Update, and a long post on taking things the wrong way and misunderstandings

I am writing while sitting inside with the fans and air conditioner on from our new house in sunny QLD (well, rather overcast QLD today). The house is wonderful, more than I could have hoped for, and we are slowly settling in after our big move on October 4th.

I am now almost completely off the antidepressants now, I take half a 50mg (so 25mg) tablet of Zoloft a week, and emotionally things haven't changed so I am taking that as a good sign that my withdrawals are confined only to mild physical symptoms like tingling in the limbs and extremities and dizziness/feeling light headed.

The only things that have brought me down are the occasional argument with the hubby over finances (we need to sell our old house so that we can clear out all our current debts and it isn't happening yet grrrr), and having people on facebook taking what I type the wrong way.

Before I go any further I would like to state that I am not writing this out of any anger or hate, I am writing it with only confusion and the thirst to learn what went wrong. I am merely using this medium to get my thoughts out of my head and put them down where I can reanalyse them at a later date and learn what words in what order could be taken the wrong way so that I can improve my "neutral" status updates so that in future they can't be taken the wrong way.

A serious question though, if you are asked a question about who has removed themselves from your friends list and you answer it with a name, and are then asked if you know why they've removed themselves and you admit that you don't know and then make a guess saying "I guess being diagnosed with PND and moving to QLD might have been the right time time for said person to defriend me", it's a guess, something that isn't based on fact and is just a conclusion you make without sufficient information to back you up and confirm it, you wouldn't normally see it as having a go at someone unless you were already looking for a fight would you? I know that I wouldn't, my closest friends wouldn't, the person who asked me the initial question didn't and was horrified that an innocent question had started such a huge drama just because I had answered with a name and made a guess.

I have nothing against this person who started the drama. Apparently I am passive aggressive against her and other "crunchy" or gentle parenting mothers, apparently I have something against them all and am anti-crunchy/gentle parenting just because I have smacked my kids. The reality is I have nothing against them, some of my closest friends are Crunchy and Gentle Parenting mumma's, I respect their parenting beliefs and they respect mine even if they don't believe them to be the right way to parent themselves, if I post something on my wall that might impact a bit negatively on gentle parenting without realising it, they just ignore it and move on, they don't start a fight or create drama just for the sake of it.
To be honest I feel sorry for this person. This isn't the first time she's taken something the wrong way and created drama. I've stuck by her as a friend in the past even though I didn't agree with why she started the drama, I just ignored it, had a bitch to hubby in bed at night if I needed to clear my head of it (if by the off chance said person does happen to come across this and recognises it, or one of her friends, ONCE AGAIN I AM NOT HAVING A GO AT YOU SO STOP THINKING THAT EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE SOMETHING BAD ABOUT YOU!!!, and then moved past it and went back to being friends and enjoying the good things about said person. I have noticed that said person does pick fights a lot, and is very touchy about anything said about herself and her family and reacts rather angrily and aggressively by attacking the person who makes the apparently "controversial" comment. I understand where she's coming from, I've done it myself in the past. Which is why I've never deliberately made any comments about her behaviour before. Last night I did lose control a bit after being abused one time too many in a short period of time and I did make some comments that shouldn't have been made, and for that I am sorry, but now it is done and I cannot take any of it back. In a way it is a good thing, because it has removed a negative person from my social circle who was only going to bring me down with her if I had continued to respond to her comments.

I have to note though that this person is also a fellow doula, which scares me a bit. If she can read passive aggressive from an originally neutral post and "guesses" made in the form of puzzled comments then I worry how her reputation as a doula will be affected if she reacts the same way to something that one of her clients says without the client realising that it could be interpreted as passive aggressive or, if a client is trying to tell her that she has done something wrong and is unable to get it across without seeming confrontational or condescending. Going on from that if her reputation is affected by just one client that she took the wrong way then every other doula's reputation will suffer as well. Word of mouth spreads quickly, especially when social networking is involved, and a once perfect reputation can be ruined in an hour if enough people talk about it. It is scary, and it makes it even more important for Doula's to learn and take in communication skills during their training. Something that I have noticed after talking to many doula's who have done their training through many different organisations is that not every Doula Training organisation has an in depth module dedicated to only communication and what things could be taken the wrong way and how to improve how you communicate with not only clients, but people in general.

Back to the original reason I'm posting about this. I have also had people say things about me in the past, for the most part I ignored it, unless I was pregnant and then I gave back as good as I got because undiagnosed post-natal and pre-natal depression while pregnant can make you very angry and aggressive which is what happened to me. I admit, I have created drama and started arguments before, but I always apologised for starting them once they reached a certain point where things just start going around and around in circles, which is what happened last night. Instead of accepting my explanation for why I posted and nicely asking to remove the answers to the question said person just kept going on about it and abusing me. She took it too far, and has now lost a friend who used to respect her and her personal beliefs.
I am also fully aware that she has lost respect for me as well, if she ever had any respect for me in the first place, I don't know and I never will truly know as I am not her and don't know how her mind works. All I can do is make personal observations on what I have seen of her behaviour yesterday and in the past, and from my point of view it doesn't look good, just as much of my past behaviour doesn't look good either. The difference between the two of us though is that I am actively working on improving how I control my emotions and what I let bother me and what I don't let bother me.
I was doing pretty well until the abuse started, and that's one thing I WILL NOT STAND at all, being verbally abused by someone who has no idea what I've been through or am going through and insists on making it look like she has it worse than everyone else - which is untrue, there is always someone far worse off than you are, something that I am faced with every day as a self confessed VBACtivist who supports women wanting to VBAC and having to fight tooth and nail just to get an empowering, often healing birth in a way that they want and not under the knife by some obstetrician's orders.
I may have gone through hell and back again bringing my first child and third child into the world, but both times it wasn't as bad as what someone else went through to bring their children into the world. My birth experiences had shaped me, made me, brought me down and lifted me back up again. I am stronger for what I have been through, I have more knowledge than I did when I was pregnant with each of my children, I am able to support a woman impartially throughout her pregnancy and birth, and able to share her happiness and excitement when her baby is born happy and healthy while taking any negative feedback at the same time and learning from it to be better the next time.

The one thing that I still seem to have trouble with though is dealing with people in general. I have always struggled to relate to people, to get my words across the right way. Even as a very young child I was far more comfortable around adults than I was around other children my age, but I also had the problem where I would say things that could be taken as negative or innapropriate by others. I am a literal person by nature, I say it how it is and rarely think about the consequences if what I said is taken the wrong way. In many ways I am naive when it comes to the intricacies involved in normal every day conversation, what I see as normal conversation isn't normal to most people and they find it strange and hard to relate to, just as I do with them. It seems that this is a lasting legacy from my childhood, one that I may or may not be able to overcome. But you know what? I AM GOING TO KEEP ON TRYING. Because that is all that I can do, try and try, and try again until either I overcome it or reach a point where it doesn't matter anymore
And this is where I end this post. I have updated on where we are at, I have raised a valid issue and put my side of the story across, and I have gone off topic a bit, come back again, and extended the issue again.
I have tried to explain why I think, talk and write the way that I do in the only way that I know how to. What those who read this take away from my post is up to them, I am not responsible for other peoples feelings and emotions, and I am not responsible for other peoples misunderstandings of what I write, if I was I would probably be in jail already, or dead because someone decided that I shouldn't be allowed to live. Any misunderstandings or bad emotions are the responsibility of those who have them only, and it is their choice of what they do with them, if they choose badly and take it out on others that is their problem, not mine. If they choose the better option and ignore it and move on then that puts a good light on them and they have my respect.

Jenna.

Home, And Planning a BIG Move :)

Hello all, I am home again. My plane flew in on thursday night.
I really enjoyed myself up in QLD, it was so beautiful and warm even though it is winter. I came home with a tan lol.

Much of my time up there was pent looking at houses as we are planning a BIG move to QLD in the last week of September/first week of October. Not long to go now - only 3 months to go! I can't wait, I am so excited.

While up there I also had to visit a local doctor (Dr McArthur from the Kallangur Clinic is AMAZING! A true blue Aussie bloke who is also a Doctor, and a GREAT one at that!) due to getting severe tonsilitis and a sinus infection that showed itself on the plane trip up there on May 17th. Dr McArthur went over my Effexor Prescription and agreed with me that it wasn't the best option for me while I was breastfeeding, he said that the side effects while meaning off of it were awful and he didn't recommend it, so he took me off of it and put me on Zoloft. I have to say that Zoloft is making me feel better than Effexor did, I don't get the dizzy spells or light headedness that I used to get while on Effexor, and so far my only side effects have been a 10 day period and some nausea, and some weight loss - which I can't complain about because I have a lot of weight to lose ROFL.

It was great to see my mum again, and the kids loved seeing her and my stepdad (their Poppy) every day as well - Jaycen can't wait to go back again as he misses his Grandma and Poppy.

So we are moving to QLD. We have our eyes on a house in Kallangur which is at Auction on July 6th, it is a 3 bedroom house with a large room downstairs that we can turn into a master bedroom, it has 2 toilets and 2 showers, a Pool, a nice backyard, 1 garage and is fully and securely fenced. It is also only a short walk to all shops and the local Public School where Jaycen will most likely be attending next year, and it is only 2.5km away from the nearest train station.
It is perfect.
All we need to do now is get finance and sell our house (we have 2 possible buyers currently, one is offering $140,000, and the other is offering $150,000). We will hopefully find out tomorrow if it is sold or not.

In other news I am losing weight! I have lost 4.1kg in the past 38 days - 2.1kg of that has been over the past 4 days which is a little bit freaky, but hopefully it will level out to a slower weight loss soon as my body gets used to the new antidepressants.

Emily also learned to crawl while we were in QLD. Now she can get around everywhere and follow me ROFL

So anyway, that is about it for now, Matt is making Emily giggle right now (she's such a daddy's girl!) and we will all be going to bed soon.

Until next time,
Jenna.

More on Jaycen

As I said in the previous post we have known that something was up with Jaycen for a while, I suspected things (ADHD and Aspergers Syndrome) but couldn't prove anything until we got a new Maternal and Child Health Nurse in July 2012, after Emily was born, who saw what I saw and gave us a recommendation for our GP to refer us to a Paediatrician.
During Easter 2012 we discovered that when Jaycen ate chocolate he became quite violent towards me and his little sister Elise, he would hit us and became rather nasty in general, so we made the decision to cut chocolate out of his life, he never had it on a regular basis anyway as we made an effort to make sure that he ate only healthy foods as Matt and I are both overweight and we didn't want him to end up struggling to lose weight as an adult like us, so it was a simple thing to do.
In February while Matt was home sick with the blood clot in his leg we had 2 and half wonderful weeks where Jaycen was on his best behaviour, being helpful and nice, not getting hyperactive or doing anything naughty and we thought that it would be the end of all the trouble we had had with him, but it wasn't to last, at the end of those 2 and a half weeks he went straight back to his old self and progressively got worse.
In March we decided to try a gluten free diet to see if that helped as we had been told that going gluten free could sometimes help ADHD children reduce their hyperactive behaviour, unfortunately this didn't work.
At the start of April Jaycen attended the birthday party of one of his daycare buddies, and ate lollies (I didn't realise there were lollies there until after he had started eating them) and within 15 minutes he was so hyperactive and into everything that I was starting to stress out and worried that we would be asked to leave (we had walked almost 4km just to get there! and I didn't want to have to walk all that way back home, uphill, with a hyperactive child who wouldn't listen to anything that I said), 30 minutes later Matt arrived and picked us up and we went home because we needed to get Jaycen out of there before he did something really bad.
At home Jaycen ran around like a crazy person, jabbering on about nothing in particular, getting into everything, hitting his sister, touching things that he knows he isn't allowed to touch, hitting the dog (how our dog, Libby, puts up with it I will never understand, she is so patient with him and treats him like he is her own puppy), and he started having jerky movements and twitching. After an hour he finally crashed on his bed and fell into a deep sleep the we couldn't wake him from, he was still twitching and I was a bit worried.
When he woke up 2 hours later he was a very subdued little boy and not his normal self. We made the decision then and there to cut processed sugars completely out of his diet.
It has been a difficult month trying to keep sugar out of his diet, he can no longer have his favourite Apricot Jam on toast and sandwiches and we are limited to giving him Vegemite instead. He cannot have most stir fry sauces, or much sauce (tomato sauce and BBQ sauce) in general, because they contain too much sugar as well so we tend to not give him any at all unless it's a special occasion.
Yesterday we discovered that he cannot have strawberries. At daycare they do a morning tea for the children with fruits, carrots, celery, cheese and berries. Jaycen loves strawberries so of course he ate as many of them as he could get and ignored everything else on the plates.
According to his room teacher, Tony, within minutes of eating the strawberries he became so hyperactive and uncontrollable that they had to let him outside for an hour (in the drizzle that kept on coming and going yesterday) just to run off some of the energy as he was disturbing the other children in his room. Jaycen stayed hyperactive for the rest of the day until he finally fell asleep at 7:30pm.
At least we now know that Strawberries are a trigger, but it is sad that he can no longer eat one of his favourite foods.
I am going to be writing up a list of things that he can't eat tonight to take up to QLD with us so that my mum and stepdad know what he can't eat as well.
To say that I am worried is an understatement. I am scared, frustrated and terrified about the future and what it will mean for Jaycen. All I ever wanted was for him to have a normal life, now I don't know what the future holds. We had planned to send him to school next year, but now he may have to stay back and do kindergarten next year instead and start school the year after - the year that he turns 7! If he starts school the year that he turns 7 I am scared that he will be teased and called dumb because he will be so much older (almost 2 years older) than the majority of the other children in his class. It is a scary thought, and I know firsthand how cruel other children can be to someone who is different to the norm.

So here I am scared, worried and fearful of what is to come.

Until next time.
Jenna.

A Possible Diagnosis For Jaycen

For those who know me they will know that I have complained a lot about Jaycen's behaviour and how hyperactive he is. On wednesday I did my driving test and failed yet again (so now I am setting my sights for July to do it again and hopefully pass, this should give me more time to work on the things caused me to fail), and in the afternoon we had Jaycen's first Paediatrician appointment.
It went well, the doctor typed down everything we said as we said it (a pleasant change from our local GP's who dodn't write notes until afterwards and sometimes get things wrong), and then got the paediatrician in to talk to us as well.
The paediatrician is of the opinion that Jaycen has ADHD, and also has either high functioning Asbergers Syndrome (a form of Autism Spectrum Disorder) or OCD, or even all 3 of them.
To be honest I am not at all surprised. I have known that he was different to other boys his age since he was 18 months old, and suspected ADHD and Asbergers since he was 27 months old and learned how to unlock the front door, open it and cross the road in peak hour school drop-off/pick-up traffic around the same time that he started to obsess over certain things.
Jaycen is an extremely intelligent little boy, he could count to 10 by the age of 2, and knew all the colours of the rainbow and count to 15 by age 3, now at age 4 he can count to 20, dresses himself and puts his shoes on (we are still working on tying his shoelaces on the few shoes he has that don't have velcro). He makes decisions over what he does and what he eats. The only things he is really behind in are the pincer grasp and drawing - he still just does squiggles and  lines and only a few circles, although lately he has become obsessed with drawing rainbows. He is also extremely creative, he makes Jewellery with me displaying a very advanced use of colour and shapes, and his hand/eye coordination is very good, at daycare he makes the most amazing creations using the magnetic building pieces (similar to meccano but in different flat shapes like squares, rectangles, diamons and triangles).
The reason why I have suspected Asbergers since he was 27 months old is because I have dated (and even once been engaged to) 2 men with Asbergers Syndrome, and Jaycen is so similar to both of them in temperament and in his actions/behaviour that it is quite scary.
Jaycen is obsessive about cars, motorbikes, trucks, trains, helicopters and Chuggington (a childrens TV show with talking trains). He has aversions to vegetables, bee's and Apples. He gets separation anxiety when I am not around, and he has anger issues because he is unable to control his emotions, basically he is either extremely happy/excited or extremely sad/angry with no grey area's in between.
The paediatrician also confirmed our suspicions about a sensory issue, in that Jaycen has to touch EVERYTHING that he see's, even if it is dangerous to him. He also has to count everything as well, a good example of this is the other day when Matt took Jaycen shopping with him, at the checkout Jaycen had to count every single bar of chocolate in the top layer of the display and when Matt tried to pull him away Jaycen had a tantrum and insisted on finishing his counting - this could be a symptom of both OCD and Asbergers, hence why the Paediatrician didn't want to give us a full diagnosis of either of those 2 things without further investigation.

The 3 photo's below are examples of what he does with his toys and other things. The Play center that is in pieces in the top 2 photo's is one that we have just been given by a friend and it was all sitting in a pile of pieces behind our gate yesterday morning and up until 4pm when Matt got home his morning shift at work.
Around 5pm-6pm I brought the kids inside for dinner (it was a beautiful day yesterday so I sent them outside for the day, unlike today which is cold and overcast and typical of mid-late Autumn weather lol) and this is what I found at the back door. Jaycen had carried/dragged every single piece of the play center and lined them up like this, even going so far to mostly put the pieces in order of size or colour.
The bottom photo is an example of what happens here on a typical day with his trains and cars, he either lines them up like the top 2 photo's (usually on his windowsill or on an old bathroom mat that he has claimed for this exact purpose) or he puts them into a circle like in the bottom photo where he has put his Chuggington trains into a circle and placed other trains and a car inside.

Jaycen is very demanding, and it takes a toll on me every single day that I can't do anything to curb what I see as bad behaviour but which is normal for him. Add my PND into the mix and it's a bad situation for all of us. I am trying to learn patience, but it is getting harder as he gets older and lashes out more, mostly at me and his sister Elise (thankfully he hasn't lashed out at Emily yet and I hope he never does).

Having a child with special needs, whether it is due to physical or mental disability, or even from ADHD or Aspergers or Autism (in all of which the child had special needs) that differ from "Normal" children, is hard, and it feels harder now that we have a more definite (though not 100% decided) answer as why Jaycen is the way that he is. I just wish it had been picked up sooner so that we would have had more time to learn coping strategies and implement a stricter routine with him. I and angry at the MCHN who saw Jaycen at his monthly check ups and weigh in's, I told her something wasn't right, I expressed my concerns at every appointment, and every time I was brushed off and ignored as an over worried and silly first time mother. I feel let down by the MCHN, one of the people who are meant to be on the lookout for these things so that early intervention can be given as soon as possible to allow the child to live what we consider to be a normal life.

Mothers intuition is a powerful and marvelous thing, and in the majority of cases it is always right. I knew something wasn't right but I didn't push the matter further than just mentioning my concerns. Maybe if I had things would be different now ans we wouldn't be having as much trouble coping with Jaycen's behaviour as we are now. Maybe I would have been able and willing to seek help for how I was feeling earlier too, maybe I wouldn't have PND right now.
So many maybe's, and no way of knowing what really could have been.

For now I am taking one day at a time, taking my antidepressants at the same time every morning, trying to be the best mother that I can be to Jaycen and my Girls, trying to teach Jaycen patience and that there are consequences to his actions. What more can I do? I don't know yet. I will know more after he has seen the Occupational Therapist, Speech Therapist and Psychologist - whenever that may be - and after we have seen the paed again on July 17th.

This friday we are leaving for QLD, I just hope that I can manage on my own with all 3 kids.

Regards,
Jenna.

A Little Bit Disappointed...

My client due early next month has decided not to have me as her doula. I am disappointed, this would have been my first certifying birth, my plane tickets for me and the kids have already been paid for and cannot be refunded due to the airlines no refund policy (that's $550 we've wasted for something that will never happen now).
I'm a bit angry, not at my now former client, but at myself for getting so excited over being given the gift of the opportunity to attend her impending birth. I should have stayed neutral, calm, not looked forward to it so much. I shouldn't have cared as much in the lead up, or planned anything until right at the end.
A small part of me is saying that I shouldn't have even offered to be her doula in the first place, that I was only asking for trouble as I live so far away from her, 1000's of kilometers away from her in a different state entirely.
It hurts, and her announcement came at the wrong time, literally just days after I had had an emotional breakdown from the PND where I wanted to end my life. I feel like things are fucked up all the time, I've even given in, sucked up my pride, and gone down the path of getting antidepressants (Efexor-XR 75mg) from a GP at my local doctors clinic. I haven't started them yet, but I am planning to start them in 2 days time. I hope they work, because I don't want to go through another emotional breakdown again like I did last week, it was scary.
The week before last I also failed my driving test, it gutted me as well, and may have contributed to the breakdown.
Tomorrow I am taking the driving test again, so I am hoping that this time I will pass it.
That's all for now.

Until next time,
Jenna

Thoughts and Ruminations...

I've been ruminating... thinking... trying to get my head around things. Trying to figure out what went wrong and when it all went wrong, what I did wrong. What could I have done differently...

I know that I can't change things, but I can't stop thinking. Since January 21st, the 8th anniversary of when I lost Tomas, it's like I have been grieving his loss - and the losses of my other 6 angels - all over again
I've been dreaming of Tomas, of what could have been, of him as a newborn baby and holding him in my arms but I can never see or picture his face no matter how hard I focus or try. It's like he never was real, only a dream but I know he wasn't a dream, he was real, I saw him on that scan, I saw his little nose bud, the growing arms and legs with finger and toe buds. HE WAS REAL.

So many people told me to just get over it back then, to move on and forget, that I was only 17, still young and could have many other children. How do you just "get over it", the loss of a child no matter how small they were or how long they were with you? It still hurts, even now over 8 years on.

This time 8 years ago I should have been getting things ready, all excited at welcoming my first little boy into the world, I should have been excited about my upcoming 20 week scan to find out that he was to be a little boy and I would have then gone out to buy boy themed clothes for his coming home outfit, his bassinet and a pram, a carseat, I would have been getting my learners licence so that after I turned 18 I could get my probationary license and start saving for a car of my own. I wpuld have been busy helping my stepmum plan our joint baby shower as she was due with my little sister almost exactly 2 months after me.

Every night when I go outside to have a cigarette I look up at the stars and tell Tomas how much I love him and miss him, how much I wish he was here to play with his little brother and sisters,  he would have loved them so much and been such a great big brother.

It's human nature to want what we cant have, and I am no exception. I just want my babies back.

PND - Post Natal Depression

I have been "diagnosed" with PND. I should be happy to finally have a diagnosis, but instead it makes it worse. I am more angry, more upset and more frustrated than I was before.
I keep thinking "Why wasn't this picked up earlier? How the heck can a doctor say I was borderline for PND in November while the counselor I'm seeing tells me that I have had it since my son was born in December 2008?
How the heck does this happen? I am angry with the doctor, frustrated with my counselor for pushing me to take antidepressants, and upset because now it's official, I have Post Natal Depression.
I'm over it.
I need a break.
A holiday... without kids, without the hubby. Just some time for me and only me, where I can relax and not have to worry about the kids, or listen to them scream, yell, cry, or watch them hit each other - with fists or toys - where I don't have to change and wash nappies all day every day, or give them food/breastfeed constantly. A holiday where I am alone and no one is relying on me.
That would be the ideal, but it won't happen. In just under 2 months I will be flying up to Queensland with all 3 kids and leaving hubby at home for a whole month.
Hubby owes me big time for this!

That is all.

Bad Luck Is Following Us...

Again I have been slack in my blogging, I just really haven't had the mental energy to do it.

Bad luck has been our companion lately, first Matt got a thigh length blood clot in his leg the day after he had his surgery to have his gallbladder removed and was readmitted to hospital for the rest of that day, then released with home visits from the nurses for treatment with clexane injections.
After 2 weeks the clexane hadn't worked so he was put on warfarin as well.
He has been off work for over a month now, and we are really starting to struggle financially.
It is starting to clear up now but it gave us all a huge scare.
On sunday he starts back at work again which is a huge relief.

During this time I also had the mother of all migraines and had to go to hospital where they suspected that I had meningitis, luckily I didn't, but I did find out that I have had a chronic sinus infection since Christmas Eve 2012 when the migraines started. Since being treated with antibiotics my migraines have gone and I now only have occasional headaches, which is so much better than it was before.

Last week Emily also got sick again with conjunctivitis and the flu and needed antibiotic ointment for the conjunctivitis but she had a reaction to it, it made her eyes all puffy and red, so we had to stop it, and on Tuesday just gone we went to get her immunisations done as she is overdue for them but we couldn't as she had a non asthma wheeze and congestion in her lungs and was put on antibiotics again - this time a different type - my poor baby hasn't have much luck healthwise this year :( The congestion and wheeze in her lungs are now gone and she will be getting her immunisations next Tuesday as long as nothing else comes up between now and then.

And the other day not only did my glasses break, but the front windscreen of my car cracked as well!

So things haven't been very good, hopefully they get better now, it would be nice as I've had to put off my final 2 lessons with the driving instructor, I was hoping to be preparing to get my P plates by the end of next week but now it won't happen until early next month and I have to see a client at the end of April (we met for the first time on February 25th), so I really need to have them by then.

The only really good thing to happen is that I now have my own ABN and can run my hobby and work as a Doula and run both things as real businesses, which is great!
The other thing we have done recently is help out a mate who was homeless and had been living on the streets, sleeping on park benches and concrete footpaths, for almost a month with hardly any food, so we took him in for a couple of days, fed him, gave him some clean clothes and washed his clothes, let him use our shower and then helped him find a place to stay. He was so grateful and it was so nice to see a smile on his face again even though he was crying (tears of joy). He is now living in a caravan park and can see his partner and kids again which is wonderful for them all.

Anyway, that is all for now.
Until next time, Jen.

A New Year, A New Me

One of my new years resolutions was to get back into healthy eating and lose weight again.

While I was pregnant with Elise I lost 16kg, I believe it was because of the Gestational Diabete's that I had combined with Hyperremesis Gravidarum (severe all day sickness) and the cravings that I had for veggies, salads, chicken, goat, rabbit and fish. In the 6.5 months post birth, prior to becoming pregnant with Em, I lost another 16kg, and was 10kg off my goal weight 72kg.

Since Em was born however I have put on at least 15kg, and I feel it too. I have gone up a dress size (I was a 14 in tops and 16 in pants prior to becoming pregnant with Em, now I'm an 18 in both!), and I feel yuck, fat and just plain blegh all the time.

Today is day 3 of my healthy eating project, consisting of Porridge with honey and fresh blueberries for breakfast, either a shake or celery with peanut butter for lunch and either a healthy shake or meat and veggies/stirfry etc for dinner (I only have one healthy shake a day), with an apple, a banana, blueberries and a fruit, nut and seed mix as snacks.

So far it's going well, I'm mixing the snacks up each day (thankfully I really like them all anyway) so I don't get bored, portioning what I eat and eating slowly so I fill up quicker and don't overeat.

My goal is to get back down to 80kg, and then my next goal is to get down to my original goal of 72kg. I'm not sure how much I weigh currently but I'm guessing it's around 98-99kg, which is not where I want to be.
Now don't get me wrong, but some of  my weight is muscle, and I do pride myself on having strong leg muscles, they are larger than I'd like too, but they aren't toned so that will be another thing to work on once we get the Wii set up again and start using Wii Fit like we used to after Elise was born.
I am going to try and get Matt back into losing weight as well, as he has put back on all the weight he lost before we got married and is now very very overweight. He will be having surgery next week to have his gallbladder removed as well, so once he is recovered he will need to do something about his weight.

I think that is it for now, I will update when I get around to weighing myself (we don't have scales at home, so it will have to be whenever I can get myself into our local Tony Ferguson Weightloss Center, I haven't been there since early December so it will be interesting to see if my healthy eating has helped when I do eventually go back.

Bye for now.
Jen.

Em has been in hospital...

I haven't updated for a while, there just hasn't been anything to write about until now.

As the title says Miss Em is in hospital, she was admitted on wednesdat night with suspected gastro, a fever and dehydration with a lot of tummy pain. its friday now and she isn't feeding much either.

Yesterday she lost 50 grams in weight in just under 12 hours, and last night he paediatrician said that if she wasn"t picking uptoday and gaining weight again they would be inserting a nasogastric tube to feed her.

I am also having to express allfeeds for her to have bottles now instead of breastfeeding so that they can see how much she is taking in, and its scaring me because normally in rhe morning she would have at least 300ml (I can express approx 150ml from each breast first thing in the morning) and today all she has had so far is 175ml.

At least the fever has gone down now so that is a good thing, and she hasn't had any diarrhea yet today either.

And now we are going home with instructions to treat her for oral thrush (which came up yesterday morning) and that if she gets worse again or starts to have bad diarrhea again we are to bring her back in.

Well thats it for now, have to get ready to go home.

Jen.