Babies Don't Come With Hands-Free Kits

So I mentioned last week that I was headed for the doctor's office to check out the root of my aching finger joints, and we have an answer to the million dollar question. I'm pleased to report that it is not arthritis. Nor is is repetitive strain injury. I was quite surprised to discover what was (and still is) causing me excruciating pain - something called Raynaud's phenomenon. If I cast my mind back to high school, I do recall hearing the term in biology class, back when schools still taught actual subjects instead of pretending to. I will, however, not pretend to know everything there is to know about it, and so I did a little extra reading.

There are several contributing factors but, in my case, this is how my doctor explained it to me. When one's blood pressure is low, the body responds by constricting the peripheral blood vessels (in the fingers and toes) to keep blood circulating closer to the heart. This causes cramping and joint pain in the digits due to the lack of blood circulation. On Friday my blood pressure was 85 over 50. To put this into perspective, average blood pressure is about 120 over 80. Throw into the mix the fact that I am anaemic - largely due to a history of anaemia and partially due to the fact that I am still breastfeeding - and the situation is exacerbated.

The Most Boring Post Ever

Here's a photo that has absolutely nothing to do with this post at all.

Oh, it has really just been one of those weeks. Last week I found I just had nothing to share and so, instead of forcing the issue for the sake of posting, I chose rather to take the week off. Go me! But, despite the fact that I have as little to say this week as I did last, I felt I could not neglect my little blog yet again! And so here I am! Prepare to be dazzled by the most tedious of news items!

A few weeks back I broke my little toe on Ricky's pram. I don't think I've mentioned it, mostly because it's such a lame thing to break. My hardcore reputation would have been better upheld if I'd perhaps been driven through with a lance while fighting dragons but, alas, a broken digit is all I was afforded. After a few days of limping around and a further few of tentative walking, it was sufficiently healed for a more normal mode of locomotion and slightly sexier shoes. And the heavens rejoiced. Something as small and insignificant as a broken toe is somewhat amplified when one's day consists of carting a 9kg baby up and down stairs, I was surprised to discover. I've had more fun.

The Importance of Getting Dirty

A healthy diet of leaves and dirt

For those of you who haven't been paying close attention, let me state for the record that I am a decidedly old-fashioned kind of mom. I believe in the old style of parenting. No prenatal classes or any of that jazzy crap for us. No Baby Gym to help us celebrate our child's mediocre (and inevitable) achievements as though they've just won the Nobel Prize in Physics. No hand sanitiser in the nursery, no wildly expensive organic baby food for our little man, no sterilising every little thing he may happen to lay his hands on. I am often agitated when visitors keep telling me what Ricky is doing or where he is going, as though I am not watching. "He's going toward the coffee table!" Yeah, and? "What if he bumps his head?" Then he bumps his head and he feels a little pain, or not, and learns to be more careful. Life happens. Sure, I don't intend leaving power tools or a barrel of scorpions or a set of newly sharpened Shogun knives lying around where Ricky can get to them, but I refuse to envelop my home in bubble wrap for fear that my child may actually experience a little of what we call living. If a parent chooses to wrap their own child in cotton wool and hide them away from the world for fear it may actually impact them in some way, that is their prerogative; but I am the parent who can't remember the last time I sterilised a bottle or sippy cup, and I let my son roll around on the floor with the cat. He enjoys the freedom, and that makes me happy. Don't mistake my relaxed attitude for neglect, though. I have taken every precaution to latch cupboards that may house anything detrimental to the well-being of my little explorer, and I keep an ever-watchful eye on the goings-on in my home. I just believe in getting dirty.