Italy go home!

Italy are out of the World Cup in the first round! All the cheating and diving antics those dodgy bastards could muster simply wasn't enough this year. I'm just sorry I didn't watch live the match where Slovakia put the final nail in their coffin. Hooray!

Julia! Julia! Julia!

Australia today has its first female Prime Minister in Julia Gillard. Good.

There's a lot of things I've been meaning to say about the Rudd government over the past few months, but I've been otherwise occupied. Suffice it to say I wasn't very happy at all with Kevin Rudd's leadership, his treatment of the ETS and asylum seeker issues- particularly the latter. Gam takes a slightly different position on the abandoning of the ETS, but I suppose it's a moot point now.


It's not a bad thing that we're seeing the back of Kevin Rudd as PM, but Julia Gillard is in a difficult position, with less than a year until an election has to be called. Given that the alternative Prime Minister is Tony Abbott, I sincerely hope the Labor Party's fight to retain power has not been compromised by Rudd's spectacular implosion. I also can't help wondering how much of a part big mining interests had to play in taking down a democratically elected leader in Rudd. On that issue, however, Rudd had painted himself into a corner, however sound a policy idea the resources super-profits tax was.

When talk first started of a Gillard leadership takeover a few weeks, perhaps months, ago, I dismissed it as far-fetched. But one of my clearest and most positive memories of election night in the live feed from the tally room in November 2007, the night the Australian public booted John Howard from office in a most emphatic fashion, is of crowds of happy people shouting "Juli-a! Juli-a! Juli-a!". Not "Kevin!". Let's hope the scene repeats itself at the upcoming election.

I'll still be voting 1 for the Greens, however.

Setri goes to the Ron Mueck exhibition

I only knew about the Ron Mueck exhibition coming to Brisbane when I saw Bec's (earthkissed) blog about her visit. I've long thought Mueck a really talented artist and thought it would be great to see his sculptures in real life, so when my brother and sister-in-law came to visit us a couple of weeks ago it was on our list of activities to do. Neither Richard nor Cil knew who Ron Mueck was, but they had probably seen pictures of his work in the media, I'm not sure. Art gallery visits aren't something they'd normally do, nor I (mainly because of the pretentious wankers that run the places and make them generally unpleasant to visit). However, we all had a great time at the exhibit currently being held at the Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA).

We took a lot of photos with the giant head, but I have a hard time picking a favourite.

Gam's entry in the 'father of the year' awards was rejected, for some unfathomable reason!

The little old ladies were tiny- at most about 30cm tall!

Setri yelled in the car for almost the entire journey- frustrating when stuck in sluggish South Bank traffic! He quieted down immediately upon being taken out of the car for a cuddle once we had found a park, and was perfectly behaved from then on.

There was a $12 per person fee to get in, however the exhibition was obviously ridiculously popular in spite of this, and for good reason. The sculptures are spectacularly life-like, but are created in varying un-life-like sizes that draw the eye in the same way a circus freak-show would. I only wish they'd had more of them- it wasn't Mueck's complete works.

There were signs encouraging people to take pictures of themselves with the Mueck sculptures and put them on a flickr gallery (we didn't bother with this) or email them to the GoMA (we didn't bother with that either). Lots of people were photographing the works but as far as we could see we were the only ones photographing a person next to them. It was great fun- a couple of teenagers asked to see some of the photos on my brother's camera (the batteries in ours had carked it the day before- great timing). Cil and I and Richard directed Gam on where and how to position Setri with the sculptures while Richard snapped pictures. Some of them came out really well; even the ones that didn't work so well (such as the chicken- because Setri decided he didn't want to sit up by himself) still looked pretty darn cool.

There were a few sculptures we didn't photograph Setri with- the little naked man at the entrance to the exhibition, the giant naked man sitting on a chair and a sunglasses-wearing dude on a pool lounge mounted on the wall. We probably should have done the naked men but didn't think of it (I'm sure we could have done it in a relatively non-creepy way- we managed the naked dude in a boat ok, I think). 

 Setri looking like a bona fide little adventurer in his rumpled suit and hat :)

It's amazing how the apparent size of the sculptures can be manipulated by perspective and how the photograph is taken. I love the photos we got of Setri from our visit, it's going to be a great set of memories.

Setri at 9 weeks

9 weeks :)

Setri turns '9' tonight. 9 weeks of age, that is. It's kind of freaky, he pretty much literally grows before our eyes. He was 7kg at 7 weeks and is a really *solid* baby. A great one for beginner parents! What I'm enjoying the most about him getting older is his increasing inclination to 'talk' to us. Setri's a chatty little guy- every morning he's full of smiles and conversation. Unfortunately he still cannot consistently poo or fart without some drama, but the situation has definitely improved. I just love how the first thing he does when he opens his eyes in the morning and looks at my face is smile. I suppose that's something the likes of which I would never have got to experience without being a parent. It's pretty special.

7 weeks- been smiling for a couple of weeks at that point, but I never seemed to have a camera handy!

 6 weeks old, getting ready to have a bath.

If possible, he gets cuter by the day. He didn't wind up going bald- his hair grew back almost as quickly as it fell out. Still straight though. I love his spunky little cowlick/swirl at the front of his head- that's still there. He definitely got his great hairline from Gam's side of the family, as mine all have fairly unattractive high foreheads (to hold our big brains, my grandfather used to say!). Unfortunately it looks like he's got my eyebrows, which means, if my dad and brother are anything to go by, Setri will have some serious grooming to do once he hits puberty if he doesn't want to look like John Howard... Let's hope I'm wrong! I think his little arms and legs have straightened out noticeably since 5 weeks- I'm pretty sure one of the fat rolls in his arm has sort of 'unfolded' because the bone is now a bit straighter- there is a strip of skin that even looks a slightly lighter colour, with the fat-roll-crease still visible in the middle.



Communication:

Setri's 'vocabulary' has expanded from 'ack' and little coos at 5 weeks to distinct consonant and vowel sounds. He stunned us one evening last week by clearly replying 'hello' in response to my 'hello'. Total coincidence of babble, of course, but it made us jump out of our skins the same as if one of the cats had said it! We did try and get him to repeat it but he got the hiccups- something that seems to happen almost every time he attempts 'conversation' just lately! He also expounds on his misery when he has gas pains- rather than crying he puts on an anguished expression and 'tells' us his problems. Much, much nicer than crying! Sometimes his babble sounds so close to being real words that I feel like I'm dealing with one of those freaky possessed children so often featured in horror movies. I even got a little bit scared once... Sorry, Setri!

As much as I'd like to stalk Setri with the camera when he is smiley and conversational, I tend to forget about the camera and focus on chatting to him instead. I only vaguely mind that I'm not capturing every second of his existence for posterity.

Setri uses such a wide range of facial expressions nowadays, but the absolute funniest is his 'sad face'. God it's funny. It tends to appear when he's overtired and something happens that he doesn't like (whether we can figure out exactly what that 'something' might be is another matter...). For example, when Gam used a squirt of cold baby shampoo on Setri in the bath one evening. Presto: Sadface!

 7 weeks old, doing his 'sadface'. It breaks my heart and cracks me up at the same time :)

6 weeks old, falling asleep.

Sleep:

He's still pretty good at nights once he actually drops off to sleep. That's the key. Now he has different cries for pretty much everything we are easily able to differentiate between the times when he actually needs something or is having pains, and those times when he is just experiencing pre-sleep grumpiness. Sometimes that pre-sleep grumpiness can go for hours- the boy's got stamina! At those times it makes little difference whether I'm holding him or lying in bed next to him (we're still co-sleeping, much to Gam's chagrin after having paid $500 for an Arm's Reach co-sleeper cot. *cough*) so I feel able to leave him to cry for a while at those times. Once he's out cold he goes down for a solid 6 hours before needing a feed, after which he'll drop off for another 2-3 hours. I have had to do a couple of wee-hours (ho ho!) nappy changes, thankfully those are fairly rare. Setri doesn't cry at night when he is trying to poo or needs his nappy changed (he pretty much never cries at night), but he wriggles. I will try and ignore it, such is my longing for sleep in the early hours of the morning, but he wriggles so much I have to give in, and then we both happily go back to sleep.

6 weeks old

Physical:

Setri might not be particularly advanced mentally- none of that child prodigy stuff, fortunately or unfortunately, but he's still pretty advanced physically for his age. He hasn't yet mastered rolling over from back to front or vice-versa, which puzzles me (he can flip himself over, but that never seems deliberate), but he can stand for considerable periods using only his hands to hold onto ours to balance, and his trunk control is good enough to sit up straight when sitting or being carried. Except when he's asleep or very tired, in which case he turns into a cute, chubby ragdoll.

He can't yet haul himself up into a sitting position, but to be honest I have yet to see him try- I think he probably could if he did try. Just a day or so ago I started playing an age-appropriate 'game' suggested in some of the child development literature handed out to parents. Basically, the baby lies down, you grab their arms and gently pull them into a sitting position, then lower them again. Rinse and repeat until the baby gets sick of it, I presume.

The parent info literature seems to assume a much lesser degree of head control than Setri has, as it talks about 'letting their head follow' the rest of their body as their neck would tilt back if you pull them up by their arms. Not for Setri! He loved being pulled into a sitting position (neck staying level with the rest of his body every time)- he got a little smile on his face when he realised he could help himself go from a lying position to being that much closer to looking me in the eye. But as soon as he was in a sitting position he instantly began trying to pull himself up using his hands (holding my hands) and push himself up using his fat little thighs... into a standing position. I guess his chubby thighs aren't all fat, because on the second go he succeeded! Previously it was just us lifting him up into a standing position and letting him hold himself upright- turns out he is entirely capable of hauling himself once he is in a sitting position... so as soon as he figures out how to sit up, we're screwed, I reckon.

As for his crawling, he still does his 'army crawl', meaning we can't leave him on the couch unattended, but it hasn't really progressed in terms of technique, only efficiency. He is perfectly capable of doing a full push-up to extend his arms and lift his head right up, but he doesn't seem to have any instinct to bring his back legs up and crawl on his hands and knees. It wouldn't surprise me if he went straight to walking, as he really really seems to want to stand and walk. Sometimes when we're holding him on our laps and he gets bored he will stand up and start straining to head in the direction of something that interests him, like a dog on a leash- it's quite clear at times that he is frustrated by his limited physical abilities!

7 weeks.

Toys:

Setri really only started being at all interested in toys and things other than Gam and I at 6 weeks. Even now at 9 weeks I would say his interest is limited. He seems particularly interested in textures- different kinds of tree leaves, the bristles of a toothbrush, the softness of a cotton wool ball, the rubbery buttons on the remote control and the phone. Some friends, Nick and Liz, gave him a toy consisting of a super-soft stuffed pony's head (with a soft woollen mane) atop a cylindrical cotton-cloth handle encasing a deep-toned squeaker. Setri likes to touch the toy but doesn't appear to like the squeaker- although he hasn't figured out how to make the noise himself, so that will probably change.

Shannon and John, some other friends of ours, gave Setri a large, floppy white toy rabbit of cartoonish proportions, right on 6 weeks; that was the first toy he ever showed an interest in. Not in playing with it himself, but when I made the rabbit 'dance'. He loved it- the weighted limbs (due to miniscule plastic beads in the 4 paws) move in a comical fashion, as do the floppy ears. Once I even managed to get Setri to stop crying by making his rabbit dance... only to have him start crying again when I stopped (and stop crying again when dancing resumed).

Setri's Uncle Richard and Auntie Cil (Priscilla) flew up from Sydney to visit us for the Queen's Birthday long weekend and meet Setri for the first time. Cil brought Setri a rather garish but extremely interactive toy dragon- 'Sneezy the activity dragon'- that has all sorts of bells and whistles: a rattle in one paw, a squeaker in the other, and a bell in the tail; a mirror in one foot, a pull-out daisy hidden in a pocket in the other; 'crinkle fins' and 'crinkle ears' (encasing cellophane for that pleasing 'person sitting behind you in the cinema eating noisy snacks' sound). 'Sneezy' is coloured predominantly bright lime green, with some colourful polka dots on his back and red and yellow stripes on the tummy. Setri seems to enjoy patting and rumpling the 'crinkle ears', gazing at the mirror and batting at the tail to make the bell ring. He's not always particularly accurate with the batting, but he gets a look of real concentration on his face as he fixes to give it a whack... and when he misses he seems to either lose interest or get frustrated very quickly! Patience is definitely not Setri's strong suit.  

Unfortunately Setri is a big fan of the TV. I swear I once even caught him trying to look past me when the TV was off, as if to check if there was anything on! We don[t have a CD player, so I sometimes play CDs through the Xbox and put the colourful 'visualisations' on full screen for him, which he seems to like. He particularly enjoys Fats Waller music, but I would like to get him into some other classics and start broadening his taste. He has always reacted to the mood of the music we play for him, as well as that he hears incidentally. Spooky or dramatic music seems to scare him, while jaunty tunes make him happy. A few weeks ago we were watching an episode of Family Guy while Setri was whinging (probably gas pains, but potentially tiredness, or both), and at the end of the 'special episode' there were a bunch of tunes from other Family Guy episodes. Setri stopped crying and perked up for the duration of each song, before lapsing into whinging again once they finished. There was one exception- a song featuring the old paedophile, Herbert, which made Setri burst into tears again... that was a pretty hilarious, if apt, reaction!

 Post-nappy-change, 6 weeks old. Took him no longer than 5 minutes to wet through that nappy... what goes in, etc. etc...

Medical:

Setri had his first round of immunisations last week. I was about ready to cry when the nurse was prepared to give him the first needle, but he surprised Gam and I AND the nurse by not crying- instead he screwed up his face and kind of went "Hnnnnnh", before relaxing as if nothing had happened. Unable to believe our eyes, we waited for his reaction to the next one, only to receive the same reaction! He didn't exactly shout "Hit me!!", but we were pretty darn impressed. Even crotchety, hard-to-impress Gam (who has been telling Setri since he was about 2 weeks old to 'harden up'!) was impressed. Unfortunately he didn't escape a few adverse side effects of the vaccines and was grizzly and pained for a couple of days, but he escaped relatively lightly.


Social:

Since he started being more communicative, Setri has reacted more to social situations. Now when we have large groups of people around he wears an almost constant worried expression, whereas before it didn't seem to bother him in the slightest. Same when we hand him over for cuddles to a new person (even though he still loves cuddles from pretty much anyone). He did offer up a couple of smiles and chuckles for his Auntie Cil when she was visiting, though, which is a good sign. I don't want him to be a shy kid even if I would like him to stay a mummy's boy! I hope he takes after anyone but me in the shyness department- his daddy and two gregarious uncles will be better role models in that regard.

While Richard and Cil were visiting we all went to the Ron Mueck exhibition currently showing at the Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA). and had great fun photographing Setri with the sculptures- I'll put the rest of those photos in another post.

I have only ventured out twice on my own with Setri- just short walks to the local shops- and have not yet taken him on public transport... while commuting I've how women with babies and prams are treated by some of the despicable bogans on the bus routes around here, and how slack and unprofessional some of the bus drivers have been about dealing with it (I've only seen one model example of a bus driver doing the right thing). If I do use public transport to travel somewhere it will be the train, not the bus.

Taking Setri out in the pram was a bit of a pain, although it was useful to carry home some of the heavier things I bought, partly because I have to get the pram down the front stairs without Setri in it before using it, and partly because he always seems to whinge when he wakes up in the pram- I had to haul him out of it in the Woolworths checkout queue in order to quiet him, which meant there was a bit of juggling to do with the groceries. He was good after that, but the next time I took him in the sling and he slept the entire time. I had feared the sling would be a bit hard on my back for walks, but it was dead easy even though I'm still not particularly fit. I think the difficulties I had walking when I was pregnant must have been entirely due to the problems I experienced with my hips, not the enormous pregnant belly I had attached to the front of me, as the walk to the shops was a cinch, even at a very brisk pace. So the sling isn't great for housework, but is just fine for light shopping and walks. We want to get a backpack-style carrier for bushwalks, though.

Two of our outings as a family have been to Australian Breastfeeding Association classes (for pregnant women) as the 'demo parents and baby' to breastfeed and answer questions about our experiences of the birth and breastfeeding and being new parents. We've been invited back for one more class before Setri turns 3 months and is 'over the hill' in terms of his usefulness as a demo baby. At the first class we didn't share our story of our experience at the RBWH because none of the questions we were asked directly led to it. Probably just as well as I still couldn't talk about it without crying, at that point.

At the last class, when Setri was 7 weeks old, we were asked how long I had to stay in hospital after the birth, which kind of necessitated a lengthy explanation of why I was there for 5 nights despite the birth going well. I felt it was a very relevant tale to share, though, because of the disgraceful lack of breastfeeding support I received when the doctors unnecessarily placed Setri on nil-by-mouth at 2 days of age; I also told them I wished we'd stood up for ourselves sooner and not let them stop us feeding him when we knew he was fine. I said it was important to ask for help in maintaining milk supply if help wasn't offered, as happened to me.

I tried to relate the story in a way that didn't engender a complete mistrust of the doctors at the RBWH, but it would be hard for anyone to hear a story like ours and come away with a good impression of the place. I made sure to emphasise that my experience with the Birth Centre midwifery care was one I would recommend to anyone, and that my impression of the 'ordinary' midwives for the birth suites likely meant that a good birthing experience could be had there too, so hopefully no-one wound up unnecessarily terrified of the place but instead came away with a healthy scepticism of the 'care' that might be offered postpartum.

There haven't been all that many male partners attending the ABA classes that we've been to- only a handful each time, but everyone seems to appreciate Gam's input. It helps that he's fairly knowledgeable about the mechanics of infant feeding thanks to his speech pathology background, but I think the male partners seem to appreciate a guy's perspective on everything. A lot of our experiences with antenatal care, and postpartum, seem to exclude male partners, or at least put them very much on the periphery and make rather negative assumptions about them; I hope Gam's input can remedy that in some way. The ABA co-ordinator for the classes said it's often difficult to get the male half of a 'demo family' to come along and speak at a class; Gam thinks that's partly because the exclusion of male partners creates a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy- exclude them from enough of the pregnancy and birth, undermine them enough and they will eventually stop trying to be involved. I'm sure it doesn't apply to all male partners, but I'm sure Gam isn't the first to feel that way.

Setri has been very well-behaved at the classes (he's well-behaved everywhere when we go out, except Woolworths- he hates Woolies), although at the second class he was uncharacteristically not hungry and didn't have any inclination to demonstrate breastfeeding until a good way into the talk. And of course everyone thought he was terribly cute. I'm dreadfully biased, but they were right ;)

If your dad doesn't have a beard...

Gam and I tune into Brisbane community radio station 4ZZZ when we're in the car, and a song we've enjoyed a couple of times is the thoroughly catchy If Your Dad Doesn't Have A Beard, You've Got Two Mums by The Beards. We finally looked it up the other day, and it has a video clip easily as funny as the song. Worth a look!

The birth of Setriakor: Day 3

When I went to bed that night I was nervous but confident that everything would be ok. Setri and I would be going home with Gam tomorrow. Gam and I had planned it all out.

It felt wonderful to have Setri with me again. I fed him, talked to him and told him we really would be going home this time. I told him that his daddy and I had sorted it all out and tomorrow we would be home with his daddy, the best daddy in the whole world.

Briefly, I felt some misgivings flutter through my head about promising Setri that tomorrow we'd be going home. Was I jinxing everything? What else could go wrong? Being separated from Gam for two nights and Setri for one was the worst that could have happened, I figured. Nothing else was likely to go wrong now- Gam and I had discussed everything. It was clear. I knew what to do, and tomorrow we would face down those doctors.

The registrar we had spoken to earlier in the day had seemed shocked that we were thinking about discharging Setri. Flustered, even. He could die, she said. We would need to speak to (be spoken to by) the doctor overseeing Setri's case. That doctor had not yet even seen Setri. “Did you feel judged?”, I asked Gam after she'd skittered off. “I definitely felt judged!”.

Setri had been fed, returned to his cot and had slept a while when he awoke and started grizzling. I offered him another feed, but that wasn't the key. What could it be? I rocked him for a while as he cried, and soon enough the crying stopped abruptly, there was a change in his facial expression, and he pooed. Noisily. Eureka! Now I knew one more thing that could make Setri cry: the act of pooing! I felt triumphant.

I wanted to message Gam and share my exciting 'news', so I ratted around for my phone, first in my bag, then under my pillow. I couldn't find it. I remembered asking Gam to pass it to me a little while before he left, but didn't remember what he'd done with it. Surely he couldn't have automatically slipped it into his pocket instead of handing it to me? Why couldn't I remember?

I decided it was more likely that I had only imagined asking Gam for my phone than he had slipped it into his own pocket. It must be in my bag, but I would look for it later.

It was uncomfortable bending over the crib to change Setri's nappy. I knew if I was at home Gam would be doing it for me. I wished we were at home. I had forgotten to bring nappy wipes and the only thing suitable was paper towel from the dispenser next to the sink, which I wet with water and used to wipe the dark, sticky poo residue from Setri's buttocks. I hoped it wasn't too rough on his skin. He protested at the cold water, but I got a new nappy on him.

Before I knew it, however, someone was shining a flashlight into the room and walking towards me. It turned out to be the midwife on duty. She had heard Setri crying. Why was he crying? Jesus, couldn't a baby cry in this place without the mother being interrogated? I heard other babies in the ward cry and cry and cry. Were their mothers hunted with torches? Seriously, what was up with that? I felt defensive. He'd just cried, I told her, and then pooed. I had just changed his nappy. He was fine.

“He's breathing a little fast, love”.

For fuck's sake. Not again.

He'd just being crying, I reiterated. He does that after he cries.

“I don't like the look of it, love”.

Would I mind if she took him down to Special Care Nursery to get checked out by a registrar? Why yes, yes I would mind, but I didn't say as much. What I said was more along the lines of a polite but firm “No thanks, he's fine.”

“I really don't like the look of it, love”. She would be back later to flush his cannula and would take a look then, she said.

I told her that my husband and I had decided to discharge Setri the next day and would like the cannula removed, not flushed. She clearly wasn't expecting this, and seemed flustered. She would go and fetch the paediatric registrar to come and take a look at him, she told me.

What happened next was surreal.

I was dressed only in a pair of disposable undies, having gone topless for ease of feeding Setri (and expecting some degree of privacy in my own, albeit shared, room).

The young registrar followed the middle-aged midwife into the room. She sat in the chair. Young. Blonde or light brown hair. Lipstick. Serious mouth. She had obviously taken the midwife's concerns very seriously.

She had also obviously confused me with a completely different patient.

The registrar proceeded to tell me, effectively, that I had no idea what was going on. My baby could die, she said. She was the registrar who had admitted Setri to Special Care the previous morning. What I didn't know, she said, was that she had been present at the birth. “Bubs was in a bad way,” she said. “There was a lot of meconium. He vomited after the birth”.

Hang on.

I was confused. I was pretty sleep deprived by then. I rushed over the events of the birth in my mind. I knew there were two midwives in the room by the time Setri arrived. Gam was there. I had been facing the wall and the end of the bed when Setri was born, so I couldn't say absolutely that there was no-one else in the room at the time, if they had left immediately afterward. I was pretty out of it in the immediate moments after the birth, but I distinctly remembered Setri being passed up between my legs almost straight away. He had yelled straight away. No-one had mentioned anything about him vomiting. I was sure I would remember that. Surely someone would have said something? My midwife, Karen? Gam? Gam would have said something, for sure! Wouldn't he?

As for the meconium, when my waters broke the water was tinged yellow., maybe with a touch of light green That wasn't a lot of meconium. Maybe it had gotten worse and there had been more when Setri was born? I couldn't say, but again, I was almost certain someone would have said something.

Still, I couldn't be 100% sure. I couldn't say that she wasn't there at some point. I couldn't say with absolute certainty that the amount of meconium hadn't increased. And maybe I was so out of it after the birth that it only seemed like a few seconds before they passed him to me, and he had had time to vomit and I had not only not overheard anyone remark on it but no-one had mentioned it to me. So I said nothing and just sat there with a disbelieving look on my face.

In hindsight, it's so totally and utterly implausible that it's kind of unbelievable I didn't dispute what the registrar said. But I had had 5 hours sleep in the past 3 days or so. I suppose I will have to put it down to that.

Then, for some reason, the registrar took it upon herself to quiz me on why Gam and I had opted not to have Setri vaccinated for Hepatitis B immediately after the birth. We had decided to wait until 2 months and get it done then. The only advantage in vaccination immediately after the birth that we were aware of, for babies who are not considered 'at-risk', is a population health one- basically a policy of 'get 'em while you've got 'em'. Gam and I are both immunised against Hep B, therefore Setri was not at risk. We didn't see the point in an extra needle at birth when he could just have it at 2 months.

I explained as much to the registrar, who then said “So, one of you is positive”.

I think at this point I actually said “HUH?!” out loud.

She repeated, “So, one of you is positive”.

No, I told her, wondering what part of “My husband and I are both immunised” she didn't get. We. Were. Both. Immunised. As required for our work.

Unapologetic for the inference, she moved on, asking if we were going to get Setri's other immunisations carried out. Huh? It dawned on me that she was angling to find out if we were crazed, anti-vaccine-hippy types. WTF? Er, yes we were going to have the routine immunisations carried out at 8 weeks, I told her. I was still genuinely puzzled as to why she would be asking. Even if we were crazed anti-vaxxers, how was it relevant? Did she think perhaps we were that rare breed of parent so deranged we would refuse any and all medical interventions for our child?

After telling me again that Setri could die and how important it was that I let them take him to Special Care, and after I again refused, the registrar turned to the midwife and said, exasperated, “Well, I can't make her do it”. To me, she said “At least let us flush his cannula, that way if something happens we don't have to cannulate him again. He's not an easy baby to cannulate, you know.” “I noticed”, I replied darkly, thinking of the scab on his right hand where a failed attempt had been made before his left hand had been cannulated. Now I knew who was responsible for it, and I hated her. But I agreed to let them flush the cannula. Just in case.

Setri cried when they flushed the cannula. It hurt. They left

I cuddled him in bed, feeling beseiged. I hunted desperately for my phone so I could message Gam, to no avail. He had taken it home by accident after all. We would wait it out, I told Setri. Not long until Daddy would be here and we could go home and be a family. I felt strong enough to make it. Staring down a registrar while dressed in nothing but my underpants had been tough, it had been intimidating, but I had done it. I would fend off all comers. I felt a little bit proud, and more than a little afraid. I knew by that point that the next time Setri cried I was in for it. I couldn't allow myself to sleep.

When he awoke and cried again a few hours later I willed him to stop. I took him into bed with me and fed him. When that didn't work, I sat on the side of the bed, rocking him in my arms, whereby he settled a little. Too late. The beam of torchlight bobbled its way into the room. Why was he crying this time? I had to admit- I didn't have a clue, I had been feeding Setri just in case he was hungry, a desperate attempt to shut him up. He didn't have a dirty nappy this time, and wasn't too hot. I rocked him in my arms. He was breathing a little heavily from the effort of all that wailing. The midwife again said he was breathing too fast, that she wanted to take him downstairs to Special Care Nursery. And I, again, refused. When Setri was settled, when he hadn't just been crying, his breathing was fine. He was feeding just fine. Dirtying his nappies just fine. But no-one ever bothered with what I had to tell them. They just stalked me and pounced whenever he opened his mouth to cry, I felt. What was it with treating a newborn baby's crying as being something out of the ordinary?

The midwife again said she was going downstairs to fetch a registrar to take a look at Setri.

I took Setri back to bed and fed him. He was ready for a feed by then, and I kept an eye on his suckling and swallowing to make sure that, too, was normal. I was getting paranoid that somehow I'd get something wrong- fail to make sure he attached properly, fail to make sure he was suckling properly- and they would use that as another excuse to try and paint him as a sick baby and take him away again.

This time the midwife had brought the senior registrar on duty.

Brown hair, slim, no makeup, scrubs. I was in bed, topless, with Setri still latched on to my chest. He was only suckling intermittently now. This registrar had obviously heard from the midwife and/or the previous registrar that Gam and I were planning on discharging Setri the next day, and launched her line of inquiry thus.

Indeed we were planning on discharging him, I confirmed. We were aware that we would have to speak with the doctor overseeing Setri's case and sign a form stating that we were aware we were discharging him against medical advice.

Then the bombshell came.

It wasn't so simple as that, the registrar told me. If she or other doctors felt that it was important that a baby not be discharged, the baby could be removed from parents' custody. She chose her words carefully. She avoided use of the word 'you', or reference to 'your baby'. She was merely stating a fact. The threat, however, was clearly implied.

I knew she was bluffing. Such cases typically only occur in life or death situations, and often after a court order. They weren't going to take a baby away based on a single, possibly benign, symptom, I knew that. Objectively, I knew that. But I was shaken.

I fought hard to stifle the impulse to cry. In hindsight I'm surprised I didn't also have the impulse to punch her in the face and immediately flee the hospital with Setri in my arms. Just as well.

I wished like hell that Gam was there with me. I'd be stronger if he was there. Thinking of Gam only made me feel even more like crying. I pulled myself together and dismissed the registrar's insinuation, tried to appear as cynical and confident as I could- how effectively, I was not sure.

Then, as I knew would eventually happen in this place, she critiqued the way Setri was feeding at my breast.

Having fed for some time, Setri was now pausing sleepily between bouts of sucking. This was perfectly normal. Not to the registrar, however. This was a sign of how he could not muster the strength to feed! This was a sign that he could not cope with breathing and swallowing at the same time! I don't know if she was ignorant of the fact that babies are not supposed to breathe and swallow at the same time- it's called 'suck-swallow-breath coordination' for a reason, or that it is perfectly normal for babies to rest between bouts of sucking- especially if they are sated, as Setri was by that stage. He was still breathing reasonably fast even though the last bout of crying had ended some minutes ago, I had to acknowledge, but was clearly undistressed.

Subsequently came an encore performance of the “He could die, you know. Drop dead, just like that” variety. Over and over. I knew that the neonatal period holds the highest likelihood of mortality for a baby. I knew we were in the danger zone. I knew, of course, that the fact that Setri was a 'mec baby' meant that he was at a higher risk than many other babies. But, Gam and I had reasoned, Setri was born healthy. He was still, despite the protestations of the doctors and maternity ward midwives, healthy now. He was, we knew, highly unlikely to drop dead as if God had simply snapped his fingers. It was not impossible, of course, just statistically extremely unlikely.

The doctors knew as much, even though they were saying otherwise. The reason they continued to say otherwise was that they were trying to scare a pair of parents who they assumed were simply ignorant and stubborn, and what better threat than the prospect of a dead baby? Suddenly, irrevocably dead. If we took Setri home, I told the registrar, and he developed obvious signs of distress, we would take him to a hospital closer to home, the Mater Children's Hospital. She again countered with the 'sudden death' argument.

I don't know how she wore me down. I was absolutely unconvinced by any of her arguments as to why I should allow her to admit Setri to Special Care. I wasn't sure how she did it at the time, and it's even less clear to me now. But eventually I gave in.

I agreed, I told her, to allow her to admit Setri to Special Care for observation only. I stressed that it was to be observation only, and told her I wanted to come down with him. She agreed, and so Setri was once again taken from my arms. She placed him in his crib. I got dressed.

It was around 5am. I had not slept even one minute that night; I had received 5 hours of sleep in the previous 72 hours. Sleep deprivation was taking a toll. I had dark circles under my eyes. I felt like a zombie. This must be how all new parents feel, I surmised.

Following the registrar and Setri out of my room, I felt distraught. I had no way to contact Gam. He had accidentally taken my phone. I had no small change with which to make a call from a payphone- I had left my wallet in the car, figuring if I needed anything I had my phone and could call Gam, preferable to leaving valuables in a hospital ward. So my wallet was with him too. I had no pen with which to scribble a message and no time, either. I followed the registrar, holding back tears.

The registrar stopped at the ward reception, to let them know where Setri would be from now on, I figured. While there I had time to steal a pencil from the desk. I asked the registrar to wait for a minute and hurried back to my room. I found an envelope and quickly scrawled “Gam- in Special Care”, before hurrying back to the registrar, whose face bore an impatient expression.

Yesterday I had been in a wheelchair. Now, following the registrar who was taking Setri, I struggled to keep up. When we arrived in Special Care I washed my hands and gowned up. Habit, already.

Would I mind, the registrar asked, if they put him in an isolette instead of a crib?

Would it make any difference?, I asked. Was there any particular reason he'd need one over the other?

“Not really”, she replied. It was just that there was already an isolette right here, and if I wanted a crib they'd have to move it. Also monitoring him would be easier, as the temperature in the isolette could be raised so he'd need fewer clothes, meaning there was less to interfere with the sticky pads of the monitoring device. I gave the go ahead to use the isolette, dismissing as far-fetched and paranoid the thought that briefly flickered through my head that the isolette and its more serious, clinical appearance may later be used as 'proof' of how sickly Setri really was. Never dismiss anything as mere paranoia.

The nurse, as lovely as the rest of the Special Care nurses we'd encountered previously, fetched me a chair.

Now in the isolette, Setri's breathing did look distressed. He was now asleep, but clearly experiencing some degree of chest retraction, his little abdomen pushing out past his ribs with every breath. If Gam and I had been at home with Setri and witnessed this, we would have taken him to hospital. This looked like respiratory distress, there was no denying it. Had the doctors been right all along? Regardless, I knew that this onset of what looked like genuine respiratory distress would be used as 'evidence' of such. While it was bad enough to be of concern, just how bad was it?

Setri's colour was good and his pulse oximetry, his blood oxygen saturation, was fine. His work of breathing did appear to be increased since being placed in the isolette, but apart from his high respiratory rate and the chest retractions, all signs were good. There was never any suggestion of giving him supplemental oxygen. His pulse was normal, his temperature also normal- the 37.3 degree 'temperature' the previous night had been an anomaly because I had overdressed him and then kept him in bed next to me, overheating him. Every reading over the previous 24 hours had been absolutely normal.

It was then that I overheard the doctor telling the nurse to set the monitor to alarm whenever Setri's pulse oximetry meter reading dropped below 94. That seemed rather high to be setting an alarm, I thought. “Why so high?”, I heard the nurse ask. I didn't hear the doctor's answer. I felt like the aim was to set the bar unnecessarily high for Setri's release. If his blood oxygen saturation dropped below 94 for even a second it would be used as evidence that his increased respiratory rate was evidence that he was struggling to get enough oxygen to his brain- evidence that he could, as claimed, come to great harm or even die if we didn't agree to everything the doctors wanted.

The registrar came to speak to me, pointing out Setri's chest retractions and saying how, even though he was now at rest and no longer crying, he was in respiratory distress and it was just as well he'd been admitted to Special Care for observation. I agreed, miserably. Observation seemed like a good idea at this point. Still, aside from monitoring his vital signs, which were fine and always had been, what were they achieving?

I sat, watching Setri, for an hour, as the sun came up and the nursery grew light. It was 6am. I struggled to stay awake, feeling the weight of every hour of sleep that was owed to me. In another hour he would need a feed, I thought. Gam would be here shortly afterward. I should try and catch an hour's sleep before Setri needed a feed, and maybe I would meet Gam when he came to my room instead of relying on him finding my note.

I told the nurse I was heading upstairs for an hour or so of sleep, and that I would be back soon. “Good idea” she said, reassuringly. I comfortably assumed that I would receive a phone call from the nursery, just like last time, if Setri needed feeding sooner. Never take anything for granted.

After an hour of sleep, breakfast had arrived. Cornflakes this time. Gross. I put the packet aside in case I got hungry enough later to want to eat them as a snack. I drank the juice but left the yoghurt this time because I knew Gam would be bringing me hot, fresh porridge made with organic oats and milk. Much more wholesome and tasty. Given that I hadn't yet heard from the nursery and it was only a couple of hours since Setri's last feed, I decided to wait for Gam. I knew he would be over fairly early once he realised he had my phone with him.

When Gam arrived I ate the porridge he had made. He'd brought sugar and and organic cream, too. Real food. I was conscious of the fact that my milk would be coming in soon, and was glad to be able to eat something substantial and healthy, in order that I could in turn sustain Setri.

I cried as I recounted the night's events to Gam. Poor Gam. He felt incredibly guilty at accidentally taking my phone home, leaving me helpless when I needed to contact him. I tried to reassure him. It was an unfortunate accident with the worst possible timing. It's not like either of us could have foreseen a night in which I would be under constant bombardment, deprived of sleep and bullied by some doctors of questionable professionalism.

Gam listened in amazement as I told him of the first doctor's claims- that she had been present at the birth and that Setri had vomited after he was born. She had not been there, he confirmed. A doctor had made a brief appearance in the room prior to Setri's emergence, as per protocol for 'mec babies', and left the room as soon as Setri gave his first cry when the midwives caught him as he shot out of my body, saying “He's fine, I don't need to be here”. That doctor had not been Australian, as the one who claimed to have been there was.

I could not, at first, tell him of the second doctor's implied threat to remove Setri from our care. When I finally choked out the story some minutes later I broke down, sobbing. Gam comforted me, saying of course it couldn't happen. He was as stunned as I was that anyone would even say such a thing, would try that kind of intimidation. The fact that it was a far-fetched and unlikely prospect in a situation like ours did not prevent it from having a strong emotional impact. That was when Gam first mentioned the word 'complaint'.

The behaviour of the two doctors, we agreed, had been unacceptable. We had been unhappy about the way things had panned out, culminating in Setri's first admission to Special Care, but that was merely a matter of a difference of opinion, the midwives and doctors taking what they saw as a prudent, cautious approach. An approach that we viewed as being overly cautious, that interfered with our time bonding as a family. An approach that failed to acknowledge the fact that I had been observing Setri longer and more closely than anyone, and listen to what I had to say. But not one that was callous, detrimental to my wellbeing and distinctly unprofessional. Until last night. A line had now been crossed.

At that point we wouldn't have believed that things were about to get even worse.

Around 8am I mentioned to Gam that it was odd that no-one from the nursery had phoned to summon me to feed Setri, as he had been feeding every couple of hours until they took him away, and it had now been 3 hours. We decided to head down to Special Care to feed Setri and find out more about what they had planned for him, and when he would be released. It was Wednesday morning and at that point, based on what we had been told the day before, we still thought that they would be releasing him the following day,

“He's on nil by mouth,” we were told when we arrived at the nursery and told the nurse we were there for Setri to have a feed. They had stuck a drip in him again. What the hell had happened to 'observation only'? When I agreed for Setri to be admitted, I had agreed to observation only. I stressed that at the time. He had been feeding just fine immediately prior to being admitted. There was evidently no medical emergency or they would have called. Why was Setri now not allowed to feed? “You'd better speak to the registrar,” the nurse said.

“We don't know how he'll tolerate a feed”, said the registrar. Another registrar, I noted to Gam later, when he asked me if I could recognise either of the two I'd encountered the night before. Setri had been feeding fine since birth, we told her. He had been feeding right up until being taken for admission, I said. Not only that, Gam told her, but we had been feeding him all of yesterday, too, while he was hooked up to the same monitors. His oxygen saturation had been unaffected by breastfeeding. Couldn't we try breastfeeding him while he was hooked up to the monitors and actually observe whether his oxygen saturation was affected? Whether he could tolerate a feed? No, said the registrar. It was too dangerous.

He's in respiratory distress, we were told. There's a chance that giving him a feed could kill him, or at the very least reduce the amount of oxygen going to his brain and give him brain damage. The same refrain. He could die, he could die, he could die... They had placed Setri on his stomach inside the isolette. I was surprised, given the posters plastered all over the walls of the hospital and nursery touting the 'supine is safe' theme. I asked the registrar why. To help lessen the work of breathing, she said. He was working pretty hard to breathe before, and this was to help him. So would a cuddle, I thought.

Setri had finished a feed literally minutes before being taken away, I assured Gam a little later, while the registrar attended to her work. He was supposedly in respiratory distress then too.

We approached the registrar again. Could she give us some information on his condition? What had they found from the tests they had ordered so far? Were any of their previous differential diagnoses (infection, meconium aspiration) looking likely? When could Setri come home?

There was no indication of infection, we were told. Of course it wasn't possible to be 100% sure before the blood cultures were finalised after 5 days, but infection seemed a very unlikely prospect at this stage.

His chest x-ray from the day before had come back clear. Perfectly normal. They would do another one today.

The most likely diagnosis at this stage, the registrar said, was persistent pulmonary hypertension. But they couldn't be sure.

If they couldn't be sure, we asked, when could he come home? The registrar prevaricated. We pushed. What she was saying, she finally admitted, was that at this stage they did not have a planned date of discharge. Prompt diagnosis, if there was one to be had, did not look likely.” Indefinitely, then,” I said. He was, she conceded, in the nursery indefinitely. She attempted to reassure us: it was unlikely that he would be held beyond Saturday. And yes, she acknowledged- it was possible that Setri's fast breathing was normal and that there was absolutely nothing wrong with him.

Gam and I were incredulous. We were expected to leave our healthy baby in hospital indefinitely on the off chance that doctors would find something wrong with him? What was this place? Didn't they have sick babies who needed the beds? Not only that but I was occupying a bed too, despite being perfectly well. This was a public hospital- public hospitals never have a surfeit of beds, right?

We headed upstairs. It wasn't that we doubted the good intentions of the doctors- even the two whose treatment of me we intended to make an official complaint about, however unacceptable their conduct may have been. Hospitals aren't filled with evil, malign types who want to experiment on healthy babies. But no-one was listening to anything we had to say. No-one was willing to acknowledge that we had been spending more time with Setri than anyone and were capable ourselves of observing his condition. We could accept that Setri was breathing faster than the average, healthy baby generally does. We could accept that this meant he was more likely to experience any one of a range of adverse outcomes. But given Setri was feeding normally, sleeping normally, crying normally and soiling his nappies normally, combined with a complete absence of evidence for any of the differential diagnoses for his fast breathing, we were happy to assume that the most likely explanation was that he was a normal, healthy baby who breathed fast- until there was some evidence to the contrary. To do otherwise meant accepting that he would be hospitalised indefinitely and prevented from establishing breastfeeding during this crucial period. Moreover, I had consented to admitting Setri to Special Care for observation only, and they, without consultation or permission, had taken it upon themselves to order nil-by-mouth and place him on a glucose drip. We felt justifiably angry.

Gam, being forced to go home alone every night without Setri and I, had not been sleeping well. He couldn't bring himself to sleep in our bed, so he slept on the lounge with a blanket. He was sleep-deprived- by this point he could not even sit down without starting to nod off. I was worried about him, despite his protestations that he was fine. I was fairly severely sleep-deprived too, by this point, and knew that he wasn't in any state to be driving to and from the hospital on a daily basis. Needing some sleep myself, I convinced him to lie on my hospital bed with me.

Gam passed out immediately, while I could not manage to fall asleep amongst the daily hospital hubbub. Soon enough we were disturbed by the arrival of the physio who had come for my routine postnatal visit. She checked my stomach muscles for separation of the rectus abdominis. I hadn't escaped the birth unscathed after all: being so large during pregnancy had left me with a 4-finger-width separation of the muscles, quite large by any standard. She provided me with a length of 'tubigrip' to wear and advised me on proper techniques to avoid straining this area and enable the connective tissue to regrow, as well as gentle exercises to facilitate restoration of the pelvic floor to its normal state, and advice on 'emptying the bowel' without straining the pelvic floor.

The latter advice was also contained on a poster on the back of the toilet door; despite feeling the urge to go, I had become so paranoid about not straining my pelvic floor while pooing that I had not been able to allow myself to actually do it. The poster helpfully mentioned that it was important that the knees be raised above the level of the hips, and that feet should be placed on a footstool to achieve this- only there was no footstool. This, combined with the many accounts I had read of painful defecation after birth by women on baby-forums meant that I effectively developed psychological constipation!

As soon as the physio left, Gam and I headed back down to the Special Care nursery and went to see Setri. We arrived at his nursery only to be kicked out by a brusque-mannered nurse because there were no visitors allowed between the hours of 1pm and 3pm- unless the baby was being fully breastfed. They were the ones who had stopped him from being breastfed in the first place! They had prevented me from breastfeeding Setri and now they were preventing us from visiting him?! I had not been able to hold Setri even for a cuddle since around 5am. Gam had not held Setri since he had left the hospital the night before. Setri had been without any physical contact from us for over 8 hours. I cried as we left the ward, and Gam put his arm around my shoulders.

We went and bought Gam some lunch. I sent an SMS to my parents. We had planned on them coming to visit and see us at home 3 days after Setri was born. Tomorrow would be the third day, and there was still no end in sight to our stay in hospital. Rather than putting them off any longer and waiting until we settled in at home, we figured they may as well come and see Setri while we were in hospital. I had sent them an email the day before complaining about Setri's unnecessary admission to Special Care, telling them that we were going to discharge ourselves the next day, asking them to delay their planned visit by a day to enable us to settle in together at home. Now I had to tell them that things had changed yet again, and to alter their plans once more. I also messaged my only family member apart from Gam in Brisbane, my cousin Rachelle, and told her she was welcome to visit in us hospital, as we had no idea when we would be getting out. Rach called back to say she'd be at the hospital after peak hour but that she couldn't come and see Setri as her husband Chris was coming down with a cold and she was worried she might be carrying the bug herself.

Shortly after we arrived back in my room, the midwife on duty came by, asking if anyone had spoken to me about being discharged from hospital. I had been listed for discharge because I was not needed in the hospital as Setri was no longer being breastfed. First they had prevented me from breastfeeding him, then from visiting him. Now they were trying to kick me out.

No-one had spoken to me about this, I told the midwife. She said that as it was now so late in the day (around 4pm) it was effectively too late for me to be discharged and she would make sure everything was in order for me to stay the night.

After that we headed down to see Setri again. He was distressed and crying and very unhappy. But we weren't allowed to hold him. We watched him cry through the isolette. One of the nurses told us we could put our hands through the holes and pat him, so we did. It didn't help him feel better, nor us.

Gam drove home to cook me a proper dinner, my first in 3 days.

While Gam was gone the new midwife on duty came by to introduce herself. She had a student midwife with her, and made a good impression straight away. She asked about my baby, and I told her that Setri was in Special Care. I also told her that none of the doctors down there had bothered to enquire as to whether I wanted to express breast milk for Setri, nor provided me with any information or support on how to go about it. I knew full well how to express, but had no way of collecting the colostrum. I was upset that Setri was missing out on colostrum- it contains important immunologic components and acts as a laxative for the meconium in the baby's gut.

I felt angry that the doctors, supposedly so worried about Setri's health, couldn't seem to give a shit about my ability to breastfeed him after they'd finish messing about and depriving him of nutrition. If I did not have a high degree of knowledge about breastfeeding, thanks to my health sciences background, I would have been screwed, my milk supply quite likely messed up. An average mother would have found it more difficult to cope with the treatment I was receiving, and I wanted the irresponsible nature of the doctors' treatment of breastfeeding to be highlighted.

The midwife promised to come by with a syringe for collecting the colostrum and show me how to express. She also noted from my file that no-one had checked my perineum since my midwife immediately following the birth in order to be assured it was intact and that no injury had been missed; she would do that too, she said.

Rachelle showed up while Gam was still out, and I broke down crying as I told her an abbreviated version of events. It was so hard to get the words out. We had been expecting to go home 6 hours after the birth, and now we were here indefinitely, despite Setri being so perfect. I couldn't fathom how it had all gone so wrong after such a great birth. I really wanted to take Rach to Special Care and have her see Setri, have her see just how wrong all the doctors were. I wanted someone to confirm that Gam and I weren't crazy. My midwives from the Birth Centre didn't think we were crazy. They'd been checking in on me every day, checking in on Setri in Special Care, too. But they weren't about to openly question the necessity of Setri's admission, even though they had listened sympathetically.

I didn't tell Rach about what the two registrars had said to me the previous night. It was too much to even think about, let alone say out loud.

Gam returned with dinner while Rach was still there. A spicy lamb dish, with preserved lemons, served with brown rice at my request- I was still being very conscious of my fibre intake because of my fear of going to the toilet. Gam refused to eat any himself in case I needed more. I made sure to leave some of the lamb, hoping he would at least eat some when he got home. Otherwise, I knew, he would not eat anything.

After Rachelle left, the nice midwife came by again. She gave us a couple of syringes and advised me on how to express. I found my own technique much more productive and Gam helped me by collecting the colostrum in the syringe. The syringe proved inadequate and we requested a specimen jar, which the midwife duly provided. Gam held the jar for me while I expressed. It was a funny experience, 'milking' myself. It felt good that we were doing it together, doing something for Setri. We went to Special Care again, bearing the little jar of creamy yellow serum, handing it to the nurse on duty to put in the refrigerator. I knew Setri probably wouldn't get the colostrum- he was nil by mouth, after all, but I planned on expressing as much as I could as a way of making a statement to the doctors who had ignored the importance of our breastfeeding. I wanted to fill that fridge with those little yellow-lidded jars. I wanted them to know that I was still there and that they couldn't ignore the fact that I was breastfeeding Setri. That it was important to me that he be allowed to get what he needed. It was far too passive a statement, but it made me feel a little better.

Setri was still inconsolable. We sat for a while, but there was nothing we could do. We weren't allowed to give him what we needed. Now, I wish like hell we'd told them to go to hell and done the right thing sooner.

Back in my room, my parents called. They'd received my SMS. They'd also received my email the previous day, in which I complained about Setri being admitted and called it unnecessary. Mum admonished me to do what the doctors said. It was important, she said. So-and-so's baby was a 'mec-baby', and he got meningitis. You couldn't be too careful.

They would drop my grandmother at my Aunt's house in Walcha the next day (Thursday); they would probably travel to Brisbane on Friday. Depending on whether they felt they could handle all that driving they may even see us tomorrow. Gam and I smiled as I told him this, knowing that my mother would move the earth to see her first grandchild the next day.

Gam left for the night at 9pm, reluctantly heading home to an empty house.

The midwife and student came by and checked my perineum. It was all intact, the midwife confirmed. I asked if she could provide me with some more specimen jars for expressing, which she duly returned with.

I expressed again at 10pm, wishing Gam was there to hold the tiny jar. It was a lot harder to manage without him. I did my best to provide an impressive quantity in the small container. I knew I would have to work hard to keep up my supply. Setri was a big baby, and would consequently need more energy than the average baby just to maintain his weight, let alone to grow. Knowing that expressing is never as effective as actual breastfeeding in keeping up milk supply, I wasn't sure I would succeed. I took the little jar to the ward reception to be labelled, asking for it to be refrigerated and taken down to Special Care.

I lay in the dark, alone. I had the room to myself- my roommate had been discharged that day. I listened resentfully to the sound of squalling newborns, their crying unimpeded by the intrusive investigations of overzealous midwives. I was still angry that first one midwife, then another, had suggested to me that Setri's crying was in some way an abnormal behaviour for a newborn baby. What kind of idiot did they take me for?

I contemplated going to Special Care to sit with Setri through the night, but decided against it. It was probably important for my milk supply that I got some sleep, I thought. I woke every time the nurses' call alarm went off. I regretted ever using that alarm.