Wow giddy I am tired just reading about your day Well done on all your achievements. We have the V-Tech walker for ds (not one of those they sit in, one they can push along when old enough), he seems to like it and we deliberately haven't put the batteries in yet! Hope your dh will be released soon, you have a lot to cope with on your own.
EYM - HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, hope you've had a fab day. Your older boys are v cute by the way, if my little sister were not completely mad I would be asking for an introduction
sfx - fingers crossed for your sleep.
Cratchit - I only have one tried-and-tested strategy for dealing with tax returns. It is called "a bottle of red wine". And bear in mind until recently I had at least two to do per year, i.e. one for Sweden and one for UK. (One year I had the triple, Sweden, Netherlands and UK). Imagine my horror when I had two to do whilst pregnant. Clearly a small amount of wine was necessary but it was still a struggle. Now the UK Revenue have announced they no longer want tax returns from me as I am back on the pay roll, yippee!
I'm afraid that morphine is not available to the general public, although I am startled at how easily pharmacies will hand stuff over to me because I go in and claim to be dh's wife! No id or anything. My personal pain medication is limited to the very occasional paracetomol and above-mentioned wine
I'd try not to stress about ds' sleeping if I were you, although I can understand it must be horrifically frustrating when you're trying to get stuff done. Unfortunately I think you may need to get through separation anxiety now before you reach the end of this particular journey. My ds sleeps heaps better at night in bed with me than on his own (I of course get no sleep whatsoever), I see a slippery slope developing.
Re: oats - yes, they do contain gluten but not wheat (obviously!). My dh has no problem with "getting his oats" (I put that joke in for giddy's benefit!) so his intolerance is clearly to a wheat protein other than gluten. I've obviously missed something somewhere along the line because I have to track down KVG's recipes, what is up with your ds? Organix do various breakfast cereals, I'm sure some of which are gluten free although I've never looked as we still haven't got past the occasional puree stage. Cornflakes would be my first suggestion.
Bubb - glad Oscar has enjoyed his night away (apart from the screaming!)
Sky - don't think sainthood is on the cards unless the job description includes swearing, cursing the world and generally feeling regularly cr*p about one's lot in life! Actually my main strategy for coping is to let the housework reach almost (but not quite) the levels seen on "How Clean Is Your House", dreading ds being mobile and standards having to rise in that department too. Your dstepdad's situation sounds very similar to ours (minus small child(ren) admittedly.
dh has done really well with his meds again today, he's finding it tougher going but we are persevering. We went (briefly) to visit a friend of mine, one of the girls I lived with at uni. She found herself unexpectedly pregnant last year after a brief relationship and is due at the start of April. Knowing she was still rather in denial about the whole thing I was deliberately trying to make conversation which didn't involve babies or pregnancy or anything like that, all rather strange! Ds behaved very well in order to demonstrate to her that babies are not complete monsters (wish he would save some of that behaviour for us!)