Princess Brooklyn - 3y + 2m

Dear Princess Brooklyn

This whole month you have had your Nana Shona staying which has meant that you get an extra set of eyes to entertain. We haven't done too much exciting unfortunately, mainly due to lack of sleep and the weather not being too great. You had a few birthday parties this month. I  had to drop you at one and leave because I had to go to work. You had a great time, my favourite was Millar's bacause I got to take miniature train rides with you. I love having Brooklyn and Me time.

Nico's group is not on in the school holidays which has meant that you and I got to go to YOUR playgroup on Wednesday mornings. We made Easter baskets the first week and then had a little easter egg hunt the second week. I love watching you play with your friends, realising how much you really do play together now, rather than just along side each other. You make dolls/ figures/ animals talk to each other and will try to include everyone in the play. Games are still a bit out of your league. You understand taking turns but any other type of rule escapes you. Maybe in a few more months.

Holly comes to play here once a week or so, and you sing/chant "We are best friends, we are best friends, we are best friends" (Well, it is more like "We are bes fens" but we know what you mean) and have a great time together. You cuddle up on the couch for quiet time and watch Tinkerbell or Barbie. You have been going to daycare together on thursdays for a few months now so I think that made you even closer. You are going there for Easter today with Nana Shona and Dad, I will be there after work. We did a mini one in the front garden this morning

You have been helping me out in the kitchen a fair bit the last month or so too. Pouring, mixing, scraping. I think the only reason you like baking is to lick the bowl. Popcorn is the other favourite at the moment. Luckily we have glass lids so you can see the kernels popping and bouncing around the pot.

Just this week, we painted the hallway, dining and playroom. you got to help out in your playroom and were very good at it. You had a great time and were very proud of yourself.

Also this month I found my EFTPOS card you were "playing" with in September. In a bag of cotton wool balls under Nico's change table.

Hey Brooklyn, guess what.
I love you

Mama

Your funniest utterings this month.

"Mama... look... Dad is full of it!!"  (He was standing on a chair, leaning on the wall painting. I think you meant something ab out falling...)

"Nana, put that dirty old thing out and come and play!" (cigarette)

Driving "Mama, can I sit on your lap?" (No, you are not allowed, the policeman will get angry) "But he isn't here! He can't see me!"

After i told you to go to the toilet, which you didn't want to "Oh! Bother!!"

Hands

So there is a competition going on I thought I would enter.

Your best/ favourite bodily feature. I don't like much about me... so it was a bit hard. I was thinking eyes. I get told they are pretty cool. The problem is writing about your eyes and why you like that part.

"I like my eyes because they are pretty and blue, and I get complimented on them." BLAH!!!

SO I chose this

 I know it is a crappy photo but it was blown up.

My hands. I like them.
They are big for a lady but not manly... and they can pull off chunky jewellery.
They are delicate (and steady!) enough to thread a needle
They are strong and don't usually need a man to open a jar.
They are gentle and their touch can take away my childrens fear.

Research done on little micro prems like Nico, when they are still tiny, in isolettes, struggling to fight... a simple touch can improve all their vitals. Oxygen intake, heart rate, blood pressure. They are magic. When you can't do anything for your baby, not even hold him in your arms, feed him, lift him...the touch of your hand is all you have. The only thing you can do is softly hold his foot, place your palm on his back or your pinky in his fist and believe you are making a difference in his fragile life.

Nico at 6 weeks old

I love my hands. Not only as a body part but for what they have come to represent for me. They remind me of Nico's size, his progress and his struggle.

I also appreciate being able to scratch the annoying mozzie bite on my knuckle.

SO what about you? What's your fave body part? Take a photo and enter it over at Danimezza's blog.

Dear Nico - 18 months

Dear Nico,

A little late this month, it's been a bad week so I had to chose sleep over writing.

18 months is a milestone and it makes me sad to realise how old you are. I don't know how to express why without sounding negative and like I wish you were your sister but I will try. At 18 months your sister had experienced so much, she had been overseas half a dozen times, had holidays and her life was great. She was having playdates and running around like a crazy chicken, learning so much. We didn't know it at the time but she was about to have an amazing little man come into her life. You were supposed to be many more months away. I look at your day to day life and my heart breaks for you. Still so trapped, so frustrated. Watching life go by, understanding what is going on around you but not being able to participate the way I know you would want to. Not being able to give you the usual experiences a 1 1/2 year old has. It's just not fair.

You have your squiggle chair now, albeit with the wrong head support. It means you have a good supportive place to sit and we can push you around the house. It goes high to be at table level with us, or low to be at Brooklyn's play height. She loves to push you around and I think she is a bit envious of your cool chair. She loves her Mister Man and tries so hard to make you laugh or smile. You definately know what I am telling you when I say "Here comes your sister" or "Where is Brooklyn?!" and you get really excited. Lately your favourite game is to chase her around the house. I hold under your arms and you run after her. It makes all of us laugh and gives me warm fuzzies.

We continue to work on teaching you to control your arms/ hand/ feet. There have been some good signs, all dependent on your mood. Biala (Early Intervention) has a lot of "switch toys". They are your usual baby toys with music or movement but they have been adapted to have a giant switch, about the size of a large saucer/ small bread plate. The idea is to get you to hit the switch with your hand or stomp on it with your foot. You are good at it with your foot, stomping is a natural movement for you. On the right day, you are getting your arm/ hand to do it as well, if you are lying on your side and we support your shoulder to get you arm forward. I am such an emotional mess, I often cry when you get it right. Silly I know but it is such an encouragement to me that you will be able to amuse yourself at some point in the future and not just have to sit on the sidelines.

Today you got your  Bard Button, which looks like this the top sits on your skin like a little lilo valve. It should make you more comfortable when sleeping since you insist on being on your tummy. The tube you had really annoyed you. It will also make it easier for us to dress and carry you. It was a quick op today and even though you were pretty miserable after coming out of general anaesthetic, by later in the afternoon you were back to normal.

You have been pretty unsettled the last 2 weeks, I think because of your molars. you have one giant one through now and the other 3 are all so close. You are back to hourly wake ups most nights but go back to sleep pretty quickly. I just wish I could do something to take all the pain away, teeth or otherwise. I feel so helpless and hopeless. I really do feel like the worst mother in the world when you are screaming... I want so much to fix it all but just have to walk away sometimes to avoid having a breakdown.

Pics to come.. sometime soon

Love every little piece of you, but most of all your giggle.


Mama

A blogs life

Something a lot of people wouldn't know, is that when you blog, you read a lot of blogs and there is a littlearge community of bloggers out there, entertaining and supporting each other, most of all giving the writer an audience. I am new to this little world and admittedly am still finding it a bit strange and don't think of myself as a true blogger like all those people I love to read. They are all fabulous writers, I am just keeping journal online which I choose to allow others to read. One day maybe I will feel good enough, interesting enough, and be creative enough to feel like I am one of 'them'

I know the lovely Toushka, (before I was a blogger) She was kinda my little mentor without even knowing. I 'followed' her onto a parenting site that she had told me about and started to blog there, not even knowing what blogging meant. I just thought I was sharing my story... after losing our middle bub, it was a way to cope without dragging 'real friends' down too much with my misery. The support I got from people who had been through similar experiences was great. When Nico came along I decided that, like Toushka, I would get a blog site so I could pretty up his story. My intention was to print off a copy as a book once the NICU journey was over.

Through this, I discovered the blog community and have peered into the lives of people I have never met. It's a mixture of reading a book that never ends, watching a TV series and learning about a new friend. One of my regular reads Singular Insanity  was at kids party I went to. Her face looked familiar to me but I was not 100% sure... then she said her kids names and I knew. Here is a person who; you  know by name and  face, you know a fair bit about, you have had small conversations through Facebook or on blogs... and yet you haven't met nor was this a planned meeting. I tend not to put photos of myself online so I didn't expect her to know who I am. I felt like a stalker meeting the ...victim (??) and really wasn't sure how to say hi... or how much - if any - of what I had read of hers, I could make reference to without coming across like said stalker!

Next week, I'm going to dinner with a group of bloggers (including Singular Insanity) organised by  Danimezza  who is in Melbourne for the week and I am not sure how its going to be. I haven't been out with new people, on my own, in years. I can't wait but I am freaking out. I might have nothing to say. There might be a secret language that I don't understand. Maybe my 800-1000 page views makes me ineligible to even call myself a blogger and I will be turned away. Or maybe I will have a great time, meet some fabulous people and reclaim a little bit of me.

Sticks and stones

Warning. Uncensored post. Not designed for warm fuzzies. Just letting my fingers type and see what comes out 

Words hurt. Words can eat you from the inside out. This past 2 years certainly proved that to me.

GP: "An MPT. Medical pregnancy termination" (in response to my asking what I had just sat the ED for 8 hours waiting for, only to be sent back to my GP to tell him he was meant to make a booking)

Genetics specialist "Your baby is not compatible with life outside the womb" (not Nico, middle bub)

Sonographer "Your cervix is short and dilated which tells us you are likely having this baby sooner rather than later" (at 20 weeks pregnant)

Obstectrician "Probably better to go into labour in the mext 2 weeks, then it can be called a miscarriage"

Obstetrician "I would prefer it if your husband were here when I tell you this, but your waters have certainly broken and you are quite dilated" (the day I turned 23 weeks)

NICU nurse "We had to resuscitate him"

NICU nurse "Take him and get the mother out of here, quick."

I am getting pretty sick of these words, nesting in my head ... lurking in the back, seldom used corners. Like a spider you glance at now and then, expecting it to just go away if you leave it long enough... and to your surprise is still there, everysingle time, looking like it hasn't even moved.

We have our precious little miracle man and although he comes with a new set of words I would rather not hear, we have him. So now I just have to get rid of those cobwebs that are cluttering my brain and focus on the blessing that is my children, husband ... family and friends.

Flash back.

Today I had one of those days. A day where I just wished I could rewind my life 5 years and be in a place where I have no one else to take care of, no one to worry about or sort out. Just for a day. The time where I could lie in bed all day because of a minor but persisting headache. The time where if I didn't want to cook dinner, I could have Weetbix sprinkled with Milo and no one could care less. But that was then.

5 years ago, I lived the high life. Literally. We had an apartment on the 22nd floor in the CBD of Melbourne.  Our view extended from the MCG to the left, Albert Park dead ahead, to Port Phillip Bay over Port Melbourne on the right. We had a gym, tennis court, swimming pool and barbecue area on the 3rd floor, and the Crown complex was at the end of our street, 3 minutes walk away. Every day I walked into that building, through the foyer with its little couches that no one ever used, I felt like I was living in a hotel, but in a good way.

We lived 3 floors up from where those front balconies become triangular

We both worked 5 days a week but somehow we saw more of each other then. Our life comprised of shopping, bars, lazing in parks and going for drives. My favourite weekend away was to the Japanese Mountain Retreat. Just driving into the grounds, we knew we were about to be experience something special... being shown into the room was beyond serenity. Shoji/ rice paper screens, tatami mat, neck deep bath next to a giant picture window overlooking a private miniature Japanse garden.

I'd only like to go back to that life for short periods though. A day or two a year would suit me just fine (unless it was to the retreat... I would stay there a week a month) In this life, we can step outside to a yard, albeit small, and not not have to take an elevator. I love to wake get up - after 7am please- to my gorgeous children's smiles rather than brief acknowledging ones from strangers on the tram. We have true friends now, not the fickle "See-You-At-The-Bar" type we mainly had in our city life.

And if I have to get up in the morning, against my will, and brave the headache... these are the two that I want to stumble through the day with.

Even if Prince grumbles all day and Princess steals my convealer, puts it on her lips and plays annoying Hannah Montana songs on the guitar.