Baby

As long it it’s healthy?

21/06/2015 by MrsSavageAngel Leave a Comment

Hands up any of you who, when pregnant were asked “what are you hoping for, boy or girl?”. It’s a pretty regular question and one I know I was asked myself. I mean it’s also a pretty rubbish question. If anyone asked Ben while I was pregnant, what he was hoping for, he’d always say ‘errr.. a baby’. But in reality, no matter how daft, it’s probably a question we’ve asked expectant mothers ourselves.

So, hands up who answered “I don’t care”? And keep your hand up if you added the caveat, “as long as it’s healthy”? Quite a few of you I see.

I didn’t. Well not quite. I knew, knew, knew I wanted a boy. I was actually quite petrified at the thought of having a girl. Girls are so, well, difficult. Boys, much simpler. And I wasn’t shy about telling the truth. When I found out, quite late on, we were indeed having a boy, I couldn’t have been any happier. But for all my honesty, I know I also used the caveat “as long as they’re healthy”.

What a stupid thing to say.

Was I really saying I wouldn’t love my child if they weren’t healthy? And what did I mean by healthy anyway? It’s such an broad sweeping and vague term. Did I in fact mean, “as long as they’re normal”. I’m horrified to think back to the ignorant me and wonder whether this is the case, but I think it is. I want to scream at her and say don’t be so bloody arrogant and oh by the way, you should know this right now THERE IS NO NORMAL.

So yeah, I got what I asked for. I wanted a boy. I got a boy. And boys are not simple. They are just as complex and difficult and hard work as girls. And I wanted him to be ‘healthy’ and physically he is. I mean he really is. He’s never had antibiotics in his life, not because I don’t agree with them, just he’s never needed them. He gets the occasional cold and has had D&V maybe two or three times in his life. Physically my little dude is an ox. But ‘normal’?

Oscar’s autism is classed as a disability. I have a disabled son. This is not what I hoped for. This is not what I wanted all those years ago when I was flippantly remarking on the life of a child yet to be born. No, I think it’s fair to say, I am not in a place yet where I can see his autism as a gift or a positive in our lives. I also think it’s safe to say if I was asked if I wanted to give his autism back, I would. It’s hard. Some days too hard to explain. But if someone could have told me, when he was born, that this is who he is, would I have done anything differently? Would I have loved him any less, despite him not being the paragon of “normal child” I had held in my head for the previous nine months (and, let’s be honest, beyond)?

I didn’t want this for my son. I didn’t want autism to ever be a part of my life. But it is. And I love him no more or less than I would have done with or without it. To say you don’t care what you have as long as it’s healthy implies you will only love a child if it meets your expectations. I’m pretty sure that that’s bull shit. I’m pretty sure you’d love you child regardless. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe that’s just me. But maybe we need to stop using such thoughtless phrases, from some kind of maternity script. Maybe we could just change the lines a little.

Q: What are you hoping to have, boy or girl?

A: My baby

6 weeks on – our ASD journey

27/04/2015 by MrsSavageAngel Leave a Comment

So, it’s been 6 weeks since we had the meeting where it was agreed my gorgeous, floppy haired baby was just a little different from the other children. 6 weeks since I wept on my husband in a hospital corridor. 6 weeks since we felt one weight lifted and another replace it. 6 weeks since Oscar was diagnosed as “autistic”.

We’re getting on pretty well I think. Oscar’s speech gets better every week. Every day brings new words, new phrases, something else to amaze and baffle me. Three weeks ago, out of the blue, he started to say “Thank You” whenever you give him something or do something for him. Sometimes it’s even “Thank you mom mom”. He’ll even point it out if you don’t say ‘thank you’ when someone gives something to you! He can’t speak but suddenly he’s the politeness police? What the heck? And I say ‘heck’ because that’s another things he’s started doing, repeating the words you really don’t want him too! Like “Oh My God!”. And “Balls!” And the “f” word you never want them to say in front of their preschool teacher! It’s not that I swear all the time, but the fact that I didn’t have to worry about him repeating back what I said, meant I didn’t think to moderate my language ages ago. Like my friends did. Ahh well! At least it means he’s taking it in I guess? Sigh!

His behaviour is getting better and better too. His eye contact has gone from shaky to amazing in just four small months. He approaches other children now, be it friends in the garden, those at nursery or strangers in the park. He’s learnt a simple “Hello” opens all sorts of doors, particularly games of chase. There’s still nothing Oscar loves more than running around, but he’s now allowing other children to get in on the act. Even more amazingly he’s started to play games initiated by other children. Slowly slowly catchy monkey as they say, but last week he was approached at preschool, by a little girl, asked to play a game and he did. I think his TA was as shocked as I was when she told me.

Don’t get me wrong he still gets upset about things. Frustration is clear on his beautiful little face when he can’t get what he wants or do what he wants. But now he looks at me while he cries. And his bottom lip wobbles. He rarely hits himself and the anger goes as quickly as it came. These are tantrums of a toddler. We rarely see the blind panic of a melt down that can take over a hour to calm any more. But when we do, we’re coping with them better. Staying calmer, giving him that safe place he needs. We’re also a lot better at avoiding situations that could push him to that place beyond. We try not to make a big deal about it and that’s helping I think. For example, some birthday parties work for us, others (the sit down and watch kind) don’t. Yet. Give him time.

Yeah all in all, he’s progressing brilliantly. And yet as he gets easier, the stress of him is replaced by the stress of what his diagnosis brings with it. A hundred forms to fill in, a thousand things to read, new people every week, a new language (mainly made up of acronyms), advice, process, meetings. Getting everything set up to support my little guy, comes at a human cost. Me. I tell you what, it’s lucky I was an Account Manager for five years. Little else could have prepared me so well to deal with so many agencies all at once. Plate spinner extrodinaire that’s me. Only this time I’m not getting paid for it. But on the plus side neither do I have to work in Hoxton Square with all the hipsters, so you know, swings and roundabouts 😉 .

I’m not trying to brag here, but I feel like I need to keep some kind of record of the journey, of his milestones that would mean so little to anyone else. Heck ( 😉 ) who am I kidding, yes I am bragging. I’m so ridiculously proud of my baby and how he’s coming on that it’s worth all the forms and all the meetings and all the stress.

Last week someone told me what a polite little boy I had, after he said Hello, Please, Thank You and Goodbye, all perfectly and all in the right place. I didn’t cry, because seeing me sad upsets him, but I was crying inside.

Crying with happiness.

...handsome boy. — …handsome little boy.

Wicked Wednesdays 15th April 2015

15/04/2015 by MrsSavageAngel Leave a Comment

We love the warmer weather in our house. I’m definitely a bare foot person and I think Oscar’s taking after me.

Bare foot, yes, but bare everything else? I take his jeans off to change him and he’s out the door.

This is how I found him in the garden.

Such an exhibitionist!

Although that’s more likely to come from his father 😉

I’m joining in the wonderfully wicked Brummymummyof2‘s link up #WickedWednesdays

Happy Wednesday!

Birthday Party at The Hen House, Haslemere

13/04/2015 by MrsSavageAngel Leave a Comment

What a couple of weeks it’s been. We’ve had an awesome Easter, with fabulous weather, amazing days out, lots of fun and lots of love. The best thing by far about the Easter Holidays though has to be Oscar’s 3rd Birthday party. We chose The Hen House in Haslemere as the venue for his party months ago, and you can read about why here. I have to say in the run up to his birthday, I was much more excited than he was. I just knew how much fun he was going to have and that made me really happy.

On the day, I had my hair cut in the morning, leaving Oscar at home with Ben. Seriously you’d have thought it was me having the party, I was so excited (although that could have been the giddiness I always get when I spend time alone!) As we’d chosen exclusive use of The Hen House, we arrived at 2.30pm, just as they were closing to the public. We were immediately made to feel welcome as the staff busied around cleaning up, tidying the soft play and rearranging the tables. I was asked how I wanted the tables laid out and as I wanted as much floor space as possible, the tables were laid out in two long lines. This gave plenty of seating, but also tonnes of milling/running around (depending on your age I guess) space. We didn’t have to arrange any extra decoration, but as I’d decided on a loose Farmyard theme, I had ordered 20 cow print helium balloons, from a local party shop who delivered them to The Hen House for us. The most I had to do in terms of preparation of the venue on the day, was tie weights to the balloons, place them ~~artfully~~ strategically round the floor and fill some bowls with the M&Ms and Haribo I’d bought with me. Job done!

Guests started to arrive bang on 3pm. We’d decided to take full advantage of the Hen House’s licence and bought prosecco and larger for our adult guests. To be honest I wasn’t sure how this would go down. Would people be driving? Would people think it was weird to drink at a children’s party? Well, I can categorically tell you it went down a storm! I had people tell me this was definitely the way ahead in children’s parties and the prosecco went down so well, one of the staff had to run out and grab us some more bottles. All before anyone realised we were running low though! Smooth!

It was a prosecco and Haribo kinda party

The kids had an absolute BLAST! I have never seen Oscar play for so long and so hard and sooooooo well with everyone there. He could run, he could throw himself down the slide, he laughed. Some of the dad’s got well and truly roped into playing with the children and Ben got adopted by our friend’s daughter, Charlotte, for the day. She wouldn’t let him leave her side. It was the sweetest thing.

10845690_10153800940500616_497370237631973743_o — Note the Daddy at the top of the slide. To be fair I did find a group of them hiding up there later on!

20150404_142850178_iOS — Oscar and his buddy Cecily playing and laughing

Oscar taking a rare moment of rest on the light up disco floor. I chose the "light up when you step on it" setting and the kids loved it! — Oscar taking a rare moment of rest on the light up disco floor. I chose the “light up when you step on it” setting and the kids loved it!

Because the number of children was a very manageable ten (plus two babies), there was plenty of space and fun to be had without a single altercation happening. Don’t get me wrong, we could have had more (up to 30 at an exclusive party), but I felt for Oscar (and for me to be fair) ten was plenty and I think I was right. It meant the adults (or at least those who weren’t being held prisoner at the top of the slide 😉 ) got to well and truly relax. It’s also a venue that really understands little people, meaning we were able to feel relaxed about their safety. This allowed us to have a good old catch up and it really did feel as much as a party for us as it was for them. The music was a playlist I’d put together myself and played through The Hen House computer (they did offer to make one for me, but I have a very specific taste in cheesy music and it was best for me to do it myself 😉 ). I got to talk to friends I hadn’t seen in weeks and introduce friends from different areas of my life to one another. This was fab and some great conversations were had. All while the children played happily and safely.

There were children at the party - honest! — There were children at the party – honest!

The children played until they were red in the face (or was that just my son?). The food was bought out around 4ish and the children all sat to a set table. I was a bit concerned whether Oscar would want to join in with this (who’d want to eat where there’s soft play to be throwing your little body down?) But sit he did! The party package comes with food included and we had all the usual suspects of freshly made sandwiches (for which I was able to chose three different fillings), sausage rolls, crisps and vegetable sticks. When we booked the party I’d explained to Henri, the owner, that Oscar is eating a gluten free diet at the moment. She wasn’t fazed in the slightest and couldn’t have been more accommodating. Some of the sandwiches were made using (good) gluten free bread and despite my suggestion that we swap sausage rolls for plain GF sausages, Henri insisted on making her own delicious GF sausage rolls for everyone! The crisps and snacks were all corn or potato based (as opposed to wheat based Cheddars or similar). The children took a break from wearing themselves out and tucked in happily. And there was plenty enough for the toddlers to eat their fill and for the parents to grab a bite too.

All the children sat and tucked in happily

Yup thats my boy sitting with the other children and eating. Happy Mummy Moment! — Yup that’s my boy sitting with the other children and eating. Happy Mummy Moment!

Myred faced boy. I swear the wine is not his! — My red faced boy. I swear the wine is not his!

The absolute icing on the proverbial cake was in fact the cake. Or more to the point the cake/candle blowing moment. Instead of one large birthday cake, Hen had made Oscar a pile of his favourite GF Brownies (the ones he badgers me for every time we visit The Hen House). The staff asked if I would like to hold the cake, while every one sang Happy Birthday, which was a lovely touch. He’s not really done the whole blowing candles thing before and despite practising at home for days before (so he knew what to do), I was a little nervous as to how he’d react. So Ben held Oscar and I held the cake(s). Everyone sang to him and he took it all his stride, looking to me for assurance when the time came to blow. It was a perfect, perfect moment! We then handed round the gorgeous Brownies and every one was taken or devoured!

The children started to leave around 5, happy and tired, with a cow print balloon in one hand and a farm themed party bag in the other. I had real fun putting the party bags together and although The Hen House did offer to do them for me, I’m glad I did my own. They had a Milky Bar Cow, a farm animal toy, a farmer’s neckerchief/bandana and a packet of seeds for them to plant and grow. This all came in a brown paper bag, with a farm animal mask to decorate. Putting the fun back into functional, that’s me!

We had so many compliments on the way out. The children all told us how much fun they’d had and the parents did the same. It was such an amazing feeling. We got to take the credit for the most amazing party, when really, we did so little towards it. The staff at The Hen House, did everything and made the whole day go without a single hitch. We didn’t even have to tidy up! We just packed up his pressies, grabbed the remaining balloons and left! Bliss.

We have had such a bumpy few months recently, what with Oscar’s ASD diagnosis and the stress that has put us under as a family. But we were able to give our special little guy the most amazing birthday party, exactly as he needed it, to have as much fun as is humanly possible for any three year old to have.

And for that, I can’t thank The Hen House enough.

We’d like to thank Henri and everyone at The Hen House for their amazing hospitality and generosity in hosting Oscar’s birthday for us. You can find out more about hiring the venue, either exclusively or non exclusively, on their website www.thehen-house.com.

I was not paid to write this review and as always all opinions are my own.

Its all in the planning

24/03/2015 by MrsSavageAngel Leave a Comment

I can’t believe the end of March is fast rolling round. I’m finally starting to get everything in place for Oscar’s birthday, which is lucky, as its on 2nd April. It might not have been, had the induction worked when it started three days earlier, and I still swear he hung on in there for fear of being born an April Fool, but there you go.

His actual birthday is on the Thursday and Ben has taken the day off work. We like to do something just the three of us on his birthday, only I was struggling to think what to do this year. His birthday falls in the first week of the Easter hols and I knew everywhere, even those places he would enjoy and could probably cope with, would be heaving. So we’re taking a leap and going on our first outing to a SEN play facility, the Thames Valley Adventure Playground. I read about it on someone else’s blog and even though it’s an hour away, I knew immediately that I wanted to take him. I’ll write more about our visit when we’ve been, but I’m super excited for him and it’s an adventure for us as a newly diagnosed SEN family. Fingers crossed!

We booked his party for the following Saturday a while ago now and while he doesn’t really understand what’s going to happen yet, we are so excited that we have the exclusive use of our local soft play cafe The Hen House in Haslemere. My plan is to move as many tables and chairs to the side as possible, giving the children as much floor space to charge around in as I can. Other than that, the wonderful team at The Hen House have the entertainment, the food and the drink covered. Which has kind of left me to enjoy planning the little details. Such as what he’s going to wear. As it’s a soft play party there’s little point him getting dressed up too smartly on the day. However I have bought him this Boden t-shirt, a nod to the farm animal theme. I love it.

Other than that, the guests have been invited and most but not all can make it. But then that’s what happens when you book a party both on Easter weekend AND on the day of another boy’s birthday! I completely forgot about it being Rudy’s birthday until the moment I went to tell his mum about the party. Honestly, how could I forget? We were in beds opposite each other in the hospital! Ahh well it was going to happen sooner or later I guess and hopefully we’ll get to celebrate with them another day.

The invites themselves were something of a mission. Once I decided on a farm theme, I saw some beautiful barn invites on Pinterest and was convinced, for weeks, that I was going to make some just like it. Make. Including cutting stuff out and sticking stuff on. It was a lovely thought and all that but seriously? I barely have the time to blow my nose most days! So not wanting to be defeated entirely, I ordered some personalised printables from Etsy (several invitees told me how much they loved them and I think I could have passed them off as my own creation, but I just cant lie that well!) I also bought card to print them out on, wanting ever so much to have physical printed invites. What a palaver! The card wouldn’t go through the printer and when it did the colour wasn’t as I’d hoped. In the end I emailed the invite round and do you know what? I have no idea why I didn’t just do that in the first place. Physical invites are great for a child to take into school and hand out, but really, when it’s going straight the parent, email invites are the way ahead.

As the party’s taking place in the highly decorated Hen House, decorations weren’t really the necessity they might be if I’d been hosting at home. However, in keeping with the theme, and because I have yet to find a child who doesn’t adore them, I have ordered helium filled balloons, in a black and white cow print. My plan is to have them float around the place with strings long enough to reach up and grab. At the end of the party there’ll be a balloon for every child, and hopefully a few for Oscar to take home too!

Then there’s the party bags. I’ve had a bit of a downer on party bags in the past, primarily because they always seem to be filled with sugar and plastic. Now I’m not saying the boy doesn’t love sugar and plastic, but I wanted to see if I couldn’t pull together a favour bag that carried on the theme, but also had fun and interest for the children. I think I’m getting there, having managed to source plain brown paper lunch style bags from pipii.co.uk. Everything going in it has a nod to the farming and farm theme. There is some sugar, but also some fun and I hope some interest. I just need to figure out if I’m going to decorate the bags somehow. I want to. I really want to! But chances are I won’t and I’ll call it minimalist instead. Ahh well!

Which just about covers everything a three year old could want for their birthday.

What?

A present?

Ahh jeez!