It's a tough time of year....

I know that many of us struggle through this time of year. I certainly do. Part of it is that it's the season of "togetherness" and therefore it's the time of year when I feel most alone.

It's the time of year when I really notice that we don't get invited to many things. It's the downside of being a one parent family. In my experience, most of my friends and family think about inviting other "families" to their christmas parties and gatherings, and that usually means having a grown up man so that their husband has someone to talk to. (Obviously I don't have enough single parent friends.)

When I've been in relationship, this time of year has been busy busy busy. When I'm not, it's extremely solitary.

And then my boys go to DH. And the dark cloud descends. The sad and lonely cloud.

Christmas Day was pretty good this year. I have one of those families who really only get together on Christmas Day. Obviously I see my parents all the time, but my brothers have full lives which do not include me and my children.

We did have an uneventful Dec 25 this year... not always guaranteed. Toto and Boo were pretty exhausted and a bit lethargic, but other than vomiting in the garden bed a couple of times, all went well.

My beautiful niece Jaz

Papa and Nonie

The cousins

The boy cousins

Boo taking a quiet moment with a new magic set

Harry and Tim .... son and father

Toto in a pensive moment

Father and son..... Papa and Matt

Boo in a less exhausted moment

We were invited to a family "do" on Boxing Day... The little cousins got to hang out together again, and we grown up cousins enjoyed a rare catch up.

Uncle Jim (my Dad's brother) and Auntie Rose. Precious.

My favourite cousin... Katie.

My Dad

Happy Christmas *cough* *cough*...

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Thanks for being my co-pilots on this rocky road. love, Fe

It's an epidemic....

The Department of Health had to be notified about our whooping cough as it's a "notifiable illness".

They had 20 cases reported in Sydney on Friday alone! It's truly an epidemic!

We discovered this morning that Boo can't swallow tablets. Apparently. It took HALF AN HOUR to get him to swallow the anti-biotic! He was desperately distressed (as was I) but he finally did it. I found out afterwards that I can break open the casing and put the inside bits into water for him to drink. Which works a treat. Thank God, as we have to take these three times a day for five days.

And then the poor little thing had a major coughing / vomiting fit while weeing. He literally painted the bathroom. Poor thing was so drenched that he had to get straight into the shower. More washing (towels, clothes) for me.... and such a waste of loo paper! He drenched the whole pile of spare rolls! I seriously had to laugh (once I knew he was okay) before mopping, wiping walls etc. I'm still kind of laughing.

See? I'm trying to find the amusing bits in amongst the agony.

Toto's last day....

... and man it was emotional.

The whole school forms a large arch and the Year 6 kids walk through it... to the tune of "Time of Your Life" by Green Day (which is actually called "(Good Riddance) Time of Your Life"! Huh!). Who wouldn't cry?

(and thank you M for the wonderful hugs)

Toto meandering through the arch. Don't you love the "hat hair?"

"Yeah, I know you're there Mum! Do NOT expect me to look at you."

It's official. The diagnostic results are in. Whooping Cough. And just after we came home from school, Toto fell into a heap and started coughing too.

Apparently the fact that he's been at school isn't a problem (according to the doctor)... it's now, with listlessness and fever and feeling ill that is when he begins to be contagious. I still feel bad about him having been at school though. But without a crystal ball, how can any of us tell what's going to happen?

So we have to stay away from babies and old people. And have started a heavy regime of antibiotics (me too, just in case).

Both boys want to stay home with me this weekend, instead of being with DH. I had to tell him over the telephone, and he actually said "I just want to be supportive of you and give you a break". Can you believe it?

I replied, in a very very quiet and calm voice.. "DH (I actually used his name, but jeez it was tempting), the most stressful thing I have going on at the moment is you taking me to Family Court, so please don't patronise me with false offers of concern."

So... more nights of no sleep. More days house-bound and bored. Except for me.. I'm still trying to get all this bloody stuff finished in between soothing and feeding children, cleaning vomit off the carpet, emptying vomit-filled buckets and washing vomit-covered clothes and sheets. It's so frustrating to be unable to get to the shops. I'm dying to go to Spotlight to buy some fabric to complete some Christmas present bags, but just can't get there. Hopefully no-one will expect too much from me this Christmas.

Amazingly, or perhaps not so amazingly, the song that is on loop in my brain at the moment is "Things Can Only Get Better" by D:Ream.

Boo's worse...

This is an horrendous illness.

We're getting no sleep... the coughing until he vomits is worse at night, although it continues through the days as well. Days when I'm desperately trying to do :

a) the legal docs
b) a Child Support change of assessment response
c) 6 years of tax returns

And there's nothing I can do to comfort him. Well, other than the Vapor rub, the humidifier, the cough medicine, the sympathy.

It's heartbreaking.

And he's missing ALL of the end of year school activities. Not fair.

Toto has his very last day of primary school tomorrow. We had the formal Year 6 Farewell dinner on Wednesday night and (of course) I was teary and emotional.

Hope my tears don't embarrass him too much tomorrow. I'm too exhausted to hold them in.

Radio Silence....

It's not like me to not post for so long.

Boo is SO ill. We're up pretty much all night every night. He's coughing until he vomits and I'm changing his bed linen and washing everything and bathing and soothing him and sitting with him until he sleeps for 20 minutes before doing it all over again.

And I'm also racing to re-do my affidavit once again. I visited the lawyer the other day and was given instructions as to how to make my affidavit more effective. Instructions that basically involved re-writing the whole 17 pages and adding about 6 more appendices. I say "racing" because his office closes this Friday and we need to get it done (and discussed and edited by him and then signed and lodged) before then as he doesn't open up again until 10 days before the hearing date.

In the midst of this, Toto is dealing with all of the Year 6 Farewell stuff. His health has improved and I'm now convinced he doesn't have the dreaded whooping cough.... just a bronchial lurgy.

So, the telly is parenting my boys. My parents are feeding them. Things like supermarket shopping, washing (other than midnight bed-linen), cooking and tidying have gone out of the window. To be resumed when life calms down.

And tonight I have to attend Toto's Farewell Dinner. I need this like a hole-in-the-head but I refuse to let him down.

On the upside, "she" is doing really really well! She's dealing with everything, feeling less fragile and is almost to the point where I can tell her all about my dramas. I can't wait for that time. I really miss her wisdom and comfort.

Santa Claus and other childhood deceptions.....

When Boo was about 6 years old, we had the following conversation:

B: Mummy, you would never tell me a lie, would you?

F: No darling. Of course not. Why?

B: I want to ask you a question, but you have to promise to tell me the truth.

F: Oh. Okay. What is the question?

B: Is Santa Claus real?

F: *gulp*

B: Mummy, you have to tell me the truth!

F: Santa Claus is not real.

B: What about the Easter Bunny?

F: Nope. Not real.

B: The Tooth Fairy?

F: Nope.

B: Why did you have to tell me that! Couldn't you have lied?!

I wrote it down in my diary at the time, wondering if I'd given him the best answer.

I also asked him not to tell his friends about this, as many of them still believed in Santa Claus and it was up to their own parents to decide when to tell them the truth about him. The blessed little thing has NEVER told any of his friends, and gives me little winks when we're around other kids who still believe.

Boo now loves this story. He loves it that I told him the truth. He loves it that I still give both boys a little pressie from "Santa" each Christmas. And he especially loves it that he doesn't have to worry about the logistics of Santa breaking into our home on Christmas Eve (because if Santa can do it, then anyone can do it!).

But recently we had a conversation about the "BIG LIE" that I told them when they were little. Where we lived was very near a big park, and every Saturday and Sunday an ice cream van would circle around and around playing Greensleeves through a tannoy and enticing all of the neighbourhood kids outside for a sugar-hit. I couldn't handle the pleading, and so I told my boys that when the ice-cream man played his song, it meant that he had run out of ice-cream and was heading back to the ice-cream factory for more. He was playing his song to cheer himself up.

They believed me. One day, of course, they were explaining this to some friends and were told the truth. That I had lied to them. Luckily they were pretty big by this time and were able to laugh about it and understand the reasons behind the lie. I feel pretty bad about having lied to them, but anyone who knows what it's like to be CONSTANTLY saying NO to 2 small children might be able to empathise with me on this one.

Toto was not a cuddly baby. He was long and thin and had a long neck (kind of like a very cute ET!). I nicknamed him "Lerty" as he was always so alert. DH had left, I was preggers and sad and desperate for cuddles when I accidentally found a way to get them from him.

I took him through a car wash. To say that he didn't like it is a bit of an understatement! He screamed and howled until I unstrapped him and held him in my lap. Once there, he stopped crying, wrapped his little arms around my neck and snuggled me like there was no tomorrow.

Needless to say, my car was kept VERY clean with VERY regular car washes after that. (Not quite a lie, but a manipulation of the situation to achieve my own wants.)

And of course I have lied regularly and constantly to them about DH. I protect them as much as I can from the hideous truth and make excuses for his lousy behaviour towards them. And now I think they have been doing the same thing to me. They are beginning to tell me things that I can't believe they have never told me before. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I guess I've taught them to protect the ones that you love, but it's hard to be on the receiving end of it.

What, if any, lies have you told your kids over the years? Did your parents ever lie to you?

Whoop....

Toto and Boo are both sick. I took them to the doctor today and he suspects whooping cough. Toto had a nasty cough a while back, which the doctor had looked at and determined to be nothing more than a viral lurgy. It seems that Boo has caught a new bug and has passed it on to Toto. The doctor stuck an ominous looking swab down Boo’s nasal passage (a LONG way down!) to get the material required for the diagnosis. Boo was very brave.

It’s raining and grey and both boys are curled up on the sofa watching the telly. Other than our visit to the doctor, we have been inside for the last two days.

I’m actually quite enjoying it (despite the horrendous sounds of both boys coughing until they can’t breathe) as it feels as though we’re cocooned in our own little pod... with both boys requiring lots of cuddles and comfort.

If it IS whooping cough, they’ll take antibiotics to prevent them passing it on to others. The medicine does not reduce the duration of the illness. Apparently there’s a bit of a plague of it in Sydney at the moment. My doctor alone has diagnosed three cases in the last week.

So, we’ll stay away from everyone while we wait for the test results. I suppose I’ll go out for supplies every now and then, but other than that I’ll be Dr Mum with my ready supply of cough medicine and cuddles.

And I’ll try not to think too much about all of the horrendously stressful other things that I’ve got going on.

My newest love....

I'd like to introduce my newest love.....



His name is Charlie and he's 4 weeks old today. His mum is my "chosen sister".... her sister is my mum's god-daughter and her grandmother was my brother's teacher in Steiner school.

I spent a couple of hours cuddling him today. It was the most amazing therapy for me during this incredibly stressful time.

It seems to me that lots of my friends in blogland are having a really difficult time right now. I hope you can find a Charlie of your own for some cuddle-therapy.

I've been tagged!!!....

Thanks to the lovely Wikke, I've been tagged to post a photo of the contents of my handbag. Uggh.

I am extremely lucky in that I changed my handbag over on Sunday, and so this one hasn't had much time to gather all of the gunk that I usually haul around.



So, in no particular order, my handbag contains a black pashmina, my business cards (all identifying features blocked out!), headache tablets, hand cream, lipstick, hair clips, keys, spare battery for my DSL camera, spare SD card for my point and shoot camera, my point & shoot camera (in the Crumple bag), mints, headphones, nail file, pen, tissues, wallet, supermarket receipt, copy of my affidavit, hair comb, old theatre ticket, name tag from the emcee'ing job..... AND the thing that most people probably would not know that I always carry in my bag.... two dowsing pendulums (for when you can't choose which bottle of wine to buy!)

I'm kidding, of course. I've also been known to use them to choose between butter and margarine (in Holland with Wikke!) and which brand of coffee to buy!

I'm intentionally making light of a subject that I actually treat quite seriously. Toto is also into dowsing, and has his own pendulum. I have absolutely no idea how or why they work as well they do, but they have never let me down. It's all about energy and intuition... two subjects that I believe in but don't fully understand. And I kind of love it that I let it into my life without having to understand it to the nth degree (unlike many other things in my life).

I tag.... ummmm.......

Guera, M, Ali and Dina.

But you've got to play by the rules. No cheating and hiding the embarrassing stuff!

Thank you...

Thank you to everyone who has helped me, and will hopefully continue to help me, with my conundrum about the pharmaceutical industry.

We had a huge thunderstorm here a couple of hours ago, and as soon as it finished, this appeared in the east. Awww....

Thought I'd share it (you know, as a kind of thank you for my last chunky post).

Something to chew on....

I'm the first to admit that I'm on psychiatric drugs and have been for about, oh, ten years. There are times when I think they're working really well and that I can therefore put up with the side effects, and there are times when they suddenly seem to stop working, and my psychiatrist changes me to another medication. Occasionally she suggests that my diagnosis should change too. Something that annoys me as I'm not interested in labels (I have always seen them as a way to add a whole dimension of "lack-of-control" to the person being labelled).

I've always had nagging doubts about whether the cycle of depression that I suffer would be any better or worse without the medication. I've always had a fear about the long-term side-effects that these meds could cause, but I've balanced that out with the fear that without them, I could well commit suicide. The fact that I am a single mother and would so anything to give my children the best mother that they can possibly have has made me accept my own need to be on these meds.

It's an issue which came to a head when it was suggested that there is an anti-depressant that would help Toto stop his hair-pulling. My STRONG reaction of "There is no way that my child is taking a psychiatric medication" surprised even me.

Now, please understand that I am in no way condemning anyone for putting their child on psychiatric meds, or for taking or not-taking them themselves. This is purely about me and my feelings on the topic..... NOT about judging anyone else.

I was googling some contra-indications for "her" when I came across a website which led me to a website which led me to.... (you know the drill)... a website which contains a film exposing a whole other side to the pharmaceutical companies' relationships with psychiatrists and the FDA etc. There are 10 YouTube videos of 10 minutes each. I was transfixed.

When I was living in the UK, one of the contracts I had was within the new product development and marketing division of a multi-national pharmaceutical company. The corporate mentality and resulting decisions that I witnessed there shattered any belief I had in the "good intentions" of these companies. I was witness to a meeting in which it was decided to throw billions of dollars of research money at a new headache pill INSTEAD of at an AIDS drug because the profit margin to the company would be much larger (people with headaches are likely to live for a long time - and therefore will buy pills for a long time, whereas people with AIDS are likely to die and therefore stop buying the meds).

The thing that REALLY got me was that it was marketers who made the decisions, based upon public purchasing statistics, as to which area of disease the researches would focus on.

Please watch these videos if you or your family, or any of your friends are on psychiatric meds. Please DO NOT go off your meds because of watching the videos!!! I'm not sharing them (they're out there for you all to find on your own anyway) with the intention of turning anyone off the field of psychiatry or psychiatric meds, but with the intention of having a conversation with you about your thoughts on the subject.

I'm not suddenly going off my meds as a result of watching them. I'm just doing a lot of thinking which may change how I handle my medical treatment in the future. It also may not.

Click here to go to a blog which has all 10 videos posted.

And then PLEASE come back here and talk to me about it. (Obviously I still want you to talk to me even if you haven't watched the videos!)

She's home!!!!!

I know I haven't been posting much about "her" lately. This was mainly because I didn't want to jinx things. It seemed that everytime I posted about her taking a step forwards, she took two steps back.

Also, I had an inkling that her daughter might have been reading my blog (damn site-meter!).

But she's now home. She came home yesterday and is pretty wobbly but I'm optimistic that this is THE home run.

Can't tell you how much I've been dying to tell you all.

any new readers who have no idea what I'm talking about can click here to find out more

Well, it's a quiet weekend....

... but I have managed to throw in a bit of culture (that sounds even better if you say it with a strong Aussie accent and it sounds like kultcha!).

My parents took me along to see a matinee play at the Sydney Theatre Company as one of their friends dropped out at the last minute. The play was called "Rabbit" and was written by a new young British playwright called Nina Raine... apparently hugely successful in the UK, but it did nothing for me.

Still, I love going to the Wharf Theatre. It's in an old wharf and although the inside has been re-done entirely, they've kept the outside exactly as it was when built in 1831. There's a long walk to the restaurant at the end (and the theatre) and I took advantage of the slow pace set by my parents and their friend to take some piccies...

This walkway is hung with amazing black and white photographs of past Sydney Theatre Company productions. Many of the pics include Aussie actors who went on to become major international stars.... Mel Gibson, Hugo Weaving (yeah... I know he's really a kiwi) and Rosie Byrne to name a few.

Some of you might know that "our Cate" and her husband Andrew Upton have taken over as the Artistic Directors of the Company. Very exciting....



My Mum and I feel like we "discovered" Cate. We saw her in many Sydney Theatre Productions before she was a film actress and always said "Isn't she wonderful!! She will be a HUGE star!". So we're glad she's coming back so that we can feel snuggly and proprietorial when we see her perform (!)

One of the loveliest things about this theatre is the wonderful cafe and restaurant at the end of the pier, where you can enjoy a fabulous glass of white wine....


..... while you're soaking up the view...


Makes missing Toto and Boo just that little bit more bearable.

Flashback Friday....

Thanks to Le, I'm going to give you a glimpse into my life in the '80s.

Here is a pic of me at my 21st birthday party... smack in the middle of that notorious fashion decade. You're lucky it's not in colour, or you might be blinded by the gold colour of my glittery outfit.

Big hair, big shoulders, big nails, big cocktail.... *shudder*....


And here I am with my peeps, with the Sydney Town Hall behind us. My "uniform" was always to wear a blazer... unless it was boiling hot in which case it was a leotard under linen pants (or my favourite Stuart Membry shorts, M! Sorry.. can't find a pic of those!)....


I spent the end of the '80's living in the US. And I dyed my head dark brown (the one and only time in my life) to see in the new decade. This is me in NYC on the last day of the '80's....


I spent the beginning of the '80's in the whirl of the Sydney rock 'n roll scene, and the modelling scene. Superficiality at it's best. It's a time that I doubt will come again (way before grunge... it really was all champagne and cocaine) and I guess I was lucky to be a part of it, but it wasn't all happiness.

I then moved in to the corporate world.... when corporate greed was at it's zenith.... and life was all about long lunches and even longer expense accounts. It's quite amazing to think back upon it with the perspective of today's economy.

I'm still not quite sure why I had such a strong urge to leave my country, but I did. I happily exchanged designer outfits for t-shirts and cargo shorts and travelled from Backpacker Lodge to Backpacker Lodge. I was ribbed by my new friends about being the only backpacker travelling with a suitcase and a blow-dryer! Perhaps that's why I'm so extremely the other way these days!

The best thing about the '80's for me? The friends that I made in San Francisco. They still count amongst my closest friends today. I'm not sure if it's because we were thrown together in the horror of the aftermath of the '89 earthquake, or if it was kismit that put us all in that backpackers lodge at the same time. Whatever it was, I'm eternally grateful for it.

*Grrrrrr*....

Guilt if you do it wrong, fury if someone else does it wrong with your kids (DH).

It's a daily battle with the kids now. They adamantly do NOT want to go to DH's. I get tears, hysterics, screaming, hair pulling (their own, not mine) and I can't bloody agree with them! I mean, don't get me wrong... I understand why they don't want to go right now... and I understand why they don't want to go more frequently than they are currently going.... but I am the adult and I know that life is long and they still have the possibility of a long and rewarding relationship with their Dad as adults. And I also know that I can't make their Dad out to be the enemy.

You might be thinking what DH is thinking. That I'm bad mouthing him to the kids. Involving them in this in a negative way. Christ I wish I was in a way because it would be much easier for me. I had to tell them what he is asking for in the court orders because it affects them. I am fighting this for them, not for me. But I truly don't talk him down in front of them. I feel like I'm lying to my kids about all of this and that's making them even more upset because I've never lied to them before.

The amount of times I say (to myself or to my Mum) "If only DH could HEAR this conversation!". I spend all of my time reassuring them that, although I support them not wanting to live with him during the week, I will not support them not seeing him at all.

I have, of course, shed tears of frustration in front of them, for which I feel great guilt. We live in a small 2 bedroom apartment. I have nowhere to go to hide when it's all too much for me.

You probably think I'm crazy. And if I keep this up I think I will go crazy. But I just do not want to put them in the middle of this &*^&% legal battle. I do not want them to feel torn.

But of course they do anyway.

Toto came up with a great one yesterday. "Mum, you remember that man with the cigarette that smelled funny that we passed on the street on our first day in Glasgow?" Ummmm.. yes. "Well, Daddy's house smells like that a lot".

He's desperately trying to give me evidence to stop him having to go to his Dad's.

And then I find out that they're being farmed out again this weekend while they're meant to be with DH. He plays cricket with friends on Saturday so he's farming them out until Sunday night.

Why can't he just leave them with me?? This is why I'm so positive that he's only trying to get the kids in order to have no future child support obligations. Because when he has them, he sends them to friends' houses.

*Grrrrrrrrr*

Phew....

I did it! I finished and, thanks to the wonderful Ewan, delivered the docs to the lawyer in time. Now it's a waiting game.

Thanks to ALL of you for the wonderful support. It meant a lot.

I also had to hang around for the washing machine repair man. Everything always happens at once, and early last week my washing machine broke down. We've been struggling with hand washing and borrowing my mum's machine. Today the repair men replaced the engine, so here's hoping it's now as good as new.

Not surprisingly, all I want to do now is sleep.

This is last nights' sunset. Taken from my office window.