Really? Two Years already?

Sometimes it feels like you’ve been gone forever.  And sometimes it feels like you’re still here on this earth, just still living on another continent with a lot less phone calls and contact.

The last two years have been full of ups and downs.  We had a blast at your memorial service with your old military buddies and I think you would have enjoyed the send off you were given.  Like you always wished, a fish eagle cried out as we scattered your ashes into the river to disperse through the land you loved so much.  It was a perfect moment, one I’ve thought about a lot in the time that’s passed.  I will never hear the cry of a fish eagle again without thinking of you.

There has been a lot of healing that has occurred in the last two years.  I’ve come to realise that there were many times that you were just plain shitty to us, and that allowing myself to forgive you for those times would set me free from them.  So I’ve forgiven you.  You know the times I’m referring to.  They’re in the past where they belong and while I will never forget the shitty times, I can remember them without the bitterness I used to feel about them before.  And for all your shittyness, there was good too.  Good times, fun times and lots of crazy laughs.  I will never forget playing “pazant” at that one party in Namibia where your buddy got so dizzy he fell into Mom’s prized roses and the times when Moz and I would invite all our mates over and we’d do fashion shows for you and Mom.  Yes there were times when you didn’t do such a great job, but overall there were more good times than bad and I think that’s all a parent can aim for.

While you’ve been gone, I’ve experienced a pregnancy and become a Mom.  You know how much that meant to me and I can tell you, that you were absolutely right when you told me to never stop fighting for this privilege.  I wish you had gotten to see me pregnant.  I wish that my son would’ve got the chance to meet you.  Cos while you often said that you would’ve sucked with a boy, I think you two would’ve actually had a riot together.  He’s cute Dad.  I think you would’ve loved his mischievous giggle and the gap he’s got between his top front teeth.

I find that as time passes I think of you less often.  Must be because the grief I felt at your passing is healing.  The touch point of how you left us is not as tender as it used to be.  I’m happy for that.  Maybe it’s because my life is full and busier than ever now.  The hole is filled to overflowing.  I’m happy for that too.  But I’ll hear a song or a sound that reminds me of you every so often and I find that I smile when that happens.

I know, that writing these words means nothing to you.  You are gone and getting them out is merely a form of catharsis for me.  But I wanted you to know that I’m thinking of you today and I am missing you still.  Not as much as last year granted, but you are missed.

Take care of you, Dad.

xxx

Another journey comes full circle…

I cannot be more happy to see one of my closest friend’s journey come full circle today – her precious daughter Chloe Hope was born this morning to much joy and celebration after a long journey with infertility.

Welcome to the world Chloe – you bring with you so much healing to past hurts.  May God continue to keep His hands on you and may you grow strong in Him as you grow up.

We love you so much little girl.

How to make a happy baby…

When I got home night before last, Cliff was dead keen to show me how to make a happy baby!  It works   My best is Jazz running along and tryna nibble his little toes…

Cute Overload

One of you wise souls told me via email that babies bounce back super quickly from being sick and boy were you right, Kade is back to his usual happy go lucky self and he just warms my heart to the core.  So for your viewing pleasure here is some of the cute overlaod I’ve been lucky enough to experience this past weekeend…

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Milestones

Any mother knows all about milestones.

As a first time Mom we can be a bit obsessive about these milestones.  Is he reaching them soon enough?  Why hasn’t he shown signs of that milestone?  Oh shit – he completely missed a milestone – what if he won’t “work” right now?  Most of you know the drill…  We are so proud of them when they reach those miletones that we cannot wait to show them off to the world… “smile my boy”, “clap handies, clap handies”, “wave bye bye” etc

I can tell you right now that I was not prepared the other type of milestone.  The not so nice ones.

On Tueday night I started feeling a bit off colour.  Sore achey back, super tired and just not 100% well.  I put it down to stress and made a mental note to get myself to the chiropractor for an alignment pronto (well as soon as payday hit).  By Wednesday I was feeling super shit.  Clammy, dizzy, super nauseas and the runs had hit my body.  Not pretty.  I stayed away from people at work, but stayed at work to try not give whatever I had to Kade.  Eventually I went to the doctor.  He found nothing wrong with me.  And yet I felt like death.  I got home, spent some time with my buddy boy and just before bath time he started crying uncontrollably.

After his (super short) bath I checked his temperature as he was looking very flushed – 37.6 – crap!~ After loads of crying and much heaving, m,y poor baby had a massive vommit – one that actually stole his breath and scared both him and me to death.  Cue some Calpol.  He slept for a little while but woke up crying again.  Not a happy boy.  After checking his temp literally every 30 minutes – at 23h30 when it hit a 39.2 I got Cliff out of bed and told him we needed to head to the ER.  I was not taking ANY chances.  Gave him more Calpol and off we went to the Olivedale ER.

ER doc checked his ears and throat all clear.  But when he tried to check his tum, Kade was not happy at all.  Poor baby had ended up getting my tummy bug after all.  Talk about feeling like a shitty mom!  Literally. We were told to keep him hydrated to keep the fevers under control with the Calpol (cos he was reacting to it nicely and not bringing it back up) and to expect diarea in due course.

Yesterday the fevers raged on and off and my poor child had such bad runs.  What made it worse was that I was feeling like death myself with a massive headache and major runny tum myself.  Its been a tough few days in the Young household.

What I’ve learned the last few days can be summed up as follows:

• It is possible to have a runny dump at the precise same time as your son – with him on your lap while you are on the white throne
• You can survive and still function (albeit not as effectivley) on 3 hours sleep in a 30 hour period
• Fevers and diaorea scare the crap out of me – especially when the person who is experienceing them is my child!
• Empaped kicks Calpols ass!  Empaped is my BEST friend.
• Having Kade has made me much more emotional – several times over the last few days I have found myself on the verge of hot tears
• I cannot stand seeing my baby boy look like this:

• Kids bounce back way quicker than we give them credit for.

This morning whilst he’s not quite 100% right yet, he is definitely looking better and has turned the corner.

Reaching the shitty milestones is not as much fun as reaching the cool milestones is!

ad-ven-ture/ad’venCHer/

1.  ad-ven-ture/ad’venCher/

Noun:             An unusual and exciting, typically hazardous, experience or activity.

Verb:              Engage in hazardous and exciting activity, esp the exploration of unknown territory: “they had advsentured into the forest”.

Synonyms:    noun. venture…. verb. risk – venture – hazard – jeopardize – dare - jeopard

Catching up on blogs the other day (man alive you guys write A LOT) I was reading Julia’s thoughts on her word for 2011 and her word for 2012 and I thought to myself “what an awesome idea” and promptly told her that I was going to steal her “word for the year” concept.  In the past few day’s I’ve been thinking very carefully about what word I was going to allocate to 2012.

There were many words that jumped into my mind – Grace, Thankfulness, Responsiblity, Journey, Love and so on and so forth.  But I wanted to push myself and find a word that would encompass all the other words that rose so quickly.  I think ad-ven-ture/ad’venCHer/ captures what I hope for 2012 in my and my family’s lives.

Because lets face it, life is somewhat hazardous, but also exciting and certainly unusual.

I cannot wait to follow the path that leads to further exploration of my son’s mind and development.  I cannot wait to see how he unfolds as a person under our guidance, love and teachings.  A journey which I’m sure will be coloured with love, joy, gratitude but tempered with worry, hurt and sadness.  My wish for him, is that his adventure with us as his parents is as fun and life moulding as ours will be with him.

On the work front  I hope to open my heart to new adventures.  Ones that will lead me into risk and ventures.  But hopefully ones that will result in fruits of the harvest and more time and energy to expend on the adventure of growing with my child.

I’m going to journey with my body too.  To places once traveled to but long forgotten.  Places of better health and fitness.  These are area’s of adventure with my body that I have long neglected and I can literally feel my body itching to visit these places again.

Finally an adventure of Spirit.  Of closeness with my Dad.  Of renewing my mind and spirit in Him daily.  Of focusing on the fruits He has in store for me and the fruits He has in store for others THRU me.

Like all adventures, I know there’ll be troubled waters to cross and rocky paths to navigate but I know with the correct gear and preparation, the end destination will be SO worth it.

What to say about 2011?

We’re already 5 days into 2012 and each time I sit in front of my laptop and start to put fingers to keyboard to do my 2011 round-up post, I find that words start to fail me.

Because what do I say about 2011?

Whilst the year as a whole came with many ups and downs - ups which were super high and downs which were super low, I cannot say that it was the best year of my life.  And yet the year, 2011, contained the most amazing day of my life to date.

On the 03rd of June 2011 I was blessed with the most amazing gift ever – my son Kade Ethan entered my life the way he continues to fulfill it – with wonder and surprise.  He has healed me in ways that I didn’t even realise I was broken.  He has healed my husband in ways I didn’t realise *he* was broken.  And he is a shining light  to all that share our lives.  I love him more than my heart can handle and he is teaching me to love life’s smallest treasures again.

I’ve been honored to share in the births of many other such gifts and to see the healing that they have brought to their respective families.  I’ve been blessed to share in my close friend’s pregnancy and to see the healing her pregnancy has brought her and her family.  So much joy has filled the days of 2011.

But there has also been sadness, hurt and anger.  Trials and tribulations that family and friends have had to face and conquer.  I am so proud that I am connected to a wealth of people who in the face of adversity, find the strength to let the sadness knock them down and once they’ve allowed that sadness to keep them down for long enough, to extend the middle finger and triumph over that adversity.  You know who you are, and you inspire me.

I have grown so much as a person in 2011.  I realised that I could give of myself responsibly and still be a good friend and family member.  That  allowing myself to put myself first does NOT make me a bad person.  Just the opposite in fact – it makes me a better one.  I’ve realised that letting go of toxicity is the best thing I can do for myself and for those around me.

I’ve fallen more in love with my body than I’ve been in a long time and have let go of plenty of past hurts.  I’m free-er than I used to be.  That’s not to say that I don’t still have a lot to work on cos I sure do, but I hope to continue in 2012 in the manner in which I started in 2011.  I have some goals I have set myself and I will be doing my best to achieve them.  One little step at a time.

I have high hopes for 2012, that my learning will continue as I draw closer to God and explore the structure that is my family.  Here’s to an amazing 2012 my friends.

May it bring all of you the desires of your hearts and the happiness you deserve!

Have yourself a Merry Lil’ Christmas…

It’s no secret that I love Christmas.

I love it for many reasons.  First and foremost, I love Christmas because it’s an outward showing of the love I have for my Saviour who was born into this world to die for my sins. And yes, I know he wasn’t actually born on this day but the symbolism of it holds true for me.

I love Christmas cos its a special time that I get to spend with my family.  My big, mad, crazy family.  As a Curley tradition we always used to wake up early on Christmas morning, head to church and when we got home we’d crack a bottle of bubbly, mix with OJ and toast while opening pressies.  We still do this every year.  We have a massive Christmas lunch with loads of laughing, joking and EATING and then we all sit and lie together on couches, some of us have naps, we talk, we tickle each other but most importantly we love on each other.

As Cliff and I got further and further into our infertility journey, I still loved Christmas but it started to become a time of sadness mixed with the joy for us.  We used to be reminded of the fact that we were the ones without children over and over.  And we all know “Christmas is all about the kids” right?  It became a time of year that I stopped looking forward to.  I used to head into each Christmas with the thought that next year would be our year and when it wasn’t I would spiral further into the despair…

Last Christmas I was pregnant, happily so and I was just so darn glad that I could embrace the joy that Christmas was for me again.  I had experienced my last major pregnancy bleed and my child was growing in my tummy.  I could let myself drown in the happiness of it all.  This year, I know I’m gonna have to take a trailer with to my Mom’s house to cart all the pressies home.  Cos this year, my son will be entering into the Christmas mayhem with us.  I look at him as we draw closer and closer to this special day and I fall to my knee’s with gratitude.  I cannot believe that we hit the jackpot so to speak and that we are so blessed.  I sink into my happiness like an addict sinking into a high.

But I also take a step back to think of those who are still in the trenches of infertility.  Of the joy that is robbed of them at this time of year.  My wish for all of you who are still trying to make or add to your families; is that your deepest desire’s are fulfilled in the coming year.  That next year will be a Christmas of unending joy and gratitude.

So from me and mine, to you and yours “Have yourself a Merry Lil’ Christmas”

Um….ok….

So the year is winding down and it seems that I am the only doofus still at work at this time of year, cos EVERYONE else is on holiday and I have read all the blogs on my reader, I am getting sick of Facebook and there is only SO many times one can check Twitter without getting BB thumb…

So I thought I would head on over to my blog and start cleaning it up a bit, my blog roll is a mess of note and there is no time like the present to tweak things here right?

I saw then on my dashboard a “top search term” and I quite literally choked on my tea…

“up guys see only shit and down guys see only assholes”

Um… Ok…. If you say so searcher.

Now back to my little blog clean up…

A Rose by any other name…

While I was supposed to be working today, I was catching up on some blog reading and read this post of Julia’s.

I have always loved hearing about other people’s names and how they got their names and what their family traditions are in relation to naming etc… I started typing my response to her post and when I realised I was writing one super long essay, I decided to hijack her post idea and put my response here

My mother is one of five children and all of them have second names – my Mom is Carole Lucielle – and hated the fact that all of the girls had one of their names chosen after an actress my Grandfather loved (Mom was after Lucielle Ball).  As a result of this neither my sister or I have second names.  I always wanted my second name to be Elizabeth and often used to tell people it was my second name

My father had many names – he was Peter John Biller Michael Curley – WHAT A MOUTHFULL!

Cliff is officially Clifford Mark and both he and his brother have traditional names and second names…

When we got married I changed my surname to a double barrel of my maiden name and my married name – Curley-Young – not becuase I’m this great feminist or anything, but simply because I felt that my family was so much a part of me and I couldn’t bear to part with my unusual surname…

Through our years of infertility I would often see names that I liked and said that I would name my kids those names one day… as we battled more and more to conceive I stopped doing that and would secretly seethe when friends and family “stole” the names I had planned to use one day… What a chop I was!

Before I conceived I had a friend who told me one day she couldn’t wait for the day when we told her we would be having a little Clam of our own.  I was like what?  And she said ”yep a little bit of CLiff and a little bit of sAM, your CLAM”…  Well we all know that the nickname stuck!  Cliff and I did not come to Kade’s name easily.  Mostly because my dear husband would not be serious enough to actually discuss baby names most of the time.  He kept on saying “lets name him Bob” or “how about Tard?” I was super prepared.  I had a few baby name books and trolled website after website looking at boys names that I liked.  But nothing ever really “fit”… The one constant name that we both liked right away was Ethan.  But we both also realised that Ethan was being used a lot at the time and that we wanted our son to have a name that was different.  A name that was as special as he was to us.  I was about 36 weeks along and we still had not offically decided on his name.  I read a blog post and the woman who wrote the post mentioned a name that meant “defender of the faith” and it just clicked.  My son that was growing in my womb had helped defend MY faith and I hope that our testimony helps to defend others faith.  I told Cliff about it and he fell in love with it as well and that is how we got to Kade Ethan.

We realised though that his initials would end up being KEY and I was concerned about that until my husband (bless his heart) said the most endearing thing he’s ever said in relation to naming our son – he told me that it was appropriate cos Kade was the KEY to our hearts.

And that is my long winded story of names!