Yes.. This training video will help for #wolfcatcubs tomorrow…
Yep… that covers all I need for the hospital….
And this song… covers today…
Entries Tagged as 'cubs'
16 hours to go before #wolfcatcubs… NO am I not excited.
Why oh why do people ask me if I am excited about the arrival of the #wolfcatcubs. I’m not, there is nothing to be excited about.
Terrified is the best word to describe what I am feeling. Perhaps it makes people feel better to ask you are excited. My wife is in hospital with twins coming in under 16 hours. What is there to be excited about…
For example in no particular order, what if I drop them, what if they aren’t healthy, how will I pay for them, what if they don’t breast feed properly, what if my wife is really crook post op, I don’t have enough leave, what if I drop them ( yes I know I said it twice ), what if I screw up the one chance I have to get a great first photo etc etc etc…..
People have said I will make a great father… how do they know. I couldn’t organise my way out of a wet paper bag when it comes to domestic duties. About the only thing I can do that is remotely parent related is tell really bad Dad jokes.
See there is a lot to be terrified about. They will they be cute and will I love them, that is a given (well cute if they take after Mrs Wolfcat, not me). So I have that covered already…. So back to being terrified I go.
I have a week to finish sorting things around the house, and at least most of the big pieces are in place. But so many little things… for what will be very little things.
I might be excited next week, but this week while I try and get my head around everything I am just terrifed.
Of course next week I will bring them home… then I will be terrified all over again.
#wolfcatcubs update – holy crap batman they are coming on MONDAY….
Well, I thought the nice measured title, reflects the measured mood that I am in at the moment.
Of course I am in a measured mood, I am sitting back on a Friday night with a beer. A well deserved beer after the day I have had as well.
Yesterday marked the start of Week 35. So Ultrasound, blood test, BP etc. And like all great drama’s I didn’t pay attention to the ominous music playing in the background did I.
Test results came back fine for the Cubs, but Mrs Wolfcat is to coin a technical phrase.. “FULL”. Her body has decieded to slow down, with her BP up, blood work not coming back as good as it should have etc. So we have moved from the optomistic “Lets aim for Week 37″, to the “you’ve done enough.. Week 36 ( aka thursday ) to the ” We are admitting you in a few hours, pack a bag, aiming for Monday.
So I calmly drove home, and with little fan fair or panic helped get Mrs Wolfcat’s final things together and took her to hospital.
Even after a few hours in the “uber” gymnastic contortionists dream of a bed she is looking a bit more rested, so Monday looks like the day.
Now I have to run around and do all those jobs I still had weeks to do over the weekend. Worse yet, I am getting instructions on bits of paper on how to do said tasks, which of course leads to fear of loosing the bits of paper.
The camera is charged, fresh batteries in the flash, memory cards emptied, and even a back up camera just in case.
Sometime Monday morning I become a father of twins…. ok… I think I need another beer.
#wolfcatcubs update week 34….
TICK TOCK TICK TOCK TICK… TICK.. TICK… TICK… oh crap…..
Yes, the ticking has got much louder.
Way way much louder. And now that the blog is back up and running, I can update long form again.
One BIG bit of news.. the Date has been set.
TICK TICK TICK TICK….
July 7 is what we are aiming for. That is the date that has been booked in for the C-section. Which is less than 2 weeks away.
Mrs Wolfcat is basically full, and the Twins are doing really well, so now it is a matter of holding on two more weeks.
TICK TICK TICK….
Someone asked me if I was excited… well only if the words excited and terrified can be interchanged.
TICK TICK TICK…..
So I really should stop writing on the blog, and go and put the first of the two cots together…
Before I know it the TICK TICK TICK will the the BUZZZZZZZ as the timer runs to zero.
Bugger this shit is getting real #wolfcatcubs
Bugger this shit is getting real #wolfcatcubs, a photo by wolfcat_aus on Flickr.
Well… still need to set up the bassinet version for the cubs, but that is a job for later this evening.
Welcome to the City Select Baby Jogger. We decided this seemed more practical than a side by side.
Is it, no idea, but given it may well be the last practical choice we get to make ( although, really is having wolfcatcubs practical anyway…… )
#wolfcatcubs RC2 Week 32
Well, RC1 is being much better behaved.. To the point we only need weekly scans now, not twice weekly…
But of course, I think RC1 may want to be a dentist, so we cant show you their face. Or it could just be that RC1 is facing the wrong way.
Anyway…. meet RC2 
#wolfcatcubs week 31.6 update…
here is a photo of Mrs Wolfcat and the Cubs….
This possibly would explain why she is sleeping so badly at the moment.
RC1′s heart seems to have slowed down, but still is a bit higher than RC2′s. Kind of handy to have a built in control unit
So regular monitoring will be continuing. Worst case scenario at the moment is early delivery at week 34, but fingers cross we keep going. Although Mrs wolfcat is feeling very full at the moment
#wolfcatcubs Week 30.4 Scan Update
This is an update to the previous Week 30 post.
The upshot is that we still don’t know anything, but will be having another scan in a few days. RC1′s heart rate wasn’t as high as last time, but still peaked over 207bpm which is shouldn’t.
Hopefully on Thursday we will have a much clearer idea as well, as the OB is aiming to have spoken to/and or Mrs Wolfcat will see a pediatric cardiologist. The ultrasound man didn’t see anything wrong the RC1′s heart which is good news.
So, I guess RC1 is just giving us practice for being a pain and causing worry where there doesn’t need to be any. That said, we aren’t really worried anyway for a number of reasons, mainly, there isn’t a lot we could do about it. And secondly, it isn’t anything we have done anyway as RC2 is acting as a great control unit.
The other big advantage of the place we had the scan was more video (process as I type – will upload later tonight ) and some more photos as well.
So here are the images.
RC1′s heart ( they are camera shy and facing away )
RC2 is not camera shy
Update: 1/6/11
Got an email from the OB this morning…
Good news is that the heart rate is mostly normal. When the heart goes fast it looks like a normal rhythm still, just fast. There is a hint of some fluid around the heart. If this is increasing it might suggest that the baby is a bit compromised by the fast periods of heart rate. So the OB is now planning scans twice per week to check on the heart. So it will be closely monitored. The good news is that tomorrow marks week 31 and they are ahead of the curve on size, so all good really.
Two Wongs don’t make a right….
Well, I was damned proud of that title, and if I want to make a whole blog post around it I shall.
But on to serious matters……
When a Liberal Senator “meow’s” at Penny Wong when she is trying to answer a question the reaction should never have been from the Libs and their supporters, but she had it coming. Nor should it have been, but it is all fair in politics. Nor should it have been, you need a thick skin to play the game. What should have happened in the first place was that a well paid elected representative of the people of Australia should have acted like a grown up. And a big congrats to Penny for calling the situation as it was.
But no, modern politics is about the sound bite, the quick reaction and the quick snark. It is no longer about a mature debate around the subject. #carboncate was a classic reaction, not to the subject, but to a spin and byline.
Worse was still to come, like Scott Morrison and many politicians from both sides of parliament, the “apology” wasn’t an apology as you or I would expect, but was a saying sorry without saying sorry statement. I only hope that the in person apology was better than what David Bushby said on twitter:
“I am sorry that Senator Wong has felt offended by my reaction”
Sorry but WTF. That isn’t an apology for ones actions, that is a transference of blame to the other person for their reaction to what was a childish act.
Of course the #auspol crowd and a number of Liberal senators jumped on previous comments that Julia Gillard has made saying what is the difference. Which goes back to my extremely pun ridden title. Two wrongs don’t make a right. I know it is old school, but pointing out that someone else did bad to justify or shift blame isn’t acceptable as an excuse in the playground, yet in politics it is.
It is time for Australian politics to grow up, we pay you a lot of money to do the best for not just yourselves but for us.
The increasing vitriol and outright hatred in poke insults at each other, then saying but “she/he did it first” not only lessens you, but lessens us all.
Week 30 for #wolfcatcubs, with a small scare as well.
The ultrasound the other day was all fine, and today Mrs wolfcat said, please come to the OB with her at lunch time. Sure, a 30 min appointment, with a bit of drive either side, I can do that.
Well, it didn’t turn out that way, but as I figure having cubs means that all pretenses of planning are going out the window anyway.
During the ultrasound, the woman doing it, noted that RC1′s heartbeat was a little to fast. Possibly due to being away, or just being grumpy with its small space being pushed in from the outside by the scanner. During the visit to the OB also did point out that at the moment Mrs Wolfcat is considered full sized for a singleton birth, with each cub around the 15kg mark. The question was asked about the faster than expected heart rate
“Just go up to fetal monitoring, could take between 5min and 45min”, sure I thought, easy, I’ll just work a bit late, that will be fine. 2.5 hours later, we were done. Turns out that RC2′s trace is bang on the money, but RC1 cycles up to 220bpm then back to 140 or so. Whilst the ladies doing the scan were impressed, we are still going to have to monitor this. What is all means, we still don’t know, so an extrabit of stress at the moment.
But we were sent home, waiting for people who understand these things to look at the traces. (I’ll update when we get more info )
Another thing I’d like to say is I love work places with flexible work hours. My last job and my current position both have this arrangement.It was great for me to be able to sit with Mrs Wolfcat during these rather dull, sit here for 2 hours tests. Sure, I had to work till 7pm, but I got my hours done and still spent the time I needed to for work/life balance.Sometimes it is important for work places to thing of the man in these situations.
So here are the the #wolfcatcubs heart beats…. RC1 is the left monitor, RC2 is the right. The monitor droppping back to below 90 or — was when RC1 decided to squirm, which seems to be its fav way of passing time.
Update 27/5/11:
Call from the OB, it could be something, it could be nothing. Hmmm… well that doesn’t help much. Going back to the good ultrasound people next Tuesday to focus on RC1′s heart. OB doesn’t seem to concerned, and given the weight they are and age, we are ticking boxes still, so nothing to panic about.
