Babyfever!

Watching my cheeky little monkey growing up so fast is making me increasingly broody! The desire of having a little sister or a brother for her to play with is getting harder and harder to resist. i've started dreaming about having a baby again. This also happened before I was preggers with our daughter. I'm dreaming of a baby girl again. I've named her already, just like our first one. (I'm terrible I know!) I can't help myself. I'm waiting at least until my 25th birthday is out the way, I've worked too hard to get my pre-preggers body back not to enjoy my quarter century in style! But after that it's time to get our lives sorted out for a new arrival I think. Bigger place, saving lots of money (well saving some money hopefully) in time for the new babby! Exciting! Seriously, need to calm myself down, and leave it on the back burner for a couple more months at least, can't be making any hasty decissions, really need to sort out all the living arrangements and whatnot, this house is barely big enough for the 3 of us, and with no storage at all it's never gonna work. 

But just the thought of holding a brand new baby I made makes my heart melt. Picturing the two of them getting to know each other, holding hands, our big girl holding the baby and teaching her/him ( I think it'll be a girl, dunno why...) things...aaaaw. 

I think my uterus just skipped a beat.

Rage!

Shattered. A long weekend behind us now. Getting out of bed today was a struggle, but thank god I've no where to be. I gave up trying to get more sleep on the couch when my little monkey girl was walking all over me feet and elbows in the face. 

For the first time I really lost my temper in work on saturday. To the point that my headchef sent me out for a bit to chill out and get a coffee to calm my nerves. See I've been working with this guy now for 2 months. Supposebly he was a headchef somewhere, but he doesn't have the skill, speed or hygiene level of a head chef, not even a demi like he is now. Somehow he's gone from a head of the kitchen down to a breakfast chef and everything in between. I thought it was meant to go the other way? The constant babysitting in the kitchen while I'm trying to get work done, finally got to boilingpoint and I blew. He's messy, slow, he doesn't have a clue what he's doing, and he burns things. Two months into the job, and he barely knows the menu now. I'm usually quite patient, but he it's not only that he's crap at his job, he makes me worse at mine, because I can't get things done while I'm having to watch him and therefore i get forgetful and distracted. So all that was playing on my mind, and our souz chef was just back from holidays and he can be so very rude to people for no reason at all, and this guy thinks that anytime someone else reads a check, he loses a testical. A ticket came in and I read it out, and by this time I was already pretty annoyed having to put up with this cartoon character I was having to work with.. So I called out the check and my souz chef said something smartarse back at me and I just lost it..." Chill out you stupid *BEEP* *BEEP*, don't even talk to me you *BEEPING* *BEEP*, so sick of listening to your *BEEP* BEEP*, stupid *BEEP* *BEEP's sake*!!!!!!!!!! A lot of kicking fridges and cursing followed and you can be sure that no man in that kitchen was talking to me or trying to get in my way! I finished service an hour later and went downstairs to take a tablet for my headache, and coming up spoke to my headchef who thought it would be good for me to get out for a bit, and he promised by the time I get back the muppet working my station would be sent home. Thank Jeeves for that!

We had a chat about all that at the end of the night, we have done also before, I've not made it any secret that it's just not working out with him, as my headchef says I'm always brutally honest. So the guy is goig on holidays in a weeks time, and he won't be returning. It means more work for me, but also that I know exactly where I stand and that things are gonna get done, and done the way I like it, as I'll be the one doing them. 

I swear I've never had this much trouble trying to work with someone. It's just been unbearable. I've really tried to get on with things and just help him out, but I feel like a right bitch and a bully, cos I have to tell him off all the time, and he's just not got what it takes to work there. 

You live and learn.

A company online sold 4 cd changer and ipod docking station combination stereo systems, and it was cheaper than in the shops, and i had never had a bad experience from that kind of thing before. The website looked legit and everything seemed to be in order as I looked at the tems and conditions for return policys and whatnot. So I placed an order and was expecting my new soundsystem in 3-5 working days. A week and a half went by and nothing had arrived so I wrote an enquire email to the company and received one back the next day saying there had been an error on the deliveries from the suplier and they offered me an alternative item, which I kindly refused and asked when I could expect my original order to arrive. I was told at the end of the week. Another two weeks went by and no word back and nothing still hadn't arrived. I wrote another email and got no respond. I wrote another email this time just wishing to cancel my order and get my money back. No word back. Another two cancellations later still no respond. I wrote them another email saying I had contacted the citizens advice bureau, as the company had ignored me for over a month on my attempts to cancel my order or making a refund.  No respond. We were discussing matters with the people from citizens advice bureau on what we could do. My husband was on the phone to them for 3 hours. Firstly they kept him on hold for 35 minutes. Then they nonchalantly told him, the order had been canceled. My husband responded "that's great, but we would like to have our money back too." The put him on hold again for an hour, and after was cut off the phone. Safe to say we were not happy! Absolutely disgusted!

Two days later he finally got hold of the guy I spoke to first through email when placing my order, he was the one who offered me an alternative item. 

He said "your order has been canceled and the refund has been put through, and should be with you in 3 days. Please accept our apology and a 10 pound gift voucher for easyishop.co.uk, as a token of good will." 

What a laugh!

You can imagine what I told him to do with that 10 quid voucher!

We informed him that we would not be making any more purchases from their company and would do everything we can to make sure no one else does either.

The money was finally in my account two days ago. At least that part is sorted out now. I'm still gutted about the whole thing, and hope no one else has to go through such hassle. The way we were treated was absolutely horrendous! I think I've learned a lesson about trusting...or on second thought, probably not. I always seem to trust people too easily. Well I'll try my best to be more cautious.

The times they are a changing...

I hate to admit it, but my generation of people seem to think that life owes them something.

 They think they are born into this world and things are handed to them on a platter and if they don't like what they end up with, then everyone else will have to pay for it. People seem to live in this bubble where in their head they can put nothing in but get everything out of it. 

Another school shooting has taken place. Another 10 innocent lives have been taken, because someone didn't like what life dealt them and therefore thought everyone else was to blame for it, rather than taking charge of their own life and making something of it. 

When did we stop respecting life?

It's a scary thought of bringing up children in a world where everything you've worked for can be taken away from you in a split second by someone how thought that you're  life is worth no more than theirs, and therefore they can decide to take it. When did sending your children to school to get their education become a question of wether they live to see the next day. These are not normal times, when we have to fear for the lives of our children just trying to make something of their lives.  

It saddens me as a parent, and a human, to think that this is the world we live in now. Not only do we have to worry about natural disasters, wars, illness and all the other wicked things that came out of pandora's box, we also need to worry about the fact that people no longer allow others to have happiness, instead the envy of others having more than us pushes people to do awful things instead of pushing them to work harder for their happiness. 

My dad taught me the value of life and to respect all living things. If I can teach that to my children and see them grow up without something or someone cutting their life short I'll be happy with just that. That'll make my life. 

A long long time.

It's been a rollercoaster. 

It's been so long I don't know where to start from. Life has been hectic and things are finally feeling sort of on the up again after a very emotional down face. 

We spent a few days in hospital with the baby, after one night four weeks ago I got a phone call in work that my daughter had been taken to hospital. Something sudden had happened and she was stumbling all over the place not able to control herself or her movements. Her legs wouldn't carry her. I was picked up from work and brought to the hospital where she has been  prodded and probed with an IV drip on her foot and she looked like she was literally off her face. It seemed like she had taken something, but no one could tell me what. My heart stopped and I burst into streames of tears. I picked her up and she was floppy. Even as a new born she had always been able to carry her neck and head and no she felt spineless. No words can describe how I felt at that moment. 

They had taken blood tests and we had to get a urine sample from her, which isn't very easy to do with a year old baby. We missed three times as she went on the bed. We finally got a urine sample and I stayed in hospital with her, where every 30 minutes she got monitored for changes and had her heart rate and temperature taken. Needless to say, we didn't sleep that night. I sobbed in bed watching her with tubes coming from everywhere, as they gave her antibiotics through a drip. She was being treated for meningitis as a precaution before test results would be available. The doctor explained to me that she had to be fasted as the next day she would be getting a lombard puncture and brain scan. 3 o'clock in the morning she kicked her IV off and blood gushed from her foot, and no one was out on the ward as I screamed for a nurse. Amanda, our night nurse came running down the corridor and helped me get the bed and baby cleaned up, and said a doctor would come in to put in a new drip. The doctor came in an hour later to put a gel on her feet to numb the area. Half an hour later she came back to put in the drip. She struggled to find a vain as baby's vains aren't visible. After a half an hour of trying both feet she went for her hands, with no result. This time the area wasn't even numbed. It all got too much for me to watch her screaming and I asked her to stop. She said they would have to try again later as she needed her third set of antibiotics in the morning. 

In the morning we waited hungry as the other babies on the ward got their breakfast brought to them, but my baby was fasting for her scan and wasn't allowed anything. Another doctor got her IV drip in the first try on her arm with no hassle at all. She was taken in for her lumbard puncture and I was asked to stay back as it would be upsetting for me to watch. After what seemd like a lifetime she was brought back and was allowed to have some milk. She seemed a million times better, although she was still wobbly and knackered from the night before, but she didn't seem as drowsy and "drunken". 

The doctor explained to me that the liquid taken from her spine looked very clear which is a very good sign and she was upgrated from 3o minute watch to 2 hours. Along the day she seemed to improve and seemed more like herself. I myself was a weeping mess from sleep deprivation and having to deal with the fact that just hours earlier I was still thinking I might be losing my child. 

The different doctors and nurses kept coming in to keep me up dated and monotoring my angel all day and night, and that evening she got upgrated to 4 hour watches, which meant we might get some sleep.  I fell asleep with my husband petting my hair, as he had promised to stay until I fell asleep, and woke up with the baby coughing up sick as she started vomiting all over herself. They had explained to me that people often get sick after the lumbard puncture, so I knew straight away this is what was happening. Our night nurse helped me clean up everything again, and I got the baby to go back to sleep. I got a few hours after that myself. In the morning after fasting the baby for another whole day I was waiting to go in to get her brain scan, when the doctor came in and told us that they had found the reason for her illness. She had consumed benzodiazepines which came up in her urine sample. Turned out my mother-in-law takes diazepam for sleeping problems, and somehow she had gotten hold of one or a crumb of one, how much of it, no one knows. 

At the same time I felt such relief and rage. I was very pleased to know that this was nothing neuroligal that would cast a shadow on her future, as the first night in hospital I had made a promise to myself to never have more kids if she had something like that, cos I would never like her to feel left out or not be able to do everything the other children would be able to.  But at the same time I felt such anger that because of someone's carelessness I had come so close to losing my child, and there is no way I would ever forgive her for that. I don't think I would be able to. We got home that day, and the baby slept most of it. She was tired of being prodded and probed for days on end and just wanted to sleep. I couldn't stop crying. Every time I thought about it all I burst into tears. My heart was breaking. Motherhood never hit me so hard before, I realized I would rather die than let anything hurt my child again. I felt so much love for her and wanted to protect her with every last inch of me. The next day she had probably already forgetten her ordeal and she was getting very annoyed with mummy dotting on her, constantly kissing and cuddling her. For a few days I actually considered giving up working just so I wouldn't have to leave her ever again. I still have trust issues with my mother-in-law, and I'm sure those will be there for a very long time. I know that she is beating herself up about it a lot more than I ever could, but a part of me will always think, what if.... The sad thing is, something like that could have come to ruin my marriage. Not that i would ever blame him in any way, but having such a huge thing between myself and his mother would effect us in such a big way. But the thing is, I have to just take it as a lesson learned, and not think about the negatives and all the what if's, because, otherwise I will never get over it. 

So you think, that after something like this, life would give me a break and have something good roll my way. no such luck, i'm afraid!

We decided to go on a shopping trip to get the baby new clothes to enjoy a day out and get our minds off everything just happened. Four miles into the motorway, our car broke down. The engine died. So much for that shopping trip. We phoned to get another car from my in-laws and my husband stayed back to wait for the AA to pick up the car and get the other car. I jumped in the car with my friends and the baby and we headed on. By the time we got to the shops, everyone was so pissed off that the whole trip was a bust and no enjoyment came out of retail therapy. An hour later, my phone died. The Phone I had bought only 3 weeks prior. What else is gonna go wrong?

Later on in the week my kitchen turned against me aswell and my dishwasher broke along with my trusted hand blender. I felt like giving up..why does the universe hate me? More financial trouble followed, I wont bore you with the details. 

It's been a couple of weeks since, and pieces are getting picked up one by one, and hopefully everything will be sorted soon, but what an awful month and a half I've had. The worst one of my life. At the worst of times I've just felt like curling up in  ball and giving up, but the one thing that has kept me going is my beautiful little baby girl, who is growing up so fast that every second is precious not to miss. I've started smiling again I've been told. :)

Let's hope better thing are a coming, it is due!