Tuesday 18 November 2008

Molly - 6 weeks old



Last weekend and continuing right through this week I have had the misfortune to suffer from the worst ever recorded case of man flu since medical records began so I had the disappointment of not being able to visit little Molly.

Man flu is a strain of flu so powerful and so deadly that it can only be matched by the Bubonic Plague. It is an incurable virus, which has mutated to only effect the "XY" gene found in men. The virus attacks the immune system ten thousand times more seriously than the average flu virus and causes excruciating pain and discomfort for the victim. Man flu has no cure and although this deadly virus is mostly laughed at by women this is almost certainly because, luckily for them, they cannot contract it themselves and consequently have absolutely no idea just how awful it is. When a man gets this terrible affliction all he could hope is that by using all of his strength that he will eventually pull through and recover. Incidentally, and I want to clear this up here and now, there is no credance in the alternative (female) definitions of the affliction as 'Sympathy Fishing' or 'Chronic Exaggeration Syndrome'.

Actually I was really worried that I might have given it to Molly when she visited last week but happily that doesn’t seem to be the case and anyway thinking about it logically she is female so obviously she can never fall victim to this deadly virus.

So I wonder what I might have missed? Well according to child development articles, quite a lot it seems. By six weeks a baby is becoming accustomed to its surroundings and will take comfort from familiar sights and sounds and they will also start to start to move their head to search for things. I had noticed this even last week when Molly had been able to support her own head and lift it a little and begin to look around.

And the really big development is smiling! Last weekend Molly pulled some faces that I dismissed as wind but it seems that I may have been completely wrong and this was indeed the first signs of happiness and pleasure because at five to six weeks a baby smiles for the first time. How exciting is that?

Not as exciting as communication I have to say because also at this time a baby (unbelievably you might think) can already begin to start and try to communicate verbally and scientists have discovered that new born babies are beginning to form different combinations of sounds as early as this and are even beginning to form vowel sounds. I think I may have helped here because last weekend at five o’clock in the morning I took Molly all around the house and explained what every single electrical item was and exactly what it did. I am confident now that she is going to be a scientist.

I missed seeing her last week because I wanted another a go at pushing the pram! It is fantastic, such a better design than those we had for our own children and so much more manoeuvrable. I especially liked pushing it around the shops and taking it into difficult situations just to see if I could negotiate my way out of little problem areas. Prams design seems to have come along so much in twenty-five years or so. When we were parents snobbery demanded that we had a Silver Cross pram because this was like the Rolls Royce of baby transport but today there is so much more choice. For a short while in 1987 we had a double buggy for Sally and Jonathan but this proved hopeless to use around the streets of Stratford-upon-Avon without causing total chaos so we abandoned it fairly quickly and sold it on to an unsuspecting victim.

This week Molly has been out on her first walk around the village suspended around Sally’s neck in what looks like a piece of medieval torture equipment but which I am sure is completely comfortable. Earlier this year I saw some people in Greece with a combination backpack/baby carrier and I thought that I might like to try that out if I get the opportunity. Maybe sometime next year I hope.

Disappointing then not to see little Molly last week but I am pleased to report that the signs of recovery from the man flu are quite promising at the moment and I think I am going to live so I am confident therefore that I will be able to catch up with my precious little granddaughter this coming weekend.




Two beautiful little girls!

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