Solidarity.

As a sign of solidarity Roman decided he'd join me on my plan to eat healthier. Every time I open up a sugar free jelly he rushes to my feet, eyelashes fluttering and mouth wide open ready to receive his share ;). And how can I say no?

Catch Up.

Jan 2012: This year has sped past.

Right now life has taken on a different meaning. It's evolving into something I could have never foreseen. I'll update on that later, but for now? I'm struggling to keep my eyes open, my energy levels up and my 'little' photography project under some kind of control. And control is a strange thing. It's an odd word that means nothing in the scheme of children and parenting. 

I wrote a while ago about not wanting to rain on Roman's parade and I think that's why I've taken a back seat with the daily writing. I need to really take a step back and just see him, rather than analyse the day to day. Taking photos allows me this, but writing lets me delve deeper and perhaps to cobble together stories that are sometimes bred out of my emotions that day. This isn't always a fantastic thing ;).

I can't seem to find the energy, time or motivation required for this project, but I know one thing; I must keep going. I hate quitting what I start, especially when I'm so close to completion. We're 9 months down with taking our photos, but only 8 months updated. During the week I just don't have the time that is needed to play catch-up so my plan is this: get everything done this weekend, on Saturday, when I have a few free hours all to myself. Those hours are delicious, so enjoyed, and I spend all week looking forward to them. 

I'm just so tired these days. So, so very tired. I know what I need, but I can't get it; more help. And if I did have it? Resentment from the other side would be felt; even if it wasn't there, it's always there without people speaking about it. I push myself to my absolute limit all the time because I'd rather ruin my health than feel the quiet resentment of others. My brother is visiting us for a week and I'm really, really going to enjoy that time with him. An extra pair of un-resentful hands is always welcome here when Bryan isn't around (the time I feel over whelmed the most.)

You probably think I'm weak or pathetic, or that I don't love my son. I'm not weak because so much has happened in my life, it's built up barriers, defenses, hard skin and I work my butt off every day to provide for my family. Pathetic? It's objective. I don't think I am. And I love Roman but I am sick, I am disabled and I'm doing a lot more than I should be doing. It's ridiculous but then, that's me, it's what I'm about. I take on too much all the time and I hate to sit still without something to do. I'm one of these annoying people who constantly pushes their limits, often times suffering set backs, and I still keep going. It affords me a semi-normal/average life that a lot of people in my position don't have. I'm fortunate but I'm still blooming knackered.

Edit: As I'm writing this I'm alone, with Roman. We're watching some science programme, which is always fun. My kitchen is a mess and it looks like the next 3 Saturdays will not be mine like I imagined. I have no idea when I'll update with 366 posts, but I'm very much behind on posting - and uploading so it's going to take a lot of my time and that's something I don't have right now. Help.

Thinking about: My 14 month old doesn't walk. But he sure can talk.

(Excuse the quality of the photo, it was taken on my camera phone.)

10 months ago things were looking good on the physical development front.

I wasn't worried (apart from the time he wasn't sitting up by himself for ages.) He was 4 months and had mastered rolling over.

Also, I want to make it clear that the above photograph was taken when Ro Ro was 10 weeks old. He was determined he was going to walk. Even then.

I thought to myself; "We're going to have a circus act on our hands by the time he's 2 years old." I pictured him lifting cars and wearing his underpants on top of his spandex trousers. Maybe a gold 'R' emblazoned on the chest of his spandex suit.

Not really.

I just imagined that we'd be a lot further on physically right now. I'm not letting it eat me alive - again - but I am starting to think; "why doesn't my 14 month old walk already?"

He gets himself around just fine. He crawls anywhere and everywhere he can get too. Once he's arrived at his destination he'll pick himself up and shuffle along on his feet. Or he'll fall onto his bum and begin the crawl.

And sometimes he nabs things off tables, crawls away with them and lies on his back to enjoy them, happy as a clam.

I need to learn his lesson in calm, in not freaking out. In just going with how he develops. He will do things when he's good and ready. He made sure of that by being born 8 days after the doctor and midwife predicted he'd arrive. He will never be rushed in life and this is one of those things.

It scares me how independent he is at 14 months. He's pulling off clothes, handing them to us and he will dress himself with a little bit of help. 

He has also been brushing (back combing) his hair for months now and is perfecting the use of the comb through his locks. 

He is so thoughtful and considerate. He tears off pieces of food and offers them to us. He offers us toys and clothes. He's sharing and he's caring. 

He kisses photographs of himself. He says soo many words. Dad, Mum, Hiya, Hey You (B's influence...it sounds like bloomin' Rab C Nesbit has moved in with us), Eh-Oh (umm Teletubbies are to blame), Bye Bye, CAT, Amen (at the end of prayers no less), Granny, Granpa, Gog (Dog), Up and 'up above' (he sings 'up above...wurlsoooohii' as in Twinkle Twinkle Little Star) and well if there are any more I am missing I'm sure B will point them out to me!

So I don't give a stuff if he's not walking yet. He'll get there. He's getting around and this obviously suits him. If he was that bothered or taken by walking I'm sure he would be doing it by now.

For now I'm going to take a chill pill and enjoy the chasing after I don't have to do.

Busy.

We've all been pretty busy these days.

I wish I could say that my 14 month old hasn't mastered the art of picking his nose, but it's true. He's picking his nose on quite a regular basis.

Yuck.

But I suppose it's just dust, right?

More Roman related things: We're (read: me) trying cloth nappies again.

It's not as though I stopped using them consciously. Life just got hectic and I got rather ill - which involved not sleeping a heck of a lot and being housebound (what's new?) for weeks on end.

B doesn't enjoy using cloth whereas I can't think of anything better but seeing as though he's doing a majority of the nappy changes we go with what he wants - it makes sense, doesn't mean I like it when it comes to me changing a disposable! 

Disposables drive me crazy. I can't fit them properly and I don't like that we're throwing money away on these kinds of nappies. I suppose most people will have an opinion on that, but that's mine.

I find that fitted cloth nappies work for me so I fitted Roman in one today. He had other ideas about where the wrap (outer layer that is waterproof) should go and began to wear it as a hat. He loves to peel the velcro apart and stick it back together - and I'm amazed he hasn't successfully pulled off a nappy yet.

I want to work on a few personal goals. I want to document my breastfeeding experience so far. I want to write about my trip to Thurso. I want to write about my Second Mother's Day. 

And in my professional life I've taken on a Distance Learning course so I can one day (when I've completed the course) do some freelance work in proofreading. I'm also just busy preparing some books to be sold and lots of other things I can't yet tell you about ;).

2011 is going to be busy!

I also thought it would be fun to add a little bonus picture at the end of this post, so click on 'read more' to see it ;). Hope you enjoy, I know I did.

Four Months and counting...

From Bump...

To Baby.




Tuesday, 24th May marked Roman (middle names removed) Quinn turning four months old. I can't quite believe how fast our family has grown into this wonderful little unit that we have become. I absolutely love and cherish my role as a mother - I am so proud and I think I might burst!

I will keep saying this: my birth was amazing. I'm not sure I will ever find the words or description to explain just how amazing it was. From start to finish it went beyond anything I could have ever hoped for. I say that because we're met with a lot of negatives about labour and birth - a twofold event in my view.

Labour

It was a scary start because I wasn't sure of my journey ahead, but I remember feeling very woozy and crampy. I couldn't eat and only managed half a toasted pitta bread. I drank loads. I remember at the start of the journey that all I wanted to do was have music playing non-stop and no one was allowed to do anything aside comfort me (haha how reasonable of me!).

It got tougher as the day dragged on - but it didn't really drag. Time was speeding ahead of me and I kept asking for the time expecting it to be earlier and was surprised every time I was told it was later than I thought. I remember about half past three in the afternoon I just felt tired and wanted to lie down on the bed. Bryan joined me because the one thing I didn't want to be was on my own. He sat on the end of the bed and told me lots of small, whispering comforts that really pulled me through my discomfort.

I can't really remember contractions, but if you've ever suffered from a bad period then you're probably close to a contraction. It also felt like a really bad stomach ache, hence why I didn't want to eat anything. A few hours on the bed, these tightenings got stronger so I decided to end my labouring at home and put myself in the hands of the doctors and midwives at the hospital - a decision I broke down and made. I was scared to go to hospital and that's why I spent so long labouring on my own at home. A few people who'd had home births had told me things like; "It's probably better that for your first, you're in a hospital." I just didn't believe that. I made a decision that if I was going to go to hospital then I'd go at the point where they couldn't do too much to me in terms of drugging me up to hopeless hormones that just landed me a C-section.

I was very lucky to be blessed with such an amazing mum and parents-in-law. They didn't make a fuss or cause a scene or leap about screaming "You're having a baby!" (Which I might have been prone to do if it was my daughter or daughter-in-law, haha). They were all so calm and the whole drive I forgot I was in labour - apart from when we drew nearer to hospital and I really had to bare down with each spasm.

I was taken into triage and then examined. I was told I was 4cm dilated and had gone into "spontaneous labour." I was a week overdue and this basically meant my labour had started and was progressing. No need for the horrible induction - if you're two weeks overdue in the UK they medically start your labour - that I had been dreading and was booked for the 13th of February. I had visions of being stuck in hospital on Valentines Day - my first Valentines Day as a married woman, stuck in hospital.

Things got a bit hairy when they took my blood pressure and pulse - both were up so I was whisked down to the delivery suite. Every midwife or doctor that came into the room said I was "dealing with the pain so well." and "Breathing through each contraction so well." To me this felt like a gold medal because at home I'd really been struggling in the last few hours and began to think I was weak and pathetic. The midwife said I could have pain relief and I said I was fine - at home I'd been begging both my mum and husband for an epidural, ha!

So I continued breathing through each contraction and honestly was dealing so well with things, I even began to picture having the all-natural birth I had so wanted. This wasn't easy to cope with, but I honestly felt I could go for the non drug route. How wrong I was.

The midwife came in and explained that my blood pressure wasn't dropping the way they had wanted it too. That it was actually rising. That this might mean I have pre-eclampsia and all other manner of scary things. They said that giving me the blood pressure drugs wouldn't work as quick as they'd like it too so the next solution to help me out (and baby) was to go for the epidural. The midwife said she knew it was against my birth plan, but she really recommended it. I cried at this point because quite frankly the epidural scared me. My mum has had four, one of which didn't work...so I was terrified.

I sat with my mum and we talked about it. I decided to go for it because at this point I'd come this far labouring and I'd only opted for the epidural if I'd medically needed it. I was lucky that the anaesthesiologist was in the other room at the time I made my decision, because by the time I'd decided to go for it he was free for a chat. He was lovely and explained everything at great length. I signed the consent form and they brought through the trolley with the needle and drugs through. I looked at my mum and saw she was terrified - I told her it was okay to look away. And she did. It sounds weird but her scared face actually made me feel strong. I felt like I could do it, if she'd gone through it so many times, then I could do it this once.

The epidural was really strange. That's the best verb I can conjure up to explain it. It felt like they were cracking my back and kicking my tail bone all at once. It was freezing cold. It was strange having my head planted into a strangers arms and sobbing all over them - crying is such an intimate thing and I shared it with everyone in that room. Everyone in the room told me it was okay, that it would be over very soon. Once the needle was in place I felt better. I stopped crying. I sat up and did everything I was asked to do - I didn't want to mess it up and end up paralysed. Again, the specialist was so nice and made everyone feel at ease.

At some point my mum decided to swap over with Bryan (stupid hospital policy that I won't explain here because it will just make me upset and I might cry thinking about how much my mum missed). He was annoyed (just stating a fact, dear) that he'd been kept out of the loop for three hours. Three hours? It had felt like twenty minutes to me!

Also, at some point they'd broken my waters and set up a hormone drip to speed up contractions. In reflection of the events I don't remember a single medical person asking me if I wanted the hormone drip in - they just did it. At the time I wasn't phased, but now, when I think back it annoys me a bit.

After my epidural was in place I was feeling no pain whatsoever. I wanted to eat! (Ha!) But wasn't allowed because it might make me sick. Things were pretty non-eventful after the epidural, just some checks and some moving me about because baby had moved into a posterior position...and because I'm no good at explaining that, here you go:

"A less common position, known as posterior position, occurs when the back of the baby’s head, or occiput, is against the mother’s tailbone. This position often results in prolonged labor and is accompanied by greater back discomfort."

I hated having the trace monitor strapped around my belly - it was so tight and horribly uncomfortable, so they attached a monitor to the baby's head and took off the horrible belt restricting my belly's comfort.

I slept a lot (read: napped, woke up and got bored) and all in all the run up was very boring indeed. I was examined at three hour intervals and was progressing super fast. At one point I had dilated 3cm in half an hour - earlier in the night they had said that they usually allow for 2cm every half hour up until the transition (the before the head coming out bit). At some point my epidural had worn off and I could feel really strong contractions at this point - the kind where I couldn't talk and no one else in the room was allowed to talk when I had one haha. The student midwife (read: my guardian angel) said I should have gas & air. It was magical. I drifted off for ages on this stuff and in between puffs I kept singing, saying things to the midwives and my husband and generally making a fool of myself. Haha.

Birth

At 5.20am I was told that I was 10cm dilated. I couldn't believe it. Somewhere in the recesses of my mind I remembered that something happens when you reach 10cm dilated, but I couldn't put the pieces together in my drugged up mind (I wasn't really drugged, gas & air leaves your system very quickly). Then the midwife informed me I would have to come off the gas & air - I honestly felt like breaking down into tears. I also did not feel ready for delivery. My body was ready - I knew it was, but my mind was not willing to co-operate.

Before I knew it my husband was telling me he could see various facial features of our baby - at first it was the top of the head, then the ears and then he said the head was out and whoosh out came the rest of the body. All in all I spent forty minutes pushing. It truly felt like five minutes. Then my husband said; "It's a Roman!" in this really moving and excited tone of voice I will never forget.

I couldn't believe the weight of this boy on my chest. This precious, warm child cawing and blue - I have no memory of him being blue at all, but Bryan says he was. Then he was taken away. He needed oxygen and they took him to Resuscitation - which didn't freak me out whatsoever, I just knew everything was going to be okay. On the walk to Resus he started breathing normally and was brought back to me. I was exhausted and overwhelmed. I wanted my mum. I told Bryan to get her and the midwife told him she would tell my mum everything, that we needed to be together in that moment. I now know that was just a way of getting things done on their agenda and if I could go back in time I would have phoned her up - me in the delivery suite and her in the waiting room, barely metres apart yet separated by a stupid policy and staff agenda.

My mum was in the room after they spent three hours stitching me up. She took several photos of the new baby and was desperate to hold him. She called my dad and I remember being on the phone and wanting but not wanting to speak to him. I felt overwhelmed with so many weird and wonderful feelings. I wanted to tell him how I was truly feeling and I wanted him to swoop down and save me from all the madness going on around me.

Then my mum and B left and I felt this huge feeling of being alone. I had acted like I was fine with them going home and actually told them to go - what choice did they or I have? My brother needed to sleep because he was working that night, neither my husband or mum drive and I didn't want them heading back on the train/bus because they'd been here all night, sitting on hard chairs. I didn't want them to go, inside of me I was screaming for them both to stay...but I knew that was selfish and really silly. I'm glad they did go because all I did was sleep.

It was weird adjusting to the new boy. Breastfeeding was great at first, but went weird. His sleeping patterns were all out of sorts - some nights he'd sleep all the way through and some nights he would wake three or four times. I felt like a failure a lot, but I kept going despite these crisis's with my self-esteem. I plowed through it all.

And now, at four months old, he's the most delicious little man you could ever hope to meet. He sleeps exclusively in his crib (he has a separate daytime one). Our evenings are our own again. That little piece of freedom has given us all a happy family feeling. I am so blessed each and every day more that I get to spend with this One.

Sugar Free.

I promised myself I wouldn't blog today. I did everything I could to avoid it. I sat on my hands, I avoided logging into Blogger and I even went as far as doing housework when I got tempted to blog.

Okay, so one of those statements is a lie. It's up to you, the reader, to choose which one.

So lately I've been going bald.

This is serious. I have been losing clumps of my hair. It just keeps falling out and what I'd normally have collected in a week in my bath's plug hole I found today, just a mere three days after I'd cleaned the bath.

Ridiculous. What's even more ridiculous is my sharing with the World about my female pattern baldness when I have a baby as cute as this:

And there's more cuteness where that came from:

I absolutely adore this boy. He is so worth waking up for and taking better care of myself for. I may live to regret this but I have decided as of tomorrow I'm going to go sugar-free. I've been eating far too much chocolate as of late - Gillian McKeith, you would not approve. And my bank balance, heart and waistline are suffering as a result.

Also, on a more serious note, I don't want to give crap milk to such a gorgeous boy. We both deserve better than this and I want to be better. I don't have any goals to reach, - they make me crazy and too obsessive - just guidelines for myself.

As for exercise...well we'll have a re-think about that some time tomorrow - there's lots of boring, depressing reasons why I haven't given exercise a proper go, but I am willing to try that, too if it keeps my health in check.

I don't want this to be just a phase, but I doubt it will be - look at the Vegan "thing." AKA my diet now is purely Vegan and I've stuck to that for six years - not counting the times where I've mistakenly ate something Non-Vegan - so I am pretty positive I can achieve this.

As for the baldness? I don't really know what that's all about. It's real, though - my hair is falling out by the clumpful. I am hoping this is some kind of post partum three month hair falling out thing.

Oh, and by the looks of things on Doctor Google it looks like I can rest easy:

"Most commonly, hair loss after pregnancy occurs between three and six months after pregnancy*. "

*http://www.drpistone.com/Female-Hair-Loss/Hair-Loss-After-Pregnancy/Hair-Restoration/