Julie's Boggle

As the current pregnancy ticked over into its 32nd week on Friday, I paused to consider what was happening in my life 2 years and 9 months ago while I was expecting Jonathan.  Around that time, I had 4 weeks of work left before 4 weeks of much-anticipated leave (yay!), I was busy training my “maternity cover” contractor and trying very hard to tie off what felt like a million loose ends.

Back then, my main concerns day to day – aside from work-related tasks – were getting a seat for my commute to work, and trying to figure out what appealed to me from the lunch selection in the canteen.  I was also having “growth” scans every 4 weeks at the hospital (which was a bit of a drag) because the arteries to the uterus had “notches” in them (apparently caused by high blood pressure, although I don’t think that the medical gurus have a particularly firm hold on this one), which can sometimes be an indicator for other complications.

It was at a 32 week scan (which was inevitably combined with a check-up from a consultant), that I mentioned a slight rash that had come up on my arm and they sent off some (more) blood for various tests.  I had also been  getting spells of annoying itching on my shins for some time, but I was assured by various doctors that this happened to lots of women, nothing to be worried about.  Yet.

My final week at work had just started when my blood pressure meter at home started to give some oddly high readings one night and we gave the hospital a call “just to be sure”.  Turned out that it was all fine and my home meter wasn’t reading true any more (how annoying), but I got kept in overnight for monitoring regardless.  While the consultants were poring over my notes, they found the results of the blood test I’d had a month before and came up with the diagnosis that I was borderline for a condition called  obstetric cholestasis (OC).  (Something to do with one’s liver being stressed by the pregnancy — a possibility I could well appreciate given how squashed up everything felt around the liver area!)

As a fairly recent addition to the list of things that can go wrong in pregnancy, there’s a lot that’s still unknown about OC.  The doctors have a suspicion that there’s a slightly increased risk of stillbirth,  so are all for proceeding with great caution.  Which is how I came to spend my last day at work, and my (now) single week of maternity leave , thinking about the fact that I was going to be induced at the start of week 37.

Fast forward to the present, and this time for whatever reason (better BP management perhaps?), there were none of those artery notches.  So scratch the extra ultrasounds and consultant visits.  They’ve also been testing my blood for OC for a while now and none of that (or the itching that goes with it) to date.  Phew.  Which leaves me with 8 weeks of hopefully minimal medical intervention!

Just like last time, the bump is now feeling rather tight and very firm.  Like half a football attached to my front and covered with skin.  I have to press quite hard against taut skin to feel my bottom ribs and need to sit up nice and straight to give all the organs a bit more space.   At 7 months, the baby doesn’t have much wriggle room left in there, so the movements are less chaotic, and feel more like one’s insides are being rearranged!

Other things are different though: my maternity trousers that I’d been so relieved to find back in 2007 (which lasted me to at least 36 weeks), are already feeling uncomfortably tight!  Oops.  My weight gain has been about the same so perhaps it’s all just hanging out more.   I’m also having much worse heartburn this time around – controlling it, mostly, with pills and revoltingly thick peppermint-flavoured goop – and consequently feeling more tired because it hits most severely when I lie down.

Anyway, there’s nothing much else to do for it now aside from sitting back and waiting to see what happens.  Taking it easy while also trying to give Jon some of the attention he needs and finding things to keep him busy and stimulated. And trying not to panic at the thought that within the short space of 10 weeks, we’ll definitely have a baby!

On the afternoon this was taken, Jon was getting a lot of pleasure out of being allowed to “help out” with the housework – trailing our lovely cleaner, Adam.  Here he’s clutching the vacuum cleaner ["VAC-leaner"] pipe in his hand, and he was in the process of gamely pushing it around his bedroom carpet.

In choosing this month’s smile, I was quite torn between the photo above and this one, taken on the same day.  Both of them showed examples of Jon’s gentle smile to great effect.

(As an aside, Jon is wearing a warm top ["wahm-cop"] of his own choosing which he outgrew about 4 months ago, but still loves to pick out.   The text is mostly inaccurate but it is wonderfully cuddly!)

Over the last 6 months, Jonathan has become very fond of teddy bears, adopting a number of mine to supplement his originally meagre stockpile.  These bears seem to fill a special role in his collection of toys, perhaps in that they are the most cuddly and also the most easily anthropomorphised?

Jon tends to treat all bears equally, although the slightly bigger ones do end up spending more time with him.  When he’s in the mood, the bear of the minute will be given a sweet little cuddle with a corresponding “Aahh!”  (Filling in the response he hears so often from us when we see him dispensing a hug! )

A definite element of bear-popularity is that they can ride pillion on Jon’s little pushcar (albeit slightly more under Jon than behind him), and they fit well into his toy pushchair.  Both of these allow Jon to show his bear just how fast he can get them from one end of the flat to the other.  He also likes how they can sit on his booster seat, where they get diligently clipped in and fitted with a bib before being fed some favourite meal, like “hot bread”.

(Tom managed to get this lovely shot the other day during the morning wake-up routine.  These bears which had spent the night with him were clearly very deserving of some Jon-love.)

In all the impromptu photos that have been captured over December, somehow there weren’t very many in the best smile category.   (Perhaps the latest bout of teething has kept Jon in a more sombre mood this month.)

Having said that, this was one of my favourites where Jon is laughing out loud as he plays with his Christmas present from us: a wooden train track.  (For reasons known only to himself, Jon has developed an avid enthusiasm for cars and trains over the last 6 months which made our choice of present an easy one this year! )

This from 13 December.

Every so often, the perfect day shows up together with the perfect opportunity to make great use of it.  On this particular glorious Autumn day, about a month ago, Jonathan and I met up with a friend and her little one and headed down to the Diana Memorial Playground for some toddler fun.

Jon responds really well to having a friend to follow / lead around – it helps to focus him on a particular activity (e.g. charging around the climbing frame), as well as getting him to look around and explore more than he would if he were by himself or with children he didn’t know.

He and James had a grand old time trying everything out.  Unfortunately the pictures didn’t come out brilliantly with the sharp bright light leaving everything in shadow or over-exposed, but I thought the two above did a good job of highlighting both the toddler enjoyment and the light extremes!

I love the way that Jonathan is still very easily amused especially by basic “horsing around” type games.  When I got this photo, he’d decided to lie down on the floor on a spare change-mat and I was getting him to shriek with laughter just from some gentle tickling with my foot.

After only a minute or two of clicking away, I ended up with a whole set of pictures that I liked too much not to share:

I’d been thinking recently that it would be good to get Jon started at a nursery group sometime soon – especially before life starts to get exciting around Easter next year.  With that in mind, I called up the only nursery I had a real interest in (by virtue of its reputation and location) to see if they had any vacancies.

Before I go on, I should briefly explain the term “nursery” in its UK context.  It’s got quite a broad definition as people use it to refer to any formal organisation which looks after groups of pre-school aged children, i.e. from baby to 5.  Nurseries vary widely in the ages (from this range) that they will take, and the hours that they provide each day.  They also tend to vary in how much they charge and in details like whether they provide meals and whether they are open in school holidays.  To give a feel for the costs involved, a full day’s care in a typical London nursery, which includes three meals + snacks, will set you back between £60 and £70.

I tend to think of the nurseries that provide the full day service as having more of a childcare role.  To be sure, they will also offer all sorts of child development, but they exist primarily for parents who work and don’t have someone to look after their child during the day.

Contrasting with this are the nurseries that operate limited sessions, sometimes only in the morning, or with a shorter afternoon session thrown in as well.  (Sometimes called “nursery schools”.)   They don’t tend to provide meals and they don’t fit in very well at all with the typical working day.  These nurseries, in my book, are purely there for child development opportunities.

The nursery I was keen on for Jon falls firmly into the second category.  It runs 3-hour morning-sessions, 5 days a week, and 2-hour afternoon-sessions 3 days a week.  Term-time only.  The afternoon sessions are aimed at the youngest children (2 to 2.5yo generally), with perhaps 2 or 3 of the older children from the morning session staying on (with their packed lunches) to give them the experience of a longer day in preparation for starting “big” school.

I knew when we went for our first visit, that they were quite booked up until January.  But Jon fitted in so well, and made such a good impression, that we were offered a place that same day!  (After the head teacher made a plan to juggle staff around to fit him in.)  I was very impressed myself with the little class that we stayed for, and happily accepted.

Thus began Jon’s formal interactions outside the home.  The sessions he attends run from 12h30 to 14h30 on Mondays and typically involve between 8 and 11 other toddlers with either 2 or 3 adults.

There is not much that is convenient time-wise about those hours , but we are managing.  At the moment, the routine has shuffled around so Jon has an early lunch at 12h00 (so we can leave at 12h25 at the absolute latest), and after I pick him up, with the mandatory homeward dawdle, he gets a nap from 3-ish to 4pm.  (Which can be a bit of a challenge.)

I’m still fine-tuning my time-management and have yet to experience a Monday that doesn’t involve jogging, with the pushchair, to make it by starting time, but we’re getting there!

It is rather nice to have that little chunk of time to myself (will become even more precious next year I’m sure), and Jon seems to love it.  Particularly today, which followed a week’s “half-term” break, he was tripping over his feet and other little people to race inside.  From next term (January), he’ll start going 2 afternoons a week, and then we’ll see how Jon and our finances go from there.

In this shot, Jon (at 27m) was enjoying a ride on a little pushcar at Snakes and Ladders, an indoor activity centre that we visit for the occasional treat, pausing just long enough to give me a lovely smile as I waved the camera at him.

(This is one of those annoying photographs which captured a gorgeous look, but with a woefully inadequate flash setting!  However, it was still October’s sweetest smile, so it’s had a little “processing” to make up for the original’s inadequacies.)

Checking my recent blog entries, I’m all too aware that they have been scant of late.  And of course I’m going to put the bulk of the responsibility for that firmly on the aforementioned pregnancy.

I will admit that it’s definitely been easier being pregnant (so far) the second time around.  If you don’t count the occasional requirements for lugging heavy toddlers around, the advantages of being a stay-at-home mum for this stage are huge.

For starters, when the periods of complete and utter exhaustion began – round about week 8 – I was able to collapse for a half-hour power-nap while Jon had his lunchtime sleep.  This was a massive tonic for my afternoon / evening alertness and I felt immensely grateful not to be reliving the endless first trimester afternoons at work back in 2006 which ground on and on under a blanket of weariness.

Now that I’m onto week 16, things are feeling a lot better in general.  The tiredness is still there, but these days it’s more down to my blood-pressure meds than the pregnancy.  And the all-day queasiness has passed too, thank goodness, so I can get rid of my food obsession.  (Of course while I was feeling queasy and tired, it was a big perk not to need to be applying my weary brain to anything more intellectual than management of domestic chores and finding a quick and easy supper recipe!)

Blogging, in the meantime, has had significant time-resource issues as the blessed afternoon nap jumps to the front of the queue, followed closely by its cousin, the early night.  And for the moments when I’m feeling quite alert and inspired to write, there is young Jon whose demands for attention (particularly when I’m engaged in a solo-task like tapping away at the keyboard) are becoming ever more insistent as the months go by.

I must say that things at the moment feel about as normal as they ever have.  Naturally nothing is static with a toddler in the house, but our routine is comfortable and familiar, and overall, the effect of the additional bump in our lives has not been significant to date.

Most noticeably, things are happening at a more relaxed pace as I learn to cram less into a day, and in the spaces that open up I’m gaining extra appreciation of time spent alone with my amusing, enthusiastic, energetic little guy.