On the home front

It has been an interesting few weeks in the Oh Waily household.

Since returning to the house we have been having intermittent sleeping issues with the littlest member of the household. She has decided that one sleep cycle is plenty, thank you very much. During the day it becomes difficult to do more than one decent task per sleep and that gets to be wearing on a Mum who is used to being able to get stuff done while little one sleeps.

But she isn't done yet. Instead of being the I go to bed and sleep with ease baby, she is now the I want to stay awake and cry and cry and grumble and shout and harrumph baby. That one really stings. Now she takes half an hour to settle and then sleeps for only 45 minutes. Aargh.

I'm sure there are millions of quotations about motherhood and patience. They're right. Motherhood and patience are things that go together. Whether or not you like it.
For those who don't know me in real life, it is fair to say that on a list of my character traits patience would come near the bottom if mentioned at all.

Oh dear, what's that saying I've come across?

The whole purpose of religion is to facilitate love and compassion, patience, tolerance, humility, forgiveness.

Dalai Lama

With all due respect to His Holiness, I think it is fair to say that you could replace the words religion and facilitate in this statement to parenthood and teach. And it isn't the kids who are learning it either, I can tell you.

So that is what is happening on the small person front. On the bigger people front we have finally reached the point where Mr Oh Waily has submitted to surgery for his ongoing back pain. A prolapsed disc in his lower back has been giving him difficulty for a few years now, and the nice cortisone injections into the spine are no longer worth the effort. After 6 to 8 months of relief they wear off and he discovers that nothing has changed with the original pain. So, no long term solution there.
An updated MRI later and the orthopaedic surgeon said: "That's gotta come out." So yesterday Mr Oh went to hospital and had his disc removed and the vertebrae fused.
He is currently dripped up to the armpits, oxygenated up to the nostrils and has control of his pain medication. However he is much more lucid today than yesterday evening but still in some pain and discomfort, as you would expect. All going well he will be home for the weekend.

Nothing in life is guaranteed, but we are hopeful that this will bring about a positive improvement. Keep your fingers crossed for us.