Oreo Discovery

As Tahnee is our second child we have learnt from a few mistakes with made with our first child. Until last week Tahnee had not been exposed to cordial because Lucas refused to drink water after tasting cordial and we are still having issues getting him to drink less cordial and more water. However, Tahnee has now worked out how to drink from Lucas's cup so she has had her first tastes and loves it!

Tahnee has also never been exposed to special biscuits such as Oreo's. Lucas was exposed at an early age, fully due to his milk allergy. Normal sized Oreo's contain no milk products and thus he was able to enjoy a special biscuit which turned into an "everyday" biscuit.

This afternoon I gave the kids a biscuit. Lucas an Oreo and Tahnee a hundreds&thousands. I went to do something when I heard Lucas whinge and cry. After investigating I realised Tahnee had somehow grabbed hold of Lucas's Oreo and was now eating it and refusing to give it back to him!! Still not sure how a 14month old out-muscled a 2.75year old :)

"I dont know how I got the Oreo Mum, honestly"

TT - Day 2

The day began with much trepidation on my part. Yesterday left me exhausted and I was worried today would be a repeat of much flooring cleaning and washing. After getting Lucas out of bed, I informed him he would be doing his wees and poos on the toilet again today. His response: to cry and say "I want to wear my nappy, I don’t wan to wear big boy jocks". He was pretty upset about the whole thing, but I knew I had to be firm, so gave him the choice of bare bottom or jocks. He chose jocks.

Overall the morning was a success. Lucas had 2 accidents at the start, one with a little wee in his jocks, but it triggered something and he remembered to run to the toilet. From then on he refused to wear jocks, so he spent the morning with a bare bottom. The other accident was a small poo on the carpet (ew!), but again he managed to stop the process and make it to the toilet in time. 

"No photos Mum!"

After those accidents Lucas was fantastic at running to the toilet when he felt a wee coming. I don’t know if the bare bottom had an influence or not, but he never wee'd on the floor :)

He was quite proud of himself and his efforts gained him two more presents. A truck and a puzzle. Each time he had to ring Dad and tell him. 

His expression when asked to smile

At lunch time, Lucas asked to wear big boy jocks again as he didn't want to sit on the chair in a bare bottom. After lunch the kids were playing, so I took the chance to begin this blog post. I was interrupted by Lucas's urgent cries for help and I ran to him in the toilet. He had needed to wee but couldn’t get his jocks off, so alas, he had another accident! Needless to say he is back to a bare bottom :)

I'm so happy that this morning has been much easier than yesterday. This time yesterday I was ready to concede defeat and stop toilet training, but a few facebook comments and a discussion with Chris convinced me to try for one more day. And I'm glad I did. Hopefully the afternoon is just as successful. 

Have you noticed that your child toilet trained better in a bare bottom than they did in jocks/knickers or pull ups?

TT update

After enduring Lucas pulling his nappy off quite often because it was wet or dirty, I decided to see how he would go with toilet training. Since the month of October has been c.r.a.z.y! I had to make a conscious effort to block a whole week off the calendar, so we could train with no distractions. As it was, Tahnee had an appointment on the Monday of the week so we didn't end up starting toilet training until the Tuesday.

Before the day I prepared by buying a few presents - small cars, a small truck, some small emergency vehicles and a puzzle - along with 14 pairs of big boy jocks and making a sticker reward chart outlining when Lucas would get one of the aforementioned presents. 

The morning started off on a bad note. Lucas refused to wear big boy jocks, insisting on wearing nappies. So I showed him the sticker chart and we went through it together and hung it on the toilet door. 

I then let him watch a little TV before telling him it was time to change out of his pajamas and into jocks and clothes. Again he started to cry, so I searched for a sample pull up that I had in the cupboard. I managed to convince him to wear that instead of a nappy and told him if he wet through the pull up then he was to wear jocks. 

Lucas didn't too badly for the first hour, and had 2 successful wees on the toilet and only 1 accident, which he managed to stop mid wee and run to the toilet to finish. He also wee'd through the pull up with that accident, so it was into big boy jocks after that. The next hour wasn't so successful. He had 3 accidents and only 1 success. The only good thing in that hour was that he got to receive the first present, a dinky car, and was allowed to call Dad and let him know. I had decided that each time he had a success on the toilet he got to put a sticker on the chart, and that he would not be penalised in any way for having an accident. After all he is learning a huge life skill, and as adults we often make mistakes when learning something new, plus I wanted to praise him alot and thus encourage the desired behaviour. 

The third hour had 2 more accidents, with one being a small poo in his jocks. Thankfully he tells me straightaway whenever he had done a wee/poo, and I got him to the toilet in time to finish what he was doing! At this stage I think he was a little sick of the toilet and was sitting down, bending over to look in the toilet bowl and saying "hurry up" :)

By lunch time we were down to 3 pairs of dry jocks and had had numerous accidents. I was exhausted and decided to stop toilet training for the day. Hope to try again tomorrow morning and see if anything from today has "clicked".

All prepared ...

All Mostly prepared ...

... Starting tomorrow!

Tahnee: PMH Surgical Appt

Last year November we saw the surgeons for an out-patient appointment. As I blogged after the appointment, we were sent for an ultrasound and X-ray. From there our next contact with the surgeon was at our developmental appointment in December where our neonatal paediatrician rang the surgeon to discuss the results of the tests.

After that, we did not receive another follow up appointment. We thought all was good until we spoke with another CDH mum whose child was repaired without a patch (Tahnee has a patch) and she mentioned they had been seeing the surgeons a lot. This sent red flags up and at our 12month developmental appointment the specialist noticed that we hadnt see the surgeons for a while and re-referred us back to them just in case.

We got a new appointment very quickly and went to see the surgical team this afternoon. A dear friend agreed to look after Lucas for me. I had to wake both kids up from their sleep as our appoitnment was mid afternoon. As a result, Lucas was quite grumpy. Although I had told him already that mummy was taking Tahnee to her hospital to see a doctor and that he was going to Mrs. B's house, I dont think he realised that mum wouldnt be staying with him. He got very upset in the car and said "mummy you cant leave me!". Talk about a guilt trip!! He was so grumpy with me that he refused to say good-bye or wave. But from all reports he had a great time. When asked what he did he said "had special chippies and played tea pots" :)

On the way to PMH I received a phone call from Chris saying he had finished work on time and could I pick him up from the workshop along the way. I agreed, naturally. Our appointment was scheduled for 310 and we were a little worried about not being on time as we were running late. However, we should not have worried! We didn't get called in until 430!!

In the surgical follow up appointments you are shown into a large room with 4 or 5 curtained off beds. One of the nurses then has a quick glance through your file and a quick chat with you as the parents, checks the patient and then we all wait until the surgeon comes to see us. For this appointment though, the nurse bumped us up the queue as she thought it was a little strange that we were back again (she had done a lot of "hmm-ing" while reading the notes). The surgeon came straight over and informed us that we needed to take Tahnee for an X-ray. So it was straight up there! Thankfully there was no line and we were seen immediately. We were back down to the surgeons within 10 minutes.

Once again we were seen immediately and we were able to have a quick check of the X-ray images. The surgeon declared it was all good and told us to see her again in 6 months time ... this comment reassured us that we should have been seeing the surgeons for a review and that it was right to be referred back to them.

And for comparisons sake, I took a photo of Tahnee laying on her back on the bed, with no shirt on. We took a similar photo at the appointment last year and you can very clearly see her protruding abdominal hernia (which the surgeon now thinks was just weak muscle and not actually another hernia).

CDH Australia Membership

At our annual CDH Australia weekend, the president of the Board of Directors spoke about the need for memberships. CDH Australia provides support and assistance to families affected by CDH as well as supporting and conducting research into CDH. CDH Australia is a not for profit organisation that relies on memberships and donations, with the membership fees being used for simple things such as mailing out a booklet to expectant families, or sending out items for fundraising (like we had for the markets last year).

We heard from the president that the insurance alone is more than the current membership income, and CDH Australia would gladly welcome new memberships. Memberships are open to families with a CDH survivor or Angel, those expecting a CDH baby, CDH survivors, extended family and friends and healthcare professionals.

So, if you have a spare $20 and would like to support a great organisation, please consider applying for membership to CDH Australia. More information can be found at: http://cdh.org.au/become-a-member/

If you prefer to not have the commitment to membership, why not consider making a donation through the website? Donations over $2 are tax deductible, and I believe you get around 30% back through tax (check with your accountant on the exact amount).

CDH Australia Weekend

Last weekend was the annual CDH Australia weekend, here in Perth. I do have plans to post about the weekend, probably in multiple posts. However, I am waiting on a few things. One is the photo release forms to be signed so I can pop the photos up, and also I am hoping to include photos that one of the mums took, but these are about to board a plane back to QLD, then need to edited, burnt to a disc and sent back, so it could be a while before I get to publish the posts.