How it is....

The alarm goes of at 6.45am and I don’t want to get up. I sleep for another 15mins before dragging myself out of bed. Breakfast and off to work. Work pressure is high but I try to study in my lunch break. I make it home for 6.30pm and take Grace while the long suffering wife cooks. All being well by 7.30pm we have eaten. I then need to work on boxing up the flat and taking things over to my mother's. We are moving in under 14 days.

I have cancelled all the direct debits, cancelled the mortgague payment, cancelled all the bills – the letters will soon rain down on me, the final demands – but I haven’t got the money to pay the bills. Paperwork needs looking at but I haven’t the will or the time to do it. At 1am I crawl into bed, at 3am grace wakes to feed. At 6.45am the alarm goes of and I don’t want to get up. I sleep for another 15mins before dragging myself…and so it goes on.

It is the long suffering wife's birthday on the 27th. Grace’s dedication on the 1st. So much to do and right now all I want to do is sleep.

Last night the wife asked me how much I think her stomach will recover. If how it is now is how it is. She is doing the exercises from the physio – we are a long way off from where things will be but I see her struggling and there is no easy comfort I can offer. The long suffering wife was always going to struggle with a post birth body – she is a recovering annorexic on the wagon for some 10 years now. The tear of her stomach muscles though has made things so much harder, so much worse than they would have been otherwise. She has never had a positive body image and now I see her walking on a thin wire high above the world trying so hard not to fall, trying to cling on.

In a brief moment between feeds, between changed nappys, between packing boxes, between Grace with wind, I catch glimpse of my wife and daughter's eyes, brief moments, the merest hint of a smile and for a moment I lose myself in it and everything seems okay – and then I remember that there are things I need to be doing and so I drag myself out of my chair and continue the battle for survival.

Today I am struggling.

Yours as ever,

The Broken Man.

Tears after Bedtime

It seems that Grace has yet to learn how to vomit on demand. While this is a skill which most of us take in our stride, it seems that at 3 ½ weeks old there are occasions when Grace knows she wishes to be sick, but seems a little uncertain of how to go about it.

Instead of sitting down and drawing up a number of possible ways of carrying out this operation she tends to opt for screaming while sticking her tongue out intermitantly. As she screws up her eyes while doing so they look rather puffy and inclined to explode. It is not an attractive look, and as such my vocal daughter tries to avoid this model of behaviour when in company.

For visitors she sleeps, or stares wide eyed and bemused at some unidentifiable point in the room. When accompanied by the occasional smile visitors assure us that Grace is indeed very good, very lovely etc etc. They cuddle her and tell us how relaxing they find her. However, a certain time comes in the evening when the visitors have left and the vocal daughter feels she is able to drop the act.

If you can't be yourself with your family, who can you be straight with? As such she has developed a workable routine. First she pees and screams for a change. We change her. She then pees again. We affix nappy two. She then poos. We affix nappy three. She then requests food (failing to use “please”). After a short feed she indicates that she is bored and sleeps for three mins. This my wife mistakenly takes as an indication that she can stand up. Clearly this results in requests for more feeding.

Having finished feeding its time for the loo again. Discovering that this has not made her feel more comftable the vocal daughter informs us she has wind, this she does cunningly with a slightly different pitched scream while trying to knee herself repeatedly in the stomach.

10 mins or so of winding follows. Normally with nappy change. At this point the vocal daughter has a difficult choice..is it time to feed…or time to vomit? Sometimes unsure which to go for she will attempt a feed and give up to return to crying while sticking out her tongue. A state which she feels able to maintain for some considerable time before returning to the start of the procedure.

Yesterday I came in from a meeting to find the long suffering wife sitting on the sofa having been able to do little other than hold our vocal daughter as she expressed her discomfort. As the long suffering wife was unable to find a method for relieving the distress of Grace, she opted for holding her, while rocking slightly and crying herself, on the principle that, if you can't beat them, join them.

Fortunately for me the vocal daughter decided that she would indeed now vomit (just after I picked her up), and as such would return to a temporary state of calm. An extra pair of hands providing the exciting opportunity for the long suffering wife of having some extended leisure time (10 mins in the shower followed by a cup of tea).

I have of course explained at length to the vocal daughter that having informed me of her discomfort due to winding, cuddling, feeding or nappy changing, she does not need to continue to inform me of it. One short screech for each requirement is sufficient, after which a pause of at least five mins in which the need she has identified is addressed, would to my mind prove to be a far better system.

Despite careful explanations, and even on occasion’s diagrams and a pie chart, the vocal daughter has yet to grasp the finer points of my proposal. I suspect that I need to provide a flow chart for her to ensure that she fully gets to grips with my proposal.

Yours as ever

The Broken Man