White bread.

I've been avoiding acknowledging its possibility for approximately the last 2 years. It's always been in the back of my mind, well at least for the last 15 or so years, but as I had no symptoms I realy didn't think it was likely. But these holidays, even though the Possum is still waking once a night I've been getting quite a lot of sleep. And sunshine. And exercise (lots of exercise). And yet I still feel tired. Slightly "off".

Part of that, I reasoned, was because I've been enjoying slothing around in between gym sessions. Baking and eating and consuming far too much cheese. And if I felt a little bit crampy, a little bit bloated, then maybe the occasional drinks I've been having will be contributing.

But the tiredness can't really be fobbed off that way. I know I have a massive sleep debt. I know that the Possum means that I don't get to entirely regulate my own sleep cycles, but it's more than that.

Part of it is assuredly my anxiety at the moment, which, as my fingernails can attest, has been rampant. But that's settling down. I am feeling more human. I am laughing a lot more and more easily. I am finding all the good things in my existence instead of pining after the things I can't have, which I have found do not (obviously) contribute to a sense of well-being.

But again, it's more than that.

My grandmother, who I don't mention enough considering her importance in my life, was an enigmatic, energetic, mentally sparkling woman. She was a ferocious competitor in board games and at cards and was not the sort of benevolent granny who "let you win". If you won against her it was a triumph to remember through the ages. Thanks to her no-one I know will play cards against me, having inherited that sharp and canny way of bamboozling opponents. But no win was as sweet as laying down Canasta against Nana. In fact, I can remember her voice clearly, in one phrase that se used to use while playing my Dad (perhaps the only person on the planet I know who is more competitive than me) at Scrabble.

She was a painter and artist. She especially liked painting porcelain and scattered through the family are her gifts of hand painted plates, porcelain dolls and Victorian jewellery boxes and powder boxes. She crocheted and knitted like a demon also, fingers always busy, never one to sit still. She had a ferocious determination to grow begonias and fuschias and battled against the soil that she insisted on growing them in until they flowered.

I still have a tin of her pencils and paint brushes in the top of my wardrobe. It smells slightly of cedar, slightly of cinnamon and completely of a scent that belonged only to her. A scent that recalls sitting in her rocking chair, listening to her berate the Australian cricket team and brand them all cheats and poor sports as her fingers moved with lightning speed, hooking wool through loops that she didn't even look at to create.

To say that I loved her is woefully inadequate. To say that she was my mentor, guardian and the person who understood me more fully than any other on the planet doesn' come close. There is a spark of recognition amongst the race that knows Joseph, that is unable to be fabricated. It's either there or it isn't. And we were definitely of the same race.

Family was the most important thing in her life. Children and babies and adults coming together to celebrate noisily was a faithful part of my childhood. And at everyone of these gatherings she'd be in the centre, with al of us orbiting around her, drawn in by her remarkable gravity and presence. Sitting around the outdoor tables at Christmas, plates groaning with food, Aunty Gail's slice sitting in tupperware waiting and Aunty Sue's cheesecake beckoning. Rum balls in the centre, all the flavours of Christmas that as soon as they spread on my tongue even now recall that pure joy.

Nana always made her own special food for these occasions too, funny salads and boiled potatoes and other good things. Things that, I realise only now, didn't contain wheat. Because Nana had coeliac disease. A disease that seemed more a nuisance than anything else. It meant that she would only occasionally sneak a rumball. Or a piece of cake. Never bread, because 15 years ago there really wasn't the variety of gluten free anything tat there is now. She was pretty good with managing it. I'm not sure when or how she was diagnosed, I never thougt to ask. Even wen she was diagnosed with the lymphoma that is associated with autoimmune diseases it didn't occur to me, being as I was only 18 and didn't really have a clue what any of it meant anyway.

Until she died. Horribly. 3 months later. I couldn't get enough of information about cancer, lymphoma, chemotherapy and treatments. I researched biology and chemistry in my spare time, wanting to know what it meant. Trying to understand. A path that eventually lead to me sitting the GAMSAT exam and entering medical school. A path that caused me to give Bingley a chance and to start a family of my own. A path that lead me to sitting here, in my little house with 3 children, a husband and a whole bunch of letters after my name.

But it was trying to understand her and how we could have somehow staved off her death that was the real motivator. One of those useless magical thinking traps that we all perhaps enter into when faced with things that we just don't want to deal with.

A few years after she died my sister was diagnosed with coeliac disease. And my two Aunts, who stopped making cheesecake and chocolate caramel slice, were diagnosed too. But with only 1 first degree relative, a couple of second degree relatives and no symptoms I never really considered it.

Then my Dad, who has given blood voluntarily over 250 times was rejected because his blood count was a bit off. So he went off to get investigated and words like bowel cancer were thrown into the "have to exclude" mix, so that we were relieved when we found out it was "only" coeliac disease.

And so now I have 2 first degree relatives, 3 second degree relatives and I am symptomatic. I am not ready to be tested though. I love wheat. I love dense Italian bread. I love lighter, crusty French bread. I love baking. I love kneading dough. I adore pasta and noodles. And did you know gluten is in barley and rye? And possibly oats? Or that half of the thickeners, sugars and syrups in any sort of processed food are derived from wheat?

I knew that, but today, in an effort to just see how I go with a low gluten diet I actually considered all the things I can't have. As someone who primarily eats meat, fruit and vegetables (and the cheese foodgroup), it's not such a shock to the system, but almost ALL the convenience foods are out. No quick sandwich for lunch. No cereal for breakfast (unless it's the prohibitively expensive, cardboard flavoured gluten free variety). No muesli bars. No porridge for breakfast. No up and go when I'm too rushed to make a proper breakfast. No biscuits (not that this is a great loss) or cake.

And of course, after 3 days of eating low/no gluten all I want is bread. I want a baguette to eat on its own with butter. I want cake and biscuits even though I don't normally eat it. I want some dense, grainy bread that crunches between my teeth. I even looked at a bag of jubes (even though the last time I bought a bag of lollies was for the Elfling's birthday party) in the Supermarket today.

Denial's a powerful thing, and if this experiment leads me to further testing I guess I will have to unOstrich a little. But right now I can't bear to think of never again being able to have a guilt free bowl of penne with home made pesto. Or being able to roll out my own ravioli.

But every time this week I've thought of it, and considered abandoning it al for denial, I've thought of the grief of losing someone who meant more to me than all the chocolate cake in the world and eat my banana chips instead. Because what I want most out of life is to be like her. To have meant so much, to so many people not through what she did, but because of who she was.

Donna's Topic

Why Jenn wants to be a doctor...

Hmm, good question. Now to come up with an interesting way to answer... basically, in a nutshell I fell into it. Which is not an interesting answer, and I wish I could say it was my lifelong dream. But it isn't. My lifelong dream involves living in Southern Spain perhaps, painting in a sundrenched stone walled studio with a hammock off the side for much lazing and not much working. Maybe wandering down to the vineyards occasionally to check the sugar content of my grapes and planning my next sojourn through Provence and getting round and ruddy off wine and cheese. Or that's the dream du jour.

Through primary school and highschool I had very flighty dreams. Mathematician, physicist, astronomer, archaeologist, research scientist, interpreter, author. They all had favour with me for a decent period of time, and I still secretly want to be all of the above. So come the end of highschool when we had to put in preferences for uni, we all had to trudge up to the Careers Counsellor and tell him what we were hoping to do, and whether our OPs would match up. And if we were still having difficulty deciding - fill in this questionnaire and it will supposedly spit out your dream career.

And in my interview with the careers counsellor, he looked at my OP prediction (1-3) and said "well getting in is not going to be a problem... what do you want to do?". And my response? "I have no [freaking] idea". I had one course that I was going to apply for, and that was Arts/Science dual degree at uni, precisely because I had no other direction. Arts/Science would allow me to do a bit of everything. The test thing that would supposedly answer all my floundering questions was useless - about the only thing it didn't recommend as a career was hospitality. Though I still scored OK there. The career dude was very unhappy with me applying for only one course - you're allowed to put up to 6 preferences, but being as the required OP for my course was an 8 and that I could have failed all of my end of year exams and scored at least a 5, I wasn't understanding his anxiety on that front.

So I turned up at uni, with no idea what I was going to do, clasping a course guide book and a highlighter and sat down in the great court highlighting stuff that looked interesting. My first semester included French, Spanish, Chemistry and Biology subjects. I absolutely adored the French, enjoyed the Spanish and sort of winged the Science stuff. In later semesters I also studied History, Archaeology, Human Biology and Physiology, Physics, Pure and Linear Maths and enrolled briefly in both German and Russian (dropped because the timetables didn't allow me to sleep until noon). I have maintained for a very long time that my Arts degree kept me sane. It was what a uni degree should be - challenging and philosophical and it taught me to think laterally and openly. Unfortunately though, the great cliche of Arts students is somewhat relevant in that finding a job with my Arts degree would have been quite difficult.

So I went on a career search. This was no doubt influenced by the fact that during my second year, my grandmother (who I was very close to) became very ill and subsequently died from a relatively rare form of cancer, which I spent a lot of nights researching into the wee hours. I had the grades, intellect and personality to study medicine, and I liked the multifaceted nature of the profession. I also, and I can't lie, liked the guaranteed job and income at the end. So I applied, sat the exam and interview and did well and started my degree. And it's only while I've been here and been doing this course that I have really discovered my passion for it.

This is an amazing vocation, and I cannot wait to be out there actually practising. I love the interaction with others, I love the opportunity to heal not only patients, but relatives, friends and families as well. I love that I can get such intense personal satisfaction from doing good things. I also love that I never ever stop learning. It is impossible to know all that there is to know in medicine, aside from anything else it is an ever expanding field. It comes with great frustrations and tragedy, as will any job involving actual human beings - but the enjoyment I get out of it is second to none. Being in birth suite in the last few months has been incredible - to be a part of something so life changing in others lives. I am very lucky to have chosen a job that allows me that.

So hope that answers your question Donna! Hopefully I didn't bang on too much *blush*

Jai and Peter

Up until about 2pm this afternoon I was still feeling pretty raw, and let's face it, pretty damned sorry for myself. I was sitting at work, having read all of the available out of date gossip magazines, 2 newspapers (one current), and a good couple of chapters out of my textbook, waiting for the magic bingo ball in the sky to drop so that a little baby currently hiding in its Mum's belly would decide that *today* would be the day. The giggling gods instead sent Cletus and family who all had their 2 bobs to say about the miracle of labour and were not very much help to the poor labouring woman in the middle.

Mrs Cletus was not considered a good candidate for me to assist, and so I sat, chatting with obstetricians and midwives and assorted other staff, while catching up on 3 month old gossip about Hollywood *stars*. And I brooded a bit. Or a lot. Or more than a lot even. But basically had far too much time to think.

Then I asked if I could check the primip who had arrived and apparently was less than 1cm dilated. She was coping OK, but her contractions seemed to her to be worse than what the machinery was telling us, and there was some debate as to whether she was actually in labour. I had a major sense of deja vu watching her though, and in spite of the comments of the midwife, I thought that something was happening. When she suddenly became VERY restless, even with pethidine on board and was jumping up repeatedly to go to the bathroom I thought that a VE was a very good idea when the midwife suggested it.

Barely 2 and a half hours after she had been assessed as barely in labour, this beautiful woman had fully dilated - passed transition pretyt much on her own, and was just about to get a few latent minutes before second stage hit good and proper. We quickly assembled trolleys, snapped on the latex and headed on to the business end, where with the consent of the midwife I again was able to become primary accoucher (catcher). In record time the head was on view, and with coaching a little blue face carefully slipped out into the world. Feeling for anterior shoulders and then at the neck we found the cord wrapped around. We waited for the next push and the shoulders, first anterior and then posterior were delivered and a slimy floppy entangled body came soon after.

It was a little difficult to untangle the cord from the neck as I was on the opposite side to the wrapping, and although he was perceptibly moving, the little baby was not crying, or mewling, and the cord was barely pulsating. My heart was absolutely in my throat as we rubbed him dry and placed him in his mothers arms - concerned about the decels we'd seen on the trace, and the horrible floppiness of this tiny perfect little boy. I watched him as he opened his eyes - still not crying and willed him to yell. The midwife quickly clamped and cut the cord, vigorously rubbing him and he coughed - mucus streaming from his mouth and nose. But still no cry. We rubbed some more and then he squeaked, a tiny little mouse squeak. Not enough to perfuse his veins and stop my heart hammering in my throat.

"Oxygen?" Queried the backup midwife who'd come in...

"Yep" concurred the primary midwife as she quickly briefed the parents and picked up the little blue baby from his mother's arms. And at that second, separated from his mothers arms, the little boy decided to yell. A good yell. A "put me back in my Mummy's arms this instant" scream. And so we did. And there he stayed for over an hour except for a quick weigh and measure. And watching this perfect new family with my blood pressure slowly returning to normal, it was all I could do not to cry or to smile. I was part of that, I helped in that, I was there for that. The first person to see the face of a new little person on this Earth. Born beautifully and powerfully and dramatically.

And suddenly all my own issues were bundled up into something small and manageable again. I looked at them, looked at my own hurt, and thought about the fact that it was insignificant in the scheme of things. That all that mattered was still finding beauty in things. Of seeing the precariousness of birth and realising that my own fragility is self made.

So to Jai, whose birthday it was today, welcome to the world little man. May you grow strong and tall and healthy and give your parents always the love that they shared this afternoon. And thank you for pulling me out of my slump. For making me see the bigger picture and gifting me perspective.

And to Peter, I'm sorry. I hope sometime you can talk to me again. I miss you.

October 15

Today is international pregnancy and infant loss remembrance day, a day where every miscarriage, stillbirth and neonatal death can be remembered. So many little people that meant the whole world to someone and yet who are unknown by most in the world. I'm not generally a religious person but this is one day I light a candle and watch its light flicker. There is one tiny flame who I miss most of all, and who I wish I could light enough candles to bring back. She's my inspiration to do Cardiology and my determination to at least try and be strong enough for paeds.

October 15 is also the day I learned 7 years ago, unequivocally, that my grandmother who I loved so much was going to finally be relinquished from the pain she was suffering. It is a bittersweet day, and one that still gives me a sharp pang.

And finally it is the day that I was born 26 years ago at 10:20am in a little regional hospital in Northern Queensland. I think I have achieved a bit in my short 26 years, I am married, I have 2 children, I have 2 Bachelor's degrees with more on the way and yet that list still seems bare and not full enough. But I have had a blessed life, and I have much left to achieve. No one can ever be truly happy if they've achieved anything otherwise what would be the point in going on?

As such I've concocted a teensy list of things to do before this landmark rolls on again

This time next year I want to
- have only 4 weeks left until I can call myself Dr
- have 2 happy and healthy daughters aged 2 and 4 and a half
- be married and happy about this
- have conquered my weight loss goals and be hovering near that magic 60
- have devoted time to knitting and sewing and cooking
- have my rose and wisteria flower and have some vegetables growing

But most of all I want to be where I am today - happy, content, and very very blessed