we're still here

hi all, internet access has been sporadic, or more like non-existant. sorry.
paris and london survived well. new york nice. will write when can.
off to honolulu on thursday, hopefully better internet there.

murphy's law

in an hour and half our ride arrives to take us to the airport. this is great. what sucks is that the water went off sometime last nite around 10pm and still isn't back on. so now showers yet. we'd really like to get cleaned up and do the last little bit of packing and then relax.
thankfully we still have a little bit of our drinking water so it seems we'll be heating that up in the kettle and having a wash out of a pot (no plug for the damn sink.)
let this be the last of the crap this country throws at us.

p.s. percy slept very well last nite; 10:15pm to 4:15am- 6 whole hours! could be because we gave her some baby panadol at her 6:30pm and 10:00pm feeds. so tempting to dose her up every nite! just joking. she went back to sleep at 4:30 to 7:15 as well. she seems to be shaking off her cold already- what a trooper!

next blog from paris!

bye bye little baby...

all percy's too little things are gone.

actually, reading again the title of this post could be a bit alarming! little baby herself is just fine (bar the cold) and hopefully fast asleep in her cot.
i meant all the things associated with her being a little, little baby are gone. rita's driver just came to collect all the clothes she has grown out of, her bouncer that she has grown out of and her play mat that she could still use but we can't fit in a suitcase.

(wouldn't it be nice to have a driver?)

i'm actually quite sad about all the things going. partly because it does show how much percy is growing and partly because i really liked those toys. i feel guilty that i am denying her toys that she has played with since she could first grasp something with her itty-bitty fingers. i'm working on the idea that all the new sights and adventures over the coming weeks will let her happily forget. and, for crying out loud- she still has morry the moose, psychadelic butterfly, mutant butterfly, all the books, her soft ball, and a collection of other rattles and toys! i'm being silly.
i'm sure it will all be put to good use for the poor abandoned babies here. i included a sheet set and some towels that we bought here too. i was told anything they can get is appreciated.
plus it's a good excuse to get percy new stuff when we get home!

aahhh, home... what an idyllic sound. this time tomorrow we'll be taking our seats on the plane to frankfurt, finally on our way.

so it's bye to little baby and hello to big, world travelling, adventure baby!

first cold

poor darling percy has caught a cold. it couldn't be worse timing! flying to frankfurt tomorrow and than taking the train to paris. we'll have a quiet day in today and see how we go. not that we can really change our plans...
she had a few little coughs yesterday afternoon and then a big sneeze with lots of mucus. she had her bath and went to sleep normally but only gave us enough time to put dinner on plates before she woke and cried. paul comforted her while i wolfed down my dinner, changed into my pjs and took her to bed with me. all things considered she slept relatively well. she fed at 10:20pm and 2:15am, both times still able to breathe thru her nose. she was quite snuffly during the nite and needed to be rocked at midnite, tho she settled within ten minutes.
this morning she woke at 6:30 and happily rolled between us until i fed her at 6:50am, after which we got up for the day. she feels a little warm to me but one of the things i did not buy before we left home was a thermometre, damn. she was a little subdued playing this morning, also needing the snot wiped away quite regularly. it doesn't seem too bad at present. we're hoping it gets better rather than worse quickly.
she's gone down for her 9am sleep very well. i was concerned it might be a battle. i've elevated the head end of her mattress so hopefully that wil help her sleep better. maybe even long enough for me to have a shower! better get going...

our first journey together - conclusion

as i lay in the darkened room with darling paul holding my hand i'd like to say i thought about all the deep and meaningful things that having a baby will turn your mind to. but, nah; i was just happy not have so many people staring up my beep beep beep.

the hospital midwife soon returned and said why don't we try a few pushes anyways? the reasoning being even if i couldn't get her out on my own, if i could get her lower down by a few centimetres the forceps would have a better chance of working.
i was up for this. i really wanted to avoid all the interventions. somewhere deep inside i knew i could do this without further interference. sounds corny but it was there.

at about 9:45pm, with jan and the hospital midwife coaching me and paul encouraging me i started pushing with each contraction. as the epidural had been taken out some time before i was getting a lot of feeling back. this was invaluable in helping me decide when to do what.
i made excellent progress such that when the hospital staff started to return around 10pm they each exclaimed "oh, you're having the baby!" damn right i'm having this baby! jan was elatedly talking me thru each push and paul was in tears telling me how magnificent i was. he announced "i can see her!" quite soon, making me more determined yet to see her myself. at one point i thought she was already out to about the ears but not quite, it was a little set back but nothing was going to stop this birth. with three pushes to a contraction and a reasonable rest in between percy slowly made her appearance. midway paul asked me if i was pushing when i didn't have a contraction; i replied no, but i can feel her sliding back up between pushes and i'm trying to hold her in place! i'm not travelling the same distance twice if i don't have to!

percy crowned, turned her head out and slid out entirely all in one contraction at 10:23pm. (i think it was one, maybe i should ask jan to confirm that part.)
the hospital staff were respectful of our wish to have a lotus birth. however percy wasn't breathing well and had swallowed heaps of gunk meaning she needed attending to. initially this was done on the bed between my legs but space did not allow and the light was not good enough. paul cut her cord and she was placed on a nearby table. i kept whispering to paul "she's quiet, she's quiet." i had expected and wanted a full throated yell to confirm her presence and her life. unfortunately her throat was full of other stuff. it was quickly cleared, she was breathing fine and within 10 minutes was back with me, cradled against my chest.

"hello baby, we love you"

some recent photos

our first journey together - part 2

the road leading to the maternity wing at RPA must be the most pot-holed, bumpy road in the inner west! or ambulances have absolutely no suspension. that last 300m, or whatever distance it is, was the worst of the whole trip; i thought i was going to bounce off onto the floor.

i was wheeled into an examination/admittance room. is that what they are called? i think it must have been about 10:30-45am. still no foot long needle. people were fussy about but i wasn't paying any attention. i know paul was there but not exactly where.
soon i needed to go to the bathroom. getting off that high up hospital bed and shuffling the three metres to the loo was quite a challenge. thankfully i did make it as i lost the mucus plug and possibly my waters broke at this time. paul tells me my waters were broken manually much later on but i don't remember that. i think paul's version is more likely because otherwise percy was in there without her waters for a very long time.
my dilation was checked again after this. i was at six centimetres. yay! this meant i had dilated six centimetres in five hours. finally some progress. we were asked if we wanted to go home again. yeah, right! where's my foot long needle!?! if it hadn't been for the second, left side pain i probably could have managed the contractions. as it was, we'll never know. we declined the suggestion of returning home. i was wheeled into a delivery room.
jan had arrived at the hospital somewhere in this time, paul having rung her to say we had a change of plans. i think she was quite disappointed with me, us. oh well, it was my pain and my choice. it was fantastic to have her there with us for the remainder of the day as she was our advocate and fighting terrier! see, this is one of the reasons we didn't want to have our baby in a hospital. the number of interventions just add and add and add. "let's do this", "you need this", "that baby is at risk", etc etc etc. most of which i'm fairly convinced is medical staff deciding that the labouring woman is not fitting predetermined processes and timing. all very well, but not applicable to births. they are natural things that run their own course. of course i fully acknowledge modern medicine and the many lives it has saved or enhanced. also the hard working people that staff our medical system. it's not that i disbelieve them or think them wrong, they just couldn't explain satisfactorily why certain actions were being recommended. just because you've always done it that way, or that's what it says in the book, isn't enough of a reason to apply it to me.

anyways, i did have an epidural. so i got my sort of foot long needle. after this i was numb and happy to rest. naturally every bloody person in that hospital decided to come in to ask me questions or check something, departing with- "well, you should rest now, try to get some sleep." well, i bloody would if you'd all piss off!
once i was set up paul took the opportunity to return home to collect some important things that we should have brought with us- my medicare card for example! we literally turned up with what we were wearing and the house keys. quite funny now.
throughout tuesday afternoon my body did it's own thing without me being too aware of it. an intervention i didn't want but was convinced to take was a syntocin drip. the epidural had slowed the labour down and the synthetic oxytocin is supposed to speed it up again. so we waivered about this for a couple of hours, discussing with jan. then my epidural needing topping up. unfortunately the connection of the two tubes at my shoulder separated and the good stuff spilled down my back and into the sheets rather than into my spine. i had been told that it would feel cold as it followed the tube down my back, so when i felt the coldness i thought it was what was supposed to happen- not the spill. when all the pain came back such that jan turned the gas on for me to have a few breaths of that, we worked out what had happened and called for it to be done again. during the wait jan talked me thru the contractions and the side pain and modulated the gas for me. at the end of every use she gave me a shot of oxygen that kept me clear headed and not nauseous.

as the sun was falling there was still no baby in sight. we'd had many discussions, almost arguements with the hospital staff on what to do next. you see, according to protocol, i never got into 'established labour'. where the contractions are coming every 2 to 3 minutes and lasting for at least a minute at a time. mine were 2 minutes apart, 5 minutes, 3 minutes, 7 minutes; all over the place. however dilation was slowly taking place and percy was trying to get into position.
around 9pm the decision was made that percy needed to move as her heart was decelerating with every contraction. i was given a form to sign to consent to a forceps or ventouse (vaccuum) extraction and failing that, a cesearean delivery. i really did want to avoid all these things. what would have happened had we remained at home? could i have dealt with the pain of percy try to come out ear first, rather than crown of head first? would the labour have been shorter without the epidural? would percy have experienced the decelerations? these things i still wonder about in quiet moments.

i signed the form.

all the straps and tubes and whatnot was removed from my body. paul was given a set of blue scrubs (is that the word?) to change into. a narrower yet bed was wheeled alongside the one i occupied. half a dozen people were whirring about the room. i thought there were 20 people, but paul tells me otherwise, and they probably weren't 'whirring' either. i was about to be lifted onto the new bed when the room emptied. apparently someone else needed more attention than i did.
reprieve!
just paul and jan with me now. the room was dim and i took stock. what an astonishing two days. what was going to happen now?

tell you later, percy is due for elevenses!

dad's are fun

percy had her first shoulder ride yesterday. this was doubly good fun because she loves hair (possibly because she has so little of her own!) and could grab great hand- and mouth-fuls of paulie's hair...

our first journey together

since this is a blog about travelling with our little girl we should start with our first, miraculous journey together.
i think i ought to record the story of percy's birth somewhere... here seems a likely place.
if birth stories don't interest you, or you think this will get too personal or too icky, skip it.

paul and i decided after some thought that we would like to have our baby at home. of course this decision was met with varying degrees of support to downright- "do you want to die?" derision. to the deriders i have nothing to say, you're too small to think about. to our supporters, it might have taken most of you a while to come 'round, but thanx.

after some searching around and interviewing three women we chose our midwife. (very few men in this role.) it was fantastic to have a midwife. no traipsing off to doctors, hospitals, obstretricians, health centres, whatever, etc. jan came to our home at times convenient to us. no waiting in boring rooms surrounded by sick people. no need to take time off work or out of the weekend. no 15 minute, "how are you?, yup, all's good, on yer way then." jan was with us for no less than two hours every visit, often longer, and spoke to us about all sorts of things. not just how my blood pressure was that day.
there was no reason not to have our baby at home. i was very healthy, had no particular risk indications and the pregnancy went relatively smoothly. i suffered some morning sickness which required paul to drive me to work for a couple of months, and a few lie downs on the lunch room sofa occasionally. i was disappointed i had to give up riding my push bike so soon tho. i rode the 50km sydney spring cycle in october which meant i would have been about 3 months preggers, with my good mate mark along to push me up the hills. that was quite funny, he literally put his hand on my arse and shoved me along once or twice! however soon after this, even the 10 minute spin to work caused me to feel nauseous. so my lovely bike has been in the shed ever since! boo hoo.

towards the end of the pregnancy jan told us that the baby was not lieing nicely with her spine along my tummy but sort of half turned with her spine aligned with my left hip. she was confident bubs would squirm around and be nicely lined up on the day. unfortunately this didn't happen and i think was a major contributor to the change of plans that eventuated.

on sunday 25th march 2007 i woke up about 10pm with a pain in my stomach. then i woke up again with the same pain. it finally occurred to me that this is probably a contraction! yes, i was a bit slow on the up take. i thought, wow, these are coming fast, like every five minutes! so i resolved to stay awake and time them. silly me- more like every half hour. i was dozing in between and not registering the passage of time. as the sun was rising i turned to paul and said we're having a baby today. gee, was i cocky!
all thru monday 26th march i had contractions at odd spacings. they were completely manageable. i generally just stopped doing whatever i was and closed my eyes and breathed slowly thru them. we walked up to our local shops before lunch to get some supplies. i was walking slowly but quite happy to be out in the sun. in the afternoon paul and i took a big walk around sydney park. i'm not sure when, but some time that day we'd bundled my mum, who was staying with us, off to my brothers. i only wanted paul and the midwife with me.
during our park walk paul phoned his best friend to tell him we were having a baby that day. he replied it was a great day to have a baby as it was his birthday too! paul had forgotten- oops.
after climbing to the top of the biggest hill in sydney park (those of you who know the park, know the hill i mean!) i figured that was enough.
at home i bundled up on the lounge and watched movies for the remainder of the afternoon. paul rearranged the furniture (small terrace house) and got the birth pool out. he collected towels and blankets and pots on the stove and whatever other fussing about he did. i was blissfully content not to pay attention. i had other things on my mind.
by bed time nothing much had changed. the contractions were irregular and still on the mild end of the scale.
again i woke up about 10pm. this time in quite a bit of pain. i asked, no told, paul to go sleep on the spare bed because i wanted all the room i could get to thrash about. so thrash about i did. nothing made me comfortable. in finally found some comfort sitting on the edge of the bed so that whenever a contraction came i could boost myself up with my hands and moan thru it. between contractions i had piled all the pillows up to my right and tried to rest leaning on these.
at 2am paul came back in saying he couldn't bear for me to be suffering alone. he could hear every sound i made. i was very happy to have him there.
my wrists were starting to give out from all the boosting up too. unfortunately standing didn't work, nor kneeling or all-fours, or much of anything!

we called jan i think at 5am, could have been 4am. she said she'd come over soon and that we should go ahead with getting water in the birth pool and perhaps i should try a hot shower.

(just a note here on how much having a baby can change your mind set. paul and i are what you might call nerds. we apply the scientific principle, we don't accept things unless they are properly argued or based on fact, we have a subscription to 'new scientist' magazine for pete's sake! however, instead of going the hospital, obstretrician, may-i-have-my-cesar-now, option, we chose to have a home, water, lotus birth attended by a midwife. how hippy is that?! p.s. a lotus birth is when the cord is left attached to the baby and placenta for it to dry and fall off naturally. this usually takes between 3 and 10 days, during which you've got to lug the placenta around with the baby.)

between calling jan and her arriving i'd slid into the birth pool. it was very nice to have that extra bouyancy and heat. however since about midnite i was experiencing a pain down the left side of my abdomen that was constant. i had no 'breather' between contractions. while a contraction was on that was the overwhelming feeling, when one was gone the left side pain was nearly as bad. it was this lack of time to collect myself and ride up the next contraction that left me so upset.
jan actually thought i was doing a good job. that was reassuring. so good in fact that she said she was going to go home again to have some breakfast and take the dog for a walk. this is part of her approach- very hands off if not needed. let the labouring woman and her support do what they need to do. i did ask her to check my dilation before she went. it is only if you request will jan do this. perhaps i shouldn't have asked... there was no dilation. all these hours for nothing! she said i was nearly completely effaced but no dilation. what a blow. how much more of this would be need to get me dilated?

unfortunately it was during jan's absence that things ramped up for me. i was alternating between the pool and the shower, meaning a walk up and down the stairs in between. paul rang jan to explain that i wasn't coping. she asked to speak to me and thru crying and screaming i said i couldn't do it any more. she said that i could and that she was on her way back.
before she arrived i had a complete break down in the shower- bellowing and crying and squirming and screaming and sobbing. poor paul had to witness the whole thing. i said to him i wanted an ambulance to take me to the hospital. i needed drugs.
paul explained later (much later!) that he was angry that jan was not there to help us at that time. he had been told that i was doing okay and transferring to the hospital was not necessary. on the other hand his soggy, naked, sobbing wife was begging for relief. he naturally chose to help me and be the one person i can always rely on, trust and turn to. what if he had refused to call an ambulance? how would i have felt about him and his care for me? as it is, these are academic questions and i don't have to answer them.

i was back in the pool when the ambulance arrived. i had great expectations of them bursting in the door armed with a foot long needle, sinking it in to me and the pain floating away.... sadly, not to be. i had to clamber out, but on my daggy blue dressing gown, slippers and waddle my own way out of the front door. there i was laid on the gurney and slid into the back of the ambulance. paul initially elected to drive our car to RPA, then asked to come with us. he was hoping to sit in the back with me, but was put in the front. frankly, i might not have noticed. there was no foot long needle, no pain relief, no comfort...!
oddly, one thing i did notice was the route we took to RPA. i adore erko where we live. i've spent a good amount of time wandering its streets. as i glanced out the ambulance window, hoping to distract myself, i recognised the tops of the buildings we were passing! i thought to myself- "this is the long way 'round!" aarrghhh!

and now percy is due to wake up; she'll be hungry. part two coming- the hospital.

master of the left hand roll

today percy has proven i really shouldn't leave her alone for a moment. rats! and very good at the same time! plus perhaps i shouldn't have tagged her as being right handed...
this morning she rolled from her back to her front on the left side, then onto her back again, again to the left and once more onto her front. she was well clear of the play mat by this time and half way to the bedroom. which was lovely to watch and met with squeals of excitement. i think she looked at me to say 'what's the big deal?!' okay, little miss- do it to the right as well!

crucial baby travel tip

the world is not made for babies. perhaps i shouldn't be surprised at this. they don't contribute to the economy, they haven't got anything intelligent to say, only their parents think they are the bees knees and they complicate fucking travelling like you wouldn't believe!!

tip: if you are flying somewhere and need to be transferred to your accommodation at the other end- take your baby car seat with you. for gods sake, spare yourself the anger and frustration.
i am trying to organise a car to collect us at jfk airport to take us to our manhatten hotel (and back again) so far no company will supply a baby seat- we've got to supply our own. i'm livid. why is this so hard? how can a dedicated car service not have a baby seat?!
needless to say we did not bring a baby seat with us. i just assumed all taxi companies and car services would have these things as a matter of course. what an idiot i am turning out to be.

of course this is going to be repeated in paris, london and honolulu. i almost wish we were going to second world, eastern european countries where they don't give a flying fuck about your safety and certainly don't have legislation requiring babies be safely seated in cars.

i'm so completely over it. i had a terrible nite last nite and just wanted to sort this out as the final thing before we leave. i was looking forward to a snooze while percy slept and now all i can do is toss and turn and try to figure it out. hence i'm up and having a whinge. i think my stress cortisol levels must be thru the roof. i fucking hate the whole thing.

the power slurp

for some weeks now percy has power slurped thru her feeds. i don't know if i ought to be concerned or not. i generally take consolation from the fact that she is growing and tracking about average in her blue book charts. but should a baby really get thru a breast in under 5 minutes? i continue to offer her the nipple but she pulls away, sometimes with quite a protest. i can only assume she's had enough.
i can recall spending 20-30 minutes a side. now she's drained both sides, burped and re-nappied in 15 minutes. perhaps i should just shut up and be grateful!
any thoughts anyone?

Started packing!!

yes, i may be getting ahead of myself but i can't help it.
i'm trying to make the load home as light and as convenient as possible. all the things percy has grown out of and the cheaper russian toys, plus her play mat and bouncer we are donating to the international womens club of kiev abandoned babies program. when i read about these poor bubs it nearly broke my heart. these babies live at local hospitals because there is nowhere else for them to go. often their mothers are drug addicts, hiv infected, homeless or all these things. they deserve some nice clothes and toys. it is possible to visit the babies and play with them. i would have done this but i didn't learn about them until just before i went to holland for 3 weeks and now it is too late. plus i probably would have cried and cried and cried and wanted to bring them all home with me. it makes me shiver to think 'what ifs' about percy being in a similar situation.

anything that we have worn out i'm chucking. plus there was a number of shirts of mine that were in a pile at home to go in the vinnies bin but accidently got packed instead. i'll leave them here too.

i'm hoping we can leave one, maybe two bags at the left luggage service in frankfurt airport. this means we won't have to lug them to paris and london and back to frankfurt with us. which is important because our flight from paris to london is with easyjet and apparently they really sting you for excess baggage. i'm sure we can live those nine days out of one suitcase for us and the carry-on wheelie case we use for percy.

so i've got one bag packed already and am plotting how best to do the others.
am i counting down the days?! well, as i said to alison- "only the hours!"

percy with paul's favourite things

it occurs to me that we have photos of percy with some of pauls favourite things- have a look...

bacon, coffee, beer

we just need sausages and martinis now!

pictures from the war memorial

it is often commented that tin tits sword looks out of proportion and too short for the sculpture, whose real title i think is 'mother of the nation'. the story is that it was shortened so that it would not stand higher than the highest point of the largest church in the lavra complex on the next hill. it would be wrong for a secular item to stand higher than a spiritual item.
the reliefs below are in bronze. they are huge and would have been very, very impressive when still shiny.
paulie was supposed to climb up and straddle the tanks cannon, according to local masculine custom. he didn't want to take the risk with his precious first-born strapped to his chest. to give a bit of perspective, that's the base of tin tits with the scaffolding on it behind him.

father's day

sunday was father's day which we marked by paul working a 14 hour day. i wonder whether it is worth it... he doesn't get paid enough to work 14 hours on a normal day but particularly not a sunday, and his first fathers day. grumble, grumble, grumble...

after percy had her breakfast at 7:00am we slung her up and walked off to see tin tits. aka- the war memorial. i'll try to add a picture here but don't hold your breath.

well, that's the best i can do. she is a truly enormous sculpture erected to commemorate the second world war (i think.) i imagine you can figure out where the nick name 'tin tits' comes from. the walk there was interesting as we found a sort of secret garden. obviously some effort and expense had gone into its construction but now it is all over grown. try another piccie...
okay, so now they are both up the top. that's not how it started out. however you're probably sick to death of me whinging about the non-user friendliness of this blogging site. you'll just have to match up pictures with text as you go.

upon our return to the apartment paul checked the laptop and saw there was problems at work. and that's the last we saw of him 'til he came to bed at 10:30pm. he then got up again at 2:30am to check how things were going in australia. he really isn't compensated enough for this. whinge, whinge, whinge.

we'll make up for it next year.