A New game

Posted on 21 February, 2008 by Boo

Bath time has always been pretty lame in our house. I’d put Jaxon in the bath. he’d splash around a bit and then I’d take him out to get dried off and dressed for bed.

But tonight, since I had the camera in the bath room trying to get a clip of Dude getting in with him…Jaxon put on a show.

And what a show it was. He is becoming quite the little character. Every single day he come’s up with a new quirk, something new to tell me about. It’s all very exciting.

This part of mother hood is MUCH more fun than the baby “baby” stage. That’s not to say that I wouldn’t love to have a baby “baby” all the time, and that when I’m down the street I don’t go all gooey when I see a “fresh” baby (that’s what Tim and I call them…fresh one’s) I do I do!

Anyway here’s Jaxon in the bath. I know I am going to hate this game very soon. But today was the first time he’s done it and it was way way waaaaay cute. So it’s ok. He’s also only JUST started giggling like this. He used to sound sort of asthmatic so this one is nice!

Ten down, One Hundred and Twenty to go!

Posted on 18 February, 2008 by Boo

Yes, seriously!

There are 130 bit’s of glass to cut out for this project. A bit daunting!

Here is the first ten bit’s I have cut. I’m not sure I am happy with them. I’ll get Tim’s second opinion before I turf them out and start again though!!

Believe it or not, this is 3 solid hours of work! Just ten bits!!!!!!!

Later that day

Just thought I would add this next photo . I am having trouble typing since I cut both of my index finger’s on the very last bit I was cutting. Piece number 71 if you must know.

I’ll be ok. It’s just like a paper cut! Oh and it’s amazing what you can get done when your baby is in the care of your other half!!

Sunflower’s

Posted on 17 February, 2008 by Boo

Anyone that’s known me for at least 5 months will know that I am trying to teach myself how to do stained glass. Tiffany stained glass, not the other one. I have no interest in the other one just yet. Although Tim does. That doesn’t matter because he’s changed from wanting to make things from stained glass to wanting to make model aeroplanes. How that shift happened…I don’t know. Maybe Jaxon’s room started the madness. Oh wait, I haven’t shared Jaxon’s room with you yet…keep an eye out and I’ll post picks!

Anyway, I lost all motivation for the stained glass when I finally completed the mirror I was making for Tim’s Mum Judy. (Below: Judy’s Cat Mirror)

I had no idea what I wanted to do and no real desire to just mess around. I HAD to be doing something constructive, not just making candle holder’s. So I sat here searching the net and finally found what I wanted to do.

And here is the very beginning of my new project. YOU get to watch as it grows!

This is the picture I have based my project on.

And this is my design from that.

And then from that little drawing Tim put it through a resizing program that made it THIS big!!!!

When I first got the idea to do this as a mirror the main thing was that I didn’t want it to be as big as Tim’s Mum’s mirror. So we looked at where we were going to put it once it was done and measured how big we wanted it. WELL!! It is MUCH bigger than Judy’s mirror! (60 cm W X 80 cm L) But I’ll do it anyway!

Stay tuned for more Sunflower updates as I work my magic!

Those photo’s

Posted on 16 February, 2008 by Boo

These are practically the only good photo’s I have of my brother Terry. Well, maybe. These are the only one’s I have framed and on display. I didn’t think he’d want the naked beach photo’s or the drunken staggering home photo’s in frames!!!

This first one is of us at our childhood home in Melbourne in 1992. That makes me 15 years old and Terry 19 years old. Note that Bitsy is still in the picture! She lived for another 3 years after that photo. She was 18 years old when she had to be put to sleep after having continual heart attacks.

This second one was in 1996 at a cousin’s 21st and her Dad’s 50th. It was a barnyard party. This is how I like to remember Terry. He was tall and thin, athletic (triathlon’s) and a good drinker. He ALWAYS had a smile on his face, a cheeky one. That night we got VERY drunk and cried together because Mum had just left Dad. He put me to bed and let me wear his jumper because I was cold. And then slept in the back of his car.

I really wish I had many more good photo’s of Terry and I together. It is sad that we were so close but now that he is gone I have very few physical memories of us together. Learn from my mistake, take photo’s with everyone you love. It’s hard to think about but one day it might be all you have of them.

One of those days

Posted on 15 February, 2008 by Boo

There are days when you don’t even think about it. There are days when it doesn’t hurt. But then there are days like today when the pain wont go away and when you can’t stop thinking about it.

On those days the tears come hard and fast. An invisible rope wraps itself around your neck and keeps you from breathing.

Your heart sinks because this wont change.

The worst thing about it is, that the ONE person you want to hold and tell them you love them, isn’t here. And never ever will be again. It hurts to breath, and it hurts to be the one that got left behind.

This is one of those days.

Today I wish with every single particle of life in my body that my brother was still alive.

I want my phone to ring and for Terry to say “I’m out the front, come for a drive?” like he used to.

I wish that he could hear his nephew’s laugh as he play’s hide and go seek with his Daddy. Or see the sparkle in his eye when he discover’s he can stand all by himself.

But none of this will ever happen, or happen again. There is nothing more painful in this world than losing a loved one. Nothing more painful than having your dreams torn from your heart forever.

(Photo: Terry and I with my first dog Bitsy. I’m scanning more photo’s, because I want to share his memory with you)

A new friend!

Posted on 10 February, 2008 by Boo

A couple weeks ago I saw an add on Freecycle asking for a double or single bed. I didn’t think much of it and didn’t even think about the spare bed that hasn’t been used for months.

Then last week I finally clicked on and discussed it with Tim. We don’t need such a big bed, we’ll give this one away and get a single bed for the spare bedroom.

So I offered it to this person not knowing that it was going to change my life!

She replied that it would be great if she could have our bed. I gave her my address and she replied again that she had JUST moved and was living just around the corner from me.

Well little did SHE know that she was in fact living directly across the road from me, in a house that friends of ours JUST moved out of. Tim and I watched as she moved in last weekend!

Anyway I got invited over to meet her and her family. She has four kids and was having a birthday party for one of her son’s today.

When I got there, I was so excited to find out that the birthday party was for her youngest son Couper…who just turned ONE!

How amazing is that?? Jaxon just turned one three weeks ago. I am pretty excited about this. A friend for me AND a friend for Jaxon! Not only does she have Couper who is one, but a daughter who is 2, another who is 3 and a five year old son!

Usually I would run a mile from someone who had four kids. I mean I struggle with ONE child and all of the kids I do know are little terrors. But her kids are so well behaved and nice!

This is a great day in my life.

You DID WHAT???

Posted on 8 February, 2008 by Boo

Last week I forgot my pill.

I told Tim in the morning “I forgot my pill last night” and he turned around and said “Are you fucking joking?” Like I had crashed the car or accidentally chopped off a finger or something.

This pissed me off a little. I’ve been taking the pill for one year now. I’ve forgotten twice. Last Saturday night/Sunday and once when I was in hospital at the paediatrics ward when Jaxon was 4 months old getting poked and prodded.

So who else is with me when I say that if MEN had to be in charge of contraception for 365 days of every single year, and remember to take a single pill once a day (at the same time no less)…that we’d all have ten kids AND be bare foot and pregnant????

When I pointed this out to him he said he was sorry, but that he had BIG plans for me that night and now it was all ruined.

Well…condom’s ever ring a bell???

Needless to say, his big plans fell through. Because it was likely he thought it was TOO HARD to remember to put a condom on!!!

(sorry Tim, you know I love you!)

On another note…

Posted on 8 February, 2008 by Boo

Would it be THAT bad????

Posted on 8 February, 2008 by Boo

I am craving SO bad today! Hmm. What day is it? It’s day five I think. So in my mind I keep thinking “I don’t want to swallow” and then a few seconds later I think “It wouldn’t be that bad”

Man I must be crazy. Am I out of my mind????

No need to answer that for me.

I know the answer is yes, completely out of my mind.

The Bet

Posted on 4 February, 2008 by Boo

As many may or may not know, Tim and I are smoker’s.

I started smoking not long after I met Tim. I was 25 years old. Simply put, the worst ever thing I ever did. I’ve been trying to quit ever since and was only slightly successful when I was pregnant with Jaxon. I say this because not less than two days after Jaxon was born I was back on the fags.

But seriously, I think it wouldn’t be unfair to say that we have “tried” to quit more than 30 time’s in the last five years. Some attempts came very close to being successful…only to be ruined by silly things. Like a MIL visit 5 days into our attempt (she smokes) or a new born baby back in hospital being poked and prodded.

This time we’re aproaching quitting with a different tactic. We have a bet. A bet that just might help us kick the habbit!

Here it is. Might I first say, if you are squirmy…or you don’t know me and know that I spare no detail’s…you should maybe look away. This is X-Rated shit!

So the deal is that neither of us is allowed to tell the other how much we would LOVE a smoke. We find that this is what make’s us weak. If Tim tell’s me he’s dying for a fag when I’m doing really well then all he’s done is remind me how much I would really like one, and vice versa.

The next part of the deal is that for the first fortnight that we successfully quit, Tim can spend the money that we have saved (OMG I can’t believe I am about to tell you this…$150 every two weeks!!!!!!) on anything that he like’s. In the second fortnight I can spend it on anything that I want. And from then on in it is to be saved.

On top of that, we have other BIG things riding on our quitting.

IF it is Tim who cracks and buys smokes first then he must do ALL of the washing in the house for an entire month. Clothes, towel’s, sheet’s…everything. From go to woe as well. He must collect it, move it to the laundry, seperate colours, wash, hang out, bring in and fold AND put it all away. For one month.

IF it is I who cracks and buys smoke’s first then…hmmmmmm. Look away now. I must give Tim three head job’s PER week for an entire month. AND I MUST SWALLOW!!!

Is anyone else with me when I say that I AM NOT EVER GOING TO SMOKE ANOTHER SMOKE????

Last time I attempted to swallow I literally threw up ALL over Tim. And I’ve never gone back for seconds either!

I love this bet. I love this deal. It’s day one of our quitting attempt and every time I’ve thought that I wanted a smoke I’ve also thought “no, if I have a smoke I have to swallow. I don’t want to swallow…I don’t want a smoke”

Of course this is day one. They say it takes three week’s to break a habbit. Ask me how it’s all going in three weeks.

The MANY level's of Baby Proofing!

Posted on 2 February, 2008 by Boo

I think I am in stage four of baby proofing my house.

Baby Proofing started off when Jaxon was just an itty bitty baby. Maybe he was 5 months old.

My baby proofing level back then was LEVEL ONE. An easy level which required minimal maintenance.

Level One baby Proofing meant that just one meter of space surrounding Jaxon HAD to be baby proofed. After all, he was not rolling, crawling or walking. Anything that was an absolute NO NO for baby was simply tossed aside.

But this level didn’t last long. Soon Jaxon learnt to roll, and then learnt that rolling was in fact a clever way of getting to those objects that once just sat there teasing his immobile body.

So came LEVEL TWO Baby Proofing.

Level Two Baby Proofing is much like Level One, just a little bit more work was involved. Since Jaxon now knew how to roll remote control’s had to be put UP off the floor. A few electrical cords got taped to the wall. In many cases, simply putting large item’s in his way was enough to keep the house safe.

But Level Two didn’t last long either. Now the item’s that Jaxon had spent hours and hours laying on his back watching and wondering about were now accessable. A few roll’s this way, a twist here and there and they were now within reach. Dog food and water comes to mind!

And so came LEVEL THREE Baby Proofing.

This involved quite a bit of construction on Mummy and Daddy’s part. A good part of New Years Day was spent building baby gates. These gates made me sane. I no longer had to wonder why Jaxon had gone quite, and why Mexxi NEVER had water or food. The kitchen became out of bounds, because we heard somewhere on the grape vine that hot stoves and babies just don’t mix well.

Another good thing about Level Three baby Proofing was that things we didn’t want Jaxon to get into or chew simply had to be put on the couch, or the coffee table. He couldn’t get to them. He could only look at them and wonder HOW he could get to them.

This level, thankfully, lasted at least 3 weeks. Right up until Nanny and Poppy taught Jaxon how to CLIMB stairs! It would appear that although WE don’t have stairs, other objects are just as much fun to conqure!

Hence why I am now faced with having to move in to LEVEL FOUR Baby Proofing.

Level Four is getting much more advanced. Now the coffee table is NOT a safe place to put my open can of drink. I learnt that one the hard way. And the couch is NOT a safe place to leave the remote control’s. I’ve also considered just getting a big ass dog chain to put around my neck in place of my normal necklace, since Jaxon think’s that the necklace is the perfect item on my body to get leaverage to pull himself up!

I have to find a new home for the fire poker’s, the free standing lamp and the pedistool fan in Jaxon’s room’s. Let’s not forget to chock open ALL door’s, for Jaxon might think that opening and slamming shut a door for hours on end be FUN FUN FUN!

So level Four I am stuck on. I shall spend the better part of my Sunday making sure that Jaxon can not piss me off by breaking something that was once out of his reach. Or spilling my RED soft drink all over my brand new rug!

I’ll also be having a word to Daddy, about the small item’s of crap that he tend’s to leave lying around on the coffee table, since it’s dangerous to leave them on the floor these days.

I suspect that Level Five and Six baby Proofing will involve the kitchen table and the DVD player. I had a brief preview of them tonight when Jack, who is now walking…pulled the face off of our DVD player (our two week old, brand spanking new DVD player) and nearly got my BCP from the very edge of the kitchen table.

I dread to think what Level’s Seven through Twenty will entail. Tim suggested gaffer taping Jaxon’s hands together and getting him a baby ball gag as a baby proofing measure.

I just don’t know if we would get away with that…especially since now I’ve told YOU about it!

The MANY level’s of Baby Proofing!

Posted on 2 February, 2008 by Boo

I think I am in stage four of baby proofing my house.

Baby Proofing started off when Jaxon was just an itty bitty baby. Maybe he was 5 months old.

My baby proofing level back then was LEVEL ONE. An easy level which required minimal maintenance.

But this level didn’t last long. Soon Jaxon learnt to roll, and then learnt that rolling was in fact a clever way of getting to those objects that once just sat there teasing his immobile body.

So came LEVEL TWO Baby Proofing.

And so came LEVEL THREE Baby Proofing.

Hence why I am now faced with having to move in to LEVEL FOUR Baby Proofing.

I’ll also be having a word to Daddy, about the small item’s of crap that he tend’s to leave lying around on the coffee table, since it’s dangerous to leave them on the floor these days.

I dread to think what Level’s Seven through Twenty will entail. Tim suggested gaffer taping Jaxon’s hands together and getting him a baby ball gag as a baby proofing measure.

I just don’t know if we would get away with that…especially since now I’ve told YOU about it!

The things you find…

Posted on 31 January, 2008 by Boo

…in your own back yard!!!

This is a baby Galah for those of you who are not educated in the way of Australian Native Birds. For ALL of the people saying “Oh how cute, I want one” then check out the OTHER clip…they’re noisy little f&cker’s! (I can’t find the other clip…but when I do I’ll put it here)

We think he fell out of his nest last night during a rain storm. He was wondering around the back yard and unable to fly. So I caught him up in a towel and put him in a cage.

I took him to the vet who basically said that if I didn’t look after him then they wouldn’t be able to do anything but put him down.

So home again I go with a screaching bird in the back seat of the car. I fed him and gave him water…which he threw out of the cage door and tipped over.

But luckily the next morning he looked much better and as soon as I opened the cage he flew away.

A happy ending was had for all.

THANKS MUM!!!

Posted on 26 January, 2008 by Boo

12 Months

That’s OK Jaxon! I mean I only spent the last TWO WEEKS planning this cake. Sweating over how to make it all come together perfectly…and YOU DON’T EVEN CARE!

That’s right people’s. I gave Jaxon his very first birthday cake. A very crappy looking cow as far as I am concerned (check out this link for what it SHOULD look like http://jas.familyfun.go.com/recipefinder/display?id=50115) and he didn’t even touch it! I even TRIED to slam his hands down in to it…but no. It’s messy Mum. No Mum, it feel’s funny on my hands. Next year, REALLY…NO CAKE FOR YOU!

“What the HELL is that!?! And more to the point, what do I do with IT?”

No cake for you!

Posted on 22 January, 2008 by Boo

I just don’t think Jaxon is meant to have a 1st birthday cake!

I made two cakes tonight plus 4 cup cakes.

I happened to be feeding Jaxon while they were in the oven. So I’m sitting there waiting for captain “take my sweet time eating” Jaxon to drink his bottle…while calling out to Tim every five minutes to check the cakes.

WELL!!

In between his last check and the final check the top cake burnt! That was sort of *ok* because I am going to cut the top off of it anyway and use it up the other way. So I don’t stress about it.

But when I go to take it out of the “tin”…which isn’t a tin because it’s one of those stupid a$$ silicone things that are so SH!T it’s not funny…the top breaks off of it.
So now I have no base for my cow.

That’s ok says I. I’ll make another one.

Except I have no more self raising flour left and it’s 9pm at night. Now there are dissadvantages to living in a small town, one of them being that everything closes early. I’m cruising around from petrol station to petrol station hoping that just one of them will sell SF flour.

But no. It seems that no one cook’s enough cake’s these days to warrant a place on the shelf in your local petrol station. OR…people who DO make cake’s plan well enough ahead that they don’t run out of ingredient’s at 10pm at night!

As I said, it just look’s like Jaxon is not meant to have a cake for his first birthday!

Dude Two

Posted on 13 January, 2008 by Boo

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Dude

Posted on 13 January, 2008 by Boo

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Stage Three – Tim and Boo, the Beginning

Posted on 11 January, 2008 by Boo

I’ve decided to jump a few years ahead of myself here and tell you how Tim and I met. It’s much easier than telling you about my depression and suicidal tendencies.

Wow. It turns out this is hard to write too. Not because it’s a hard subject but because I want it to be prefect!

On a dark and stormy night, way back in August of 2002, I got lost and was running low on fuel.

Except I wasn’t really lost. I just didn’t know the name of the street I was on. I knew where it lead and I knew I was on the right track. I just need to put that in here because my Mum would read it and say “same old Boo” meaning that I could get lost in a paper bag. Which is true, but another story for another day.

I pulled in to the last petrol station before the freeway. I put my petrol in and went inside.

There I paid my $10 and the guy behind the counter asked me how I was. Well, I was ok. So I told him that. I told him that exceptÂ for the raining drive I had to get home, I was all good.

He pointed behind me to a motor bike and asked me how I thought he felt having to drive to the other side of town on his bike.

So if you’d known me all those years ago you’d probably know that I don’t like motor bikes. It might have something to do with my Dad always telling my brother and I that if we ever got a motor bike or tattoo then he would kick us out. I don’t know…but we both have tattoo’s!

So I told him just how against motor bikes I was. I didn’t count on him arguing with me though.

“Ahh, but have you ever been on a bike?” he asked. Well no. I haven’t I said. But…

“Ahhh-ha!! Then you don’t know what you’re missing out on”

Yes, but they’re so dangerous! And back and forth and back and forth…until three minutes later he’d told me to come back at that time the following week and he would take me for a ride. For a full week I didn’t think about him again.

The following week, by pure chance of course, I ended up back at his petrol station. Seriously, that things happen for a reason bull shit I keep telling you I believe so much in??? Well it was never more true of this night.

It wasn’t like I was lost or anything. Really. I knew exactly where I was and where I needed to go to get home. As I drove down that same street I hadn’t thought about for a week and all of a sudden over the hill comes that petrol station I made a split second decision to go on in and see if he’d remembered.

He had. He had a helmet for me. He had a jacket for me. Luckily I’d lost some weight so I actually fit in to that jacket!

Just before we left, I wrote my ex-boyfriend (whom I am still very good friends with) a text message saying “I’m just about to do something stupid with someone who claims his name is Tim. I don’t know him from a bar of soap. If I don’t call you tomorrow by lunch time, my car is at this petrol station and my will is in the bottom drawer”

So we jumped on the bike and set off at one am in the morning.

WOW.

I think I loved Tim before that first part of the ride was over. Obviously he couldn’t have said anything to me that would make that happen. But he could and did put his hand across mine on his tummy. He just kept it there and kept patting my hand to make sure I was ok.

I had never been better. I was loving the ride.

We stopped at the Crown Casino for a coffee. Or a coke in my case since I don’t drink coffee. It was three am by then and we sat there talking for hours and hours. It was freezing cold, yet we sat there by the river under the sporadic bursts of warm flames by the river chatting about nothing and everything all night long.

At eight am we rode back in to the petrol station and we parted ways. When I got home that morning I told my house mate that I had met the man I was going to marry. She laughed at me, but I don’t think she is laughing now.

Seven days later I went and spent the weekend with Tim. It was nearly a two hour drive between our houses so it was easier that way. I don’t think I ever really left. Three weeks later we made it official with all of my stuff (cat included) making the journey across town as well.

There are just a few silly things I’d like to put here. Because recently I had a chat with a very old school friend who was unsure if the man she is with is THE one. And there are things that happened in those first few weeks that were so different to any other relationship that I just KNEW Tim was it. I could stop looking because what I was looking for was standing right in front of me.

I think we’d been going out for about two weeks. I’d only just moved in. Tim went up to the back of the house and when he returned I gave him a hug in the hall way. I hadn’t planned on saying anything. I don’t know why it came out or where it came from. But I put my arms around his neck and I told him that he was the one. Keeping in mind that we’d only known each other for 2 weeks so Tim really should have run a mile. But he didn’t. He looked right back at me and he let me know that he felt that way too.

Then, not too long after that Tim was in the shower. I’m pretty sure that we’d just had sex for the first or second time (yes, I made him wait three or four weeks) because I was getting dried off as well. But the steam had fogged up the screen and I wrote in the steam…I love you. I wasn’t scared to say it. It didn’t feel like it was too soon and I should just wait until he said it or if I should ask my girl friends if they thought it was too soon and blah blah blah. I wanted to say it because I felt it. So I said it. And he immediately wrote it back to me.

Now, I’ve had a few serious relationships but the one that went by the way a year or two before I met Tim? If I had said anything like that to that man (who is gay by the way…hi Chris) in the first year he would have started crying because it was just all too soon!

We’ve never ever looked back. A few months later, watching a movie, one of us (and I really do forget now who it was, because it was a mutual question) took the pull ring off the coke can we were holding and asked “If I gave you this ring would you marry me?”

We got married one day before our one year anniversary. I never did get a proper engagement ring, but that pull ring is still in a safe spot.

This isn’t perfect. I will rewrite it one day.

This is Tim and I not long after we met. In the petrol station that we met in.

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You probably don’t want to see the other photo’s we took with this camera

About Me, Stage Two

Posted on 10 January, 2008 by Boo

Stage Two. Or in other words,Â late 1997 until 2002.

It’s a very hard time to write about. But I want to. You’ll just have to bare with me while I get it all out right.

There are things about me that you don’t know. And they’reÂ hard to jump right out and say without feeling somewhat ashamed.

But the thing is, I’m not ashamed.

Just embarrassed.

So I’m just gonna say it here, right now. And then I’ll probably leave it at that for a little while. Until I get over it.

I’m a self harmer. Or cutter.

And I’ve tried to commit suicide. Twice.

I’ll be back sooner or later to put it all down here in writing. Once I’ve done that, you’ll be on your way to discovering Boo.

These years were hard, really hard. But they’re a part of who I am and leaving them out would be cheating myself.

Attempt two

I’m calling this time 1997 to 2002 but really it all started a lot earlier than that.

When Terry died I guess I was in denial about it all for a very long time. Not that he had died. But that I needed help.

Depression is a funny thing. It’s so obvious from the outside but it’s one of the easiest things to lie about. How are you? I’m fine thanks, how are you?

We’re programmed from birth to act a certain way, say certain things in response to others. To give stock standard answer’s even if they’re not the truth.

I wasn’t fine. I really needed help. But the funny thing is that when I say it’s the easiest thing to lie about? It’s the easiest thing to lie to yourself about.

While people in my life kept telling me I needed help and I needed to do something about “it” I kept telling myself that I was fine. I kept telling myself that no one could help me and that talking about it just wouldn’t help.

So for five years after Terry died, I broke.

That really is the easiest way to describe the way my life went in those few years.

And thats about as far as I am going to get right about now.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not all crushed and crying because this is painful, it’s really not. It’s therapeutic to get it out. But the creative juices stopped flowing at about 11.30pm and it’s now 11.55 and I wont get anywhere further than this tonight.

About Boo, Stage One.

Posted on 6 January, 2008 by Boo

So.

About me.

Well.

I was born in 1977. In Carlton, Melbourne…Australia. To my international friends…that’s down the bottom end.

I was born with blonde hair and blue eyes and though I didn’t have them when I was born, I would slowly develop lot’s and lot’s of freckles. But let’s not talk too much about the freckles. I don’t like them much so I’m thankful that I got so many of them they just grew in to a nice tan.

When I was 7 or so my parents took my brother and I on a holiday to a place on the Murray River in South Australia called Hogs Wash. It was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. One day, a bush walker past by and he started a conversation with us all. At one point, he looked down at me with my freckles and he said “Did a cow fart on your face?” So as I say, I don’t like my freckles too much…lets not talk about them anymore.

Camping was a huge part of our lives growing up. I think some of my best memories come from the times when my parents took my brother Terry and I out of school and went trekking somewhere. We’d put the dog Bitsy in a home and we’d just go. Of course, that’s how it was for me. We “just went.” But now that I’m a mother myself I know that when you have kids…”just going” is something other people do, not what parents do. Now I know that for my parents there was probably weeks and weeks of planning and packing. Lists for this, budgets for that. Man. I had it easy growing up.

That’s a lie in it’s own way, but really it’s not. I did have it easy. I had a loving mother, a father who was home (if not, “there” all the time, he was at least home) and a I had a wonderful brother. Through primary school was hard for me, I still enjoyed school. I was diagnosed with dyslexia when I was in grade two. I didn’t know how to read at all back then and really I should have. I got taken out of regular classes to learn. The first book I read by myself, was The Enchanted Forrest by Enid Blyton. I was 13.

I excelled in all of the creative classes and though it’s not so obvious now, I was quite the sporty type way back then. I did cross country running on weekends, gymnastics on weeknights and swimming. I loved my BMX bike, climbing tree’s and playing football. Doll’s and I never got along.

My two best friends were both boys growing up. Daniel and Marcus. Brothers. Daniel was a year older than me and Marcus was a year younger. We camped together, fished together, went to the pool together…did all sorts of naughty things together. No, not that. But collecting their bull terrier’s poo to make shit bombs for the neighbors was not beyond us. We grew apart when we went to different schools, but if they called me right now and needed help…I’d so be there for them. They saved my life once, and they don’t even know it. And it’s not something I’m going to put here except to say that dirty old men should know better than to fuck with innocent little girls.

High School was hard. Not for the learning because once I could read I excelled. But the teasing and bullying was tough. I’ve writen about that here before so I wont go in to it again.

As a younger kid I knew I wanted to work with animals. That’s all there was to life as far as I was concerned. I wanted to be a vet, but little did I know I wasn’t THAT smart. But I did all of the subjects I needed to do to get there. Biology, Chemistry, English, Maths. And then I did arts as well. Chemistry wasn’t my thing but the other subjects I was an A grade student. I took part in school plays, I sang in bands. I was the President of the Student Representative Council for five years.

I granduated Year 12 in 1995. That was the same year that Bitsy died too. It was a hard year but not the hardest. I didn’t get the grades I needed and the next best thing was becoming either a Vet Nurse, or an Animal technician. I’ve never really wanted to be a Vet Nurse, so off to school I went to be an Animal technician.

I wasn’t sure about it. But within months of starting the course I had a job at a labratory looking after lab animals and I loved it. I worked at a major University in Melbourne, breeding mice, rats, rabbits, dogs, cats, pigs, guniea pigs and frogs for reseach.Â I was responsible for bringing and raising the first successful breeding colony of Tree Shrews in to Australia from the UK in 1999. I loved working with animals and yes, I killed them too.

You can either hate me for this or thank me for this. I always just thought that it was going to get done, so those animals might as well have someone who loved them and respected them as much as I did to look after them while it happened. And if you’ve ever had a family member or friend who needed medicine to stay alive, or a medical procedure done to save their lives…just remember it’s all practiced on the animals. Like it or not.

Eleven years ago, I was camping on the Murray River with two school friends. We’d been out of high school for a year or two by then and I was beginning to appreciate the things I did have in life because some of the things I took for granted had slipped away. Like having parents that were still married.

I remember the day I came home and found Dad crying because Mum had decided to leave. I remember mostly that on my way home from Uni that day I had been thinking how wonderful they were and how I should just tell them how much I appreciated them for being my parents. How much I loved them and how good it was to know they were always there for me. But when I got home, it was all gone.

And as I was saying, 11 years ago I sat on the banks of the Murray with those two friends and we all told each other what we loved about our lives. I remember that the things I was grateful for was my Mum and Dad, even though now they were not together. I had the best brother ever, we were so incredibly close. My friends, were the best you could ever have. My dogs were my life and I was in school and working part time for a job that I knew I was going to love.

The next day I went in to town to meet my Dad and my brother. When I couldn’t find them, I called them. My Dad didn’t sound quite right. He sounded winded, for want of a better word. When I asked him what was wrong he struggled to tell me that my brother Terry had been killed in a car accident that morning. He was 24.

So that’s a story all on it’s own.

My brother Terry.

He was 4 years older than me. He’s in two of my earliest memories of life. I remember him looking over the cot rail’s at me. I don’t know why I remember that but I do. Then when I nearly drowned at age 4 because my Dad fell off a cliff looking for cuttlefish but finding big snakes…I know that Terry and I had been walking through the waves together with no shoes on. Let’s see. Other memories. Terry once half ate a banana until it was all squishy and then shoved it in to my mouth. He held my mouth shut and he forced me to swallow. He used to spit in our coke so that it was all his. He used to walk really fast and I’d have to half run to keep up with him. He was the kind of brother who would beat his little sister up but a second later would run bare feet over broken glass to protect her from school bullies.

He liked to say to me “Don’t say I don’t look after you kid” and I never did, because he always looked after me. He was my best friend. My best enemy. I have a diary entry that I will eventually put here for you to read. It explains so much better than *I* can now what he was to me.

His life ended at 2.30am on the 13th of December in 1997. In a way, my life ended that day too. But that was eleven years ago now.

They say time heals all and that’s not true. But time allows for other things to happen. Things that eventually take up memory space that otherwise would have been filled with the hurt and pain of losing one of the most important people in your life. Time allows you to call up older, happier memories of them without bringing with it the hurt that they are gone and can’t come back.

Eat, please eat.

Posted on 1 June, 2007 by Boo

I just found this as a Diary entry in some of my old word documents. Along with quite a few things from this time. So I decided, that this would be helpful to have here forever.

JJ’s feedings all day today and all of yesterday have been so difficult. I have to remain calm “they” tell me…and that’s almost impossible. I mean they tell me “We’re worried about his weight” (since he’s below the 3rd% and dropping steadily) and then in the next sentence tell us he has to have 700 mil a day. Well that’s all good and well except JJ eats really well right up until he hits exactly 75 mil a feed. He sucks well, he concentrates, he doesn’t spill a drop…and then he cries, twists and turns his head, flips his legs up and twists upside down in your lap, pull’s his arm up in front of his mouth spits it in my face, vomits, coughs and splatters…bends his body right back, closes his mouth and pushes the bottle out with his tongue then wont let it back in. Anything a baby could possibly do to not eat, he does. He even started just having the bottle in his mouth and PRETENDING to suck the other day. I sat there for an hour and thought wow this is a great feed only to take the bottle out and he’d had nothing!!! So 75 mil a feed, multiply that by 5, he’s only wanting to eat 375mil a day. So they want us to FORCE a bloody baby to eat 150 a feed. Tell me, how do you make a baby suck? You can’t.

It’s just getting frustrating. Our appointment with the paediatrician is on the 18th. That means I have 85 difficult feeds ahead of me. And I am telling you, if we get there and he comments on his weight and then tell’s us JJ is just a “fussy” f*^king eater I am going to hit the roof. And it’s sad that I feel I have to take Tim along just so all of these issues can’t be blamed on PND, which in my opinion wouldn’t exist if we weren’t constantly reminded that JJ was not gaining weight properly and we “HAVE” to “MAKE” him eat more…but sorry, there is nothing wrong, it’s all in your head, some babies are just fussy, you should try feeding him in the dark, on your other arm, make the milk warmer, don’t wake him up…upside down with your hand stuck up your a$$…that might work!?

Can you tell I have had enough? And not to mention that we get lectured about not having his shoes on ALL the time. Just once we’d love to hear “You’re doing a great job, everything’s on track and JJ’s a healthy young boy” is that too much to ask??? I just for once in my life would like someone to say “Something is not right here. Let ME help you” and get REAL help!

Break Down and Beyond

Posted on 29 May, 2007 by Boo

I found this, as a letter to some on line friends in some of my old word documents. I really think this will be good to have here. Some times, Jaxon is going to hear things I have said or things that I have felt in the past. And perhaps getting to read the actual story of what it felt like to go through all of this with him will help him see, it’s not his fault. Or mine.

So hereâ€™s my story, from meâ€¦not through SMS which can be a bit hard to get all detail into. This might get long, but you expect that from me.

When I first broke down, everyone kept telling me I should go to this place called Riverton. They said it would help me, that doctors and pediatricians would â€œsort out JJâ€™s problems.â€ I was under the impression that they would actually solve the problem, or try to anyway.

So we show up at Riverton. Itâ€™s a wonderful and beautiful place. Itâ€™s not a hospital, although there are nurses there 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Picture it more like a 3 star hotel. I had my own bedroom and bathroom, JJ had a room with a cot in it off mine. There are three lounge rooms, a huge kitchen for everyone and amazing court yards outside your room. They have play rooms for the kiddies as well as an outdoor play area with sand pit and swingâ€™s etc. There are twenty other rooms, each the same as mine, each with a struggling family in it. You get assigned your own nurse each shift, 3 for each day. The facility is brand new although they had been in their old building for more than 25 years. It had only been open for two weeks when I got there and they had spent 10 million on it so you can imagine it had the best of everything.

When we first got there and filed through mountains of paper work, we got taken to our room. Our nurse came in and asked hundredâ€™s of questionsâ€¦including â€œwhat do you hope to get from your stay here?â€ We answered we needed help with feeding and sleep. And if the crying should happen to start up at any point, Iâ€™d need coping strategies to deal with it and not just have a nervous breakdown again.

We spoke about my stay in hospital, which also helped us to find the first problem. The nurses in hospital had nursed Jaxon to sleep for the entire stay. While he wasnâ€™t sleeping before we went in there, he did start to for them. But really, only because when each nurse got tired they had 10 other nurses to hand him off to. But when I got home for that short time when Maddy died I couldnâ€™t do it. He would ONLY sleep if he was being held and if I put him down he would wake within 5 minutes. So the nurse told us about â€œsleep associationsâ€ This means that JJ had come to associate being nursed with sleeping and that without being nursed, he wouldnâ€™t KNOW how to sleep alone. So that was our first task. We had to break his old habit and form new sleep associations. It took about a day to change his associations. Now when he goes to sleep I take him to his cot, wrap him up, put his dummy in, stroke his forehead for a minute and then walk out and turn the lights off. For the first day he cried like you wouldnâ€™t believe. But the nurse stayed with us and told us when to go in and when to leave him be and see what he was going to do. Sometimes he was just making fussy noises; if we left him he would fall asleep. Sometimes he would be wailing and she would make us go in, comfort him and leave when he settled. After that initial day, once Jaxon learnt what the â€œsleep routineâ€ wasâ€¦I would put him down awake and leave the room and he wouldnâ€™t make a sound. He would just nod off to sleepâ€¦AND stay asleep until his next feed.

The next issue we found was that I was keeping him awake too long. I thought he was meant to feed and THEN have 1.5 hours or so to play and be merry. But in fact, they told meâ€¦he is meant to feed AND play all in about 1.5 hours. At about 1 hour I should start looking for his tired signs and put him down as soon as I see them. So we worked on that and since then Jaxon barely cries at all. Before we went there Jaxon wasnâ€™t sleeping at all during the day and was crying most of the day until about 11pm. If I complained to Mum that I couldnâ€™t get anything done or that *I* couldnâ€™t sleep she would say â€œSome babies just donâ€™t sleep. Youâ€™ll have to deal with itâ€ but the nurses said thatâ€™s not true. You CAN expect babies to sleep, thatâ€™s when they do the most growing and they need it just as much as a good feed.

Then came sorting out his feeding. We were only meant to stay for one week. And by Wednesday all of our problems had been solved. Jaxon wasnâ€™t crying, was happily going down for a 2.5 hour nap without complaining or needing to be held and I was starting to feel confident that going home was going to be ok. He had eaten like a champ on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Come Thursday though he stopped eating. Well not stopped eating, but he would get to 50 mil (60 mil is 2 oz) and then he would start crying and kicking and screaming. I lost my confidence. I was SO SO MAD at him for being a little angel for those first few days and then becoming his normal difficult self just a day before I had to go home. I was angry that I had had three days to GET help with feeding but didnâ€™t need it, and then when I was just a day from having to go home and wouldnâ€™t have help he started up again. So I asked to stay another week. They saw my anger and frustration, and after having thoughts about drowning Jaxon they didnâ€™t want to send me home feeling like that. Well, I am home now and I guess his â€œfussyâ€ feeding hasnâ€™t been helped. But they did give me some good tips on how to get him to take more (give him 45 minutes to eat, stop mid way to re-heat the bottle change his nappy and have a 5 minute break. If at the end of 45 minutes he has only had so much but not enough then Iâ€™ve tried my best and thatâ€™s all I can do) and how to remain calm while he is going off his head.

As for the constant crying we dealt with. Obviously unless they saw it they couldnâ€™t give us answers. And Jaxon only cried that inconsolable cry for 6 hours once. So our theory is that he was getting to 75 mil in a feed and then starting to fuss the way he does now and we would say â€œheâ€™s had enoughâ€ and stop feeding him. But he needed to be eating more (about 150 mil) so he was always hungry. Because he was always hungry he couldnâ€™t sleep well. A big vicious cycle that we had started without knowing it. We do need to find out why he gets to that magical 75 mil and starts getting upset.

They held classes every day about feeding, settling and sleep patterns (a babies sleep cycle is only 20 minutes, and they havenâ€™t learnt to â€œroll over and go back to sleepâ€ like we have. So when they wake up 20-30 minutes after youâ€™ve put them down leave them and let them learn how to put themselves back to sleepâ€¦unless they full out cry for you to help them) dealing with stress, supporting your partner, play groups, nutrition, baby massage, dealing with changes after a baby, relaxation and all sorts of other classes. Although Jaxon was always asleep for the set play group times, I got to go along and watch how other motherâ€™s interacted with their babies (since Iâ€™m a bit of a dud when it comes to that!)

So Riverton turned out to be nothing like I was expecting. But I also left there with MUCH more than I expected to leave with. Jaxon has his feeds at 6am, 10am, 2pm, 6pm and 10pm. And he has a 2.5 hour nap between each feed and sleeps all night. I have so much time now itâ€™s funny I sit here and wonder what to do next. Mostly I sleep, but housework gets a look in too! Feeding is really difficult and tiring, and Tim canâ€™t do it because you need to stay calm and it is really frustrating when he wont eat. But we bargained that he does some housework while I do feeding so that when I am done with that I donâ€™t have to worry about dishes or washing. I also got to meet other parents struggling. There were two lotâ€™s of twins there the first week getting help to put them on different schedules so Mumâ€™s didnâ€™t have TWO crying babies at the same time. Other Mumâ€™s who had always breast fed their babies to sleep and wanted to stop doing that but the child (two year olds some of them) wouldnâ€™t â€œletâ€ her. It was really funny once Iâ€™d spent the first week there to see the next lot of motherâ€™s coming in all tired and weary and knowing that when they left their problems would be on the way to being solved.

I am so happy now that Jaxon is on a feeding and sleep schedule. He doesnâ€™t cry anymore, and if he does itâ€™s usually because heâ€™s ready for a nap. Of course heâ€™s still being a lil rat when it comes to feeding. We have an appointment with the paediatrician in three weeks. We have to get a referral to the physio to look at his right arm, and weâ€™ll talk about other tests to find out whatâ€™s going on during feeds. Tomorrow we go to Brisbane to get his tenotomy done I think (I hope not, heâ€™ll be in a cast for three weeks ) Oh and Dad gets here tomorrow night tooâ€¦.oh what FUN :S

Cry baby

Posted on 17 April, 2007 by Boo

Once again, I found this going through my old word documents. This one, is just a few days before I admitted myself to hospital.

Jaxon’s crying has started up again. He hasn’t slept for more than half an hour today, I am so tired and sore from carrying him to shut him up. We went shopping and he fell asleep, thank goodness…but it all started up as soon as we got home. At one point I put him down and he started crying within 3 minutes and then he shut up. I was all happy and relieved it was finally over. Tim was watching TV so I stayed in here on the computer. When I went out into the lounge room I found out why Jaxon had stopped crying. Daddy was cuddling him on the couch!!!

I know some degree of crying is normal but this is out of control. Something other than reflux must be wrong. And it can’t be normal for a baby to only sleep for half an hour in a 24 hour period. He is wide awake and crying all the time.

And you know what? I am SO SICK of advice right now. I know people are just trying to help but we are honestly trying everything to make him feel better and nothing is working. So MY Mum and Tim’s Mum can STOP telling us that massage will help, or that bathing will help, his chair will help, going for a walk will help. He scream’s his lungs out while I try to massage him and he cried all through tonight’s bath. His chair hasn’t been used for days because he just wont tolerate it!! There is just no end. So they can stop telling me those things!

I feel like I might as well be raising my child on a deserted island for all the help we have.

Cry Cry Cryyyyyyyyy

Posted on 3 April, 2007 by Boo

Once again, found this as a letter to some girlfriends on an online forum about new born babies.

I know I complain about this a lot, but I don’t see many other people talking about it. I figure the only way you’re all going to tell me this is normal, that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and that things do ONE DAY get better, is if I say it myself. Or maybe that it’s happening to you too, and you’re having trouble dealing with it too.

Jaxon has been crying since 2pm. We’ve had about an hour of breaks…20 minutes here, 20 minutes there. It’s now nearly 11pm. We’ve taken him to the hospital to see the midwives and nothing is physically wrong with him. He’s just screaming his lungs out.

I’m not dealing with it, Tim is not dealing with it, and Jaxon is obviously not dealing with something either. I don’t know how much longer I can take this. I wonder how on earth people go on to have more children when the first months of their lives is hell. And I mean that, this feels like hell. My life has gone to sh!t.

Bad Mum

Posted on 31 March, 2007 by Boo

Random thoughts to some online friends about motherhood in the midst of Jaxon’s non stop crying.

Does anyone else feel like they’re doing something wrong with their LO, or that they’re somehow making things worse when their LO is crying? At least once a day he cries and cries and cries and I cry right along with him because I don’t know what I am doing wrong. I hate myself for being a bad Mum and think he must hate being my child because I can’t make what ever is wrong go away.

New Mum thoughts…

Posted on 19 February, 2007 by Boo

A diary entry from very early in Jaxon’s life…

All I ever wanted was to be a Mum. And I thought I would be a natural at it. But the truth is, it doesn’t all come naturally. Most of it, if not all of it..is a learning experience. And that’s what made becoming a Mum so hard. I had expectations about EVERYTHING, and when it all turned out differently…I got upset with myself. I got angry at myself and I got upset about it all.

I always imagined how wonderful it would be to have this little human being that looks up to and adores it’s mother. Reality hits when I gaze romantically into my babies eyes and he stares BLANKLY back at me, or past me…or through me. It’s like I am not there, and it’s not what I expected. It was a real downer for a while.

I expected that when my baby cried I would pick him up and THAT would be enough to make it all better. Nothing like a mother’s touch right? Wrong. Sometimes I can’t help him. I don’t know why he’s crying and I don’t know what else to try. And that is frustrating. It’s upsetting to know something is wrong, they need something…and because you’re so inexperienced at the mother thing…you haven’t figured out what it is yet!

And if you think the sleep deprivation of getting up to pee every half hour is bad, think again. You get to a point where you’re dizzy you’re SO tired. All you want to do is close your eyes and go to sleep. But this thing, wont stop making noise…noises which YOU have to stop. And at times you will resent them for making you stay awake for so long. Or waking you when you JUST got to sleep. But that too, get’s easier…I think I am getting used to the long strecthes, and taking advantage of the sleep I do get!

Being a new Mum is really hard. I can’t even begin to tell you how hard it is. I put a lot of pressure on myself to do it all perfectly, to get it all right the first time, and to know what to do in any given situation.

Before I had Jaxon I was confident I would be a natural. I was a confident person full stop. And then JJ comes along and he rips it all out of me. I felt like I lost my spirit, and it felt like I was on the verge of giving up on life all together. Instead of feeling like I could face anything he threw at me head on, I felt scared and angry that I was doing it wrong and being a bad mother. I never expected this little baby to make me feel so incompetent and inadequate. But it did and I hated that feeling.

I was being unfair on myself, and didn’t even know it. And that made things harder. So I ask you, to lower your expectations of yourself, give yourself a break and go with the flow.

Three weeks later I feel much more confident and I can say it does get better. Slowly you learn what to try, what to expect, and it get’s easier.

Jaxon's Birth Story

Posted on 5 February, 2007 by Boo

On the 23rd of January I was really uncomfortable. We went shopping and did some things down town, and I was always feeling crampy. It was bearable at that stage but not nice. My need to pee also increased as the day went on. I went from half hour pee stops, to about every 3-10 minutes!! THAT was annoying. Tim shaved my pubes off and I knew I was going in the next day and wanted to look somewhat nice for my photoâ€™s so I asked Nicole to blow dry my hair straight for me. That was at about 10pm that night (I should have been sleeping!) So I was sitting there and the painâ€™s kept coming on stronger and stronger, to the point where I couldnâ€™t sit for more than 2 or 3 minutes. It was just period like cramping but it was really intense. So after about 15 toilet breaks and lots of wriggling on the seat Nic finally finished my hair.

At that point I decided I HAD to go to bed, but the pain was so bad I thought I wouldnâ€™t be able to sleep through it. I was beginning to wonder if this was not labor itself just 7 hours before my scheduled C-section. So I called the midwife at 11pm and asked if I could take pain killerâ€™s to get to sleep, OR if I should just go in. She made me go in, and that certainly took our minds OFF the c-section for a while!

They hooked me up to the monitor and sure enough I was having contractions! OMG did that freak me out! I went from sitting on the bed to the toilet every couple of minutes. All I wanted to do was push but no poo was coming outâ€¦AND I gave myself a hemorrhoid! She left me there in pain for some time but then came back with some tablets to take, one of them being a temazepam (sleeping pill) and the otherâ€™s I donâ€™t know. I stood up just after taking them; they were taking me to my room. I felt FINE for about two steps then said â€œIâ€™m gonna chuckâ€ AND DID! All over the floor. She said â€œI wonder if the tabletâ€™s stayed down??â€ and I heaved even bigger the next timeâ€¦NO they did not stay down! So I had to get taken to the room in a bloody wheel chair like a cripple and given the tablets again!

Whatever she gave me stopped the pain, and I had a nice hot shower. Tim had to leave at 2am. My first night EVER sleeping in a hospital, sleeping away from the love of my life. I was so worried he would sleep in and miss being back at the hospital by 6 am for the pre op stuff (since I am his alarm clock!) Or worse, sleep in for the actual op! At 5.50am I was down with the nurses asking if they would call him for meâ€¦but sure enough he walked out of the elevator cleanly shaven and smelling pretty for me!! YAY!

The BIG Event

So pre op started, they put the stockings on me, paper underwear and a surgical gown and cap. SEXY!! Tim asked the mid wife if she could leave us alone for ten minutes I looked so damned hot.

They wheeled me into pre theater at 6.30, and I had the IV put in. Not too bad, it just stung a bit. THEN I had to wait an hour for the doctorâ€™s to show up!! That was the longest hour of our lives!!!

The doctor that did the IV also did the EPI, and might I sayâ€¦if youâ€™re having a c-section, or even just know youâ€™ll have the epi and itâ€™s scaring youâ€¦look away now, this isnâ€™t pretty!! They had me sitting on the edge of the bed leaning over a pillow, and gave me the local anesthetic. Tim stood in front of me holding my hand. That didnâ€™t hurt so much but when they started the epi, MAN did that hurt. It took a good 15-20 minutes and he had to try 4 different spots in my back before he finally got it to work. I was crying after the first attempt.

Tim was fantastic!!!! He held me close, and put his clean shaven soft cheek up to my cheek and whispered sweet nothings in my ear. Of course that didnâ€™t help much, it still hurt like a b@stard and the tears kept coming. But I felt so close and loved by Tim. He told me that that was the hardest part for him too, knowing it HAD to be done and that he couldnâ€™t just yell at the doctor to stop whatever he was doing and take me home. But he was so good, coz I didnâ€™t know he was feeling that way. I canâ€™t express enough how in love with Tim I felt through that experience. All I could think about was how soft his face was, and how nice he smelt and how wonderful it was to be loved by him. Through the pain, I still felt love, lots of it!

At one point the needle must have hit a nerve and my leg moved involuntarily and I screamed, I was in SO much pain it was awful. But soon after that happened it was all over and they asked Tim to help me lay down and get my legs up with the rest of the nursing staff. Thatâ€™s where I started giggling. I couldnâ€™t help them one little bit. My legs where dead but I could still feel them. It was like having pins and needles, or when your foot goes to sleep and all you can feel is the sensation of it being touched. I couldnâ€™t stop laughing!!! Right up until I got the shiverâ€™s!! Like when youâ€™re really cold, my teeth were chattering and I couldnâ€™t stop it and didnâ€™t feel cold at all!

So they started. Tim sat by my head and held my free hand, making fun of me to take my mind off what was happening. Again, I couldnâ€™t have gone through this without him by my side. I didnâ€™t feel a single ounce of pain, but I could still feel that they were doing something. I donâ€™t know any times of how long it took, but finally I heard a little cry (8.27am) and even though we knew we were having a boy, they said the words â€œcongratulations, you have a baby boyâ€ and very very quickly held him up high enough for me to see him over the curtain. All I saw was his big ballâ€™s though! They were HUGE!!!!!

They did his obs on a table I could see, and I cried as they did it. I wanted him with me so bad but knew I had to wait. Tim and I sat there watching and I totally forgot that they now had to work on sewing me up. Tim kept whispering â€œLook what we made Mummyâ€ and kissing my forehead. Again, another moment of pure love that made me cry even more! They put Jaxon on my chest for a couple minutes but he needed to be kept warm so they had to take him away. Tim went with them, I wanted him to.

Getting sewn up was the weirdest thing I will ever have to explain. I could feel them moving my skin, but it felt like it was up in the middle of my belly button. And as they were pulling the thread through I could feel the pulling on the skin, but it wasnâ€™t painful. It was SO funny. I wasnâ€™t laughing of course, but it was funny.

Tim came back in and sat with me for the last 10 or so minutes. At one point the doctor mumbled something and I didnâ€™t hear it. Perhaps thatâ€™s what was meant to happen because I made the mistake of saying â€œI didnâ€™t hear thatâ€ and so he stuck his head over the curtain and said â€œIâ€™m just sticking some pain killerâ€™s up your BUMâ€ Gee thanks MISTER!! If ever there was a TMI that I really didnâ€™t need to know, this was it!!!!

Once I was out in recovery they gave me my little boy. He is so precious. I was really not ready to be a Mum and wish I had some sort of time machine to bring back the pregnancy. Here is this little squirming thing that needs ME, that depends on MEâ€¦and I feel helpless!! The midwife put him on my boob for a drink and taught Tim the words â€œOoooMâ€ and â€œNum Numâ€ which he says now every time itâ€™s time to go on the boob!! I swear weâ€™ll be having sex for the first time and heâ€™ll be saying them then too!

I kept saying to the midwife that JJâ€™s little feet were going blue, and they were. By the time she came to look he was going purple. He couldnâ€™t keep himself warm which is when they put him under the heat (my profile pic was taken then, thatâ€™s obviously Timâ€™s hand!) They took him away for a bath, and 20 or so minutes later put me back in my room where Mum patiently waited for me.

The Stay

Because of the Gestational Diabetesâ€™ and the fact that they said he was no further than 36 weeks when he was born, JJ couldnâ€™t maintain his body heat and had to stay under the heat on my chest for a full day. I was boiling, but had to do it for him. The first midwife to give me a sponge bath was a MAN! He also happened to be the first one to help me with breast feeding. We didnâ€™t think he was getting any milk so THE MAN midwifeâ€¦HE milked my boobs! OUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCHHHHH!!!!! OMG Iâ€™d rather have my bum fu%ked by a horse!! Again, it needed to be done so JJ could eat. On the next shift JJ was in the nursery and the midwife came in and did the same thing because his blood sugar levels were crashing. At this point I gave permission to give him formula if thatâ€™s what they needed to do. They were not getting a lot out of my boobs to help in that department. By the way, it is TWO WEEKS past op and as far as I know, my milk still has not come in. I am never firm and never engorged like everyone says I should be!

From this point on his blood sugar levels were checked every 3 hours. Seven days of heal pricksâ€¦his little feet were black and blue. I canâ€™t stress enough how critical it all felt from here on in. His blood sugar should have been above 2.6 but at times it was down to 1.4 and he was really crashing. These were very scary moments, and I was almost glad they had him in the nursery so I didnâ€™t see their frantic moves to get him back to normal.

I hadnâ€™t had morphine during the op so I got to have it for my first night in bed. It didnâ€™t take away the pain but BOY, did it make me feel good! That first night trying to sleep was absolute hell. I couldnâ€™t roll on to my sides; I never sleep flat on my back. I had the IV in AND the catheter in as well!! I kept telling everyone I should have had the catheter inserted at the beginning of the pregnancy! Twenty Four hours without a peeâ€¦absolute BLISS!!

The second day very early in the morning they took the IV and catheter out and forced me to get out of bed. OMG!!!! The horse WAS f^%king me six ways left of Sunday!!!!! I have never felt such intense pain as the pain of taking those steps towards the bathroom. The nurse helped me get undressed and popped me in the shower. Through the pain I was still p!ssed at her for having the shower on before I got out of bedâ€¦come on lady, water restrictionsâ€¦global warming!

I got to have a 2 minute shower before I fainted, out like a light. And if there was any dignity left in my poor olâ€™ body it left the building when she said â€œAre you dry everywhere?â€ and I had to ask her to dry my a$$ crack AGAIN! So she dressed me and walked me out, Tim was waiting. I got to him and fainted again. I donâ€™t remember much at allâ€¦the pain went away!

But once I was out of bed the pain slowly eased up. I sat in a chair instead of in bed, and I walked all the way to the nursery to see JJâ€¦very VERY slowly! Now it only hurt to get in and out of bed, or to roll over. I still couldnâ€™t lay on my sides in bed either.

They decided that they would try to bottle feed him formula. But one of the midwives said â€œNipple Confusion! Nipple Confusion! (think â€œThe sky is falling the sky is falling!), donâ€™t do thatâ€¦I KNOW, weâ€™ll tube feed himâ€ So they put a tube down his little nose right into his stomach. Then they decided that I would breast feed once (15 minutes each side), and tube feed him the next feedâ€¦yay holding a syringe above his little head as the formula went inâ€¦what fun bonding we had!

Breast feeding didnâ€™t hurt me one little bit. It was totally frustrating though because he kept falling asleep on the boob. His blood sugar was so low he couldnâ€™t stay awake and he NEVER ever woke up crying to say he was hungry. He just kept sleeping right on through the feeds. While we were there for 9 days, we heard him cry 3 times.

Towards the end of day two in hospital, baby blues kicked in. It was very frustrating to have a crying baby by the bed and not be able to get out and help him. This one time, I was really feeling inadequate because of this. I had to buzz the nurses who took their sweet time to get to me and JJâ€¦to help me sort him out. At this point one of the nurses came in and sat with him and I lay in bed with the lights out crying. I couldnâ€™t help it. I felt so helpless and here are these midwives and nurses who make it all seem so easy. Who make stopping a crying baby and calming them down seem soâ€¦natural! It was anything but easy or natural for meâ€¦when getting out of bed was something I had to learn to do all over again.

At about 10pm that night the night nurse started her shift. And here starts the longest night of my life!! Up until now, three shifts of midwives that I happened to like and trust had told me 15 minutes on each breast, and a top up with formula. This nurse, Liezel comes along and wakes me up and told me I am starving my baby and we are doing it all wrong. SHE is the expert, SHE has just finished her schooling and it is HER that should be listened to. After my night of crying, and being so tired and worried for Jaxon, I totally lost it at her crying. I kept saying â€œWhy is it that ALL of the other nurses say one thing and you come here and say another?â€ and all sorts of things. I was SO confused. I couldnâ€™t stop crying, and she kept putting him on the boob even though he was asleep and dropping off every 30 seconds. Even though we had established that he wasnâ€™t getting anything from me. Through the tears I called Tim and told him if he didnâ€™t come and deal with this b!tchâ€¦I was walking home! So he came in and the Nazi nurse kept us up until 5am trying to get us to see that SHE was right and that she was the breast feeding Goddess of the world. She kept trying to get us to watch a latching on video. Hello b!tchâ€¦heâ€™s latching on just fine! Heâ€™s falling asleepâ€¦not latching wrong! I have MY technique down pat, he has his technique down patâ€¦he just canâ€™t stay awake!

Needless to say that nurse and I never got along. I will never forgive her for the hell she put us through every time she was on shift. JJ was on three hour feeds and she would FORCE us to breast feed him (even though he wasnâ€™t getting ANYTHING from me since my milk wasnâ€™t in) for 2.5 hours and then say â€œRight well you have half an hour to sleep, we need to feed in half an hourâ€ LIKE HELL woman! Heck, I think Iâ€™ll write a complaint about her Nazi ways!

I was spoiled there because in a three bed bedroom I was all alone for 5 days. Tim could come and go as he pleased; visitorâ€™s had the run of the room. I even walked around naked a bit! Seriously all of your dignity goes out the window when a male midwife gives you a sponge bath AND milkâ€™s you like a cow IN FRONT of your husband and every member of staffâ€¦nurse, doctor or otherwise has seen your tits or worse, your twat!! Oh and letâ€™s not forget the doctor shoving pain killerâ€™s up youâ€™re a$$!

So night five comes along and 2 other woman have their babies and join me. This was very stressful. And it was frustrating to watch them WALK to their beds just an hour after having their babies naturally. It was heart breaking to see them bonding with their babies, and changing their babies and feeding their babies the very next day and again I cried A LOT. For me I didnâ€™t have a clue how to change a nappy because the nurses did it for me all the time. And when one of them finally said â€œIâ€™ve left the nappy for youâ€ I cried my eyes out because I had no clue! But I did make friends with both woman, and since we live in a small town our kids will grow up together. We took photoâ€™s of all of them togetherâ€¦JJ (5 pound 15 ounces) looked tiny next to an 8 pounder and a 10 pounder! And one of them, Nicki is going to complain about Nazi Nurse as wellâ€¦so thatâ€™s even better!!!!!

So tube feeding went on for another couple of nights. I was going stir crazy and got sent home between feeds during the day (the first time Maddy and Mexxi were SO happy to see me that I cried!) Then, a midwife that I had a really big fight with when I was working at the hospital came on shift and I was dreading my night even more than those with the Nazi nurse. But you know whatâ€¦she was lovely. She said â€œItâ€™s about time JJ came to the party and played ballâ€ and she helped us to keep him awake. She forced him to breast feed every time he ate. And we weighed him before and after each feed to see how much he was getting from the boob. NOT MUCH at all!! He was meant to be getting 40 mil per feed but he was only getting 15 mil or so. So we HAD to formula feed to get him full and maintain his blood sugar.

The very last night we were there an OLD SCHOOL nurse came on. Tim thought we would hate her, but it was her that made us see that tube feeding was not the answer here. We told her how frustrated I was at being kept in there. That I felt like they would keep us in until JJ was toilet trained and that I just couldnâ€™t bond with him if one) he had his face covered in this big ugly tape and tube, and two) I had to feed him by holding a syringe above his face, it wasnâ€™t healthy for either of usâ€¦or Tim. So she taught us a few more keeping baby awake tricks, and said â€œNipple confusionâ€¦.pffffft what a loud of crap! Letâ€™s just concentrate on getting him fed! Bottle feed him and you can go home!â€ But we did the weigh before and weigh after a breast feed, and with her keeping awake techniques and other thingsâ€¦he got his 40 mil quota!! Tim did the weigh and double checked, and checked again. I thought he was trying to figure it outâ€¦but he was double checking. I cried I was so happy!!!

So the next day, we told all of the nurses OUR plan. Screw what they had to say about tube feeding and blah blah, we ARE going home at 8pm tonight, we will express and feed if thatâ€™s what it takes. So we hired an electric pump and thatâ€™s what weâ€™ve been doing ever since. Itâ€™s tiring but the good news is we had our first childrenâ€™s health services visit last week and THEY figured out within two minutes of hearing our story and looking in JJâ€™s mouth that he is SEVERELY tongue tied! Thatâ€™s why heâ€™s not getting anything from me; he canâ€™t bring his tongue up under the nipple to draw the milk down! Iâ€™m sort of p!ssed the midwives AND the doctor didnâ€™t look at that. They seemed so content to just tube feed him for the rest of his life. Like how hard can it be to say â€œbaby not feeding wellâ€¦check listâ€¦is the baby tongue tied? Donâ€™t blame the mother for doing it wrong or holding the baby wrong, or the baby for latching wrongâ€¦check for freaking tongue tie and fix the actual problem!!

SO thatâ€™s our VERY long story!! We came home and have played happy families ever since! Tomorrow (today) we fix the tongue tie, a very simple operation that will take less than two minutes. Then I should be able to take the machine back and breast feed like every other mother!

And before I go, a very special thank you to JeannetteKirk for her constant SMS/TEXT support through out my lonely nights! I cried every time Tim had to leave. Weâ€™ve never spent a single night apart and it was so hard watching him go. Without her support I would still be there battling now depression!

Jaxon’s Birth Story

Posted on 5 February, 2007 by Boo

The BIG Event

So pre op started, they put the stockings on me, paper underwear and a surgical gown and cap. SEXY!! Tim asked the mid wife if she could leave us alone for ten minutes I looked so damned hot.

The Stay