No more exploring for Dora

So Dora isn't a freakin' explorer anymore. Instead she wears makeup and hangs out with her friends and goes shopping and worries about princess dresses. And poor old Boots is nowhere to be seen - at least in the episode that I had to sit through. I was never really a Dora fan. That high pitched twang went through me and the way she stared back at the telly after asking a question kind of gave me the creeps. But credit where it was due - she used to climb mountains and overcome obstacles and wrestle alligators and the likes. Dora kicked ass. With her almost androgynous looks and her little bowl haircut, she was so much more substance than style. I remember my nephews loving her 10 years ago, and so did my nieces. A rarity in a world of Barbies and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Something for everyone. But this new Dora in the City or whatever it's called, Dora seems more concerned with collecting sparkly things and going to the mall with her gal pals than she does about going on adventures. She wears makeup and is accessorised to the hilt. She doesn't rely on her trusty backpack or map anymore. Instead she's got a posse of tween friends who accompany her to parties and on shopping trips. How disappointing. Another kids' brand that has succumbed to turning our little girls into image-obsessed, two-dimensional characters with nothing but pink on the brain. 

I have two girls and a boy and I've spent the past five years since becoming a parent trying not to allow the gender divide into the playroom. Toys are toys - there are no girl toys and no boy toys in our house. My eldest two, a boy and a girl, play 'superheroes' and 'shops', they play out scenes from Frozen and take turns being Elsa or Anna or Prince Hans. They both love Blaze and the Monster Machine and Paw Patrol, Ben and Holly's Little Kingdom and Peppa Pig. Peter Pan, Pinocchio, Cinderella - they're all hits and we like to mix things up. She plays with toy cars and he plays with dolls. It's how we roll. I haven't banned princesses (I was a huge Disney fan growing up!) and I haven't banned swords. I let them play, use their imaginations but I want them to know that they can be anything or anyone they want - and it has nothing to do with their gender. 

It's hard to find positive female role models for kids these days when a Ben and Holly toy set I got in Smyths one Christmas has the Ben character saying things like "I'm really good at fixing things" versus the Holly one that says "I'm really good at looking pretty." And when a huge, iconic brand like Lego suddenly starts dividing up its sets based on gender - with the boy stuff being based around cool things like robots and space adventure while the girl items are things like "shopping malls" and hair salons. Groan. Even a set of 'happy family' cards by toymakers Spears contains a set of characters like Mr Smiles the dentist and his wife Mrs Smiles. Mrs Curls, the hairdresser and her husband Mr. Curls. There's the doctor and his wife and the florist and her husband. You can see where this is going...

We're supposed to be getting better, not worse, with gender equality. So why then are we starting the brainwashing younger than ever?

Why our €14,000 bill just doesn't add up...

So I'm settling back home after a two-week stint away that cost €1000 per night. Fancy shmancy... Or not. This €1000 per night room charge didn't include my breakfast and I had to sleep in a chair for the first five nights, and then on a postage stamp-sized mattress on the floor. The shower didn't have any toiletries and I had to provide my own towels. Tessa, my one-year-old, was with me. She was treated to lumpy Weetabix or Readybrek for breakfast, along with a couple of slices of white toast. Lunch was usually pureed vegetables of varying shades of yellow and orange - I never quite figured out what they were - along with gravy infused mince and mashed potatoes. Every day. For two weeks. In the evenings, we could chase someone down for a bit of reheated scrambled egg and we once managed to score some fish fingers. So for €1000 per night you'd think I'd be screaming for a refund, yes? What kind of accommodation provider could bill €14,000 and provide such basic facilities? An Irish hospital, that's who.

Don't get me wrong. Not for one second am I complaining about the excellent healthcare that my baby received during her stint in CUH. The staff there were excellent. Professional, warm, attentive - everything I could want when trusting people with the wellbeing of my child. They always went that extra mile with her and always tried to make her smile. But €14,000 for the room - before the consultant's fees, ultrasounds, bloods, surgery and whatever else will be totted up? To me, it's crazy. I know it's the insurance company that will be stumping up the cost, and if we had been public patients we'd have been limited to €75 per night for up to 10 nights. But that's not the point. If a hospital is benefiting to the tune of €14,000 from our stay, I think the least that should be on offer is proper nourishment for the patients and some basic facilities for parents. After all, if I had decided to go home and leave Tessa alone overnight, they'd have to invest a lot more resources in her care. She was constantly trying to climb out of her cot, for example. And I spent most of my days doing laps around the ward with her. At 16 months old, she can't exactly take care of herself, and unlike some of the tiny babies in there who were not doing much more than eating and sleeping, despite her illness, she was looking for constant entertainment and interaction. So my presence there was necessary, unless of course they wanted to dedicate a nurse or carer to her around the clock.

Another point was the lack of food for me. Tessa didn't eat much at all during her stay. I'm not sure if it was the illness, the high dose of anti biotics or the quality of food that put her off. I'd hazard a guess that it was a combination of all three. All she wanted to do was drink milk. I breastfeed her so she pretty much reverted back to being a newborn - feeding around the clock, clinging to me as her main source of nourishment and comfort. I was delighted to be able to do it - I never once had to worry about dehydration or her going hungry and having her close to me meant I knew when she was spiking a temperature. I was an instant source of comfort after yet another blood test or canula insertion. I certainly burned up a lot of energy though, and given that I wasn't provided with any meals, I spent a lot of my time in there feeling hungry - especially in the first few days before I had managed to organise myself and buy some provisions. We live an hour away from the hospital and my husband was at home with the other kids, so I didn't have anyone else to mind Tessa while I went off for something to eat. There is a lovely parents' room on the ward - it has tea and coffee, a water cooler and a fridge, along with a comfy couch. The trouble is, I wasn't allowed to bring Tessa in there, and I wasn't allowed to bring cups of tea into the room we were staying in. So it wasn't exactly practical in that sense. And given that I was my daughter's main source of nourishment during our stay, a sandwich here and there, or even one of the god-awful hospital dinners, would have been really appreciated. I survived on Tesco ready meals snaffled when Tessa went to sleep for the night, and chocolate. Lots of chocolate. 

So as we settle back in home and relish in the luxury of things like fresh fruit and vegetables, fish that doesn't come in a rubbery yellow coating, and bread that isn't in the form of cold and soggy toast, I realise what a massive shakeup our hospitals need. The nurses shouldn't have to chase down kitchen staff to send up food for our babies who are in there recovering. Our babies shouldn't be deprived of fresh and nutritious food while they're at their weakest and most vulnerable. I shudder to think what the catering bills for CUH are, given the lack of proper and nutritious grub. But the €14,000 that our insurance company will end up paying for our accommodation would buy a lot of grapes, strawberries, oranges, rice cakes, bread sticks and other healthy snacks, plus dinners that don't consist of congealed gloop covered in salty gravy. That €14,000 would more than cover our rent for a year. Or if we were really splashing out, it'd provide 50 nights in the Grand Suite of the 5 star Castlemartyr Resort in Cork - including breakfast and 25 dinners. Now that's some food for thought.