"Baby brought back to life by mother's touch"

I read this in the paper yesterday

Baby brought back to life by mother's touch

And the Today Tonight video here. Scroll down to Miracle Survival story.

And I thought wow that's so cool.  Lucky for her that it went well and they didn't just pass him off as dead!

So I go to work today and I'm doing my Caesarean list and the midwife there asks me if I saw that thing on Today Tonight about the baby brought back to life, and I said yeah I read that in the paper, and she said "That was me, I delivered them and then I filmed them".  I mean talk about a small world!  That happened in my own hospital, with a midwife that I know!

Apparently she said on Today Tonight they told the story nicely but she said when the mum went onto Sunrise they were bagging out the midwife and Mrs Ogg didn't defend the midwife at all, just smiling and nodding.  So Midwife A was grumbling about that, but she said she didn't care really, it was just disappointing that she was bagged out on national TV and she felt that the mum was a bit ungrateful.

Midwife A said that she even offered to film the baby's last minutes with a camera they had on them so they had some record of the baby, and that's why there was even video to show about the baby and stuff!  I just watched the video and it showed the Neonatologist Dr G on it too... not sure if that's a good thing...

What car should I buy? Part 2

Ok I've narrowed my choice down to 2 cars:

Volkswagen Golf Wagon 118TSI comfortline
Nissan Dualis+2 Ti

Two different cars.  So hard to choose!

What do I like about the Golf?
1) Fuel economy. 6.7L/100km is hard to beat!
2) Zippy little 1.4L engine
3) It's a Golf!
4) Roomy station wagon
5) Safe

What do I like about the Dualis+2?
1) Sized between a hatchback and an SUV
2) +2 seats in an emergency up the back!  Not comfy though!
3) Tones of extra features included in the price for the top of the line model such as moonroof (glass roof!), bluetooth, seat warmers, leather seats, keyless entry
4) value for money price
5) Safe

OK so what don't I like about them?

Golf:
1) takes premium unleaded 98 only.  Geez, that will add heaps to my petrol bill.  No wonder the darn thing is so fuel efficient.
2) Adding all the extras makes the price go up
3) ugly... it's a station wagon!

Dualis+2:
1) Fuel economy not as good - 8.2L/100km
2) Not as roomy as Golf
3) Doesn't have back seat vents for air con/fan

There are quite a few reviews out there:
Dualis
Carshowroom.com.au
carsales.com.au
goauto

Golf
carpoint.com.au
motorreport


Interestingly to insure either of these cars comprehensively, the Golf is $300 more expensive to insure.

I think I may end up getting a Dualis anyway.  I will still get the +2 seats because the boot is bigger with the +2 seats folded down than the normal.  Will cost me an extra 2.5k though.  Should I get AWD?  I dunno, will I ever use it?  I doubt it.  I can always take the Lexus if I really need to do 4WD stuff.

I am such a klutz

My friend EC gave me his HTC Touch Pro 2 to try and within 2 days of using it I dropped it and smashed the screen!  So I feel like the biggest idiot.  It's taken me a while to get it how I like it and now it's broken.. still works properly though as if there is nothing wrong.  It's quite good for taking videos of the kids.

The touch screen is not as good as an iphone but it's better than my old one.  The screen resolution is so much nicer too.

I told EC that I'll take him and his wife out for a nice dinner somewhere, when we can get babysitting!  I wonder where I should take them and when.  They say they don't know much about fine dining but I'll make sure it's something really nice.

Julian can ride a little trike!

I went to a birthday party on Sunday and the parents of the birthday child had a small trike that was the right size for Julian to sit on.  So I put him on it and he seemed to be really good at pushing himself along!  It must be because he is in a walker at Nanny M's house and he's good at that.

So I went out on Monday and bought one from Toys R Us for $10 and couldn't wait to show hubby.  He was so impressed he immediately put it on for his mum to see and she was very excited.  I took a video of it this morning.

Spinal chlorhexidine rumour is true - with Chinese whispers variations

Read the SMH story here.

Such an unfortunate story! And scary for all anaesthetists because I can see exactly how the mistake happened.  The story I heard though was a mother of 2 kids having a 3rd elective caesarean and spinal morphine in one pot and chlorhexidine in the other pot.  And then accidentally drew up chlorhexidine instead of spinal morphine.  And that the patient was paraplegic now.

The actual story is about a woman having a first baby having an epidural in labour, and chlorhexidine instead of saline was injected in the epidural space.  And she has patchy paraesthesias rather than full blown paraplegia.  Which is still bad but different from the story.

Lots of people ask me if that mistake can happen.  And I tell them the truth, it can happen and I can see how it happened.  Thank god it didn't happen to me, I feel sorry for the anaesthetist as well as the patient, I'm sure they're totally mortified by what happened.

What new car should I buy?

After these car dramas I've been thinking that I should get a new car.  I've been looking at the Volkswagen Golf Wagon, but it is a tiny car with not much power... though it is very green (but says I have to use premium unleaded in it!).  The VW Passat wagon might have a bit more kick.

Someone told me to look at the Camry Hybrid, which has rather nice fuel economy but hubby and my mum are not keen for me to get a Hybrid they think there's something buggy about the technology.

Hubby wants me to get an Audi A4 wagon.  But that's starting to push the price boundaries a bit for me!

Hope to go test drive a few models tomorrow

Update with Julian's lactose intolerance and Erika sick again!

Well Julian seems to be tolerating his lactose free diet well.  Nanny M has got the lactose free formula and he has taken to it rather well.  He's down to one poo a day now (well maybe 1.5-2) and he's doing it straight after his morning milk.

Today he woke up around 4am and was talking to himself.  I just let him be and went back to sleep.  The next time I woke up it was 615am and I couldn't hear Julian at all and when I walked in there he was asleep.  And YAY no poo in his nappy!  He was such a good baby, one scoop of normal milk with 3 of soy and straight after he sat on the toilet and did a poo.  Yesterday however he woke up at 350am and talked non stop that I went and got him at 430 because I couldn't stand the noise anymore.  So you can imagine how tired he was.  I'm not sure why he was good last night, but now Erika is sick he might get sick too and have bad nights (see below).
Erika woke up this morning covered in snot and having a blocked nose.  Nanny M said that she spewed out her panadol even though she feels terrible.  My poor little girl.  She probably got it from her cousin, he has a cold at the moment and is quite miserable.  I hope she's only sick for a day or so.

Erika is quite cute at night.  I take her to bed and she tells me what story she wants recited/read to her and then we cuddle and I ask her to say goodnight but she won't unless I say if you don't mummy is going to go away and then she says night night mama.  And she gives me a kiss too and asks me to kiss her as well, and then sometimes she asks me to hug or cuddle her, and put my arm around her.  These are such cute days, if I don't remember them now they'll never come back.

Sydney Aquarium

Took the kids to Sydney aquarium yesterday.  Erika had a great time!  She went to almost every tank saying "what's that" and we saw fish, sharks, dugongs (eating lettuce), jellyfish...

When hubby got home I asked Erika to tell him what we did today.  She said "riding car".  I said what did we do afterwards, Erika?  What did we see?  There was a long pause and she said "fish".  And I said what else did you see.  She said "big fish".  I asked her what do sharks eat.  She said "Erika".

Cute as!

Ooh a nice looking Japanese restaurant I'd like to try!

I'm sitting here on a Thursday and since I did a favour for my ENT surgeon friend whose anaesthetist had to pike the afternoon, I ended up biting off more than I could chew and am stuck here for way longer than I expected!

In the meantime one of the other ENT surgeons PY turns up and recommends Busshara as a restaurant. Looked at a review and it looks great!  Can't wait to try it.  Check out these yummy pics!

Gone sewing crazy!

Ever since I started making my hats I feel like making more things!  I saw a gorgeous bag pattern that I wish I could make but I bet it's too complicated for me but the fabric is sooo cute!

I was thinking of making library bags for Erika and Julian.  Hubby brought back some nice fabric from Taiwan which is high quality cotton which would be good for bags for the kids.  Just trying to find a nice pattern is all.  The Heather Bailey pattern is rather pricey and looks way to complicated for me!  Here are some more patterns I like:

First day at work for HK

I am guilty of pestering HK to get a job.  He has been sitting around at home playing games and "studying" but he needs to get out there!  So for months (maybe it was only weeks or a few months) I was applying for jobs on his behalf.

Now I'm not very good with CVs so none of the applications were replied or even made it to interview or phonecall - basically culled straight off the bat.  So after that I asked Sev to give me a hand - I sent the CV to Sev and got him to make it look better.

Not long after we did that, he got a phonecall from some companies who obviously were impressed enough by CV but wanted more information.  And then he got an interview!  The worst thing was - I noticed on his CV I had put MY mobile phone number as a contact and not his phone number!  So the job interview came to my phone when I was at work and I felt like the biggest idiot and then HK got an interview and he was so nervous by it he made himself physically sick.  On the day of the interview the first SMS were along the lines of "I don't feel well" and "I have a stomach upset".  As the interview time drew closer the SMS's were like "I have a migraine" and "I have chest pain going into my neck and arm", which finally culminated to "I've got all over body pain" which persisted long after the interview!

Even though he had awful interview technique (literally looked like he was petrified every time he was asked  a question and the answer was always I don't know or no I can't do that) he must have impressed them enough because they kept calling him back and even though he didn't get the job that they advertised for they gave him a casual job!  Now I don't know how much work that is but at least it was a job!

So he came back this week after going home to help his parents and rang them to see when he could go in and get some "work experience" type stuff, and they told him that they were going to pay him $35/hr + super and start work on Thursday!  So today he's at work, and I'm hoping it all goes well.

I'm a bit sad because it means I can't apply for anymore jobs.  It was fun applying for jobs.

In the meantime I wanted to give him a hand doing a set up your own business thing for helping friends with computer problems/networking.  So far only 2 people interested but it would be a work at home type thing for which he needs a car I reckon if he's going to do call out stuff.

MORE car drama!

Today I was driving to work and while I was on the freeway there was a funny noise - like a flapping noise (like you hear if you have a flag on your car flapping in the wind).  Then it stopped and I was like phew!  Then the battery light came on... then the oil light came on.  Mum and the kids were in the car with me and I was freaking out (it was on the freeway bit where it's 80km/hr) and I was ringing hubby and HK and then the temperature gauge stopped working and then the ABS light came on.... and when I turned onto Narellan road I realised the power steering wasn't working!!!  I managed to get mum to the train station and then drove to hospital and parked the car (by that time the lights on the radio had gone as well, and the airbag lights had come on) and called NRMA.  Michelle came to pick up the kids and then NRMA got there looked at my car a fan belt and a ?pulley had broken which is attached to the alternater and battery and that's why the battery wasn't getting charged when the car was running which made all the electrics die.

So my car got towed away eventually and hopefully it will be fixed today.  If not I'll have to go get the car seats out so I can put them in some other car!!!

1800: OMG more drama.  At about 11am I got a call from the mechanic who had fixed my car and was coming over to the hospital to come pick me up.  So I started looking for my wallet.. couldn't find it.  So I was super stressed and my nice colleague RR lent me his keycard and some cash and told me his PIN so I could pay for my car!!!  So lovely of him.  Anyway the cash was enough to cover and I came back and I still couldn't find my wallet.  STRESS!  So then I suddenly got a call from Admissions downstairs - they had found my wallet!  So I was running down and they said I'd left it lying on the chair downstairs - where I had been sitting waiting for the tow truck.  AND all the money was still in it!

Could it be lactose intolerance?

Mum was up here while hubby went to visit relatives in Taiwan, and she suggested that Julian might be lactose intolerant.  So we decided to do a little experiment and we put him on Soy formula for 2 days.  At first he drank 100mL and then cried so I had to put a little bit of sugar in it and then he polished it off quick smart.  And we found that his poos decreased!  The next day he woke up at 530 and only did a little firm poo in the morning and then didn't poo all day.  And today he woke up at 5 and had a tiny poo on his bottom (very solid) and so I gave him his normal milk and about 30 minutes later he did a nice big poo with some solid and soft bits in it (whoever is reading this blog will think GOD all she does is talk about poo!).  So today we'll see how he goes with being back on normal milk after having 2 days of soy and see if he's better.  But I really do think that he's been better and happier after having the soy for 2 days, he seems cheerful and happy and he's sleeping well!  I was a bit worried about his poos but I guess we'll worry about that later... see how these two days go.  He'll be at Michelle's for 2 days on normal formula so we'll see how his poos are - maybe his bout of diarrhoea ages ago threw his bowel flora out of whack and he just needed a rest.  Wonder if his bowel flora came back though....

I think I might do another experiment and start giving alternating lactose free milk and lactose milk during the day.  All I want to do is have him sleep well overnight!  And not have poo in his nappy waking him up.

A blue moon! This has never happened before!

Yesterday Julian woke up at 530am and he had NO POO in his nappy!  And he didn't poo until after he had some breakfast!  I have no idea what made that happen but I wish it would happen again!  The only thing I can think of is that the night before that I gave him only bread to eat (but it was only a small amount).  Maybe bread doesn't make so much poo...

... because last night I gave him rice and bread and we're back to 445am poos again.

Mum also thinks that Julian may be have an intolerance to the milk.  I changed to Nurture to see if it made any difference but really I should change to a lactose free formula.  And see if that makes a difference.  Geez, lactose free formulas are expensive!  I'll have to go get some today.