Thursday, June 28, 2007

Opthamologist today

We took M to see Dr Forrest today. We now have to patch her other eye (formerly known as her "bad" eye) because her former "good" eye is now not working as well. M is actually preferring her "bad" eye. The doctor hasn't seen a patient switch eye like this in the past four to five years.
He also doesn't seem to have so many other patients who pull off and try to eat their patches ... M did that again on Monday.
So we're going to be patching her left eye for the next month, and we'll see doctor again at the end of July. If her eyes are even at that point, it looks like we'll have to act quickly with her surgery before her eyes potentially swap over again ... it's all rather interesting, as I thought her right eye was not responding in the best possible way to patching!

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Back at work

I started back at work this week. I'm working three days a week for now, and we'll see how that goes for the next month or so. My role is really a full-time role, and my boss and I need to see how it goes being part-time, and I need to see how I cope with everything and work. What a journey! I don't know how women in the US go back to work so quickly (mat leave is typically three months over there, so you stay at work til you pop!). M was still barely sleeping at three months ...
I think any Mum has a tough, full-on, 25-hour-a-day job, but those Mums who combine working out of the home with working in the home are to be admired!

Great-Grandad Moore

We had a bit of a scare with M's Great-Grandad Moore (my Grandad). He was taken from his nursing home to hospital at 11:30 last night with poor breathing. They think he's got pneumonia. The doctor's thought he wouldn't last the night. MorMor, Great-Grandma and I spent the morning in the Emergency with Grandad, and contrary to the doctor's predictions, he's survived. He was taken back to the nursing home at around midday. He is so strong, and we've had so many scares where doctors have thought that he's at death's door in the past few years. So far, he keeps proving them wrong.
I hope he knows he has a Great-Granddaughter.

Sick girl

So M has had a cold on and off since starting daycare. We knew it would be this way, and it seems that getting sick when around other kids is inevitable - even if one of us stayed at home with M til she starts school, we'd be going through all this with a 5 year old in grade one. Since Sunday, her cold's been rather yucky, and M has been having some cough syrup. This was perfect timing for her first babysitting session with Gramps and Gran Lylia. Until Wednesday night, the odd bit of Demazin, as required, seemed to be doing the trick (and a visit to the GP in between to make sure that it wasn't anything more serious). Wednesday night we had a very upset little girl waking up every hour or so. I was feeling so happy to be back at work ... not! The last few nights have been rather horrid, and typically involved an hour or so of trying to convince M that she wants to sleep in her bed from about 3am til 4am. It's such a shock to get some yucky sleep happening, after having good sleep for a while!
M's been rather upset this afternoon, so we called a Doctor out for a home visit. The inside of one ear is looking red and bulging (I think he said Titus something) and he's prescribed antibiotics for the next week. Poor little chook. It must be so hard to have pain and occasional fever and just not be able to do anything more about it than cry and want cuddles from Mummy and Daddy.

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Driving Distractions

Yesterday, we went for a wee drive before lunch. There was a house in Wooloowin I wanted to drive past that I'd seen online (not that we're even seriously looking for a new house yet, but I am checking out a few real estate websites). So we drove past that house, then the house in Nelson St Dad and Lib owned (I remember staying there when Peta was so young), another house I house sat once, and then headed to Portside for lunch. As we were waiting at a red light to turn into Junction Rd, I turned to look over my left shoulder. Matilda's sitting facing forward in the car now - very distracting when I look over my shoulder, as I normally get a great big smile each time! Something didn't seem quite right. I looked back towards the lights again, still red, and then looked back at Matilda. Now she seemed to be choking without any noises ... oh crap ... but at least her mouth was open, and there was something in it. I let go of the wheel, said something like "Jesus, Mary and Joseph" and reached back and was able to pull the item out of her mouth. Meanwhile, John put the park brake on, and opened his door, trying to get me to say something about what was going on.
I looked at the object I pulled out of Matilda's mouth. It was her eye patch, it's kind of like a band-aid, so it isn't very big; not normally easy to rip off, but very easy to try to eat. Matilda still puts everything in her mouth, and she has choked on some bits of chunkier food, so I've experienced her choking sitting right in front of me at the highchair, but never out of my sight like that. Very scary, but luckily quickly over and all OK. We realised afterwards that we weren't that far from our GP's rooms, and also were only about 4 housese away from Prof Led, a paediatric surgeon we know. Phew. Now Matilda's just fine, and we're going to take off the patch if it's starting to get that loose.

Friday, June 08, 2007

May-June Photos

Four generations of Moores - Mothers Day
Pirate Matilda
Cuddles with Aunty Jenny - hope you're having fun in Minnesota!
Cuddles with Aunty Petie
Happy Birthday Aunty Janet! Here's your presenet, actually, I'd like to keep the card thanks.
Last moments of freedom before the gate was put up between the TV room and back deck
Enjoying the big bath
Cuddles with D on Origin night
Cuddles with K on Origin night

Monday, June 04, 2007

Head Bobbing and Colds

I took Matilda to the paed last week to check out her head bob. Madeleine commented on it at M's christening, and it's been ongoing since then, although she doesn't really bob her head when her patch is on. The Dr decided that the head bob is a form of non-verbal communication and Matilda's just trying to chat with us. She can control it somewhat, and doesn't bob all the time, so she wasn't too concerned by it. We also got her ears checked out, as she always pulls at them when she's upset, but they looked just fine. So it was a typical paranoid first-time parent doctor's visit! ;)
We took all of Matilda's vital stats, she's just a bit over 8kgs now and 70cms long. I can't remember her head circumference, but she's in the 95th percentile for that! Her height is in the 75th percentile, and weight in the 50th. All over that's pretty decent measurements I guess.
Matilda has been fighting a bit of a cold for the past couple of weeks, on and off. Towards the end of last week, it got rather yucky, but only in the middle of the night. M's still having a feed at about 11pm (it's a dreamfeed, we wake her for it, and we should be able to phase it out soon), and on Weds, Thurs, Fri nights she just couldn't settle after the feed. M normally goes right back to sleep, so dealing with a cranky grizzly snuffled up little one when you're just desperately wanting to go back and snuggle under the doona is not fun. We had had some problems with the vaporiser, so hadn't been turning it on (nasty smells from the motor ... as it turns out, I think I overfilled it). On Fri night, JR caved in and turned it on, and between that and some infant panadol, M eventually went back to sleep at about 1:30am. Our neighbours got home at 2am and then had chats on the back deck ... Anyway, the poor love is blocked up, but mainly at night. Hopefully it will be over soon and we can all get some decent sleep at night.