Instalment 32 Sunday 8 May 2011

It's Mothers' Day today and the first mothers' day that I won't be sharing with my own mum. She slipped away last October and although for the past six or so years, she was unaware of what was happening around her, I still did.

My mum, Cecily, suffered from 'end stage' dementia for over six years and was unaware of who was around her, where she was or what she was doing. She did not recognise anyone and could not communicate. Somewhere deep inside me knows that somewhere deep inside her, she knew I was there and she knew me. I hang on to these thoughts because they help to get me through.

Dementia is such a cruel illness. It is a robber - a thief, unrelenting and of great stealth.

Even though mum may not have been aware of her surroundings or what was happening to her, she was loved. And today, I missed her a little bit more than normal. I felt the same at Easter time. Each Easter I used to buy mum a small soft toy to clutch. Her limbs had grown very stiff and she needed these little toys to take some pressure off. They worked well.

So, today marks the first Mothers' Day without my own mum, but we still remember her. I will never forget her and I pray in my heart that she knows how much she was loved.

Today is also a day to remember my mother-in-law, Audrey. Ian's mum was a true rose as well and passed away back in 2007. I know Ian and his sisters still find it hard and miss their beloved mum. Losing those we love and need is very hard on anyone. A lot of our friends have now also lost their parents and we all use our memories and photos to help us stay connected. Ian and I have lost all our parents and that makes us feel quite confronted with the fact that now we are the matriarch and patriarch of our family. Wow! I feel too young for this sort of responsibility.

As role models, it is our responsibility to make sure their memories live on for the sake of their grandchildren and great grandchildren. It is important that they all know where they have come from; their roots.

We don't need special days to remember our treasures, they are always on our minds.

However, Mothers are so important to us in many ways and so, today is dedicated to them.

My family blessed me with a lovely dinner Saturday evening at Gusto Gianni, a contemporary Italian restaurant where they serve up the most delicious dishes. It was so lovely that everyone could be together. It doesn't always happen these days, so it was very special to me.

They also blessed me with some lovely gifts. I felt very spoilt.

This morning I found a very special gift on our back lawn. Ian had found a possum box in the weekend shopper and decided to go and get it. He laughed as he told me it was a present from my baby possums...isn't that the sweetest thing?

So to every mother out there...I hope your day was blessed as much as mine.

Instalment 31 Saturday 7 May 2011

I decided I'd try Tamigotchi and Saori with a new teat today, and this worked a treat. On one of the later feeds, I decided to try to go back to the larger 5ml syringe, once I knew Tamigotchi was happy with the teat. For the past little while I've just been using the 3ml syringes because Tamigotchi has not wanted to drink from the 5ml.

Success! It is great when everything works. Both possums drank their 5ml formulas and seemed very content.

During the afternoon, I decided it was time to trial the possums in a new setting. I went over to the shed and got the plastic cage Gillian had leant me. I scrubbed it down and made it all clean and disinfected. I dried it all off.

While it aired, I went for a walk around the garden finding a couple of branches for climbing and also some leaves for Tamigotchi to munch on. Saori is not quite up for this exercise, so the leaves are for Tamigotchi, but Saori might explore them.

I brought everything back to the house and I set up the cage. By the time I'd finished, it looked like a mini forest. I added two little pouches and hung them so that should the possums decide to, they could put themselves to bed.

After the next afternoon feed, instead of sending Tamigotchi off to sleep, I placed him gently on some branches in the cage and then he took himself off to explore. He was really ready for this exercise. He found some leaves and picked them up. He held them in both hands and started to shred them. You could tell he was really enjoying himself. He was very comfortable in there.

Saori was a different story, but it didn't hurt her having a turn in there. She paced around and tried to look for a way out of there. She is a real social girl and only wants to snuggle after her feeds. She lasted in there until the last feed of the night and then I decided to put her in a pouch and back in her basket for the night. Tamigotchi spent the night in his little mini jungle.

My beautiful family took me out for dinner to celebrate Mothers' Day. We went to Gusto Gianni's at Portside. We had a great time. The food was excellent and so were the cocktails. I had the pork belly and it was superb! I love my family. They really look after me and make sure I am blessed. This year, not only am I a regular mother, but I am a possum mummy too.

Instalment 30 Friday 6 May 2011

I spent the day organising hospital things and once that all got done, I was able to concentrate on regular things. Filling in the hospital forms proved to be a very time consuming exercise and I was glad when I finally could do no more for today, at least.

The possums are all well, but Tamigotchi acted finicky towards his food today. He does this every now and then and I haven't really worked out why, yet. I'm not sure if it is the syringe, or the teat, or the taste of the milk, or if he doesn't feel himself. Well, people have off days, don't they? So, why can't possums?

I just have to persist with him. I manage to get him to eat all his food most of the time. There's been a couple of times where I have thought he'd finished and I cuddled and put him to bed and then, when I've gone to clean up everything, discovered that he'd left a half a ml or more. He can be a tricky little munchkin.

Saori continues to be herself. She has this cute routine. As soon as I remove the rubber band from her pouch she scampers out into my hands and then she climbs all around the outside of the pouch, biting and clamping down. She knows the routine and I let her do her stuff for a little while and then it is time to go to the toilet. She always goes to the toilet for me. She's a good little poppet. Once that is done, I wrap a towel around her and settle her into position and from then on, she loves to suckle until all the milk is gone.

She is the most beautiful baby. My heart just fills with love with these two babies.

Once Saori finishes her formula, I try to mop up under her chin and then she scampers up under my chin and burrows down under my shirt where she sits and preens herself and then snuggles in for a nap. She loves snuggling into my chest under my shirt where she feels very safe.

After Tamigotchi finishes feeding, I wrap both my hands around him securely and lift him up near my face and I pat the top of his head with either my finger or my cheek. He loves this and it sends him to sleep straight away. He feels secure snuggled up like this.

Instalment 29 Thursday 5 May 2011

Today was filled with many mixed emotions. My stomach was knotted and I felt on edge. My doctor had organised an appointment with a specialist which was set down for 1:30pm and I felt nervous and tighter than a drum.

I got some jobs done through the morning and then before I had to head off to South Bank to the doctor's rooms, I fed my babies and cuddled with them. I weighed the possums today and Tamigotchi weighs 99 grams and Saori weighs 72 grams. The new technique seems to working, especially for Saori. She is now doing very well, putting on about 9 more grams since the changeover.

I received some news during my visit with the specialist, and after some more tests performed by the doctor, he revealed that I would need some fairly major surgery and so he got busy organising this for me. I have mixed feelings about surgery. On the one hand, I know it is now the best thing for me and hopefully will fix my problem so that I can get on with things. On the other hand, there are risks, as there always is with surgery, but I have to move past this and concentrate on getting through it all and look forward to when I'll be healed and life will be so much better for me. The surgery is set down for 23 May, which is very close and now I have some things that need to be organised. I experienced a little teariness during the rest of the afternoon and evening, which is probably only natural. I'll improve. Out of everything I felt concern over, I worried the most about being separated from my gorgeous babies while I'd be in hospital. The doctor said I'd be in for about four days approximately. I will miss my little babies.

Steve, a friend of ours was to come over for dinner a little later on tonight. Ian decided he would come home with Steve. Steve would stay the night and Ian would catch a ride to work with Steve in the morning. Steve is from Kingaroy and is down in Brisbane working with Ian, although we've been friends for years. They are working on the same project.

We ended up, after a unanimous vote, ordering a couple of gourmet pizzas from Sambos, down at Gumdale. Sambo is an old family friend. He makes lovely woodfired pizzas and we haven't had pizza for a very long time. We also had some lovely 'fattening' calzonne as well. We weren't disappointed and dinner was delicious. Kimmy had also made a lovely triple chocolate custard cake and we had some of that for dessert.

We enjoyed a lovely evening catching up on all the latest details in Steve's life out at Kingaroy with his wife Collette and son, Christopher. It was good to see him.

Instalment 28 Wednesday 4 May 2011

Today is athletics day and I've been asked to help out with the boys' high jump. We've had a fair amount of rain lately and yesterday afternoon we experienced a wild storm front. It almost looked like the athletics carnival might have to be cancelled, however, it fined up and the kids got their whole day of field events in with no problems.

The oval was really slippery and we had some spills and thrills at the high jump arena, but the boys were tough and knuckled down to have a great time. The field events went through till 1pm and then it was back to a normal day.

I fed the babies and then went to grab a bite to eat myself. Linda, a friend who teaches up in the secondary school popped down to have a cuppa with us during our lunch time. It is always good to catch up with her.

The rest of the afternoon I spent back in Writers' Circle and then at the end of the school day, I had to leave on time to go up to the secondary library to meet a new student that I was to tutor this term. I fed the babies before I left. I took the babies with me and no one was the wiser. The possums are really no trouble at all.

This first tutoring session went well and my student proved to be lovely. Once the session was over I ended up having to go back to my classroom because I'd left my keys back in my room accidentally.

I headed home and got myself ready for Book Club, which was due to start at 7:30pm. I got some dinner organised, fed the babies. My darling Kimmy kindly vacuumed the floor for me, so everything was looking lovely and spiffy. Then, Kimmy decided to whip us up a batch of home made scones...mini ones that were light and fluffy. It doesn't get much better than that.

Book club was great and we had a great discussion about this month's title: 'The Good Earth' by Pearl S. Buck. The evening was topped off with tea and coffee and warm, fresh scones.

Instalment 27 Tuesday 3 May 2011

Another trip to school, with possums in tow. They were very well behaved and I seem to be managing the feeding routine at school without any problems. I managed to get a car park a little closer to my class which helps with all the things I have to carry.

I left a little earlier for school and fed the possums after I'd set up my laptop and got my class organised. This will get the babies through till after morning tea. I have to attend a meeting all the way through morning tea, so I will feed them after that.

This is Week 2 of second term and it's the second week where I will only be able to teach Writers' Circle on one of my days because tomorrow is our Primary's athletics day. I will still be working, but doing different jobs. I spent some of today endeavouring to set up some new display areas in my classroom. The students worked hard on their Writers' Profiles and we enjoyed a good day of writing.

Instalment 26 Monday 2 May 2011

I told Ian my plan for the trees and where I'd like to plant them and he kindly got busy fencing the area off from the horses. He did a really great job and now we have a great place to plant the trees. It really will be like a possum playground when we are finished.

While Ian fenced, I began using the hoe to dig up holes for the trees. The ground is lovely and soft from all the rain we've been having. It made digging the holes much easier. I managed to dig four out of the six holes by the time Ian finished fencing. Our neighbour Frank brought us over some worm fertiliser to put in the bottom of the trees holes. Frank manufactures worm tea, using Jossy's horse poo. Frank always brings us some of the finished product and it is amazing stuff. The plants love it and are all doing really well since we've begun using it.

Ian came and gave me a hand digging the last two holes, and then he dug one more for my new replacement frangipani tree. The builders destroyed my last frangipani tree when we were renovating. They leant an old fence against our back fence and it fell over and squished my old frangipani tree to the ground.

While Ian dug holes, I began to plant out the trees. The heaviest part of the whole process was breaking down the clods of clay and dirt so that it could be added to soil additive to make a nice mix for the trees.

Finally all the trees were planted and already they looked great. When the trees mature, it will be an awesome food source for the possums.

I weighed Tamigotchi and he now weighs just under 100 grams, so the new technique is working. He still doesn't seem to be enjoying his dinner, but he does get through it all. I tried introducing him to some leaves and he loved nibbling on them.

During the day, I mustn't have banded Saori's pouch well enough and she managed to squeeze her way out of the bag and then she sat herself in the basket, inside the cupboard. She didn't try to escape or go anywhere and she was very happy to see me when it was time for dinner.

Instalment 25 Sunday 1 May 2011

Last night we attended a friend's 40th surprise birthday party and because I knew we would be there for a number of hours, I had to take the possums. I fed them before we arrived and I left them in the car till I had to feed them about 9:30pm.

The party was great and when it was time to go and feed the babies, I invited one of my friends and a little girl, Kristen, who is 12 years old to join me. I taught Kristen back when she was in Prep and now she is very interested in wild life, so she was very excited. Her mum thinks she might become a vet in the future.

It was lovely to watch my friends' faces light up when they saw the babies. After I fed Saori, I let Kristen hold her. Saori cuddled up in her pouch and went straight to sleep. Kristen enjoyed holding Saori, while I fed Tamigotchi, who was very slow to eat. I had to persist with him. I then let Joy have a hold of him, after he finally finished eating.

Some young children at the party heard about what I was doing and snuck over to the car to watch. Ian was with us as well, so he was able to help keep things quiet so that the babies didn't stress.

I settled the babies back down after my friends had their cuddles and we all returned to the party. I have to be creative when I am out with the possums and they need feeding.

Today was relatively quiet. Towards the end of the day, I gathered up the list of trees that Gillian had compiled for me and I drove to Bunnings to see if they had some for sale.

I ended up buying six new trees, including: about three varieties of myrtles, a grevillea and two callistemons. So I know what I will be doing tomorrow. I kind of got very excited buying the trees because in my head I've been designing an area in our yard to make like a possum playground. I want to encourage them down the middle to back part of our garden because we live on a very busy road.

Instalment 24 Saturday 30 April 2011

Well it seems our new technique is working. Saori has jumped to 65 grams and is happy enough to lay back and suck on her new teat.

That's one positive.

Tamigotchi on the other hand, has gradually lost his fur from his chin and along his tummy. What is left is his bare young skin! I'm a little devo at this, especially finding little bits of his fur in his pouch. He really has had a reaction to the formula. Saori seems to have missed out on this, as well as the urinary infection that Tamigotchi got. Maybe Tamigotchi is a little more sensitive?

Along with this, Tamigotchi is not all that interested in his food. I ended up getting him to drink it, but he is definitely reluctant. Wow, looking after possums certainly has its ups and downs. It's all worth it, but just when you think things are going along well, a change comes along. I guess too, it depends on their little personalities. I hope Tamigotchi is going to be okay. I worry about him sometimes.

I will just continue to be in charge and even if I have to force him to eat, that will be better than him fading away to a shadow. I've just got to keep doing what I am doing and we'll get through this.

Instalment 23 Friday 29 April 2011

It was another early start for me today. I awoke at 4:30am to feed my babies and then I had to drive Ian to work. He'd gone out after work the night before to have a dinner with a couple of mates and the designated driver drove him home, while his motorbike stayed safely tucked away at work. I thought I might have a rest when I got home, but decided to keep on keeping on once I got home.

Since my visit to Gillian's yesterday, I tried to adapt to a new feeding technique which was slow going but I knew with practice I would get better. Well, I hoped I'd get better. I found feeding Saori very hard going with the drip by drip process, so I tried a new teat and I made a very small hold in the end with a safety pin. This seemed to work and by the end of today, Saori's weight had gone from 57 grams to 63 grams. It seemed things were now starting to work.

Instalment 22 Thursday 28 April 2011

Days always end up being so busy and today was no different with another trip to the doctor for me and then off to the shops to get a couple of things.

I had phoned Gillian, my possum mentor earlier in the morning to ask if I could call in to see her and she said she would be home and would be happy for me to call in. I wanted her to take a look at my babies because I was a little worried that Saori did not seem to be putting on any weight. So on the way home I called in to see Gillian and she took a look at them both.

It seems the formula, when it spills out of Tamigotchi's little mouth and trickles under his chin and tummy it reacts with his fur, and Gillian noticed that he has lost some of his fur under his chin. I hadn't noticed this. She said it was not a huge issue. She told me the formula sometimes did that to some of the babies. I did not know this before, so now I decided to make sure to take extra special care and endeavour to make sure things don't leak as much as they had.

Feeding baby possums isn't always as straight forward as you think. Most people probably think, like I did, that you just need to whack some milk in the bottle and pop it in their mouth, but it doesn't work like that at all. I am constantly learning new things along this journey.

Other than this slight set back with regard to his fur, overall, Tamigotchi was doing well and putting on weight like he should.He was now over 80 grams and Gillian said she could see a lot of growth in him. He was all fluffy, warm and cuddly for Gillian when she nursed him. It also seemed as though his toileting issues had all cleared up too.

Next, she took a look at Saori. She agreed that Saori had not put on any weight and decided to feed her and use tissues to measure any spills along the way. She weighed a tissue dry and then after Saori had eaten and some of the spills leaked into the tissue, she weighed the wet tissue. Saori works very hard on the teat and tends to dribble and bubble quite a lot and it is this that runs out of her mouth. After her first feed, Gillian discovered that she had leaked at least 2ml, which is most of her feed! No wonder she is not putting on any weight.

Gillian thought I should try to change the technique that I used to feed Saori. I laughed because I wished I was in more control than I actually was. It is really Saori's technique. I explained to Gillian that Saori loves to stand up and hold onto the syringe when she feeds. It dribbles all down her elbows and down her belly. Anyway, I knew now that I would have to be more in charge and not always let Saori have her way. Gillian suggested that I remove the teat and drip the formula, one drop at a time, into her mouth. This is a very time consuming method, but the way I saw it, I didn't really have a choice.

I bought some new teats off Gillian and was pleased that Gillian was happy with their progress anyway. She enjoyed her cuddles with them too. While I was there, I asked Gillian for a list of trees and bushes that possums love to eat. I had a plan.

It was great catching up with Gillian and as we were leaving, she told me she was off to pick up an older rescued Brushtail possum. How exciting.

We loaded up and headed home while I thought about how much more careful I would need to be a feeding time.