Please feel free to send this to your fellow MumTums!
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Monday, January 19, 2009
Saddest news
We just had word from some UK friends that a close friend of ours lost their beautiful 1 year-old boy last week. He'd been having seizures since October, and he died just the other day.
It's the worst possible thing that could ever happen to a parent, and I can't quite get my head around it yet. It's not real, it can't be. Terrible things like that happen on the news to people you don't know, not your mates who you just spoke to on Skype. I look at my own children and a horrible little part of me feels relief that mine are still OK, we had a scare of our own when Kaitereo was a baby, and just the thought that we could have lost her makes me feel utterly terrified.
We spent the weekend away at Tareka's Marae, and Tareka and I had a "discussion" about the different way in which his extended family raise their kids. Generally, it seems that the kids are all sort left to get on with things, and the adults are around, but not really watching them. The older kids are expected to look out for the younger ones, and everyone always seems to assume that someone else is watching them. This sort of parenting frightens me, and since I had my own children I battle constantly between my need to keep them protected from the world, and my knowledge that they need to experience life in order to learn, grow and become independent.
It always amazes me how the kids DO stay safe in this situation. The baby seems to know not to toddle over to where the cars are, and just plays happily around her siblings and cousins, while the adults get on with whatever jobs need doing, only pausing to feed the baby or pick her up when she toddles over for some attention.
It reminds me of something I read about the Yequana tribe, where (according to Jean Liedloff) the babies and children are never told to "be careful" or warned about potential hazards, and just left to learn about how to survive using their own instincts, and the amazing thing is that it seems to work, and life in the tribe appears unbelivably idyllic.
When I was stressing at Tareka about how dangerous a place the world is, and how we need to make sure our children are either kept away from hazards, or taught how to take care of themselves, he looked at me with that serious face he gets and said "you can protect them all you like, but sometimes they just don't wake up in the morning"
He has a point, how could my poor dear friends have protected their baby? Simple. They couldn't. No one is to blame, horrific and terrible though it is, it just happened. I send them all my love and sympathy and support, and I really feel for them, but ultimately they will get through this together, with their older son and each other.
Peace, my friends, I am thinking of you always.
It's the worst possible thing that could ever happen to a parent, and I can't quite get my head around it yet. It's not real, it can't be. Terrible things like that happen on the news to people you don't know, not your mates who you just spoke to on Skype. I look at my own children and a horrible little part of me feels relief that mine are still OK, we had a scare of our own when Kaitereo was a baby, and just the thought that we could have lost her makes me feel utterly terrified.
We spent the weekend away at Tareka's Marae, and Tareka and I had a "discussion" about the different way in which his extended family raise their kids. Generally, it seems that the kids are all sort left to get on with things, and the adults are around, but not really watching them. The older kids are expected to look out for the younger ones, and everyone always seems to assume that someone else is watching them. This sort of parenting frightens me, and since I had my own children I battle constantly between my need to keep them protected from the world, and my knowledge that they need to experience life in order to learn, grow and become independent.
It always amazes me how the kids DO stay safe in this situation. The baby seems to know not to toddle over to where the cars are, and just plays happily around her siblings and cousins, while the adults get on with whatever jobs need doing, only pausing to feed the baby or pick her up when she toddles over for some attention.
It reminds me of something I read about the Yequana tribe, where (according to Jean Liedloff) the babies and children are never told to "be careful" or warned about potential hazards, and just left to learn about how to survive using their own instincts, and the amazing thing is that it seems to work, and life in the tribe appears unbelivably idyllic.
When I was stressing at Tareka about how dangerous a place the world is, and how we need to make sure our children are either kept away from hazards, or taught how to take care of themselves, he looked at me with that serious face he gets and said "you can protect them all you like, but sometimes they just don't wake up in the morning"
He has a point, how could my poor dear friends have protected their baby? Simple. They couldn't. No one is to blame, horrific and terrible though it is, it just happened. I send them all my love and sympathy and support, and I really feel for them, but ultimately they will get through this together, with their older son and each other.
Peace, my friends, I am thinking of you always.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Project Update
I have finished the first draft of chapter one of The Secular Marriage Course.
Can anyone think of a nicer name for my book?
I have sent my draft off to the people who created The Marriage Course, so I really hope it gets past this first draft. I will get onto writing chapter 2 on the assumption that chapter 1 will pass muster!
Can anyone think of a nicer name for my book?
I have sent my draft off to the people who created The Marriage Course, so I really hope it gets past this first draft. I will get onto writing chapter 2 on the assumption that chapter 1 will pass muster!
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Last resolution
3. Learn a new language. I am going to attempt basic Mandarin-Chinese using EARWORMS!
Monday, January 5, 2009
New Years Resolutions
Yes yes, I know everyone gets all excited and makes these, only to collapse in a quivering heap by the 11th January going "it's so HARD", but there you go. I WILL DO THESE THINGS! You lot can hold me to it. In fact, please do, the more people I have to 'fess up to if I don't do this, the more likely I am to keep going.
That's it.
ONLY 2? Yes, only 2, and I will be sticking to these babies, just watch me GO!
- Learn to run - I will do this through a program called "couch to 5k" which claims to be able to get me from a lazy lard-bucket to a 5k fun-runner in 3 months. I am giving myself until the end of April to hit the golden 5k, then I am intending to keep running that 5k at least once a week, and aim for 3 times a week where possible. I am on the lookout for a cheap second-hand treadmill so I can continue this no matter what the weather does.
- Relax about food and learn to love my body - this will be achieved through a strict diet of self-approval and hypnosis, courtesy of Paul McKenna. It worked for my GORGEOUS bridesmaid, so I reckon it'll work for me. I am listening to the CD every night and have a little picture from MyVirtualModel which shows how I'll look at my ideal weight which is my motivation and positive thinking tool.
That's it.
ONLY 2? Yes, only 2, and I will be sticking to these babies, just watch me GO!
Monday, December 29, 2008
Monday, December 15, 2008
Body beautiful
I've been thinking about the changes that happened to my body when I had my children (and what will happen if we have any more), and I have been trying to come to terms with the fact that the view in the mirror isn't the view in my head any more.
All my life I have been either dieting, exercising or in the middle of some minor eating disorder in a bizarre bid to get the image in my head to somehow transfer into my flesh and bones. I tend to think I've got close after the event, when I look back at pictures and go "hey, I looked OK then!" but I undoubtedly thought differently during the "then" period.
Before I had my first child, I attended WeightWatchers and successfully lost about 15kg (just over 2 stone), so I was at a healthy weight for my height when I had baby number 1. After baby, I lost the excess weight by walking a LOT (I delivered and collected census forms, which took 3 weeks of walking for about 4 hours a day, every day), so when I got pregnant with baby 2 I was pretty well back to my pre-baby weight. Now I am about 7kg above my pre-baby weight, and about 10kg out of the healthy weight range for my height.
I have discovered that trying to restrict my food intake with children around is impossible, unless I want to go insane, and I also found that the stress of trying to change my eating habits significantly tended to push me back towards bulimia, so I decided that food intake is just going to have to be left alone. I know I ought to drink more water, but other than that my diet is reasonable.
I think that the only way I can go now is learn to accept the changes that have come about through childbirth and breastfeeding, and make an effort to be more physically active.
I was thinking about how womens bodies change when they have children, and I came to the conclusion that the physical changes are similar to the changes we experience at puberty - they are permanent, fairly sudden and relatively surprising (even though we know what MIGHT happen, everyone is different). Our breasts grow more tissue to supply mik, our hips widen to accomodate the baby and our hormone levels go insane.
The permanency is what I think I need to accept and work with.
My body has reached the next milestone in it's growth. Puberty began the process, and bearing children is the purpose of the pubescent changes. It's a neat little circle really. I have reached an important step and I simply need to go with the flow, as I did when I first grew breasts and found my bum getting wider!
I am no longer just woman-shaped, I am WOMANLY. Only women can bear children (at the moment!), so being the shape of a mother is an honor.
All my life I have been either dieting, exercising or in the middle of some minor eating disorder in a bizarre bid to get the image in my head to somehow transfer into my flesh and bones. I tend to think I've got close after the event, when I look back at pictures and go "hey, I looked OK then!" but I undoubtedly thought differently during the "then" period.
Before I had my first child, I attended WeightWatchers and successfully lost about 15kg (just over 2 stone), so I was at a healthy weight for my height when I had baby number 1. After baby, I lost the excess weight by walking a LOT (I delivered and collected census forms, which took 3 weeks of walking for about 4 hours a day, every day), so when I got pregnant with baby 2 I was pretty well back to my pre-baby weight. Now I am about 7kg above my pre-baby weight, and about 10kg out of the healthy weight range for my height.
I have discovered that trying to restrict my food intake with children around is impossible, unless I want to go insane, and I also found that the stress of trying to change my eating habits significantly tended to push me back towards bulimia, so I decided that food intake is just going to have to be left alone. I know I ought to drink more water, but other than that my diet is reasonable.
I think that the only way I can go now is learn to accept the changes that have come about through childbirth and breastfeeding, and make an effort to be more physically active.
I was thinking about how womens bodies change when they have children, and I came to the conclusion that the physical changes are similar to the changes we experience at puberty - they are permanent, fairly sudden and relatively surprising (even though we know what MIGHT happen, everyone is different). Our breasts grow more tissue to supply mik, our hips widen to accomodate the baby and our hormone levels go insane.
The permanency is what I think I need to accept and work with.
My body has reached the next milestone in it's growth. Puberty began the process, and bearing children is the purpose of the pubescent changes. It's a neat little circle really. I have reached an important step and I simply need to go with the flow, as I did when I first grew breasts and found my bum getting wider!
I am no longer just woman-shaped, I am WOMANLY. Only women can bear children (at the moment!), so being the shape of a mother is an honor.
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