Catherine Tate

I'm a relative newcomer, but already a huge fan of Catherine Tate, who has a variety of characters she plays. Check out her Gran character for now and I'll post more later:

Life is short

A couple of years ago, when I was pregnant with Annabelle, I went with Mel to his golf presentation night and sat next to a girl called Lisa. She was very attractive, young (perhaps mid 30s) and full of bubbly conversation. Apparently she was an ex-elite tennis player so she was very fit and healthy.

Lisa went on a trip overseas and when she came back she felt bloated and sick. She went to the doctor thinking she might have gall stones and found out she had cancer. Her liver was so riddled with it they couldn't believe she was up walking around. She started intensive treatment immediately. At some point prior to her diagnosis, she and Mel were partners in a golf tournament and they made it through to the state final which was at a resort in Port Stephens. We made a weekend of it and had a great time.It was just after her first round of chemo that we had our trip. She was wearing scarves during the day and wigs for dinner but apart from that, you would never have known she was sick. She was so positive and full of life. By then, Annabelle was five months old.

Since then, we've moved to Adelaide and Mel has stayed in touch with Lisa while she continues to get treatment. Whenever in Sydney, he goes to visit her and he's seen her health gradually decline to the point of her being unrecognisable and having difficulty talking.

Last night, Mel got a phone call to say Lisa died yesterday.

Life really can be devastatingly short. I've been moping around all week bemoaning all sorts of things that are minor inconveniences in the big scheme of things and it's given me a bit of a reality check about what's important in life.

RIP Lisa.

Do you like books?

I love books. I buy way more books than I read. Books are my biggest indulgence.

A lot of the books I buy aren't readily available in stores here so I often find myself shopping on Amazon and paying heaps in postage etc. WELL.. I am here to tell you today that there are alternatives to Amazon and I have found them!

For an aussie site with free postage, check out Fishpond and if you want to contribute to global literacy, try Better World. I've ordered from BW and am waiting on my order (a little slow, but hey.. free delivery!) and I have yet to try out Fishpond but I'm sure I'll think of something to order soon. :)

Happy shopping (and reading!).

Quick update

Sorry I haven't had much time to post lately. I'll come back later to write more but just wanted to stop in and say hi. The Scarsdale Challenge had to end four days early when I remembered I was booked into a two day training program with lunch provided, but in ten days I lost 3.5kg. Yay! Training involved muffins and biscuits and some creamy lunch dish so I think I've put back on a kilo. Ah well....

Speaking of training though, it was really, really good. It was about working with abused chidren (or children exposed to family violence, which is a form of emotional abuse) and their parents. It was also about how abuse and violence in the first few years of life affect a child's brain development. It was SO interesting and I'm hoping to use a lot of it in my work. I've got another more indepth training next month just on the brain development stuff and I'm wetting my pants with excitement about that one already.

Apart from that I've been feeling very "meh". I don't know if it's hormones (I still have to get that damned Mirena removed) but every now and then I get very dissatisfied with my lot in life, in particular being in this place where I have no friends, no-one who can look after Annabelle so we can get a break, no real relationship with my husband because of the aforementioned lack of time together. We started talking yesterday about planning for a holiday at Christmas, so that perked me up a bit considering the last time we had a real holiday was 2004! It has to be somewhere that has a creche though because if we spend $5000 to go on a holiday and still get no break, I will book myself into the nut farm.

Editor's note

The link I posted to the Scarsdale Diet on Wiki isn't the best link to use if you are actually thinking of doing the diet. It leaves out some foods and doesn't include all the rules and FAQs. I've found a better link and will re-post it again HERE for anyone who feels like taking the Scarsdale Challenge. :)

The highs and lows

Here's a snapshot of my week in review...

I asked my boss whether the organisation would support me to get my psych registration through supervision. I also asked to be sent on some very interesting, and quite expensive training. She said yes to both. I even found a supervisor and have an appt with him for this coming Monday. The idea of getting my psych registration in 2yrs is about enough to make me wet my pants. That was most definitely a high!

Yesterday I had my first experience of one of our clients having her child removed by the State. It happened on site so I had to be there to assist. I can't go into all the details but the whole ordeal took several hours and was a draining, emotional, and frustrating experience. That was a low, for sure. And still is.

On a much more trivial level, I'm sticking to the Scarsdale Diet with a steely resolve I wasn't quite expecting. I think having a few of us doing it together makes a huge difference. Five days into it, I'm about 2.5-3kg lighter and more to the point, even after my very emotional day yesterday, I had no inclination to pour a large glass of SSB when I got home (that's Sem Sauv Blanc for the uninitiated ;)). So my jeans finally fitting me again is definitely a high.

Mel got home on Monday from the UK and was jet-lagged for two days before getting the flu. He has now been in bed for three whole days and doesn't look to be getting better any time soon. It's been awful for me. Never mind him. I feel like a single parent! I was actually getting a bit snippy with him thinking he just had the man-flu (you know.. "achooo... ooohhhh I'm going to diiiiiieeeeeee..") but now I'm really feeling for him. He was due to fly overseas tomorrow to present a paper at an international conference and he spent many, many long nights putting together that paper and was really excited about it. Today he cancelled the trip because he's just too sick to fly, let alone get up and deliver a paper. He can't even get out of bed. I feel sad for him. That's a low. :(

I think they're the highlights. Oh, unless you count me buying a dress on sale today for $19.95. When I got home and peeled off all the layers of price-tags, I saw that the original price was $139.95!! W00ts. That's a high. Over and out.

I'm annoyed

About six weeks ago, we parked for too long in the Coles carpark and got a ticket. Ok, we weren't actually shopping at Coles so we deserved it. It was $19. I can hear Sydneysiders laughing.. yes $19. The minimum ticket I ever got in Sydney was $73 and that was for parking on my uni campus, not even on a public street!!

It was due a week ago and with Mel away I totally forgot about it. Finally posted a cheque off on Monday. On Wednesday I received a reminder notice so there must have been a cross-over between them receiving my payment and mailing the reminder. That would be fine, except that the reminder (note: this fine was only a week overdue) has an additional penalty of $36 added to the original $19! THIRTY-SIX DOLLARS!!!!!

I appreciate that it's not going to break the bank, but I get SO PISSED OFF with big organisations charging totally unreasonable fees. Like the bloody bank honour fees which have recently been found to be legally unenforceable! I'm pretty sure a "reminder fee" that is almost double the original infringement is not a reasonable reflection of the cost incurred to the council in sending the reminder letter and don't think I won't be telling them that today!

Can you tell I'm annoyed? I'm really annoyed. What if I hadn't paid it because I'm really destitute? How is it helpful to slap someone having financial troubles with a ridiculously inflated penalty fee? Who do they think they are? I'm annoyed. Don't think I'm not going to tell them today. And I'll probably end up paying the fucking fee but not before I express an opinion about it.

Drastic times call for drastic measures

At work the other day, a few of us were talking about our healthy eating efforts. Or lack thereof. None of us are overweight at all... in fact, Heather looks like a Barbie doll and Lynett certainly wears her jeans well but we were talking about you know... the last 3 kgs. Not enough for most people to worry about but enough for our clothes to be too tight. We all nodded and mmmm'd with sympathetic understanding. As we chit-chatted I said maybe we should all do the South Beach diet (I don't even know what it is, I just like the name) and we all considered that option. Heather wiki'd it and we huddled around the computer checking out how strict it might be. Then I said (foolishly) that if were going to deprive ourselves we should really just do the Scarsdale diet for two weeks, get our results and get on with it. I told them how, in my early twenties, I had lost 7kg in two weeks and kept it off and that my friends had all had similar results.

Well, that was enough to get everyone's attention. Heather's fingers got working on the wiki and everyone decided it was very doable. My testimony as to its results sealed the deal. We consulted our diaries, which included upcoming social commitments and training days (with lunch provided) and decided that Monday 14th July was the best day to start.

So today's the day. Didn't I say I couldn't do deprivation any more? How did I get talked into this? And considering Heather is 21 and Lynett is 25 and I am 36, how come I wasn't the adult in this situation telling those young things to be more sensible? I was in fact encouraging them!! Gah. Well.. now we're committed and we're in it together. Today my scales tipped 68.6kg and I couldn't do the zip up on my new work pants. It was enough to make me decide maybe this isn't a bad idea after all.

I need to debrief

So about my job (which I don't like to talk about due to confidentiality etc etc but ANYWAY)... after a week of no kids at all, this week we have finished up with a total of five in the house - ranging from 2wks old straight from hospital, to almost 3yrs old (mum is 18). In between there is a 5mth old whose mum is schizophrenic and escaping domestic violence; another one having his first birthday TODAY (happy birthday little man and welcome to a homeless shelter), and another 2yo with an 18yo mum who was raised by a junkie and who is still in love with her ex-partner who beat the crap out of her. *sigh*

I want to help them all, but trying to get time to even see them is hard when they are up and out the door in the mornings, often not to return until after dark (despite it being freezing cold outside and their baby needing a sleep!). Today one of them promised staff she was going to see about housing (a condition of their stay with us) and while I was out getting a coffee, I happened to see her scurrying along with her 2yo in the pram, then jumping into a ute with some rough looking guy, with the child in her lap (no car seat) and taking off for who knows where. I'd almost guarantee she was going to do drugs. I actually walked up and banged on the door of the car as he was taking off, and told her to promise me she'd be back before 4pm so I could talk to her, but of course she wasn't.

The thing is.. how much can I do? If I have an expectation that I'll save them all, I'm setting myself up for disappointment but the thought of little babies suffering just breaks my heart. I guess I need to find a balance and an appropriate level of detachment. I know that a baby needs to be with its mother and most mothers love their child no matter how shit a job they are doing so I hate the thought of a child being taken from its mum. They just need to be educated to be a better parent, but usually that involves working through a lifetime of crap, not just a couple of quick lessons in Parenting 101. Hence my dilemma. I see them so briefly.

So I think I need to go and watch West Wing and chill out for a while. I've been finding myself thinking about these kids and their mums at night and on weekends, and it really can be all-consuming when you let yourself get attached. Not that I'd change it, because I think if you get too detached, you can be uncaring and I like that I care, and I think THEY like that I care. So I won't change that.

But yeah.. balance...

My brilliant career

You all know I'm trying to be a psychologist, right? And increasingly I want to be a psychologist who works with infants and mothers on attachment/bonding issues... or even with adults who have attachment (relationship) problems due to their own insecure attachments as an infant. The whole field fascinates me and it is where my future lies, I'm sure of it.

So I took this job because it is working with mothers and babies in crisis. If there was ever the likelihood of attachment issues, this is where they are. Not to mention most of the mothers (ok, all of them) have shitty relationships with their own mothers and having an insecure attachment with your own parent is THE key indicator of having an insecure attachment with your own child. Some of the young mothers I see were helping their mothers shoot up while other kids were playing with barbie dolls. One was hanging out the washing and cooking her own dinner when she was six. She is now 18yo with an adorable, healthy 2yr old... but you have to wonder about their future.

But I digress. Let's get back to talking about me :)

So the job is great but it's not getting me registered as a psych. For that I need to either go back and do Masters (2yrs F/T or 4yrs P/T) or be supervised, which basically means work in the field, meet with a supervisor once a week, and do a number of field placements to get a variety of experience. It takes two years too, but these days is considered a "lesser" qualification than a Masters. Well, it always was.. but these days Masters is kind of the minimum standard for a lot of employers. It's a good way to go though, if you don't get into Masters or don't want to do it straight away (like me). The upside is that you can get registered in two years while earning an income, as opposed to being a full-time student (no income and the course costs $14k per year... not to mention child care costs. eek.)

ANYWAY, I had given up hope on the second option until I was introduced to a girl through my work, who works for a different organisation but in a similar kind of field (with young offenders) who is being supervised AND her work is paying for it! I honestly didn't know these kinds of arrangements existed anymore so it has given me renewed hope. Apparently, they just called this guy (the supervisor, who runs his own private practice) randomly and he took her on. They even haggled down his fee. Cool. So even if I have to pay for it myself, just to know that I can make a call and start working towards my psych registration is really encouraging.

Now, to get work to pay for it....

Who's on your list?

I have a list of potential candidates to take Mel's place, should he meet with a tragic and untimely early demise (by accident of course...). It changes over time, but the other night I was trying to remember who has been/is still on it so I thought it's worth writing down and adding/deleting over time. You know.. so I have it handy in case Mel's plane goes down or something (oh, did I say that out loud? hmmm... I wonder if life insurance brokers are likely to hold this against me. HA!).

So here goes - not in any particular order...

1. Roger Federer ever since he cried winning the Australian Open. Who could not love him?
2. Tiger Woods (and no, they are not all sports people)
3. Mac. You know from the Mac and PC ads. He's the hip young thing. MMMMM my kind of computer nerd.
4. Speaking of nerdy, I have to admit my West Wing addiction has created a slight lust factor for Sam Seabourne. The character, ok? NOT Rob Lowe the person.
5. .....

Damn, Annabelle's awake. Will have to come back to this later. So who's got suggestions? Who have I forgotten? Who's on your list?

Miss Annabelle and friends

I've been conscious of this blog not being All About Annabelle because no-one wants to be one of those boring parents who has nothing to talk about except their kid. But I was thinking that actually it's been ages since I've posted any pics of her or updates for that matter and if I don't write stuff down here I'm likely to forget.

So she is about 2yrs and 2mths now and as cute as a button. She can almost sing the whole alphabet song (with prompting) and can count to ten. Kind of. It goes something like "1, 2, 3, 5, uuummmm 8, 9, 10. YAAAAYYYY!!!" She remembers other random numbers (6, 7 etc) but not usually in the right order.

She sings various songs and will happily sing them over and over and over again. We have video of her sitting up in her little chair, facing the backyard as if she's got an audience out there, and announcing herself before each song. So she goes "Twinkle Star." *pause* then sings the whole thing with actions to the end, then gives herself a big round of applause "yaaaayyyyyy" then starts again with the announcement. "Twinkle Star".

She very happily goes to daycare every day now. I still don't like her being there five days but she is very well loved. She has obviously learned that it's very endearing to run up to a person and ask for a cuddle and this is a good way to get special attention. Each and every staff member - not just from her room but the other rooms as well - has told me that they have a special relationship with her because as soon as she spots them, she calls their name (she's a genius at remembering names. I swear she knows every kid's name in that centre and there's 80 of them!) runs up and asks for a cuddle. I don't know if any of them have worked out that she's got this cuddle thing going on with all the other staff members as well. They all think they are her favourite.

She wakes up in the morning and if Mel has already got up and is out doing work in the loungeroom, she calls out to him. "MEL! MEEEELLLLL!!!!!" Too cute. I've only heard her call out for "Cass" once but I think that's a bit confusing for her because the Team Leader in her room at daycare is also called Cass so she's got that sorted out in her mind. She's Cass. I'm Mummy.

Here are some recent photos:

With Alex and Nathaniel, our old next-door neighbours in Sydney (on our recent visit)

Refusing to take her hand out of her mouth for the picture...

Water play in the backyard.. during the warmer months! (really, this photo is all about the hair)

Sydney again - this time with Ally and James. Ally and I were in mother's group together and James and Annabelle also went to daycare together so they've known each other pretty much since birth, and were born 5 days apart.

If I get slack with updates, remind me in future. They grow up so fast!

My dream

At work there have been some iss-ewes. Without going into too much detail, it seems some staff have had some problems with the new manager, who started a week before me. Since I'm new, no-one really tells me what's going on and I try to stay out of gossip anyway, but I see things... and the manager tends to confide in me since I don't really report to her. She treats me more like a peer than a subordinate which, on one hand totally works for me but on the other hand - if staff have issues with her, do they see me as being on her "side" as it were? Anyway, she told me she'd got some feedback that wasn't positive. She was quite upset by it and is trying to resolve it. The staff are all quite young and all female and the CEO did tell me before I started that the place seems to constantly suffer from personality clashes and politics. *sigh* I'm far too old for it.

What this is leading to is I've been having some weird dreams again but instead of being totally confusing and nonsensical, these ones have been a little easier to interpret. About as subtle as a brick actually...

Last night I was in a house. I don't remember all the details but the things that stand out in my memory are that there was a kind of beach/wading pool thing inside the house. Yes, inside. These things seem so normal in dreams. I started to wade out into the water and suddenly there was a sharp drop and I was in over my head. I felt a bit panicky and quickly fought my way back to the shallow bit and climbed out. As I went to tell someone about the drop and warn them it was dangerous, I noticed two whirlpool things and two children out swimming right near them. The kids were going to get sucked into the whirlpools and drown, so now I really panicked. I started to yell out but before I knew it, two grown-ups were swimming out and saving the children. I was so relieved. My heart was beating a million miles an hour and I went into the main part of the house to tell someone what happened. There was a woman standing in the hallway looking out towards where I'd come from and she seemed to be as wound up as me so I assumed she'd seen the whirlpools too. When I started to say "Did you see what happened?..." she cut me off and started talking about a big incident that had happened between two adults. I'm not sure exactly (don't remember) but something about a big argument and someone yelling and walking out. I was amazed that she'd missed the whole near-drowning thing that had me beside myself with panic.

Hmmm... so let's try some amateur dream interpretation. House. I work in a house. Duh. As for the stepping off the edge and being in over my head, maybe that's a warning? I certainly don't feel like I'm in over my head now - not with the work or with the personal stuff - but the symbology of being out of my depth/in over my head/drowning doesn't allow too much for interpretation. Maybe it's saying I need to watch my step.. not get into anything too deeply. Next: Children in trouble and needing saving. Gee, what could that possibly mean considering my whole job is about helping homeless children?! Interesting that someone else saved them and not me though. I've been feeling a bit frustrated lately that they come and go so quickly (we are short-term) that I don't have time to do anything really worthwhile with them. And finally, the woman being more interested in the argument than what was going on with the kids. I'm not sure that's entirely true of the staff, but maybe it is for some.

I wonder what I'll dream about tonight. I've had quite a lot of these lately. Sometimes if something's going on in my life that is playing on my mind, I can actually ask for answers to be shown to me in my dreams and I will dream stuff that is really symbolic. It can be SO helpful if I'm confused about something. I'll wake up and go "A-ha! Now it makes sense". But I haven't asked for these dreams and I haven't consciously felt stressed or anything so it's a bit odd that it's coming up so often, isn't it? I guess time will tell.