Doctors

After living here for 20 months, I finally moved my ass and went to the gynae. My MIL helped me make an appointment 2 months earlier (yes, it takes 2-3 months waiting time for an appointment with gynaecologists or dermatologists here as there are so few of them) with Dr.Netter and went with me to my first appointment. Dr. Netter is a soft spoken, gentle woman and by far the best gynae I've ever been to as there was no pain, no discomfort and no bleeding right after!

She also sent me for a blood test after I told her about my monthly problems and a good thing too, as the blood test results showed me to be severely anaemic (3 out of 20). When I got my test results and my MIL saw it she insisted I go see our family doctor immediately. As usual I am reluctant as the wait at the clinic can take hours, but when I finally did, the doctor gave me a thorough check up and kept asking me if I had heart pains or chest pains. I didn't understand the significance of that or of all the fuss the doctors made over the blood test but after reading about severe anaemia on the internet I now know that as the red blood cells carry oxygen to our organs, lack of red blood cells mean lack of oxygen and that may cause one organ or more to be deprived of the much needed oxygen.

Dr. Netter called me to see her urgently too when she got the results and kept asking me if I was tired or have any difficulty breathing. She insists that anytime I am feeling tired I must call her. I tried to explain that I have had anaemia for many years now and am surprised by all the fuss; and she explained that I am at borderline needing transfusion, thus all the urgency.

Both doctors have now put me on medications which I must take 3 times a day, and I have another blood test coming up in a month.

This morning, I left Lucas in school early as I had an appointment for a mammogram. I was prepared to wait, with my Ipod and a book but to my surprise, the technician called me in at 8.15 am sharp. It was a painful experience - I was joking with my friend Cathy just last week as she told me that she hates going for mammograms as they are so painful and I remember saying to her, well, I wouldn't have that problem cos I am not a D cup like her. But fricking hell, it was painful for me too! I am just glad I only need to do this every 2 years.

Brissy

My thoughts and prayers are with my childhood friends and family up in Brissy as the rain and flooding continue in Queensland.

Take a look at all the videos on here, which are updated hourly on the horrendous floods:

http://floods.videohq.tv/

Happy New Year!

Lucas has crossed many milestones since I last blogged. Its amazing how fast he's growing; its almost as if he is trying his darnest to catch up!

Firstly, he is now fully toilet trained - yay!!!! It was by accident that he is now doing both no.1 and no.2 in the toilet. The NY weekend was a long one and no shops were open ( Fred drove around for an hour looking for one...) and we'd run out of diapers. So we decided - this is it; Lucas will just have to learn to sleep without a diaper. On the first night, before he went to sleep, I reminded him repeatedly that he will no longer have a diaper, so if he needs to pee, he will wake up to go to the toilet. And Voila! like magic, he woke up twice that night and the bed was dry!

However, the next 2 nights he didn't manage to get up on time, and I've had to change him but not the beddings. And for the last 2 nights, he goes to the toilet before he gets to bed, and sleeps through the night!

He also caught up very fast when he wanted to do his ka-ka and didn't have a diaper. I had to bribe him at first but now, he's going to the toilet like a pro!

He's so cute, when he does the 'drop' he says "very good! Bravo!" and then he gets up, points to the toilet and says "mama! chocolat!" (LOLS!!!!!)

Lucas has also started spending all day in school, eating (yes, eating!!!!) in the canteen with his friends. He is also starting to speak in french and loves talking on the telephone.

My fearless little boy is no longer fearless - he is scared of the dark; and when he gets up onto the playgym and climbs too high, he is scared and doesn't know how to get down.

He is into smurfs and robots, he has a collection of both toys. He loves watching and reading anything with robots in them. And his appetite has improved, though he is still not eating his veges.

Lucas is still asking for Santa Claus and presents, even though Christmas is over - somehow he still doesn't understand (or he refuses to understand) that Santa only comes once a year... He wakes me up every morning asking to open presents from Santa....