Pandemic Parenting

So what has been happening? Teddy is now 4 months old and August turned 3 at the end of July. We moved house. And we are in our second (Covid-19) lockdown. I can’t say that it’s been the easiest few months. 😳

Who moves house with a toddler and a newborn during a pandemic lockdown? I can honestly say that it was up there with the hardest things I have ever done in my life. AJ was working long hours so I did most of it myself while juggling the kids. It’s done now and we are pretty much unpacked. I’m not quite organised yet, but I’m just trying to do one thing a day. Today all I did was hang a clock, but it was something.

We are still living in Torquay, we just moved to a better location for us. I can now see the ocean from our balcony and I can walk everywhere I need to go with the kids (when I’m actually allowed to go anywhere again that is). We are so happy with the move and this house feels much more like “us”. It’s amazing what a difference it’s made to my mental health to be in a space filled with light, to see trees, ocean and hear birds singing around me.

Parenting a newborn and a toddler is not for the faint hearted. I don’t know how parents of 3+ kids survive. In saying that, I expected it to be really hard so I’m not exactly shocked. I’ve always watched parents with two or more kids at the doctors or the supermarket and thought it looked like a nightmare, and I was pretty much right. 🤣

It’s both physical and emotional challenge. I’m lucky if I get more than 4 hours of broken sleep a night because both August and Teddy are waking throughout the night. The guilt is constant. The sad reality is that I can’t be there 100% for both kids at the same time and someone is always missing out.

The other day August escaped out the front door while I was settling Teddy. I came downstairs after putting Teddy down to nap and couldn’t find him, then I saw the toys he was playing with sitting by the open front door. I almost passed out with fear. I ran out yelling his name and then saw him playing in the car in the driveway. Thank god I had parked the car in the driveway and not the garage that day which distracted him from heading out on the busy road or for a walk to god knows where.

August has had a tough year so far. He doesn’t understand why we can’t go to the playground or pool or museum or zoo or anywhere basically. He’s not overly keen on being a big brother. He doesn’t really enjoy daycare. He can’t see his grandparents. His favourite person in the world (his dad) has been so busy at work that he doesn’t have time to play. His mum is always holding or feeding a new baby. It breaks my heart seeing him sad. This is such a fun age where he’s growing out of toddlerhood and really understanding the world around him. I so wish we could be out and about in the world discovering and learning together. Hopefully we can again soon.

Teddy is my little ray of sunshine. He is just the sweetest child. He rarely ever fusses or demands attention. He just sits back and smiles. Even right now while he’s in the four month sleep regression and just had his vaccinations, he’s still a delight. I feel bad for him that his arrival into this world has been at such an unhappy time. There are no visits from friends or family due to Covid-19, everyone is preoccupied with their own misery, his brother is not thrilled by his arrival and his dad is working 18 hour days and not able to dote on him. It’s lucky that I am loving on him enough to make up for all that he’s missing out on.

I’ve fallen asleep three times while writing this so I think it’s time I give up. Life is messy and a bit hard right now, but I’m grateful for all that I have. 💗

36 Weeks Pregnant

This was taken a couple of weeks ago now, about 34 weeks pregnant I guess.

What a strange world to be 36 weeks pregnant in right now.

I’m not going to lie or pretend to be positive because honestly, I’ve found it incredibly difficult. We’ve been quarantining for 4 weeks now and it’s super hard to entertain a 2.5 year old all day at home when I’m exhausted and in pain. I do ok until lunch time and then the pain sets in and it’s hard to be bending, crouching, playing with and lifting a toddler. At lunch time I put the TV on so I can do my work and catch up on household things and then the afternoons drag… By then Augie really needs a big outdoor play, but I just don’t have it in me. I try to take him for a walk, but inevitably he asks to be carried (and his bloody bike and helmet too) and it’s just too hard for me. AJ’s work is busier than ever so unfortunately he can’t help anymore than he already does. We are considering buying a trampoline, but our yard is super skinny so we’d need to get a small crappy one that wouldn’t even have a weight limit for me or AJ to get in with him. Plus we are looking at moving house in the near future so the timing of getting a big piece like that would be annoying to have to move.

I’ve been so frustrated at the situation because I thought I’d done everything to make this transition easy, I’d settled August in childcare and hired a cleaner to come fortnightly. My dad has just retired and was going to help out with Augie before and after the baby arrives. I had grand plans to shop for the new baby and set everything up and even try and go see a movie and get a pedicure and rest up a bit. The best laid plans…

Of course the process around having a baby has also been stressful. My hospital will only allow one visitor while I’m in there, which will be AJ (kids are not allowed), so I won’t be able to see Augie for my entire stay in hospital (which is meant to be four nights). I’ve only ever had one night away from Augie and this will be super hard on us both. I actually can’t even think about it because I find it too upsetting. I’m hoping for an easy birth so that I can get home ASAP.

A run in with the door. Thank god for icy poles!

At this stage, my dad and stepmum will be coming down to look after Augie while I’m having the baby. That could change if they or we get sick or if I’m not sure they’ve quarantined properly. I spoke to them a few days ago about it and they said they’ve quarantined, but then during the conversation mentioned two different people they’d visited. 🤦🏻‍♀️ They are from a regional area and probably don’t feel the severity of the situation. So AJ and I are fully prepared to do this on our own if we need to and I’ll give birth by myself and AJ won’t be able to see the baby until we leave the hospital. This is sad, but safety is the priority.

While everyone says the virus isn’t particularly bad for babies or pregnant women, any virus is bloody hard for babies and pregnant women so it would be a nightmare if we got sick. Not to mention if anyone in our family got sick, we’d need to quarantine from each other, which is not ideal to keep a father away from his new baby or toddler away from his mum for weeks.

Before quarantine times

A small silver lining to this situation has been toilet training Augie. I’d been slack with it because we normally go out so much during the day that it seemed like hard work to be near toilets all the time. I knew he was ready before Christmas, but then we had a big road trip over two weeks which would have been messy to say the least. Then he started daycare and I didn’t want to add to his stress because I felt he’d be too shy to ask the teachers for help to use the toilet. So now we have all the time in the world! He understood the potty right away and has had no trouble (we kept him mostly naked to start with). Once I started dressing him, he had a few days of forgetting he didn’t have a nappy on, but then he got used to it. He still wears a nappy to bed, but will often wake and ask me to take him to the potty (which is super annoying to be honest!). The one thing we haven’t done much of is use the actual toilet, he doesn’t love that so far, so I need to get him used to using the big toilet next.

Throughout all this, Augie has been amazing. Aren’t kids funny how much they surprise you with their resilience! He definitely gets bored and frustrated and I can see that in his behaviour (and he will tell me “mummy I’m so frustrated”), but nothing that I think is unreasonable. This age has probably been my favourite so far because I can see his personality come out in his language. We can have proper conversations and he’s saying hilarious things that I have no idea where he could have even learned this stuff from (probably TV lol). He loves to make up songs about whatever he is doing and also being cheeky and playing games where he tells you the wrong answers and laughs at himself hysterically. He talks to himself all the time: “Do you hear that noise? Yes! That’s an aeroplane”. His ability to play properly now is so much more developed and we can play in-depth games of doctors or shops and build proper things with blocks. It’s definitely a fun age. Not without it’s challenges of course, he says “I don’t want to” about 200 times a day. He loves to throw his toys around the room for fun and he’s still waking every single night for between 1-3 hours. I’m so tired. 😴

Easter! 🐰

Up until recently, the baby in my tummy has given me no trouble. But over the past couple of weeks the aches and pains have settled in. I keep thinking it might come early because I feel so big and it hurts so much, but of course it’s all normal. I’ve been managing my gestational diabetes fine, I’m quite used to it now. I still test my blood sugars four times a day and my endocrinologist has been really happy with my results. She did question if I’m eating enough and I honestly said that I’m probably not sometimes, but it’s too hard because after each meal I can’t eat for two hours until I test my blood sugars and then I just often don’t have the time to make more food. Like right now, I had lunch an hour ago, I’m a bit peckish, but can’t eat for another hour and then I’ll probably be in the middle of something and it’s hard to prepare a gestational diabetes friendly snack on the go. Almonds are my usual choice, but I’m so bored of almonds.

My obstetrician measures the baby every week at my appointments and so far it’s measuring about 30th percentile, which is great for a gestational diabetes baby. They’d warned me I may need to be induced two weeks early if baby grew too big, so I’m really happy that won’t have to happen. Augie weighed 3.1 kilos at birth and they predict this baby will be about the same.

Rise and shine daddy!

Our biggest issue is what to name this baby. We have a girls name we have loved since I was pregnant with August, but absolutely no boys names. If this baby is a boy it will seriously be nameless. We like unique names, but not too wacky. We like the more soft feminine names, rather than a strong traditional boys name. Anything nice is a little too popular for my liking. Suggestions??? I’ve asked Augie and he says we can call it “baby girl” because he wants a girl. You and me both buddy!

Ok, enough complaining. Augie wants to go jump in muddy puddles, his favourite activity right now. 🥰

Ahhhh :(

Honestly, winter can fuck off.

Augie is sick again. He’s been sick constantly since the start of May. This brings with it behaviour issues, no sleep and just misery for everyone. It’s been cold and wet so it’s hard to do anything outside and he refuses to wear a jacket or hat. I still try to take him to the park and he won’t get out of the car, but what else can I do to occupy him? I took him to the indoor trampoline centre and he just lay on the trampolines.

We go into Melbourne as much as possible to go to the Melbourne Museum and Scienceworks, which I can’t recommend enough for babies and toddlers. It’s amazing. If I lived in Melbourne, I’d go every day. Spring is just around the corner so I just need to hang in there. We are going to Sydney this week and it’s a full 10 degrees warmer there every day. Insane. Why don’t we move to Sydney?

Well in other news, I lost my job last week. Yep, this is the third time in a row I have been made redundant. Un-fucking-believable. I thought it was coming for a while so it wasn’t a shock. The whole team were made redundant because the company has no money, so I guess I can’t take it personally. In many ways, it’s a relief because I was burning the candle at both ends to work 25 hours and still be a full time stay at home mum. I was kind of killing myself and felt like I was a shit mum and a shit employee so it was causing me a lot of stress.

I’m not really sure what I’ll do now. I had a good situation where I was mostly working from home. I live a long way from the CBD so it makes it difficult to find work. I also just don’t think Augie is ready for childcare yet. He’s incredibly shy and I just don’t want to put him through that trauma. I really wanted to wait to put him in childcare when it was best for him, not when it suited me. I’m not sure I’ll always have that luxury, in fact I may need to start checking out childcare centres very soon.

Augie had a 2 year check up with the child and maternal health nurse a couple of weeks ago. It wasn’t a great experience. She got in his face immediately to engage him and upset him and just didn’t seem to understand he was shy (then she refused to let him have a sticker unless he came and took it from her, which he was too scared to do). She gave me a massive lecture that I rock him to sleep and said I was hurting him and it was very sad for him that he needed to be rocked to sleep. She told me he should go to sleep school and when I mentioned that I understand they let kids cry it out at sleep school and she said that’s what he needs to learn to sleep. I’m not at all supportive of cry it out methods for our family and I’m finding it frustrating that it seems to be the norm in our culture. When I talk to friends, or other mums or read sleep advice online it always leads to cry it out methods. I end up feeling like I need to defend my gentle approach. I think I just need to stop talking to people about it. The next time someone asks me how he’s sleeping, I should just say “fine”.

She also did an autism screening test, which he passed fine as it was just about making eye contact, pointing at things, recognising his name, creative play and things like that. I did raise with her that I had niggling concerns about him being different to other kids. I don’t know how else to say it, but he just isn’t the same as other kids at playgroups or my friend’s kids. I like to say he’s quirky, but I do worry it’s more than that. He’s obviously very shy, he’s obsessed with fans (which is an autism factor), if we go somewhere he just plays with the fire hydrants or other weird things and not the toys, he gets obsessed with opening doors and flicking on lights, sometimes when I sing or put on music he says “stop” like the noise upsets him (I do have a terrible singing voice). I don’t know what is just being a toddler and what is different. I really wish my mum was here because she had three kids and I’m sure she’d be able to give me some guidance.

It plays on my mind a lot. I’m not sure if it’s heightened because about 6 years ago I worked with a girl who was pregnant with a baby boy and she was obsessed with worrying he would have autism (he doesn’t). I don’t know if I would have actually thought about it if it wasn’t for that experience. AJ just recently reminded me that my mum used to say she thought I was autistic when I was young (which I’m not) so maybe it’s just hereditary traits. I guess all I know is that I think he’s perfect as he is right now and I don’t want him to change. But I still worry.

I’ve been quite down in the dumps lately from work stress, lack of sleep, feeling lonely, gaining weight, financial pressures, missing my mum and a lot of small things. I decided last night I need to do 3 things to feel better:

1. Count my blessings to have AJ and Augie
2. Be of service to the community in a charitable way
3. Exercise

Wish me luck.

14 Months = Why Won’t You Sleep Child?

Let me just start this by saying that this has been a tough month for bub (and me!). It’s been a bad combination of a developmental leap, molars, sickness and travelling.

I really should look at the Wonder Weeks (development leap) app before planning a 26 hour return road trip to the Hunter Valley. His recent leaps hadn’t been that noticeable though, in fact I think I might have jinxed myself by saying they aren’t even a thing for him anymore. I can’t exactly say it was the relaxing winery getaway that we had planned. But obviously I enjoy rocking a crying baby all night instead of eating cheese and drinking wine with my friends and playing cards against humanity. FML.

The week before we left he was just miserable with his molars and then the first two popped through on the day we left for our trip (not that this helped at all). Then we started leap 9. Whoa that’s been a tough one. Well we are still in it for one more week but I’ve seen the light at the end of the tunnel. Last night he slept 7.00 pm – 8.00 am. Thank god!!!

The only thing that saved us on this trip away was that we stopped and bought an iPad holder for the back of the seat in the car. I’ve always been a bit anti kids using devices, but I sure changed my tune quickly! I put his favourite nursery rhyme show on, Little Baby Bum, (the only show he’ll watch) and he just chilled for the whole drive. Life saver!

So we got through the drive, but he still wouldn’t sleep at night. It’s like he’s just so buzzed when he’s in a leap and can’t wind down to sleep. One night we resorted to driving him around Sydney (where I was visiting my brother) at 11 pm until he fell asleep.

Then we drove home from Sydney and Augie and I both returned with terrible colds and I also got conjunctivitis just for extra fun! My niece is in daycare and always passes on killer germs and this was a doozy. This coincided with the ‘stormy’ period of the leap (the worst part) and was one of those hellish weeks I’ll remember for a while. Being sick with a sick baby to look after and also working from home was just too much. I think I have a permanent eye twitch now.

This has lead us to start the conversation about daycare. Right now, AJ and I both work from home. I work (minimum) 20 hours a week 5.30-7.30 am (before Augie wakes) and then 11.30-1.30 (during Augie’s nap). AJ runs his own business so he just works all the time ha ha. I really want to keep Augie at home with me and be a stay at home mum, but I also need to work for financial reasons, so it’s a juggle to say the least. Do I just keep running myself into the ground so I can keep Augie at home or do I need to go outside of my comfort zone and look into daycare options?

I actually don’t feel like Augie is suited to daycare right now. I take him to 3 different local playgroups and go to at least one session every day (playgroup is a space for parents and kids to hang out, play and socialise) and he is quite reserved and shy. The other kids his age all go nuts playing and running around together. They get there and immediately run off to play and love interacting with other kids and adults. Whereas Augie mostly just stays by my side and has no interest in other kids. I think this is quite normal for a 14 month old, especially because he’s not walking yet and is limited in how he can play with the other kids. Plus he’s now just started this weird shy thing where he gets scared around other people. He freezes and stares at the ground in total fear and then starts to cry. Poor little guy!

I’m sure that if I had to put him in daycare he would cope, but I just don’t think it’s a good fit for him at the moment (or me to be honest). I looked into getting a babysitter but they are all minimum of $20 an hour, which isn’t affordable for me. The other option is family daycare, where he gets placed in a family home with up to 5 kids (I think, I’m not totally sure). I didn’t think I’d like family daycare but I feel like Augie would thrive in a smaller environment like this rather than a large daycare.

I’ll go and check out some local daycare centres and see how what I think. At least I’ll be informed and ready to pull the trigger when the time is right. We have a Montessori centre and a Steiner centre, but I think they are both for 3 year olds and above so I might just wait until I can get him into one of those and keep trying to make it work.

So all my whinging aside, what else has been going on with Augie this month?

• Augie has been learning animal noises and shapes. His favourite is to hiss like a snake and he loves “tars” (stars).

• He still isn’t walking. Apparently 14 months is the average age to walk, but Augie is the only bub at playgroup not walking, they’ve all been walking since about 11-12 months. He takes a few steps, but wouldn’t just walk across the room. He is not a fearless baby like some kids that I see diving into every new experience. He is 100% capable of walking, but just doesn’t seem to want or need to walk. Honestly, it could be months away still. I just hope he walks before summer because his little knees will get ripped up from crawling outside in shorts.

• He has the two top front molars that I can see. There could be more but good luck trying to get near his mouth to look.

• He loves when you touch his nose. He’ll grab your hand and push down on his nose. Strange child.

• Favourite foods are hummus, pears, yoghurt and anything seafood. He’s finally started eating bananas- yay!

• He loves his stuffed toys (puppy and penguin) and his doll. He feeds his doll her bottle. So cute.

• Loves, loves, loves the beach. It was such a good decision to move to the beach. Except for the bloody sand everywhere…

• Won’t keep a hat on. How the hell do I keep that little blonde head from getting burned this summer???

• His favourite game is to push me and watch me pretend to fall over. It’s hysterical.

• He loves cuddling cushions, rugs, the couch and toys. He knows I think it’s cute so he’ll cuddle something and say ahhhhh and look at me for a reaction. Obviously I give him a reaction every time because it’s so friggin cute.

So that’s been our last month. I’ve whinged and complained a lot, but I’m still always grateful to have a healthy and happy bub. I feel incredibly lucky to be able to work from home and spend so much time with Augie. He is my little sunshine. ☀️

Fark!

I’m feeling super flat this week. I was made redundant from my job on Tuesday. Yep, again.

I was totally blindsided, I had no idea it was coming. I don’t work Tuesdays, but I had just spent all of Augie’s morning nap doing work anyway. My new boss called and so I immediately knew something was wrong because she’s never called me. Funnily enough, I felt so secure in my job that I thought someone else must have been fired or quit and they were just filling me in. Ha ha.

Nope. My boss very coldly read off the script she was given telling me I no longer held a position there and that I needed to bring my laptop and swipe card back. The whole thing took about 5 minutes and that was that. I haven’t heard anything more from them. It feels so weird that I’m just never going back to work.

Pretty much my whole team was made redundant because they are decentralising the department. Meaning that instead of one national marketing team, they will have localised marketing in each state.

Last time I was made redundant it felt completely different. I saw it coming so it wasn’t such a shock and I hated my job so it was essentially a good thing (even though I was pissed off at the time). Last time I took it quite personally because I was the only one made redundant. So I was a bit bitter about the whole situation, but hopeful that I’d end up happier.

This time I don’t feel embarrassed because I know it wasn’t personal. But, I just feel gutted to have lost my job for so many reasons. Mostly because this is the first job I have ever had that I liked. I loved the projects I was working on at the moment. Since I came back from maternity leave I somehow managed to hold onto the good parts of my job and let go of the parts I hated. I would actually do it for free, that’s how much I love it.

I also feel like it’s unlikely that I’m going to be able to find meaningful employment part time. I’m not ready to go back full time yet because I’m loving the time at home with Augie. I want that (elusive) balance of family and career and, for me, that means only working part time. I don’t want to just take any crappy job because if I’m going to be away from Augie, it needs to be worth it. But, part time jobs are hard to find. Good ones anyway. What happens if I can’t find work and the career that I have been working to build for years just dissolves???

Plus, I just feel exhausted at the idea of doing my resume, going to job interviews, learning a new job and bonding with new colleagues. I seriously can’t be fucked. I don’t have the energy for it right now.

Look, as down as I’m feeling about this situation, I know this isn’t a real problem. My loved ones are all healthy and I have a roof over my head. So while I’m having a little pity party, I know that things could be worse. Plus, this gives me more time to read books in my pjs with this little guy. So I’m ok.

Rut

I’m not sure if life is getting me down or if I am down and it’s making my life seem shit. What came first, the chicken or the egg? All I can say right now is that I feel like I am in a rut.

Work is just so hard, my house build has been delayed and I don’t know where I am going to live, this infertility stuff is doing my head in and I feel lonely without any family around. I feel overwhelmed and like I have nothing to look forward to right now.

I am starting to wonder if the fertility drug I have been taking, Clomid, is part of the issue because I just don’t feel like myself. I feel like I have severe PMS symptoms all of the time. I am turning into a horrible snappy bitch that I don’t recognise. I’m not sure if I can take the drug much longer or what that might mean for me.

I am really letting it all get to me and I am trying to suffocate the stress with food and alcohol. I am eating poorly, drinking too much and now my clothes don’t fit me anymore. It’s a vicious bloody cycle.

The one thing I can do to help myself is take better care of my health. Eating a diet of potato chips and red wine might feel good in the short term, but it’s obviously not helping. Even though we are heading into the Christmas season, I am committing to focus on better eating and cut down on drinking. I’m going to make choices that my future self will thank me for, even if my current self wants sugar and salt.

In all the darkness, here is the light, I became and aunty on 22nd October. Her name is Penelope Jennifer (Jennifer is after my mum) but we mostly call her Polly. I was lucky enough to be able to fly to Sydney when my sister-in-law went into labour and be there to give her cuddles right away. I can’t wait to see her again at Christmas, I miss her so much!

My first meeting with my niece

Proud grandparents

Juggling baby and dog, no problem!

2 weeks old (dimples!)

Looking just like my mum and brother

Angel

 

 

 

Valium and Netflix

I just realised that I have been in my ‘new’ job for 8 weeks now. It feels like 8 seconds and 8 years at the same time.

I’m not sure if I have ever worked as hard in my life as I have in this job. Or maybe I am just feeling old and tired? Actually, I think that might be it.

I don’t know if I have the energy to establish myself in yet another job. I just feel tired and like I have lost the drive I once had around my career. I was so happy during my 2 month period of unemployment and I miss that feeling a lot.

I think that being made redundant in my last job kind of changed me. I don’t feel bitter or angry about it, but I guess I just find it hard to trust that my hard work will be rewarded or even valued. It makes me wonder why I am killing myself in yet another job and where it will get me. See, I am getting old and cynical!

All of this work stress, even though it’s mostly been manufactured in my own head, has left me feeling particularly anxious lately. I feel overwhelmed by simple tasks (OMG I have to wash my hair…), I’m being snappy to AJ (Close the effing fridge door!) and I’m protective of my personal time (What do you mean you said we’d babysit your sister’s kids all day Saturday?). Thank god for Valium and Netflix.

Despite all of this, I have managed to stick to my healthy eating goals (for the most part). I find that often when I am in the eye of the storm I can stay focussed on eating well. The adrenalin from my anxiety keeps me going. It’s not until everything slows down that I completely crash and burn into a pit of chocolate wrappers. I am determined not to let that happen this time. I’m on high alert!

I should mention that there are some perks to my new job. My company has ties to my favourite football team, which has meant I got to spend some time with these nice guys (and a few others). Swoon.

Me with Mitch Duncan and Tom Hawkins from Geelong Football Club

The Hunger

Well I have almost finished up my first three weeks in my new job… and it only feels like three years… I think it’s safe to say that I am not one of those people who would choose to work if they didn’t have to. Obviously those people are insane.

Anyway, all this hard work has given me THE HUNGER. I just want to eat and eat and then eat some more. Why does thinking make me so hungry?

It’s not exactly unusual for me to turn to food when I am stressed (or happy or sad or excited or depressed or bored). So I am just trying to make good choices and not worry too much about weight loss. If I can get through my first few months in this job without gaining a stack of weight, I will call that a victory.

Exercise has not been a priority for me right now. I am working fairly long hours and it’s the dead of winter, so let’s face it, who can be arsed? I am walking about 25 minutes each way (a slow walk) to my tram stop to get to and from work, so at least I am getting some movement in most days.

I have to say that I am not exactly loving life right now, so I am just going to channel my inner Britney.

I feel better already!

Bra Shopping

I made a new years resolution this year to do one simple thing. Buy some good bras.

Well it sounds simple, but buying the perfect fitting bra has always evaded me. Mostly due to my own lack of effort.

Since I had lower body lift surgery a couple of years back my body shape has really changed and I now have huge boobs. Well, not just boobs, but back fat too (yay!). So I am pretty top heavy and I really need to be doing more to support those big things. My normal routine of going to Target and buying a bra that looked around the right size and was under $25 was no longer working for me.

My left boob is also almost a full size bigger than my right side. There isn’t much I can do about that, but I just wanted to share that little gem with you. Why don’t they make bras that cater to us uneven chested women? Or maybe it is just me with this problem?

So on Saturday I made it my mission to find a bra that fit me properly. I wasn’t particularly excited by this task, especially because I tore my rotator cuff in December and just putting a bra on every day is painful, let alone trying on 20 at the one time. It was a necessary evil though because I had recently purchased two dresses that needed some assistance in the bra stakes. So I psyched myself up for it.

It turns out that if you are over a size 14 or above a D cup you are going to have a lot of trouble finding a good bra in Australia. It’ll be even harder to find one that doesn’t look like it belongs to your grandmother. The whole experience really sucked and reminded me why I don’t normally put in any effort with bra shopping. I was surrounded by beautiful bras and only about 5% of them came in my size (18 DD). Damn it.

Then I was walking past City Chic and thought I would have a little look and see if they had any bras. I totally struck gold. Why didn’t I know that City Chic have the best plus size bras?

The City Chic bras managed to encase my big boobies, lift them up without my cup spilling over and control my back fat situation.

I probably need to keep working on my quest to find the perfect bra (if such a thing exists), but I have made a good start. My next step would be to get professionally fitted, but I am not sure I am ready for that yet.

This is not a sponsored post. I only dream of people paying me for shit like this.

Too Fat for Lipo

Ugh… I had a shitty week, but TGIF I suppose.

I’ve had some challenges at work, I got my first ever migraine (aura and everything), fell over outside my work and had a miserable doctors appointment.

So the doctors appointment… I decided to go back to see the plastic surgeon who did my body lift to ask about some liposuction on my lower back. I had always been unhappy with my lower back after my surgery because it bulges out, instead of curving in like a back should. It makes me feel very insecure and I go to a lot of lengths to try and cover it up. I thought a little lipo might help the issue.

Turns out that I am too fat for lipo.

My surgeon asked me how much I weighed and I told him that I don’t weigh myself, he said ‘maybe that is your problem’. Ouch. So, at his insistence, I got on the scales and the number was 88.5 kilos (194.7 lbs). Admittedly, this was much higher than I anticipated. I genuinely thought I was at least 5 kilos less than that. Damn it.

Then he gave me a lecture on how I need to go back and see my lap band doctor and use my lap band properly… blah blah blah. I tried to explain that I had difficulty with it, but I could tell he just thought that I was full of shit. He was so pro-lap band that it wasn’t worth discussing further.

He said he wouldn’t do anything with my back until I lost 10 kilos. Even though he admitted that weight loss wouldn’t really improve my back issues. If I was braver, I would have said that I thought he should have fixed my lower back issues properly in the first surgery (I didn’t because I am a scaredy cat).

I’m not saying he was wrong, he is the expert after all, but his delivery could have done with a little work… What really frustrated me was that he didn’t understand that I could be OK with myself at my current weight and that I just wanted to fix an issue that puts my body out of proportion. I guess a cosmetic surgery is not the best place to try and be body positive… ha ha!

I left the appointment feeling pretty stupid and $225 poorer. The whole experience completely put me off the idea of having lipo for now.

So that means I can put my money toward much more important things.