"Once your consciousness has been raised, it cannot be lowered"

My parenting journey, our home educating family and some other stuff here and there....


Saturday 25 April 2009

Upset

If EC is all about honouring communication, I am definitely still practising EC, despite having missed catching almost every single poo and wee for over a week now!

Poor M has had some vile tummy upset. The urge to poo kept taking him by surprise- a little and often, messy affair.  I quickly decided not to let him roam around with a nakey bum! I feel like I've washed more nappies in the last week than I have in the whole time since Esme was born! Good job we've had lovely weather and they've all been drying on the line. How on earth do people do full time nappying? I feel so awful scraping poo off his bum, and cleaning out the dirty nappies is not much fun either. 

Anyway, the tummy upset seems to have subsided but he flat refuses to go anywhere near his bucket now. I had been hoping we could stop using it and get him on a pot/the loo/something else: "So!" think I, optimistically, "this is an opportunity for change". 

However, M's choice of "something else" turns out to be the floor. He is quite clear that he doesn't want to be held, put on a potty, helped, moved or interfered with at all. Hence he has been wetting and pooing in his pants a lot, which he isn't that happy about either. If I take off his pants, he will happily "go" anywhere and everywhere, though he is smart enough to move away from it most of the time. In the Continuum Concept Jean Leidloff says the Yequana simply move the children out of the hut if they "sully" (what a great word!) the floor. Outside is not the most practical place to teach M to go, so I've just been showing him the potty and telling him that's "the place". 

Even though he's not wanting to sit for me, he does still grunt and shout for his nappy to come off when he needs to go, a small mercy. But I can't just let him crap on the floor everywhere. Or can I?....Tonight I trialled containing him in the bathroom, just letting him go where he wanted and picking up the poo and cleaning and disinfecting as he moved about....UGH. He seemed happy with this arrangement, but I am very far from pleased! Definitely not a solution for me. 

Ah, I really, really, really, really, really hope this passes soon. Bring on the next phase, PLEASE!
I suppose this is all my fault for saying I had nothing to write about....... 

Funny how they test us, i was just thinking how it might actually be getting a bit easier at long last.

Thursday 16 April 2009

Energy

My enthusiasm for writing about EC is waning slightly. I feel the need to digress and muse on other things. Do I start another blog or just diversify my topics here? I don't know.... 

Back to (practical!) EC: it's going OK. not much more to say really. Actually, I think our communication is not quite tip top mostly due to my tiredness and general preoccupation with other things, mainly keeping up with Esme and my thoughts. On a day to day level I don't really register how tired I am, but the broken nights are definitely taking their toll. I find myself slipping into habitual grumpiness and it's been a real struggle to stay present lately. I can't help feeling a good night's sleep would help ;)

Esme is really growing up fast, it's scaring me. It's much more interesting than EC for me at the moment too. She lives in role play land and gets *very* upset if I get her persona mixed up, even more so if other people won't use her "real" (pretend) name. She has a talent for imitation, and we have a variety of accents being used daily, current favourites are her take on American and broad Lancashire. It makes her hollering slightly more amusing when it's delivered with Oscar-winning panache!

Lots going on in my head, I really haven't got the mental capacity to cope with all the thoughts zipping around right now! The best idea I've had is to resurrect my yoga practice and find some peace and stillness up there. I just have to do it now! I must have some energy stored somewhere to help me kick the lethargy. 

Well that's a bit random but never mind, that's the way life is sometimes innit?