A 1st Birthday Wish

It’s been a long time between posts – and it is a very, very busy life here. 

First things first – my beautiful Boo2 has turned 1.  My goodness where did that year go.  When I think back to the days before he was born – I was so fearful, Boo2 had stopped moving as much and I was constantly worried.  I remember Anzac day last year was horrible, I was cramping badly all day, I felt super sick and he wasn’t moving very much – I was desperately worried.  Fast forward a year later and our Anzac Day was spent on a family holiday to the Gold Coast where Boo2 took his first steps. Our lives have changed immeasurably since he came into it.

To My Darling Boo2:

Happy Birthday my big 1 year old.  You were tiny when you came into our lives but you have gone from strength to strength.  You smiled so early – months earlier than you were supposed to and you haven’t stopped smiling since.  You are a happy and engaging fellow, who loves to laugh and play games.  You started walking on our Easter holiday to the Gold Coast and there has been no stopping you ever since.  You call your Dad and I both ‘Da’ and there is no greater joy in my day when I see you and your face lights up and you say ‘Da’ and crawl (now walk) to me as fast as you can.  You gave me a beautiful present for Mother’s Day yesterday, you said ‘Mum’ super clearly for the first time – well the smile still hasn’t left my face.  You are super cheeky, you love to climb up on things and when I notice and say ‘Tiny!!!! ‘ (one of your nicknames), you give me a big grin and a hearty laugh!!

You have had your challenges over your first year.  Firstly, there was the bout of bronchiolitis, then there were the ultrasounds because your hips weren’t developing properly, then we found out that you had pretty bad eczema and there were more trips to the doctor.  Then there was the trip in the ambulance to hospital when we found out that you were allergic to egg and, of course, now we know that you are also allergic to peanuts.  It has been a massive learning curve for all of   Apart from that

Exploring is your favourite thing to do, along with just being able to do what everyone else does.  Indeed within a couple of weeks of taking your first steps, you are now running.  You are super social and love people, especially all of our immediate family.  You love your Nanna’s especially as they both take such beautiful care of you each week.  You love music and singing and you can’t contain your delight when we sing songs. 

Your brother is super special to you and the feeling is reciprocated in spades.  You love to mimic what he is doing and after you walked to me, you were the person that you wanted to walk to the most.  You have a special laugh of joy when you first see him when you wake up in the morning or from a nap.  He loves you so much and is a super great brother to you.  Sometimes he gets a little jealous but for the most part, you are his favourite person.  You are a bit of a Daddy’s boy and for a bit you only wanted to go to Daddy

The day you came into our lives, Tiny, was like when the sun hits your body for the first time after a long winter – and you have been shining for us ever since.  You make me laugh, you are a joy and you are so special to me.  I love you my darling – thank you for coming into our lives.  Love Mummy.

In other news – I have to give a bit of a bullet list because so much has happened:

• We sold our old two bedroom unit for a good price

• We bought a new amazing family home that we hope we will never have to move from – it is a gorgeous two storey house with a lovely outdoor area and most beautiful garden 
•  We spent our Christmas holidays at my Bestie’s new house by the beach while they were in Las Vegas getting married

• We celebrated my Bestie’s Australian wedding with her – it was a lovely day
• We moved into our new house in February – it was a hard move but thankfully we hope we won’t have to move again.  We are just now really only starting to settle in to the house – though there is still heaps to do!!
• My sister is pregnant with her 2^nd baby (a girl – yay!!) and she is due in July
• We had Boo2's 1st birthday party at the new house on the weekend - it was immediate family only but there was still around 26people - it was a really nice party
• We are hoping to travel to Thailand in October for our first trip there (since our honeymoon) that we won’t be having a cycle

That’s about it for the moment but it has been soooooo hectic – I have many, many posts in my head – I hope to start posting regularly again soon.

The Weight of Responsibility...

I have a 3 year old and a six month old now – I have to pinch myself to believe that we made it through the wilderness and now have the two most gorgeous kids on the planet.  I am not exaggerating either – let me tell you, the Thai people are a beautiful looking people and mix up the Thai genes with my husbands anglo genes and you get some divinely gorgeous looking kids.  Not only are they beautiful on the outside, they are lovely on the inside.  JBB is a wonderful kid and a fabulous big brother.  He takes his time to warm into a situation but once he knows you, you feel like you are standing in the sunshine of his smile and that is an awesome place to be.  Boo2 is a happy little fellow, even in the middle of the night, his ear splitting smile of greeting is enough to melt away any tired grumpiness that you might have.  He loves to give strangers a smile and I tell you, this kid never stops moving, it is a work out just to hold him – his legs and arms are going ninety to the dozen!

That being said, I am very conscious that we very deliberately brought these two boys into the world.  I know that any parent (barring an accident, of course) has deliberately brought their children into the world and I am sure that they feel the weight of responsibility too, I am not saying that they don’t, I am just saying that for me, it is generally in the forefront of my mind.  For the most part, I think that this is a great thing.  The feeling of responsibility makes me look at everything, weigh things up to see what the best option is for the boys and then make a decision with this in the front of my mind.  This is good because usually I am a very ‘bull at a gate’ kind of person.

Sometimes the weight of responsibility to honour these boys’ existence weighs very heavily on me.  I feel like I am a terrible parent if I impatient or short with them or even if things haven’t turned out right, then I feel like I am failing them.  This is all about my perfection stuff though and I have to talk myself down quite a bit of the time.  I try to keep in mind that these can be teaching opportunities.  If I am short with JBB, I try to make sure that I sit down and explain to him what has happened and of course, apologise.  None of us go through life with everything going exactly as plan to, staying on an even keel emotionally and everyone being super nice to us.  I am hoping that I am helping to teach JBB how to cope with his emotions as best as possible.   Very early on, JourneyMan and I instituted a ‘hitty bag’ – if JBB gets angry or frustrated, we encourage him to pound on the hitty bag to channel his emotions into it (we both try to do the same thing!!).  Generally, it helps to get him laughing again after awhile and all the frustrations out too which is great!!

It is also easy to become ‘mummy bear’ whenever something happens that upsets JBB.  His language skill is excellent now and he can tell me what’s going on at day care which can be really great but also can make my blood boil.  A few weekends ago, I was joking that JourneyMan had been ‘mean’ to me and JBB asked what ‘mean’ meant.  I told him that ‘mean’ was when someone said or did something that made you feel bad.  The next week at day care, he told me that there was a ‘meanie car boy’ there.  I asked what he meant and he said that there was a boy who didn’t want to play with him (and then he pointed him out to me).  The ‘mummy bear’ in mean wanted to go up to that little boy and shout at him for hurting my JBB but thankfully cooler heads prevailed and I said to JBB ‘I really love the fact that you want to play with everyone but some people aren’t like that and they just want to play with certain people, that’s okay because you have heaps of other friends that you can play with’.  We talked about his feelings and I think I was able to make him feel better.  The issue with Boo2 too that I have are about whether I am giving him all the attention that he needs or am I more apt to let him cry a bit longer than I did JBB because of everything I know more now.  Sometimes, it is beyond my control (ie. pooh is spreading from one place to another and JBB needs a change ASAP, Boo2 is crying and I have to leave him until the pooh is changed).  Sometimes I worry that I am stuffing him up because he doesn't get attention straight away.

The hardest thing that I find is that I am forever unsure of what I am telling or doing to them ie. I am always asking myself ‘am I helping or f&*%ing him up?’ – I really hope I am helping!!

How do you guys feel about the responsibility, have you got any good techniques to pass on?

Supernanny to the rescue....

Firstly, I would like to thank Tireegal, Silver and Reagan and Trevor’s Mummy for your kind words of support and help to my last post.  Things have improved marginally (ie.  Boo2’s naps during the day are slightly longer) – he is still waking up at the same times at night and I am back at work (and got sick with a stomach bug straight away if you can believe it) so the exhaustion is compounding right now.  That’s not what I want to talk about this post though.

I was watching a ‘Supernanny Family SOS’ episode last night and there was a family on that had gone through many cycles of IVF and had then had adopted 3 daughters.  In essence, the Mum felt guilty because the kids were adopted and decided to parent with ‘no consequences’ the result of which they were very disrespectful and running wild.  They also shouted to her quite often ‘you’re not my Mum’.

My guess is, that the ‘you’re not my Mum’ is a fear for all of us who are going down the donor egg or adoption route.  I wrote a post about this here but this show brought it all back to me again and made me wonder if the boys will ever be so angry at me that they want to hurt me so much that they would say this to me – probably in their teenage years, I would imagine though I hope not.  It doesn’t hold the fear for me that it once did – I know that I am their Mum, I know that there is no-one else who could lay the claim of ‘Mum’ to them, I have certainty in myself.  That being said, I think it will still hurt if they say that to me but also ‘I hate you’ which I am sure hurts any parent when said, mostly I think because the intention behind it is to hurt.

The other thing that was happening was that because of guilt, the mother didn’t want to discipline any bad behaviour in the kids – that, to me, is crazy.  My parenting style is to deal with misbehaviour straight away so that there are immediate consequences to their actions (though I also think that you need to pick your battles).  JBB is definitely pushing his boundaries at the moment and has gone from sticking right by my side when we go anywhere to running off willy nilly.  This is a total deal breaker because of the danger so he has had the consequences of some of his toys being taken away, not being able to watch some shows that he likes etc.  Everyone parents differently and I can see how bad behaviour can breed – the easier road is to let it go at the time and give them what they want but I think in the long run, you pay for that in spades.  I am absolutely exhausted right now but I still try to discipline any behaviour that comes up because I know it will be worse later.  That is not to say that I am perfect, I am not even close to that, I am constantly worried that I am f*&^ing up the kids – though that is a post for another day.

JBB is now at the stage where he vaguely understands the concept of his birth.  I tell him his story about once a day (once upon a time Mummy and Daddy wanted to have a baby very much….) and he can now distinguish between ‘Mummy’ and ‘The Donor’ (who helped Mummy out with a part that is working) though of course just on the level of naming various players in the story and not philosophically understanding that his story is different from others.  My main goal at this time is for him to always know his story, so that it isn’t a surprise to him at some point in his life.  The Supernanny episode also had a great idea.  The girls were able to write out their questions and about adoption (or anything in their life) and put it into a box, the Mum then wrote the answers to their questions on the back of the card.  It allowed them to ask anything that they wanted without the confrontation of having to talk about it – they really took to it.  I think that this is a great technique – one I will adopt later on so that the boys can have answers to any of their questions.

Exhausted...

********Please do not read this post if you are in the trenches of infertility*********

I have a post waiting to publish, catching you up on all that has been happening here but at the moment - I need to vent about what is going on.  Boo2 was sleeping through the night (for oh, about a week) and bam, we went in to the 4 month sleep regression that has now continued into his 5th month.  He has eczema so I think that the itch is waking him up but he is definitely hungry also. He is generally waking around 10:30pm, 1:30am and 5am.  Most of the time, it takes me around 60-90mins to feed him, settle him and get back to sleep myself so I am generally having around 1-2 hours sleep at a time.  He absolutely refuses the bottle (which worries me greatly as I will most likely be back at work in around 3 weeks) so it is all up to me and I am feeling quite broken from exhaustion.  Especially as Boo2 will wake JBB up at 5am and he won't get to sleep and he is refusing any nap so is grumpy as all get out.  During the day, Boo2 is only having 20-30min naps (rarely, I will get an hour) and during those 20-30mins, I try to cook and clean and make sure that JBB is eating healthy and having some one:one time.

I try to get a little bit of additional sleep over the weekend but the house is small and JBB is very loud and I really only get an extra 1-2 hours between the Boo2 feeds if he doesn't start crying sooner, sometimes not even that.  That extra sleep does help me for about a day but by Tuesday I am a complete wreck again.  I just feel like I need a break, more than 3-4 hours doing what I want to do, a sleep that is more than 2 hours. He is having solids and is definitely getting enough food, and still he wakes up.  I have tried leaving him to settle himself but he will cry for half an hour or more if I let him.  I have been reading everything I can about it but all I see is that I need to resign myself that this could go on for the next 12-18months and the thought of that makes me want to sit down and cry.

In another matter that is totally pissing me off - people tell me all the time 'I just breastfed and the weight fell off me'.  I have been counting calories every day (though I missed a few in the last couple of weeks) and have breastfed Boo2 every meal and the weight is most certainly not dropping off me.  I feel a bit of pressure because I put on SO much in the pregnancy, I am an older mother and the weight puts me at a lot of health risks and I want to be around for my boys.  I have lost some but I have got, so, so much to lose that it is a drop in the ocean.

Of course, on top of all of this is the guilt feelings because I fought so hard to have these kids and I am complaining.  I feel terrible for wanting to have a break, after all, aren't there millions of mothers around the world going through what I am?

Infertility & Grief

We have finished our IVF journey.  This is a cause for celebration and of great release but the journey itself has changed me irrevocably.  I have a hard time remembering the person that I was before we began this journey but I know I was more trusting, more willing to throw myself into the future and less cautious.  Was I happy?  Sure.  Was I as happy as I am now?  I don't think so.  My joy that I have in my family, the gratitude that I feel for my beautiful boys and my happiness in my marriage that was made stronger through facing adversity and supporting each other through it.

There is a dark side too.  I worry more and lately I have been concerned at my willingness to go to the worst case scenario at the slightest provocation.  I have spoken previously that I am a recovering alcoholic (11 years sober) and that one of my coping mechanisms to get through life without drinking is to prepare myself for the worst case scenario and know that I will not drink.  This has become habitual now and it has gone to a place that I am not comfortable with.  If Boo2 sleeps for too long, I worry that the worst has happened and he has died.  If JBB is sick (as he was yesterday), I panic that he is fatally sick.  If JourneyMan is a few minutes late in coming home that he has had an accident on his bike.  I worry that my Mum's health is not good.  I worry that my Bestie will find more lumps and won't be so lucky in her diagnosis this time.  I worry about all of my people.

At the heart of it all, I am worried that I will be made pay for the joy that we have in our lives.  Every day, I am grateful for my beautiful boys but haven't I learned that on this journey you can't be too happy, or optimistic because at any time the rug can be pulled out from under you?  I don't want to live my life in this way and in my heart, I know that it also doesn't matter how much you prepare for something bad happening, you will always feel shock and grief and the other myriad of emotions that go along with the situation.  In fact, all it does is make you grieve twice.  Once in preparation and once if the actual event occurs.  In short, I need to change my coping mechanisms.  I am going to see a counsellor again to help me to make this change.

I feel a bit swamped in grief at the moment too.  In Australia, Father's day is the first Sunday of September and this year, it has the added bonus of being the day before the anniversary of my Dad's death.  That seems a little bit cruel.  Advertising for Father's day has already begun and will only get worse as August progresses and already I am in floods of tears when I see any ads as I am reminded that I won't see my Dad again.  That he won't pat my beautiful Boo2 on the head and tell me what a miracle he is. That we won't sit and watch a footy game together again, that I won't laugh at one of his stories.  When we were around at my Mum and Dad's house the other day, JBB pulled out a little walking toy that he used to follow my Dad around on his walker, we asked him what he used to do with it and he said 'follow Pop around'.  I'm glad that he remembers him but how long will this be so?  Not for very much longer.  They had a touching relationship.  Near the end when my Dad was mostly bedridden, JBB would go over to the side of the bed and lean in for Dad to pat him on the head.

I remember the last time I saw him before I went to Thailand for the transfer for Boo2.  He put his hands on each of my cheeks and wished me good luck.  I cried and I didn't know why because he was okay, I wasn't worried that he would die before I got back, I didn't think he was even close.  I still feel bad that I wasn't there to comfort him, to hold his hand and to talk to him.  I know that I was where he wanted me to be but still, I feel like I could have helped in some small way.  A few months before, we had a good talk.  He told me that he knew that he was dying and I asked if he was scared and he said that he was before but that he wasn't anymore, he was ready.  I remember my heart clenching in fear at the time, I wasn't ready but I comforted myself that I still had time.  I don't regret going to Thailand - how can I?  My darling Boo2, who is a shining light in my life came about from that trip, I can't regret it.  

Somehow the death of my Dad has become mixed up with the final chapter of our journey to our family.  I feel that because of both of these events, I will never be the same.  I continue to wonder how to move on from the scars of infertility.  Do the scars fade like the scars from the c-section.  Will I ever stop missing my Dad and crying when I think about him?  I don't know the answers to these questions but one thing that the infertility journey has taught me is to take happiness whenever you can and I am so, so lucky to have so much happiness and joy in my life.  I need some tools to work through this.

Mastitis and Colds + Boo2

It has been a rough couple of weeks.  I had a bout of mastitis which was terrible.  It came on very quickly, Boo2 sucked so hard on my breast that he bruised it and a blockage came and then came the mastitis.  The fever was brutal, I had to get up in the middle of the night (apart from feeding) to have scalding hot baths so that I could sleep.  I felt like I had been hit by a truck and my breast was so, so sore but you have to keep feeding and completely draining it so that the breast can heal.  I am a little ashamed to say that I cried a few times breastfeeding it was so painful.

I went to the doctor and got some antibiotics and things improved pretty quickly after that.  However, hot on it's heels came a cold for myself, JBB and Boo2.  We were all pretty miserable and of course, Boo2 getting was the most worrisome - we listened very carefully for any whooping, which I am hoping that he has escaped from.  JourneyMan and I, plus both of our Mum's got immunised for whooping cough (there has been an epidemic in Australia) when JBB was born so there hopefully shouldn't be a high chance of him getting it.

Finally, the last few days, I have started to feel better and that has made everything a little easier.  I found that I was having a lot of trouble staying patient with JBB during this time, I was just so exhausted.  I even went to the doctor to see about post natal depression because I was very worried about myself.  I feel a lot better now though, thankfully and whilst, JBB can still push my buttons, I am much more patient with him now. 

Now on to Boo2 - he is an awesome kid.  So smiley, he started randomly smiling at us at around 5-6 weeks and now he smiles in response to talking, songs and games - it is absolutely amazing.  He also goos and gurgles and chortles heaps - it is just so nice.  I had to take him to the Children's hospital last week for a follow up on his bronchiolitis that he had back when he was around 6 weeks and they put a camera down his nose to look at his larynx - this was not a good experience for him, he screamed and I had to hold him - I just felt so bad, it was awful for him.  He also has to have an overnight sleep study done to make sure that he doesn't have sleep apnoea.

We also had an appointment with the maternal health nurse at 8 weeks and he is putting on weight like a champ (though still only in the 5th percentile) and she said that he looked the picture of health which was great.  The only bad thing was that she heard a click in his hip so he had to have an ultrasound to check that the ball joint is developing okay.  He has had the ultrasound but I haven't heard back about it as yet - I am assuming that 'no news is good news' but I will have to give them a call this week.

In total in the last few weeks, I have been to 2 doctor's appointments for Boo2, a maternal health nurse appointment and 3 doctor's appointments for myself.  I have had an Xray, Boo2 has had an ultrasound and camera down his throat and is having a sleep study done tomorrow night.  

I am hoping that things settle down in the next few weeks.  

The action for our unit is on Saturday - please cross your fingers that we get a buyer and a good price!!

Breastfeeding

I had a lot of trouble breastfeeding JBB, my supply was low so he was always topped up with formula.  This is despite the fact that I pumped for 40 mins after each feed and I constantly tried to increase my supply but unfortunately, to no avail.  I was upset and not upset about this because I felt like I had done everything in my power to give him the best start.  I did not want my boy to be hungry, so the formula was a God send.  I was able to breastfeed, supplementing for 5 months, I felt good about it.

So, this time, I knew a couple of things - there was no way that I could pump for 40mins after each feed  with JBB being a toddler - it would take almost 2 hours by the time I had fed Boo2, settled him and then pumped and this 6-8 times a day - it just was not a viable option.  So, I researched milk supply as much as I possibly could and came up with a cocktail of supplements (fenugreek, blessed thistle, brewers yeast and alfalfa) 3 times a day from the day of the c-section.  I also breastfed Boo2 exclusively  for the first 6 weeks, not missing a feed so as not to affect the supply.  

Now at 8 weeks, things seem to be going pretty well, supply is good and Boo2 is starting to fill out.  He certainly has grown since the last time we have been to the maternal health nurse - I am looking forward to seeing how much for the two month check up in a few days.

Breastfeeding itself does not come easily to me though.  I only feel comfortable at home, there is no way I can breastfeed in public, I am just not that confident.  One of the reasons that I am not that confident is that I use a pillow and a nipple protector and I feel really uncomfortable if I don't have those with me.  The other issue is that we do the normal hold on the left side but on the right, we always do the football hold and that is virtually impossible out and about.  I also don't feel comfortable flashing my bits around to everyone.  This is ironic, since after 6 years of IVF treatments and pregnancy, I have flashed my bits to so many strangers that it is beyond count - how can I feel uncomfortable now with something so natural - I don't know, but I do.

I am also not an earth mother, love every minute of breastfeeding, type of woman.  I feel vaguely uneasy about it.  There is a feeling of claustrophobia when I breastfeed and this is exacerbated because JBB always wants to be kissing and talking to Boo2.  Then of course, JourneyDog who is Woolly wants to push his way on to my lap so I feel covered in people.  I am a person who likes my own space and these days there are so many beings who are on me, I feel a bit stressed about it.

Don't get me wrong, I am super glad I am able to breastfeed my darling Boo2, he deserves the very best start in life.  I just wanted to own up to my feelings over this very natural task.  I definitely admire any earth mother warrior who can breastfeed in public, unfortunately, I am just not one of those people.