Five months minus one day

Depressing remarks from a professor at Liverpool University appeared in the News of the World last week, with reference to the possible kidnapper of Madeleine McCann:

Society probably regards the man as an oddball. Normally these offenders also have some sort of minor disability, which makes them feel even more isolated, such as a hare lip.

Where to start! Well, 'hare lip' for one thing - why is an academic using a completely outdated and offensive term? More seriously, on what does he base the assertions that a) 'these offenders' are likely to have a cleft lip and b) people with a cleft lip are more likely to feel isolated? I seriously doubt that any research could back up the claim that us clefties have criminal tendencies, and I was astonished to discover that I should be feeling isolated because of my cleft.

Happily, the chief executive of CLAPA has already written eloquently to Professor Canter to object to his ignorant comments, as have many of the users of the Faceforward forum.



Update: Professor Canter has since apologised graciously and made it clear that the News of the World printed a summary of his comments without clearing the content with him first. (What a shocker.)

Four months and twenty three days

Lots of nice firsts with Alice lately:

- solid food (baby rice mixed with her formula; she enjoyed eating it and playing with the spoon etc but was so alarmed by the effect on her bowels (much harder poo) that we have stopped giving it to her for a little while.)

- sleeping in her own room and in the big cot (she loves it as long as she can sleep on her familiar lambskin - will I ever get to wash it? - and now has her daytime naps up there too where she goes off much more happily away from the tempting distractions of ooh, mum washing up.)

- rolled over from front to back (she can't do the other way yet - gets halfway over then doesn't quite have the momentum and just wobbles on her side).

- baby group (I've never been much of a joiner but I don't know many people in Seaford so last week I bit the bullet and went along. It was nice but a bit overwhelming and noisy even with only 7 or 8 mums and their babies. Alice was the youngest one and was much admired but got a bit over-excited and started crying, which curtailed my attempts at proper conversation slightly.)

Alice's lip repair: the aftermath

Alice remained on staggered doses of liquid paracetomol (2.5ml) and ibuprofen (1.5ml) for a week after the op. It was quite difficult to know when to stop with them, as she did seem to be crying a lot, but whether it was from pain or just general discomfort and unhappiness after her experience was impossible to tell. With hindsight (again!) I think it was partly the painkillers themselves that were upsetting her with their effect on her tiny tummy :(

She continued to do well back on her bottle although didn't take as much in one feed as before. It's only now, nearly four weeks later, that her digestion seems to have settled and she's taking what I'd consider to be a full feed again. In the meantime she developed a serious crying habit and started fussing over every feed. The GP diagnosed colic, but the cleft nurse and I both felt that it was more due to reflux which in turn was causing her to eat less so that she was constantly slightly hungry and grumpy. However, we tried a 'staydown' formula to help combat reflux (Infacol having had no discernible effect) and she hated it, so who knows? Suddenly since this weekend she's been much happier and eating loads and I don't think it's due to anything we've done differently in the end. So frustrating that babies can't just tell you what's wrong!

Appearance wise, it took less than a week for the black eye and all the swelling to go down, although the inside of her nose on the cleft side was still very narrow and completely bunged up with snot and dried blood - but the cleft nurse assured us this was normal. The nose itself returned to a more normal, relaxed shape after a few days although it will never be totally symmetrical. The stitches fell out on their own over the course of about a fortnight and the redness around the scar disappeared too. We were told to wash it once a day with cooled boiled water and apply vaseline four times a day to keep it moist, and after six weeks we need to start massaging with Vitamin E oil/BioOil to help the skin stay supple. Her upper lip has puckered slightly as the scar has pulled together but apparently this will relax again in time; however, it's become slightly raised which is a sign that it's healing TOO well and overdoing the efforts to repair itself, so we have to get some cream from the doctor to halt this process.

This is probably all very boring in its detail but you never know, someone might find it helpful! I know I wanted to know what to expect beforehand, anyway.