OMG WTF?!

Thursday was Milkbaby's 1st birthday.  It started off pretty well, with some present opening before breakfast, and then a rousing chorus of Happy Birthday upon arrival at creche.  I went to work, sat at my desk and breathed a sigh of relief (largely for having made it to work looking somewhat decent and without snot on my shoulder).  I did a bit of work and thought about what kind of cake Milkbaby might like.

At about 11am, I thought "oo, sore boob".  By 11.30, said sore-boob was impinging on my ability to type, so I took matters into my own hands (haha), and relieved sore-boob of some milk.  Easy.  (The hard part was flushing it - that stuff's like liquid gold.)

Shortly thereafter I started feeling a bit vomity.  I thought I'd better take myself on a field trip to the work sick bay.   And so by about lunchtime I was a shivering, feverish, nauseous wreck, huddled in fetal position under neon lights in the sick bay.  All I could think was OMG WTF?!  And "how am I going to bake a cake now?"

The sore-boob had become a red-hot-poker-boob.  I knew what this was.  You guessed it: MASTITIS.

Or maybe you didn't and you're thinking "huh?  I thought only cows got mastitis."

Poor, poor cows.

Fairy Godsister swept in and efficiently took me to the doctor, picked up my prescription, tucked me up in bed, picked up the DH and Milkbaby, played with Milkbaby, helped get him fed and ready for bed, and then cooked dinner.

Women are renowned multi-taskers, and motherhood hones your multi-tasking skills.  Breastfeeding is an opportune time for a little multi-tasking: your nursling is relatively still and you have at least one hand free.  My best breastfeeding multi-task is being able to change a nappy while breastfeeding - IN THE DARK.  I did not expect, however, to ever ever have to VOMIT and breastfeed at the same time.  This is what I found myself doing on Thursday evening.  It was not very dignified but I am happy to report that I managed to keep myself and Milkbaby completely clean, and Milkbaby didn't even notice the drama.

By Saturday I was still feeling and looking like a carsick beagle, the red-hot-poker-boob had an angry big red patch covering it, and to boot the milk had all but dried up.  Milkbaby was unimpressed.  I called my neighbour, a lactation consultant.

"I'm worried about my miilllk..."  I whined.
"I'm worried about you" she said.  "You should be feeling better by now and the redness should have gone.  I think you should go to A&E."
"But I'm supposed to be getting my hair cut today." [rising panic]
"Well, get your hair cut, then take yourself down to the hospital." (Luckily she's very sensible and understanding like that.)

And that, people, is exactly what I did.

To be continued...

Happy 1st Birthday

About 15 months ago, 13 couples sat nervously in a church hall, awaiting the start of their first antenatal class.  As we introduced ourselves, we were asked to reflect on what we were most apprehensive about.  One said (and I'm paraphrasing here) "I was a bit nervous about who we'd end up with in the group, but just from looking around the room I think we've done alright."

Last weekend, 11 of the original 13 couples and their babies gathered to celebrate the babies' first birthday.  It was an informal affair, with most of us taking the opportunity to have a well-deserved beer.  The mamas took the opportunity to catch up on the minutiae of motherhood and other gossip (we've been seeing each other every week for a year now), while the dads got reacquainted with each other and each other's offspring.

This event would have passed without mention, but part of it was particularly memorable.  We decided to do an obligatory "1st birthday line-em-up on the couch" photo.  Previous attempts at similar photos have been notoriously unsuccessful, invariably resulting in a chorus of babies screaming at about 300 decibels.  Now that all the babies are very mobile, getting them all to sit nicely together on the couch was never going to be possible.  But somehow we wrestled them all into the frame, with some sitting nicely, some standing on the couch and some standing on the floor in front of the couch.  The whole thing seemed on the verge of meltdown, with a few of the babies already crying, Milkbaby standing on the head of another baby who'd slipped into a very low slouch from her sitting position, and about four others squished into the corner of the couch.  I started to clap and cheer, largely to gain the attention of Milkbaby, and this stunned a few of the babies into silence, and then someone started to sing Happy Birthday.  And there we were, a group of 30-somethings singing Happy Birthday to our precious 1 year olds.  We were singing for them of course (the incredulous looks on their faces said it all), but in a way we were singing for ourselves too.

If you'd asked me at that first antenatal group if I could visualise myself with a one year old, singing happy birthday together with the people in the room, I would have smiled and thought "nah probably not".  I don't think any of us could have imagined it - or any part of this wild and wonderful journey for that matter.  At the risk of sounding a bit cheesy, I'd like to publicly thank all the other mums in our antenatal group - our catch ups were the highlight of my week and helped me more than anything else to retain some semblance of sanity and good humour.  And I know now that we'll be staying firm friends.  I can almost taste the beer and hear the Happy Birthday chorus at the pub in a year's time.

The pukester

Milkbaby's a puker.  And when I say "puke", I'm not talking about your usual baby posseting.

Posset (the Old English kind) 

"Posset" - isn't that such a lovely polite Victorian word?  You can use it next time your co-worker turns up to work with baby vomit on his shoulder ("is that posset on your shoulder?").  Or to tell your friend that your baby's spilled on her new carpet ("sorry it's just a bit of posset").  It doesn't sound as horrid as "vomit".  Actually "posset" is Old English for "a spiced drink of hot sweetened milk curdled with wine or ale" (mmm).  But I use it here to describe the small amount of curdled milk that's often regurgitated onto your shoulder after a feed.

Milkbaby was definitely not a posseter.  He didn't even start this puking thing until he was around 6 months old.  But since then he's made it his special talent, to be practised at least once a week, sometimes every day.  And when I say puke, I mean stomach-emptying, projectile barfing.  I often wonder if it's payback for all the vomiting I did throughout my childhood - on pretty much any car, plane, bus or boat trip longer than 30 minutes.

It's been a bit of a household mystery.  The start of the puking coincided with the introduction of solids (and unless you're new to this blog you'll know that Milkbaby is all "meh, solids, schmolids - just give me some milk please").  The puking also coincided with the arrival of teeth.  So our list of possible causes have been:

• food allergy (I even kept a Puke Diary for a while - but no clues)
• teething
• constipation (the Plunket nurse suggested this)
• motion-sickness
• a series of bugs (this was the doctor's suggestion - then she suggested I keep Milkbaby isolated from other children for 6 weeks...)
• wind
• overactive gag reflex
• all of the above??

Last night's puke, and the inspiration for this blog, caused Mama a few tears.  After a weekend of eating very little, Milkbaby finally had a semi-decent dinner, scrambled eggs and some avocado.  I dared to think that I might get a decent night's sleep - or at least a stretch of longer than 3 hours.  He then proceeded to jam his fingers under the bathroom door, and in the midst of the screaming, vomited said dinner.  My hopes of a decent sleep went down the gurgler, literally.  I wept with frustration as Milkbaby, now happy, threw bath toys out of the bath.

These I'm-so-upset-I-need-to-puke pukes don't really worry me.  They're unusual, but sometimes crying's a violent habit.  It's the I've-been-sleeping-for-2-hours-puke for no apparent reason that's a bit baffling.  We're no closer to working out the cause.  And I have my suspicions that the puking is linked to Milkbaby's lack of interest in solids.  But in the meantime we've got a great list of puke spots - all christened by Milkbaby:

• down my chest
• the floor of Noel Leeming
• the floor of his room and every other room in the house
• the bathroom sink (bullseye!) or the bathroom floor
• the grandparents' houses
• into a sick bag on a plane (another bullseye!)
• the back of the rental car in Australia
• the back of the complimentary car while the VW was in the shop
• the garden bar of the Southern Cross pub (we'll remind him of this when he's a teenager)
• in his crib
• in his carseat
• outside the fish & chip shop (in the gutter)
• outside Queen Sally's Diamond Deli (in the gutter)
• in our bed (I've never seen the DH move so fast)
• in a friend's car and carseat (sorry about that!)

I'm sure I've forgotten to list a few places.  Perhaps I should start carrying one of these around:

Alcohol and motherhood makes for a bad combination

The state of motherhood is a special kind of madness.  This blog is evidence of that.  But combine it with a bit too much to drink and you get some strange outcomes...   I just had to reproduce this story in full - it's too good not to share.  This woman is ALL class.

Lactating woman arrested after spraying officers

A lactating US woman was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after she sprayed sheriff's deputies with breast milk as they tried to remove her from a vehicle, police said on Monday.

Ohio-resident Stephanie Robinette, 30, was arrested and charged with domestic violence and assault linked to a domestic dispute, as well as resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, according to the Delaware County Sheriff's Office.

It said Robinette's husband told authorities the pair had been attending a wedding when his wife got drunk and started a dispute. He said that she hit him many times before locking herself in her car outside a banquet facility on Saturday.

Sheriff Walter L. Davis III said that when police approached the car to speak to her, she yelled profanities and refused to get out.

"When deputies attempted to remove Robinette from the vehicle she advised the deputies that she was a breastfeeding mother and proceeded to remove her right breast from her dress and began spraying deputies and the vehicle with her breast milk," Davis said.

Robinette was later removed from the car and arrested after more deputies arrived on the scene.

"This is a prime example of how alcohol can make individuals do things they would not normally do," Davis said.

There's even a video:

Starting creche

Milkbaby started creche about a month ago.  Leaving my firstborn with strangers is one of the harder things I've had to do on this motherhood caper (it's right up there with going to the dentist).  The first day he barely noticed my departure, too engrossed in exploring his surrounds.  I walked down the street back to the car, eyes streaming, boobs leaking milk all over the show.   It's the latest thing I've shed tears over, apart from the cat dying.  It was like this for the first week.  Then in the second week, it was him doing the crying as he cottoned on to the fact that I was leaving him.  I managed to hold it together.  And it's gotten better ever since. Last week, on my first day of work, I got a smile and a wave.  I couldn't have been more pleasantly surprised if he'd said "have a nice day at work mama!"

In my quieter moments alone, I ponder that age-old philosophical question: "if a baby cries at a creche, will his mother know?"

Then I think, "hey, I should be enjoying this 5 minutes to myself without interruption".  Even if it is just the third stall in the work bathroom.

Ah, pees and quiet.

The maternity leave TO DO list

My maternity leave came to an end last Thursday.  I am now officially a "working Mom" (more on this later).  As opposed to a stay-at-home-Mom, or SAHM in internet speak.

My maternity leave TO DO list (the optimistic version) went something like this:

• reorganise book collection
• sort and put wedding photos into an album and some others into frames
• get vege and rose garden sorted
• unpack boxes from moving (almost 3 years ago)
• become a proficient baker/sewer/knitter/homemaker

It should have looked more like this:

• have baby
• sleep
• ignore piles of washing and dirty household
• feed baby
• sleep
• sleep

Needless to say, I achieved NONE of the tasks on my original and very optimistic maternity leave TO DO list.  And only achieved ONE thing on the REAL TO DO list.  ("Have baby" - duh!)

I guess everything else will have to wait until I go on maternity leave again.

NOT!!!!

Would You Rather...

Would You Rather...  was one of my favourite books as a child.  It involved all sorts of awful options.  Like, would you rather... stay in a haunted house?  or run through a field of stinging nettles?  Ummm...  Of course I was that annoying kid who was always trying to negotiate: "well as long as it was only one night in the haunted house" or "that depends on how big the field of stinging nettles was".  Seems I was destined to be a lawyer.

Lately I've been comparing horrible adult tasks to giving birth.  My darling sister sent me a coupon deal for a Brazilian bikini wax, suggesting thoughtfully that I might like to surprise the DH.  She obviously didn't give much thought to what a bald, post-partum vagina looks like.  It would be a surprise alright.  Perhaps just not a pleasant one.  But I digress.  I emailed her back: "I'd rather give birth than get a Brazilian."

And then I was at the dentist this morning, lying there, jaw and lips stretched out of all proportion, having my teeth cleaned and polished, the little grinder making that awful fingernails-down-blackboard noise thinking "I think I'd rather give birth than go through this again."  And I wasn't even getting a filling!  Or, heaven forbid, a root canal.

And I'm still traumatised by having seven-week-old Milkbaby immunised.  I think I'd rather give birth than do that again.  Or run through a field of stinging nettles.  Or even stay in a haunted house.  But those options weren't available, so he's fully vaccinated (See?  Sensible, old, wise Mama).

According to Wikipedia, Would You Rather is a party game.  I might try it at the next party I go to.  That'll be like, never.  So consider this a blog party.

What would you rather?