Thursday, August 5

A lot happens in a week.

Its hard to believe its been another week, in some ways it goes so quickly, yet in others it just seems to drag along.
Thursday was hydro and the counsellor, all good. Holly was soooo cute after she'd been for a swim. She zonked so quickly! I took a photo of her in her car seat on the way home, she was waaayyyy too pooped, very very cute and snoring! Thursday night I went up to my cousins for dinner again with a yummy cheesecake again. Friday morning I went and picked out my new glasses and then we went down to Phillip Island for the night. It was good to be with everyone, but it was seriously one of the worst nights sleep I've had since Holly was three weeks old! It was one of those nights where you lay awake, just waiting for daylight so that at least you can get up and do something! Between the dog scampering about and Holly waking up and being in an uncomfortable bed, it really wasn't a great nights sleep. We came home Saturday afternoon and I was grateful to sleep! Sunday my mum and sister came over to help us pack the house up a bit more.
Monday was filled with appointments, the main one being Holly's physio. A friend of mine has an aunt that is really well known in the bobath technique of physio. This lady lives in London and travels the world teaching people the technique. I had told my friend about our debacle of the physio conference and how Holly had gotten sick, so she organised for her aunt to come over to our house while she is in Melbourne and consult with Holly. Such a lovely gesture! Anyway, the lady was here for about 2 hours, just catching up on how Holly is, what she's like etc. It was interesting to see what she thought. She thinks Holly has a bad temper! She said that a lot of Holly's crying is just bad temper, that there actually isn't a great deal wrong with her in terms of her spacticity. She came to this conclusion because Holly was crying while physio was manipulating her. The physio could still work with her while she cried, she didn't stiffen up. This suggested to her that her stiffening was not a part of spasticity, rather, bad temper. Holly wasn't getting what she wanted and so she was crying - like all babies!
Anyway, the physio was suggesting to me that I needed to be firmer with Holly.
That I needed to tell her to stop crying, and that I shouldn't 'give in' and
give her what she wants when she wants it.
I'm still so new to this whole parenting thing!!
I tried to be firm with her while the physio was there, but I just couldn't. It
is really funny cause I'm a teacher, I'm used to being firm with children - in a
nice way - but I just can't with my own child!
So, its raised a few questions, I'm just not sure of so many things.
What age should you start disciplining? I don't mean punishing, but being firm
and telling her what she needs to be doing - its not like she will be able to
understand me. Isn't 8 months a little too young? Its really shaken me up a bit, I keep going over it. I don't want to be mean to her. I do understand about being firm and not letting her walk all over us, but really - how much does she know?? And the other thing that keeps going through my head is so what? So what if she cries to get what she wants, so what if we give her what she wants. She is only going to be on the planet for such a short amount of time, does it really matter that we give her what she wants? I know its hard and stressful for us having someone so demanding, but at the end of the day, she isn't going to be here for long.
I think like that for probably about 75% of the time, and the other 25% is filled with - I can't keep doing this, I can't keep giving her what she wants. She wants to be held ALL the time, she wants to be fed on my lap, she cracks it when she has to go in the pusher. I get that she can't keep demanding these things of me. She needs to learn that she can't be held all the time, she just has to get used to her tumble form, she can't be fed in my lap, she is getting too big and too heavy for that. I said to L the other day, the reality is that if she was 'normal', she'd be in a high chair to eat by now, so she just has to get used to being in the tumble form to eat. She has to get used to being in the pusher, I can't carry her everywhere, and, she's going to be in a wheelchair. She just has to get used to it, like it or not. I say all this, and deep down I know that I know all this, but when she is screaming crying to a point that she vomits, the logic just goes out the window, and we give her what she wants. I either deal with crying baby or vomit. Its just so hard to know what to do, I don't know how much she understands.
Tuesday was a nothing day, I just spent it at home. I rang around a few places and sorted out connection and disconnections. Wednesday was much the same. We went to the maternal health centre and that's about it, very boring - very very boring. Boring to a point of ridiculous, boring to the point of going nutty. I worked out last night that I've only left the house once since Saturday. I don't think that's mentally healthy. I worked out that the only person I've seen other than Luke this week has been the physio and the maternal health nurse, I don't think that's particularly healthy either. It gets to be very very lonely - oh well, it will get better when we are in the new house. It won't be as far to go and visit people. Holly's got her immunisations today - that's going to be an adventure, she had a bad reaction to the last ones, I'm not looking forward to all the crying and carry on. I guess I'll just load her up with panadol before we go and hope for the best.

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