parenting

October.

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[Trigger Warning: pregnancy loss]

October. That month of jacarandas in bloom and the city coloured purple. That month when storm season really kicks off and the warmth and humidity also brings the promise of cracking thunder and lightning and rain and hail. That month of shops full of orange and black and red and green as Halloween and Christmas are jumbled together and pushed upon us. That month when newsfeeds are full of end-of-year events and pumpkins and stories of loss. The school year is coming to an end. The northern hemisphere is sliding into cooler weather. And October is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month.

I’ve seen so many stories of loss. Loss of hope, a tiny beginning that was nixed, the promise of a new life that would not make it to babyhood or toddlerhood or big school. 

While we have experienced our own losses, and come horribly close to another, I have never shared our story for the world to see. It is ours. Ours, but not uncommon, and not unexpected considering we started this whole parenting quest rather late in life.

I have my own reminders. Star Wars: Episode 7. Stranger Things. Blueberries. Sorry folks, there’s no heartbeat. 

Hospital corridor. Photo taken right after that ultrasound.

For us, these have turned into the layers of our life. They are there. They happened. They have been followed by successful pregnancies and beautiful babies and milestones and mischievous laughs and tantrums and sleep deprivation and cuddles and all of the things I hoped would come into our life, and so much more. The almosts, the near misses, the actual hospitalisation, have all reminded us of the precariousness of life as well as the enormity of the precious and amazing gift that is our children. 

Unofficial Milestones

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The last couple of weeks have been rough. Gastro went through the whole family. Our easy baby stopped sleeping. Parent guilt has hit hard as I spend my time trying to get her to sleep and struggle to spend time with, you know, our other child. 

But through all this, there have been little things happening, the little things that make up a life and are the very reason I wanted to write this blog, not wanting to lose them. The little things that are, nonetheless, important. The little things that don’t make it to the milestone pages but maybe they should. 

Like when a baby learns to put her head down, that being on her tummy doesn’t mean she must have her head raised. That resting her head can bring great comfort to her, or be incredibly adorable when it is rested for 3 seconds and then raised again with the smile of achievement as she eyeballs you.

Like when a 3-year-old starts using ‘like’, and ‘so’. Or when she starts ‘reading’ the stories to me and taking hints from the letters as to which word it is. Bonus points for doing different voices, and interjecting comments about the pictures or storyline. 

Like when a daddy can put a ponytail in young, fine, curly hair, a ponytail that doesn’t pull or hurt but does stay in for the whole day. 

These are our little things. Important, little, us.

What We Read This Week (Words of Comfort)

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This week started well. And then, on Thursday C came home from daycare and told me that sharing is caaaaaaaring and one of her friends vomited at the end of the day.

Oh dear.

Sure enough, the gastro bug has hit our family. C was unwell from Thursday night until Saturday morning and still a bit wobbly on Sunday. I was thinking we had escaped the worst when E came down with it, hard, Sunday afternoon. Sunday night was rough and I don’t think she’s entirely out of it yet.

One thing that has been very apparent in all this has been the comfort of words. In her middle of the night wakes, what C wanted was for me to read Stick Man to her. It was given to her for her 1st birthday and has been a regular story since. (Plus, the animated version is beautiful.) 

We have been dipping in and out of Anne of Green Gables for a few months now and, although she has no real reference point for it, I think C enjoys hearing the flow of the words. We read a chapter at a time, usually, and that means lots of cuddles happen.

My best friend is in lockdown in Sydney but still sent US a care package. She and her family are so so kind and thoughtful. Included in it was a book, The Giving Tree, by Shel Silverstein. C has asked for it several nights – she calls it the ‘new apple book’ which caused some confusion at first. It is so beautifully gentle.

What We Read This Week (We Love Mem Fox)

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There has been less of a precarious pile on the sofa this week. On Tuesday my sofa was turned into a fancy restaurant for Marcel (the frog) so there wasn’t really enough space… plus, Bedtime Stories has been the main pick.

E has continued to enjoy her books by chewing, but she has also (for a few weeks now) turned herself around to the books. No matter which way she is put down, or how close, she will turn herself around and reach for the books.

I love this.

Our favourites this week:

This & That (Mem Fox and Judy Horacek). I found this book a few months ago and recite it to E at least once every day. C loves (loves loves) the pictures.

Where is the Green Sheep (Mem Fox and Judy Horacek). C has taken to going through *every* sheep on the penultimate pages. 

Time For Bed (Mem Fox and Jane Dyer). An old favourite that I recited to C every night for nearly 2 years.

Oh Dear! (Rod Campbell). Lift the flap books are marginally less fraught now.

Bedtime Stories (Deb Gliori). Every. Single. One.

What We Read This Week (it’s never too early for Christmas stories)

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We love books. We have two story times during the day: before lunch nap; and after bath. The first is more baby-oriented, the second is for the 3-year-old. Baby story time happens in front of the bookshelf, so those choices always go straight back once they’ve been read. Older story time happens on the sofa and by the end of the week there will be a collection of books piling precariously on the sofa. 

Here are our favourites this week.

The Story of the Little Mole Who Knew It Was None of His Business (Werner Holzwarth and Wolf Erlbruch). Everyone loves a good poo story.

Santagram (Sophie Masson and Shiloh Gordon). Is it too early for Christmas stories? Too late? Who knows. Christmas stories are always an option here.

Where the Wild Things Are (Maurice Sendak). We love a good party.

There’s No Such Thing As Monsters (Steve Smallman and Caroline Pedler). This always elicits great squeals of laughter.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar (Eric Carle). We have a hard copy so yay for chewing, and the 3-year-old has started insisting on ‘reading’ it to us.

Bunny’s Egg Hunt (Shannon Hays). A board book, with pop-ups, and beautifully illustrated.

Good Thing She’s Adorable

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We are in THAT zone of baby sleep.

The ‘dropping a nap so is overtired so can’t sink into sleep so stays awake’ stage. The ‘practising new skills in the cot so stays awake’ stage. The ‘adjusting to solids and all that does to the insides so stays awake’ stage. The ‘new awareness of surroundings so needs to have someone there for any chance of going back to sleep’ stage.

We’ve had some shocking nights recently. ‘Good thing she’s adorable’ has been said more than once as we hear yowls and coos interspersed with frustrated acks at 4am when she’s been awake since 3am. And in those long hours of patting and ssshhhing and bobbing up and down I have been so aware of how much better I am handling it this time around. 

First Time Mum me – well. Tired and frustrated. Knowing all the reasons for the staying awake but in some ways that made it more frustrating. I KNOW you’re overtired because you refused to nap but if you would just nap when you’re meant to then we wouldn’t be in this position now, would we?! And then, more often than not, after hours of trying all sorts of ways to get her back to sleep, a burp or a fart would pop out and then, like magic, she would be asleep.

Second Time Mum me remembers these things. Why are you crying? Is it- oh. Nice burp! Theeere you go…. asleep. Second Time Mum me is far more understanding of the practising new skills stage. Maybe because I know it really is just a phase and, although it will feel like it is never-ending and I’ll never sleep again, there will be a morning that I wake up because I’m ready to wake up and not because I have to attend to a frustrated baby and she will be still asleep and on her tummy with a hand sticking through the cot rails. Second Time Mum me is better at staying calm knowing that nobody will fall asleep if there is a whiff of frustration in the air. And, to be really honest, Second Time Mum me tries to channel Chilli Heeler a whole lot more. In the ‘Sleepytime’ episode of Bluey (SUCH a gem) when Chilli says, Remember, I’ll always be here for you. 

And it makes this whole mothering thing so much easier. Yes, my back is suffering from leaning into a cot for hours. Yes, I am often so sleep-deprived I literally can’t stand or even sit straight. Yes, there is stuff I want to do (as well as sleep) while my girls sleep. But if I take care of the ‘being here for you’ side of things first, the other things are manageable. 

Where to Begin?

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Why now? 

Why, at all?

Well. There has been so much happen in the world and in our own little corner of the world recently. The Taliban has advanced through Afghanistan. Covid is raging in American schools and across the world and throughout parts of Australia (different scales, admittedly). Smaller tragedies that have hit home, hard.

Our baby can now sit, and started using the high chair, and flinging food across to our 3-year-old’s hair, and is teething furiously. Our 3-year-old is saying more and more expressions that we haven’t heard from her before, and painting the thunderstorms that kept her awake when she was 2, and getting better at matching sounds to letters, and building forts to sleep in at night.

And all of the stuff of our life will be lost, save for the photos we take, unless I make it more memorable with the actual writing of the words. Photos help, but don’t tell the full story. I can’t get a photo of the heaviness of a baby sleeping on my chest, or the feeling of soft skin and little fingers holding my hand, or the momentary flash of a smile as a face is upturned towards me. I can’t get a photo of the frustration when sleep is a battle, when food isn’t eaten, when no response is given, when their independence overtakes all reason. 

This is, therefore, partly to keep in my mind the wonderful things my children do, and how wondrous it is to be their parent, and just how fortunate we are to be where we are; to work through things for my own sake, to try to be a better parent; and to share the little things we do in our family that make up the stuff of our life.

So this is who we are. I’m Anna, wife of Glenn, mother of our two young girls. We love Star Wars and Minions and Bluey and Frozen and all things pink; baking and bubbles and food and creating.

Welcome.