Thirty-three things I want my daughter to know

1. Always be polite and use the words please, thank you and excuse me not only with your grandma but with everyone. Good manners never hurt anyone.


2. Don't be afraid to voice your opinions but do it tactfully. Don't show off and boast about your achievements. They will speak for themselves. 


3. Listen to what other people have to say even if you don't agree with them.  


4. There is never a need to raise your voice when talking to someone even if you are really upset with them. If you feel like yelling, go for a walk outside instead. 


5. Love is the greatest gift in the world. If you find it, hold on to it and don't be afraid of your feelings. True love will bring you great happiness. But don't rush it, it'll come to you when you least expect it. 


6. Always be true to yourself.


7. Never lie, not even those little white lies. Honesty is always the best policy, even if you don't think so at the time.


8. Never let someone talk down to you or treat you badly, always remember you deserve to be treated with respect and dignity.


9. Always treat other people with respect regardless of their background, ethnicity, religion (or whether or not they're religious), beliefs and values. 


10. Forgive and forget. Don't hold grudges - it'll give you wrinkles before your time. 


11. Don't ever be too proud to tell someone you are sorry or that you were wrong.


12. Try really hard not to say things you don't mean. 


13. Travel and open your eyes to the world. Visit places that are different to home. Experience different cultures, customs and foods. Take the road less travelled. 


14. Follow your dreams. If you don't know what they are yet, follow your passions. Do things you like doing. Try new and different things. Don't be afraid to make mistakes.


15. Keep good friends around you. Make time to see them and be there for them if they need your support. 


16. Listen to your mother even when you think you know best. Believe me, she's been there before. Listen to your father, too. Remember, your mum and dad will love you unconditionally until the end of time and beyond. Never be afraid to come to them for help or if you think you've stuffed up somehow.


17. Believe in yourself. Every day. If you don't feel confident, fake it for a moment and it'll come to you.


18. Always be kind to others. If someone is upset, talk to them and show them you care. 


19. Laugh out loud as much as you can. Surround yourself with people who make you feel happy.


20. Life is too short to worry, particularly about things that haven't happened and perhaps they never will, so don't worry about it.


21. Always look on the bright side of life. Things will go wrong, you'll make mistakes, people will let you down, you won't always get what you want, but it's all okay and tomorrow everything will be better, I promise. 


22. Care about the environment. One day you will have children, too. Make the world beautiful for them.


23. Read. Read books from the classics to best-selling fiction. Read as much as you can. Magazines, too. Don't be a snob, ever.


24. Keep a journal or a blog and record the every day, the small things that you may think don't matter so much but its from these things a life is made, you'll appreciate looking back on it one day - something to share with your own children one day.


25. Don't follow the crowd. Don't be afraid to try something different. And don't judge other people. 


26. Learn another language. Swim in the ocean. Learn how to cook. Eat well and drink water every day.


27. Go to university to study. Not only because it will lead to having a better job but because it will steer your mind on the right path to learning. Never stop learning. Be curious and question things all the time.


28. Don't always know everything. Ask questions. Don't be afraid to say you don't understand something. How else will you learn?


29. Always give up your seat on public transport to pregnant women and the elderly or someone who looks like they need to sit down.


30. Listen to your mum and dad. They love you very much and want the best for you even if there may be times you feel they don't understand you. 


31. Don't worry so much about finding the perfect job and don't get stuck in a rut at work. Remember, a job shouldn't define you as a person. It's one part of your life. Family is always more important. Embrace change and change careers often even if it feels scary at the time.  


32. Give back to the community. Volunteer your time. Help those who are less fortunate than you. Never turn down someone who asks you for help.


33. Reflect on your values once in a while and work out what's important to you.

So you think you can blog?

AT LAST on the day Lilia Rose turns two months, I finally wrote a post about bringing our baby girl home for the first time and entered the 'So you think you can blog?' competition on the Kleenex Mums website. 


It feels good to have done something on time for a change (even though I have been meaning to write it since the competition opened in May). 


And so what if I'm still in my pyjamas and pink polka dot night-gown? Fingers crossed my entry post will be published...

Hips to hospital

LATER this afternoon, on her grandma's 62nd birthday, baby Lilia Rose has a hospital appointment: an ultrasound of her hips to check for hip dysplasia.


Shortly after her birth, the doctors told us this type of ultrasound is standard procedure for babies who have been born in a breech position or for babies, like Lilia, who spent considerable time in a breech position during late pregnancy. 


Baby Lilia did a spin on the day of delivery with surgeons advising it was possible she turned while they gave me the second spinal injection, my cheeky little monkey. 


Either that or they didn't want to be sued for not performing an ultrasound of my belly to check her position prior to my c-section. 


'There's no way she would turn now, there just won't be any room,' one of the hospital obstetricians said on the morning of my operation and Lilia's birth. Nice one, doc.


Had they done an ultrasound and in the unlikely chance she had turned that morning, I may have been able to have a natural birth (and put my six-page birth plan to good use). But I'm happy baby Lilia came into this world safely, happily and without any trauma. 


I have tried to stay away from the internet to source more information about hip dysplasia and other than knowing it's more common in girls than boys, and my fleeting worries about the mis-matching creases on her legs, I'm feeling positive she won't need  treatment, which can include wearing a special harness, splints or having an operation.


But one thing I'm learning albeit slowly, particularly since our last time at the hospital when our then five-week-old baby Lilia had gastro, is to try not to worry about things that we don't know exist yet. This reminds me of something my older sister said to me once: 'try not to worry about things you can't control.' Good advice, sis. 

Running late but still running

TWO hours is how late I was for the last parent's group meeting making it for the last half hour of the session. Lucky for me and baby Lilia one of the other mum's daughters, Matilda, took the first half hour of the session burping-up her feed. Thanks for unknowingly being on our side Matilda, you little champion. 

Before having a baby I was much better at being on time. I had friends with babies and they were often late, not that it bothered me but I never thought I would ever be that late (poor time management skills aside). Do all new mums suffer from this? Is there a cure? 

Bugger! I've just glanced up at the clock and it's 12.28pm. The next parent's group starts in a hour and I still have to:

• get out of my pjs (yes, one of the many things I love about being a mum is having an excuse to stay in my polka dot pjs until noon or beyond)
• wake my baby girl and feed her
• get the pram out of the car and put it back together
• find the house keys
• eat something myself or at least a drink of water for now
• pack the nappy bag ...

This leaves no time to finish this post! Does anyone else live this way? Does getting to places on time with a baby in tow get easier to manage? 

  

Facebook fatigue, really?

ARE we tired of Facebook? In an article published on The Times online website, which ABC radio commentator Jon Faine mentioned on his program this morning, it seems the social networking site may have reached its peak with British and US users of the site dropping for the first time. Statistically, this means a 5 per cent decline from 8.9 million unique visitors to the website in December to 8.5 million last month. 

According to a Nielsen Online internet analyst cited in the article: 'Facebook users are finding that managing their virtual life (is) too demanding.' Perhaps there is some truth to this? 

As a Facebook user who has had a love/hate relationship with the site over the years, I have often struggled to reply to messages in busy times (a testing moment was when someone I hadn't seen since high school sent me an email asking what I had been up to in the last 15 years). But I have stopped feeling bad about it and no-one has held it against me, as far as I know. Personally, I don't find it demanding to manage this so-called 'virtual life', probably because I don't view using the site, or the digital world overall, in this way. 

Facebook plays a small part in my life. For example, the site replaces the need for a telephone: a quick message to friends about catching-up on the weekend is much quicker than picking-up the phone and speaking to everyone separately, which is great when you have a baby as it is almost impossible to fit in a long phone chat with a friend. But perhaps other people are simply better at managing their time than me? 

Blogging: type vs write?

BLOGGING. Is it the writing medium for today's audience? Are the thoughtful days of writing the great Australian novel, an investigative feature article or simply putting pen to paper numbered? Are we reading less? If so, are we thinking less? Are we drowning in information overload but not getting much knowledge? Perhaps we're running around too much and consequently suffering from short on time syndrome (I've accepted that since having a baby there's no way I can ever finish reading an article from The Monthly now but take comfort in the knowledge the cover story is not an article -- it's an essay, which takes me back to the 1990s and reading in the dark corners of the library during my university days or the last time I read an essay). Or are we just being lazy? It seems all we need today is to be ironic or witty and readers offer praise. 

From the little I know about what there is to know, good writing takes great planning, which requires ideas, thinking and thorough research -- not to mention the gruelling editing process (whatever happened to the dark red pen and the lost literary art of using proofreading symbols to correct grammar, punctuation and long sentences). It seems the ink has run dry. 

Most bloggers, I suspect, if they're anything like me, don't plan what they're going to write about or do they? I don't mainly due to the time constraints that come along with a new baby not that this was ever mentioned in the antenatal classes (and not that I mind on most days). 

But not planning gives this particular type of writing a different kind of magic, perhaps not for my audience (not that I've even worked out who you are yet or whether you even exist outside my head), but for me, as a writer of ... sorts, blogging offers something unique, not just instant publication or online interaction. 

Blogging has a kind of intangible electricity to it that runs through your fingers as you type -- similar to what I imagine being in the car with writer Jack Kerouac would feel like: driving really fast along a long, empty road without any traffic lights, pedestrian crossings or stop signs, not thinking about what we're passing or even where we're going until we come to the stop at the end. Then without even getting out of the car to explore our surroundings, we throw our half smoked cigarette out the window and keep driving or with one hurried click press 'publish post'.

Catching sleep

LATER today baby Lilia Rose will be meeting her grandma for the first time, which our family is looking forward to very much. I'm hoping our beautiful baby girl will stick to the routine we established yesterday (good luck) and be awake for some of the time. This morning's feed happened at the same time as the feed yesterday morning, which makes feeding times easier to predict and life more balanced. And mothers more sane, presumably. 


For me, along with sleep deprivation, not having an established routine is one of toughest things about having a baby (although it has laid the groundwork for some cracker moments like walking into walls and doors, forgetting the names of everyday objects: "sweetie, what's the name of that ... err, what-do-you-call-it, um ... it has four legs and a plank of wood on top ... you put things on it but not your feet", walking up the escalators the wrong way and so on). I haven't spent (correction: had) much time researching routines but have heard mothers talking about a book called Save Our Sleep. Lovely and enticing title but does it make a false promise?   


Last night, baby Lilia woke at 2am for a feed and then not until 6am. Bliss. Four hours to sleep. Heavenly. But why do I feel so tired? I know, I know. You're supposed to sleep when your baby sleeps, which in my case means I should be sleeping now but when would I get time to write? Or to eat breakfast? Or to brush my teeth? Hang out with friends? Sleeping, feeding and playing is fine for babies but what about their parents? 


I have always taken sleep for granted. Perhaps not when I've had a massive hangover, then sleep is good; sleep is essential. I probably learnt bad sleeping habits from my hard-working mum who does night-shift work and doesn't sleep much during the day either. Last night, we went around to mum's for dinner and she was nodding off at the table before we finished our meals. I've always been the sort of person who stays up late (usually reading, not including my 20s when I would be out somewhere where drinks were expensive, music was blaring and floors were dirty) and wakes up early. Nothing wrong with that, is there? 


Sure enough, it's much harder to maintain not sleeping much with a new baby and with an old body still recovering from childbirth and all that comes with it afterwards. Read in between the lines or read it here: exhaustion. I have stopped counting the hours I have slept (or haven't slept). I mean, four hours is not enough, nor is six it seems. 


I have started to, I won't write 'dream' as I don't sleep long enough to dream these days, think about sleeping for days, uninterrupted. This delicious thought sometimes entails going to a deserted beach and curling up in the warm pristine sand (sure bring me a creamy and cool pinacolada before I close my eyes) or I will happily take my pillow to a quiet room in the house, shut the door, lie on the ground with a blanket and wake up five days later. Even then, I would never catch-up to the sleep. If I did, I would try to hold on to it that little bit longer or put it in a box and open it up just before dosing off at the wrong time, again.


Useful reading (if you're not too tired) 

• Save Our Sleep website 

Human-like cow's milk?

FIRST breast milk ice-cream for sale and now another 'innovation': human breast milk from genetically modified cows has started brewing in China. Time to jump offline.

Boobies are back, formula milk is staying

TODAY is going to be a great day. This morning when my alarm clock sounded, I took her in my arms, gave her a cuddle and placed her on my chest. She took to her breakfast really well, gulping it down happily. 

When it works (read: when it's pain-free and you don't feel like biting through your knuckles or throwing the TV through the window while you're doing it), breastfeeding can be magical for both mum and baby. Of course, it's not going to be enjoyable when you're in pain but for me it doesn't really work when I'm suffering from severe sleep deprivation either. 

That's why combining breastfeeding with bottle-feeding using expressed breast milk or infant formula milk, also known as mixed feeding, has really helped my family. It means we do one night-feed using formula milk, which is also a great way for dad to get involved with feeding his baby, too. Or he could just be worried about the telly.   

Helpful resources

• How can I combine breast and bottle?      
• Bottle-feeding and formula 
• Bottle-feeding - nutrition       
• Do I have to breastfeed?

       

Wash your hands, please

NOTHING can ever prepare you for the ship-sinking feeling you get when your baby falls ill, suddenly. Blink. That's how quickly things can go from healthy to hospitalisation. 

Last week, our beautiful baby girl looked well but was bringing up her feeds. I was struggling to differentiate between her burping large and vomiting. My maternal and child health nurse said vomiting was normal provided this was no more than two projectile vomits per day. Lilia's nappies also revealed watery poos but from speaking to friends this was normal bottom behaviour for a five-week-old baby.

Two days passed and this continued. Our local GP examined Lilia and told us if she does one more forceful vomit, we should take her down to the emergency department to check for pyloric stenosis, a condition found in young babies where food from the stomach can't be emptied and causes forceful vomiting, which requires immediate surgery to be fixed. It was gut-wrenching awful to think this could be a likely possibility.

Things didn't improve. Later that evening, Lilia's vomiting became worse and she couldn't keep down her feeds. Then another large forceful vomit, closely followed by one more. 

At 8pm the three of us arrived at the hospital emergency department. Almost immediately we were taken through to the paediatrics wing of the emergency department where doctors and nurses fussed over our baby girl who was looking paler than usual and not very happy. The staff treated us very well and found us a cramped room known as P10. Twenty-two hours later, we were still there waiting for a bed on the children's ward upstairs.  

While we waited, poor baby Lilia had to have a painful injection in her bladder through her tummy for the nurse to get a clean urine sample. This happened in a treatment room and I will never forget the look of helplessness, confusion and fear on her face. 

'This will cause her pain,' the nurse said. 'Most parents leave the room.'  

Both B and I stayed. We would never leave our baby girl, not even for a blink. She needed us and we needed to be there for her, as we always will be — no matter what. As I stroked her face gently and injected cherry drops in her mouth slowly, as this would ease her pain a little, B reassured her everything would be okay. 

As the needle went in, baby Lilia screamed like she had never done before and it broke my heart. She also had a blood test. Afterwards, I held her in my arms and rocked her, gently and promised her I would never let go. She wept quietly, my sweet beautiful baby girl. 

Later, while we waited, baby Lilia was becoming more dehydrated. We were left with little choice. She had to have a tiny plastic tube inserted through her little button nose down to her stomach. It was heartbreaking to watch and makes me feel sad to think about what she has been through. The paediatrician said the procedure is something she could remember.

At home for the last two days, moments before she wakes baby Lilia tosses and turns forcefully and looks frightened, as though she is having a nightmare. If only I could take that away from her somehow — erase the experience from her young memory.     

But we are lucky that Lilia is well. After being diagnosed with gastro, which in an infant can be very serious, our baby girl is doing much better today. It was and continues to be a huge relief to know her illness wasn't anything that required an operation like we first worried it would. 

After three sleepless nights at the hospital where Lilia was closely monitored in a small isolated room (anyone coming in had to put on a special gown to ensure infection would not spread and we were not allowed onto the ward to prevent the viral infection from spreading). When we could, I slept on a chair that folds into a bed, B used the pillows from this chair while our baby girl slept in her pram. We didn't really sleep but we had each other. 

Night three in isolation, not knowing what would happen next and whether Lilia would get better, I was starting to feel really down and worried. Too tired to sleep or to talk, I couldn’t even remember when Lilia’s last attempted feed was when the doctors quizzed me. But as our baby girl slept and we watched over her, B and I slow-danced and in that brief moment, I knew things would get better, it was only a matter of time.   

Finally at noon the next day, the doctors decided it was okay for us to finally take our baby girl home. They warned us that she could still infect others and could also be easily infected by other people, particularly prior to her immunisations as she doesn’t have immunity. Baby Lilia is not allowed near other babies or children for at least the next 10 days. The paediatrician in charge, who was responsible for Lilia's care, said other than the temporary isolation, there isn't much else we can do to ensure things don't get worse. She told us to make sure we wash our hands thoroughly before picking-up our baby girl or even being near her, particularly after going to the bathroom and when coming in from the cold outside.

Friends and family coming to visit us once the isolation period is over will find to the right of the door on the hallway table a large bottle of sanitiser gel. To keep our beautiful baby girl smiling, healthy and from returning to the hospital: before coming in use this gel to wash your hands, please. 

If, like me, you've been around anyone who has been unwell in the last two weeks or have the sniffles or similar yourself, please come and visit us another time. Two days short of turning six-weeks-old, baby Lilia doesn't have immunity to your sniffles or what they may bring.  

Burping more on formula

THANK YOU to Lilia's wonderful daddy for leaving cornflakes and juice out for me this morning and for kissing me goodbye gently before leaving for work. Lilia is still sleeping as I write this and eat my breakfast, happily. 

We have our second parent's group meeting today. As I'm still not allowed to drive, not until at least six weeks post my c-section, we are going to pram it there and hope the Melbourne weather will work its magic and not rain.

Last night, following two days of breastfeeding every four hours and not sleeping very much, we gave Lilia formula at midnight but she burped up most of it. This didn't happen when we gave it to her a few nights ago and I wonder whether it's because she needs to get used to it. It makes it much easier for us giving her this feed using formula and also gives us more sleep and my sore breasts a needed break. If anyone has any advice about formula, please let me know. 

The other day we took Lilia to meet our 96-year-old neighbour Iris, who is lovely. Iris asked whether I was breastfeeding. I told her I was but had a few problems and have started to use formula, slowly. 

'They do really well on formula,' Iris told me. 'My daughter's babies have done really well, but you'll probably find that people today are a bit judgemental about that sort of thing,' she said.

If you use formula to feed your baby whether exclusively or as a top-up, I would love to hear about your experience.