In my pre-birth course, I posed what I thought was a simple question about how to set up baby for sleeping at night, and instead received the disturbing news that… he should sleep with me. In the bed!
Are you mad?
Well, they said, you’re not going to get out of bed to feed him every two hours, are you?
Actually, that’s exactly what I was planning on doing!
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When I was struggling with back pain I began using a standing desk, which helped, but then my heels started aching. After complaining to hubby, he stopped by the supermarket and as I was chilling on the couch that evening, he smeared topfen over my heels and wrapped them in plastic film. When I mentioned this remedy, astonished, to a local friend she looked at me like duh.
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I like my life in Austria. I have lots of support. I am happy here. Yet in the months since I had a baby, I have never felt so homesick and alone in my entire life. I have never before questioned my decision so much. The question to move to Austria, you ask, or the question to have a baby? Well… both.
This whole process of having a baby and becoming a mother is an adjustment. It’s much harder when you’re in a different language, a different culture and family is far away. I’m lucky to have great in-laws who are very supportive and respectful. But it doesn’t change the fact that they’re not my parents. My parents haven’t met Sam. They won’t until he’s almost a year old. They’ll have a harder time cultivating a relationship with him. And all the Skype time can’t change that. I’m lucky that hubby is great at taking photos, but sometimes seeing all the pictures of his parents with Sam just makes me sad because it all hits me again.
Continue readingSome news stories are serious – and so they should be. However, there’s nothing like injecting a bit of light-heartedness into a world where reporting only seems to get grimmer and grimmer. And since Aussies are known to enjoy taking the piss, both of themselves and others, here’s a few examples of times when they focused on the lighter side of news.
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When I was in year 9, at the tender age of 14/15, I was big into writing, and at the time, I was deep in my horror writing phase. An old friend from high school recently found a story of mine that had been printed in the yearbook, and I found it so disturbing/funny that I thought I’d share.
It was titled ‘I’ll be back’, which is relevant considering where I live now. And it revolved around a 14/15 year old girl babysitting her two year old sister for the first time. This girl was doing all the standard teenage things you do when you’re babysitting – like calling her friends and watching TV… absolutely not checking on the baby and of course… meditating… for an hour. Which perhaps was the problem… because in that hour someone came into the house and surprise surprise… murdered her baby sister.
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I have loved writing for as long as I can remember. One of my earliest memories, perhaps also of jealousy, was when a girl in my prep class brought in a ‘book’ she’d written. It was about her dog, flimsy paper stapled together complete with 5 year old drawings. It was impressive for a 5 year old, or at least I thought so. I remember the teacher raving about it. I remember being jealous. And I remember wanting to have my own book. I remember thinking I could do that.
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Austria has many different types of special cheese. Glündner Käse, Topfen, the different varieties of Bergkäse, and most of the standard ones you already know. The cheese in Austria is perfectly fine. But when I came here what I missed was cheddar. Didn’t have to be anything special but it had to be cheddar. I grudgingly accepted the Bergkäse and Gouda that wound up in the shopping trolley and passed it off as just another thing I would have to get used to.
Now, Austria is not at the end of the earth. You can absolutely buy cheddar in Austria, and quite easily, just not at the supermarket I was frequenting. So I assumed it wasn’t available.
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Now that I have been living in Austria for almost ten years and I get around pretty good, it’s come to my attention that there could actually be two of me – German-speaking Debbie and English-speaking Debbie. Because I’ve had people tell me that they notice a difference in my personality when I speak one language or the other. And well… it does make sense.
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Following on from the post of my top 10 favourite baby products from 0-3 months, now that we’ve hit that elusive 6 month mark, here’s the next instalment.
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An embarrassingly short time back I had to post a letter. Easy, I thought. I’ll find a mailbox and put it in. It was one of those prepaid deals so I didn’t have to go into the post office to buy a stamp as I usually do.
So one day when I was in the city I headed to the post office because… well there must be a mailbox there. Step one, locating said mailbox, was quite simple – it was in plain sight out the front. Step two, posting the letter… was not so simple. I faffed around for what felt like an eternity, prodding and poking and pulling at the yellow box, until… I simply fled, tears of shame burning my eyes.
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an aussie in austria 