I came across a forum where someone discussed a similar situation and how they found a specialist who changed their child’s life. I contacted her, and luckily, the Paediatric Gastroenterologist was only a few hours from where we lived. I made an appointment with him, and after examining Indie, he said that we were very lucky because if we had waited any longer, Indie’s esophagus would have been permanently damaged, and her incoming teeth would have rotted from the continuous acid exposure.
He was shocked and disgusted by everything we had been through and how the system had repeatedly failed us. He gave Indie an adult strength medication for her GORD, as she was far beyond mild strength treatment.
“It worked and she was like a completely new child.
Experiencing this new child made me feel robbed of the peace we should have had from day one.”
Indie had three interrelated problems, which is why doctors were baffled and would throw it into the too-hard basket. All three issues needed to be addressed by removing dairy and soy (CMPA), then reducing air intake with the TT and LT corrected, and finally neutralising the acid with her GORD medication. If only the ties were identified and corrected from day one, we could have simply avoided dairy, and she could have had a normal breastfeeding experience and much better sleeping patterns.
Regarding Indie’s sleep, after she was fully healed (around the 18-month mark), her sleeping pattern (or shall I say, lack thereof) was deeply ingrained. She wasn’t crying or in pain, but her body was so accustomed to not sleeping that she would stay awake until 1:30 am every morning and continue to wake up after 30-45 minutes, which is what a newborn’s sleep cycle looks like. I was extremely sleep-deprived – literally a walking zombie.
My friends with kids the same age would complain about their lack of sleep and I would just laugh and not bother to discuss our family’s sleep deprivation. At this time, I didn’t have the strength to socialise, so my interactions were barely ever face-to-face.
“I see mums today in their mother’s group meetings and wish we could have had those experiences.”
I went from someone who had no idea about babies to researching everything to do with babies all day every day. I discovered attachment theory also known as attachment parenting. This method results in huge benefits for children – over all other approaches.
Science tells us that co-sleeping and attachment style practices are positive for the child’s development, however I personally could not co-sleep with Indie. When she was first born, we built a side bed connected to our bed. We still live by the attachment and gentle parenting ideologies, however unfortunately at night, co-sleeping directly in our bed was only going to happen when Indie was unwell or could not cope as my sleep deprivation would have become even worse.
She had outgrown her side cot so we had her cot mattress on the floor next to our bed. I am the lightest sleeper you could ever imagine. Any distractions close to me keep me awake. I can even hear people down the street talking and walking! So once Indie’s health improved and we didn’t need to worry about her choking on spew in bed, I moved her out of our bedroom so I could finally get some longer blocks of sleep.
“This is when I started to do something that got Indie to sleep.
I found the benefits were backed by lots of science and there wasn’t any product out there using this method.”
This is what led to the development of the Koola Doll™.
After implementing her night routine of feeding, bath and bedtime consistently, I would sing to her and when she appeared to be asleep, I would walk out of her room. Once I was out and my voice was gone, she would cry out for me to come back.
Something sparked me to start researching the connections between the mother’s voice and the baby’s brain.
“I found there was a lot of research that showed that the mother’s voice being heard throughout the child’s development in the womb was very soothing for the infant after birth. There were not only soothing capabilities, there were neurological improvements found – amongst many other benefits.”
I was so happy to learn there was more to singing to a baby than the ability to facilitate sleep. Learning about the neurological benefits of a mother’s voice when singing to her baby, as well as the recollection of songs heard in the womb, motivated me to explore this concept further. I started playing around with a recording box and found when I recorded my voice, it also worked effectively for soothing Indie to sleep, just as it did with several studies with preemie babies using their parents’ recorded voices.
“Her sleeping improved week after week, since using my voice recording.”
She would wake and hear my voice and then drift off again (connecting sleep cycles). It also allowed me to walk out of her room faster when I was putting her to sleep.
I started to look at options like building an app, however with child safety as a focus, I knew this was not aligned with my values. Through extensive review, I have learned that Electromagnetic Frequencies [EMFs] emitted by smart devices and Wi-Fi devices have been shown in over 450 studies to be potentially harmful, especially in close proximity. Making a baby sleep app would be the easiest and most profitable way to go about this, but the health of children is the entire reason for creating this product.
So I made a low tech sound box without the need for Wi-Fi or a SMART phone.
Babies love toys and create sleep associations around tangible objects, so I decided to build my special sound box into an earthy, natural-looking doll.
“Infants get heavily attached to comforters alone. Imagine a comforter that also had those emotional connections with the mother embedded.”
As a natural parent, I’m mindful of harmful toxins in baby toys and loveys that may come into contact with a baby’s skin or mouth, so I selected linen fabric for the Koola Doll™. Being an Australian mum, I wanted to incorporate our unique Australian culture into the design, so I made the doll with a strong Aussie theme that was also gender-neutral. This way, parents who choose not to learn the gender of their baby before birth can have the doll ready from day one.
I also wanted the doll’s appearance to not over stimulate the child in terms of colour and opted for natural tones, since the main objective is calming and promoting better sleep. When it came to shape and design, I chose a koala and found the best handmade doll designer in Australia. It couldn’t have been more perfect that doll designer Keira Hunt just happened to live minutes from my house. Together, we incorporated the sound box into the back of the koala in a functional way that allows parents to access the sound box with a click of a button without disturbing the baby.
It was time to name this doll and after a lot of discussion as you are aware, I decided to call the doll: “The Koola Doll™” as the word Koola is an indigenous word for Koala.
The Koola brand was born.
