Hay While the Sun Shines

I've worked out what seems to be wrong with Monkey ... he's scared!!

The poor little sweetheart. If he sleeps through, til about 4am, he's fine. If not, and he wakes up any time before then, it's a screaming frenzy. It happened just then ... I went in, and he grabbed my hand in a panic and drew it close. He's so scared, and wants me near. I stay near.

We'll just fumble our way through, as usual.

In other, even more fearful news ... Mr TC is worried. He doesn't look good, has a big lump on his face, and today he asked me to feel his tummy for any tumours. His scan is in a few days, so I guess it's just on his mind. It must feel very strange, after chemo, waiting on scan results. Is that a lump? Am I sick again? Why do I feel so crap? Who was the second gunman on the grassy knoll?

Mr TC wins the husband of the year award this weekend! Both mornings he has got up to Monkey, took him and Tiger out for a walk, and at 9am, arrived back home to wake me up .. with a soy latte AND the paper for me. Motherfucking hero! Then, we just had family time all weekend! And, he was interested and thoughtful, bought me a bunch of flowers, and told me how sexy I look lately!!! WTF!

Last week, Tiger said "Mum, I really want to see the movie Australia." So last night I took him. Just me and Tiger, on a date. I vowed to spend more one-on-one time with him. Time is hard, these days. Parenting a baby, small child, stepson, wife of a sick guy, trying to work from home ... no wonder I kept blowing fuses. I had to pray and be gentle with myself, all weekend. Feeling SO much better.

Now, as for watching the film "Australia" last night ... let's put it out there, I do not think Nicole Kidman can act for shit. I see her on the screen, and think, oh look ... a wooden, stilted person who is trying to act. HOWEVER ... Australia was fucking wonderful, and she was really good in it! I was so, so proud to see the film focus on the whites' treatment of Aboriginal Australians.

It's the most expensive movie ever made down here .... us Aussies have a nasty habit of cutting down all our tall poppies, all the people who make it "big" and daring to give things a go. Baz Luhrmann has been castigated for audaciously naming his film, and the press are itching to call it a flop. But it won't flop. I loved it. Tiger loved it ... I was so proud of him, sitting there next to me. He was enthralled, and didn't get bored once. I kept kissing him and stroking his arm. Fuck I adore that boy ADORE.

Afterwards, we played air hockey, pinball, and a shooting game with rifles we re-loaded and hunted grizzly bears in the forest. PISSING ourselves laughing.

I had the best weekend. We are so fortunate. Yes I have felt the Big Fear around Mr TC again, thoughts flying around our heads. Yes the news of Patrick Swayze jolted us both, sitting at the park today, reading the newspaper together.

There has been so much sad news, lately.

I had the strange, unsettled feeling that I had travelled back in time from the future to today, so I soaked and drank and inhaled it in ... I kissed and kissed and kissed my boys, all weekend.

Whatever happens, I am one blessed motherfucker. I don't want to forget that.

The Terrorist

Every single night for the past seven nights, Monkey has awoken and screamed, screamed and screamed. Fed, changed, patted .... finally, if I walk around and stroke and whisper to him, he has drifted back to sleep. Until he screams again.

Poor old Michael Finnegan Begin-again. That was my brothers favourite song when he was little.

Ummmm - I'm tired? I have ended up giving up and hopping into the single bed with him in his room, holding him close. His piece de resistance was last night, screaming blue, bloody murder for three motherfucking hours straight. Nothing would help. Nothing seemed wrong. His crying was trying. I ended up shooting myself in the head, and am typing this from hell. (Tee and Rex ... Dad says hi!)

Not really .... but close.

He cried every time I tried to make him have a nap today, and putting him to bed tonight was a freaking nightmare. I was trying to get writing work done for my new job, had a deadline ... and just fucked it up. She sent it back to me three times to be re-written. She wasn't happy. "I'm usually really good!" I wanted to say. "I promise!"

I wailed to Mr TC, gnashing my teeth. Cried to stepson. Sniffled with Tiger.

Hello controlled crying ... how YOU doin'?

I've always thought that I could never, ever do controlled crying. With Tiger, a mere whisper of a murmer and I would run in to his room. Monkey? Poor sweetie has had crying issues since day one. Obviously my head is trying to make it somehow my fault, but I am beginning to see that sometimes babies just CRY. It is what they DO. And, I get the feeling if I do not nip this in the bud now I am sharpening a MASSIVE rod for my back. My back is stooped enough as it is.

So fucked. I need to work on myself more ... lately I have grown more angry, bitter and venomous than I have ever been in my whole life. It doesn't feel very nice, my dreams are getting dark, and my Higher Self is sitting out on a rock ledge somewhere, twiddling her thumbs, bored as all fuck.

I guess I'll read some baby books tomorrow, because I have utterly no idea what the fuck I'm doing. Seriously.

GOOD NIGHT

And the Nominees Are ....

About two millennia ago, the kind Rachel Inbar nominated me for a Kick-Arse Blog Award. Actually, it's Kick ASS Blog Award, but we all know arse has an R in it. Rachel sometimes leaves a comment here, which I do appreciate. Once she left one on a particularly disturbing post - probably about heroin use (mmmmm, heroin) ... she said how "boring" she was. Rachel you are not boring ... I wish I was more sedate, more even-keeled. Like you!

So, I'm passing the award on to a few bloggers. Now, I don't really like doing this, because I don't like to be exclusive. I'm sorry if I hurt anyones feelings - if I could nominate 57 people then we'd be sweet. So, I've decided to give a shout-out to those people who I have only started to read recently. Say, when my life got all fucked up back in May. A lot of people have come here and given their support ... I am eternally grateful. I'm so sorry I've not reciprocated much lately. My motherfucking useless modem hasn't helped. The very raw truth is ... lately I have wondered if I am:

a) Having a breakdown
b) Am depressed
c) Have post-natal depression
d) Want a divorce
e) All of the above

So that's my excuse. I could sit here and write a post on all my angst and demons, or I can take the motherfucking focus off myself and direct it to some others.

AHEM.

Palemother. Oh my God she is so wise and mysterious and cool. She has fish on her blog that you can feed. She knows stuff. She "gets" people. She has beautiful children. She can spot dysfunctional family habits at 10 paces. She. Rocks.


Flicka at Vacant Uterus. I thought she really did live in Greenland! I am an idiot! Flicka is real and raw and post pics of sparkly hair clips she has put in to cheer herself up on a fucked day. Her hubby Sarge and her have been through the wringer, back out, then around again. They adopted Sam, who is Monkeys peep. Flicka, never stop blogging. Please!


Annacyclopedia. She makes BORSCHT, AND she is cool. Hot hair. She looked around for a Womans Circle, couldn't find one .... so started one up. A person who IS the change they want to see in the world. Anna has taken a few beatings, lately. (From life ... not her hubby.) I told her recently that she is going to be an AWESOME mother someday. And she is. And I will be here, willing and cheering her on. I heart her.


G at Makes You Stronger. Hands down, has the best IRL name EVER. The fires of hell have burnt her. And yes it's making her stronger but I wish it didn't have to happen. She deserves EVERYTHING GOOD to now start happening. Truly a Kick-ARSE blogger.


R.A.W. (PWP) I think about RAW all the time. She is taking a break from blogging .... but her generosity and warmth meant so much to me at a really hard time.


Mrs Spock A wonderful and wise peep, who genuinely gives a shit. She totally must have known I was doing a thousand cries today ... for she emailed me THIS. Can't believe she took time out to edit pics of me and Monkey. Made me laugh and laugh, freakin' hilarious. She is wise, kind, and thoughtful.


A special mention to Nancy ... although I connected with her last year, I cannot NOT give this award to her, for her blog truly does Kick some Serious Arse. Nancy is unshockable. She stirs the pot ... went to a scrapbooking convention and women grabbed their children tighter, probably due to her cool tattoos. She's opinionated, strong, and very fucking pregnant.


I've already gone over quota - I wish I could choose more. Thank you for your support, all the peeps above and beyond, out here in Blogland. Your positive thoughts have helped me through the mire. XOX
__


I'm still mortified at the pic I posted yesterday. (Thanks for the lovely anti-uglynose comments AHEM)

Here is another, to prove that I actually am cool now. (Obviously Mr TCs tattoos help with my cool quotient).





At least my fucking nose looks semi-decent in this one. I smell coffee .. IN BRAZIL.

This morning, when I should have been working, I found the glasses I used to wear in high school, put them on, took a photo, and posted it on my blog.

Yes, yes I did.

No WONDER I never had a boyfriend in high school. I cannot BELIEVE my mother made me wear them. I am re-enacting photos taken of me as a teen .... the face is smiling but the eyes sure as hell aren't.

*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*

*** Admiring my own handiwork and congratulating myself on being SO hilarious, I was studying the picture for a while. For too long.
Ummm, MY NOSE LOOKS LIKE A CAULIFLOWER. How can I be 36 and never TRULY know how big and ugly my nose is???? 

The Big Reveal

"I got lizards and snakes
Runnin through my body.
Funny how they all
Have my face."

- Sweet Dreams, Tori Amos


The day before I turned seven, I slipped up some thin, rusted metal stairs outside our house and sliced my shin straight open. You could see the bone. Blood curdling screams …. I remember my mother running outside with lots of teatowels. She said later that she knew she needed them because of the awful sound I was making. Sitting in the doctors surgery, I got my leg sewn up with no painkillers. It was horrific … I ended up with seven stitches, one for each year I had lived. I still have the scar, I can’t stand to touch it. Every time I look down it’s there, smiling creepily at me.

One day next week, Tiger will wake up and be seven. He will open all of his birthday presents. Then, his dad will hop in his ute and drive down to the BIGGEST hospital, and get a PET scan to finally see, if all the tumours have gone. Like on a home renovating show, being blindfolded and waiting for “The Big Reveal.” We have to wait until around the 16th of December for the scan to be read.

I can’t believe that Universe would give Tiger bad news for his dad on his birthday.

Obviously, I have feelings around it. Everyone asks me when the scan is, and can’t believe we have to wait so long. I’m actually fine with the waiting. For here, in Waiting Land, lies the possibility that his scan will clear .. like a two week wait holds the possibility of being pregnant.

It feels like the worst is already over – we are now just mopping up the aftermath. My marriage has taken a huge beating, and I know we need to re-connect somehow. Can we? We drifted so far apart.

But, whatever happens … the shock and trauma of it all has worn off. We got used to chemo. Monkey is bigger now. Life marched on, like it always does.

I’m having huge dreams. Huge. I do a lot of spiritual work and healing in my dreams, I always have.

____

Last week I was with Tee, and we had parked in a big carpark where everyone fights for a space. Walking back to the car, we noticed that a car had parked illegally behind me. So we were stuck. It took me SO MANY FUCKING tries to get my car out. I told Tee I wanted to smash the fuck out of this idiots car, slam into it like a monster truck rally. She goes ... "Do you want to leave a note?"

YES.

We dealt with our anger appropriately, and left the note. Laughing so hard so I could a photo of it, to post here and show the internet.

We felt SO much better.

Lately I have felt my skin crawling, like I can’t stand living in it. I went to a meeting in Sydney last week … fucking awesome. One guy shared before me – about how he can’t stand himself lately. I SO understood. He was talking … “I mean, I’m just so sick of my own bullshit. My defects, my fucked-upness … I can’t stand myself. I really can’t. I hate myself. I just want to vomit all over myself.”

Everyone PISSED themselves laughing.

Yesterday, I looked at Mr TC and he looked sick again. Yellow, like how he looked before we found out he was sick. It rocked me to the core, the possibility that … well, you know.

Soon we shall all know.

Happy Half Birthday

I got to Sydney and promptly fell apart.

But I don't want to blog about that, about how I feel a huge ball in my chest, and I, the recovering, in-tune person that I am ... cannot for the life of me work out what is wrong. But I am not ok. And in that ... the admitting that I'm not ok, makes me feel so relieved and better. I am NOT OK! I feel SHIT! Post-traumatic stress? Depression? Anxiety? All of the above? Who the fuck knows .... I just know that I am not ok. Paradoxically, that makes me ok.

I don't want to go home tomorrow, but I have to. Then again, I don't want to stay here, either. You know that feeling where you don't want to be anywhere?

Yesterday I walked down to glorious Bondi Beach, Monkey in his pram, soy latte at hand. I felt emotional. So much has happened. What a most intense year it has been. But, I am SO SICK of myself. Just get the fuck over it already. 

My baby turns six moths old today!

I told his naughty, wonderful cousins that we are to have a Half Birthday Party for him tonight, after dinner. We shall sing "Happy Half Birthday, to you ....". I bought cupcakes. (He won't have one, we shall eat them in his honour.)

I feel like somebody has pushed their hands through the clouds and handed me a six month old baby. I have a baby. He has not been my priority. I solemnly swear, from now on, that he will be my priority. I whispered in to his ear, today .... "Mummy is going to watch you and listen to you and love you so, so much!!"

Cancer is a thief.

I give him three thousand kisses when I put him in the car, and seventeen thousand when I get him out again. I marvel at his big little feet (like blocks of cement, he has feet like his mama). People stop me in the street, to comment on what a beautiful looking little guy he is. His hair has gone from red to golden ... my Golden Boy. He rolls over, but is not interested in crawling yet. My Laz-e-Boy. Just like his mama! He can cry real tears, kicks like Ian Thorpe in the water, has been known to eat and crap at the same time. His personality is starting to come out ... he is really "here".

At mums most favourite cafe in the whole world ...

I love him.

I am so relieved, to love him so.

He looks at me adoringly, and breaks my heart. Tori Amos once sang that she has enough guilt to start her own religion. Hello.

The next six months will fly, so quickly. If I am thirsty .... then I shall drink him in, this most spectacular, amazing little human. I am blessed to have him. I feel blessed to love him, and not ever want to let him go.

Happy Half Birthday, my Wonderful Monkey Star. Thank you for teaching me The Way. You are heavenly, and magical, and sacred. I promise to celebrate that, my sweetheart guy. I am so sorry, about everything. I am flawed ... we all are. But I love you deeply. And that really is all that matters.

forever,

Mum
XOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

The Feet on the Fairy

Tomorrow I shall make my escape.

I am going to my sister Tees house, down in Sydney .... I haven't been to her house since April, since I was very pregnant. Since the pre-cancer days. (Pre-cancer days! How I miss you!)

I. Can't. Wait. I need to sloth and not cook and read BLOGS and get my google reader sorted once and for all. I need to watch Tees cable and fart freely* and ponce around the Eastern suburbs in my gold sandals, pretending I am someone.

Now I just need to wrap up all the little pressies I bought for Tiger .... with little notes from me. He can open one a day, just so he knows I am thinking of him. He has found the transition of his big brother living here again a bit hard, lately. They have been clashing, and I see Tiger get upset because he just hates how much power the older sibling has. I get triggered badly, because of my own childhood issues .... sometimes, something innocent or even just "kid-like" can alert my bullying radar. I hate bullying, hate things not being fair. I've had to rope stepson in a few times, nicely, but just let him know I am on to him.

I was worried, about leaving Tiger here with stepson and Mr TC .... so I have done what every good parenting book would say ... and resorted to bribery. I told stepson that if he takes good, proper care of his little bro ... ".. and I mean proper! Because I will KNOW if you don't." - Then I will bring him home a set of earphones he wants for his iPod. (For, he always wants SOMETHING. But, don't we all!?)

Here is Tiger and stepson, mucking around directly under the Harbour Bridge:

I am an arsehole mother lately. It's true - I am. To both Tiger and Monkey. I am short on patience, frustrated, a little bit yelling. I really need some more Mo in my Jo. I need to love them and be nice and know how lucky I am.

I have had a post brewing about my feelings for Monkey, for months now. But I have been too gutless to write it yet. I will, because it keeps tapping me on the shoulder, demanding to be written. It's muck, that I need to shine a big fuckoff light on. It's hard and it's sad, that he got so tangled in the cancer web when he was born. But it was the truth then ... not now. Things are different now.

___

Last weekend, I made us all drive down to Sydney. To park at Manly Beach, and catch a ferry over to Circular Quay. (Circular Quay is where the Harbour Bridge and Opera House are.) Tiger called it a "Fairy" (as I did, when I was a kid). He kept asking if we could buy fairy floss to eat on it.

We had a pretty cool day. Meaning - we were all getting along well. It is so dysfunctional, my family. Usually, one of us has the shits. The others rally around and try to pull the shitty person out of the slump. We take it in turns to be the shitty one. 

So this day, no-one was particularly shitty. We were all happy that Mr TC was feeling so good - if he feels good, we all feel good. A few more weeks, and it wil be the longest amount of time with no chemo in him. YAY.

Look - the Sydney Opera House is growing out of Monkeys left ear! Clever boy!

I LOVE this photo ... however, I don't love the gut overhang flapping over my jeans:

For more Show and Tells, check out Mel at Stirrup Queens HERE.

*Ummm, I fart freely anyway. I have to - if I didn't I would blow up like a blimp and float over the Southern Hemisphere forever. Mr TC is disgusted, because, obviously I fart louder and stronger than him. He thinks women shouldn't fart. Obviously, he married the wrong woman.