ml's & kg's

As a new Mom now prepared for the arrival of your baby, you’re more than likely a formidable force. With the Baby Room as close to exact as you wanted and could get it, the little clothes all rinsed out with baby –friendly washing powder with softener in it, and all folded into neat organized piles and arranged in drawers and on shelves, with baby toiletries neatly lined up to an order that only you will notice – you are 100% ready for Baby. Well, aside from some pre-birth jitters, which everyone assures you is natural and which you will feel no matter how many children you have or in what manner.

Lethally armed with baby bag and personal bag for the hospital, your greatest weapon is your Knowledge Bag. All neatly filed in your mind is all the information you have gleaned through watching, listening and reading up about everything there is to know about babies so that you too will know what to do with the little person about to arrive.

And he arrives, pink, healthy and with lots of voice and you’re scared shitless and wonder what the fuck you’re going to do now? You’ve fed him, burped him, changed him, and still he cries? Help!!!

Suddenly there’s information overload. There’s too many things it could be, too many things it couldn’t be, too many choices to make. Why wasn’t it simpler? Why wasn’t there just a wrong and a right? A black and a white? Where did all the grey areas come from???

He’s not taking to the milk, he is restless, trouble winding him – god I need some sleep, I’m gonna crack here – he’s got thrush in his mouth, could it be his ears? Is that raspiness from his nose or his chest? Is it hay fever or is it more serious than that? Grasping frantically at straws, we try new bottles, one after another, a mad kinda gleam in our overtired, burning eyes hoping that this will be the one – this teety bottle here will be the magic wand that will solve all these baby problems. But it’s not. So we turn to the gripe options. Gripe water, Bennett’s, Behoedmiddlel, Telament, we even make a mixture of them, but still nothing seems to work.

He’s allergic to the milk, we decide and turn our slightly crazed mind to the Formula and start…well making a new Formula – pardon the pun, it was intended. But that only makes it worse. And now we are in despair.

At our six week checkup at the Doctor we are assured his well, as long as his weight is on par and he is growing steadily, all is well. So we forge doggedly ahead, keeping an eagle eye on the weight, because as long as it’s on track, everything else we’ve been doing is fine, it’s what the Doctor said.

And so our lives and our first months with our first born are ruled in ml’s and kg’s. Millimeters and Kilograms.

Urgh!!

Someone prove me wrong, but I’m willing to bet on it, the second time round is not so bad. You’ve shortlisted what worked in the past and will discover not everything works the same for one as for another and so you’ll shorten the list even more, but you’re not as focused on the range the world offers, just the one your world narrowed down. And you experiment a little here and tweak a little there, and *Wa-la*, you have a ‘formula’ that works for you. And you enjoy your second child even more than your first born – who, by the way, continues to be the guinea pig in your world of choices, as he grows and ml’s and kg’s are no longer an issue, but perhaps rather liters and Kilometers and so forth!

And then, for those lucky enough – yes, I meant it, lucky enough, to have a third child, the world melts away. There are no ml’s, there are no kg’s – besides the absolute necessary . There’s just you and him and instead of counting the ml’s, you’re counting his smiles, and instead of checking the kg’s, your watching him grow and wishing he’d stop, because you know it’s over before it began, and chances are, it’s your last shot to enjoy these precious few weeks. You leave the worrying to the Doctors and let him be exactly what he is, a precious baby child that doesn’t always need a reason to cry, because crying is what babies do, it’s their thing. It’s not you, Mom, doing something wrong, it’s just their thing they do. And this new found relaxation carries over to the baby too, and they tell you what a wonderful young man you’ve got, how friendly and how relaxed, and you smile secretly, because you’re taking all the credit for it, because you damn well earned it.

Shopping With Ben 10

There are days I curse being South African.   Even though I live in what is often referred to as the most beautiful city in the world, Cape Town, there are still those days I wish I lived in the UK or States, where there's just more STUFF available. 

This wish rang repeatedly in my head as Jaco and I traipsed from shop to shop to find the kids their Christmas gifts.  My son is a huge Ben10 fan, but would you believe that here in sunny  RSA the only Ben10 stuff available is the cheaper Chinese toys - the 'immitations' should I say, and everything else is so overpriced, it would cost me a weeks' pay to buy the set.  And of course, there's only one or two of the action figures available, the rest is predictably 'out of stock' and has been for some months prior to Christmas.  WHATEVER.

And then we stumbled across some Ben10 goodies we hadn't seen before.  We didn't buy it, not at THAT asking price.   I'll say no more.   A picture speaks a 1000 words after all!

Santa Got a Buddy

Mom gets the tree up - yes, I know, it's a very LITTLE tree, but this is its last year with us...bear with me...the ligths are twinkling on and around the LITTLE tree.  Santa is in his place infront of it all.   He used to be able to sing and dance and even walk, but after two seasons with my son, he did little more than wobble, so now he just stands there.  
But CLEARLY Jacques thought there was something missing and gave Santa a buddy to keep him company.
And I just had to share...

Commander Potato & His Chick

Part of being an efficient and capable mom is learning to roll with the punches, go with the flow, expect the unexpected.  And there's plenty of the unexpected. 
So when you stick your hand in the pocket of potatoes at 08:00 am on a Sunday expecting to feel the round, slightly rough feel of a potato and instead feel something that is simultaneously hard and fluffy, do you have any choice but to shriek like a banship, whip your hand out the bag like it's been bitten and jump two feet away from the pocket of potatoes, staring at it in stunned horror and trying desperately to make sense of what just happened.

Two seconds later when you've gathered your wits and the courage to peep inside the bag, you feel like a complete twit when you see the following:-

Who?  How?  Your guess is as good as mine!

Things That Go Bump

Childparenting

Well, my son seems to have entered a new stage; he is afraid.  Of everything.   And me, being a concerned parent, have been racking my brains for a way to deal with this, and eventually Googled it.  Thank goodness for Google - I'd be lost without it!

Anyway, I am not sure if his father being away from home for a week is what started it off, or him having started a new creche the week before that.   Maybe a combination of both.  It started off small - he slept in the bed next to me while his dad was away, but he wanted me to come to bed the same time as he went.  Then he wanted me to go with him to the toilet and stand outside the door.  Then he didn't want to go into his room on his own.  And eventually he was literally walking around behind me, just about holding onto my clothes.   Now, even with his father back home, he won't go to the toilet on his own even while  the sun is still shining.

By now I was VERY concerned.

Some research on Google highlighted the fact that this appears to be normal - though in boys it can even start at the age of 9.  In girls it was more common around the six year mark.

It's crucial to approach this in the right way though.   Stressed over and over in the articles I read was the fact that this fear is very real to the child, and should not be brushed off by the parent.   Things like nightlights, staying with the child until he or she is asleep, etc was suggested.   Therapy was highly recommended in the more extreme cases, as well as parent child councelling. 

Now I don't know about you, and I feel almost guilty for admitting this outloud, but I don't have the financial resources at this point, or the ability to take time off work to take my son to councelling.

What I am trying to do is to understand him better and have conversations with him to try to draw out his fears.   I also try to send him off to bed with 'happy' thoughts in his head about the little mice that go food hunting in the dark, and the dogs that are on guard and the cat that is out playing with the neighbours cats while we humans are sleeping.  This seems to be working well.   

I found a wonderful website that I am going to share with you, where you can read up about your child's age and what is generally the developmental stages within this age, as well as suggestions on discipline, etc.  I found it infinitely useful and also put my mind at ease about some issues that I found were just plain normal for his age.

And so we learn, step by step.  The hardest job on Earth - and there's no Instruction Manual!