Category Archives: Family

Veganism And The Art Of Iron Levels During Pregnancy

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Since Freya’s conception I’ve been aware of the importance of iron-levels during pregnancy, making sure Jo not only got an increased amount of iron-rich vegan foods, but which foodstuffs to combine/avoid in order to effect a higher intake of the much-needed mineral; however, it wasn’t until last week I actually bothered to find out why, and what the test results actually mean.

Hemoglobin is an iron-rich protein found in red blood-cells. Its function, amongst others, is to carry oxygen to other cells, like a pizza delivery guy. About 1/3 of a woman’s iron reserves are given to the child, which makes it reasonably vital that a decent iron level is maintained.

Before Jo got pregnant with version 2, her “blodvärde” was around 130. This number represents the number of grams of hemoglobin per litre of blood, and should be between 120 – 150 g/l for women. During her first checkup mid-January her level sank to 111, which was low, but not quite sufficiently so to start taking iron supplements; when Jo was tested a second time, last week, her level had risen to 127. The midwife was, apparently, impressed.

I was going to end this entry with an aside that spinach is not, as everyone believes it to be, a fantastic source of iron, due to it also including a fair amount of oxalates, which inhibit iron absorption. Without doubt, that would have been a perfectly good and informative finishing sentence to an otherwise quite mundane blog, but then I chanced upon MakeupTalk’s forum, that had a question about low hemoglobin:

Just got my blood results back and my midwife said I have low hemoglobin in my blood but its nothing to worry about. Apparantely its caused by lack of iron. Is it safe to take iron/vitamin supplements through pregnancy?

asks ForeverPink, to which one of the forum moderators, Lia, replies:

Every pregnant woman HAS to take iron to supplement the body, because the income by food isn’t enough – to women who doesn’t have anemia, it’s 300mg per day, and for those who have, more. You should take it every day, and it’s at least 600mg if i’m not mistaken.

Check with an ob-gyn about it, because he/she will be able to treat you correctly.

Obviously Lia is talking shite; even capitalising will not make it any truer, Lia. In none of the articles I’ve read has it ever once stated that one HAS to take iron tablets (maybe the law is different in Brazil, which wouldn’t surprise me), with a certain site informing me that one should never take iron tablets if one’s level is not low.

What I found more worthwhile than that nugget of bollocks as an end to this entry, though, was Lia’s forum signature, which comes from the lips of Lia, herself:

Learn everything you can, you never know when you might need it.

Brilliant, Lia.

How Not To Wake Up

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I woke up early this morning (6 o’clock-ish), remaining in bed, dozing and listening to Jo and Freya getting ready. Just before they were set to go I heard Freya crying (probably an over-reaction to hurting herself, or possibly an unwillingness to do something). I don’t know how long this little outburst lasted, but after just a couple of wails of disapproval I found my heart-rate rise and my temper shorten. In the past I have stumbled naked into the hall and blurt out some angry comment, making my way back to bed, leaving everyone in a worse mood.

Today I did my best to ignore the noise, trying instead to focus on how unimportant it all was, and that within five minutes of it being over I’d forget about the whole incident. It wasn’t easy; I still got slightly uptight, but I refrained from taking it out on the girls, who left shortly after.

It was very pleasant to lie there alone and in silence, with only my thoughts to disturb me. And then it happened. I’m certain it is something that has only come in recent years, but I do not know when my morning thoughts started getting interrupted by making a mental to-do list. I was actually aware of becoming stressed at the notion of planning, not just today, but the whole weekend.

“I’d like to go for an early morning walk today and maybe be able to vacuum clean before lunch instead of tomorrow because tomorrow Jo and Freya are going to make chocolate balls for Freya to take to Emilie’s birthday party so I’ll get up early tomorrow and see if Freya wants to come for a walk with me before Jo gets up which means she can have a bit of a lie in and then when we drop off Freya at Emilie’s maybe we can…”, is pretty much how my lazy morning in bed turned out, without a mental breath or punctuation to assuage the increasing agitation building up in my head.

Once again I managed to see what was happening, and put a stop to it, forcing myself to calm down and concentrate on where I was just then. And this is where this entry came from, a result of focusing . It is extremely interesting to realise how a normal day in my head begins, and is definitely something I must work on forthwith.

Mini Mission To Haga

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We decided to go on a mini-mission this afternoon, on the spur of the moment, and ended up at Fjärilshuset, just north of Stockholm.

There were a fair number of people, most of them in the restaurant, it seemed, which was to our advantage. I wouldn’t say we roamed leisurely (Freya was far too excited, particularly at the various pieces of fruit that had been placed in the frogs’ and snails’ aquariums), but we could roam most of the time unhindered by human traffic.

As nice as the park was, I couldn’t help but feel disappointed at the lack of actual butterflies. We spotted many koi, but, as nice as they may be to look at, that wasn’t the reason for paying 160kr entrance fee. I suppose, in fairness, we came out of season (I’m supposing butterflies have mating seasons in rainforest climes, don’t they?). If not then they need to do some serious rethinking or illegal importing.

The gift shop seemed geared towards receiving a fair number of visitors. I was mightily impressed by the range of rubbish merchandise and embalmed scorpion lollipops on offer (no batteries though, of course), but my eye was caught by the aptly named “Eco Expedition ™ Rainforest Exploration” toy-pack (see photo). Indiana Jones (whoops, it’s obviously not him) is out in the jungle, with his reasonably well-scaled binoculars, when he comes across a fuck-off huge frog. Not quite sure why Wild Republic bothered making the animal swallow-safe when Indy’s (there I go again, tut!) looking device is a certainty for death by choking. Maybe it’s because there exists such things as scorpion lollipops, and a lime-green and orange amphibian looks far too enticing to be given a reasonable scale.

Not far from the exit of the gift shop, just above eye level where most people would not ever bother to look, is a dusty advert for that (now) well-known company, Wild Republic. I’ll skip any scale-related errors here, to point out what I consider to be one of the nattiest slogans I’ve come across this year: World Leader In Nature-Related Fun. I reckon if I have to explain further the wonder of this little gem, then it’s not worth knowing why. I will point out, though, they are (self-claimed) world leaders. Where the statistics are for nature-related fun contenders is anyone’s guess, but if Wild Republic say so, who am I to argue.

And to end on an educational note, which all my entries do, we come to the notion that the word “butterfly” was originally “flutterby”. I have always reckoned this to by a sack of dogs cocks, so far-fetched as to be beyond risible, and into the realms of, well, a sack of dogs cocks. Extensive research (i.e. Wikipedia and browsing the first few results of googling “butterfly etymology”) seems back up my dogs cocks theory, though I did find out that:

a) butterflies do not poo.

b) caterpillar poo is called frass.

c) Sign language for the word butterfly involves interlocking thumbs, flapping flat hands like wings.

To Be A Giant

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Some time after we had moved to our current accommodation we were contacted by the company who owns the flat, Familjebostäder, who wanted to send a photographer to take pictures (obviously) of Jo and Freya, for use in their adverts/website. I have never known how they found out about and decided Jo and Freya should be the models they were after, and it feels slightly creepy thinking about it, though I’ve no doubt the methods used were above board, and no spies or hidden cameras were used.

Despite our foreknowledge it was still a pleasant surprise going to their site and seeing us (I say “us”, even though I was not asked to appear, not even in the background, under a bed, out of focus). Freya, however, being used to seeing digital pictures of us all on the computer, and not really understanding the concept of the Internet, was unmoved by the whole thing. Until the large-scale version came along, that is.

A few months ago Jo was again contacted by the FB(I), this time wanting to know if they could employ one of the pictures in a larger format. Jo was okay with the idea, thinking it would probably be a couple of metre-high indoor advertisements that’d be easy enough to miss or (mis)take as part of the surrounding scenery.

A 7-metre high hanging is currently emblazoning the FBI offices in Stockholm. Not quite what Jo had imagined when she gave the okay; in fact, very few (minus egomaniacs) could have foreseen the enormity of the end result. Even Freya was (quietly) impressed.

Fretting Over A Game

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I am, as it is well-known, less fanatical about rock music than the average person. I don’t really like a great deal of guitar music in general, actually, with certain exceptions (thinking Pink Floyd as an immediate example). That said, I have mellowed with age, and I can find myself humming along to the occasional riff, or appreciating a wider variety of music than I once did in my predominantly synth youth and early adulthood.

That said, I did actually mess around with a guitar or two in my music making heyday. I even played bass in a rock n roll band when I was 15, playing in pubs and talent contests (well, contest). I think my interest in guitars grew only as Martin L Gore became proficient, and, after I saw him playing some groovy country stuff in one of Depeche Mode’s documentaries, I suppose I deemed it okay to be seen with one.

Recently, it has not only been okay to be holding a guitar, but fantastically entertaining; I refer, of course, to Guitar Hero 3 on the Wii.

We went out and bought the game plus 2 guitars when Chip was over to celebrate my birthday a few weeks ago. The £100 purchase seemed a bit steep, and I got pangs of guilt at splashing out so much on one game, though I knew I simply had to have two guitars to get full enjoyment.

Since then we have had a number of different people over to try it out, with further plans to make it a central reason for inviting other friends over in the near future, and my current week’s holiday has so far seen a number of solo sessions taking place. I am, in short, hooked.

There are enough tracks in the game to make it interesting, and enough strong tracks to make the absolute dire offerings bearable, if not enjoyable. It has also opened me to bands that I had previously not been giving a chance to, with tracks like The Who’s “The Seeker”, The Killer’s “When We Were Young” and Heart’s “Barracuda”. I find myself mumbling the riffs or various vocal lines from these songs more often than is absolutely necessary or healthy, but I’m happy with my condition.