Thursday 20 May 2010

Paapa.

'Paapa' is Maya's word for pasta and my favourite word of hers at the moment.

Over the last couple of weeks Maya has been ramping up her vocabulary.  Suddenly she seems more willing (or more able?) to repeat words she hears.  And better yet she remembers them and what they are associated with.  She uses "Mama" a lot more now too, which is lovely to hear.

Communication is still very limited but she is able to ask for a few things now, which makes it so much easier than trying to guess what she wants all the time.  Though there are still times when I don't understand, which often results in her (and I) getting frustrated.

Maya has been babbling for such a long time now.  It seems like she's always carrying on conversation with me.  She even pauses and does little laughs and sighs in between some 'sentences'.  It really does seem like she's telling me stories, or about her day, or things she's seen.  Just in a language I can't understand.

Wednesday 19 May 2010

Speaking of books..

Staying on the topic of books from my previous post, I thought I'd mention my favourite baby/toddler books:
  • "The Going to Bed Book" & "Hippos Go Berserk" by Sandra Boynton - Love the rhythm and rhyme.

  • "Time To Sleep" & "Where's The Green Sheep" by Mem Fox - Love the rhythm and pictures.

  • "Pants" by Giles Andreae & Nick Sharratt - Love the rhythm, rhyme, pictures and topic.  A silly, funny little book.

  • "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle - A classic and Maya loves poking her fingers through the holes in the pages.

  • "The Animal Countdown" by Frances Bacon - Love the rhythm, rhyme and pictures.

  • The "When I go to" series by Jill Harker - Great pictures (something hidden on every page), good rhythm and rhyme.

  • "Miffy At The Zoo" by Dick Bruna - Love the rhythm and rhyme.

  • "Nighty-Night, Fox" by Nancy Parent - Great pictures, rhythm and rhyme.
Maya does like the books above too, but her favourite books tend to be those with flaps you can open (like the "Spot" books by Eric Hill), or things you can touch (like the "That's not my" series by Fiona Watt) or pictures and words/counting books (like 1 hat, 2 children, etc) or any book that has a picture of a cat in it.  And while I do enjoy reading them the first twenty times, I do tend to tire of them after the one hundredth read.

Saturday 8 May 2010

I didn't know..

.. that I would be reading the same couple of books to Maya over and over and over again, because they would become her favourites and no other book would do.

.. that those couple of books that I would read over and over again would start to drive me crazy and any attempts at reading a new book would fail.

.. that I would get so sick of reading those couple of books over and over again, that I would eventually hide them away somewhere just so I could read something new.

.. that Maya would then go and select another couple of books to become her favourites and I would have to read them over and over and over again...

Sunday 2 May 2010

It's life Jim but not as we know it.

As I mentioned in my previous post I had another vertigo attack while away on holidays and I think it was caused by something I ate.  I have been on a very strict low salt diet for months now and prior to this recent vertigo attack I'd been attack free since the end December 2009. 

There's no way to know the reason why I've been attack free for so long.  Is the diet helping?  Is the medication I'm on working?  Or is it just time?  But I've stuck to the strict diet just in case it helps. 

I've found myself doubting the diet's affect, despite reading that it supposedly helps the majority of sufferers, because when I was diagnosed 7 1/2 years ago I went on the same diet and then came off it after some time and was attack free for many years. 

But there is a difference between this time and last time.  This time I have had many, many more attacks than last time.  This time a lot more damage has been done.

So while we were away I decided to eat something I didn't know the salt content of.  The next day I had an attack.  It seems plausible that the food was high in salt and the higher salt content triggered an attack.

Suddenly I found myself full of grief.  I'd been thinking this diet would again be temporary.  But what if it's not?  What if I have to stay on this diet for the rest of my life?  Of course given the choice between being on a strict diet for the rest of my life and having vertigo attacks, I choose the diet.  But the diet means forever reading food labels.  It means forever cooking things from scratch.  It means no take away foods.  It means carrying food on me at all times in case I get hungry because I can't just pop into the closest food store for something to eat.  It means not being able to pop out to a cafe or restaurant for a bite to eat (I've been told it is possible to eat out with forward planning by talking to the chef beforehand to meticulously explain my diet - but even this seems like a chore, means I can't just decide to go out somewhere, limits me on where I can eat out and also means I have to put my trust in someone I don't know to follow the diet accurately).  It means having to carefully explain my diet to hosts and trusting them to follow the diet or providing my own food.  It means a lot more planning would have to go into trips away, especially overseas (can I even go overseas on this diet??).  It  means standing around at parties and morning tea at work, watching other people devour goodies.

I love eating out, getting take away and travelling.

I know there are plenty of people out there on all kinds of restrictions when it comes to diet, but salt really does seem to be in nearly everything, including a lot of things people would assume weren't high in salt (cakes, biscuits, bread...)  Yesterday I saw that Lindt has made a new chocolate with sea salt!!  So how do I manage explaining to people what I can and can't eat?  Then how do I manage that in a foreign language? 

I guess right now not only is my diet restricted but I feel like my life is restricted because of it.  It is something that I still need to comes to terms with and learn to live with.