First rainbow

OK so before I talk about gender disapointment I will talk about how wonderful my boys are. I do know how lucky I am to have 2 lovely boys, so any gender disapointment is just really for the tutus! Leo is a lovely little guy. He hardly cried as a baby. My mum has always worked in childcare and she said he's an unusually quiet baby. He took to signing well and would let us know what he wanted. When we first moved here we didn't have aircon so it was too hot to put him to sleep inside. I walked round the garden with him in the carrier with a glass of red wine and chatting to OH. There was a colour changing LED lamp in a tree. After coming back from England a few months later after avoiding the worst of the heat he was outside in the evening and signed 'where red orange tree light'. This was the September he turned 2 so I was surprised by his memory, and the long signing sentance. He was so quiet until one day it all came out. No trying at words, just suddenly one day he repeated words, then he started saying everything he saw. Literally overnight he was talking normally. Potty training was obviously a breeze thanks to the EC. It was just a matter of him taking himself to the potty on his own, and then eventually getting to a point where he could do his own clothes. Now he even puts his seat on himself, moves the step and will even put on the light and close the door! Sleeping has been easy too. We co-slept so that was easy. Started nightweaning around 18 months and creating a sleep association with his Pooh Bear projector light. This time last year FIL was starting to babysit and he was putting Leo to sleep with Pooh Bear. In summer OH started to put him to sleep too. He has 2 stories, then the Pooh light is turned on. That's it. He's left to drift off to sleep on his own. Now standard parents probably think it's no big deal he goes to sleep on his own at this age, but I think it's so easy and no ups and downs getting out of bed at all. We transitioned him to his own room last spring too and that was easy. FIL comments how easy he is in the evening. Often he says he wants to go to Grandads for cheesy beans (we live on a couple of acres so FIL lives here at the bottom of the garden). We know when we come back from a few glasses of wine and tapas Leo will have had a bath and be in bed. Sometimes I reckon I think I'm the only person who thinks my kid is average and not a genius. He learnt the alphabet from signing time and sort of kept going from there. He can now write his own name and copy words too. I have to say that is one thing I think is a touch more advanced than other kids. When he walked more and I stopped using the carrier I would get him out his car seat and tell him to hold a light on the car. Wherever we are if I want him to be still when I do something I just get him to hold a railing or keep his hand on something. So well behaved. We have also never thought twice before going out anywhere. If we go out for a meal he is so good and we've never not gone anywhere because he may play up. I also don't think he's had a public tantrum. Oh we've had plenty of 'my banana broke' incidents which were apparently really serious, but nothing in public. So would I swap him for a girl? Nope. He is wonderful. He is well behaved. I like that. I know him. OK so maybe I won't share some mother daughter things with him but he is my son and I love him.

Guilt

I didn't realise I could get any more guilt. But this has been doing the rounds http://www.bestforbabes.org/miracle-milk-helps-heal-brain-injured-formula-fed-baby When Isabel was in NICU I did pump a bit for her, but not a lot to be honest. Just a bit each time I went in which was every other day because of the distance. So now I read that and wonder what if I had pumped more. What if I hadn´t given up when we were told there was no more brain activity. What if I could have one of those once in a million chances.

Bump photo

07/06/12, a photo by Stealth Leprechaun on Flickr.

There weren´t many. I did not grow gracefully. I ballooned like a balloon that has been blown up twice before and has totally given up the fight with gravity.

The beginning

28/07/12, a photo by Stealth Leprechaun on Flickr.

I'm just writing this blog so I actually keep a note of how these boys are growing and don´t forget what happened when. Plus family and friends can see what we´re up to without me having to share too much on facebook where not everyone cares about each tiny milestone.

I am not planning to make my life seem any more exciting or interesting than it is. To be honest it probably won´t be all that interesting and just a wee bit dull. But that´s life eh?

Anyway this is the beginning of Connor, or the end of the pregnancy and beginning of the end.

He grew,,I grew, thankfully Greenpeace didn´t roll me back in when I went to the beach.

Gender Disapointment

Now I am not going to lie finding out I was having another boy did give me some gender disappointment for a while. That´s why I didn´t want to find out at the scan, but never mind it doesn´t matter really. So Connor is a boy. But with a middle name Orlando I think it´s a fantastic name, which is one problem I had. No boys names jump out like girls ones do, but actually I think Connor Orlando is a cracking name.

But now I have my two boys I am very happy, they are lovely little men and bring me so much joy. I want to post about how fantastic they are before I post about my plan. Jordan also agrees that we won´t have another baby just for the sake of it, the next one has to be guaranteed a girl. But it´s OK there´s a plan. Plus I have also made peace with having two boys.

Now if I had a choice, 2 boys who are fantastic and easy to be around, or a girl who was a more challenging child what would I chose? Gotta go with better the devil you know haven't you. I have 2 cracking boys. They are absolute bundles of joy and easy to be around, and this makes me very happy. If I never have a girl it doesn´t matter. Apparently if you have boys you have friends for life. A girl I just met out here has a teenage son. He still gets into bed with her (OK that isn´t as creepy as it sounds). They´re close. Its fantastic. The main thing that worries me about a boy is we´re not so close and I lose them. But I don´t think that will happen, or it´s not guaranteed to happen just because they´re boys.

So before I talk about the plan or gender disappointment I want to do a post on each boy and why they are so lovely. I have written the post in my head a few times but it needs typing in apparently.

Where did it all go wrong

I can't believe this Christmas will be 3 years since Isabel was born. It's quite overwhelming. It almost seems unreal that it happened. In the same way I forget what Leo was like when he was a baby I forget what it was like to hold Isabel. The strong emotions are that final time I walked away from NICU knowing that later that day 2 children would be recieving the gift of life from my daughter. I walked away from my daughter who was breathing, her body was functioning, but yet her brain had let us down. That last visit with her was hard. What do you do to visit a baby in NICU, a baby who isn't looking at you, who is technically brain dead. We never took any photos in the hospital because that's not the baby I wanted to remember. I wanted to remember the baby that was in my arms, the baby I held, the baby I let down. It's still unbelievable that she's gone. It makes no sense.

We're now officially trying again so I'm coming to terms with never having a daughter. I have to prepare myself for only having living boys otherwise I will be so upset if I do hope for a girl. The things I will miss, helping my daughter on her wedding day, being there during her pregnancy, helping her with her own children. OK so one day I may have a daughter in law, but it won't be the same. She'll share all those things with her mother and I will be on the sidelines. My heart will always ache for the daughter who never stayed.




I'm still angry that it happened, but glad that through this Jordan and I have stayed together. At least it didn't break us up, which it could easily have done.

Now we have moved house the nearests hospital is the one with the NICU. It's on a hill so it's a major landmark in the city. I see it every time we go shopping. It brings back the memories of going to visit Isabel. Oh the dread as we walked up those stairs. I wanted to see her, to hold her, to take her home. I didn't want to stand by a stupid fucking box while nurses cared for my daughter. Then again they managed to keep her alive and get her fluids up so that her organs started to recover. I'm the one who failed her.

I suspect it's time to turn on the TV and have a glass of wine before I really start dwelling.

On the outside looking in

Christmas day 2010 should have been Isabel's 2nd birthday and was the first Christmas Day back in the UK. Jordan and I had a lot of 'talks' about how it would be. He said I had to pretend to be happy for Leo, and yes I agree that he cannot see that Christmas day is a sad day for me. I don't want his Christmas to be ruined by the gap that is unfilled every year. But I just couldn't promise I wouldn't get upsed. I can't promise that and I don't know how I will be each year. Part of me also doesn't want to be all happy and joyful as I feel that would be disrespectful. My daughter is dead and although I manage to forget this during some parts of my life I should remember her on her birthday. When we were talking, and getting a bit worked up, Leo was sat in between us chuckling an giggling. But it was so obviou s he was trying to laugh to make us happy. He was sat there laughing and just trying to lighten the mood, it broke my heart. How do I balance Isabel's birthday, and Christmas? How do I manage to not constantly have my son growing up trying to make sure I don't sit down and cry?

My parents as always did not say a single thing. Yeah OK maybe they 'didn't want to upset me.' But I cannot believe another year they didn't even say are you alright.

At one point I had to get something from the car, I looked across the road to my neighbours. They moved in when I was 7, their daughter was the same age. We went to school together and have kept in touch since university and life meant we saw less of each other. She was due a trimester before me, it seemed so perfect. Both pregnant with daughters so close together, we grew up together so it would just be so nice. Her daughter was also 6lb when she was born, the trouble is her daughter is still alive and I still don't understand why life did this. Well when I looked across the road I saw my friend and her husband with her parents with their arms round each other all dancing round in a circle. I must say I don't think I have ever hated them as much as I did. The contrast was so obvious. Me with my grief, them all together as a family dancing around with joy on Christmas day. I can't wait till her daughter starts school, starts dating, goes to university and gets married. It's shitty to deal with this crap, but it's even shittier to see constantly see the life that should have been. It's like our lives were together but we both got to a cross roads and I took the wrong path. Trouble is I can't go back.