The endless training and retraining merry go round

I am pausing in my reminiscences about travelling Australia to have a rant about an email that I  recently received.  I had only gotten around to reading it yesterday and the thoughts and opinions that I have about it are bouncing around in my head.  I'm sure it will help if I set them out here as it is a subject that I have touched on before.

This is the email:

Hi Emma,
I  hope that you and your family are all well.

Training Admin at Head Office have asked me to let you know that you will need to upgrade to the NAT10006 Cert IV in BE Counselling and NAT10007 (Community) in order to be able to train and assess, once back from maternity leave. It doesn't take long to do :-)

I wondered if you would like to have a chat about it?
Best wishes,


Now firstly, I haven't replied yet or found out what this is all about and whether everyone has to upgrade to the new qualification, or it's just me because of my maternity leave. But either way it's still feeding into this mentality that is prevailing at the moment of training, more training and constant upgrading of qualifications.  I have written before about this need to stay current and the onus that this then places on women to stay connected to the workforce.

This email was sent to me not from an employer, but from a volunteer organisation that I have been involved with for 17 years.  For more than 15 of those years I have been actively involved as a volunteer breastfeeding counsellor.  I went through an extensive 12 month training course to gain the necessary skills and knowledge in order to gain the qualification.  As well as counselling 100's and 100's of women over the ensuing years, a requirement has always been to keep up to date with changing information and so to engage in self education.  This I have happily done as it is a particular area of interest for me.  Plus, I was in the process of having babies which greatly reinforced, and often upgraded pre-existing knowledge and skills.

Fast forward a number of years and the Australian Breastfeeding Association (ABA) became a registered training organisation (RTO) and had to not only total rewrite all of their training programmes but had to fall into step with a whole new bureaucratic way of doing things in order to satisfy the requirements of being an RTO.  So I retrained as a breastfeeding counsellor and community educator through a complicated process of recognition of prior learning.  I also went on and trained as a trainer and assessor.  I had only recently at that point trained as an assessor with the association under their old scheme and had to go and retrain in order to fit in with their new framework.  That was the fun and games I engaged in at the end of my Australian trip through 2008 and 2009.  After jumping through the various hoops and settling down to the business of actually doing some volunteer work for the association I found that I needed to upgrade my training and assessment qualifications again!  It seems that there is constant review happening and everything needs to be upgraded every five years as a matter of course. I started to feel like I was spending more of my 'volunteer' hours jumping through administrative hoops than actually at the coal face helping mothers.  Each year required a complicated appraisal of the experience and skills that were utilised during the preceding year and a requirement to reapply for the position of counsellor and trainer and assessor.  It was all enough to make you want to bang your head against the wall. 

This year, partly as an excuse to just leave the whole thing behind and have a break from it all, I decided to take 12 months leave to just enjoy being a mum with my beautiful new born baby girl.  ABA has not respected my leave and I have been asked to help here, answer questions there, fill in reports and field endless requests about when will I be coming back. So far I've only been on leave for 10 months.  Already I have been thinking that at the end of my twelve months I shall
resign as trainer and assessor and counsellor, and just go back to being a member.  I still really believe in the association and what it stands for, but feel that it has allowed itself to get derailed by its adherence to this governmental paradigm.  I have heard that the association is some millions of dollars in the red, and with the need to spend so much of its time and money satisfying regulatory requirements instead of doing their core business of providing information and support to breastfeeding mothers, I find myself not surprised.



It saddens me that a women's organisation like ABA whose soul goal is to improve women's ability to breastfeed their babies would allow themselves to be corrupted by a system that is actively discriminating against women and disadvantaging them if they take even a short amount of time off work. It feels to me like they are just following lock step with a new dogma without assessing how this affects not only the women working for them but also the message it is reinforcing across society.  As a women's organisation we should be standing up and pushing back against this insidious incursion of our rights.  Women should be allowed to take a reasonable amount of time off work (paid employment or volunteer) and by reasonable I mean years if necessary, and not expect to be treated like some out of touch imbecile with the memory of a gnat.  Being current in qualifications up to the last second is not only ridiculous, but insulting. Humans have the intelligence to being able to grow and develop and hone skills without the need for a training organisation or regulatory authority to sign off on their supposed competence.  The idea that ticking boxes is somehow indicative of a person's worth is a sad joke.  When we take time off work to raise our babies, our brains do not atrophy.  We often still have cause to think about work, through just the natural reminiscences of past life, reading the journals that still come through our mail and email inboxes, reading relevant articles in the newspaper and just generally being connected to the outside world by being fully functional and normal intelligent human beings.  The current system seems unable or unwilling to recognise this fact unless you prove it in triplicate by filling in a convoluted series of forms that sets out against very specific criteria just how each piece of knowledge and experience fits into a predetermined matrix written in training goobly gook.



What I find most ironic about the ABA's need for me to upgrade my qualifications, is that while I have been on leave I have actually been doing the very thing that I have to prove that I have the skills and knowledge about.  For the past 10 months I have been breastfeeding my baby every single day, sometimes it's felt like 24/7.  I have, through personal, real life experience, managed the newborn days, the supply issues, the managing paid work, expressing, the teething, the introduction of food and all the other issues surrounding a baby.  This is the stuff that we work in and train mothers in as a part of our volunteer work.  Surely to actually be doing all of this in practice should knock any theoretical training course right out of the water.  Logic says it would, but logic and bureaucracy don't seem to exist in the same bubble.  We have our heads so far in the sand that we can't see the illogical consequences of this. Particularly in a volunteer organisation where there is no paid incentive to be made to jump through these hoops.  At work, you cop, to a certain degree, the madness because they are paying for it and for you.  A volunteer organisation is getting your goodwill and time gratis.



I really hope that this madness will end and there will be a collective realisation at some point very soon that this training and assessment regime is completely unsustainable as it is costing way too much money and it is leaking good quality people, who are fed up with the system, from the association.

Bowraville

We went to Bowraville today to watch Evan play in the Coffs Harbour City Orchestra.  They were giving a performance in the old theatre there.  Bowraville is a lovely quiet little town inland from Macksville on the NSW mid north coast.  It still has lots of its original buildings, like a boarding house, a wash house, an emporium, and of course the theatre. It has a reasonably high Koori population and as yet seems to not have been discovered by the alternative community people like Bellingen has been.  I was really surprised at how quiet the town was today.

The logistics of getting to Bowraville today were a little challenging. Evan needed to be there early to set up, and being a hour's drive away, it wasn't feasible to drop him off and the rest of us come along later.  Also, to further complicate matters, our 'big' car, the one that can actually fit in all of the family, was out of action.  That left us with the small car, which can only seat 5. As a family of six this meant we needed some advanced planning.  We weren't keen on leaving anyone behind, so Steve managed to organise a lift for himself and Evan with someone else from the orchestra.  They left quite early and had a long day at Bowraville.  Steve chewed up some time at the Bowraville museum, learning that the town was originally called Bowra.  When it got its post office the name was changed to Bowraville in order that it was less likely that it could be confused with Bowral.

Sarah was the driver for us today and she drove Harry, Ellie and I.  We left much later than the others and got to Bowraville about ten minutes before the start.  Along the way, Sarah and I discussed the outline of the story that we had thought up while travelling Australia in 2007.  Sarah reminded me of a lot of details that I had forgotten.  We nutted out a few more ideas and I wrote a bit of a skeleton of the story.  Sarah had various writings of the story that she had attempted in the past, and was able to show one of them to me that she had stored on her laptop.

The concert was very entertaining and we had great seats close to the front and right in the centre.  The theatre is quite old and still has its original style.  The acoustics seemed to be really good too.  The orchestra played a number of pieces such as White Christmas and Polar Express.  Then we had a sing along of Christmas Carols with orchestral accompaniment.

Ellie has a ball climbing the steps in the aisle and made herself a little friend when she discovered a little boy around her age.  He was a little less able on the steps, so Ellie had a great time showing off her prowess by standing and walking and getting herself up and down the steps.

Body Rock

My friend told me about body rock a new fad exercise regime that involves short bursts of very intense exercise, followed by a short rest and then repeat.  The exercise bursts are supposed to be very intense and are meant to hurt a lot.  The whole workout only takes about 10-20 minutes..


I was warned before I looked it up on you tube that the women in the websites are very "busty". I can see what my friend meant, it looks like boob jobs are mandatory for this.  Maybe because the exercise is so intense that if you had "real" big boobs they would be flapping around all over the place, I know mine would be.  These women are very skinny, so obviously their boobs are enhanced.  They have boy hips and E cups, at least.  I haven't seen any men doing it either. Just endless videos of hot sweaty women torturing themselves.  Looks like a combination of perving on sexy women as they are scantily clad and writhing around in various positions, where you get a nice view of boobs and bum; and women voluntarily torturing themselves (along with posting their workouts on facebook) in  order to gain approval from others.

Not sure that I'll be jumping on this craze anytime soon.  I think yoga is more my pace.

Evony

http://www.evony.com/

It's hard to find time to blog today as I am setting up all of my cities in my Evony accounts.  At long last after years of asking for it, the powers that be, have finally granted us a merge.  I suspect it's a bit late as so many people gave up waiting and have already left the game.  I am practically on my last legs and doubt that I can last much longer.  I just don't seem to have the time required to devote to it anymore.

Life in Evony started about four and a half years ago with just one account.  The kids insisted that I play so that we could set up a family alliance.  Not many weeks into the game, they got sick of it and gave up their accounts to Steve and I.  As time went on I picked up a few other people's accounts as well.  Soon I had at least 10 active accounts and a bunch of in-actives that I could activate if needed. This all took 2 computers for me and 1 for Steve to run. Then Steve quit.

I got left with all my accounts and two laptops dedicated fulltime to running them.  This carried on for a while and the game seemed to gradually lose its attraction as more and more good people left.  Then when Ellie came along I found that I seriously did not have time to play anymore.  Which has been fine because the server was dead with very little to worry about in terms of getting attacked.

That was then. Now we have merged and everything is all lively again.  I don't know for how long, but I can rest assured that come 48 hours time when truce wears off, I'm gonna be faced with a bunch of flashing birdies to deal with and still no time to do anything about them.  I'm interested to see how the new server pans out, but really can't see myself sticking with the game for too much longer.  Perhaps by the new year I might be able to finally kick the habit.  Not bad seeing as I was the last one in the family to join the game and the last one to leave.  I think that the kids will think twice now before inviting me to join them in another online game as I seem to end up being in it for the long haul.

Homemade Ice Cream

Non Dairy Ice cream

 

 

2 teaspoons powdered agar agar  ( usually just use gelatine as I am not concerned about making it vegan)

3 cups of soy milk (use flavoured soy milk of your choice: vanilla, chocolate, coffee, etc) You could also experiment with other ‘milks’ such as chai or almond.

½ cup castor sugar

1/3 cup sunflower of safflower oil

1 – 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1.       Combine agar agar and 1 cup of soy milk in a saucepan. Stir over a medium heat until agar agar dissolves and milk begins to boil. 

2.       Add remaining ingredients and stir until sugar dissolves.

3.       Place covered mixture into the fridge to for about 2 hours to chill.

4.       Stir mixture and pour into an ice cream churner.  Process until it has reached the desired consistency about 30 minutes.

5.       Enjoy.

 

 

 

Pestilence

Evan is home from school today insisting that he is sick.  he doesn't look too bad to me, but his mate had some bug that had him off school for a few days and Evan is convinced that he has it too. It consists of upset tummy, headaches, general body aches, sore throat and runny nose.  Harry has decided that he's coming down with it too as he went off to school with a headache today. I gave him a dose of Nurophen and told him to call me if he got worse. Steve was complaining about aches and is a tad nervous as he has to fly to Sydney tomorrow for a job interview.  He doesn't want to be sick for that. I feel fine, Ellie seems fine and Sarah left at 6 this morning for a volleyball competition in Byron Bay.  I am assuming she's fine too.  I always find that the path of disease as it spreads through the family is slightly different each time.  A different mix of people seem to catch it, and a different person gets it worse than the others.  Usually, the pattern is that one gets it quite bad, one doesn't get it at all and the rest inevitably catch a slightly less virulent version over the ensuing days.

The other pestilence Evan visited on us today is a very annoying piece of malware that he downloaded onto my computer last night.  I have spent all day removing programmes, doing scans and removing shortcuts to get rid of the bugger.  So annoying and frustrating to have your computer hijacked.  I think he's banned from this computer from now on.

The last great pestilence epidemic that Evan visited upon the family was back in 2002 when he brought home chicken pox. Harry was a babe in arms so was spared the disease due to being protected by my immunity as I had already had chicken pox when I was a child.

Sarah, succumbed next followed by Steve with each successive victim getting a worse dose than the last. I must admit that I wasn't the most sympathetic to everyone's plight as I found the whole thing quite amusing.  They were dreadfully uncomfortable and I sat there perfectly comfortable, feeling like I had super powers as my immunity protected me.

 A few years after the event I wrote a couple of  children's stories about them.

No Spots For Harry

 

Evan came home from Preschool one day with a few spots on his skin.

 

 

“Mmmmm”, thought Mummy, “they look like they might be chicken pox”.

 

She wasn’t sure because she hadn’t seen any chicken pox since she had had them when she was four.

 

That was a long time ago.

 

She remembered that they were very itchy and that she had had a lot more spots than Evan had.

 

 

Two weeks later, Sarah who was a little older than Evan, came out in quite a lot of spots.

 

“Yes”, thought Mummy, “They must be chicken pox”.

 

 

Daddy started to worry.  He couldn’t remember whether he had had chicken pox when he was little or

 

not. 

 

He rang up Ninny and Pa.  But they couldn’t remember either.

 

 

Two days after Sarah broke out in spots, Daddy who is a lot older than Sarah and Evan, broke out in

 

loads and loads of spots.  Really itchy spots. 

 

From his head to his toes and everywhere in between.

 

He was miserable!

 

 

Although Sarah and Evan were feeling a little itchy themselves they couldn’t help thinking that Daddy

 

looked very funny.

 

 

There was one other person in the family who had not yet come out in any spots.

 

Mummy, Daddy, Sarah and Evan waited and wondered whether Harry, the youngest in the family at

 

only six months, would get any spots.

 

But Harry, who liked to snuggle up and breastfeed happily in Mummy’s arms didn’t get any spots at

 

all.

 

 

Because Mummy had already had chicken pox as a child she couldn’t get them again.  She had an

 

immunity to them.  It was this immunity that she passed to Harry through her breastmilk.  Harry was

 

protected from chicken pox because he was breastfed.

 

 

Harry and Mummy being so healthy, looked after the rest of the family.

 

Evan had a few little itches so on went the calamine lotion.  That helped him a lot.

 

 

Sarah had lots of itches so on went the calamine lotion.  But it didn’t help enough.

 

So she got into the bath as well.  That helped a lot.

 

 

Daddy was beside himself with itches.  Every spot from the top of his head to the tip of his big toe

 

itched – especially  the one right on the end of his nose!

 

On went the calamine lotion.  It didn’t help at all.

 

So into the bath he went.  But that didn’t help either!

 

 

So he went off to see the doctor.  But even the doctor couldn’t help him very much.  Poor Daddy!

 

The Doctor said that Daddy had to try not to scratch and wait for his spots to get better.

 

 

It was a long few weeks.

 

And Daddy did eventually get better.......

 

 

All  except for that one spot that left a scar right on the end of his nose!

 

 

Here is version 2

No Spots For Me!

 

One day Evan came home from preschool with a few         . 

 

Mmmm, ‘thought mummy they look like they might be the dreaded chicken pox.’ 

 

We hadn’t had any chicken pox in our young family yet. 

 

2 weeks later Sarah who was a little older than Evan came out with quite a few         . 

 

Daddy started to worry.  He couldn’t remember whether he had got the chicken pox as a kid. 

 

Mummy well remembered having chicken pox as a child.  ‘Ooh it was so itchy.’ 

 

Two days after Sarah broke out in

        , Daddy who is alot older than Evan or Sarah, broke out in ALOT of spots.  He was miserable. 

 

There was one other person in the family who had not had chicken pox yet.  Harry, the youngest in the family at only 6 months didn’t get any          at all. 

 

So while Harry was breastfed from mummy they were both protected fromthe dreaded                                           

        .  Harry and mummy looked after the rest of the family. 

 

Evan had a few little itches. 

So on went the cream. 

Sarah had lots of itches.

So into the bath with her.

 

Daddy was beside himself with itches.  He was covered from head to toe including the one right on the end of his nose.

 

Daddy was frustrated. 

 

After a week the dreaded          started to fade away. 

Still mummy and Harry did not get those dreaded itches. 

 

After 2 weeks it was back to normal and they lived happily ever after. 

There is a postscript to this story.

Although we thought that Harry was immune from catching the chicken pox virus, some years later, when he was around 4 years old, he came down with shingles. This was an odd occurrence in a four year old, particularly one who'd never actually had chicken pox.  As it was an oddity we were sent to a paediatrician to have a look at him and check that all was well.  The specialist conformed that it was indeed rare, but not unheard of for Harry to get shingles at such a young age.  The specialist concluded that Harry obviously got a subclinical dose of chicken pox when he was a baby, and this virus had laid dormant in his body until he came down with shingles.  He also told us that Harry would not need to be immunised for chicken pox as he now had his own natural immunity to it.

That sounded great, except that two weeks after presenting with shingles, Harry came down with chicken pox. I didn't spend the $100 plus to go back to the specialist and show him that Harry had managed to catch chicken pox off himself.  I'm sure he would have presented as a very special oddity, but I didn't want to foot the bill to show the paediatrician, so he shall remain  a medical obscurity.

School daze photos

It's funny how I think that I have done a good job at collecting the kids yearly school photos. Yet when I actually went to collect them all into one place there seems to be a few years missing. Obviously, whatever safe spot I put them in is still not ready to yield up its treasure quite yet.  I often find I have to actually be looking for something else before I find what I was looking for a few days ago.

My sister has this really cool display of her children's school photos on the wall, in order (I'm pretty sure she has matching sizes as well) all the way from Kindy to end of high school.  I thought that would be a cool thing to do too, so I have been saving school photos for years. Well, so I thought.  I was going to compare the kids' photos in each year of school, starting of course with kindergarten.  The only problem is, I am missing Sarah's Kindy photo. I do have her year 1 photo, but not Harry's year one photo. Moving onto to year two. I do have all three year 2 photos, but Sarah's seems to be a joint shot with Evan. Obviously, that year I decided that rather than do individual photos I would get sibling photos.  Or maybe I did get individual shots too, but have mislaid them, which is entirely possible.

Year 2





Harry, Evan, and Sarah

My problem is that I am a hoarder, but a disorganised hoarder.  I hold onto stuff with the best of intentions, but don't store or catalogue them properly. So when the time comes to actually do something with my hoardings I am faced with frustration at not being able to carry out my original intentions.

Year three seems to be missing Evan's individual photo, so I have to move forward to year 4 where I have all three of them again.

Year 4

Sarah, Harry, and Evan

\

Two years out of their primary school years isn't too bad, well, it could be better.  I just need to mis-locate something else and while searching for it I may come across the lost years, fingers crossed.

Sarah years 1 to 4

Evan in Kindergarten, years 1,2 and 4

 

Harry in Kindergarten, years 2,3 and 4