Metung

[donnalotus]

I've had a couple of really good days. Yesterday I contacted the Steiner Playgroup & Kindergarten in the town about 30mins drive away. I'm quite excited to find a Steiner school down this way as I'll be keen to get Declan involved and expose him to different, natural, earth-based ways of thinking. I was hoping that someone there would be able to recommend a local pediatrician or GP that is a bit more open to non-traditional vaccination (such as homeopathic) or at least who would discuss the dangers of vaccinating with me.

Yes, I'm one of those people. I'm sorry, but there's so much information out there, and even one of the people involved in the American vaccination development programs says that the jury is still pretty much out on the dangers of vaccinations. My concern is actually around autism and the growing links between children vaccinated in the 1980s (and possibly earlier) and the sudden appearance of children going from highly functioning and active children to brain damaged and/or autistic.

I spoke with a woman (Kath) who couldn't recommend someone to me, but she did give me some great information to look into, including a website and a Doctor (Isaac Golden) who has a wealth of information on the dangers of vaccinations, and he also believes strongly that it's safer and better to use homeopathy to boost our childrens' immunity to diseases - he even sells a homeopathic immunisation kit which Kath uses for her children.

I also found out there's a Steiner playgroup in Metung, which is only 15 minutes away from here, so a little closer, and I can pretty much start going whenever I like because even if Declan can't interact with the children, it's an opportunity for me to meet the other mothers and get to know people. I'm really looking forward to it, I'm hoping to find a few like-minded people that I can really get along with and maybe make some good friends.

Today Mum and I took Declan on a drive down to Metung because I've actually never been there before, even when I lived in Bairnsdale from '97-'98. Metung is pretty much a tourist destination for people who like boating, or fishing, or whatever kind of hobbies can be done on the water. There's water everywhere and is quite beautiful, but not as nice as the beach. Still, we had a nice lunch at the bakery (spinach and ricotta pastry) and Declan slept the whole time through, so no grizzling or needing to stop to feed him either.

Tomorrow is the Lakes Entrance market so we're all going down to that, which should make the MIL happy as she cracked the major shits because she didn't get to go last time because *gasp* I went into labour and went to the hospital. We're likely to go out for lunch, I think, for Father's Day. We have been trying to start a Sunday roast type thing every week to give MIL something to interact with the family during, and so on, but I think I'm going to cull them back to every fortnight at least because frankly, she annoys the hell out of me and I don't enjoy it, neither does anyone else really other than her. 

Either way, it's hard to go to the market and then come home and have a roast (or any kind of) lunch ready because MIL can't get her ass out of the house before 10:30am-ish generally (and that's on a good day). It wouldn't be a problem if she could get herself up and dressed and ready to go by 9am, like most people on market day, but she can't so it's hard to be in two places at once. Therefore, there's no lunch prepared for tomorrow's Father Day (not at my house anyway), so if it's going to happen, it's happening at the local pub, or a cafe or something.

Anyway, gotta run, Declan is refusing to settle down (even after a nappy change, 45mins on breastmilk AND 120ml of formula), so going to have to sit and try to rock him to sleep at this point as he's getting over-tired and grumpy!