Sept 08 - Our LO's are nearly 2, and they're hiding to do a poo (is it time for potty training, not until it stops this raining)

[ninja]

I started it!! (I'm going away to London with just DD1 tomorrow so I want to know where you all are when we get back.

3 toddler free days!!

Am liking the love in on here It's amazing to think back and look at what we've all gone through together

Right then, who's little one's were up at stupid o'clock this morning? And guess whose shift it was this morning?.....

However, we're off to my parents today for lunch. So I think I'll leave the childcare to them today

Sorry to hear you're having a hard time of it digi.

The garden / veg patch is nearly finished now. Just a few leeks and a brussel sprout plant left in for the winter. My garden is looking lovely at the moment .... as I had a gardener tidy it up the other week . Totally worth it as he did it beautifully with decent tools and without small children under his feet.

Better go, I had a decent nights sleep for once so I'd better make the most of it.

I'm really jealous about your garden Meglet. I've not done anything to ours since we moved and now it's just been taken over by weeds. I think I may leave it till spring and then get a gardener's help for a weekend as I don't have a clue about gardens, never having had one, and I'm too pregnant to dig. Does anybody have any tips?

pacita This is the BBC gardening page which has the basics on it. And you have to watch gardeners world too! Not sure how much gardners usually cost but the company I used charged £13 an hour, I suspect that's good value for gardeners though.

The only problem with having the garden tidy is that I'm now wondering how nice the house would be if I had a cleaner!

LOL, thanks meglet I'll check out the BBC.

right now, I am really really frustrated. I'm usually a nervy character that cannot stay still, but right now, I am completely flat and have no energy. I do hope the iron tablets make a difference (pregaday, has anyone used them and can let me know if they work?)

A neighbour offered a moses basket. As I gave Diego's away, I accepted it. It came without a fabric lining, frayed in the handles, and with a wrinkley mattress and sheets that smelled of mildew. Why? I would not offer something where I would not put my own baby. I am now lumbered with it, AND still need to buy one. Grrr.

Bookmarking. Will catch up when I get home from Scotland tomorrow.

meglet Always dreamed of having a gardener. In fact we very nearly got one before the summer then dh suddenly decided he was going to weed the garden himself. So we never got one. Waaay too expensive round our parts.

Ds was woken up by a little girl peering into his buggy today. He punched her for it. I tell him off when he lashes out but it doesn't seem to have any effect, he looks mildly guilty for a few seconds during the scolding but then quickly changes the subject. And never says sorry. Am I expecting too much asking him to say sorry?

Am back to work tomorrow. It does feel a little soon, but have to brief a freelancer on some work for a project. Then potentially I could go home after that. Ds is at the childminder tomorrow so could have a self indulgent afternoon napping and scoffing left over Halloween treats.

Scan at the epu and hopefully a chance to make an appointment with a consultant on Tuesday. We are currently having a bit of a cash-flow issue (I'm still insisting on saving up for this mythical maternity leave I might one day have) so can't really afford to go private, but am worried the nhs process will take ages.

Digi hope the week goes as well as it can - and yeah, I'd have a self-indulgent afternoon tomorrow if you can.
We've been saving hard for maternity leave and I keep thinking it'll pay for a new kitchen if we never manage to conceive no2.

It's so hard not being able to plan ahead atm. We've been offered a villa in Florida for 2 weeks next Sept but if I were to get pg this month, baby would be born end of July, or I could get pg later and not be able to travel with a due date of, say, Nov.

Can i also just say, these sorts of concerns are very trivial compared to most things so I'm having a self-indulgent moan.
Am v tired as despiste putting C to bed by 7pm (ie 8pm BST)last night, she was up at 5.50am - clearly thinking it was her usual waking time of 6.50. We also managed to get away with just a 30min nap yesterday, so thought she'd sleep later no problem.
How do the rest of you reset the body clock for them?

Robyn coped quite well with the hour change. I don't panic about when she should go to bed I just take her when she is tired. I can indulge this as we have no early morning routine to be up for. This last week she has started asking to go up at about 7-8pm and then gets in our bed early morning and back to sleep before we get up at between 7-8am. The only snag we have is if she wakes when Lucy is awake.
She was up yesterday at 6 but seems to have adjusted now. It's usually me who is shattered for a few days.

Hope work goes ok today Digi. If I were you I would defo be sitting on the sofa this afternoon scoffing sweets.

M has started to say sorry and in the right context, but I think he has learnt to just it rather than mean it. They don't 'get' empathy until they're about 3 I think.

mrsa - we managed to reset M's body clock my completely wearing him out yesterday. He was awake from 5.30am to 6.30 pm and only had about 45 minutes sleep in the day. Topped off with lots of running around all day. It seemed to work. Maybe next year I'll keep him up an hour later the night before so we don't have a 5.30am wake up call.

Thinking of you DG

Thanks bec and iltmimi. Work was ok yesterday, didn't leave quite as early as I intended, but it was fine. As an added bonus DS slept through last night!

Got my appointment at the clinic this afternoon, hoping to be reassured with next steps.

Having a separate nightmare with my poor poor little Dbro . Social services turned up at my dads last night, my dad had a letter about the visit, but not a reason. Turns out that a potential sexual incident happened while DB was on a school trip. He's only 10 FFS!!! Where were the effin teachers??? And this trip happened 3 weeks ago so why is it only being dealt with now? Apparently 5 boys were involved. One of them wrote quite a graphic account (genitals in mouths) of the incident but the other four haven't mentioned that side of it. So we don't know what actually happened. Poor DB keeps changing the story as he's scared, embarrassed and has had such a shite life so far with his crazy mum (my ex step) and parents divorce that he's so used to compartmentalising things he witnesses. Am getting all this info second hand from my sister as I don't have the emotional strength to help my father at the moment.
Sorry, didn't actually mean to spill all this out here but I literally don't know what to do. DF has a meeting with the head this morning, Dsis is going to fill me in. Am so so so with the school for a) not actually keeping an eye on these kids properly b) taking their fucking time so that by the time ss visited half term was over and db has to go back to school today knowing that all those other boys will have had the same visit c) completely and utterly failing to protect my brother and these kids on a school trip. Whatever has happened I completely blame the teachers on this trip. Completely. How on earth are we expected to trust them to protect them at school?

DG I'm absolutely livid for your DB. 10 is young and so vulnerable. I think your family should persue to know to the last detail of the story and hold the school to account. If kids are not safe on a schooltrip, where the bloody hell are they???

Oh dg I'm so :( for you and your family, what an awful thing. I really hope your DB feels able to open up to someone and give a true account of what happened.

Yet again DH isn't going to be home before kids bedtime, they're watching mr tumble in lieu of bath tonight . I was fine having them all weekend on my own, but this is now the 9th consecutive day, and usually DH does breakfast and bathtime. All respect to our lovely single parent friends, I honestly don't know how you do it xx

Oh Man DG, so sorry to hear all of that. I hope they figure it out and your brother is able to forget whatever it is that happened.

How horrible.

oh my goodness dg that sounds awful and I'm also shocked at the way the school have dealt with it so far. Hope it's all cleared up soon.
Hope your appointment went ok today too.

Is your dh going to be ths busy with work for a while Carrie. I agree with the respect for the single parents, I don't cope well with dh not being around either.

Had a good week up in Scotland. The train journey up was fine with just me and the boys (DH flew upfor weekend) Saw my best friend which was great as I hadn't seen her since May and she's had a tough time recently (she lives across road from my parents so I stayed there). Then went to see another friend for a night, stayed at the in-laws for a night, went to Aviemore for the day for DH's Grandpa's 90th birthday- he didn't know we were coming so was a lovely surprise, esp as he hadn't seen ds2 before- then back to my parents for a night before coming home yest.
DS2 has had a nightmare couple of weeks with sleeping. It started by him moaning in his sleep loud enough that it'd wake us up, then has gradually got worse and turned into proper crying. He had me up several times each night while we were away trying to settle him. Most of the time there doesn't seem to be anything wrong but the last few nights I think he's had sore teeth and sore sinuses/throat/ears.
Last night I was a bad parent and gave him medised as we all needed some sleep and he needed to be able to breath.

debi what is this medised and where can I buy it? Sounds like we need to stock up.

carrie sympathies on being an almost single parent while also being a sahm. Bloody hard work! Hope your dh's work calms down soon.

eandz how are you? How's ds?

I've been an awful awful sister and not called my dad yet to find out how his meeting with the head went. I know my aunt (who lives next door to them) is being very supportive and very hands on. She's a key worker with mental health patients so she knows how social services works. I've cowardly been waiting to talk to my sister but she's prepping for an important meeting tomorrow. I know my db is in good safe hands with my dad and aunt. And we're going to have a big sibling day out on the weekend so he'll get lots of tlc then.

Scan today confirmed complete miscarriage. Have to wait two cycles before they'll test. And then 10 weeks after that for the results. So I'm actually looking at a 6 month wait to find out whether I have clotting issues (which can be treated with aspirin) or dh and/or I have genetic issues (which can't be treated and is a question of odds). More than likely we'll keep trying. In the meantime I'm going to have some counselling.

digi can you take asprin anyway just in case it's that? It doesn't do any harm does it?

Medised is paracetemol with a decongestant in it. I don't know when it was 1st made but about 4 years ago it said age 3 months plus on the bottle (which was crazy), then it went up to 2 years plus and now it's 6 years plus I think. The decongestant makes you drousy and it was being abused by some parents to get their kids to sleep. I think there was also no evidence that it worked in children under 6 and could cause sideaffects so it was changed to plus 6.
But I used it with ds1 without any probs when it was still allowed and still had some (which is actually out of date so doubley bad parent!) so we gave ds2 a half dose of medised and half calpol and he slept much better for it and it not so stuffed up and didn't complain of pain yesterday. Then last night he slept all night with any drugs, hooray.

aww DG i'm very sorry to hear that. I would suggest aspirin too.

N is doing ok. Still not talking like the other kids, but is able to communicate in every other way. I try very hard not to compare.

Robyn is sick again. She has a chest infection and is struggling to sleep on a night. Dr gave her some antib's and she is having a nap now.

Robyn is sick again. She has a chest infection and is struggling to sleep on a night. Dr gave her some antib's and she is having a nap now.

Oh poor thing debs, hope Lucy doesn't catch it.

DS's quote of the day after building a duplo tower "like your bottom mummy, is big!" hmm. I'm sure this chocolate orange will take the pain away

debi we used medised when we took 8mo DD no the plane to brazil . I believe people were overusing it and overdosing their kids, but if used properly its ok, but of course you're not 'allowed' to buy it now.

eandz if it makes you feel any better Toby isnt relaly talking yet either x

debs sorry to hear that...hope things improve x

carrie ds1 makes puking noises when I get undressed....

digi am thinking of you x

debs sorry to hear Robyn's unwell, does she get these chest infections often? My sis is prone to those (although am sure smoking and singing sometimes at the same time can't be helping).

eandz they all seem to catch up with each other in the end. DS wasn't really talking for a while, just barking one word orders at us. Then all of a sudden seems to be picking up whole sentences each day.

Have been told junior aspirin is the right dosage to take and to only take it from when I next get a bfp as if taken before it can prevent the egg from implanting. So will be stocking up on the stuff ready to start scoffing whenever that happens.

Little bit more info trickling through on my db. Apparently the incident happened on the Monday night of the school trip (first night), one of the boys went and told a teacher at 2am on Thursday night. Teacher got the other four boys who were involved up and got them to write down their account of what happened. We are not allowed to read it as it we're not allowed to know who did what to whom. Then that teacher called the head the next day...who called ss...who said do not tell the parents as the abuse could be coming from home and we need to investigate according to protocol. So from being alerted on the Friday of the school trip, social services then take two weeks to send a letter by post to the parents who are then wondering what the hell their child has said/done to warrant a visit from social services. So now we're angry at the teachers for letting this happen in the first place, and now we're really bloody pissed off with SS for taking so bloody long to process the fucking paperwork that merely enables them to TELL us what's happened to our poor boy. And now they're all sitting in the same class while SS take months to investigate. DB was not one of the instigators so mercifully is officially considered a victim. I mean I'm sure even the boy who instigated it is a victim in his own way (whether abused, or allowed access to porn through neglect), but surely they should be put into separate classes or something?

Can you imagine if a girl was involved? There's no way they'd argue with the parents if they wanted to take her out of school or wanted the other child expelled. But because they're all boys, they're expected to just get on with it.

The only light at the end of the tunnel here is that it's DB's last year of primary school. So next September will be a fresh start, new class, new classmates.

Apologies for such spewing it all out here. Haven't had a chance to talk to anyone about it as have been busy with work, DS and hospital appointments.

WWYD though, if it was your son would you take him out of school? DF seems to think he shouldn't have to take him out, away from his friends, when it wasn't his fault. If it was DS I'd just want to protect him over and above anything else. And if that meant taking him out of school and home-schooling him for a couple of months till the other kids had been expelled then that's what I would do. Surely, missing his school mates is a small price to pay compared to potentially being bullied and getting into fights.

digi . I would be feckin' livid, I would not be happy with all the kids still being in the same class. What about the NSPCC, they might know the best ways to manage a situation like that?

I see what your DF means about keeping your DB at school but I'd be tempted to get him the hell out of there too. Hope he is ok and the school investigate properly.

debi & carrie DD has medised on repeat prescription. She has super-sinuses that are like green snot waterfalls when she gets a cold. The GP said I looked like a sensible person and it was better to give her that to dry the snot up than pump her full of anti-biotics when she got a cold. He did say it was taken off the shelves because a few people were just using it for the sleep side of things.