Pregnancy after LT TTC #17

[dreamrise659]

Hi everyone,

Well as you know I had my meeting with Family Day Care yesterday and then my 20 week ultrasound.

Well the meeting with Family Day Care was pretty horrible... I'm not sure how much they believe me and how much they believe the mothers written statement. They seemed to believe most of what I said. I couldn't believe some of the lies the mother has said including:

1) that I pulled the kids by their arms to get them into the car. The kids were in fact all really good at getting in the car themselves and one of the 2 and a half year olds even used to do up her own seatbelt (I would just double check it before I hopped in the car). So why would I need to pull them by their arms to get them into the car????!!!! The woman who rents the unit at the back of my house - well her study window faces where I park the 4WD which I use for Family Day Care. When I told her about this part of the complaint last night she said she'd be happy to write a statement saying that she saw the kids always get into the car themselves and I never "pulled them by the arm" to get into the car. She was just as gobsmacked as I was that the woman would even think to make up such lies.

2) that I made a comment about the father being unemployed apparently stating "I thought he would have a job by now"???!!!! In actual fact as far as I knew he was only unemployed for around 3 days and I know through personal experience how difficult it can be to find a job in this area (twice in the past 5 yers I have had nearly a month of unemployment between jobs) so there is no way I would ever make a statement even similar to this.

3) that my daugther told the children off. Truth is that if the children I was looking after ever got into a fight with each other and I was in another room (like the kitchen preparing their food or the toilet etc) then my daughter would come and tell me what happened so I could intervene. So she never told them off herself.

4) that I spoke to the children with an aggressive tone of voice and if they hurt themselves I didn't console them (both complete lies).

and too many more to even mention. I was completely floored by all these allegations and I don't understand why the mother would even make up such lies (except in an attempt to then get out of paying me the approx $750 she owes).

Oh and I found out what the other "inappropriate conversations" was - when I told the mother that my mum's best friend was on life support and it looked like being turned off that day. I explained that I told the mother about this because both my daughter and I were very upset about it but that only the 10 yr old was within hearing distance of the conversation (and really even if the younger ones had heard how would 2yr olds even know what "turning off the machine" meant to be able to potentially be upset by it????)

When I left there my friend/ support person told me she couldn't believe the way the meeting had gone and it turned her off ever considering doing family day care and she would discourage any of her friends from doing it too. Both of us have alot of experience working in schools and there are set procedures which must be followed if a complaint is lodged. I have still not seen any written documentation about the complaints - though the manager kept referring to a written statement by the mother. I believe I should be entitled to see exactly what she has written. Apparently in her statement (which looked to be 3 A4 pages long) she has explained why she couldn't take her children out of my care earlier. I would love to know what her excuse was.

When my daughter was preschool age I used family day care services and twice pulled my daughter out from a particular carer because of issues I had with the way they were doing thing. In one case the carer tried to charge me for when she was going on holidays (so I would have to pay her and pay for alternative care for that fortnight as well) I knew this was illegal and told her so. She got nasty so I complained to family day care and pulled my daughter out. The 2nd time a carer made negative comments about the relationship I was in at the time. She made the comments to me but in front of my daughter. I immediately withdrew my daughter from her care, lodged an official complaint with family day care and had to pay three times as much to then put her into a childcare centre. I also still had to pay the carer out her "notice period" - which I did. I was a struggling fulltime student and single mum at the time and paying the extra childcare fees meant we had no spare money for any emergencies, let alone clothes, treats etc. Had to pretty much live on 2min noddles and eating at friends places etc for that next fortnight just to scrape by. Three quarters of my total money each fortnight after that went just in rent and childcare fees then. But I wasn't prepared to leave my child in a situation which I didn't believe was in her best interests. So I can't see what excuse this mother could have for leaving her kids with me if she truly believed I was a bad carer????

Anyway after we left I ran into the mother of one of my former TAFE students. She asked me how I was and I told her I was now 20 weeks pregnant so she congratulated me. She then said "I just want to thank you again for everything you did to help J*** with the course. He's doing really well now and I really appreciate what you did." As we left my friend said to me "well that was nice to hear someone appreciate what you do after that horrible meeting." I agreed it was really good timing to remind me that I am a good worker, good teacher and good person.

Family Day Care will apparently take a week to write a report and decide what action will be taken. The manager (who I had never met before) seemed unaware I was pregnant (so nobody had passed on the news about me having my ultrasound straight after the meeting and therefore needing it to not drag on too long). When I mentioned about the scan she seemed suprised and asked me how far along I was. When I told her 20 weeks she didn't say anthing else. No congrats or acknowledgement or anything. And that was how the meeting ended.

Well now for the ultrasound...
Bub seems fine. All measurements were slightly small for age (measuring between 19w1d and 19w5d when I am actually 20w1d). Kidneys, stomach, heart etc all fine.
Baby kept moving around. In the time that I was in there it moved it's head from my left side to my right side, to up towards my ribs and then down towards my bottom. It was also moving it's arms around alot. The guy said there is still plenty of room for it to move around at the moment.
At the start I told the ultrasound guy that I really wanted to find out the sex and he said "well we'll see what we can do - no promises". Anyway at the end he had a look. He said I think it might be a GIRL. I was so surprised. I told him I had been thinking it was going to be a boy (though hoping I was wrong). He said that he used to tell people he was 51% sure (since it's a 50/50 chance anyway) but "they didn't like that". He told me that mistakes can be made so he wouldn't say definately. I told him that with my daughter, who is now 14, the first scan they had said they think it was a boy but at the 2nd scan they said it was definately 100% a girl and the guy doing that scan had told me he had no doubt and had never been wrong. This guy yesterday wasn't prepared to give me a definate (I got the feeling that maybe he has been wrong before and thats why he won't give a definate answer).
He did show us one shot of the babies legs and bottom and said "well I can't see any boy bits there so lack of boy bits means it's probably a girl". Anyway my Dad has taken this as meaning it is a girl and my mum (who has been hoping it would be a girl) used this news as an excuse to buy some little girl dresses but I'm still feeling unsure due to the ultrasound guys response.

I would love to see if there was some way I can get another scan in a month or 2 to confirm it because I would hate to get all the way through the pregnancy thinking it is a girl and then end up with a boy as I don't think I would cope very well with that. If it was going to be wrong it would be better if I thought it was a boy and then got a nice surprise that it was a girl.

Oh and the cramps... still getting them. The sharp ones appear to only come when I am particularly stressed or anxious. the duller ones are more constant and I have been told that they are probably "growing pains" because the baby is growing so rapidly at the moment so your body is having to stretch. Anyway at least I'm relieved to know it's nothing to worry about and bub is fine.

Lori
DD - 14
Bub due 28th August - possibly another girl (hope so).