Filed under: Corona 2020 | Tags: Castex, Chamonix, Children, Confinement, Covid-19, ego, elementary, Emmanuel Macron, Enfants, enseignant, France, Haute Savoie, health, Jean Castex, l'ecole, L'organisation mondiale de la sante, Les Houches, Macron, primary, professeur, Sante, school, science, Securite, WHO, Xavier Roseren
Bonjour Monsieur,
J’ai lu (Le Monde et Les Echos) qu’il n’y avait pas de prĂ©cautions de sĂ©curitĂ© Covid-19 pour les enfants des Ă©coles Ă©lĂ©mentaires de moins de onze ans dans toute la France au retour des Ă©coles le mois prochain. Est-ce vrai? Si oui, comment est-ce possible? Il a Ă©tĂ© largement dĂ©menti que les enfants ne peuvent pas attraper le virus (100000 aux Ătats-Unis cette semaine, Reuters), il est largement admis qu’ils peuvent le propager, et l’immunitĂ© collective signifierait 60 Ă 70% de la population testĂ©e positive pour Covid -19.
Mon enfant de neuf ans comprend certainement le protocole de santĂ©, mais c’est un enfant qui est impuissant face aux autoritĂ©s adultes, et qui ne pourra par la suite pas maintenir des distances de sĂ©curitĂ©, se laver les mains rĂ©guliĂšrement, garder ses effets personnels des autres enfants, ou aĂ©rer le salle de classe dans laquelle il est assis toute la journĂ©e (ou insistez pour que les classes soient Ă l’extĂ©rieur lorsque cela est possible) s’il n’y a pas de rĂšgles en place que les adultes doivent exĂ©cuter et suivre pour le bien-ĂȘtre de tous. Comme nous lâavons dĂ©jĂ vu avec le port de masque «obligatoire», de nombreuses personnes ne suivent pas ce protocole, mĂȘme s’il est dĂ©fini par la loi, mais nous devrions essayer de dĂ©finir des paramĂštres.
L’Organisation mondiale de la santĂ© et divers syndicats d’enseignants (y compris le mien) conseillent d’Ă©taler les salles de classe pour permettre la distanciation tout en permettant une frĂ©quentation rĂ©guliĂšre en classe et le port obligatoire de masques par les enseignants et les travailleurs pour assurer un retour en toute sĂ©curitĂ©, ainsi que des fenĂȘtres ouvertes, un lavage rĂ©gulier des mains (il n’y a jamais de savon dans les salles de bain de l’Ă©cole de mon fils!), des entrĂ©es / couloirs se dĂ©plaçant dans l’un ou l’autre sens, et une dĂ©sinfection rĂ©guliĂšre des surfaces. Ceci afin de permettre Ă la fois d’aller Ă l’Ă©cole mais aussi de ne pas infecter notre population avec Covid-19 peu de temps aprĂšs avec une augmentation des «clusters».
De plus, nous vivons dans un endroit trĂšs touristique, et cet Ă©tĂ© a de nouveau Ă©tĂ© extrĂȘmement occupĂ© par les voyageurs – Ă la fois ceux qui viennent et ceux qui sont en vacances dans d’autres pays. Je connais plusieurs familles dont les enfants frĂ©quentent l’Ă©cole locale et qui ont voyagĂ© Ă destination et en provenance de diffĂ©rents pays avec peu ou pas de respect des protocoles de sĂ©curitĂ©. En consĂ©quence, leurs enfants pourraient ĂȘtre asymptotiques, ou malades, et nous ne le verrons pas complĂštement se manifester avant la fin septembre, aprĂšs le retour des enfants pendant deux ou trois semaines.
Pourquoi agir de maniĂšre Ă ne rĂ©pondre qu’Ă la crise? Pourquoi ne pas anticiper la crise et agir en consĂ©quence? Encore et encore, les professionnels de la santĂ© et les scientifiques disent que NOUS AVONS LE CONTRĂLE avec ce virus si nous avons simplement un leadership clair et la discipline pour adopter des mesures de sĂ©curitĂ©. Quelle excuse avons-nous pour ne pas faire ce que nous pouvons?
Enfin, Ă part une brĂšve communication en mai du bureau du maire disant que la frĂ©quentation serait obligatoire pour tous les Ă©lĂšves, nous n’avons reçu aucune information de l’Ă©cole ou du bureau du maire local concernant les protocoles de sĂ©curitĂ© pour nos enfants ou les attentes pour nous parents. C’est nĂ©gligeable. Si nous n’avions pas eu l’incroyable professeur de classe que nous avions, nous n’aurions rien su, et de nombreux amis se sont retrouvĂ©s dans cette position, s’appuyant plutĂŽt sur des ouĂŻ-dire (ce qui Ă©quivaut Ă la dĂ©sinformation et Ă la panique).
Nous devons faire mieux si nous voulons Ă©viter un autre confinement ou, bien pire, une sociĂ©tĂ© trĂšs malade et contagieuse qui entraĂźne la perte de nombreux ĂȘtres chers.
Merci d’avoir pris en considĂ©ration ce que j’ai Ă©crit ici en tant que parent, professeur, et membre de votre Ă©lectorat trĂšs prĂ©occupĂ©.
Veuillez recevoir, Monsieur, mes salutations distinguées.
Filed under: Travel pieces | Tags: alpine, Balmat, Biarritz, Chamonix, France, holidays, mer de glace, mountain cimbing, St. Gervais, Victorian era, winter sports
“O, wind, if winter comes, can spring be far behind?” Percy Bysshe Shelley
I went to the Musee Alpine in Chamonix yesterday. I had been reluctant to go, given that I donât like the cold nor winter sports and figured this is what the museum is composed of. But, I went, and itâs good that I did.
The guide enunciated throughout her tour, was charming, informed, and a bonafide Chamonard to boot. What I discovered is that the name of Chamonix had changed perpetually due to boundaries being re drawn and small disputes between nearby communes. For example, St. Gervais had attempted to âclaimâ Mont Blanc rather than Chamonix, despite its being miles away. And Turin had been a part of the Haute Savoie.
What is particularly interesting to me is how the village evolved over the last two hundred years. It was once solely inhabited by a very rural, agricultural people who were afraid of the mountains, believing them âcursedâ by demons. I understand this â at the top of the mountains in the winter the howling of the wind is akin to what monsters might sound like. The residents scratched out a living during the six months of temperate weather with agricultural pursuits, then spent six months making garments out of wool, fur and wood. Now, itâs a place in which most of the residents capitalize on tourism, making it their primary source of income, from becoming mountain guides, ski instructors, and certified sportsmen, to the many shops and restaurants (only really) open during the winter and summer seasons. Additionally, many of the Chamonards have sold homes that have been in their families for generations to the wealthy French, Italians and Swiss who like to holiday in Chamonix.
Indeed, during the turn of the 18th and 19th century, Chamonix was much like Biarritz in that European aristocrats visited in droves, and as a consequence huge, grand hotels were built to accommodate them. These were later destroyed or turned into something else when the same aristocrats went elsewhere and France passed laws to give all French people the opportunity to go on holidays themselves.
From the late 18th century, Chamonixâs mountains also became a site for scientific study during a type of âenlightenmentâ age. The stories of climbing Mont Blanc are astounding in their arduousness and danger. Itâs no wonder the grumpy Jacques Balmat, who made the first ascent of Mont Blanc in the mid 1700âs, wearing wool and leather, is so famous around the valley. This eventually led to the arrival in droves of Victorians to Chamonix for âthe mountain cureâ and glorious retreat for alpine sports, further cementing its designation as a tourism hot spot.
The culmination of the museum visit is a room that holds a series of paintings of the Mer de Glace, created by various visiting painters over the epochs. What one observes while looking at all of these paintings of the same subject, is that despite each of the paintings being almost identical in their vantage point, each of them looks slightly different. This is arguably not only a matter of perception, but also a metaphor for the dynamic aspects of the mountains and nature itself.
Filed under: From the Soap Box | Tags: Chamonix, convert, diet, environment, fads, golden rule, health, meat, pollution, vegan, vegetarian
Addendum to the piece, below
“Only I can change my life, no one can do it for me.” Carol Burnett
I actually began doing research on the environmental effects of eating meat shortly after writing this piece, and in September of 2016 I reduced my eat consumption by 90%. In essence, while I still am hurt and irritated by the people who were combatively proselytizing (& just being plain mean), I have since evolved and changed my ways…
That said, I will keep this post up as evidence of my previous ignorance and petulance on the subject…
To my recently converted vegan eating friends,
Congratulations on your vegan diet! Iâm glad that youâve found something that you want to do to help the environment and your general health. Iâm pleased that youâre contributing to the overall welfare of the collective. Really I am.
But even though Iâm super happy for you, I get upset when you talk about your vegan diet and put down meat eaters as barbaric dimwits. Iâm a meat eater. But you know that – weâve had Sunday Roasts together. While itâs arguable that Iâm a dimwit, I donât believe Iâm barbaric and cruel. And what about the golden rule? Youâre treating animals better than I may, but youâre putting me down in the process of justifying your diet. I might evolve from my place lower than you on the evolutionary chain, but your lectures and accusatory tone may prompt me to crawl right back into the water, leaving my shell on the shore.
Last week alone I suffered three separate people in Chamonix Valley who have recently made this lifestyle change, proselytizing to me about veganism. Each of them explicitly and implicitly told me that if I continue to eat meat I donât care two shits for the environment, about other living creatures, or my own body. I didnât engage in argument. I mean, I donât really care about my own body, and I should given that Iâm aging and thatâs a horrendous process…I tried to let it âroll off of my backâ and not to let my eyes glaze over, attributing their antagonism to early zeal, but the third novitiate made me angry (and hurt, if Iâm to be honest): I ran into this friend in the parking lot of the primary school and excitedly mentioned that my husband and I are replacing our very old car with a hybrid. He told me in a flat, contentious voice, âYou should become a Vegan if you really want to help the environment.â While I stumbled a bit with a reply, muttering âOh, gee…um…â he immediately suggested, âYou could stop commuting to Geneva for work.â As I scratched my head to figure out a polite way to stop this conversation, he rapid-fire-suggested, âYou could stop visiting your family and wasting jet fuel.â I spluttered a âOh. My. Well now…â Without hesitation, he went on to tell me that the âbestâ thing I could do (in addition to the aforementioned) was to keep the old car on the road and not cause the industry and subsequent pollution that happens with the creation of a new car. That I wasnât serious about the environment if Iâm unwilling to do the previously stated things. Awkward. I think I said something innocuous and superficial like, âOh…well…okay. Then Iâll see you around,â and drove off with the belt of my coat stuck in the car door.
These interactions prompt me to write this letter now. I feel that I must justify my existence as a meat eater. And while I risk being a hypocrite âcause Iâm now exhorting you, the reader, to my cause, and being defensive to boot, Iâm also brave for defending my meat-eating ways which may, in the end, just reinforce the idea that I am a selfish, negligent nitwit who would sooner sacrifice kittens than give up something that pleases me.
So here goes:
My name is Victoria. And Iâm a meat eater.
I wasnât a big meat eater to begin with. We werenât rich when I was a child and so we ate all kinds of awful meats that I wouldnât touch, such as plaice, beef tongue, liver and pigâs feet. As a young adult in charge of my own dietary acquisitions, I found that I preferred to spend my money on drugs and entertainment. Granted, I did eat the odd slice of pepperoni pizza, but I can most definitely not be called a savage meat eater through most of the late 80âs and all of the 90âs. As a bona fide adult (meaning I pay my taxes, got married â again â am responsible for raising a child, pay my bills on time and donât piss off my employers) I do eat more meat. But thatâs primarily because Iâm eating
three squares (or at least two) and itâs hard not to eat meat whilst still having a relatively diverse diet. Also, my son would never eat if he didnât eat meat. Or at least heâd only eat starch and carbohydrates. (And donât say thatâs âcause weâve allowed him to eat what he wants. That weâve spoiled him. That we havenât starved him enough. Short of tying him up with gaffer tape and administrating vegetables and fruits intravenously, weâve tried everything).
Iâm still making excuses for my addiction, I know, but we donât consume a lot at home. And what we do eat is locally sourced. I know the animals I eat are still hung upside down, scared, and killed and thatâs horrific, but I do spend the money and take the time to buy the meat in which the creature was at least allowed to enjoy their lives to that point. And, hopefully, in their nicer environments they were also spoken to softly and humanely as they were slaughtered. But I donât think itâs fair to say Iâm cruel to living creatures because I eat meat. I sign petitions to stop cruelty to animals. I support The World Wildlife Federation and National Geographic with annual cash donations. I pet wet, smelly dogs, including my own. Iâve taken in the neighborhood stray. But there I go justifying my behavior. The fact is, I like it. Especially the salty ones that originate from pig. Please donât take this the wrong way, but it sucks to feel judged and admonished about my meat eating ways and I donât like it one bit. Please let me hit my own âbottomâ and reach the decision to stop eating it (and the rest) on my own.
This does not mean Iâm not concerned about the state of the world. Iâm deeply troubled by the world today, to the extent that it makes it hard for me to be happy at all with the myriad of global problems. My predisposition to neurosis is on overdrive these days, what with Trump, Brexit, Turkey, the Middle East, French strikes, mass shootings, environmental calamity, desertification, unfair wealth distribution, terrorism, human trafficking, the bodyâs resistance to antibiotics, etc. etc. It keeps me up at night. Seriously. Unless I take a pill (but now theyâre prescribed, so thatâs okay, right?).
With regard to the environment, I may not be a vegan, but I do many small things throughout every day in an effort to help save our planet:
- We never dry our clothes in a dryer even though I really miss soft towels and jeans.
- We donât run water while weâre brushing our teeth, and my husband is a total soap dodger, so thatâs water saved, too.
- We donât flush after each pee, adhering to the saying, âif itâs yellow, keep it mellow…â
- We recycle, and flatten all the boxes and bottles.
- We car share to the school most mornings (and weâve attempted to involve two additional neighborhood families whose children go to the same place at the same time, to no avail, and despite their lamentations about environmental calamity…).
- We donât use harmful detergents and cleaners, even as I really miss the smell of Ariel.
- As mentioned, our new car is a hybrid, and despite the fact that itâs just weird looking.
- As mentioned, I didnât eat much of anything through my childhood and into my adult years.
- I spent most of my adult life without being the owner of a car, living in cities with true mass transit capabilities. That counts for something (How many of you can say the same?).
Yes, Iâm flawed. I eat meat. I like it. I also eat gluten. And I eat dairy. I suffer a cheese belly due to my penchant for the stuff. I love milk in my coffee. I enjoy omelets and quiche (Iâm getting hungry). Even as Iâm still adapting and shaping my philosophy of the world, itâs not likely that I will convert to veganism anytime soon. I would like to do more to help. To have a big garden in which my husband grows vegetables and fruit, perhaps heâd even keep a few bees, but heâs busy at the moment earning money to put some kind of food on our table.
These recent conversations with these vegan disciples have left me disturbed and suspicious. Each personâs eye had the shine of a zealot. The imparting of their vegan information the air of proselytizing. The sudden popularity and timely coincidence suggests a fad. Growing up on the West Coast of the USA in the 1970âs, I met all kinds of charlatans who were apostles of Buddhism, Lao Tzu, Pluralism, Karma, Chakras, and astrology, with various accompanying diets, revered stones and/or crystals, yoga practices, and exercise regiments. Later, they became dot-commers and venture capitalists that âdoâ yoga and Pilates as part of their social role and follow folks on Twitter who practice âmindfulnessâ and positivity. These recent conversations with these vegan followers here remind me of home and those good old days…
But letâs get back to my central point – whatâs up with the preaching and shaming? I have many old friends who are deeply devoted vegetarians. And a couple of vegans are among them. They donât attempt to persuade me to their ideologies or make me feel bad about my own lifestyle choices. Perhaps theyâve lost their enthusiasm and itâs just a way of life. Perhaps theyâve ascertained that Iâm a lost cause. Perhaps itâs âcause they know that Iâm not a conspicuous consumer. That Iâm not one of the bad guys.
Before my dad died, I used to frequently call him up after Iâd watch the evening news (from any time zone), crying over the state of the world. In addition to the news, Iâd be upset with the broadcasting itself, too, and what it implied about the world and its state of affairs also. My dad, a political activist, would always tell me: âModel the life youâd like. Try to live faithfully to your spirit and your values. Believe that the micro will affect the macro. Remember humor. And live and let live with critical insight, but not fast judgment.â
Filed under: The Baby Diaries | Tags: Boy George, Chamonix, clubbing, Culture Club, DJ's, expats, French Alps, hyperreality, L'Amnesia, motherhood, nightclubs, pop music, teen spirit, The New Romantics
âForty is the old age of youth; fifty the youth of old age.â Victor Hugo
A friend invited me to go and see Boy George in Chamonix last Friday night. Yes, thatâs right â Boy George of the Culture Club fame, the iconic girlie-man in the pop band of the 1980âs – was in this wee village DJâing, or âspinning.â When I remarked on how bizarre it was to have Boy George in town to my husband, he tried to give it the âbig unâ about how Chamonix is a cosmopolitan place, a destination for many, and that I underestimate its appealâŠthat Boy George probably saw it as an opportunity to go snowboarding for the weekend, hang out in a âcool French Alpine village,â and do his DJâing. Hmmm. I later found out he was paid 15k, which makes more sense. Curious to see what he looks like now, and a little anxious to prove to myself that Iâm not only a rapidly aging mother, I agreed to go. Then I found out that he wasnât scheduled to begin till 1am. If Iâm up at 1am these days itâs cause my little tyke has wet or pooped himself, had a ânight terror,â is hungry, or has indigestion. Moreover, if Iâm up at 1am these days, it means that when my day inevitably begins at the crack of dawn, Iâm going to be even more fatigued than usual. Not wanting to disappoint my friend, however, or myself, I decided that on the night of the show, I would go to bed at the same time as my son (shortly after dinner), then wake up at midnight and go to the gig. All went as planned, I got a few hours of sleep, got dressed, made a coffee for myself, took an ibuprofen, (god Iâm lame), and set off for the nightclub.
Nightclubs still smell like the teen spirit of my youth â sweat, alcohol, hormones, and the close, stale smell of an interior that never opens its doors for a spring-cleaning. This one is downstairs in a cave-like space below a two-story magazin. I couldnât help but think that if there were a fire none of we club goers would be able to escape and itâd be a tragedy noted on the AOL homepage. Many of Chamonixâs expat âsocietyâ were out for the gig â middle aged, middle class, dressed up in heels and âhipâ tennis shoes, already drunk in celebration of being away from their respective hearths-and-homes, in denial of the next morning and the demands of children and the household. Boy George didnât come on until 3am (he must have been snoozing before his set, too) and he looked good: he had a sequined butterfly flower makeup design on half of his face, eyeliner, white foundation make up, and a pink, glittery fedora, with a simple black suit. Like the rest of us, heâs put on a bit of weight over the years. There was a charisma and energy around him – you could sense him moving through the crowd even before he entered the DJ booth. Immediately there was a tight knot of people around the little booth, which would have made me claustrophobic. Hyper-realistically, cell phones were over the heads of everyone standing around him as they took pictures and made videos. Boy George didnât do much other than bob around while his partner actually DJâd, then he, himself, started spinning. He chose âpoppyâ riffs, which were good, and the music he chose had an energetic, non-aggressive beat, but after awhile, it was repetitious, and, well, boring. I wasnât the only one to think so either âcause the club drained of folks pretty quickly. That said, maybe the crowd left because they were knackered in the small hours of dawn?
Filed under: The Baby Diaries | Tags: Beaufort, Chamonix, Cremeaux, French Alps, French foods, mont blanc, pussy willow, Tomme, winter sports
“In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.” Albert Camus
Clear, crisp air that feels like itâs cleaning your pores. The squeak of your shoes in the snow. Mountains on all sides rising so high against blue skies that they look false. Glacial run-off creating rivers that you can feel the cold emanating from when you walk near them and can hear in the quiet of the night. Little crosses and chapels dotting the hills. Chalets with snow logs on their roofs to keep the snow from falling on their inhabitants. Red shutters. Copper roofs. Darkened and aged wood on the older homes. Sunshine that tans the face even as you wear several downy layers. Pussy willow trees. Skiing and waffles and chocolat chaud. Beaufort and Tomme cheese made by special cows in the Alps and local farmers, sold at the market each Saturday. Men in thick wool sweaters smoking while driving their snow plows and tractors. Mountain lakes so clear that the colors range from dark blue to aqua. Population explosion in the winter and summer bringing big, fancy 4wd BMWâs, huge tourist buses and queues for the gondolas. Paragliders, climbers, skiers, hikers, bikers, snowboarders. Helicopters overhead. The sound of avalanches and the explosion of dynamite to set off controlled avalanches. The smell of pine and wood- burning stoves. Nights so brightened by the moon that you donât need artificial light and your body casts a shadow. The single light on the mountains indicating the snow machine levelling the pistes (ski areas). Tartiflette, fondue, and cremeaux in the evening as Haute Savoie fare. Quiet nights. Starry skies. Snow and ice.
Filed under: The Baby Diaries | Tags: Antoine de Saint-Exupery, assistante maternelle, baby, Balzac, Calvin Coolidge, Chamonix, Colette, creche, Flaubert, France, Godard, kids in France, nanny, nursery, toddler, Truffaut, Victor Hugo, Voltaire
If you see ten troubles coming down the road, you can be sure that nine will run into the ditch before they reach you. Calvin Coolidge
After putting my sonâs name on the waiting list for the crĂšche (nursery) when I was four months pregnant with him (almost a year ago), and intermittently popping by to say âhelloâ to the Directrice of the creche, show her my growing belly, then my new baby, and reiterating my desire for a place when there was one available – we have been given one! Hooray!
But in addition to keeping myself on the forefront of the Directriceâs mind, thereâs an official process. I quickly had to go to my âfixerâ â an Irish woman who knows the French systems of bureaucracy like the back of her hand and gets paid by expatriates to delve into these waters on their behalf. In order to employ the services of the crĂšche, and an assistante maternelle (nanny), I must show that I earn income and, more importantly, pay taxes to the French government. So, she set me up as an auto-entrepreneur (self-employed). It quickly gets you into the system, which is why there has been a huge amount of criticism in France about this scheme and its supposed abuse by foreigners. But, for the moment, it exists. I must report income every quarter and then pay around 25% of my income, give-or-take.
For the crĂšche, my husband and I must produce an Avis dâAttestation (official breakdown of earnings) for last year, utility and bank bills proving we live locally, a letter from the doctor declaring our son is fit to be in collective care, as well as an ordinance, or prescription, for Doliprane in case of a fever, proof that we have supplementary healthcare (for that 20-30% not covered by your taxes and the state), official paperwork proving that we have gainful employment (the letters from the organisation that oversees profession liberales, or freelance and contracted workers), and duplicated pages from our boyâs Carnet de Sante (a health book given at birth in France that records all health visits, vaccinations, hospital stays, etc.) proving heâs had his necessary vaccinations. The French love paperwork, but Iâm freakishly organised, so compiling this dossier and putting it neatly in a binder is actually fun for me. Itâs perverse, but itâs also useful in this country.
Then thereâs the adaptation process. It is literally a period in which your child is adapted, or assimilated, into the crĂšche. If your child does not meet their expectations, for example, not eating and sleeping when they have that scheduled, then your child loses his place in the crĂšche and you must apply for a place in the following year. I agree with this in theory. I think itâs a great idea to slowly introduce your child into a new environment and its regimens and people and if it doesnât work for all involved, so be it. But something in it also makes me think of the last person picked for a team during physical education in school. If youâre not accepted, then youâve not fitted in, and regardless of what one may say about the entity that has rejected you, or the reasons for the rejection, youâve been rejected.
The first day you go with your baby into the crĂšche and sit with him there for about an hour. The second day, you sit with him for an hour, and then leave him for an hour. The third day, you leave him for two hours, which coincides with either their eating time or their sleeping time. The fourth day, itâs three hours, which again coincides with their eating or sleeping schedule. The fifth day, he stays half a day. The sixth day, he stays the whole day. I found it exhausting and overwhelming, so I can imagine what my wee one thought. The women seemed nice enough, with the exception of one who was rather shrewish, though all of them would be coquettish with my husband and look me up and down with a cold, polite smile every time I came in. There are two or three women working on a given day, and eleven babies at a given time. I was amused to see that they have a wooden contraption that has four baby seats on it in a row, and they literally feed the babies a mouthful and move down the line at feeding time. The babies sleep on separate cots in a room together. They would let the babies cry rather than going to them- theyâll fall asleep on their own (or they should!). But dang! I was amazed and pleased when my baby came back to me tidier than when he went in â even his nostrils were cleaned!
At the end of the adaptation process, the shrewish woman told my husband that my son was ready, but she was not sure if the mother was ready (me!). She didnât mention that to me when she told me he was accepted. But who cares? Heâs in for two days a week (as the lovely Welsh assistante maternelle has agreed to take our boy three days a week!) and hopefully it will be the start of his French education and a great introduction to the best of its culture, to the lessons that have given birth to its auteurs, and its wonderful writers and philosophers, rather than the beginning of his training to be a clerk in a Balzac-ian society.
Filed under: The Baby Diaries | Tags: baby sleep, breastfed, Chamonix, co-sleeper, cot, crib, formula, France, French Alps, infant sleep, nursing, Ralph Waldo Emerson, sleep
There was never a child so lovely but his mother was glad to get him to sleep. Ralph Waldo Emerson
The sleep situation with my baby boy has caused a lot of strife in our household. When I first came home from the hospital after having a c-section, I was unable to move in bed, and it seemed âsafeâ and easy to let my baby boy sleep in the crook of my arm, which I laid upon a pillow to keep it level. Every well-meaning woman whom I know told me this was unacceptable and dangerous- my baby could be smothered by me or by my husband in our sleep! Websites confirmed this. But it also seemed as though most of this death-by-smothering was a result of a parent being intoxicated in bed next to them. And almost all of them were a result of the father. For me, it seemed natural, and practically speaking, it seemed to be the only way to get him to sleep.
After many âdiscussionsâ with my husband, however, and his dissatisfaction with the sleeping arrangement, we moved the baby onto this little cot that was cut at an angle so that his head was higher up. On each side, there was a little velcroâd buffer to keep him on the wee bed. This little cot fit right in between the pillows where my husband and I rest our heads, and also seemed to work for awhile. I liked having the boy so close, because it allowed me to hear his breathing over the snores of my husband. Even so, my husband expressed repeated dissatisfaction with this arrangement and after many âdiscussions,â we bought a âco-sleeperâ that we put on the side of the bed. To be honest, I never liked this situation because my boy seemed close but very far, too, and it seemed rather pointless to have him on my husbandâs side of the bed, but he claimed it made it âeasierâ for me to sleep. Finally, we put the boy in a crib in the corner of our room and hoped that this would be a fine option. The boy was able to sleep in the crib, but he woke up every couple of hours, anyway, to feed, and going over to the crib, picking him up, bringing him back to the bed with me or sitting in a chair to nurse him seemed tedious and Iâd be wide awake afterwards.
The doctor told us that the baby can literally smell the milk of its mother if itâs in the same room, and this is why the baby was frequently waking up throughout the night. Consequently, my husband and I put together a sleeping schedule. Because my husband goes to bed early each night, anyway, I would be the âpoint-personâ to attend to the boy when he cried in the evening and early night while my husband would sleep in the guest-room and get several hours of uninterrupted rest. At about two am, after being awaked for another feeding, Iâd nurse the boy, weâd change places, and Iâd sleep peacefully until morning, and when our son next woke up, heâd be fed a bottle of formula by his father, the rotation manoeuvre completed!
To be honest, when I was in the room with the boy alone, Iâd simply take him back to bed with me and feed him while I was lying down and then doze off at some point till his next revival. I could have gone on like this for a number of months, but my husband has badgered me to put the boy and his crib into a room of his own so that we can sleep in the same bed together like a ânormalâ couple. Because I canât think of a logical reason not to, and Iâm really too tired to argue, I have complied. The first few nights that the boy was in his own room were hideous. He cried at an ear-splitting pitch and I nearly had to be tied down not to go to him. These last few nights, however, have been blissful. It seems to be true what the doctor said about his smelling me in the room, because he does not wake as frequently as he once did. As a consequence, I am feeling a renewed sense of energy and wakefulness that I have not known since I was seven months pregnant and could still sleep at night!
Filed under: The Baby Diaries | Tags: baby, birth, Chamonix, Erma Bombeck, France health, French Alps, healthcare, infant care, midwife, midwives, sage femme, sage femmes, womb
Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died. Erma Bombeck
The sage-femmes (mid-wives) at the hospital were great. Through them, I learned to nurse and to bathe my child, as well as to take his temperature. They were also the ones who would come and relieve me, or check on us during the night, making me feel that my baby boy and I were tended to.
But the sage-femme assigned to me by the obstetrician for pre-and-post-birth care was useless. Before my boy was born my husband and I went into her office, and sitting before her little desk, waited for several moments to see what she would do because we had no idea what we were to do. She didnât say a word. Finally, we asked some tentative questions about the care in the hospital that we should expect, which had already been answered by my good doctor, but we wanted to be polite. She would answer them as an adolescent might, with as few words as possible and giving no opportunity for elaboration. It was a struggle and that 15-minute appointment seemed to last an hour.
Post birth, however, one is meant to go to the sage-femme for ten visits in order to properly recuperate. Itâs actually prescribed by the paediatrician at the hospital before you leave, and the lâAssurance Medicale, the health bureau, reimburses you for the visits 100%. This is a very good and holistic approach to the birthing process that I highly commend about the French system in theory, but Iâve gone to this sage femme a few times now, and I still find it useless. On one such visit she put a long towel, sheet type-of-thing around my lower back and near my pelvis, and pulled it tightly around the area. I asked what this was for and she told me it would help âreshapeâ my womb. On another visit, she pulled out an appliance that looked like a combination between an electric razor and a vibrator and proceeded to put it into my vagina. I asked her what this was for and she told me that it sent out electrical currents that would help âreshapeâ my vagina and womb. On another visit she had me practice getting down and up off of the floor and doing sit ups. Iâd ask her questions that I thought she might know that were relevant to me, such as about the blood blisters on the breasts, and the left breastâs drying up, and the lack of sleep, and doctorâs visits, and she was not able to provide any answers. She doesnât have children. I could be her mother. Oh! I did find the visit in which she took out the stitches from my caesarean very useful.
Perhaps finding a good sage femme is akin to finding a good psychologist? This is very American of me, the land of people who seek to discuss their problems (and why not? I think the world would be a better place if one could unload all their worries and problems on a person they paid to listen to them and to keep quiet about it all, and who then eliminated the need to unload on your friends and family). Anyway. Perhaps itâs like a psychologist in the sense that if you get a bad one, an incompetent one, then it will turn you off of ever going again to one. I would have stopped going to this sage femme, but at the end of every visit I had with her I felt bullied into making the next appointment, so I would make one in order to get out of the room. After several visits, I decided I didnât want to go anymore and tried to tell her that it just wasnât âmy cup of teaâ and it âdoesnât seem to be working for me,â and I donât want her to âwasteâ her time on me anymore. She gave me an angry lecture on how irresponsible I am being to my body by giving up the visits before theyâre over! I listened to her quietly, and then suggested we call it ten visits, as prescribed, submit it to the relevant authorities for her to be reimbursed, and Iâll give her the co-pay in cash. To her credit, she immediately agreed.
As much as Iâve appreciated other medical care in France, Iâve found my sage femme visits the least helpful. I will presume that she is an anomaly.
Filed under: The Baby Diaries | Tags: babies, baby, baby health, carte vitale, Chamonix, French Alps, French doctors, health in France, healthcare, healthcare in France, infant care, l'Assurance Maladie, Mark Twain
The only way to keep your health is to eat what you donât want, drink what you donât like, and do what youâd rather not. Mark Twain
Today I went to the doctor with my boy for a check-up and we had an interesting conversation. She is a âstand-inâ for our regular doctor. Originally from Marseille, she loves the mountains and her husband works for the mountain rescue. Normally, she does research on frostbite for a national study and sheâs also six months pregnant (and looks great. Unlike the bulk I was, and remain â Iâm still wearing my maternity clothes!).
After sheâd checked my boyâs weight, vitals, and head circumference, etc., we got to chatting about life in Southern France (I hold onto the idea that I will live there one day, put perhaps it wonât be until Iâm in my 50âs, like Colette). From there, we began talking about the state of French industry. Recently, France has lost two manufacturing company contracts, which were employing/would employ thousands of workers because of inefficiency and the demand for guaranteed lifetime contracts, respectively. After that, we segued into the dire state of the French healthcare system. Iâm a great admirer of their system â a winning combination of socialist and capitalist care â and Iâve been the grateful recipient of many medical services in France. Nonetheless, I am aware the system is bankrupt. That it has been so for thirty years. It seems to me that to raise the cost of doctorâs visits, hospital stays, and long term care, SLIGHTLY, would help the system immeasurably. It may even save it. Arenât the French meant to be collectively oriented? Why isnât this happening?
What she told me was surprising. Particularly from a French person. She said that the French complain about the 23e or 28e they must pay for each doctorâs visit, which is the amount one pays before being partially reimbursed. In reality, only about 10e per visit goes to the doctor. Unlike their American counterparts, for example, doctors here are not getting rich through their vocation. She told me that when the doctor is unable to process a Carte Vitale (oneâs personal health card which is registered with the health authorities, is run through a machine at the chemist, the hospital, by doctors at every visit, and then is automatically reimbursed for a given treatment) and must give them a brown form to fill out and send to the lâAssurance Maladie (health office) for reimbursement, instead, the French patients complain about having to pay for the price of a stamp in sending the form in for reimbursement.
She is very pessimistic that anything will change in France, despite the dire state of affairs within the medical arena and the economic problems for the country as a whole. She believes that in general, the French believe that they are âentitled.â They do not care whence their rebates, subsidies, incentives, reimbursements, and retirement plans come from, only that they receive them and pay as little toward them as is possible. She believes that short of a huge philosophical shift in thinking, which is not likely to happen as the general population in France refuses to accept that there is a problem that requires everyone to adapt, the French medical and economic systems are doomed. I want to believe this is not so.
Filed under: The Baby Diaries | Tags: accompagnateur, assistante maternelle, babies, Chamonix, creche, existential struggle, exotic, famille garder, France, motherhood, mountain leader, nanny, nursery, P.J. O'Rourke, toddler
Everybody knows how to raise children, except the people who have them.
P.J. OâRourke
I took my baby boy to the lovely Welsh assistante maternelle today. Sheâs still undecided about whether sheâll return to being an assistante maternelle after the last three years in which sheâs spent under the famille garder while raising her young son. Even so, sheâs kindly agreed to watch my boy for a few hours a day, a few days each week, while my husband is away working as an accompagnateur, and Iâm grateful.
So today I dropped him off at hers for the first time, went home to write, and attempted to have something to eat at a leisurely pace. But all I could think about was how I really am a different person now that Iâve had my baby boy and this unsettles me. I feel as though Iâm more emotionally tender, and consequently more vulnerable than Iâve ever been in my entire life. A little person depends deeply on me now and I am completely responsible for him. I realise, now, that my life has been relatively carefree thus far. Iâve cared about jobs, work, boyfriends, husbands, sure, but ultimately Iâve always been free to do as I wish. To go out to a dinner at midnight. To sleep till 10am. To miss the last train and take the night bus home or stay with friends. To travel to exotic places with my only concern being to get the correct inoculations beforehand. To leave a job or a place or a man because Iâm unhappy. To do most personal things on an impromptu basis. To do most things selfishly.
Iâd been so cavalier before having my boy about putting him into care as soon as it was possible so I could resume my professional interests. I was so cavalier about taking him with me on travels to places I want to visit and revisit in the second and third worlds. But now that he is in day care and not with me, I find myself feeling nervous, agitated, and I have an enormous, nebulous sense of guilt. As for traveling to obscure locales with him, I think âNo way!â I suddenly fear excessive heat, uncomfortable lodgings, bad water, food poisoning, malaria, typhoid and hepatitis!
Iâm not the easy-going mother Iâd hoped to be, taking my child everywhere with me and not particularly concerned about dangers, and more carefree. I fear I am conventional. That said, maybe things will change with time as he ages and becomes less vulnerable? Although, from what I hear from my elders, oneâs child never really seems grown-up even when they are. Maybe as I learn to trust that my boy is happy in care, or at least not unhappy, I will be able to relax and concentrate on other things. Maybe with time Iâll better remember warm days and nights, exotic food, and the stars of the Southern Hemisphere, rather than its heat, poverty, and potential for bad stomachs.
