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Eloise's Diary Entries Diary Navigation: Choose A Diary Entry -------------------- Latest Entry: 12/2/99 -------------------- 11/28/99 11/24/99 11/20/99 11/17/99 11/10/99 11/3/99 10/26/99 10/20/99 10/13/99 10/6/99 10/4/99 9/28/99 9/15/99 9/9/99 9/2/99 8/26/99 8/19/99 8/5/99 7/30/99 7/16/99 7/6/99 5/14/99 5/14/99 5/7/99 4/27/99 4/15/99 4/8/99 3/25/99 3/20/99 3/19/99 3/18/99 3/12/99 3/9/99 3/4/99 -------------------- Eloise's Introduction

October 20, 1999

35 weeks; 5 weeks to go!!

Well, you'd imagine with only five short weeks (more or less) to go that I'd be getting nervous, or excited, or that this whole baby-thing would be becoming real to me. WELL, IT ISN'T! It's very strange, but it doesn't feel real at all. I'm not nervous at all (which seems really suspicious to me), and I'm not even particularly excited yet (oh, well, maybe a little). Half the time I still can't actually believe there is a little baby in my big, round-as-a-bun belly -- despite being rather heartily poked and jabbed and prodded from little fists and hands and feet within. I try and imagine it, try and believe it, but it's just too unreal. And the birth thing still feels like it's ages away. I can't believe it could all happen in five short weeks. It really, really, doesn't feel like it will. I haven't had any contractions, I don't even really know what a Braxton-Hicks contraction is, or feels like, so I guess maybe I haven't even had one of them yet!!

As you can see I'm trying really hard to get the reality of the situation TO SINK IN!! Maybe it's something about pregnancy hormones -- but I'm just rolling along, my head in a foggy cloud, not really thinking concretely about anything much. And I still haven't had any baby dreams or birth dreams or anything. When is my body, my mind, my subconscious, going to start gearing up for the mammoth event ahead of me?? When??????????

Anyway, on another front I must say that last week's entry about 'the family bed' drew a lot of responses on my mail board. Thanks to everyone for sharing your experiences, ideas, information. Just a note to clarify a few of the safety issues that were raised.

• If you're thinking of sharing your bed with your baby you need to have: a firm, preferably hard mattress; minimal blankets, pillows and bedding; and ideally have the bed up against the wall with the baby sleeping between mother and the wall. This minimises danger of baby suffocating on loose bedding or falling out of the bed.
• You can't ever share the bed with baby if either parent has been drinking, or taking any type of drugs -- as lowered awareness puts the baby at risk of being squashed or rolled onto.
• And one idea might be to have the baby in a baby sleeping-bag rather than under any of your blankets. That way the baby has it's own space, and there is a boundary between the baby and other bedding. The sleeping bag needs to be up very high on the bed -- between mum's and dad's heads/pillows (pillows need to be flat and pushed to the sides of the bed or preferably none at all.) That way baby can't get lost under the covers or squashed between adult bodies (which could overheat baby). Baby should be sleeping up around mum's and dad's head all the time -- and yes, it's quite possible you'll wake up with feet in your face!!

So, sleeping with baby requires attention to a few safety details.

Apart from that I've not much to report. Oh, except JK and I went shopping and bought the bubby its first Christmas present. It's a huge old-fashioned teddy bear with moveable arms and legs. (It'll be bigger than the baby for the first year or so). It's named Benjamin Beardsley Bear and it's a classic old-English bear with yellow-gold fur. (I can just imagine the glorious tea parties he will preside over in years to come.) It was a family tradition in my family that each child got their first teddy bear for their first birthday. I'm changing the tradition a little bit so that each of our children (fingers crossed there'll be more than one) will get their first (and only, hopefully) teddy on their first Christmas. It's made me very excited about setting up new traditions for my children. It gives me enormous pleasure to think about how I can make their childhoods magical and imaginative, and full of special traditions and rituals. I'm a huge sucker for Christmas and Easter and Birthday traditions.

So on that happy note I'll sign off.

Best wishes to all,

Eloise