storbarnsförälder

( Tucked away )
Rob has been very energetic and cheerful. The new job suits him brilliantly. This morning he finally did some DIY that has been waiting for months and months - shelves in the front room - and also repaired last week's trike puncture, sorted out the gears on the trike, and ran some errands.

And Taimatsu came over and we weighed towels and sorted them for dying; the first load is in the washing machine right now. I hope they come out ok. There's no reason why they shouldn't, of course. Then we'll have a whole set of matching family household everyday towels, enough for everything we need, I hope. I would really, really like that.

Now Rob is coming back from Argos with a deep bookcase for the children's room and hopefully a saddle-cover for the trike for him.

My midwife's backup midwife came today. It had to be today, because Rob had some time off in lieu and won't be able to come from Google for antenatal appointments and today is his last day in the local job. She was pleasant and it was a useful meeting; now I know that if she's the one we get when it all kicks off we all know each other and what the situation is and she knows where we live and so on.

This is Rob's last day of being gone 7:45 to 17:15 - from now on, it'll be about 06:55 to 19:10, which is a bit longer for me and the children (I am having trouble doing sums but I think it's 9h30 vs 12h15). We've sorted out frozen meals for the first week or so while we find our feet. And today I'm doing very little; the fall off the train did have an effect on my general well-being, in that my SPD is sharper and my BH contractions are more frequent and stronger, though those not as much today as yesterday, so I think that will ease off soon. Some things are going to be complicated as the SPD gets worse though, such as getting the children to swimming and Girls Brigade (I already need to be extremely well to get them to ERAPA, and they don't like travelling in the heat or rain so we haven't been going much).

I need to hang laundry; I spent this morning cuddling Emer, who was very upset that she hadn't been allowed to get up in the nighttime and play so that she wouldn't fall asleep and have bad dreams. Instead she slept on Rob, until he lay down, and we all slept in awful painful positions in the big bed, Rob with his feet on the pillow and me facing the wrong way with my hips twisted nastily and Emer sprawled out between us. Actually, I think Emer's position was fine from her point of view, but from mine it was painful! So this morning I haven't done my minimum housework, and I ought to, because then I can do nothing at all with a clear conscience.

It's also my last evening off for a while, I think; Rob will come home, take Linnea to Girls Brigade, and take Emer swimming, and I will have almost two hours to myself. Next week I'll have to take them both to GB and of course I won't be able to to take E swimming so we will just wait - possibly if the library is open for some of it we can go there. There's even a possibility that Rob would be home from work in time to collect L from Girls Brigade, depending on the culture in that office; a lot depends on who gets to leave on time and who stays late to deal with transatlantic meetings and so on, and who Rob needs to be with for his first week while he's picking up the ropes.

The biggest bonus is that Rob is no longer going to be unhappy in his work. That will revolutionize evenings and weekends, no kidding. Even just having handed in his notice made a huge difference; actually working somewhere he likes will make a bigger one. The children are beginning to come around to the idea too, though Emer is a bit upset ("I will neber see Daddy at dinner again EVER!") and I'm pretty sure that when the new improved Rob shows up they'll be as enthusiastic about the change as we are.

Some things:

Sunscreen in spray bottles with a pump-action lid is not practical for our household. Neither of the adults can use it tidily and neither of the children can resist spraying it everywhere.

Keeping huge clothes in the attic was a very very good idea and I feel much better today having sized up again. Also, I learned (while digging through old, larger clothes) that my bra band has gone up eight inches so far this pregnancy. No wonder I so often felt I couldn't breathe.

Linnea's Girls Brigade bunch did a Sports Day and she won the obstacle race. She is absolutely elated. School-type Sports Days are a glorious ambition of hers and she's never made it to one before, though we had a few opportunities.

We need to buy Emer a floatie vest like the one Linnea had when she was 18 months. She doesn't get to go swimming anything like often enough, sadly.

Today was going brilliantly until I gave Linnea a joyous hug and she joyfully wrapped her legs around my middle and my hips just about caved under the strain and now I can't expletiving walk. As I was sitting recovering with my head in my hands and my feet on a carefully positioned stool Emer objected and wrenched the expletive thing away and my hips got even worse.

Now everyone is screaming and shouting and crying and I gave myself a headache sobbing over the pain.

If I could remember where the pain-

[power to laptop died]

Well, Emer calmed down enough to hand me my mobile phone, and I phoned Rob, who told me where the painkillers were; Linnea fetched me some and a glass of water, and Rob came home. I am now in bed awaiting hot water bottles for my joints and tea for my nerves, and he will also feed the children, who kicked up a massive fuss when I said I couldn't stand up to cook lunch and could they make their own (not because they can't make a damn sandwich but because they object to an incapable mother).

I am so tired of today. I have also remembered that I haven't yet complained about the disabled access at Bath Spa railway station, nor blogged about the bizarre woman on the bus who objected to my having crutches.

A normal, health c-section is much riskier for mother and baby than a normal, healthy vaginal delivery.

Breastmilk is nutritionally superior to formula milk.

It's still not spelled "dialate".

Babies do not sleep 8 hours at a stretch at night at 3 weeks. You can't make it. It's cruel to try.

Some things are not "parental choice" issues, like feeding a newborn skim-milk from a cow because you don't want it to get too fat.

Some things really are "parental choice" issues, like which sets of mutually contradictory evidence-based advice one follows about pacifier use, cosleeping, etc.

If one child is reading quietly upstairs and the other is hiccupping contentedly in her pram, it's time to make tea and read "The Keeper of the Bees". Self-massage of sling-abused shoulders optional.

The cleaners came today and cleaned while we were swanning around town; they even got the scale off the sink, though I have no idea how. I think they scratched the porcelain but I'm not complaining.

There was also post; I got some tie-dyed baby clothes, which I can now pack in my hospital bag, and another cheque for the new book, and a wedding invite for self and Rob, and some junk. I'm very pleased about the clothes because I was looking forward to them and hoping I wouldn't have to buy nasty pastels or stuff from websites outside the UK with uncertain postal practices.

We bought lots of things for Linnea's lunches for while I'm in hospital, so that packed lunches will be easier, and we bought a vast amount of meat for roasting and slicing and freezing.

My mother got a ferry ticket and train tickets and should arrive sometime about 7 pm tomorrow, all going well. She also has a mobile phone, which I'm delighted about. I hope she likes it as much after a week's use as she does now.

Being in a wheelchair is massively liberating on account of not being able to walk around otherwise, and takes Attitude. It would be very, very easy to be invisible. One guy responded to "Excuse me" in a shop with "I'm leaving in a minute." A few minutes later a shop assistant asked him to move to let me past, in my wheelchair, and I said "Oh no, he's already refused to move once." He got Looked At by everyone else there, I think. (If he had any physical disability preventing him from moving swiftly and nimbly, it was cured by the shop assistant asking him rather than me asking him).

Reading town centre is beautifully set up for wheelchair use though, really - I knew it was good for buggies, and it turns out that that does translate to good for wheelchairs. In general, people in shops were pleasant and responded to me when I spoke, though a few people responded to Rob. I have been wondering how to find out what it's like to get a wheelchair onto the buses that give me trouble with a buggy, but I can't figure out an honorable way to do it, since it's clearly a misuse of the free loan of a chair from the shopping centre.

Here I go, stopping.

I did leave the house today - I went to the library by bus, bringing Linnea in the buggy, because I can't walk with her any more (she's too fast) and I can't walk as far as the library. I was in too much pain by the time I arrived to do much, but I did return some books and attempt to sort out the problem with the book I returned ages ago that periodically reappears in my list as overdue. I sat on a chair and Linnea read a stack of books. We didn't withdraw any because I'd be in hospital when they were due back, which wouldn't work well.

On the way back I couldn't walk all the way from the bus-stop to the house so we stopped at the sandwich shop. Linnea ate the sausage and ketchup from her sausage sandwich, and I had a baguette, and then we went home. Shortly after that I moved badly while kneeling down and ended up shaking, sick, and crying from the pain. So that was the afternoon written off.

None of this is related to the previous birth injuries, by the way. This is something weird happening to my pelvis. I am not allowing it to actually happen, though. Nu-uh.

Linnea was pretty worried about me. I was oddly able to smile brightly and sound cheery and fine, though, as long as I was talking to her. I managed clipped civility with my mother in law. When no-one was looking I was a godawful mess.