person, or spend extra hours on fundraising with your brigade peeps, then that counts, too, and is yet another way to know someone and have them be important in your life.
Today we attended a funeral of a fellow vol, and as well as being really sad that he left us so suddenly, I was glad for the opportunity he gave us to bring together former members we hadn't seen for a while, and to be together to appreciate the massive contribution of his life he did make to our brigade in his time served. I didn't know him as well as many of the others did, and I liked him a lot. He was non-confrontational even when he was having a confrontation and he offered whatever he could to the brigade, even when work kept him away from training and callouts. I knew he really wanted to get back into brigade life, like old times, so when I was told of his sudden illness it felt like a sideswipe. I think a lot of us were still processing it today, to make sure it was real. I guess it was, because we watched the casket being lowered into the earth after forming a guard of honour for him.
I wasn't sure, when I first joined, what that action would lead to, in terms of all these new people I had to get to know and work with. I had heard of firefighters refer to one another as family, brothers and the like. Somehow, these people enter your consciousness, then your subconscious and strangers form a very odd 'family' indeed, and a very welcome one. My mum used to complain that I had more time for strangers than I did for my own family, when I'd go to training on Wednesdays and Sundays, then fundraising, and callouts. When I first joined they were strangers. In a very short space of time the term 'stranger' couldn't be further from the truth, even if I didn't know what music they'd like played at their funerals. Those same people didn't know my mum, my sister, my favourite colour, and they accepted me for what I was willing to give and what I could dig deep to find in order to give.
In the foreseeable future we'll be moving to a new area and joining a new brigade and the process will begin again, perhaps with some more theorising and musing on my part. I dread to think that I'll feel about people I don't yet know the way I do about our current bunch of fiends (oops, did I forget the 'r'?), because it doesn't seem possible. Yet I hope that does happen, because I don't want to lose that sense of belonging to something way bigger than myself in the process of moving town. I'm ambivalent about my own situation where my childbearing has meant I have spent more time away from brigade than I thought I would have to, but babysitting for two young children on a Wednesday night is hard to come by when you're asking favours of loved ones, and also trying to maximise study opportunities when uni work is due. I'm told that everyone understands, so it's probably time I ease up on beating myself up over that. And the move doesn't mean we can't retain bonds with our current brigade, it just means we're adding to our brigade experiences.
I think I'm in a lucky situation where I was a vol and then introduced Tom to vol life. He knows what I mean, so I don't live with someone who doesn't understand why I would drop everything for 'strangers', or who struggles with that committment. I'm also lucky that I have friends in a few of the partners, so even if they don't always 'get' it, we still get along, and can be part of one another's lives.
No answers, no great revelations, I just needed to get it out.
So, thank you Steve A, for helping me thresh out these thoughts and bringing to my attention how important you have been, and how important all our members are to our lives, both private and 'just brigade'. You gave what you could until there was nothing left to give.

Sunday 26 September 2010

The Palace Arriveth!

The Farm Project now has a dwelling! Ok, so it's a caravan, and to some this may not suit their sensibilities about how one ought to live with a family of two small children, but it's OURS and it's on OUR farm. We have somewhere to stay comfortably on weekends, and, when I have some clear headspace and time, I will fashion it into something liveable and cosy.
Already I've put in some touches to make it more inviting.

Thursday 9 September 2010

The Sick Bay

The pestilence is visiting our household. The previous weekend it was Small Girl and I who had taken to our bed, and said Girl convalesced through the week while I hacked together my research proposal for my subject at uni.
Then Tom took the boy to the farm on Saturday night and us girls were to join them on Sunday for Fathers Day. I got an sms early on Sunday morning to say the boys were coming back early because it was cold and windy. WELL, Tom came back and brought me home a feverish, sadly looking child...not a successfull Fathers Day outcome. I spent it tending to my sickly child's needs, between his various naps. Yes, MY ELDEST had lots of little naps during the day...he was THAT sick.
He spent the next day in bed watching DVD's on my laptop, then transferred to the couch to watch some kids shows, before retiring to bed again. THAT sick, he was.
On Tuesday he spent the morning in bed and then decided it was too sunny to stay in bed feeling sick. He took himself outside, played hard, came back in, lay on the couch, went outside, played hard again and came back in again.
Yesterday, Wednesday, he felt sick again after a feverish night. Again, it had been a sunny day and he couldn't help himself, he just had to go outside and feel the sun on his skin. This time, he took himself off to bed for two long naps. And he went to bed easily that night again, with no fuss.
Today was a similar story, just without the naps, so he fell asleep on the couch while I was away swimming with the girl and was transferred to my bed.
I haven't actually dosed him up on paracetamol this whole time at all. I decided to let his fever do its work. Sure, he was feeling subdued and unwell and sometimes a bit dizzy, and has had a perpetual eyes-at-half-mast kind of appearance about him, but he's not actually saying he's in pain. Talking to a friend about it last week, in relation to the girl having her fever last week, we concluded that sometimes it's ok to let them have a fever and not give them something to make it go away. The body is trying to do something - it's elevating its temperature to kill off the bug that's giving it the irrits - the body is in combat mode. It occurred to me that we live in a society that is afraid of fever and jumps to quell the symptoms of illness, before gauging just how important it is to do that. Yes, some high temperatures carry risk of meningitis and similar complications. I know that can happen. This fever, though, wasn't seeming to be such a critical deal. Hot body, some sweaty outbreaks, fine by morning before another feverish bout occurred the following night.
I took him to the doctor after the third night of it (I'm not a white-coat hater, I just don't feel the need to clog up waiting rooms for every virus we contract). Turns out he has swollen glands but no sign of infection, and a follow up tomorrow should determine where he's at with it all. So, I've done ok.
The doctor did, however, espouse that I dose the boy up on paracetamol and a decongestant, to 'keep him comfortable and back to himself'. Hmmm, there's keeping him comfy, and then there's having him back to his old self. I decided to just get the decongestant to keep breathing comfortable, and to let him feel a bit sick. I made a calculated decision to avoid dosing him up based heavily on what he, himself, had done during that day; that is, to take himself to bed for a nap.
For a kid who never stops, maybe it's ok to let him really feel what it's like to slow down. Not for my convenience (or for undiagnosed Munchausen Syndrome, which I'm pretty sure I don't have...), but for his own self-awareness. If I dose him up so that he doesn't feel that sick, how is he ever to read his body's signs and listen to what his body is telling him? Masking discomfort isn't the best way forward all of the time. Just because we have paracetamol in the house, doesn't mean we have to use it. I do use my essential oils for their medicinal properties before I resort to manufactured medications. The bedroom smells divine, as well as helping to restore healthy order!
As it is, it makes sense to him when I tell him that his body needs rest. If he's on pain relievers, this connection is much harder to make. When I've asked him over the last few days how he's feeling, he's been able to stop what he's doing, have a think and intuit, and then articulate that he's 'feeling bad' and where he feels bad. He's four. Knowing himself and what he needs is a great tool to have and medicating him every time he's got a virus isn't going to do him any long term favours.
A side effect of this illness of his is that our relationship is back on track. Whatever energy it is that guides our lives and nature could well be at work here (I'm not religious, so if you'd like to think of this energy as a God, god, deity, spirit, go ahead; it would work just as well). One of my recent posts points to the near-exasperation I have felt for the first time in four years of motherhood. None of the other stages of motherhood have tested me as much. Up until recent times, motherhood was pretty dreamy and I loved how I came out of the challenges presented to me. My kid is probably more high-octane than most of the other kids we know. He's irrepressible. That's how I prefer to think of him. Words like 'naughty' and 'bad' just don't enter my vocabulary. They have no constructive value.
Anyhow, this spot of sickness has come at just the time we needed to press 'pause' in the way things were going. It's given us a lot more opportunity for cuddles and "I love you's" than we'd ordinarily have - we usually have a lot, it's just that during the week we get caught up with the various activities we have for him that keep him occupied and engaged, and I'll go to bed thinking we didn't spend a particular day with much tactile communication.
This week we have woken up together, with him being in my bed for comfort. We have snuggled in the middle of the night, we have snuggled in the middle of the day with nowhere to rush off to. It's been very good for our relationship to have him home sick and getting back to basics, I suppose.
Whilst outside today, he saw that I was standing with the girl on my back in the carrier. He insisted on procuring for me a folding chair. "Mum, I will get you a chair so you can sit down and stay outside with me", "Thanks, that's very kind of you", "You're welcome, Mum". This is not what 'bad' kids are made of, and if they are, then I'm willing to bear that cross!
So, boy being sick is not such a terrible thing to befall our household. Not when it's taught us both a bit more about ourselves. Me, to take stock of recent times and just hold my precious, intuitive, reactionary, effervescent, joyful first child in his frailer moments, and him, to learn the value of resting his body and listening to it.
Putting himself into bed rest was an unexpected and mature, independent action. I'm glad I didn't order him to bed when he stepped outside. It would only have ended in frustrated argument, anyway. With freedom comes responsibility. He's not doing too badly, is my boy, with his freedoms.

Friday 3 September 2010

Done and done

n'kay, I just signed up for a gym class. Not just any class. Zumba class. It's a teaser promotion where you get 8 classes for a mere nothing (well, just about, I reckon).WeHEY!
It SHOULD be fun, given I love to dance (and lack the opportunities for a really good dance session since...oh, far too long...) and I have a memory of the last time I used to get in a weekly dance sesh and had a size 8 figure, a mere D Cup (I could wear TRIANGLE bikini tops and not look like I was soliciting!) and, oh, 15% body fat, or some such ridiculous stat like that. That is SO gonna happen with these 8 classes, I can feel it! Ahem, yup, shuddup. At least I'll enjoy myself one morning a week after leaving children-folk in capable hands (separate, capable hands - not wanting to burn child-minding bridges just yet).
The other 'done' is my assignment. It's not fantastic, not even sure it addresses the criteria. But my head has been feeling like a ship banging up against a wharf with no buffers attached to it (come on, sailor-types - what ARE those things called? I never did learn their names in all my childhood watching my dad's ship come into port...) with this lurgy that I've had since last week. However, I have headings, I have references, I have INTEREST in the subject matter (and the subject matter says that engagement is a key ingredient to well being, and I'm all for that well being lark), I have a medical certificate for lateness AND...I have reached the word limit, so that works well for me to signify 'completion of task'.
But, wait! It's not 2am yet! What will my well being do with all this extra sleep? Dream about wearing favourite jeans, rocking a six pack and reliving my days of Joy at the Metro (pleeeeeeeeeease, someone remember what I'm referring to and have mercy on my antiquity!), for those were days of sweaty, hot-panted, platform-booted wholesomeness. Can't wait for Zumba!

Tuesday 31 August 2010

Home, Sweet Homebirth Story

In a month and a half Small Girl will be one year old. It will be the first anniversary of something amazing, and I got so busy before and after that I never ended up blogging about it. Well, you're here now, so you may as well read about it - glad you clicked the link? This is a dolled up version of a story I posted in a forum last year, soon after the event - it's much more polished now!

Sometime in 2008 I had a moment of clarity, where I realised I could ask my body to let me know when I was ovulating, as I hadn't ovulated since 2005, when Oscar was conceived, I guess. I had been breastfeeding overnight and during the day and also co-sleeping from the day Boy-child was born, and this worked well with my body's rhythm for my fertility cycle. I had spoken with a couple of wise and intuitive friends about this and they concurred that this had been the case for them, with 3 kids each to help make their case.
I decided that my body's plan was in line with my own plan for a 3 plus-year age gap between my kids. Knowing I was to return to study, volunteer firefighting and horse-riding, I also knew that kids too close together would be unfair on everyone involved, as I'm not very zen under stress. I knew that for me it would be ideal to wait until our first had gone through that intense period of rapid development before having another little person whose needs would need close attention from mummy. I wanted to be as present as possible for the second baby and my body came to the party with my conscious mind by being 'infertile' naturally while I enjoyed Boy-child's first years.
In December 2008 I intuited a strong and compelling signal from within that ovulation had occurred, two and a half years since the boy's birth. I had been using a Mooncup, which is a menstrual cup made from silicone that not only saves the environment, but took me to a place of comfort with my own body and rhythm I had never enjoyed before and recommend to all women. Once I knew what had happened I then asked for my body to let me know when implantation had occurred.Tom had been wanting a sibling for the boy for some time...in vain, because my body and lactation were plugging along, of their own accord and duly ignoring his preference. Later, in January of 2009 I had one day where my pelvis just gave out and by the end of the day I couldn't walk without holding onto walls - something that hadn't happened since I was pregnant with Boy when I was dealing with excruciating Symphisis Pubis Dysfunction, or SPD. It was too much of a coincidence and the next day I was scheduled to ride my horse all morning at a riding club rally. I did that and came home and it was as if nothing had gone on the day before. So, I knew. That was my 'sign'.
I told Tom what I knew and he believed me (with not a semblance of 'yeah, yeah, that womany, airy fairiness crap'!), and we kept it to ourselves. For nearly 5 months. It was quite delicious, actually, to just know, the two of us, and not have to talk about it with anyone but our private midwife, and a bit later on, Katerina, who agreed to be part of our birthing team. I didn't really show until closer to 6 months in, so it was easy to pretend I'd been eating a bit healthier since the fires. I had been feeling untethered since the fires and my appetite took a hit - whether it was a combination of the fires or just early months of pregnancy I can't tell you - and my acquired nervous disposition saw me lose some weight during pregnancy, such that I appeared to be quite un-pregnant for some time. It was a great surprise when we announced the pregnancy to close family only, some time near the 18 week mark. If I'd had my way I would have just waited for our close family to notice my belly once it had popped out, but Tom was keen to avoid noses being put out of joint, so I relented and allowed the news to be told! It wasn't so much for secrecy that I wanted to keep it quiet, it was more in keeping with the kind of pregnancy and birth I wanted to have - private, quiet and intimate.
We decided before falling pregnant that the next pregnancy would not be scanned by ultrasound or prenatal testing, as the reading I had done, and meditation combined, were not in favour of 'routine' scans and testing. We would let this one do what it would do and roll with any punches coming our way. No testing for me meant that we couldn't then fall into the medical model of pregnancy and have doctors put the hard word on me based on their training and what they consider routine. So much has changed in birth and not all of it for the better - with so much evidence suggesting that medicalising birth is interfering with normal birth processes. Not for us, this medical intervention caper.
The pregnancy was eventful, and only in terms of what I did during that time - strike team duty during our bushfires in Victoria,
getting through uni semester before taking another intermission, going to three cities I'd never been to within 3 months (Brisbane for a quick escape in mid-June, Newcastle to visit Paul and Dan in early August and Canberra for the Birth Rights rally on September 7th) and starting up my singing gigs with Brett, with gigs in late May, end of June and late September (in our duo, Black Pepper) after a 3 year absence from the acoustic stage.
Anyhoo, I had spent a lot of my pregnancy pretending I wasn't pregnant and then, come mid-September there was nothing planned, nothing in my diary...it was great! I nested in a way I didn't do with Boy-child and just thought about the ambience for the homebirth I was wanting, gathering materials, music and information to make it what I wanted. I made up birthing oils for massage and spray mists and some post-natal concoctions for relaxation and nurturing. Under no illusions that Tom would utilise his massage experience on me, I massaged myself...a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do. Oh, and I DID pay for some pregnancy massage from a local practitioner, as well - I'm not silly!
We were working off LMP (Last Menstrual Period) for due date...which came and went with no sign of labour, though in September I had felt myself dilate and also felt Braxton Hicks contractions that I didn't feel with my first pregnancy. I told Tom that if the baby didn't come early, it would be late, and not be born near the LMP due date.
All of the first week in October yielded nothing and Tom was keen not to get up for work each morning, hoping to call in for his 3 weeks leave. The night before the estimated due date we did our second belly cast (the first was a dismal failure) and thought "Right, it can happen now". On the Friday we took a last minute opportunity for a family pregnancy session with an ABA (Australian Breastfeeding Association) photographer, Susan D'Arcy, and thought, "Right, it can happen now".
Here is a sample of the simple and beautiful photos Susan took of us:

On Saturday I completed the first painting I had attempted in about 2 years and thought, "Right, it can happen now". Tom was forlorn to have to front up to work again on Monday, the 12th.
I had an appointment at home with my midwife, Helen Brown of Midwives Naturally, and told her about my intuiting the implantation date, so she did a calculation from that and said my due date would then have been the 11th...so not so 'overdue', after all. I wasn't fretful or anxious...just bored. EVERYTHING was in place; trial run of the birth pool had been done, I had my drinks and supplements all ready to go, music playlist prepared, batteries charged for torches and cameras etc.
Through Tuesday night I had some more Braxton Hicks contractions and when I woke to pee at about 3.50am they were stronger and regular. The remained regular at 6-10 minutes for the next 3 and a half hours. At 3 hours I contacted Helen and Katerina who would be attending to support us as well as Oscar. We all remained hopeful. I lit my candles, put on my mantra music, put the rose water in my fuchsia glass water bottle and rubbed some birthing oil into my body, before wrapping around my body pillow on the couch to wait. Alas, by daybreak the whole thing had backed off, as I extinguished unneeded candles, one by one. I was SO disappointed, because I had been working through my Sleep Breathing and Deep Breathing (HypnoBirthing tools I learned with the first pregnancy) and visualising outcomes. Katerina came round, anyway (lucky she wasn't working that day), after Tom had already called work to start his leave (boy, did I feel bad) and we decided, after mentioning that I had been tossing up what movie to see at the cinema, to watch Mao's Last Dancer in the afternoon (it was Boy-child's creche day and I had been meaning to catch a film for months). I felt flat and rejected by my baby! But I also intuited that my baby wanted to come at night...maybe it was all those Buffy episodes I'd been watching on DVD of a late evening?
Resting after a false start
Thursday morning and Tom asked if anything was happening...well, donchya think I would say something if it were? We decided to bite the bullet and go to Baby Bunting to get this car seat for Boy because he was, by now, unmistakeably too tall for his seat at the time (well, I borrowed my mum's and converted 'his' back to a baby seat) and then to Fountain Gate shopping centre to do shopping for the pantry (woefully empty). It was so hideous - I thought Knox was bad enough (where I stick to the 'new' atriums when I go with Boy, because I'd had to get things in recent times and I had been averaging maybe 3 trips a year prior to that), but Fountain Gate has some truly grotesque acoustics. We all got overloaded and cranky - our humours kept up only by a delicious serve of thickshake and icecream at the food court.
We got our shopping done, headed back to the car and I felt light cramping again. I had a couple of tightenings on the way home, got home, lurked on forums and Facebook for a while and Tom organised dinner (the good egg; he'd been ace taking over from me for about two weeks, since I couldn't stand up to complete a meal despite best intentions, due to the SPD). From 6pm I was timing the tightenings and breathing through them. For about 45 mins they were 10 mins apart and dinner was served. Tom and Boy were due to leave for a swimming lesson about 20 mins drive away from home, in Ringwood and Tom asked if he should go. They'd be back by about 8.45pm and I deemed it 'safe'. Tom called before hopping in the pool and I said they were about 8-10 mins apart. He said he'd get home and tidy up because I said the floor was crunchy again and in a state (not just fussy pregnancy nesting, the floor was awful because my pelvis wouldn't allow me to clean the house properly...next time I'll hire a cleaner). I couldn't wait and started sweeping the house (it wasn't very big, but collected dog hair and dust because we lived on an unmade road) with a vigour, because the broom became my 'dance partner' during tightenings. Finally, clean floor!
This was my 'altar', where my aromatherapy and light therapy was set up, alongside the birthing goddess (who was on loan to me to help guide me through the processes)

I lit candles, dispensed some aromatherapy and lathered in birthing oil again, to my music (and the new music I had been given the day before by my massage therapist) of hypnotic and soothing Mantra by Deva Premal, after fitting the Chinese red paper lantern to the light fitting of the lounge room. By the time the boy-types got home at 8.30 tightenings were 5 mins apart and sharp buggers. I tried to put Boy-child to bed and he was being a bit difficult, whiny and un-sleepy. I read to him and then he asked me to read him My Brother Jimi Jazz, about a homebirthed sibling. Once finished, I turned out the light, he had 'Babu' (his reference for breastfeeding and boobs) and was still fidgeting. I was getting a bit cranky because all I wanted to do was stand and rotate my hips. Half way through a sharp tightening and deep breath I felt a 'pop', and a slight trickle. I leapt out of bed (to the boy's dismay), went to the loo and told Tom. It was more show, the washable pad was wet, but not saturated and I told Boy to hop into our bed if he'd go to sleep. 5 min intervals were increasing to 3-5 mins. I had already called Helen and Katerina to let them know that things had started again, whilst Tom was at the pool. Boy-child would still not settle, which was unusual - he knew something was up because I was being so erratic...and all I wanted to do was go into my 'zone'. I told Tom to just leave him stay up and to call Katerina to come. At this point he also asked if he should call the midwives to come...I couldn't say 'yes' quickly enough, but then saying anything was becoming a secondary priority. I was hanging onto walls and furniture to swing my hips around to get through some thick and fast surges (Hypno speak for 'contractions'). I told Tom he had to get the birth pool going and, before I knew it, it was filling. Just as it was nearly ready, Katerina arrived and took over with teh boy - she was just so the right person to ask to perform this role.
She took him to his room and that's when I needed to get in the water...instant relief, Sweet Mother Of All That Is Good And Right In The World! The water helped deal with the surges incredibly well, because I was losing it (or thought I was) - I was getting teary thinking I had lost all my HypnoBirthing skills in the intervening years and wondering why it seemed more difficult this time (or so I thought, again).
The midwives arrived but I could barely look up to acknowledge them. Boy had hopped into the pool a couple of times before this and when he got too boisterous was plucked out, with much protest - sheesh, that was hard to deal with at the same time. But my committment to have him there remained. At one point I allowed myself some comic relief when he ducked under my arm and attached himself to my breast - scuba Babu! No-one else knew what he was doing until I said "he's attached"...even then I don't think they believed it (though his Daddy did).
Tom stayed kneeling in front of me with his arms around me and head on my shoulder as a counterbalance, every once in a while telling me I was doing well. The midwives said the same and prompted me to keep my bum down in the water. Boy-child was in and out like a freaking yo-yo and it was all I could do not to snap at him. Little blighter was trying to inspect my perineum to see what was happening!

I told everyone that I wanted to bail, and as soon as I said that I realised I may not have that much longer to go. I had no idea what time it was. I then remembered some reading I had done in those last few weeks about a midwife encouraging birthing women to feel inside the vagina for the progress of the baby and that feeling the baby's head had been motivation to press on peacefully and confidently. I felt inside with my middle finger and thought I felt nothing...but then, I felt something! The tip of my finger found a slimy surface that felt round! Two surges later I felt again and reported quietly to Tom that I felt it between my middle knuckle and the base of my finger. The next surge (by this time between 1-2 mins apart) brought it to my middle knuckle. Wanting to wait another couple of surges before checking again I decided against that and checked at the next...Bloody Nora, this baby was at my first knuckle!
From here on in my breathing sounds became moaning sounds (and upon watching teh replay via video Katerina took, most of the noise must have only been happening in my head) and I felt I was losing the plot again - the surges were unrelenting and I could barely keep up with the momentum. I religiously told myself that breathing was the answer, just keep breathing and I'd get through it, that it couldn't be much longer. Boy-child thought it would help to periodically force feed me nuts and dried fruit, so I obligingly opened my mouth, then gave the contents to Tom when Boy turned away (just wasn't in the mood, but couldn't reject his gestures!). He also tipped water down my throat and both my hands were holding me up, so stopping him was a problem - until Tom gently sorted him out.
There was a head at the opening of my vagina (or birth canal, depending on how delicate you are about these things) and it stayed there...I wanted to bear down and breathe it out like I had with Boy...but the bugger wasn't moving at the rate I preferred - it just hung around at the opening, surge after surge. It must have been about 4 or 5 surges (though Tom reckons it was less) and the midwives guided me to hold the head and go slow - the right words at just the right time; I got straight back into my Birth Breathing, creating a 'J' shape with my spine to my tailbone, and a midwife pushing my bum back into the water to help me. There were photos being taken, mirrors and torches being held and things explained to Boy-child. I was back in my zone and determined to just breathe the kid out. At one point I heard Tom tell me "it's a girl" and wondered how on earth he could know that from the face being out (turns out he said "that's the girl" to encourage me, I realised later). So, in my head, 'it' had become 'she'.
Once the head was out I felt better, but still dealing with fast and furious surges. Eventually I said I just wanted her out and the midwives got me to turn around, facing up, and guided her out - she was kicking like a dolphin and I was just 'over' the whole sensation.
Then, there she was, on my chest - my living, breathing new baby, not making much noise and me breathing on her face, under instructions. We all sighed at the sight of her as we gathered around to see what I had made.
Boy was mesmerised and we were all relieved. The midwives informed me that it had taken 2 hours and 15 mins from established labour to birth...huh? No wonder it was ouchy! It was 11.20pm and it was still the day after the 'false alarm'.
More surges came for the placenta - I was not overly joyed about this and complained that I hadn't had to go through that last time (postpartum hemorrhage meant I'd had a managed third stage that was a bit of a blur). Again, I was guided in how to bring the placenta out. Again, sweet relief!
Boy hopped into the water and was swimming around in it again, meeting his little sister and showing off his fishness. Yes, he was swimming with vernix, but he didn't care. Our little white dog, Coco, had been sitting faithfully by the birth pool for much of the labouring time, and I appreciated her mammalian presence.
We were helped from the pool to my couch, where we just took each other in for ages. By the time I was helped to bed it was 1am and I was doped up on some pain killers for the after-pains.
It was me, my new baby girl with no confirmed name, and my fella, with Boy asleep in the next room crashed out from the experience. The midwives said everything I did had been ideal. I was centred, and serene and keeping noise low and constructive; every once in a while humming to the mantra melody, as I had been listening to mantra for months. There was no tearing, not even grazing this time - just some bruising, which healed within days from using a herbal recipe I dipped overnight pads into and froze (much nicer than frozen water in condoms!).
Well, the story wasn't supposed to be very long because the labour wasn't very long...but the birth was part of a journey that needed telling, too. We chose the right people to be with us and we had learned so much about birth during the first pregnancy and resolved so much by the second that we were prepared for what homebirthing would do for our lives. I knew it was my destiny, as I would muse about my grandmother birthing all nine of her children in a tiny house in a small Honduran village, aided by local and experienced birth attendants. All live births, and only one of her children passed away (in 1992) before she did in 2003, but that's another story. I only knew my grandmother for 6 weeks in 2002/2003, and she would never know, by the time she passed, in our winter of 2003, that she inspired me to birth in an uninterrupted way, with faith in my body and my baby's intelligence to birth herself.
I achieved my goal - to birth at home, in water, avoiding the need to get into a car during established labour, with my vivacious son witnessing the entrance of his much-wanted sibling and his daddy, who wanted the sibling more than any of us! I felt pretty peachy and 'zen' about it in the following weeks and months...hell, I still do. And 'zen' was the ultimate aim - even though it was fast and hard, I remained true to my aims and a peaceful beginning was experienced by Girl Face; my second water baby and first homebirth.

Something Fishy


Today I was woken by a boy calling out to me, saying him and Benny were having a bath.
Having gone to bed the previous night at midnight with the fuzziest head, after a weekend of small girl with a high temperature over two nights and having nursed a cold all week myself, I stayed on in bed when I heard Boy-child stir. We had no appointments or engagements, so why not?
This is why not: Benny is a fish.
Benny was flipping around in the shallow bath water after he had been plucked out of his small tank, which sits on the window ledge outside the laundry.
This fish was plucked out of my parents' dam at their small acreage in East Gippsland, so the poor fish is already a displaced citizen and missing its school of fish, never mind having to deal with being boy-handled for the purposes of having a BATH.
He's recovering now and his scales look like they're in shock still. He may not make it. Assuming he's a he and not a she. If s/he does, it looks like we'll be transporting him back from whence he came. For his own safety and longevity. I don't think s/he'll mind!
PS. does anyone know what kind of fish it is? It was teeny when he was plucked from the dam and almost translucent, we have no idea what breed it is!

Thursday 26 August 2010

Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em

I had mine today. A real tester of a day. In the end I 'ran away' from Boy-child.
This morning I almost put him in the car naked because he gave me the runaround about getting dressed (and it was to be dressed into something of his own choosing - he wears a superhero outfit for KinderBallet, among other circumstances) and we were late to the class (never mind that I'm getting myself ready to leave earlier and earlier each week to circumvent this same situation...). Not to worry, he'd assured me all week that he'd participate and listen to Miss Cynthia's instructions, because we agree that Miss Cynthia knows stuff about ballet that he wants to learn and she really wants to teach him. At the conclusion off the lesson, Miss Cynthia told me that Oscar was climbing instead of dancing. So, I asked him, "do you want to do ballet?", to an enthusiastically affirmative response. I find me a brick wall for a chat.
I have made a friend of one of the ballet mummies and we have fallen into a pattern of staying on at the community centre's cafe for a chat while her girl and my boy play, and my girl empties her Louis Vuitton bag (I tells ya, she knows her stuff, we just can't afford what we want, her and me!) and her smaller girl charms the pants offa me (her husband is Chinese and together they make gorgeous children). Our 'conversation' is punctuated by my asking Boy to bring Girl back from the foyer and he responds by way of picking her up and running out the door with her to the carpark. That was just the first time. Both times I had to recall my athletics running days (yes, it's as painful for me to remember as it is for you to imagine) to save them from the (albeit geriatric or community disability van) traffic.
Not one to rest on his laurels (don't make me even think about what that means, it just seems appropriate to insert at this juncture), he proceeds to wind open the windows of the cafe, lift himself up and climb out. Because I asked him not to open the door to the cold. Creative. Highly unauthorised. I threaten to eat his bacon sandwich. Temporary fix proves effective.
His friend comes crying to her mummy a few times reporting various ways Boy has flung himself about and created collateral damage. He spreads water all over the tables and draws in it with a straw (probably as retribution for not allowing a lemonade this week - I wanted to see if he'd be calmer, so I guess we answered that question today...give over with the lemonade embargo next week is my mental note to self) and, for good measure runs Girl out onto the asphalt of the carpark and I do my horse growl at him to get back inside (that growl is the evil one I employ when my horse is being dangerously touchy about me being around him and I don't want to hit him, cos I don't do hitting - thankfully, that hasn't happened since he was a young thing and is the least of my worries nowadays).
Deciding that any further attempt to fraternise (and geez, those conversations take unexpectedly refreshing turns) is becoming dangerous to the wider (and geriatric or disabled) community, we call it a day, we pack her bag (one Milky Way, one tissue packet, one pair of sunglasses, one unused condom, one set of keys...I decide I'm going to organise an op-shop bag with op-shop trinkets in it for Girl to play with when we're out, cos one day someone will get embarrassed...) and pack our respective children into our respective vehicles.
Well, my delightful little Gemini reclined in his booster as I drove away and offered, "Mum, I love your heart", from the bottom of his own. There's only one response to that, and it's not the sequence of choice adjectives running through my mind at the time. "I love you, my darling, and I really need you to listen to me". This week has worn me down and that's all I had at that given moment. Mind you, we stopped at 4 different places on the way home and he was my fun-child again.
He insisted on having his harness on (that I bought in Dubai in 2008 and hadn't really used much since), so to all and sundry it appeared that I prefer to have my four year old tethered to me while I shop, but every time I let it go to look at something I was pleaded with to take back my hold of the 'leash'. Just in case anyone cared for my excuse, I responded with a "yes, Puppy Boy". He's not out to get me, he just wants to have fun, and it's not my job to quell that instinct. It's just not always the safe way or the contextually appropriate way that he chooses to express his orientation to fun. We enjoyed one another's company for a section of the day today. That's not unusual, he's a really loving kid, mostly.
Then we got home. I prepared some crackers and cheese with him. And he began to unravel. Or I did. Or we both did. Him into an increasing momentum towards reckless abandon and me to, well, somewhere very dark. I heard banging, went into the room he was in with Girl on my hip (don't tell my osteo!), whereupon I had the agility to dodge a shoe that was aimed at me. I paused a moment, took a breath and...shut the door. The round handle of which is positioned about 1.5 metres off the ground so that he can't reach it. I knew that. And I waited in the kitchen. I strapped the Ergo around my waist, put on my jacket, clicked Girl in and called out to him that I was going for a walk. He cried out for mercy and I replied that he was to stay at home with Dee, whom he hadn't even greeted when she arrived because he was too busy throwing things at the wall. I let him out of the room when I was ready and got my bag.
It was difficult for me to leave him in his growing anguish and, finally, he was writhing in Dee's strong arms while I explained briefly why I was walking away from him. I left him shrieking for me and as much as it hurt us both, I knew I needed to. It was going to do me more good than he, and he wasn't going to be harmed by it. Staying meant yelling and I had resolved not to go there.
So, I walked the short distance to the shops. And bought chocolate. Yes, the packaged, commercial, on special, likely unethical variety. Then I crossed the road again to get a yoghurt frog from the health food shop - Boy LOVES yoghurt frogs from there. Then I went into Voski Von Mueller, my favourite boutique and local retailer. I chatted and bought a gift for a friend and felt infinitely better. And then I walked home.
Who should greet me at the gate, but a rather hoarse Boy calling out "Mum! Want to come for a walk to the oval with us?", as his dad, his Dee and the dogs were all dressed for a late afternoon stroll. And you know what? I did. And he still loves me. He told me so about 5 times on that walk, in the rain and wind. I also got a "kiss and snuggle" as I left the house with small girl for our Baby Swim lesson.
Some may say he needs a smack. I don't abuse my position as parent to inflict shame. Some may say he needs a Time Out. He'd lose the 'lesson' in 2 seconds flat; instead, when I left he had a soft place to land, in Dee. I don't revoke things he likes because that's punitive and doesn't address what's causing the conflict, and makes it about him, instead of about 'us' and everyone involved. I'm not saying that I executed the perfect response or that I effected a resolution. I'm just saying that I kept us all safe because I was sufficiently eroded to know that my decision-making skills for avenues of resolution were compromised. So I walked away. I didn't feel better. And I didn't feel worse. To me, that's a small win; whether he knows it now or not.
So, with today worked through to a peaceable conclusion, I now turn my attentions to an assignment that's due tomorrow morning. I'll see how I go and if I'm losing me head from lack of sleep, I'll pack it in and speak to a uni counsellor next week to organise extended time. Yes, I feel I deserve it, given that most of the students in my course aren't also taking a simultaneous course in Boy-child, or 4 year olds, or 4 years olds plus their completely dependent little sisters. If you think I'm working the system, you're pretty much on the money. That's what the system's for! And that, my friends, is how I limp through my Grad Dip Psych.
Tonight I opened an email from Carol Fox, from Life Performance and this time she espoused being honest with difficulties, instead of pretending to be superhuman or perfect. She says,
We all eat and shower and go to the toilet, and we all have fears, and vulnerabilities and days where things look, sound or feel not so good. So let go of the pressure of needing to be perfect all the time! Let go of the illusion of being superhuman. Just be real. You might even discover you establish even more rapport with your team, and inspire them more than you ever thought possible.
Well, I don't know if I've inspired anyone with my tale of woe-is-me, or even established any rapport with anyone, and dammit, I DO feel better for admitting that I can't always keep it together for my boy or with my boy. I don't mind him seeing me lose my cool and to see me struggle with something and to see me work through a problem. How else is he going to learn that it's ok to make mistakes, it's ok to work towards a better 'next time' if you're lucky enough to get one, that it's ok to be challenged?
Another quote I came across today, whilst looking for a saying to help someone through a rough patch, was in another Carol Fox email (she sends these out weekly, as a kind of 'pep-talk' to a mailing list to which I subscribe...good thing, too!) was this,
Between stimulus and response, there is space.
In that space lies our freedom and power to choose our response.
In our response lies our growth and freedom
Victor Frankl (1905-1997) Psychiatrist, Author and Holocaust Survivor.

For me, today, I chose not to yell (ok, so I growled my 'horse growl', there's room for improvement), and I choose to be free from the yelling response. Aim small, win big. Just Do It. (sorry, it's a pervasive pop-culture reference to which I adhere, as it happens...)
Find your space.




Wednesday 25 August 2010

Dear Reader

Arrrrrrrrgh...time for an update, I reckon.
So, I've lost count of what week it is at uni. Suffice to say that I'm somewhere behind that mark, still. I'd have lost my identity if I told you I were anywhere else, though...this is how I do 'student', it would appear. It's how I've been doing student since I started uni in 1994 - I've taken time off from uni in 1998 (when I was forcibly removed from enrolment by the Exclusions Board, only to return and finish my BA with Honours - that'll learn 'em), with a 2 year break to have a 'real job' (only to realise that stuff is for fools, and full time work and I just don't have a friendly accord) and 6 months 'off' between handing in my Honours thesis and embarking on my Grad Dip Psych in 2005. Then falling pregnant (as loosely planned, mind you, so my decision-making there occurred on parallel universes before they rudely converged in that October) meant that my Grad Dip would take an age and three quarters to complete. As if that wasn't complicated enough, I fell pregnant again, for the prestige you get when you add a degree of difficulty to elements of life that really didn't require complication, and were already interesting enough.
Here I am, two units away from graduation, and I'm enjoying this unit. Which is a bit perverse, because, apparently, this is the hardest unit of the course. I'm not refuting it's level of complexity - it's way complex - just sayin' I'm getting a lot out of it, the relevance is high and my project is something I'm genuinely interested in (positive psychology interventions - all that happy, happy, motivation, 'what makes you tick' stuff). Still, life seriously intrudes on my best academic intentions. Again. Hard to concentrate when there's a cute girl on the floor wanting to be held and snuggled and breastfed. Call me undisciplined, but there you go - my dedication to study dissolves with a pretty face.
Which leads me to what I really wanted to update the blog for. The girl. She's a treat, my little walker. On the 15th of August she was 10 months old, and her 'taking steps' turned into what could be more reliably described as 'walking'. Within the last week and a half since turning 10 months she has been waddling around the house and delighting all of us with her ambulatory efforts. There's a lot of plopping down on her bum, before she resolutely collects herself for the next effort. Like her mother, she likes to throw in 'degree of difficulty', by either attempting to clap whilst walking, or to wave, or sing and wave, or talk and clap. Or all of the above in one contained, more often unsuccessful, attempt. She's waving goodbye, too - whether you're saying bye in English or Spanish, she'll start flicking her hand up and down. She's a social girly.
Sturdy, too. This is a valuable trait when you're the sister of Captain Chaos. I think she has better coping skills than I do, currently. I could learn from her, I'm not too proud to admit that.
She says 'Mama', or "Mamamamama', just to be convincing - and I am pretty smug that I'm the first in her vocabulary list. Boy struck a lovely compromise for us in the 'Mummy/Daddy' wars - he said 'puppy' first, and all was well. This time round, I'm smug and triumphant. And why not?
As for that brother of hers, he's challenging all my inner resources. I thought I had it down pat with him and then all that 'boyness' kicked in to give me what for. Sheesh! I got left behind, spun around blindfolded and whizzed inside a Gravitron with that testosterone surge (Come ON, you Gen X Melbournites, you KNOW what a Gravitron does to your head). He likes ballet. I've got him in a ballet class and he's the only boy. I ought to have photographed him the moment he opened the bag containing his ballet shoes - he was just so pleased with himself! We watched some ballet on TV and he wants to lift 'his' girls when he's bigger - that conversation was a melting moment, for sure. Write him off as a feral at your own risk.
It's not just the dancing to which he likes to turn his physical prowess. This week I took him to see my horse again (weather lately has been formidable for taking small girl out in) and I relented to let him have a ride. Normally, he'll sit on Dante's back while I lead him back up from the paddock, and from time to time I have sat him on Dante whilst I lunge him in the arena, with the dual benefit of giving Dante a bit of a workout (with the best intentions of following up with more regular lungeing and riding...still hasn't happened) and also giving Boy something else to wrap his brain around. I've posted the photos before and he's comfy up there. This week I popped Dante into a canter, which I've never done with Boy up there on his own (I have done it when he has been sitting in front of me on Dante, and that's fun) and he was actually pretty good - sticky and balanced. I was so proud of him and thinking of his future in a forthcoming Olympics when the farrier, who was present at the equestrian centre on this day, pointed out the significant horse height to boy size ratio, and his observations of child hospital emergencies and injuries in similar ratio scenarios. Fair point. Point taken. Point not resented. Point tricky, though, cos Tom doesn't like to come with me to the horse property and sunny days don't seem to hang around till Boy's creche day lately, so if he comes he rides. And if it were up to me he'd already have a pony of his own to ride. Thing is, it IS up to me and I can't afford the headspace and time right now to look for his pony. My bind is that right now, going to see Dante will invariably involve taking Boy with me and making that call each time he gets on, or taking my rare opportunities to go without him when that coincides with nice weather (for the girl's sake). Anyway, he loves it and he's got a knack. We had a chat about it and I'll work out a way to keep him riding and Dante in light work. I'm probably not going to keep myself off the "Tut-tut" conversation list, but I probably never will, for one reason or another and I can't control that. One thing that made me laugh, though, was said farrier trying to illustrate his point in a way that only someone who didn't know Boy could. He asked me how I'd feel if Boy climbed a ladder the height of Dante. Ummm, he's climbed higher. And if he fell off that ladder? He's fallen further. Not a good example! Boy sleeps on a loft bed and swings himself off at will and in one piece all the time. He climbs playground equipment the 'wrong' way and ends up sitting on TOP of the structures while other kids point at him and say he's 'naughty' (well, extraordinarily agile is probably more accurate and meaningful) to their parents, who glance, alarmed, from me to Boy, from Boy to the ground, from the ground back to me. And probably shake their heads in disbelief at my composure before gasping as he leaps off said structure to land safely on two feet on the tambarked surface, ready for the next misadventure. That's my boy. If he can get himself up, he can probably get himself down. And I DO note that falling off a static object is not falling off a moving, possibly frightened or agitated horse (depending on the reason horse is dislodging boy) in the kettles of fish-type difference in scenario. But still.
Not to be pigeon-holed into 'feral kid' status, this kid also partakes of a weekly creative drama class. He LOVES it. And I don't know why, exactly, because it's a class I drop him off to and do my own thing for an hour. Letting go is kinda nice. So is a quiet hour with the small girl mid-week!
My tip of the week is: watch Boy. It's a film I got to see last week with Katerina and it's being released tomorrow in cinemas. It will make you laugh, chuckle, wheeze, wince (if you were a child in the 80s, that is - if you are a child of the 90s and you are currently reviving the 80s via your wardrobe you will probably not find it nearly as comical) and perhaps just a little teary in parts. It's well worth the trip to the movies, and I just love, love, love Kiwi cinema. This film exemplifies why. So, umm, if you don't like it, you may not find yourself as enthusiastic about the film-making cred of our cousins across the ditch...but I think you will.
Well, it's past midnight, the girl has finally resigned to a sleep-state and as much as I'd like to continue with my imminently-due assignment, this panadol I've taken will only take me so far. Wisdom says sleep is the course I should follow, and who am I to argue with her?

Wednesday 4 August 2010

Full head

OK, it's Semester Two. It's week 4 of Semester Two. I'm behind. Quite behind!
So, I am playing serious catch ups at uni, and as a result, have been spending time while driving, falling asleep, showering, on what to write next in my blog...of course!
I'll be back with some ramblings of varying themes.
Hope your week is being good to you :)

Tuesday 13 July 2010

'Political Correctness' - yeah right...

So, respecting people's human right to seek asylum, people's desire to make better lives for themselves and their families and the value of 'difference' is 'political correctness', is it? Not impressed, Ms Gillard.
The honeymoon is over. I was overjoyed to see a woman, ANY woman take up the mantle of Prime Ministership. At that point in time it didn't matter which woman. It could have been a Liberal or a friggin' Family First person and I would have marked the occasion for it's history making and moment in time for women, who have, for time immemorial been subjugated to male rule (pretty indisputable, but go ahead and dispute that if you want to). That's fine, I never saw Gillard as the Messiah, and as she said herself, even people who support her will be disappointed by her from time to time.
I am not surprised by the populist rhetoric about asylum seekers, nor particularly shocked that she should play with it the way she has. I expect that from major parties these days. I am a particular shade of Green for a reason.
It doesn't matter which political party it comes from or which leader it comes from in the community. The fact that someone in leadership believes it's up to populist DEBATE to decide what we do with our responsibilities under the Human Rights Convention, to which Australia is a SIGNATORY is completely up the creek. To suggest that protecting human rights is POLITICAL CORRECTNESS is a complete sham and disgrace. It highlights my own thesis, and that of many others in the field of racism and discrimination, that racism and xenophobia are about the concern to maintain privilege and access to resources, based on some idea that 'difference' is bad.
How arrogant of us, as a nation, to believe that our way of life is so superior that we also believe people fleeing for their lives can erode us and our 'identity'. What a crock. Just how strong are we as a culture if we can be so easily eroded by this? Fear underscores weakness. It is a weakness of our culture, of our institutions, of our structural systems that the acceptance of desperate human beings (who are just like you and me and seeking safety for their children and immediate family) can feel like such a threat. And that this perceived threat is to be entertained by national 'debate' so that the government can gauge from this 'undercurrent' what to do with this apparent 'flood' of asylum seekers. Get. A. Grip.
And yanno what? It is in seeking to exclude and define borders (a pox on the term 'border protection'!) that we actually lend support and moral strength to the reasons these people are leaving their homelands. Exclusion and 'national borders', narrow ideas of 'nationhood' and identity that actually don't mean much (house of cards) leave people alienated from places they called home, render them targets of expulsion, exclusion, discrimination and even genocide.
Don't get so comfy that you think this could never happen to you. It could. Not that I believe it will. It just COULD. You could find yourself on the wrong side of what those in power believe is acceptable to their definition of belonging to our society. Goodness knows I'm only just scraping in, according to the various definitions of Australianness. And I was bloody born here. I don't know any other home and have no desire to call anywhere else home.
In seeking to pad ourselves in the perceived comfort of defining our borders and national identity (whatever that may be), we buy into the notion that countries are absolute and people should stay within those defined boundaries. Sheesh, if people just stayed in their countries, we wouldn't have a refugee crisis, right? I mean, how inconsiderate of some foreign government to decide certain groups of people no longer conform to an idea of national identity, national religion, political ideals. Now those people feel the need to come to OUR country where they won't possibly fit in because they have a religion that we don't know much about, where funny clothes, speak another language, eat food we never thought to serve up, have vastly different life experiences because of THEIR government regimes imposing certain values on them. There's no way they could possibly 'fit in' here. Too different. So, let's tighten up our idea of belonging to this country by excluding people and defining what our borders are. Let's do what these foreign governments are doing and make sure these asylum seekers have nowhere to go to seek safety and LIFE for themselves and their families.
My parents weren't refugees, I don't have that personal history to share with asylum seekers. I grew up with many refugees. Fine, fine people who value themselves and what they have to offer to our ungrateful, xenophobic, often racist society. Many of who would have been killed, as their loved ones were, had they not sought and been granted refuge in Australia in the 60s, 70s and 80s. My background certainly knows about discrimination, racism and even genocide. It's in my consciousness. The Mayans and the Irish have both been subjugated people in their past. Hell, the Mayans are still second class citizens in Honduras. They shouldn't even be here after the efforts the Conquistadores went to to access their gold. That's another story, another history lesson. My point is, you don't have to be a refugee from another country to know that at any moment in history you could be the next casualty in 'nation-building', or definition of a community identity. But that's not why I urge compassion - not for the selfish reason of "well, it could be me, so I'll do my bit for karma to be kind to me". I urge compassion because it's not actually a harmful thing to exercise. It only threatens the mind for those who are currently within the 'accepted' demographic in Australia. People whose personal history in this country cannot even go back further than 230-odd years. No-one asks the indigenous population what they think of immigration, let alone asylum-seekers. How bloody rude. And arrogant.
Seeking asylum and being a refugee is not about immigration. Immigration is the end result of a harrowing journey, wondering if your life will be cut short, if your children will live to school age, if you'll ever see your mother and father again. 'Boat people' are NOT immigrants until they have been accepted here and are safe from what they flee. Immigration is a very secondary issue.
If you were escaping a regime that was determined to exclude you from life as you knew it, wouldn't you appreciate your issue being kept out of the influence of public opinion?
I know a lot of my friends have my compassionate leanings, so this blog post is preaching to the converted. I had to vent. I watch Q&A on ABC1 last night and my brain was bubbling over with sadness, rage, incredulity at the arrogance of some of the people with which I share this country and its resources.
Our fears, resentments, prejudices and ignorance do not belong in the decision-making process that determines people's right to seek asylum.
If this post smacks of 'political correctness' then continue to hide behind that accusation and only think of your own life, which is a mere blip on the timescale of humanity. Or examine your assumptions until they become logical, instead of fearful and exclusionary.
Because human society was never meant to be marked out in fixed territories that people couldn't move in and out of freely (without 'papers' locking them into an identity dependent on global locality). That is a recent development in human history that has caused untold damage to the human psyche, wrecked our natural world, and destroyed actual, real people like you and me.
Defending the right of people to seek asylum, or even 'merely' better lives for themselves and their families is not and never will be 'political correctness'. Discrimination and exclusion on the basis of someone's origin and 'culture' differences IS racism.
That's what I think, Ms Gillard. Does my opinion count, or do you just want the rednecks' thoughts on the matter?