Top ten of 2011

As the year grows to a close and everyone seems to be making lists of their highlights, lowlights or favourite kebabs (no, really) of 2011 I thought I might as well join in.

2011 did not start well for us, as you may well have read about here or here. But, it has got a lot better since and so I thought I would tell you all about that.

So here goes...my positives from 2011. And you know what, it's been a good one!

1. Getting pregnant and getting past the 12 week mark. We lost our second pregnancy at 10 weeks so the happiness and excitement of this one was tempered until we made it safely past the first trimester. With just 2 months to go, the realisation of our family expanding by one more little person is setting in and we are all so very excited and happy!

2. We got engaged. We had always talked about marriage and kids and felt under no pressure to do the former before the latter. However, after getting through all of this and becoming a much, much stronger couple and team for it, it became really important to us to make it official. The wedding is not until December 2013 because we want the kids to be old enough to be part of it but planning is well under way and we are very excited!

3. Our wonderful William, against all odds, started to talk. His first proper, identifiable word was duck. It changed our worlds more than you know. He seems to have given up on saying duck now but clearly says 'car', 'gone', 'cat', 'Parker' (our cat's name) and 'cook' and has a whole heap of other sounds that are just waiting to be turned into proper words when his wee head is ready. Yay for him!

4. We bought a house. A proper grown up, expensive, let's stay here for a long time, house. I love it. It is just the perfect size and shape for our family with heaps of parks nearby to help with that never ending wee boy energy.

5. We had our first proper family holiday. We have been away for weekends since Will was born, and for long haul holidays to see family but they never felt like holidays should feel. They were full of obligation and tension and often, tragedy, and family time was rare. But last summer we went here to stay on a farm and it was wonderful. It was easy, enjoyable, relaxing, stimulating and perfect family QT. And that was with morning sickness and torrential rain all week!

6. Will stopped pulling out his hearing aids or refusing to wear them at all and started keeping them in ALL DAY long other than nap time and bath time. The difference they have made to both his and our lives is immeasurable. Such a huge milestone for us. 

7. Will started to sign; to properly use signing as a language and communication tool. I wrote this list when he had almost 40 signs, it badly needs updated as he already has closer to 60. It has made life much easier and more fun and is hopefully keeping Will from feeling too frustrated at not yet mastering much speech.

8. We got a cat. Well, technically, he is just on loan while some friends of ours are away experiencing life on the other side of the world. I have never been so much of an animal person but the difference he has made to our life as a family is wonderful. Will adores him as you can clearly see from the fact that 2 out of the 5 words he can say are 'cat' and 'Parker'. They are still learning each others limits but I can tell that there is a mutual admiration / fascination there and a whole lot of love.

9. Shaun got a new job. I knew that his old job was hard, that the people were annoying and that he felt, and was, undervalued and taken advantage of. I thought that was just how working was but turns out it doesn't have to be! His new job is just the right amount of hard to be stimulating without losing sleep over it, the people are wonderfully crazy so far and he feels valued and in control. He keeps saying 'I am so much happier' which makes me feel a) awful for not realising how unhappy he actually was and b) so very grateful that he had the gumption to get up and move on. We are all happier for it!

10. This last one is not so much of a point as just the whole year of 2011. At the beginning of the year it felt like we could, very easily, fall apart as a couple, a family and individuals. And what happened was that not only did we not fall apart, we got stronger as a couple, a family and as individuals. We didn't just get through it, we got over it and we are happy, happier than we have been probably. And going into 2012 I feel so lucky to have everything that I have and so excited about everything that is coming.

But enough of this sappy nonsense, someone pass the champagne and let's toast the new year!! xx

My Miscarriage

I am writing this post in conjunction with the Mumsnet campaign for better miscarriage care.

I found out I was pregnant when I was about 5 weeks. It was unexpected, I had only had one period since having my first baby 8 months earlier. I was sick and tired, more so than I remembered being with my first.

The nausea was unbearable most days until about 7 weeks and then it subsided but I still felt tired. At 9.5 weeks we flew to NZ, I felt very nauseous all through the flight but put it down to stress of travelling that far and with a 9 month old baby. We arrived on the Saturday, on the Monday I went to the bathroom and there was a spot of blood.

We went to a local GP who assured me that because I had carried one baby to full term this was probably just spotting and very unlikely to be a miscarriage. The doctor asked me if I had any pain, if it was cramp like. I lied and said no, I was not ready to lose this baby, not here, not so far from home. They took some blood to measure my pregnancy hormone levels and sent me on my way. If it was to miscarry, they said, it would just progress like a period and be over in a week.

I didn't have any bleeding for the rest of the Monday or the Tuesday. On the Wednesday I went to the bathroom and there it was. Blood. Lots of it. Like a heavy period. I was losing the baby. The emotions were impossible. I was devastated and we were on holiday. We still had to meet people, see people, socialise. I still had to be a Mum to my little boy a million miles from my home, my Mum, my friends.

And then the pain started. It was excruciating. It was contractions. I am so grateful I had already had a baby and could understand what the pain was. I felt like I was in labour as my body tried to expel the fetus. On the Thursday we were supposed to fly from Wellington to Auckland but the pain was so very, very unbearable that I went back to the doctors. This was not progressing like an ordinary period. The bleeding was heavier than any period I had ever had and the pain was only comparable to labour.

The doctors wouldn't see me and so I went to the hospital. They felt my tummy and examined my cervix. Because I was between 9 and 10 weeks pregnant there was a high chance that the pregnancy was ectopic. There was a chance the embryo was rupturing in my fallopian tube. There was a chance that I would have to be operated on. There was a chance that I would have to have my fallopian tube removed. There would be a chance that I wouldn't be able to have any more children. They put me on a morphine drip to numb the physical pain.

I was sent in an ambulance to a bigger hospital where they could do more tests. I had an emergency ultrasound. There was a fetus. It was in my womb, where it was supposed to be. There would be no operation, no irreversible damage. The baby was just 6 weeks gestation. No heartbeat. But that could be because it was just too small to see one. There was hope. Except I knew that there wasn't. I had lost too much blood, been in too much pain, no good was to come from this.

They took another blood sample to compare my pregnancy hormone levels with the one taken a few days earlier at the doctors. We went out for lunch.

We went back to the hospital to be delivered the inevitable news. The baby was dead. It's heart had stopped beating at 6 weeks gestation. It had been dead inside me for 4 weeks, a month. I had no idea. They call it a missed miscarriage.

I took a full 10 days for the bleeding to stop, I was prescribed super strength codeine for the pain. On about the 5th day the codeine didn't touch the pain, I could barely walk. But we had people to visit. I was in my partners God Mother's house. I went to the bathroom and my sanitary pad was saturated after only an hour or so. I sat on the toilet and had an overwhelming urge to push. There was a plop. There it was, my fetus. In the toilet. It was the fanciest bathroom I had ever been in. I came out and went to the beach, telling no-one what had just happened.

After that day the bleeding and pain eased and eventually stopped. The heartache has neither eased nor stopped and I doubt it ever will.

For me the worst thing was being so far from home and my family. I cannot fault the care I was given.

People band around the word miscarriage like it's something simple. I always thought it was just a late period, especially miscarrying before 12 weeks. For me it was like labour but with no happy ending. People need to be made more aware of the intensity of the pain, both physical and emotional that comes with miscarrying.

Please, read the Mumsnet campaign for better miscarriage care and support it. It is something that so many women will go through and we need to make sure that support for both the physical and emotional pain is both available and appropriate.