An open letter to my husband

Lately I’ve realised just how lucky we are to have you, I mean I’ve always known that when we need you you’d be there, but lately there’s just that air of something more special in you than that.

While I know both our lives have changed dramatically since the boys were born, I’ve really seen you grow. I’ve seen you put our kids first, be involved and actively participate in parenting alongside me. I’ve seen a shift from “if I have to” to “of course I will” or “I want to do that” and it’s made you unbelievably and unequivocally more sexy to me.

In these past few weeks alone you’ve made runs to pick up extra summer school uniforms for next term after our bigs grew too fast over winter, you’ve willingly texted me as “Charlie elf” to tell the kids Christmas is only 100 days away, you’ve left work early for training pick-ups or drop offs, for school assemblies or just because I got too nervous letting Zoe catch the bus by herself. You’ve attended parent teacher interviews and actively participated and despite the tantrums and screams for mum you’ve navigated dinner and bath time alone more and more as I try to stay on top of other things – and while some may say “he’s their dad that’s just expected” sometimes it can’t always be the case. 

These people don’t see how you leave the house at 5:30am Monday through Friday some nights after being up for hours on end with Carter crying and how you don’t come home some nights till after 8. They don’t see you studying for your masters until 1 or 2 am or waking at 4am on a Saturday to travel with the Junior Raiders during their season. They don’t see all the stuff you are doing in the hopes that it will improve our lives and what we can provide our children in the future.

I know that in the thick of these years I can feel overwhelmed by coping on my own, I can resent that you aren’t home as much as other dads are but the truth is I am unbelievably proud of you. I am also unbelievably thankful that despite all of these things you still want to be there for your kids, you stand track side, sit in grandstands, you attend ceremonies and you do bath times. You “duck” down to the shops at 9pm when I realise there’s no milk or bread, you do load after load after load of laundry so we have clothes to wear, you hug them when they need it and you back my parenting decisions 100%.

I knew when I married you that you’d be a great dad, but I never imaged you’d be exceptional.

I’ve never loved you more and I want you to know how thankful I am for you each and every day.

xx

sincerely, your wife.

8 years since I became the luckiest mummy alive

You unlike anyone before you called me mumma, and now you are 8.

I fear that our time with you as a child is nearing to an end, that soon the things we do will bore you, be uncool and daggy. I fear that next year you'll start to become aware that perhaps Santa isn't real, the Easter bunny too.... I fear you're childhood is wrapping up on magic and entering pre-teen. I hope as I write this next year that I still have a little longer with my special boy by my side.

In 8 years we’ve grown together and we’ve created a personality that wasn’t in existence before. I am different because of you and I am thankful for that. You are you, and I can’t explain my pride in you.

You are just and right. You are kind and strong. You are smart and respectful. I can honestly say that there is no one out there like you Cooper, a wise soul on a young body. This year you are doing extension maths, which proves to me that you have your dads brains, you love to read and learn and ask questions to understand the whys, hows and when’s. You still deeply care about your friends and family. You love time on the farm, at Forster and with your grandparents. If you had a choice you would spend all your waking hours with your friends. 

During school holidays you will often spend a day or three on the farm and while you always come back tired you come back happy. While you love video games the wide open space and adventure suits you. You still insist you are going to be a zoologist, palaeontologist or archaeologist when you are older despite me constantly pushing you into a trade.

This past year we’ve supported you every week with footy, bmx or soccer. We’ve been to theme parks, zoos and sporting events, we’ve walked mountains and swam in oceans, we’ve been watching you grow and grow and grow inside and out! You spend many weekends sleeping over at friends places or arranging play dates at the park. You have learnt to compromise and to tame your temper by walking away.

You look forward to having your own room back – while you certainly tolerate sharing, and at times when in trouble find comfort with Zoe in your room; you long for a space for you to display your Lego, hide you secretes and read quietly alone without disturbance. You absolutely cannot stand when Mason and Carter get into your room for fear they will destroy everything you've worked so hard on. 

You love to hear the boys cheer for you on the side line – they call you BUBBA and your face explodes with pride. You’ve surprised us this year with your desire to win, until now you’ve always just enjoyed playing, but now you don’t like to lose.

My highlights for you this year: the heart-warming birthday card you made and hid for Zoe. The absolute excitement of all the major rides you went on at Movie World and Wet and Wild proclaiming both the best day of your life. The intense joy you still get when Charlie Elf arrives on the 1st of December. The huge hugs you give me when you are feeling overwhelmed and the rare moments you hold my hand to walk through the shops.

Each night before you turn out your light you call to us from down the hall, each and every night you yell “ I love you, goodnight, see you in the morning” – I hope it never ends.

after 3 years patiently waiting to be old enough to use the adult go carts you
finally got to  with your best friends for your birthday.

8 and very pleased with your Arsenal  FC cake

Your best friends are: Liam, Paxton and Lewis

You have 8 adult teeth with an 9th just popping through

You play league, futsal, bmx, soccer and oz tag - you are begging to play cricket this up coming summer

You love spending time with your friends, PlayStation games, reading  and Canberra Raiders matches

Favourite food: PIZZA, any kind of pizza..... curried sausages with mash and Oma’s apple pie with custard

You hate: when things aren’t fair, losing, sharing a room, having to stop reading and go to sleep

You are 141cm tall

You weight 29kg

Mason Rushby you cheeky little 2 year old

Mason,

Things I’ve learnt from you over this past 12 months…..although you can understand me and even for the most part respond to me you will do nothing unless you actually want to. I’ve learnt that you, like Cooper before you, prefer the outdoors and wide open spaces to anything offered to you inside. You are confident and comfortable where ever you are but you also look for Carter more than he looks for you for reassurance. You are happy to talk to anyone who will give you attention. You are mischievous and cheeky and oh so troublesome at times. You want to do everything on your own, you will tantrum over the wrong shoes, not being able to carry your own bag to daycare and especially being told you can’t eat slugs, worms, poop or drink from the dogs bowl. You are Brave.

You are determined to peddle your own trike….to climb the rock wall alone…. Eat seated at the table instead of your high chair. You are just determined. Your vocabulary is outstanding, with every new word I wonder how you go so clever – so many people told me that you’d be slower to learn to walk, talk, jump, run because you were premature and because you were a twin – but as I said –determined!

Over this year I have laughed and smiled with you and at you. I’ve held your hand and kissed your face 10000000 times and I’ll never get sick of hearing you say “love you mum” .

When you arrived our whole worlds changed, my ideas for our family changed and my perception of myself changed. Sometimes I feel like I am super-mum tackling each day with you and your siblings then there are times i  feel like I am barely scrapping by, am I spending enough time with you? Have I read to you enough, played with you enough, have I told you I love you enough. As you will learn as you grown there is never enough time to spend with those you love, never enough time to hug, but for you Mason, I hope I’ve given enough for you to know you belong here.

Every morning I wake to you yelling at Carter to get up from bed, and then your little face beams as I open your door and you run as fast as lightening down the hall for breakfast. At night long after your brother is asleep I hear you playing or climbing into his bed to give him toys. While you fight – you two are exactly who each other needs 100% of the time.

You love:  tormenting your brother Carter till he loses it. food, trucks (especially garbage trucks) bikes, buses, rudiger, climbing, running, football, dancing and octonaughts

You hate: sleeping, broccoli, nappy change time,  the white part of a poached egg, did I say sleeping already?

Your best friend is Carter.

You can count (with Caterina) to 10 in Italian and English, have been requesting you sit on the toilet (alas nothing happens) climb jump and run as well as must 3 year olds.

Teeth: 16 – just 2 year old molars to come

Height: 86.5cm

Weight: 12.2kilo

Your favourite food: anything with pasta in it and cheese on top. Anything that comes with a dipping sauce.
Your Favourite place: outside, at Cooper’s football or the park

The terrible Twos - Carter Rushby

Carter,

You have certainly come out of your shell. You are so much more comfortable playing on your own, you don’t go looking for Mason if he’s not around, but you do love (and hate) his company. You like to fight, I don’t know if its watching Cooper play football or just wrestling with Dad, but tackling people is you favourite thing! You still love your cuddles and you’ll fight anyone who’s cuddling mum when you want to. You shower me with kisses and cuddles whenever you get the chance. You are cautious and you are shy. I often hear you singing songs or making up babbling stories as you play, but the second you catch someone watching you it all stops. Zoe is still your everything, whenever mums roused on you or Mason has upset you in any way you turn to Zoe to make it right. Now let me tell you, you Carter John Rushby can tantrum with the best of them kid - you will full on pitch a fit for no good reason, go stiff as a board and throw yourself to the ground, scream, kick and hit like the whole of Kmart isn't watching...... but that's just one side of you... the other side is sickly sweet.

You are happy laying around inside with books and trains but nothing beats throwing and catching with dad when he’s home. You are super clever, you like puzzles and building things. You are the Calm to Mason’s Storm and I love that you are both such individual and independent little beings. When he wakes you each morning you beam at him, both laugh and giggle and then run down the hall yelling "breakfast breakfast" until we oblige. I just love your bond.

You love to cheer, you are everyone's biggest supporter – you yell and clap and cheer from the sidelines of netball games, football matches and BMX racing. Your little “GOOOO BUBBA”  is Cooper’s favourite thing to hear from the side line. I hope you are always your siblings biggest fan!

You cheer in the car when you realise it’s a daycare day and you aren’t fond of Caterina when Mums at home. You really are my little koala kid, you spend most nights in bed with us, or at the very least the wee hours of the morning. Whether it’s because Mason has crawled into your bed and you’re not happy about it, or because the dummy just isn’t cutting it to sooth you back to sleep – I don’t mind, neither does your Dad, because  I know one day I’ll have blinked and these days will seem like a distance memory, I know one day I’ll ask for a hug and it’ll come on the provision that your friends don’t see it. I know right now I am where you feel safe, and I hope you always look to me for that security.  Much like your brother I spend my days telling you how amazing and special you are, how I love you and how you complete our family – I hope you always know and feel that you were meant to be our child and that we wouldn’t have life without you in.

You love: sleep, tackling Mason, food, balls, books, rudiger, music and shaun the sheep

You hate: when Mason is cuddling mum, apple skin,

Your best friends:  Mason and Zoe

Teeth: 16 and working on 4 molars as we speak

You can: count to ten and randomly sing the ABC song, dance and tackle

Height: 87.6cm

Weight: 13 kilo

Your Favourite Food: curried sausages with mash

Your Favourite Place: the shower, mummys lap or bed

Our only daughter turns 6

To our darling daughter, miss Zoebelle on your 6th birthday, 

This past year has simply been our favourite to date with you. You have grown up into such a sassy, independent, strong willed and curious little girl. You love everything from mascara to mud cakes and we love how you don’t fit within a box, that you’ve made your own rules for who you want to be. You dance to the beat of your own drum, and this year despite loving to dance you very directly told me you didn’t want to go to dance school anymore because you can choreograph your own routines to dance to. You are Princess Tomboy and why the hell shouldn’t you be! Who says you have to choose. Everything is still very dramatic when it comes to you, your screams, giggles and crying would rival that of an Oscar winner. This year as for the past 2 years nothing we say can keep you away from the twins, we can tell you till we’re blue in the face to stop cuddling, picking them up, interfering with their independent play time but you just can’t help yourself. You love those boys sooo much and boy do they know who to turn to when mum has roused on them! 

You are going from strength to strength at school and if it wasn’t for your endless love of drawing, colouring and crafting I would bet you’d do even better with your reading! School for you is much more about being with your friends and playing than it is excelling at spelling or maths. Never the less you are always praised for your leadership and outstanding efforts in class – and for us that’s’ all we can ask for. You are social and funny and super confident about your place in the world and that’s why we love you.  

Over this past 12 months you started playing netball, spoken at school assembly, been to Australia Zoo, Wet and Wild, Movie World, Byron bay and Coffs Harbour. We’ve done beach trips, WNBL basketball grand finals, baseball games, raiders matches and bush walks – but top of your must do list is always have a slumber party with friends. Well baby girl this year, for your 6th birthday that’s exactly what you got! The giggles, karaoke, whispers and laughter that filled our home filled us all with joy. While there wasn’t much sleep had nothing beats seeing your smile the next morning.  

Now let’s talk about that smile. That smile gets you anything from your poppys and most of the time it gets you anything from your dad too. That smile could light up the world and when you smile everyone around you smiles. You are truly the most beautiful girl, your beautiful porcelain skin touched by tiny freckles across your nose, those piercing blue eyes with the longest dark lashes, perfectly pouted pink lips and hair that shines in the sun all make me wonder how I could create something so flawless in every way.  

You Love: lip gloss, your twin brothers, make up, wrestling dad, spending time on the farm, rock exploring at the beach, dancing, dressing up, CRAFT… all the craft all the time. 

Your Best friends are: Ruby, Rosie, Emmy, Elsie and Sophia 

You play: netball – and as I write this I’m looking into rock climbing as a sport for you as nothing else we’ve offered really sticks with you.  

Your Favourite food is: sushi…. Seriously – when given the option you’ll always pick sushi!, but you also love mums berry crumble, pepper steak pie and the ever popular Rushby tasting plates. 

You hate:  having to follow anyone else’s rules, bad smells, anytime there’s blood, vomit or poop around, going to bed before cooper (in fact anything that cooper gets to do and you don’t you hate)  

You have all your baby teeth – not a single wobbly one yet 

The most memorable milestones this year: going to movie world, seeing skyfire fireworks, breaking your arm on holidays  and having your very first slumber party.  

You are 115cm tall 

You weigh 20kg 

Happy birthday miss Z, we love you, you’ve made our world a much brighter place and without you I wouldn’t be complete.  

Cake with cousns

her Glamping slumber party was a huge success

the girls in their onesies

All the sweetest things for our sweet girl

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder – lets talk about it….. .....

When you hear the acronym PTSD what’s the first thing that pops into your mind?

Army War Vets?

War Widdows?

Well that’s probably where 99% of people go when they hear it, but what about NICU families, or mothers who suffered birth trauma or have watched their children die?  The thing is that a lot of mothers who suffer Post Natal Depression may instead be suffering undiagnosed PTSD.

The cold hard fact is that in Australia 16% of mothers suffer from PTSD, many of them mothers to pre-term babies, or those who suffered major complications during child birth. For me though every year for the past 2 years around May I start to suffer debilitating anxiety. Diagnosed as PTSD last year the very thought of me heading to the shops or inside play centre with my boys strikes absolute terror into my body that cripples me.

Ever wondered why you didn't know ?? Here's why, because the sigma mental illness carries is burden enough to break a person. They'll view me as weak I think. When now i realise that i am far from that.

My PTSD strikes as we lead into the anniversary of my babies being hospitalised with RSV (see earlier posts). The very thought of winter bugs, viruses, exposure to unvaxinated children or adults, people coughing without covering their mouths, visitors kissing my boys on the hands and lips, sitting my boys in shopping trolleys or playing with childcare toys that aren’t cleaned daily send me into a complete panic and I withdraw from everything that I believe exposes them to risk. From the months of May-August you will not see me in shopping centres with my boys, I won’t attend parties with them where there’s a chance someone may turn up unwell, I religiously tell visitors to wash their hands, cover their mouths and not kiss my babies hands or lips. I carry hand sanitizer everywhere and purify my house with burning essential oils. I stock up on hundreds of dollars of pre and probiotics, vita gummies and high strength vitamin C tablets.

This is my story of PTSD and it’s important to share, because not everyone will understand why you may withdraw from certain situations or react the way you do. They will see me for 9 months of the year completely care free, as my boys eat dirt, pick food up from the floor and chew on it, and kiss people on the face with wide open mouths. While you may think I’m completely irrational leading into winter it doesn’t matter, for me Winter triggers horrific memories and the association between winter and illness for me as someone who suffers PTSD is 100% real.

For me as my boys grow bigger I know they grow stronger, the more winters they see the more exposure to germs and the stronger their immunity gets – but sometimes knowing that doesn’t help the intense fear you feel when you recall your lifeless babies strapped to machines to help them breath playing on repeat in your mind over and over again until spring comes and the winter germs disappear.

So there it is……PTSD lurks amongst so many of us and it doesn’t discriminate, it’s just another reason why you should chose to be KIND before judgmental, to ask are you OK before shutting them out and to never assume that just because someone doesn’t talk about it doesn’t mean it’s not happening.