Training Course: fourth lesson

Today we had the fourth lesson of the delivery training course at Sant'Anna Hospital. Topic: how to take care of the baby (with some notions on how to take care of ourselves). All the two hours were dedicated to an infinite list of things we have and we do not have to do: for the first time I needed to take some notes... After all that mess of informations, I do not even know now where to start to tell you what new-parents are supposed to do with their little one, once he/she is at home!
Let's see... yes...

1) How and when is Emanuele supposed to be cleaned?
Typically, he will need a change after every meal. We have to clean him completely and with lot of care in order to avoid irritations. That sounds pretty obvious, I would say.

2) Which products can we use?
Generally some kind of baby-oil and baby-lotions, even though for the private parts water is always the best solution. No spunges (to be sterilized every time!!!), only cotton. Cream only in case of irritations.

3) How to feed him?
Assuming that everything will work properly and I will feed Emanuele, I have to give all my attention to him while he is eating. I can talk to him looking in his eyes in order to let him feel as the centre of my attention... it does not sound difficult, on the other hand, it sounds very natural. Since I have been talking to him all the previous months, I suppose it will come naturally for me to talk with him once he will be born.

4) When is it the right time to have the first bath?
As soon as the piece of the umbilical cord will drop, Emanuele will have his first bath. It looks like some newborn do not like it, as they had already forgot nine months of "fish-like life". I must say it sounded weird to me, but this is what the doctor assistant told us. Anyway, after the first moments of fear (if he will have them) the baby should like it. It is a good habit, since the beginning, to clean his head at least every two days.

5) Be careful not to be anxious: babies are very sensitive and can feel it! Just take it easy, if a difficult moment will come... easy to say now :|

6) Do not make comparison with other children... in other words, do not listen to what uncles, aunts, grandparents, friends and whoever will tell us about their children and children they know and bla bla bla... every baby is a different, new person with his needs and innate problems. Also comparison with That's it! We will need some time to know him and we will understand how to deal with him in the better way.

Of course, many and many other things were told us today but I think that at the end, the most important of them Maurizio and I will have to keep in mind in dealing with Emanuele, is to do what our hearts will tell us to do. It is true that he will be our first baby, but I am sure we are responsible enough to understand what is better for him to grow healthy not only in his body but also in his mind.

Oriana Fallaci: The Agitator

From "The New Yorker"
Issue of 2006-06-05
Posted 2006-05-29 by Margaret Talbot

[..]
I visited Fallaci on the day before the Italian election, in which Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was defeated by the center-left candidate, Romano Prodi. Fallaci told me that she had not sent in an absentee ballot. She loved referenda: “Do you want the hunter to go hunting under your window? No! Do you want the Koran in your schools? No!” “No” was something Fallaci was happy to say. But Berlusconi and Prodi were “two f-----g idiots,” she said. “Why do the people humiliate themselves by voting? I didn’t vote. No! Because I have dignity. . . . If, at a certain moment, I had closed my nose and voted for one of them, I would spit on my own face.”
[...]
Raed the full article

READ THIS: Italian Politicians' Salaries

Some weeks ago, on the "Espresso" magazine, a paper appeared about a recent decision taken by the Italian Goverment. It concerned the increasing of the salary for the politicians "working" in the Italian Parliament: the amount has been decided to be equal to 1.135,00 every month. The decision was taken by ALL the politicians, without any expection (impressive, isn't it?). Besides, this decision was hidden, namely it does not appear in any official document.

Monthly Salary: 19.150,00 Euros;
Basic Salary: 9.980,00 Euros;
Assistant (portaborse) usually a relative: 4.030,00 Euros;
Monthly House Rent Refund: 2.900,00 Euros;
Insurance: from 335,00 to 6.455,00 Euros.

ALL THE PREVIOUS ALLOWANCES ARE TAX-FREE!!!

Besides all that:

Mobile Phone: free;
Cinema Tickets: free;
Theater Tickets: free;
Bus/Tram/Metro Tickets: free;
Stamps: free;
National Airplane Tickets: free;
Use of Motorways: free;
Sport Facilities: free;
National Trains: free;
Official Governamental Airplane: free;
Embassies: free;
Hospitals: free;
Insurance against Death: free;
Car including driver: free;
Restaurant: free (in 1999 they have eaten and drunk for free, with an expense
equal to 1.472.000,00 Euros).

They get a salary and have the right to retire after 35 months of "work" at the Parliament. A normal Italian citizen has to work AT LEAST 35 years to get a pension.

They get back something like 103.000,00 as refunding for the electoral expenses (by violating in this way the law against the fundings for the political parties). Moreover, previous Presidents of the Republic, of the Senatus and of the Parliament have advantages for all their lives (example: Mr.s Pivetti has an office, a secretary and an escort always at her service, for free!)

Italian politicians produce a damage equal to 1.255.000.000,00 (1 BILION and 255 MILIONS) Euros to their own country.

The Parliament costs to Italian people something like 2.215,00 Euros, EVERY MINUTE!

Talk about it because these infos can be read only through the net...

Have a nice day.....

Thanks to the guy who sent me these infos (he knows who he is!)

Training course: third lesson

Today we went to the third lesson of the training delivery course. We had a one hour and a half tour around all the floors of the Sant'Anna Hospital. Starting from the arrival at the E.R., we have been shown the labour and the delivery rooms. They look very comfortable and fully furnished to put the future mother and father in the condition to "prepare" properly for the delivery. The labour room is a private room complete of a fully furnished bathroom including a very comfortable shower and an hair-phone. The delivery room contains the tipical delivery "bed" and two other helps for the mother according to the natural position she will choose to deliver the baby. No constrictions will be imposed by the doctor and by his/her assistants. All the necessary to assist the newborn is of course in that room. We then saw the room where mother, father and baby will stay together for the two hours following the delivery: there, the mother and the baby will be monitored by the doctor. After that, we finally were taken to the nursery! Five newborns were there: four girls and a boy. They were sooooooo small! Their heads could stay in one adult hand! Not to mention those little hands! Just amazing!!! They looked kind of very similar to each other, but surely Emanuele will look different from all the others to our eyes!!!

Emanuele docet

Since a couple of nights, suddendly, Emanuele decided that he does not like anymore when I sleep on my right body-side. We understood that Monday evening. I was simply laying in bed on that body-side and as usual he started to arrange himself to stay more comfortable... first with normal movements... then stronger and stronger as a real complain: I could not calm him down!!! He was really angry!!! A series of "#!?*#@!!&#@" start coming out from my belly!!! I asked Maurizio to use his "power" (that is still working) but that did not work as well... then he realized that probably, in that position, I was "squeezing" Emanuele!!! I felt very bad since I did not understand what was going on. In these months I always menaged to realized Emanuele's needs!!! I changed my position and actually he stopped complaining :) According to our knowledge, Emanuele's back corresponds to my left body-side so probably he does not experience any problem when I lay in that way. On the other hand, since he is bigger and bigger, it is understandable that he might not like anymore the left side since it is there that his face, arms and legs are. Fair enough!!! Now, the problem is that I can lay only on my left body-side for all the night... which is not that pleasent after a couple of hours... so the trick is to rest for 10-15 minutes that part (staying awake), rearrange myself in that position for the next two hours and so on...

Emanuele & Maestro Franco

"Una vecchia bretone
con un cappello e un ombrello
di carta di riso e canna di bambu'".
It looks like Emanuele appreciates old classics from Franco Battiato!

Maurizio & I with... Emanuele in progress

New interesting CDs

From Sweden
Dissection - Reinkaos
Official Website





From Norway
Enslaved - Ruun
Official Website





From Finland
Eternal Tears Of Sorrow - Before The Bleeding Sun
Official Website





From Portugal
Moonspell - Memorial
Official Website





From Norway
Satyricon - Now, Diabolical
Official Website





From U.S.A.
Tool - 10000 Days
Official Website





From Germany
Vanden Plas - Christ 0
Official Website

Chess Olympic Games

Chess Olympic Games - Torino
20th May - 4th June 2006
Official Website

Every day inside the 21000 squared meters of Oval Lingotto, 136 national teams will play in 450 matches.
Every morning, 13200 chess pieces will be ready to be used in official mathes and 6000 in minor ones.
Official soundtrack of the Games by Maestro Ennio Morricone.

Official Olympiad logo by Lorenzo De Palo, student in the Graphics Course at the European Design Institute of Turin.

Second lesson of the training course

Two days ago we went to the second lesson of the training course for the delivery. Half an hour was dedicated to learn the natural positions that a woman can assume during the labour period before the delivery; at Sant'Anna Hospital every one of us will be left free to choose her own position, namely the position each of us will feel naturally. The doctor assistant will help us, following our natural instinct. This was a very important news, at least I felt very happy not to be forced to assume "classical" position... I will use gravity as much as I can :) The rest of the time was dedicated to the description of the labour period itself: according to the doctor assistant, that is the most painful part of all the "business" and it is very important for the woman to know it very well in order not to rush to the hospital before the real labour is started. Time will go slowly enough so that we can have all the time to relax, think clearly about what we have to do... and calm down the father... the fact that the father will be more stressed than the mother, at the beginning of the labour, is apparently a universal constant! So, we will start probably a few hours (maybe days) before, feeling some painfull at the bottom of the belly: that is not the starting of the labour yet! Only after that period (that can change of course from woman to woman) we will start the real labour period... and apparently it is impossible not to notice it. The painful will start from the top of the belly and we will feel the peak (a very strong peak!) of it every 2-3 minutes for something like 30-40 seconds. Now we are in labour! At this stage, we have still the right not to rush to the hospital: the assistant told us that it is better to stay at home the more one can. I can agree with her, but I must also admit that probably at that stage you just want to have the confort of some professionist telling you that everything is going well and so on. Anyway, we can have a hot shower to relax the muscles (20 minutes is fine) and than we can go to the hospital. We will arrive at the emergency room where the baby and then I will be monitored; then we will be put in a single "labour room". Maurizio will be with me and Emanuele so we are both sure that everything will go well! He will help us during all the labour period. When the dilation will be complete, we will be moved in the delivery room and after a not well defined period (that is different from woman to woman) Emanuele will see the light and we will finally see him!!! He will be put on my breast in order to help him having soon some milk. After all the emotions will be reach a human level again, someone will clean and dress Emanuele. Apparently that will be a kind of trauma for him, after nine months of freedom from society constrictions! Anyway, once Emanuele will be "ready" for the world, we all three will be put in a private room and Emanuele and I will be monitored for two hours. After that, we will be ready to reach our hospital room and stay together for all the time we will spend at the hospital (usually no more than 4 days).

Some news...

I have been kindly "accused" not to take enough care of this BLOG... kind of true, actually... the main reason is that we (Maurizio, Emanuele and I) do not have so many news to share at the moment. Surely, things will change in the near future when Emanuele will be born: pictures and funny story will not be taken just for us!!! Be sure of that :) In the meantime, what can I tell you? Well, we started the last week the training course for the delivery at Sant'Anna Hospital. A doctor assistant will guide eleven future mothers to the moment that will probably be the most important of their lifes: giving birth to their babies. For a funny destiny, 9 of us are going to have a baby-boy. The first lesson was mainly focused on our questions and doubts about ALL the possible arguments; only the last fifteen minutes concerned a few exercises to train us in preparation of THAT very moment. Tomorrow morning we will go to the second lesson. As regards specifically Emanuele, he is always very active. I am experiencing some problems in sitting all the day at my desk, as he seems not to like it and not be able to find a right position to stay comfortable. Things are much better when I walk around. Same story during the nights: every time I change my position in the bed, he rearranges himself and I cannot avoid to notice it since now he is "big" if compared with the room he has to occupy. Only 49 days to go... if he will respect the estimated delivery date (4th July).

News about Emanuele

A week ago Maurizio and I went for the last ultrasound check and we saw our little treasure. He looked in very good health and full of energy. His hands were close to his mouth as he was carrying a sandwich ;) The doctor concentrated his attention to important things as head and brain, internal organs, arms and legs. We also saw his face for a brief moment. We heard again Emanuele's heart and that is always a great emotion. According to statistical analysis, his weight was roughly 1.7 kg and he was 43 cm long. Now, a week has passed and surely he is heavier and longer. He was already in the right position for the delivery: we are hoping he will not turn himself upside down. He does not have so much space to move now, so hopefully he will stay in this position. On the other hand he is very active and strong and he might change his mind... The 8th month of pregnancy started a couple of days ago: time is passing over very quikly and we can not wait for THE moment to come.