6 down, 1 to go

The disadvantage of having a relatively easy set of nights is that you become complacent and also the fact that your sleep pattern is turned upside down. When I was on medical nights, I'd be up all night and this would translate to being asleep all day. For O&G however, I'd sleep for a few hours at night, and a few hours during the day and this in turn will translate to me being groggy most of the time.

I shouldn't complain though. My nights seem to have followed the following pattern this last week - listen to handover, spend an hour (or two) sorting out a few patients, spend an hour (or two) on the internet and then spend about 45 minutes on the bed trying to fall asleep. About ten minutes after falling asleep, I'll get bleeped to see a patient and this invariably falls between 3 and 4 in the morning. After which I spend another 45 minutes staring at the ceiling trying to sleep, and eventually dozing off before waking up around 8.

The days are spent sleeping, eating, chatting with Sweetie and catching up on DVDs that I have bought but have yet to watch. This includes The Prestige, Superman Returns, The Constant Gardener and Nobody Knows.

The last movie was one of the most random purchases I've made; I just happened to have glanced at it whilst buying Howl's Moving Castle, and the fact that the lead won the Best Actor award at Cannes caught my attention. And seeing how I was in DVD-buying-mode, I figured why the heck not.

Turns out that this Japanese movie was beautifully-made and heart-wrenchingly poetic. The premise is based on an incident in the 1980s, in which a mother left her four kids to fend for themselves, with the eldest 12-year-old child acting as surrogate parent. So you have 4 of the most adorable kids trying to live as normal in a box-like apartment, initially surviving on takeaways before moving down to mixing rice with their instant-noodle soup to munching on paper to keep hunger at bay. Although slightly long, the movie is made in such a way that we view the unfolding of the story through the eyes of the children; both literally (e.g. when looking at close-ups of feet and little toys) and when considering the psychological changes that the children were going through.

Apparently, it was reported that when the kids were found, the eldest was beset with grief because he thought he had failed in his duty to look after his siblings. Instead of blaming his bitch of a mum, who deserves to be publicly flayed and hung upside down from a lamp post.

I get really annoyed with mums who don't look after their babies. Especially in a country like the UK, where poverty isn't really an issue. Even if said mum was from the lowest socioeconomic class, there are loads of support put in place by the government to help them out especially with regards to behavioural changes like quitting smoking or drinking less alcohol. But no... it's just too much to ask. Who cares if baby is born too early or develops asthma at an early age?

Of course, some women should just be banned from the labour ward. This includes people like Siti Nurhaliza, as she might watch a father lovingly cradle his newborn baby and fall in love with him. =P