PMT?

My friend Shed made me laugh out loud today when someone asked about symptoms of PMT and her reply was this:

I don't suffer from PMT myself but my husband seems to have some kind of hormonal problem. Once a month he turns into a fucking useless arsehole.

Shed, you're fabulous. I really needed the giggle :)

If you thought the dying bird dream was bad..

Toilets.

I am dreaming of toilets. I'm not going to say any more than that, except these toilets are in various states of cleanliness (or uncleanliness as the case may be), some are overflowing, some are in small closed rooms, some are in open spaces, some are in large rooms with lots of space.

Toilets. I wonder what Carl Jung would have had to say about that.

And nothing at all to do with my dreams, but does anyone else find it slightly disturbing that they felt it necessary to include that last instruction (bottom right)?! LOL!

I think I've decided...

Well, I had kind of already decided so I should more accurately say I think I am happy with the decision...

.. to not have another baby until I finish uni.

I KNOW, I KNOW I've already said that but what you don't realise is that I have had a lot of angst about this and haven't been reeeally sure it was the right thing. And I don't like angst. Nuh-uh. I do not like angst one little bit. But today I came to a point of feeling quite happy that this is a good decision.

If you don't give a rat's arse about how I have come to this sense of resolve and inner peace then you can stop reading now. Because I feel the need to share so I'm going to.

The thing that was worrying me about waiting any longer to have the baby is that Annabelle is already THREE and even if I time the pregnancy (as much as you can time these things!!) to have the baby as soon as I finish my course, which is the end of next year.. then there will be close to five years between them. I thought that was too long. She seems like she's ready for a sibling NOW and in fact she often asks me when she is having a baby sister.

Also, I thought that part of the idea of having more than one child is so that they can grow up together and be friends, and leaving it too much longer means there probably isn't too much chance that they're going to be spending a lot of time playing together. Well, not like they would if they were closer in age, y'know? She will be off at school when the next one is still a tiny baby.

And also, the early years are bloody hard work and I would really like to get them over and done with so that I can get on with enjoying all the things you can do with older kids. And that's not to say I'm wishing these years away but really.. there are a lot of restrictions on your lifestyle and choices when you have tiny babies and I think it's only since Annabelle is getting bigger and more independent that I'm realising it actually does get easier (thank christ) and I want more of the easier and less of the harder. :)

BUT...(here's the bit where I contradict everything I just said)

I really have to finish this uni course because it's been twenty goddamn years since I wanted to be a psychologist and I'm afraid if I pull out now, it might never happen!! I just want to get the damn thing over with.

And secondly - and more importantly - today as we spent our time with Annabelle, instead of me feeling bad that she's stuck with two adults and no kid company, I realised that actually she gets ALL of our attention and that's really lovely for her, and for us. To be able to really enjoy these early years with her and for her not to have to compete for attention is kind of nice. Not that having a sibling would be bad, but I just could see for the first time that there are advantages to her being the only one... for now.

And then if I have another baby after she's started school, she'll be off onto her next stage of life and the new baby will also be able to enjoy that quality one-on-one time with me and he also won't have to compete too much for attention. So in a way, I think spreading them out is nice for them both.

That's what I've decided anyway so don't anyone argue with me now that I'm happy! :)

Last class

I just attended the last class for the semester. The LAST ONE! W00TZ! :D This semester has felt like it dragged on forever mainly because we had a month of Summer School before first semester even started. Ugh!

And actually it's not over yet because I still have two major assignments to hand in and a 60% exam to study for - all in the next 3 weeks! But at least there is no more getting up and driving to 9am lectures. Hallelujah and amen to that. Having said that, I really like my classmates and I've enjoyed spending 4 days a week with those people, all stressing over the same stuff. I think we've become quite a tight-knit little group. *sigh* I'm sure we will still see each other.

So anyway, after my last exam on Thursday 25th June, I will have a luxurious 3-days worth of having NOTHING TO DO and then it's highly likely that MY FIRST PLACEMENT WILL START ON THE MONDAY. ARGH!!! There is no rest!!!!!!!!

Total Eclipse of the Heart

Check out this literal version of Bonnie Tyler's classic. As daggy as it is, it will have you giggling. :)

Psychic fair and tarot cards

Today we went to the psychic fair. I got two readings, both of which were fairly crap. The first one had good potential but Annabelle had to go to the toilet before she'd finished so I had to cut and run. Bugger!

ANYWAY, back to my point..

The second woman was a tarot card reader. While she did my cards she said there's a possibility of another baby. I know the tarot pretty well and the Empress card is the fertility card (and I get it ALL the time when I do my own cards) and of course it came out. She said the Empress card can mean a lot of things (growth, prosperity, fertility, abundance, motherhood, family) but what made her think in my case it was most likely a baby is that it came out with the Ace of Cups and the Ace of Pentacles. She said those three cards together is a pretty sure sign of a baby. (I personally think it could also be a new creative business venture but maybe that's me being in denial...)

Later on, she told me that if I want to ask a question, a good way is to spread the cards face down and draw out three cards with my left hand. We did that for a few questions and it worked really well. Like, the cards were SUPER clear with their answers.

SO.... I came home and decided to test out this three-card game and I asked the cards if I really am going to have another baby. I lay them all out face down and drew three cards from the deck with my left hand. I got:

1. Ace of Cups
2. Empress
3. Ace of Pentacles.

*insert twilight zone music here*

I got another HD

This time it was for that one hour presentation I had to do a couple of weeks ago. Sadly, it was only just a HD (as in, 85%) so when I get the results of the other assignment for this subject and average them both, I'm sure it won't be a HD overall. But they say this doesn't matter because no-one is ever going to ask to see our results ever again so all we need to do is scrape a pass and we're laughing. Yes, our LECTURERS actually told us that.

Which makes you wonder why we're all still hanging out for our HDs. Crazy bloody high-achieving idiots that we are. Idiot psychologists. That's what the world needs more of, eh? Highly anxious, competitive individuals who base their entire self-worth on the quality of their academic record. Yep, that's who you'd look to for help in your time of crisis.

Sunday night update

My course finished early today. Yay! Came home and could resist the champagne urge no longer. It has been a long, LONG week.

So I'm feeling awfully light-headed after two.... no make that three glasses. Mav has just got off the phone from Domino's so in about an hour or so I fully expect someone to knock at the door with a couple of cold pizzas that are not what we ordered. But if I don't have to cook, what the hell.

And I just found (another) workshop I want to do but this one is on the Gold Coast in December so we've just been talking about making a week of it and taking Annabelle to all the theme parks. That's enough to get me really excited. Where's that champagne? Oh woops, I finished it. *hic*

Breaktime needs to be over... NOW

I haven't done any uni work since handing in my last assignment on Wednesday. That's three days of no uni work. I'm getting panicky again and think I have developed a tic. This weekend I'm in a workshop learning how to be an ABA (Applied Behaviour Analysis) therapist. It's a type of intensive therapy that has good results with autistic kids and if you want to be a therapist, you have to do the intro workshop. I don't even know if I want to be an ABA therapist but you know me - I like to have options. And having the option means doing the damn training. I'm a bit bummed that it's the second weekend in a row I can't spend my time with Mel and Belle, especially since he goes o/s again on Monday for two weeks.

Speaking of Miss Annabelle, she woke up really sick yesterday (Friday). Mel was able to be with her in the morning while I went to that observation session, but I had to race home to look after her. She was complaining of sore ears, poor poppet, and sleeping A LOT. Took her to the doc and he said her ears were fine, so go figure? Still, it's awful to have a child screaming and saying her ears hurt and not having a clue what's wrong or what to do about it. :(

She's much better today thankfully.

To add to my things to whinge about, I have to learn the freakin' DSM-IV for a quiz in a week's time (EEEK!)and I have a big assignment due this Friday (ok, technically due THIS MONDAY but we have this thing called a "grace period" which means we have until Friday) that I haven't actually started. *hyperventilates*

The only reason I've not been institutionalised yet is because I got an extension for the assignment. So that is GOOD. But that is also BAD because it means I could quite possibly drag it out and take way longer than necessary to do it, which means it will run into the time I need for the next BIG assignment due in a couple of weeks, not to mention the 60% Epidemiology exam I have to study for. *vomit*

It feels like the 5th month of pregnancy. You know when you feel like you've been pregnant FOREVER but you've still got soooooo long to go? That's how I feel about this semester.

Now I'm off to bed with my DSM-IV study notes.

*cough cough splutter*

I'm falling apart at the seams, but sadly there is no time to be sick or tired so I'm trying very hard not to be either of those things. And failing miserably.

Have I posted to say I finished at work? And I even bailed a day earlier than I was supposed to! I couldn't bear going back in for that last day when my two favourite chicks weren't going to be there so I thought "gee I wish I had an excuse not to come in" and the next minute I chipped my tooth on a breadroll. Yes, a breadroll. See? I manifested it. Of course I needed to make a dentist appointment for the very next day and had to ring the CEO to tell her I couldn't make it in for my last shift. Hallelujah! (Probably next time I should manifest a cheaper excuse since the dentist cost me $600...)

Then last weekend I attended an EFT workshop (Emotional Freedom Techniques), which I will be back to tell you all about (tap, tap, tap...).

And all the while I've been slogging away at my noony work (as Annabelle calls it.. "uni work" to the rest of us), churning through one deadline after another and dragging my germy, coughy self to all the classes when I'd totally rather be in bed but if you miss a class you have to do a "redemption exercise" and I say FUCK THAT. As if I've got time to do more work than I already have to. Sheesh.

Tomorrow I'm supposed to be having my quality day with my daughter since I've cancelled her Fridays at childcare, but instead I have to go and do an observation session for that behaviour therapy I mentioned before - with autistic kids. If I like that and think I'd like to do it for a job, I have to attend the training which is THIS weekend. ALL weekend. Nice timing (NOT), considering my next major assignment is due next week. So I'm trying very hard not to be sick. Or tired.

The GOOD NEWS is that Mel has started trying very hard (bless him) to find some dates that we can have some weekends away because I told him that if we don't, I might actually divorce him and I think he believed me.

And tonight I am having drinks with the girls from work to celebrate a few of us resigning and that will be the first time I have had drinks with the girls (ie. no husband and no child) since Annabelle was born 3 years ago. How sad and tragic is that?! When I realised it, I actually was quite shocked. No wonder I'm such a miserable whingey cow. I never have any goddamned FUN!

I'm supposed to be coaching a client as we speak (type) but she seems to have forgotten our appointment so I better get on with my next assignment.

Later.