Amelia and Annie's Awesome Adventures

This Week

2012-01-18T16:19:00.001-08:00

It’s been a whirl-wind kind of month since Christmas. I’ve been unable to post about the girls’ every move, the holidays, or the milestones because there’s been this big, dark cloud of life happenings tainting my thoughts. I’m returning to work next week. I haven’t been in the classroom since May and as I march back into the working-mom-having-it-all-I-mean-DOING-it-all existence that I dread, I return to a helluva a work atmosphere. While out, I lost half of my classes. It’s of course illegal to say, punish a mother for taking maternity leave . . . and yet I find myself going back to work in a financially impossible position. Probably not punished in retribution for having a baby, I do feel confident that I lost classes because . . . well, because I wasn’t there to teach them last semester. They went up for grabs so to speak and found themselves new homes. I will, therefore, make just enough money to pay for the child care required for me to work . . . to make that money . . . to pay the child care . . . and you see the problem. I’m facing this semester with the looming threat of needing to find a new job. I mean, a new career. A new calling (is there such a thing as more than one?). A new identity. A new life away from teaching. It’s all rather unfortunate because I was never in it for the money. But there HAS to be some money in it. And there is only one thing that would make me jump ship and turn my back on this passionate-but-abusive relationship I have with teaching.

Well, two things really.

Through all of the bullshit I am facing with work right now, I’ve come to realize that I can’t keep dragging my family along on this dream of mine that is clearly not coming true. In fact, it feels like it’s falling apart, and breaking my heart into a million little pieces along the way. Not only have I worked myself to the depths of possibility for this career, but I’ve built my life around it as well. I’ve developed my own sense of motherhood in this identity and schedule and have not one idea how to revise the vision. I never wanted to be the mom who dropped my kids off in the morning and picked them up in the evening every single day. It wasn’t in the plan. I worked full time AND stayed home full time. It was more than two full time jobs, but I did it willingly because it gave me the best of both as long as I could withstand all of the work, which of course I did.

As the semester has neared, I’ve found myself lost in a cycle of horrible negativity, depression, and anxiety—all of which I will have to discuss here at another time—mostly because I’m not out of it yet. So as I prepare for working again, I not only fear that I can’t love it anymore because of its abuses. I also fear that I shall love it more than ever because of our separation. And while I remember every single day that I have all of the things that money can’t buy, I also face a very real financial struggle for survival as I cross the bridge into unknown territory. I have never felt so financially prohibited in my adult life and here I sit with two babies, a family, and a whole life to make work.

At what point do you give up on your dreams? What is more detrimental to your children—you giving up? Or not saving for college? Leaving them at day care all day? Or pulling them out of preschool because of cost?

Where do you hold the line? I have no idea, but wish me luck as I begin to figure it all out, one shaky, unstable step at a time.

How Did This Happen?

2011-12-20T15:12:00.001-08:00

Since Amelia is only in school once a week these days, we are spending a LOT of time together, her, Annie, and myself. It’s a daily struggle to keep Amelia stimulated, entertained, and loved while also caring for the baby—especially since she’s used to school lessons, projects, and friends several days a week. There’s been a lot of acting out, which I am assuming is a result of this sudden change in her daily life/schedule. Thankfully, Amelia is tremendous at keeping herself occupied with quiet projects or reading in her room for hours. But she needs mama too and desperately needs to get out of the house every day. Considering the babychild literally runs to bed every night and runs out of bed every morning, she needs open space to just . . . run. Every. Day. At least this is what I’m realizing now that we’re all spending our days together.

We’ve actually fallen into a pretty decent routine each day while Justin’s working. Early morning is mostly survival and juggling, but once Annie goes down for a morning nap, I sit down and spend concentrated time with Amelia. We play a game or make a craft project, read books or bake a treat. It’s her and I time. When the baby’s up again, we all hang out as best we can (will be SO much easier once she sits up unassisted!) through lunch. After lunch used to be house nap time, but it took exactly a quick second before Amelia realized that if she didn’t sleep, she could crash Mama Time and get a solid couple hours to herself with me. She hasn’t napped since. So My Time quickly turned into Amelia and my time. (sigh) During this time, we now shower together, get a couple tasks completed and then hang out. Sometimes I remind her that it’s Mama Time and that she can stay up with me only if she gives me some space/time to work on my projects. This includes her hanging out with me while I sew, working on her own ‘sewing’ projects. The ultimate privilege for her is to get to use a few of my sewing pins for her scrap fabrics. She literally sits at the table just beside me, follows me into the ironing room, and back to the sewing table, not wanting to separate for a single minute. It’s mostly very sweet . . . but sometimes exhausting too.

In any case, a major goal at the moment is to get her outside every day to run. You know, like a dog. I’ve been trying to get a trip to the park into my routine for a few months and now that Annie has been sleeping through the night, it’s finally doable. So we went to the park yesterday. Annie hung out well and happy while we indulged her sister, even though it resulted in her missing her nap (seriously, to give needed attention to one kid, it always seems that the other—the little one usually—suffers) and Amelia ran around climbing, jumping, sliding, etc. She was thrilled that we were all at the park ‘togever.” When she asked to get on the swing, I was stuck. I was holding Annie and didn’t have the hands to push her on the swing. I try to avoid saying things like “I can’t do that right now because I have your sister” so she doesn’t blame the baby for every inattentive moment she has with her mother. And then I thought about it . . . I bet Annie can fit into the swing! Hmmm. I wonder if she’d like it?

I plopped Annie into the swing, pushed a tiny bit . . . and she didn’t scream.

I think the verdict is still out on whether or not she enjoyed it. o’ hai.

Onto Amelia. Plopped her into the big kid swing. She was very excited to have Sister with her on the swings!

So I pushed her and stood back. And took this picture.

Didn’t think too much about it. When I got home and looked at this picture, it took my breath away. I’d be lying if I didn’t tell you that my heart began to pound loud and fast. It’s not staged or posed, but just a picture of them being kids. I think it’s the first picture of them just playing. In any case, it blew me away. I have two kids. Let me repeat. . . I HAVE TWO KIDS! Please someone, tell me when the hell THAT happened. Without exaggeration, I still find it hard to believe that I am a mother at all . . . much less the mother of two. And here they are. Dude, WHAT?! How is it possible that there are two people on the planet who rely on me as their mother—for all of eternity?

And now that the second baby is here, that’s it. You spend so much of your life thinking “someday when I have kids,” wondering what you’ll have, and then it’s a totally separate stage of your life in getting them here. And now they’re . . . here. And growing big. Amelia will be in school in a little over a year. And Annie is big enough to ride in a swing! And this is my life. It’s settled. Mother of two girls . . . who will soon no longer be babies. Then I’ll just be a mom of a couple of kids, driving them to school, cheering at soccer games, and helping with homework. The weirdest thing is that I cannot tell you how or when I got here. It’s hard to explain these moments when your life comes into focus for a second and you don’t recognize yourself. And you realize that you’re getting older, heading to old, and that you’re a grown up and that there are people who will only ever know you as Mom, an old grown up. It’s not a bad thing, but it certainly catches me off guard every once in a while.

I’m sure there are many more of these moments to come. It’s only the swings now. I can’t imagine the heartbreak these two little babygirls will bestow upon their mama—just by growing up.

It’s a Good Thing She’s Cute

2011-12-16T13:12:00.001-08:00

We had a pretty rough day yesterday. Amelia and I have been battling something terrible and yesterday was pretty . . . bad. But then we went to her gymnastics show last night and she was the cutest kid on the planet. I went from barely able to even look at her to proudly blubbering as I snapped pics of her ‘tricks.’

She was as adorable as possible in her grab bag hand-me-down leotard (that she got after having a pee accident in class one day. Score!). And she was SO excited to play with all the big kid gymnasts.

She performed with just one other little person and the crowd just loved them to pieces. Amelia was so shy when she started gymnastics that I had to tell the teacher to be sure and include her because she kept getting left out. . . Yeah well that’s all gone. She loved having the audience there and wanted to keep performing even after her turn!

I die.

And even though she misbehaved all day and pushed me to the point of wanting to strangle her, I decided to keep her after all. I mean that tushy has saved her many a time. She’s lucky I’m a sucker for amazingly cute tushies.

Doin cartwheels like a boss.

(video forthcoming)

I’ve Heard of Babies Like This

2011-12-14T22:07:00.001-08:00

I’ve talked to parents who simply shrugged as they mentioned that their baby slept through the night at a few months old. Or who boasted about their little ones as being “the easiest baby ever!” Their baby just smiled and cooed at them all the time. I’d even heard of babies who didn’t scream for three hours when they missed their bed time by 30 minutes. I’ve seen with my own eyes babies who just hang out happily and appear to just be along for the ride, mellow, easy.

I thought these babies were a myth. Even the ones I saw myself, I had my doubts. I thought their parents were liars or worse, terrible parents who must just ignore the screams of their poor, over-tired babies. Because I assumed that they all screamed. I assumed that they all screamed when they had a dirty diaper, missed a nap by 5 minutes, or simply when changing their clothes. I assumed that they all screamed when the woke up and when they went to bed. Isn’t that what makes parenting so hard?

And then I had Annie.

And she smiles like crazy. She laughs easily. Cries rarely. In fact, even when she’s crying, you can still make her smile with little effort. When she turned three months and stopped sleeping, I thought she’d lost her status as the most perfect baby ever. . . and when she was about 4.5 months, I decided to try sleep training her just to see how it went. One evening of complaining-not-crying for a bit and she was sleeping through the night. I don’t know if I should even say it, but for the last week, she’s slept until 6 or 7 and even 8 once. And then she takes a 3 hour nap every afternoon without fail. She sleeps in the car and doesn’t mind running all over the place. She’s nothing short of amazing.

She is the only thing that could heal me of my first-time-mother experience. She’s made me love babies instead of wishing they’d just grow already. And naturally, she’s growing so very rapidly. I actually believe that I will miss her being a baby someday. . .

Without my even coaxing or teaching her, she’s hitting all of her milestones. She’s already rolling from back to front.

She reaches out to grab everything and plays with toys.

She’s pretty super.

She’s just my sweet, little baby.

Good Morning Sunshine!!

Amelia and Annie on Thanksgiving

Oh. My. Thighs.

On our way to the Festival of Lights Parade.

And since Annie stares down anyone who dares to eat in her presence, we decided to let her have a go at food herself. She literally will pull herself off the boob to turn around and glare at me when I try to eat. We skipped the whole rice cereal game and went straight to avocado. She’d open her mouth and take the spoon willingly. Then she’d do this.

What have you done to me?!

Then she’d recover and open her mouth again wanting more. I’d give her a tiny bite and she’d do this.

Repeat.

Tonight I gave her some ground oatmeal and she DUG it. Made a bowl thinking she’d only have a few bites and she snarfed the whole thing. So it’s ON with food. Will be roasting some butternut squash and sweet potatoes this weekend! I can’t believe I’m already busting out the ice cube tray lids and making baby food in bulk.

I can NOT believe that my little love is 5 months old already! I am enjoying her so. Did you hear that?! I am ENJOYING her so very much. She is just a sweet, joy, love, babycakes. I just can’t get enough of her and that smile and those cheeks and thighs and . . . just her. She’s just my heart. I love her so and I marvel every day at her and how much she’s changed my view on babies and parenting.

Now, she’s ready to start teething. She’s been drooling on everything and gnawing on anything she can slam into her mouth. . . so maybe the worst is yet to come. . . ? Somehow I doubt it.

5 Months Old!!

Have I mentioned that she never stops moving?? NEVER.

Most of the pics I take of her are blurry from movement.

Annie, 5 months.

And don’t think that I can take pictures of Annie without Sister jumping in. How proud is Amelia?? It’s so NOT for the camera. She adores her sister. And quite frankly, the feeling is ridiculously mutual.

Oh Look.

Heart.

I can’t believe it’s been 5 months since we brought Annie home. And I can’t believe that just one year ago, we were barely aware of her. I can’t believe that I have two babies and I can’t believe that these little girls are all mine. Five months later, I think Annie completed us in a way when we didn’t even know we were missing something.

4-month stats!

2011-11-17T23:02:00.001-08:00

Annie had her 4-month check-up Tuesday. I was really curious about her height and weight because she doesn’t really look bigger to me, but she keeps growing out of her clothes. She’s in 9 month jammies for crying out loud. . . but doesn’t look like that big of a baby. . . ?

Anyway, she weighed in at 14 lbs., and 9 ozs. Crazy enough, that is LIGHTER than Amelia was at 4 months! I can’t believe it. I remember Amelia just exploding in weight around 3 months and then surpassing the 50th percentile, but I anticipated Annie keeping her lead on Big Sister since she started out 2 whole pounds bigger! She is still in the 72nd percentile, so not a small baby, but I was a little disappointed. Less than three pounds in 2 months? And I get up every other hour through the night? What gives? Her doctor didn’t seem too concerned about the weight drop in percentile so maybe she’s in for a growth spurt. Heaven help me. The kicker though is that she is 15.5 inches long! WHAAAAT? Yeah, Amelia was 14. She’s growing out of her clothes because she’s so tall. Oh lawd, another tall baby? We are not tall people! So yeah, she’s grown 6.5 inches since birth. Helps me feel better about the weight. A little.

She got her shots too. Thankfully, this time she didn’t appear to have any reaction. Justin even took the day off just in case! It was pretty nasty last time so I’m relieved that she rebounded well this round. It was crazy too because she hardly even cried. Most babies just scream and scream but she took them pretty well. It always helps to pull out the magic boobies immediately after. Works like a charm every time.

This is our little Nugget on the way home from the doctor.

Saggy cheeks. Hand holding blanket. Sleepy baby.

Ummmmm. It kind of reminds me of this other picture . . . of this other baby . . . on her way home from her 4 month appointment . . .

Saggy cheeks. Hands holding blanket. Sleepy baby.

Crazy right? Yeah, it trips us out too. I even got one of Annie from the same side.

Now that Annie’s 4 months old, I have to come to grips with the fact that she’s not a new born anymore. Not in that I’ll miss the newborn phase but in that she shouldn’t be treated like she just came home from the hospital. The months have really flown by so it does feel like it was just yesterday . . . but it wasn’t. And maybe because she’s such an easy baby, we’ve continued rocking her to sleep, cuddling for hours before putting her in her crib, and letting her nurse for longer than she needs. I don’t really mind any of these things in moderation. Unfortunately, she doesn’t know how to go to sleep on her own and requires a lot of holding. It’s unfortunate that you have to think is these terms, but to continue with treating her like a newborn, we’ll set us all up for failure. So some of the hard work begins and we move into the next phase. In exchange, we get to hang out with her more and play more as she grows more alert and interactive. Each phase gets easier and harder. . .

Can’t believe we’re headed to Thanksgiving already! Wonder what the new year shall bring. . .

Why Occupy Wall Street?

2011-11-16T15:23:00.001-08:00

I grew up in a working class family that struggled to make ends meet on a monthly basis. Both parents worked full time but at mediocre jobs, doing what they could to raise a family on two high school diplomas. I started working and paying as much of my own way as possible at 16. I had to get a ride to work and home after stocking a salad bar on the dinner shift. From that job, I worked my way into bussing tables, running plates, and eventually waitressing while in college. I waited tables at two restaurants while also coaching kids soccer and attending full-time classes by 19. I continued working full time through college, paying off my tuition, which I always had to charge, each semester. In the hard times, I went to classes 5 days a week, worked closing at the restaurant on Thursday and Friday nights, and pulled an obscenely early morning bookkeeping shift followed by the busy waiting shift late on Saturday and Sunday nights. I went entire semesters without a single day off between work and school and found myself writing papers and studying for exams between 2 & 5 am. I completed 2 Bachelors Degrees on my own dime, but it took 6 years.

When I entered graduate school, I moved into a full-time ‘real’ job for the State of California. It offered me a stable income and reliable hours. I took the bus to school after work, carrying a change of clothes, my books, dinner, and a can of pepper spray for the 10-block walk home from the downtown drop off. I was one of the only people in the Masters program with a full-time day job, plugging along, and only taking 2 classes a semester, both at night. On the weekends, I struggled to maintain the 500-1000-page per week reading assignments and 25 page papers due. I did little else but clung to the faith that someday, I wouldn’t be in school and I could allow life in a bit. While I was in school, I was offered several promotions within government work. I turned them all down, resisting the urge to make more money, become reliant on a big salary, and therefore unable to afford my dream job of teaching at the college level. I worked out of my duty class a lot, doing the jobs of higher-paid employees, but refused to settle into a more posh life. When it was time to complete my thesis, I had to compile all of my research on Wednesday evenings and one Saturday a month—the only times when the archive was open during non-business hours. It took three years.

After ten years of higher education, I finally reached my academic finish line and received a Master’s Degree in History. Finally! With school coming to a close, I agreed to marry my boyfriend of 6 years. It was all coming together, we thought. He’d already established a modest, but solid career as a Probation Officer after working full time to pay his way through college as well. All of the hard work was sure to begin paying off as we headed towards our thirties. Two weeks after finishing grad school, I entered the classroom as a professor for the first time. It was one of the single biggest moments of my life. I’d returned to the very community college from which I’d graduated only 6 years prior. For the first two semesters, I played it safe and stayed on at the state job, always worried about money. I’d work all day, teach at night, and then return home to write the next day’s lectures until 3 am. I’d taken three classes, was teaching for the first time, and still working a normal day job. It was one of the toughest times in my life. And more exhilarating because finally my work was going towards a career.

Once married, my husband and I began looking at homes to buy. We’d rented for several years and watched the housing market balloon into horrific price points. Every time we looked at potential houses, I came home in tears. We saw houses that were completely filthy and in terrible neighborhoods and we couldn’t afford them. Houses were selling at an alarming rate. Builders were taking plots for one home and building three and people were buying them. There was the feeling that if you didn’t get something ANYTHING in this market, you never would own a home. Those disgusting houses we saw would be sold in a few days. There was a real sense of panic that after all the hard work we’d put in, we’d never have a real home. We initially held back and balked at high prices, waiting for the downturn. . . that didn’t come. In just a year, houses were $75,000 more expensive than the previous. We felt punished by our own caution and conservatism. It was fairly devastating to think that I’d worked so hard to break the cycle and get an education only to find that I couldn’t afford a home in the underprivileged neighborhood in which I was raised. We remained patient and saved as much as possible and finally found a house. It was new and $30,000 less than the median home price was at the time. We didn’t want anything fancy. Just a home! It was, in essence, a great deal.

We signed the papers on our home on our first wedding anniversary. Before the deal closed officially, we’d sneak into the house and sit on the floor in the empty rooms for hours. This is our home. It was twice the size of the tiny house we’d rented for years and nicer than anything either of us ever expected. The brand new neighborhood was filling up with other young couples eager to begin families. Grocery stores proudly hung their “Coming Soon” banners on the corner intersections. There were schools and parks in the growing plans. Even though we thought we might have to eat top ramen for the rest of our lives, we had a home. It was perfect.

In the next couple of years, I took the full leap into teaching, taking work at two schools to cover a modest, but middle income. I taught 9 different course topics in only 3 years and often worked into the wee hours preparing, preparing, preparing. All the while, I knew it was just creating a foundation for my career, even if it left little room for the married life I’d just begun. Every semester, I taught classes in the morning, the afternoon, and in the evenings. Oftentimes, I taught on Saturdays as well, just trying to make it. Whatever it took to build my reputation as a hard worker and to build a steady and reliable economic situation for our budding family is what I was willing to do.

You see, what I’m trying to say is that we followed the rules. Justin and I did everything you are supposed to do to have a decently comfortable life. We put in the hard work, broke the cycles of low income families, and took minimal risks. We focused on building a stable foundation and working hard to achieve your goals. We never expected or desired wealth. We didn’t want a house to make a profit, but to make a family. We had a modest lifestyle and expected to keep it for the long-term. We did not ask for handouts and laid the groundwork ourselves. We did everything right.

After a couple years, the housing market finally began to deflate. As it turned out, mortgage banks had been selling average working people loans based on shady fine print and impossibly low interest rates. Often times, these loans were for a set amount for several years only to explode into a much bigger payment later or start with a low rate (to get the buyers sold) only to skyrocket in the future. Essentially, they loaned too much money to people who couldn’t totally afford the payments by making it appear as if they COULD, even if only for the short-term. Therefore leaving the buyers to figure it out on their own later at their own peril. This created a housing boom making homes very expensive as there were too many people desperate to get in on the rising costs (or not be left out as the case may be) . . . and these loans continued. The frantic lending included selling homes at 100% financing (the prices were so high that nobody could really afford a down payment), meaning that the house would have to rise in value in order for the owners not to end up in trouble. As the prices continued to rise, the lenders continued to qualify virtually anyone for a home loan . . . and so it all continued to grow. And grow. And grow. The problem? The growth was on inflated numbers because those loans were not going to last. They’d made it seem like everyone could afford to buy a home and that it was a sure moneymaker, flooding the market. It’s like building a house of cards . . . you can only go so high on so little before the tiniest gust knocks it down. And it all just . . . popped.

We’d been happily living in our home when the market crashed, making our payments diligently each month. And when the economy crashed (there was more to it than just the housing too, of course!), we saw it immediately in our neighborhood. The oversaturated housing market came to a halt. The community was only half finished, but the construction just stopped. There were entire streets with just the frames or lots exposed—and no homes. Plans for the schools, stores, and parks dissipated. And as the years went on, the first wave of neighbors, who’d bought loans that were to adjust in 5 years, began to leave. They couldn’t sell their houses because the house wasn’t worth what they owed on them and they suddenly couldn’t afford the payment. So they couldn’t afford a house that now had no value. Imagine the struggle! Do the ‘right’ thing by the bank and harm your family’s financial future . . . ? Struggling to make payments on a sinking ship. Neighbors disappeared in the middle of the night. They’d pack up and move before anyone could ask them why. Normal, educated, well-paid families were losing their homes in a humiliating way—and the rest of us schmucks continued paying mortgages for nothing because no value was in the home. These vacancies only made the remaining homes continue to lose value, leaving us all on the sinking ship. Further, as the houses emptied around us, crime rates skyrocketed. Our neighborhood began to fall prey to home invasion robberies and other crimes. As the banks sold off foreclosed homes at rock-bottom prices (further plummeting our home’s worth), the neighborhood took on a different atmosphere altogether. Suddenly, I found myself in a neighborhood much like the one in which I grew up, where you don’t feel safe walking in the streets or opening the door to strangers.

Except we’d worked so hard to avoid this.

When we realized that our house was worth $100,000 less (yes, one-hundred-thousand) than we paid for it, we called our lenders. We were current on our mortgage(s), in good standing, and not seeking to leave the home. We just wanted to stay but not sink. We asked the bank about modifying our mortgage to make it more affordable and realistic in terms of what the home was worth. Would they really want us to pay our whole lives on this house that would never again be worth the initial price? Of course they did. They refused to talk to us. We were told that if we missed a payment on the house, they could deal with us but that as long as we were in good standing, they couldn’t help us. Yes, as long as we paid our bills and did the responsible thing, we were screwed. If, however, you wanted to totally eff the bank by NOT paying your mortgage and walking away, then they’d negotiate. It made no sense and it was clear that the banks—who’d created this shit to begin with for their own profit—had no desire to keep average people from losing their homes. In fact, they were encouraging it. So why didn’t we? Because we had a conscience about it and we’d agreed to pay the mortgage. And the banks knew this. They knew that most people do not want to leave their homes in the middle of the night or struggle to find a place to live—that working Americans have a sense of value and obligation that worked in the banks’ favor. As we talked to neighbors all facing the same dilemmas, everyone had a similar story with the banks. Nobody could get through to the institutions that if the banks would just work with the owners, everyone would win. Surely the bank would fare better by keeping people paying their mortgages than abandoning their homes, no??

It made no sense except in spite. The banks were spitefully punishing people for signing on to terrible loans. They wanted us to struggle, even at their own profit loss.

As the story goes, the economic downturn affected much more than just the housing market. Business scaled back, local governments lost a fortune in property taxes and cut employees, and so on. Not only did we find ourselves fighting a losing battle over our home, but we both suffered losses at work. As a two civil-servant household, we were hit disproportionately. Justin was dropped a rank, watched his career path disappear, and took a tremendous pay cut. He also took cuts in his retirement and medical benefits. I lost one class at first and then took a salary cut as well. Then as other, more seniored (privileged) colleagues took their pay cut, they demanded more classes to make up for it, and I lost further work. And suddenly, it was we who were struggling to pay for a house that wasn’t worth it. And we continued paying. We cut all excess and buckled down to pinching pennies to pay that mortgage. We again called the bank. They again refused to work with us. As far as they were concerned, as long as we paid the mortgage then we were not deserving of negotiation. . . even if we were starving in the process, so we learned!

We put the house up for a short sale—selling it at the market value and taking a terrible hit in our credit and losing all of the money we’d put into the house. We never considered a foreclosure because we wanted to do the ‘right’ thing and take the hits. When we talked to the banks about short selling the house, we were told they wouldn't even consider an offer unless we stopped paying the mortgage. They wanted us to default. And we did. And we cried about it and lost months of sleep over it. And received the threatening, hateful, horrible phone calls from the very banks that took us down this path. We had to submit every financial document we had to the banks every month so they could determine that we were appropriately poor enough to sell their house. We got an offer on our house—for $200,000 less than we paid for it—and the banks took so long verifying us and requiring us to resubmit all of our paperwork over and over . . . that the buyers finally walked. They didn’t want to wait anymore. Despite that the banks do better when they can sell the house, they made it difficult and torturous just to punish us. . . when we’d offered to pay for the house at a much higher price than the one offered. When our realtor was on the phone cancelling the buyers’ offer, another department of the bank called at the same time to say that they’d accepted the offer. . . but it was too late! They waited all of that time just to accept?

It was a horrible rollercoaster experience for us. We didn’t close on the sale of our house for 12 months. It was emotionally draining, ego shattering, and eye-opening. . . It seemed that so many other hard working people were in the same boat as us. Why wasn’t anyone calling out the banks?! Unemployment is skyrocketing, millions of middle class Americans are homeless. School is impossibly expensive, yet teachers are making less. Public safety is out the window and civil servants are taking a clubbing. And the housing market was among the biggest catalysts to this whole mess? And who was behind the housing crisis? Who was gambling with Americans’ money and then leaving them out to dry when they had nowhere to go? And most infuriatingly, who threatened to halt the nation if they didn’t get a hand out from the government . . . after denying any amount of cooperation with the average citizen. . . ? They refused to take offers from homeowners for reasonable adjustments to value when the alternative was foreclosure and a total loss. They wouldn’t negotiate with those wanting to do the right thing. They punished those who continued paying on homes. And then they took a bail out and sent their executives on vacation with millions in bonuses. And the government shook hands with the bastards while ignoring the pleas of the people.

We, however, are living in a rental home (we moved shortly after listing our house, again not wanting to make money off unpaid mortgage, but just somewhere to live), rebuilding our credit, and still struggling. I’m facing complete unemployment next year as the cuts have only increased and probably headed back to government work as a copy maker to make ends meet. Changing careers in my mid-thirties and with two children and without a home to call our own was not the vision all of those years in school. I am not a lazy, druggie bum. I am not asking for a handout. I am not jealous of the rich. I do not want a life beyond my means. I’ve worked my whole life to avoid being here. I was supposed to have a better life than my parents. I want a better life for my children. I pay my bills. I went to college. I am ambitious. I work harder than most people I know. I want to live in a country where people matter more than companies. I believe in civil disobedience.

I am the 99%.

Astounding

2011-11-13T21:23:00.001-08:00

Sometimes Amelia comes up with things that completely blow me away. I used to try to write them down, but she adopted that book and it’s since disappeared. And then most of the time, I commit her stroke of brilliance to memory only to space out when I try to record it. So annoying. Sometimes she something so sweet it brings tears to my eyes . . . and then I don’t want to rush to facebook or blogspot because it should be just a special moment. . .

Anyway, yesterday we pulled her big, red chair out for the 4-month photo shoot. After dragging it inside, she wanted it to stay in the front room to play with. This is what she created.

It’s her ‘shop.’ See the register? She tipped the chair on its back and hopped on the platform with her counter. She even hung some cloth bags on the corner. Then Justin and I had to spend the evening and all day today buying things from her. She’d put our stuff in a bag, take our money, give change, and then chime, “Have a great day! See you again soon!”

How does she come up with this stuff? How creative are you when you see a fluffy chair as a market? Making Mama proud, that one.

4 Months?!

2011-11-13T21:13:00.001-08:00

I never posted about Annie’s 3-monthsday. Why? Because just before she turned three months, she stopped sleeping. Almost completely. For two and a half weeks or so (who can remember?!), she got up every hour through the night. The baby who’d slept through the night into morning a number of times at only 2 months old, stopped sleeping entirely at three. It was a little rough, especially since it was not long after Justin went back to work and I found myself having to get up with Amelia in the morning as well. So that went on for what seemed like forever and it’s only just now starting to level out a bit. It was a rough month for sure and I couldn’t THINK much less write or say, THINK.

The good news? This is my second baby and I just kept telling myself that this is all temporary. It will pass soon. When it’s your first baby, you think it’ll be forever. That simple perspective makes a lot of it far more survivable.

In any case, Annie is four months old! Can you even believe it? I really can’t. I wish there were appropriate words to describe the difference we’ve had with her to this point than with her sister. By the time Amelia was 4 months old, I’d lived an entire lifetime it seemed. I’d spent hours and hours sobbing in the closet (true) and just willing her to grow older. With Annie? It’s just flown by. The stages just come and go in a flash. I swear I still consider her a newborn. And today, a tiny baby rolled by at the grocery store and it made me realize that Annie is not going to be a baby but for a minute. It made me tear up! I’m actually sad at the thought of her growing out of the baby age. I look forward to her being a little girl whole heartedly, but will also be sad to see the baby grow away.

Why? Well, she’s just totally enjoyable. She’s such a sweet, mellow, easy, contented baby. I feel stupid even writing that. It can’t possibly be!

But it is. And she brings only joy (and some exhaustion from time to time). She smiles constantly, laughs easily, and snuggles readily. She’s as sweet as they come and doesn’t even cry when she’s hungry or needs a change. The only time she gets fussy is when she’s tired and even that is more of a complaint than a cry. It’s really . . . crazy. . . and we find ourselves marveling every single day at how easy she is at this stage. Annie is so incredibly lovable. And I do love that babychild. . . until my insides ache. I could easily spend all day running my cheek against hers and nibbling on her chubs. After Amelia and before Annie, I would see people with babies and think “thank heavens that is not mine!” I saw babyhood as something to endure and survive to get to the good part. And here she is, teaching me with her silly, drooly smiles that babies are to be treasured and soaked in because the speed at which they grow is not always welcome.

At four months, Annie is sitting up on her elbows when on her belly and rolls over a lot. She doesn’t roll every time I put her on her tummy, but maybe half of the time. It’s definitely something she can do, even if not all the time. She sucks and chews on her fingers all day and has discovered the magic of the thumb’s perfect fit a couple times. She only nurses for a few minutes at a time and only uses a binky to settle for a few minutes before falling asleep. She falls asleep in the car, sometimes as soon as we get moving, and still loves to sleep in her swing for short morning naps. Since we started putting her to bed earlier (before 8), she’s been sleeping much better too. Getting her to sleep at night is as easy as bath, jammies, milk. Even though I pull out a book every night, we never make it that far before she’s asleep. She typically wakes once in the middle of the night and then is up again in the early morning—usually an hour and a half after going back down. When she wakes in the early morning, I bring her to bed with me and she nurses and sleeps snuggled into me. It’s the only way I’ll get another hour or so before Amelia gets up and since my first baby would’ve never done that, I relish the sweet, warm baby sleeping beside me.

Annie’s starting to babble too and I can’t wait to hear what she has to say. She squeals often and appears to adore her sister. Already looking up to Amelia with astonishment. Amelia readily accepts the role of her sister’s entertainment. She sings and dances for Annie until they are both giggling at the other . . . and their mama dissolves into a puddle of sappiness.

Here’s to (3 &) 4 months!

HA! A kiss smack from Sister Mollie

Getting big!

4-month bald spot!

Totally Buggin Halloween

2011-11-04T22:42:00.001-07:00

Halloween didn’t get its due respect this year. Still tired from my brother’s wedding, on a Monday, and with a new baby? I mean, recipe for an under celebrated holiday right there. We didn’t even dig our fall and Halloween decorations out! gah. It started off a bit tricky too. Since Amelia goes to a hippy-dippy preschool (if only public elementaries were as good!), they have a no holiday policy. I mostly appreciate this policy because we are not religious and don’t really want religion creeping its way into her schooling. However, when it comes to the fun holidays like Halloween or say, Valentine’s Day, I think the kids are missing out. AND I kind of thing they’d learn more by being exposed to lots of different and diverse cultural experiences. ANYWAY, since they don’t celebrate Halloween, I sent her to school in her cute Halloween outfit but not in costume. Lo and behold, we show up to school and all of her friends were WEARING THEIR COSTUMES! So yeah, WTF? I looked at Amelia and while taking it well enough, I could immediately see her sadness. I said, “well you have your super cute Halloween skirt on today right?!” And that sweet babychild agreed with me, “Right mama.” All the while I knew she was just aching to be in costume too as her friends were running around with capes and wings and pretending to fly all over the place. Mama meet heartbreak. What’s a mama to do? Load the baby into the car, drive home, unload baby, gather costume, load baby, drive back to school, unload baby, dress child, load baby, drive home, and unload baby?

That would be goddamn crazy!

But I did it anyway. I couldn’t stand that brave, sweet, but quietly sad little face. I couldn’t take it. Call me goddamn crazy.

And you know what? I walked back into that school with her costume in hand and watched her smile slowly. Not the big, cheesy grin she gets when she’s happy, but the teeny, tiny subtle smile she gets when she’s thrilled. Off to the bathroom we went and as we’re dressing her, she says, “I’m SOOOO glad you brought my costume for me mama!!!!” And off she pranced back to her class, twirling for all to see. And she buzzed around the playground all day I heard later.

Insert satisfied sigh here.

That evening, we ate dinner early, dressed the girls and headed into our new neighborhood curious about trick-or-treating. There aren’t a ton of kids here in this immediate area and it’s fairly remote in a way. We don’t live on a cookie cutter block, but on a street where you have to hike up and down hills to get to front doors. Curious indeed.

But before we left and before any tears,

Complete with a stinger. bzzz

But wait. It gets better. This bee needs some company.

Can you even handle it?! Because I am barely hanging on. The striped tights on both? STOP! It’s too much. And you know that my favorite name for Amelia is Bug right? So yeah. Oh and Amelia loves the Ladybug Girl books. In one of them, she meets Bumblebee Boy and they make the Bug Squad. Perfect all around.

The Bug Squad!

The Disinterested Bug Squad!

Mama and her babies (I still can’t believe I have TWO!)

Daddy’s Bugs

It’s okay Annie. You’ll get it someday.

So it turns out that our quiet, peaceful, and outdoorsy neighborhood ROCKS! Holy crap I can’t even believe it. We went to about ten houses (and seriously had to hike) and Amelia scored THREE full candy bars, a full (sealed) bag of microwave popcorn, three fruit roll ups, and handfuls of other stuff. It turns out that a lot of our neighbors are retired (read: big lovers of babychildren) and there aren’t a lot of kids in the area and most of them go to the more suburban neighborhood a mile away (more bang for the buck I guess), so each house only gets a handful of treaters at most. But they are beloved! Not only did she score major loot, but we had to stop and introduce her and us at every house, tell everyone where we live, all about the girls, etc. We literally stopped and met the people at every house and hung out talking before moving onto the next house. So small town. And so sweet and loving and safe. There is something so comforting in being surrounded by people who adore your babies. And there were no punk kids out being assholes. Just good, innocence all abound. Several of the houses were decorated really spooky only for us to find out they didn’t have small children anymore! They just liked to be festive and participate. My favorite house? We walked up to it and I could see through the kitchen window two women about 50ish hanging out watching tv in furry, sparkly tiaras. When Amelia rang the doorbell, they both jumped up and RAN to the door giggling. And oh, did the fawn all over the girls, gushing this and that. So fabulous all around.

Amelia was really dialed into Halloween this year. Not only asking Trick-or-Treat and saying thank you, but also totally chatting it up with everyone who looked at her. As we were leaving one house, she tossed over her shoulder, “You have a really beautiful yard!” And as the owners closed the door, I heard the wife say to her husband, “Wasn’t she just a doll?!” Swoon.

And Annie? She was the perfect little ladybug! It was definitely pushing into her bedtime and she didn’t fuss at all. And she stayed in that costume the whole time! Who does that? We could’ve never gone out that late with Amelia at that age and I’m pretty sure she was over the costume after a minute. Ah, the second baby. They are more flexible and agreeable just by the nature of their existence, no?

And speaking of first Halloweens . . . we took this picture of Annie

Because we have this picture of Amelia

Please note the cheeks, nose, lips, tongue, eyes. And CHEEKS. Is it wrong that I feel as if I rolled the dice and hit the jackpot. . . twice?

It was a good night all around, even if not given its proper due.

Ghosts of Halloween Past

I never got around to posting about Halloween last year, so here are a few pics of our last Halloween with an only child.

We had no idea what was about to happen . . . from this

to this

Amazing what 12 short months can do! Ohhhh, I look so much more tired in the second one. Sigh.

Since nobody around really takes a lot of pictures, Halloween is one of the only times a year that I get a picture with my kid(s).

2008 (Poor, tired mama)

(side note: good grief, I miss our house. sniff.)

Punkins for the Punkins (part 4)

2011-11-03T15:08:00.001-07:00

We’ve been running through the standard fall activities this year. And with a baby, it really is running. When a baby wakes up, it’s like turning over the hourglass and you’ve got to get through your day in the short spurts when the sand pours. When it stops, everyone stops. Even though I’m not working this semester (why, why, WHY can’t I just stay home until they go to school?!), it’s still been difficult to get through the various festivities. I remember when Amelia was a baby, it was kind of like going through the motions that first year as well. We are doing our best at hitting the important things, but not feeling very um, festive about it. It’s all just tiring. This fall has been particularly exhausting because my brother got married on the 22nd. Holy crap that added a ton of events into an already eventful month (pics from that to come soon). Not to mention that a little SOMEbody was in the wedding as the flower girl, which created about 6 months of mama stress leading up to the big day. Oof.

Anyway, we did the major October events—plus some.

On the Monday after the Wedding Extravaganza, Amelia’s school went to the Pumpkin Patch for a field trip. And guess who drove/chaperoned? Moi! Despite the fact that I wanted to crawl into a hole and sleep for a month (oh, did I mention how Annie stopped sleeping almost completely for two weeks before the wedding?), I loaded my car with kidlets and headed to the Patch! Now I don’t typically post photos of other peoples’ children without their permission, but just this once. . .

This is what my car looked like—plus a teacher as passenger. Could they be any cuter? I mean seriously. Now this might sound weird, but this scene found me very emotional that day. I always wanted to be the kid whose mom drove to the field trips and visited class on party days and now I am that mom. I felt fortunate that despite how disillusioned I am with work right now (as in looking for another job kind of disillusionment), but it does allow me an alternative schedule to be available for things like this. And I feel grateful that we have a vehicle that allows for so many people. When we bought the Pilot, we envisioned it full of children on the way to fun times like this. I can’t believe how quickly it’s begun—and that I have a life that allows it. It made me tear up like an exhausted and emotional mommy! Amelia was so excited that I was there and proud that her mama was with her school. And it just about melted my heart into a puddle when I was holding two little hands that were holding the hands of other little people. Adorable.

I was dreading the chaos of herding a bunch of preschoolers through a pumpkin patch, but it was surprisingly easy, organized, and quick.

Looky my pumpkin! Amelia picked the smallest one she could find and adopted it. While everyone else put their bigger pumpkins on the cart, she carried hers all the way to the car.

And since she got to go to the Patch with her school, we planned on just skipping the hectic family trip this year. And then we felt guilty because Amelia went to the PP as a baby and we should at least get a bigger pumpkin for the porch (because we MAY actually carve one this year) and because Annie deserved her own first Patch experience. . . blah blah. The second kid thing is tough like that. So we actually went to another Pumpkin Patch only 2 days before Halloween. Seems like too strong a tradition not to I guess. I mean, we have pictures of us all going since Amelia was 5 months old.

We went to a small place in our new town. It was okay, but my favorite is still Fog Willow near our old house. I’m pretty sure that the man driving us on the hay ride at this new place was drunk. Seriously. Anyway, it still had the usual suspects—pumpkins, slides, hay ride, and bouncy house. Wait, bouncy house? What the . . .? Seriously, when did bouncy houses become mandatory at every kid function?? It was pretty small though and all the pumpkins were bunched together. I prefer it when you can walk all around and look for the perfect punkin. Like looking for the Christmas tree. And the funny thing is that though we were really there out of guilt for the second baby, it was still Amelia’s fun. It’s always like that.

No sleep for two weeks doesn’t photograph so well . . . but I figure may as well document the exhaustion.

When we went to the community Harvest Festival here in town a couple weeks before this, Amelia bought tickets to go into the big bouncy obstacle course thing. She got halfway through, then stuck, and then took that crawl of shame back to the front. Then she wanted to go on the big bouncy slide, got two steps up the ladder and right back down. She is a very fearful kid, low on the courage side and high on the careful side. We always call her our little Hall Monitor because she plays by the rules and insists that everyone else does too. With exception to the hardship in getting her to do something new (ahem, like swim lessons), I’m mostly pretty cool with the carefulness. Perfect for the older sibling, no? And of my blood for sure.

In any case, we thought we were destined for tears and doom when we saw this monstrosity.

She wants to go on these things so badly. And then she feels just terrible when she can’t convince herself to try. It’s a serious battle and after the Harvest Fest incidents, she put her head down and pouted till we got home. So sad. But here were were and she said she wanted to go down the slide. Great. So after some serious pep talking on our part, she headed up. . . and right back down.

Sigh. What are parents supposed to do in this situation? You don’t want to force them and make them miserable, but then you know that if they’d just try, they’d love it. ACK! Well this time, we were not having it. No. Our kid was not going to miss out on the goddamn bouncy dragon slide thing. So . . .

And once he got her up the ladder, all she had to do

Now this slide had some real speed and she had her worried face on the whole way down. It went so fast that she tumbled to the end. Promptly stood up, smiled, and up she went again. On her own. Again. And Again. And Again. She even lost the worried face after the first um, ten times and got crazy with her approach. Stupid, bouncy slide ladder terror? Done.

And of course, there were punkins too.

Oh and Annie was there too. lol In her Halloween shirt that was too hot to wear until the weekend before Halloween. I hereby declare NOT to buy long sleeved Halloween shirts again. It’s always too hot to wear them more than once if at all. So annoying. On another, far more important note, do you see those thighs? I cut off her head just to get those chunks o’ meat in the picture. I just want to bite them! I can’t stand it.

And just for kicks, here’s Amelia on her first trip to the Patch, five months.

November First

2011-11-01T13:01:00.001-07:00

We moved at the beginning of February to a new town and in the middle of a terrible rain storm.

Life was fairly gloomy at the time. Sick, pregnant, and stressed, we were betting all of our chips on a sunnier future after all of the strife. That very first night in our ‘new’ home, we woke up to something we’d never seen in our own yard.

We woke up feeling like we were truly starting a new day, chapter, life.

Of course, then it continued to rain/snow for the next 5 months and I continued in illness and thing were generally pretty poopy. When the sun finally came out to stay, I was out of school for the summer, towards the end of pregnancy, and life improved dramatically. Through the gut-wrenching process of selling our home, we found ourselves in the mountains where our own yard smells like camping and with a swimming pool/spa to soak away the days. It finally felt like things were looking up and we found ourselves enjoying long, warm nights playing together as a family and feeling very lucky. And even after Annie was born, we spent our afternoons poolside, eating al fresco, exploring the nature around us, meeting the town, and soaking in sunshiny happiness. We finally relaxed and allowed ourselves to live in the moment. It was the summer . . . that was. After we brought Annie home, Justin stayed home for a couple months and we all settled into a closeness we’ll always remember enviously. It was one of the best summers we’ll ever have.

It’s hard to tell around here when the summer ends, since it’s still very warm and we’re all still hanging out in our flip-flops and tank tops. But I guess now that it’s November and Thanksgiving is a few weeks away, it’s time to say so long summer. And as we face another very tough year ahead (the cuts just keep on coming!), we’ll always have those warm months of 2011 to fall back on in our minds’ eye as the moment when time stood still and we became a family of four.

A Year Ago

2011-10-01T13:26:00.001-07:00

Last year just about this time, I had a horrible, no good kind of day. I couldn’t sleep one night before work and stayed up all night stressing about the impending weekend. We were going to put our house up for sale the next day and there was a lot to consider. We didn’t know what was coming, where we were headed, and where we even stood in that moment. It was emotionally draining and we weren’t even in the thick of it yet. In my sleeplessness, I surfed the web on my phone, peering at the tiny screen, lying in the dark, and poking away at minutia. I realized in my search for nothing that I hadn’t heard from a good friend in a while. We’d reconnected on facebook and had danced the mutual gushing dance when we’d found each other at long last. We’d stayed in contact and had plans to see each other the next spring. There’s more to it than that, but in brevity I’ll leave it. Again, in my restlessness, I realized I hadn’t heard anything in a while. I clicked on his FB profile and immediately knew something was askew. A quick google search resulted in the confirmation that he’d died in a rock-climbing accident a couple months earlier. I was instantly devastated. I obviously didn’t make it to sleep that night and got out of bed feeling heavy with grief and exhaustion and stress.

I felt gutted as I got ready for work the next day. You know those days when your eyes burn, your head buzzes, and your body merely exists? It was one of those mornings. And when our nanny, with whom we’d begun to have problems, showed up that day, I was in a frenzied mess getting out the door. Wouldn’t you know that as I grabbed my keys she said, “I’m giving my two weeks notice today.” I stopped and looked her in the face to hear what must have taken her every bit of brilliance to announce, “This isn’t working out.” It was 3 weeks into the semester, the day before we put our house up for sale, and a few hours after learning that a dearly important friend had died.

Have you ever been dumped by someone who didn’t deserve you to begin with? It was like that when the nanny quit. We’d already begun looking for a new person to watch Amelia and pulling ourselves away from Ashley. I had hopes that we could make it through the semester, but I’d started the research phase all the same. Things had gone awry over the summer when Amelia started telling me that Ashley worked on her computer and played on her phone all day. I’d come home early a couple times and been able to verify Amelia’s accounts and trusted her far more than the grown woman watching her. Over the course of the summer, when Ashley watched Amelia 4 days a week, the poor girl had started having potty accidents regularly and almost regressed all the way back to diapers after having been out of them for months. I of course blamed myself for working too much! In any case, it’d gotten to the point that we knew Amelia was not getting quality care. Or hardly any care at all and I’m pretty sure that Ashley knew that Amelia was ratting her out. My girl was a very smart 2 year old, you see-- and if you aren’t that smart of an adult, that would probably start to scare you.

In any case, back to that day. I realized that day as my mind almost exploded with stress and emotion that there is NO stress like Mama stress. To think that we didn’t have anyone to watch Amelia the following week (I’d be damned before letting Ashley come back after that day!) or how she would handle the transition or what was about to happen to us all just made me fall apart. I went into crazy, stressed mom mode. I made it through my first class by not remembering a single thing I’d said, spent my break contacting family and friends to gather volunteers to watch Amelia in the next week until we could land a regular gig. I was on the phone with my mom and Justin several times, coming up with a plan. I cancelled my last class in order to go home, confront Ashley, and let her go for good. In retrospect, I should’ve just let her go in the morning because the thought of her being in my house with my kid that day made my skin crawl. On my way home, I pulled out of the school parking lot and saw a sign for preschool next door. I pulled in on a whim and walked in and spoke with the Director for an hour. I literally didn’t know what I was looking for, what questions to ask, or what would work for my kid. I just kind of stumbled in the door wide-eyed and when someone asked me if I needed help, I honestly replied, “I have no idea where to start.” I left with their handouts and quite thankfully, was too late home to confront the woman I’d trusted in my home, treated like family, and by whom I felt betrayed. Justin, always the cooler head, was able to let her go with fewer fireworks than I could have ever managed.

When I walked in that evening, I immediately burst into tears. The exhausted emotional stress of that day, the previous night, and the days to come overwhelmed me. I really didn’t care about losing a half-assed, untrustworthy nanny, but the thought of throwing Amelia into a brand new situation without warning just did me in. I wasn’t ready for Amelia to go to school. I told Justin that I just couldn’t handle the thought of her with a backpack and lunch pail trotting off to preschool. As I told him this, he welled up too. My head had been spinning all day and I wanted to collapse and here we had a rather large situation on our hands. Mind you, we didn’t even have a babysitter for Amelia. She’d only ever been with my mom and Ashley. Very methodical and careful parents, we found ourselves at a major loss of where to ever begin.

The only good thing that came out of that day was the visit to the preschool. As we talked it out over the weekend, it really seemed like this school had what we’d look for—you know, if we ever took the time to look. ha. Amelia visited the school a couple times that week and was enrolled within a week of the nanny quitting. And less than two weeks later, she went for her first real day at preschool. I blogged about it that day.

And she indeed went off to school with a backpack and lunch pail.

And it indeed broke my heart into a tiny pieces as anticipated. She just seemed . . . so little. *crack*

And as it turned out, school was brilliant for Amelia. Though it was a HUGE transition for all of us (She’d only ever been left with two people beside her parents), she managed it very well. In fact, the potty accidents disappeared within two weeks and potty training was officially over. (guess it wasn’t me working after all) She was happy, adjusted, and with her own space in the world. It’s crazy to think that it was cheaper for us too btw, which is bananas since it was so much better for her. The switch was tough and there were some downsides to preschool vs. nanny, but overall, the babychild immediately grew better.

It’s been a year since Amelia started school and she is the happiest little girl on the planet, I’m convinced. She sings all day everyday, has confidence, and loves her friends. She adores her teachers and learns the coolest things at school. She loves to play school and is always the teacher in her own game. It’s in her blood. I couldn’t be happier with our experience with her preschool and am now thankful that we were pushed into enrolling her. I’m pleased that I didn’t make myself crazy researching schools and going on a multitude of visitations. In the peak moment of mama stress, I trusted my gut and got shit done. And I find myself so very glad that we handled the situation as we did.

I took pictures of her school days through the last year.

Official Fall School Pic—taken the Friday before she even started. :)

First day in the 3-year-old class!

The new pics should be in soon. :) What a difference a year makes! All from a no-good horrible kind of day. There’s no stress like mama stress to make us trust our instincts to make the best decisions. And there’s nothing like an amazing little two year old to remind us that parents struggle more with these transitions than the little ones. It really is incredible what we as parents can do when put in a corner and worried about the well-being of our babychildren and that is what I learned that day in September last year.

Sisterhood

2011-09-14T21:45:00.001-07:00

Amelia adores her baby sister with her whole heart. I thought there’d be resentment and acting out, some selfishness and general hatred. Everyone warned me about her adjusting and how much sisters fight, blah blah. But so far, I’ve only seen love between the two. Amelia is constantly worrying about her ‘Baby Sis’ and always looking out for her. She loves to hold her hand in the car ‘to keep her company’ and talks to Annie in her special baby voice. And Annie? She turns herself inside out to follow her sister’s voice and her biggest smiles are for her big sister. It’s just too much. Our biggest concern about Amelia and her sister is that Amelia does too much. She wants to hold Annie and carry her around and gets in the baby’s face with too much gusto. Amelia is really an ideal older sibling, being such a careful (read: serious OCD), sweet, and sensitive kid. I couldn’t have asked for better for this moment when it comes to the baby.

Now I could go on and on about my girls all day because they have consumed my existence but I know that I’m seriously and biologically inclined to bias. So instead I’ll just post the pics I’ve been getting. None of these pictures were staged either. They all just happened and I had to run and grab my camera. :)

“She needs a blanket, mama.”

This makes her so happy. Even if it freaks BabySis out a little. lol

Taking care . . .

These are all of Amelia’s sleeping buddies. Very special belongings indeed.

Amelia asked us to wrap her up like BabySis

“You too, huh?” HA!

You can’t lay Annie down without Amelia supplying all necessary comfort objects ‘to make her more comfortable, mama.’

Do you see Annie looking at her sister?! My heart might just explode.

Too much for one mama.

Amazement

I may never have had a sister . . . but now I have sisters. Be still my poor, bleeding heart.

Two Months

2011-09-14T13:40:00.001-07:00

Annie turned two months old Monday! And it was the first time that I’ve missed the actual day of a monthiversary. I guess what they say about the second baby is true—she’s always less documented than the first. It’s not really that you are less excited or interested in the second baby so much as you are too busy with two babychildren to do simple things like eat. Or blog. (Equally important.) It turns out y’all, that two babies is a lot of babies.

Actually, in Annie’s case, we missed Monday because the poor babygirl had a terrible reaction to her shots! Her fat little thigh swelled up from hip to knee, turned bright red, and was terribly tender. She threw her head back, closed her eyes, opened her mouth wide . . . and screamed. Inconsolably. For over an hour. We tried everything we could think of and essentially panicked but nothing worked. boo. She finally conked out from exhaustion once the Tylenol kicked in and woke up much better. So WTF. That sucked and ruined the rest of our plans for the day!

But enough about that. It’s the only negative thing to say about our little 2-month-old! Annie’s stats: 12 lbs., 4 ozs. and 23.5 inches (I’m skeptical on that though because I don’t think they stretched her neck out all the way. The rolls are deceiving.), putting her at 85th and 89th percentiles respectively. Yeah, it’s a whole different experience than we had the first time (but Annie is growing at the exact same pace as Amelia, as their 2 month weights are 2 lbs. and 4 ozs. different—just as they were at birth!) She is growing perfectly and looking bigger, rounder, chubbier, and rolly-pollyer than ever. The fluke rolling over was not such a fluke. She’s rolled over 5 times already! She’s started batting at things with her hands and looking around the room to follow voices and following things with her eyes. The best part is that she smiles all of the time and just in the last week or so has started cooing. She makes a happy noise when she smiles that is so adorable, we turn ourselves inside out trying to get her to smile loudly. Her little grin has evolved into a full-blown, full-face explosion of smile. She’s just a sweet little love who smiles more than she does anything else (except sleep).

Big smiles

Holding her head up like a professional!

Rolling Over!

Strong back . . . Super Baby!

When it comes to sleeping at night, Annie is a star. She has slept for 6 hours at a time since we brought her home from the hospital—for the most part. She most typically wakes up between 330-430, eats, and goes back to sleep for a few more hours. About once a week, she sleeps until 5 and once a week, she wakes up at 230 so you never really know. I’ve managed to get some sleep in there too, but am still living the tired-new-baby life. Mom’s sleep translates into many fewer hours because she has to eat dinner once the baby finally goes to bed, do laundry, check email, talk to her husband, or otherwise just relax. Then, when the baby wakes up, you’re up, feeding, and hoping to get her back to sleep. Sometimes Annie goes back to sleep within an hour. Others not so much. So if she gets up at 330, stays up until 5, then it takes me another hour to get to sleep (now 6) and the baby is back up at 7 to eat again. Or the Big Girl comes in to say good morning at 7. *yawn* However, about once a week, I get a solid 5-hour stretch and feel new again. Annie is kind and sensitive to me like that. Now napping in the day is a whole different ballgame with her. It’s really hit or miss whether she’ll go down for a nap or not. There are some days that we spend the entire day getting her to sleep over and over and then unsuccessfully trying to get her to stay asleep in her crib. There are days when she sleeps for 3 hours in her crib too. So we are working on some routine there . . . and I have a suspicion that once Justin goes back to work, we will settle into our own little schedule during the day with more consistency. While Justin’s off, we are doing things during the day and whatnot.

Though I worried at first, it doesn’t appear that little Annie has any of the tummy troubles that Amelia had. The symptoms she had at the beginning turned out to be from an oversupply of milk and a strong let-down. That is, she was drowning! Of course my mind went to the worst-case scenario when all I have to do is look down to know that of COURSE I have an over-supply of milk! I mean holy huge boobs. Once I figured that out, things have been much better. Ironically enough, Annie is a puker. I say ironic because Amelia had such a severe case of reflux that she actually didn’t puke at all--EVER. It’s really rare except in the worst cases. Now we have the baby the pukes all the time but without pain. It’s a mess and gross, but I’ll take it!

In terms of adjustment, I’m really proud of all of us. Life has continued quite a bit after Annie’s birth and she seems to have just fit into the fold of our family. Life is completely earth shattering when you become a parent for the first time but when that next baby comes, it’s just about taking care of that baby. It’s not about finding the parent in you, which is a very traumatic transition. Then, when we think about Amelia at this age, she screamed for entire days at a time, completely crippling us in every possible way. Soooo, that we’ve gone out to eat numerous times, taken Annie here and there, and managed to spend time alone with Amelia has been pretty incredible. I’m actually shocked at how much time I’ve had with Amelia. And how much time I’ve managed to carve out for myself even. Although I think that Mommy Time is about to end when Justin goes back to work. In any case, I couldn’t peel myself away from Amelia until I had to with work, so getting away to hit the mall or get a haircut has been much easier this time. On most days, Justin and I crash into the couch with both kids in bed and talk about how good life is. It’s beyond exhausting and crazy hectic. It’s messy and absolutely unglamorous. But pretty good too.

Some pics from the second month . . .

(notice the little somebody always nearby)

And the traditional shot! I’m 2 Months Old Today!

Half grin

A Nap-Time Laundry List

2011-08-19T16:26:00.001-07:00

*It’s my first day alone with both babychildren and they are both sleeping at the same time! Yes, I should be sleeping myself, but here I am instead. I have to clear my head of all the things rattling around in my brain that I want to get into words. Nothing cohesive and no commentary. Just little thoughts.

*Left my wallet at Target today. Thank Mother Earth they had it! But since Justin was headed out to a golf tournament (mmhmm), I had to take both girls back to the store to pick it up. Annie slept on the way—as long as the car was moving. Every time we stopped or even slowed down, she wailed. So annoying. Amelia used to do the same thing and it made me crazy! I’ll surely get a ticket one day and will have to explain that if I go slower than 35, my baby screams. In any case, it turns out that a wailing baby is the ONLY thing that makes Amelia quiet in the car. Trade off. And every time I glanced in the backseat, I saw that Amelia was holding Annie’s hand. Not in my view and not trying to be cute for attention. . . but to keep her baby sister company. How sweet is that?! I am not sure my heart can take all the sisterly cuteness.

* Annie is huge. She is literally as big as Amelia was at 3 months old. I love that she feels more sturdy already and is getting past the mushy newborn phase quickly, but dang! My whole plan to have another girl and pass on the wardrobe is about to foiled, I fear. Annie is definitely not fitting newborn clothes in either length OR girth, but I just knew that 3 month clothes would be way too big. . . until I tried them on. Fit perfectly. WHAT?! So crazy. I don’t know if I will every get used to her being so much bigger than her sister. I weighed her yesterday and she is over 12 lbs. HA! How is it possible to have two babies on such different ends of the scale?! Insane. And in regards to the clothes, she is going to grow out of season y’all! And my whole evil plan for two daughters to share their clothes is quickly headed down the toilet.

*And I of course totally LOVE that she is so big and chubby and ridiculously strong.

*Speaking of strong, I forgot to post about Annie rolling over. Twice. True story. She rolled from her belly to her back twice within the first 3 weeks. I thought the first time was just a fluke and then it happened again! I set her down on her tummy and looked away. When I looked back—on her back. Holy hell! I can’t even set her down and trust that she’ll be in the same place at less than a month old?! I think we are in trouble with this one. With Amelia, you could see a milestone coming a mile away. Made it much less scary.

*Justin’s taken an extended leave from work and it’s been nothing short of wonderful. I just keep thinking how we’ll never again be off from work together for a long time to just enjoy our family and togetherness. I am not too worried about juggling two babies when he goes back to work, but I will definitely miss him. Hopefully, we still have a few more weeks. It’s been so awesome to divide the duties and kids and make it all work as a family unit.

*Last Saturday was the perfect day. Justin got up with both kids so I could sleep in a bit. Then Amelia and I went to the Farmer’s Market (alone) for a while, eating berries out of the basket and sharing a peach muffin. After that, I took both Annie and Amelia on an errand for the first time alone—without a hitch. Once home, we had lunch and both girls went down for nap at the same time (saving grace!) so Justin and I spent some time together in the pool and soaking up the sun. After nap, we watched a movie with Amelia and then had a yummy dinner outside as a family. So simple. It doesn’t get much better than an easy day with your babies and your love, enjoying life’s little pleasures.

*My brother’s getting married in 2 months. It’s an ‘elegant’ wedding and Amelia’s the flower girl. I’m not thrilled about having to find a formal dress in which I can breastfeed and feel remotely human 3 months post-partum and take a million pictures.

*Speaking of my brother, mothering my second baby has given me profound insights on the affects birth order have on children on into adulthood. It’s too much to go into now, but the second child has an incredibly different set of parents and a universally different experience than the first. Makes so much sense and watching it all unfold has made me realize a lot about my (older) brother and I.

*School starts next week. I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I miss the excitement of the first week after summer. Arriving at school and meeting up with all of your tan and rested friends. There is a buzz in the air that is intoxicating at the beginning of the school year. HOWEVER, that excitement is the ONLY thing I miss about it. . . and even that is pretty false because I teach summer school every year, so rather than excitement, I am mostly immersed in dread and burnout and forced to fake the energy. So in reality, I don’t miss work right now. Not one piece of me wishes I was in meetings this week and prepping for class next week. If you know me or have taken a class from me, that’s probably a surprise. Heaven knows I love my job and am practically married to it when in session. . . but that’s the problem! I teach at burn-out pace year in and year out. I don’t have a good sense of balance between work and home and I’d rather be here. With my babies. I don’t want to worry about grading papers while breastfeeding at 3 am.

*OHOHOH! That reminds me that it must be recorded that Annie slept until 5 once this week and then until SIX am! What in the efffffff? Who does that at 5 weeks old? WHO I ask? Of course, the first time, I woke up at 3 in a panic and the second time, I had to get up at 5 to pump lest my boobs completely explode. I didn’t pump the first time and practically drowned the poor child. Is it really possible that we have that kid? The one who just . . . sleeps? Oh my. The good deeds I will do if it turns out to be true.

*And the big one is up from nap. She asked me to put barrettes in her hair. “Like Daddy does it with two clips.” So I put two in and she looks in the mirror, “Mama. Can you fix this? It doesn’t look right to me.” Sigh.

This here life? Pretty good.

Date Night

2011-08-19T15:31:00.001-07:00

I’ve been desperately carving out time to spend with Amelia alone. Our relationship has shifted profoundly since Annie was born and I’ve seen the stress on her. While she is sincerely and genuinely kind and loving to her sister, Amelia’s acting out through this transition has mostly been aimed at me. She even hit me a few times in the first couple weeks. It has been probably equally painful for me, this shift in our relationship. It’s just not what it used to be. Can’t be. I just keep telling myself that this time with the baby is temporary and in just a few months, I’ll be more free to spend time with Amelia and share more with her again.

All in all though, it has to be said that Amelia has handled this transition really well. There were a few episodes in the beginning that were rough, but she really does love her sister to no end and appears to really understand that Annie is a baby and needs special attention. It’s still early I guess, but I have faith in her. I truly think the transition has been harder on me. Watching her cling to her dad and say that she wants him all the time just sucks, but I know that nobody’s replacing the Mama anytime soon and her and I will go back to our own special relationship soon enough. . . even if it will never be as it was.

Anyway, the whole reason I started this post was because again, I’ve been trying to make time for special Amelia adventures. We started tiny when I took her to get her hair cut for an hour. It was the first time we’d been alone since Annie’s birth (maybe 3-4 weeks at that time) and as soon as we walked out of the house, Amelia said, “It’s just you and me mama??” Heart. Breaking. And then one day I surprised her at school at pick-up time (a task that Justin has done solely since a week before Annie arrived) and we shared a smoothie before heading home. Too fun.

Last night, I took Amelia on a real date night. We went to the movies and watched the new Winnie the Pooh flick and then off to dinner. She was pretty excited.

The only theater still playing that movie was a ways from home, so as we got closer, she asked “Are we close to the moooovie Gator mama?”

The WHAT?

“The Mooovie Gator.”

You mean the movie theater?

“Yeah. The Mooovie Gator.”

Thee-uh-terr. The movie theater. Say it.

“Theee-uhhh-terrrr”

Right!

“Do you see the Movie Gator mama?”

Sigh. We are getting close sweetie. Very close. We’ll be there soon.

And then I looked back to see her “looking for the mooovie gator.”

Those are her binoculars apparently. ha.

Since we were on a special date night, I went all out and got popcorn AND a slurpee. Serious business. Amelia’s never had a slurpee before last night, but I’m pretty sure she’s a fan.

The movie was pretty cute and appropriately short for the kids’ age. It was just the classic Pooh story book story in a movie. You know the one—with the red balloon. Since we got out of the movie earlier than expected, we decided to hit dinner too. I asked Amelia what she wanted to eat and she was contemplating when I thought of the perfect place. I’d seen an IHOP on the way to the theater and as we walked out, I told her that there was a restaurant that made tons of pancakes, even for DINNER. To which she replied, “OOOOHHHHHHHHHH. I want pancakes.” When we got to the restaurant, she asked what it was called and when I told her, she said, “I LOOOOOOVE IHOP mama” as she skipped in the door.

So it turns out that IHOP is really empty at night with exception to several people eating alone. Since it was so quiet, Amelia got a lot of attention from the staff and she even ordered for herself and responded to all the waiters who asked us how everything was. Very grown up, you know. OH! And it also turns out that kids eat free at IHOP every night. What the heck and who know?!

It was a sweet little date night with my favorite first-born. It kind of broke my heart that it’s come to this—special occasions—but felt pretty good about it. Although I was totally exhausted by the time we got home. ha. Oh and that Amelia asked for her daddy ALL the way home. *heavy sigh* On the flip side, Annie was VERY happy to see me and even smiled when I fed her.

Lastly, the whole time I was out with Amelia last night, I kept thinking about how I never got away like that when SHE was a baby. What the heck?! How can I manage to get away from the baby this time when I was in complete and total captivity the first time? And now that I can pry myself away from the little chubby leach at home, I need to spend it with the other babychild? Does that mean that I could have seen friends or laid by the pool or just done anything by myself back THEN?! I am really beginning to mourn for the first time mother in me who had it so rough.

In any case, we’re all making it work. And if a date night is all I’ve got for a while, then a date night we shall have.

Good grief, I love my girl.

Baby-Timed Post

2011-08-16T21:43:00.001-07:00

I’ve begun several posts only to get interrupted and unable to finish them. Argh. I’ve been on the internet a lot, but only on my phone. My actual keyboard time boils down to a couple times a week. Ack.

So instead of waiting to finish a full post, I’m just going to get little thoughts down as quickly as possible until the baby timer goes off.

Today was a rough day. (Coming from my only previous experience, I don’t know what a normal fussy baby is like so I am trying to stay positive even though it appears that there are early symptoms revealing themselves.) In any case, Annie finally fell asleep today late in the afternoon and slept through Justin’s birthday dinner. And then on the way home, she screamed like an animal. All. The. Way. It mostly sucked hard. There was a funny moment though when Amelia (who stayed astonishingly silent for almost the whole ride) looked at her sister, sighed, and said “Come ooooooooon Annie. Don’t cry in the CAR!”

This of course made us chuckle.

If the child only knew.

A Tuesday in July

2011-08-12T22:33:00.001-07:00

I gave myself a whole month of just soaking in major baby-ness but it’s time for a formal introduction.

Early on a Tuesday, exactly one month ago, we set off to the hospital with the surreal notion that we were on the way to life’s biggest moment. I don’t know when I’ll be ready to sit down and plug out the whole birth story, but our trip to the Birthing Center that day resulted in this . . .

And this . . .

And then this . . .

And be still my heart, there was this . . .

Do you see the amazement in her eyes? So. Dang. Precious.

Miss Annie Layne was born at 745, weighing in at 8 pounds and 6 ounces and measuring 19 inches. Although, to be fair, she was unnamed at birth and for a few hours after. While her birth was nowhere near as exciting as her sister’s, it was far more pleasant. However, the day was not without incident or complications either. Again, details later. It still, for the most part, was a big improvement with our previous birthing experience. And the talk of the entire day was her size. From the first comment the doctor made before pulling her out to the conversation that went into choosing her name. Annie’s size shattered the assumption that I make tiny babies. Where her sister was the tiniest peanut in the birthing wing at 6 pounds, Annie was a total bruiser with 2 pounds and 4 ounces on her big sister. Opposites. Already. Oh except that they look identical once you get passed the extra chub on the new one.

The first month has flown by at record pace. I swear the first month with Amelia felt like an eternity and this time, it’s felt like a blink of an eye. I’ve learned that there’s a lot of value in the ease of already being a mother with the second child. That transition into Motherhood adds a level of complexity and fear that weighs the first experience down to a grind. That said, I’ve also learned that I completely blacked out on Amelia’s first month. I SOOOO forgot how hard it all is in the beginning. Figuring I was an old pro at breast feeding, I didn’t give it the attention necessary. I’d forgotten how much effort it takes in the beginning, physical and mental. Add my confidence with a baby that came out with a much stronger suck than her tiny sister and you’ve got bleeding, cracked nipples in less than 24 hours. Holy hell, I can’t even describe what it takes to continue letting your baby attack you when you are in such pain. Wincing doesn’t even begin to cover what your body does as that baby gets near you. And someone please tell me again how women got the rap as the ‘weaker sex?’ Anyway, that was something I totally got to avoid the first time and struggled with the second go-round.

Other than that, things have gone pretty smoothly. . . so far. Annie, having so much more meat on her little bones, has been a longer sleeper than Amelia was. When we brought Amelia home from the hospital, she was so tiny that we had to wake her every couple hours to eat for two weeks. It was dreadful. Annie has slept in 4-5 hour increments since we brought her home, and only getting up once on a typical night. Amazing! While that is really impressive for such a new baby, I’m pretty tired from not sleeping for longer than a few hours at a time for a month now. It really does start to pick on you as time accumulates.

Which makes me wonder why I’m writing this blog when I should be sleeping!

There’s still so much to catch up on, but for now, I’ll wrap things up so I can hit the sack.

Annie Layne 1 week

2 weeks

3 weeks

One Month!

At one month, Annie is over 10 pounds (guessing) and already passed 21 inches! She was born big and has only continued gaining chubs rolls and length. She literally looks like a spitting image of Amelia at about 2.5 months or so. It’s so crazy! She’s been able to pick up her head and turn it to the other side since the day she was born and can now hold it up for intervals. She holds it up more than not. She has begun to smile in the last week or so, reserved with a half grin most of the time but the full gummy smile every once in a while. She has baby little baby acne breakouts and has started to enjoy bath time. She sleeps in the car (halle-frickin-lujah!), and loves to eat. Annie absolutely adores hanging around outside and prefers moving about over sitting and rocking (to the disappointment of my back). She loves her sister’s voice and can luckily sleep through the incessant background of tiny voiced-chatter and regular meltdowns. The baby has grown into 0-3 month clothes and may be pushing out of them in the next couple weeks. Annie, has, to my potential heart break, showed some symptoms of reflux or digestive issues. Nothing super decisive or convincing, but there are signs here and there. The poor baby also has paranoid parents who have no ‘normal’ as a comparison. We are however, eternally hopeful.

Annie, at one month old, is pretty cool.

Life.

2011-07-15T21:57:00.001-07:00

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Nevermind.

2011-07-10T09:40:00.001-07:00

I should’ve known better than to wax on about how great things are. Our luck never seems to run like that so it was silly on my part to have the nerve to relax my guard and just enjoy life.

Amelia woke up sick yesterday. She’d been snotty-nosed on Friday but by yesterday it appeared to be a full cold. There is still a possibility that it’s an allergy attack or something but it came on suddenly and has endured going on the third day now. Not to mention that on Friday night, she didn’t sleep a wink, which would indicate an actual illness since allergies make you more tired than anything. So Justin was up with her all night and she was just a mess yesterday. She woke up drier today but just sneezed at least 10 times in a row, so the fountain of snot is back.

I spent yesterday totally freaked out about how this affects this week and sinking right back into a gloomy thought pattern. I don’t know what made me think we’d escape this pregnancy without one last illness. We’ve been relatively healthy for about a month (save for the severe asthma and allergies I’ve had). Wouldn’t it just make sense that we’d end it . . . sick?! And what does it mean for this week? Well, first and foremost, it could throw off our whole plan in regards to keeping Amelia in her regular routine of school and whatnot. It certainly makes taking care of her more complicated, probably putting more pressure on Justin. It also means that if still sick come Tuesday, she won’t be able to visit the hospital to 1) meet her sister or 2) see her mama. Not seeing her for 4-5 days?! I’ve never gone that long without seeing her and certainly don’t want THIS to be the occasion that we’re separated for so long.

And then I had a minor meltdown about getting sick myself yesterday too. If I catch this illness (and let’s face it, I have caught every illness since October), I could potentially not only be sick while giving birth, but also would have to be crazy careful around the baby. The baby that I’ve longed to just snuzzle and kiss and sniff for what feels like a couple years now. *tears* I just can’t be sick through this. I can’t. We’ve gone through too much to get here.

And just when I was feeling so positive. Fucking figures.

The Good Life

2011-07-08T14:30:00.001-07:00

Another hodge-podge post. Too much and yet too little going on to focus on complete thoughts and ideas.

37 Week Update

EEP! I can’t believe I’m 37.5 weeks pregnant. Last week was all about pins and needles. Just waited and waited to go into labor . . . and nothing. We had our (LAST!) OB appointment yesterday. It was technically our Pre-op appointment and when I put it on my calendar, I laughed just knowing I wouldn’t make it to that appointment. In any case, the doc checked again via ultrasound and saw Baby’s head is still up . . . but she’d rolled over since last week! Not flipped into a different position entirely, just rolled over so now her feet are on my right and her spine is on my left. Friggin wiggle worm! There’s no room in there. Just relax already! Of course, as the U/S wand moved about my belly, BabyGirl kicked and moved right along with it. The doc also checked my cervix (that seriously sucks btw) again and it was closed and high still. All evidence points to making it to our scheduled surgery next Tuesday. (TUESDAY!) The bad news was that my blood pressure skyrocketed all of a sudden. It was up to 140! My bp is usually very low—100 plus or minus a bit—so 140 was pretty high. We checked it twice and it was the same both times. Off to the hospital we went for a non-stress test. It was the first time we’ve done that! The nurse was fab and by the time they hooked me all up and put me in bed, my bp was back down to 114. Nice. We stayed for about an hour while the continued checking my bp (114 every time) and monitoring the baby. Well, trying to monitor the baby, which meant chasing her around with the monitor trying to get a decent read. She was a bit excited for all the attention. Oddly enough, a couple contractions were even recorded on the little printout too. So that was that. No worries. Everything’s good and we got some preliminary check-in stuff complete at the hospital for Tuesday too. Feeling good about it.

Shifted Thoughts

After constantly looking for any little sign of labor for the past two weeks and walking around on eggshells, I’m now only focused on Tuesday. I have visions of waking up, taking shower, carrying my bag and pillow to the car, arriving at the hospital, and having a baby. While making it this far would have been shocking to me a week ago, my thoughts have shifted. NOT making it to Tuesday would shock me now. I’ve got my eyes on the prize and am SO excited at the thought of avoiding labor. I mean, for shit’s sake, if you have to get gutted from hip to hip and suffer the consequences for months (forever!), you should at least get a pass on labor and those sonofabitch contractions. I mean, there should be something positive about it right? Oddly enough, I’m suddenly feeling like there’s not a lot of time left. I mean, FOUR days from now we’re having a baby. A BABY! A whole new person coming into the world and there’s only a few days between now and then?! Damn. And last week, I was thinking there was no way I could make it to July 12. WTF? You can’t win I guess when you’re a crazy pregnant mama whose mind and body are at odds.

Extra Time

I am SO enjoying this extra time. Justin’s been taking a lot of time off of work and we’ve spent our days hanging by the pool and relaxing. Today was the perfect day. He and Amelia got up early and let me sleep. Once I was up, we hit the pool until lunch time. After lunch, Amelia and I napped (we’re back to napping for now. Fingers crossed) for a couple hours and when we woke up, it was back to the pool. Then Taco Thursday commenced with poolside dining followed by some homemade ice cream, mama/daughter shower, and now mama/daddy relaxing time. So to recap it’s sleep, swim, eat. Repeat. We went through a very rough fall/winter/spring as a family and we are finally enjoying the results of that stress and those sleepless nights. Our new house has its quirks, but when we’re all enjoying these beautiful last moments before baby and lazy, summer days, it feels like our own personal oasis. Justin has me on husband-imposed bed rest, so I’m mostly being spoiled beyond reason at the moment and spending most of my hours submerged or sleeping. It’s wonderful. It may all even be part of the reason that I’ve made it so far into this pregnancy as well. I am actually feeling better this week than the previous few and aside from the predictable discomforts, feeling pretty good and positive. When Amelia was born, I still had a stack of finals on the floor of my office and hadn’t relaxed a bit, since I’d worked until 4 days prior. This time, I’m really enjoying these last days. Of course knowing that there’s only a few days left probably helps too, but it’s been nice to just be for a while and I will always look back at these last couple weeks as precious.

Which begs the question

Why do I teach every summer? Having time off with my family and even more myself has been amazing! I usually teach 3 classes in the short summer session, making myself crazy with a frantic pace and WAY too much work. We are going to try from this year forward to set ourselves up in a way to avoid my working too much in the summer. It’s an important part of our annual income, but with two babies, maybe not worth it? We’ll see. I feel like a different person without work hanging over my head every minute. Despite the prevalent ideas that teachers have it sooooo easy, it is a job that doesn’t take weekends evenings off. If you’re not responding to student emails every second, you’re grading papers and writing lectures. It’s beyond draining and encompassing. This is the longest break I’ve ever had from teaching and it’s been pretty fantastic.

Independence Day

Justin’s job is another kind of work that sees no holidays. He worked on the 4th (just like he worked on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day—boo) and we definitely missed him. His absence means that we can’t really celebrate the way we’d like. It’s such a family holiday! We still managed a pretty good day. We went to a neighboring town to catch a parade in the morning. It’s a teeny tiny mountain town and the parade was perfect for us. It was little and unimpressive, but easy to find, not overly crowded, and done in an hour. What we (I) didn’t anticipate is that every participant in the parade threw candy into the crowd. Amelia was the only child on the whole block on onlookers, so not only did every parader throw candy directly to her, but all of the adults around us gave her theirs too. I had an entire cloth shopping bag FULL of candy when we left. Good grief, she was spoiled by that crowd. And she was thrilled, naturally. Luckily, I saw a student there randomly enough and unloaded all but a couple lollipops (‘wowwipops’). After nap, we managed to swim with Grammy for most of the afternoon to escape the 90+ heat. Then we had a fab 4th dinner just for the 3 of us that even included homemade tutti fruitti ice cream. Woot. I hoped that Amelia would stay up late enough to see the fireworks for once, but the poor munchkin just couldn’t make it and was in bed by about 815. I wandered into the backyard to watch the fireworks from the Fairgrounds’ show. It was a great show, but I felt lonely missing my love. Not the same without him. Next year, we are having a party at our place for sure. We have a great location for fireworks along with a huge backyard and a great pool. Not to mention, we’ll have a little birthday right around the corner from the holiday to celebrate as well.

Pictures

So Amelia and I had a photo session. It was a combo maternity/mama and daughter session. It was the hottest day of the year so far at 6pm when we took them and I was much farther along that I’d hoped to be at picture time so I didn’t have the best expectations. As you can see (save for the above pic that I took on my phone), they came out pretty great. It was our first time meeting the photographer and she was fun and the pics came out beautifully. I’d definitely recommend her. Pics courtesy of Channa Vance. Despite the fact that I look at myself in these pics and cringe a little (holy pregnancy face!!), I can see them for their beauty and just can’t get enough of the pics with my Babygirl. Can’t wait to put some up in the new Baby’s room. I didn’t take any pics when I was pregnant with Amelia largely because it’s so hard to see yourself in that state with any objectivity, but wish I had. So even though I totally dreaded going through with it this time at 35-36 weeks, I am glad I did.

This Time . . .

2011-06-30T08:23:00.001-07:00

Parenthood is such an unpredictable job. Even the best laid plans get thrown out the window the minute Baby’s born. As someone who researches by nature every thing I do, I’m the first one to admit that books are helpful and handy and yet totally pointless too. I am an information gatherer . . . but no book nor google search is gonna raise a baby. When things got rough and complicated with Amelia, there was no book, video, or even doctor with answers. I had to find my own answers and learn something very valuable—to trust my gut and fight the experts when necessary. I learned early in motherhood that even the most experienced parents and doctors were not the experts on my baby. That, even as a brand new, have-no-idea-what-I’m-doing mother, I was the expert on Amelia. It was a profound realization.

As we get closer (she will be here two weeks from today, no matter what!) to bringing home another baby, I’ve been reflecting a lot on our experience with Amelia (oof) and how far we’ve come (seriously) and wondering how it will all apply to our new beginning. . . while also realizing that our expertise is likely out the window with this baby too. They’re all different right?!

What I’ll Do Differently

Breast Feeding. I will do a lot about breast feeding differently. The top thing on my list of doing things differently will be to not care what anyone else thinks about it. I won’t cover up, go to another room in my own house, or run to the parking lot to feed my baby in the cramped seat of the car. I had such anxiety about feeding Amelia in front of family members and friends, even when they came over to our house! And why? Because I didn’t want to bother them. I never once fed her in public because of the perception of others. Why?! Why would I censor myself in something as innocent and natural as feeding my child? Why worry so much about other people including strangers that I would make myself and baby uncomfortable in the process? Quite frankly, if someone doesn’t want to see my boob, they shouldn’t look. If they think it’s gross or inappropriate, I dare them to confront me. In a world where Hooters has a children’s menu and Playboy sits on the backs of millions of toilets across the nation as a classy magazine, I refuse to consider my body obscene when using it for its intended purpose.

I will not agonize over stretch marks and the bread-dough belly left behind. As a mother of two in my thirties, it’s not only okay, but totally time to let the hawt, college girl in her twenties go. Since having Amelia and struggling with body issues, I have come to an important realization. I don’t want to be the same person I was in my twenties. I don’t want to wear the same clothes. I don’t have a desire to be a MILF or attract younger men, cougar style. See, I don’t have to be sexy to anyone except the one I actually have sex with. The hell is up with expecting moms to look like they’ve never had babies? Y’all know that’s impossible right? Permanent damages, yo. And you know what? I believe that by getting women to focus and obsess over stupid things like stretch marks and saggy boobs, she doesn’t realize how powerful her body is and how vital its abilities. If she focuses on what everyone else thinks about her body held up to a silly Hollywood standard, she won’t ever acknowledge her own strength in surviving such a grueling process. We’re so weird as a society that we talk more about her getting fat than the amazingness of bringing a whole person into the world. The HELL?!

I will accept help. I may even ask for it if it’s not offered. I can’t do it alone. Justin and I can’t do it alone. I’ve become a believer in the Village necessity in raising babychildren and I can let go of some of the work to let that village take root. With Amelia, she screamed so much that I couldn’t bear to put anyone else in the position to listen to it—and therefore never got a break from it myself. I didn’t think anyone else should have to deal with it/her. Now I realize that it would have just done me wonders to have gotten out for an hour here or there and it wouldn’t have killed anyone to listen to her for an hour or two either. I’ve also learned as my friends and family have had babies that people want to help. They do. When someone offers, they want to be involved. It’s a win-win.

I will try to demand sleep one night a week. With Amelia, I did the night duty. Every night. And when it was 9 months later and I hadn’t slept, I imploded . . . and then exploded. It’s not possible to get by without sleep. It infuriates me when I see mom blogs/boards that say ‘sleep is for the weak.’ No. Sleep is for survival. I very nearly landed myself in the hospital for not sleeping when A was a baby. My body felt like it was crumbling and my brain was just mush. And I wasn’t a good mom when I was exhausted. The biggest problem for us was that we got into the routine of my getting up, no matter what. Learned early on that Justin was useless without sleep so he’d get up early and relieve me so I could sleep for an hour or two. Added to that (and probably more significantly), I was constantly paranoid about my milk supply so even if he by chance got up to feed her, I’d insist on getting up to pump so my body wouldn’t quit producing. (palm to forehead) So in my mind, it was pointless to have anyone else feed her because it was more of a pain than just feeding her myself. My bad on that one. This time, I will try to take one night a week that is for me to sleep through and recharge. I will not feel guilty about how exhausting it will be for my husband because he is a parent too.

I will communicate more with Justin. He is receptive and willing to do his part. With our first child, I think we both struggled to figure out what his part was. It’s really difficult to manage roles with a nursing baby. I mean one person has the milk and the other . . . doesn’t. So yeah, equality in parenting goes right out the window. BUT I could have asked for more help. I could have asked him every once in a while to bring the baby to me and take her away after nursing so I wasn’t up. I should’ve told him how much I was struggling because he wanted to do more and didn’t know where to insert himself. I trust that he’ll be more comfortable and take more initiative this time . . . BUT I can’t expect him to read my mind.

I will trust my body on the milk supply thing. Taking a 3am feeding off once a week will not result in my starving the baby the next night. As long as the baby is on the boob, there will be ample food for her and I shall trust that a whole lot more.

We shall take this baby out more. I had just gotten in the stride of taking Amelia here and there when the screaming set in. We were so consumed by it that we just retreated, shades drawn, phone off, and alone. We didn’t want to be out somewhere and then have her start screaming (which mostly lasted for hours), we were too exhausted to go anywhere, and we were usually already trying to get her to stop screaming. It. Was. Awful. By nature, I think the second child needs to be more mobile—because you already have a little person who needs to get out of the house. Amelia’s situation definitely stunted and paralyzed us. It would be nice to go on a road trip every once in a while or hit the beach for a day. We will all need it.

We shall take more time for ourselves. Good lord, Justin and I spent maybe one evening alone in the first year of Amelia’s life. And we’ve only spent a weekend away together ONCE since she was born! We don’t have a lot of familial support with watching her and don’t want to take advantage of the one person who does watch her, so we just don’t go anywhere. And when she was a baby, we didn’t want anyone else to have to deal with the difficult baby. But now, even if someone just watches Amelia and we take the newbie out to dinner or to the movies, we need to carve more time out together. It’s a need. More used to leaving Amelia with caregivers, it should be a bit easier this time to get help. Hopefully. We could drop the girls off with my mom for a couple hours to catch a movie and the sky won’t come tumbling down, I’m sure.

I will tend to myself. Though I am okay with letting go of the younger, single, skinnier version of myself, I am not okay with just forgetting about myself altogether. I remember taking Amelia on errands when she was a baby. She’d be dressed appropriately, always clean, fed, and cute. I’d be none of those things—walking around in the rain with a t-shirt on, hungry, and unshowered. A majority of the time, I’d be in my car before I realized that I hadn’t even looked at myself in the mirror before walking out the door. I was a mess. A zombie mess. And this made my self esteem piss poor and therefore made it even harder to take any time out for myself. Even if I have to take the baby with me, I will get my toes done once in a while and not wait a year to get my hair cut. I will *try* to buy myself some clothes instead of spending all my money on stuff for the kids, even if it means coming to terms with a new body.

I will pump more. Ack. I hate pumping. I really do. But there has to be a better balance than what I did before. I hated pumping so much that I just did it to make it through work hours. I will try to stock up milk so I can *gasp* maybe grab coffee with a friend every once in a while or just not live by the 2-hour leash every so often. I know it’s just easier to breastfeed, but maybe some space would be good too. On the fence about this one because part of me wants to just avoid bottles and pumping altogether.

I will control more of the hospital situation. If I am tired, hungry, wanting to feed the baby, I will say so and clear out the hospital room. When I think about how many people streamed into that room the day Amelia was born, I can’t believe it. Here I was, just out of surgery, and after having a baby and hosting guests all day AND night. Justin, Amelia, and I were not alone one time until after visiting hours that night. Not once. I can still tell you everyone who saw us while we were there and how special it was for people to visit us and meet her in the hospital, but I didn’t speak up for me or us. Amelia lost a lot of weight in the hospital. I should have been feeding her more, resting more, eating myself (which I didn’t do at all). This time, I’d like to protect our time with the baby more. I know we’ll be so excited to show her to everyone, but we need to pace ourselves and carve out our own space as a family with more urgent tasks at hand than seeing a slew of visitors.

I shall try not to will her first year away by constantly looking forward to the next step.

I will not feel guilty if I don’t spend every second entertaining or stimulating my baby.

I will not feel guilty when I spend every second of a day snuggling and entertaining my baby.

I will not reject pink. Feminine does not equal bad. It took me a while to get that and realize that there’s balance. Pink does not equal making $.75 to the dollar but it’s hard to separate what I know academically sometimes. I will hold a line at the things proven destructive for girls: Barbie, Disney Princesses, and the like are still out. But now that I’m three years into this girl thing, I’m in. And I love celebrating girlhood while also allowing Amelia to be herself and explore typically boy things too. As a jock tomboy growing up, I rejected all things girly. I don’t want that for my girls because girls are pretty rad and they should know that. Although to be fair, the pink thing is just obnoxious! lol

I will enroll her in preschool at 2. The benefits far outweigh the negatives.

I will try to get more involved with the community, other moms, and in play dates. Not only is it good to have built-in friends for the baby, but Mama needs other mom friends too.

Well that’s what I’ve got rattling around for now. I’m sure there’s a million other things that will be different this time, but we’ll have to follow that story as it unfolds.

Until then, here’s a little pic of my first-born little teacher at school this week.

Random Thoughts

2011-06-28T10:01:00.001-07:00

Everything is jumbled and fragmented and misguided in my brain right now.

I woke up yesterday morning, got Amelia ready for preschool, dropped her off, came home. Walked straight to bed and slept for 4 hours. Woke up feeling better but still drained. The flurry of activity that came in the last couple weeks has given way to complete and total exhaustion. At this point, I don’t do much besides being pregnant. Even getting dressed to sit in the pool seemed like a chore today. End stage.

Babygirl is running out of space. Every movement she makes hurts on my end and I can only imagine how it feels for her. Can she (we) make it two more weeks?

Sleeping at night is nearly impossible. Heartburn, sore hips, inflamed crotch (I’ll never get used to this truth), and bouts of cramps keep me up, tossing and turning. Oh and getting up to pee every couple hours. Holy crap! With Amelia, I got up once a night for the last couple months or so, but this baby is just crushing my bladder. I pee a couple drops, stand up and have to pee again. Sit, pee a couple drops. Repeat. It’s like having a UTI without the crazy burn, but with someone sitting on your crotch. Just moving into a different sleep position requires that I run to the bathroom. What the heck?

And every time I get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, I tread lightly fearing (anticipating) that my water will break.

Amelia is being a real trooper considering how cranky and impatient her mom is these days. Her forgiving and loving spirit makes the guilt that much worse.

We switched her preschool schedule to coincide with Justin’s work week. Her and I are alone on Sundays, but that’s it now. As sad as I am about losing another day with her, I know it’s for the better. Not only am I the mom I’d like to be right now anyway, but when the baby is here, it’ll be a necessity to have that time. I guess I’m most sad not for the days right now that I’m missing, but that our days of being together, just her and I, and off on summer adventures are over altogether. Though, in reality, they were gone a while ago since I don’t have a lot of energy to set off on adventures anyway.

I also think that if I go into labor while Justin’s working, I’d rather be alone than home with Amelia. I’m afraid of going into hard labor while trying to remain calm and focused and not scare her. So that was another reason to change her schedule.

But then I’m totally panicked that she’ll be in school when it happens and I won’t be able to see her before going to the hospital. I won’t be able to tell her that she’ll always be my first baby and that mama’s love won’t change with the new baby. What if something happens in surgery and I didn’t talk to her before I left?

I’ve decided that the very worst part of this whole pregnancy has been the asthma. Even beyond the at least 20 illnesses I’ve had since November, the asthma has made me sicker than anything and still is. I still wheeze until I puke at least once a week. The thought of getting this baby out AND catching my breath is just unfathomable.

Amelia’s new haircut is still taking my breath away. It reveals her face in such a delicate manner, allowing her natural beauty to shine. She’s just beautiful, that kid and I can’t decide if I adore that or fear it, but it’s inescapable at this point.

When Justin’s working, I miss him like crazy. Not just because of all the things he does around the house, but as my friend. I stay up way too late each night just to see and talk with him for a while. On his last night of work for the week, we usually stay up until 2 just catching up on the week. It feels so right when we’re all home together. It’s when I’m happiest.

I’ve gone through a marked shift in my thinking in the last couple weeks. My thoughts are focused more and more on Baby than pregnancy and preparation. I keep thinking about seeing her face for the first time, smelling her little head, and just holding her on my chest. The fear and anticipation is slowly giving way to the excitement and anticipation.

I learned with Amelia that I’d rather be caring for a newborn than at end stage pregnancy any day. And the switch from one to another is very near.

Some People are Jackholes

2011-06-27T22:38:00.001-07:00

First things first—nothing new to report here. Still pregnant. Did a little too much today and ended up a little crampy, but otherwise, just plugging along. Ever since I blogged about Amelia’s crazy tantrum monster behavior, she’s been an angel. ha. I shouldn’t even say that! But really, I’ve been paying attention to how helpful and loving she is. She doesn’t want to be a monster, I’ve decided. She is just mandated by her three-ness and by the incessant need to gogogogo all day and wind up an exhausted mess that leads her to to push and push.

Anyway, did you know that some people are just total jackholes? Well they are. And when you get into any discussion of the boy versus girl nature, holy hell does the Jackholedness of others come roaring out. I don’t even mean a political discussion about such controversial or heady topics as say, equality or anything. I mean simply telling people that you are expecting your second daughter. . . or hanging out in the sandbox with other moms. Take each of the following scenarios—all of which have occurred in the last couple months.

1. Anonymous ‘friend’ asks me, “Did you find out what you’re having yet?” (Yes, I resisted the urge to respond with a baby, dummy) Me: We’re having another girl! (insert ridiculous beaming and gloating here). “Well don’t worry. You can borrow (insert ‘friend’s’ son’s name here) anytime you want.”

So let’s recap. I say we’re having a girl and the response is one of rescue? As in, ‘don’t worry. As your friend, I will help you through this by offering a boy to you to fit your needs. Or wants? Not quite clear on which this person was getting at. However, what I do know was that the assumption was that I’d obviously be missing something in my life and would therefore would need to fill this need by asking others for help. And by help, I mean their sons. Rewind three years and this is the same person who, when told that we were waiting until birth to find out the sex of our first born, said, “Oh and Justin’s going to be there just WAITING to see a penis, huh?!” I still don’t know exactly what that meant except that a girl would be a disappointment because every man must just long for a son? I dunno on that one, but here is a simple case of two total jackhole statements by the same perpetrator.

2. At Justin’s work (which is a very masculine-dominated environment), a (male) coworker strikes up some small talk about kids and whatnot. Justin tells Dude that he’s got another daughter on the way. Response? “Oh Man, you have to try for a third. You gotta get that boy!” Justin: No way Dude. We’re done with two! Trying not to get annoyed and just keeping it light. Dude says, “You’re missing out Bro! My son is the coolest thing that ever happened to me. We have so much fun together. You definitely need to go for a boy, Man.”

Now this is a rather obvious jackhole encounter that doesn’t need a lot of analysis. It’s of the same cloth as the first. You must be sooo disappointed to have another girl. You need a boy to do cool things with your kid. The best (BESTBESTBEST) part about this story was Justin’s response. The conversation continued as follows; Well what do you mean about all the things you do with your son? What kinds of things?? Now this question made Dude very excited, “Oh Man. We play football, work in the yard, I take him to Home Depot and teach him how to use tools. You NAME it, Man and I’ve got my BOY with me.” Justin: Dude. I do all of those things with my daughter NOW. Dude says “Oh. Really? Well. It can’t be the same.” Conversation over. (Don’t tell him or anything, but Justin is very well on his way to receiving his Feminist Membership Card.)

3. And my personal favorite. . . Sitting in the sandbox at the local park. A little boy asks Amelia if she could share her sand toys with her. She of course says yes. He’s about the same age, maybe a little older than her, promptly sits down and take a shovel of sand and throws it, sand flying all over the place. His mama comes over and tells him that “this if your ONE warning. No more throwing sand.” To speed along a lengthy story, little dude continues throwing sand and getting ‘final’ warnings. It becomes apparent fairly quickly that this kid is kind of just a punk—and given all the warnings he was given, I could tell you why too. But that’s neither her nor there. The thrown sand gets pretty close to Amelia but not enough for me to get involved. Anyone with kids knows that the park/playground politik is a little dicey in the way of dealing with punk kids. Amelia, for her part, is glancing over at this kid but mostly just doing her own thing. The picture of the two of them together, along with the mom yelling the same directions over and over is a bit humorous to me and I start to chuckle at the absurdity of it. Mind you, just a little chuckle, nothing dramatic or insulting. It was just a funny picture. And THEN, the mom, who obviously felt insecure about the situation (as we all do when our kids are being punks and our parenting is on full display), looks at Amelia quietly building a sand castle and sighs. “Boys and girls just play so differently.” And she promptly got up, took her kid’s hand and explained to him that they were going to the other (adjacent) park as a ‘discipline’ I guess.

And it’s a good thing that she left too because her comment enraged me. As much as I found her kid’s behavior amusing, her excuse for it was downright insulting. Soooo ummmm, your child’s penis leads him to throw sand and ignore you? Not the lack of follow-through and discipline? Really? His penis? And how often do you use that as an excuse for his poor behavior? Because that would explain . . . A. LOT. And what are the chances of said child NOT turning into a complete and total asshat as long as everything he does is excused by his CROTCH?! And of course, that’s not even the worst of it. The most insulting part? That she also dismissed Amelia’s sweet demeanor by HER crotch. WTF?! So let me get this straight. Your kid’s balls make him an A-hole and my kid’s uterus just prevents her from misbehaving?! Wow, wouldn’t that make parenting just basically pointless? And oh-so-easy for parents of daughters, sheesh. And guess what? My babychild is NOT above throwing sand in the freaking sandbox, I can tell you THAT! She actually prefers bark so that the slivers fly all over the place, to be honest. But she also knows that if she gets told not to throw the bark and continues throwing of the slivery mess, she’d find her hiney back in the car and headed home very quickly. Vagina not withstanding. Shocking, I know. Quite frankly, all parents should be offended by such comments and attitudes. There are so many sweet, well-mannered little boys out there that deserve the credit. . . and the chance to live as a person and not a penis. And there are plenty of misbehaving little girls out there too! And how insulting to say that a child behaving well is simply because of her parts. ARGH. Jackhole.

And while we are speaking of jackholes, I’ll also note that I posted a frustrated status on Facebook, “Please don’t use your kid’s penis as an excuse for his bad behavior or my daughter’s vagina as a reason for her good behavior.” Simple statement. It’s not tricky or accusatory but a general thought. And wouldn’t you know that two people, facebook friends who are also actual real-life friends, said they were offended by this and ‘unfriended’ me, which in the fb world is like cutting someone out of their lives. W.T.F.? I even tried to explain that this statement was a simple defense of all little boys and no response. And while I was frankly shocked at first and even a little hurt, I’ve come to see that this fits in the jackhole category too. Seriously. Don’t be stupid. ((shaking head))

I imagine that people’s stupid comments will only continue as our lives as the parents of little girls progresses. However, I hope that they will come to rely on the fact that I will always stand up for them and never turn my back to jackholery aimed in their direction. Even though I find it odd that in 2011 such archaic thoughts on gender are still so prevalent. Guess we’ve got our work cut out for us. But I say bring it because I can take it, even if it’s only one jackhole at a time. :)

ps—I’m planning on resuming editing of these posts some day. I swear.

Amusing Amelia: Quote of the Day

2011-06-22T23:40:00.001-07:00

“Mama, stop saying mmmhmmm and just talk to me.”

I Know What You Did That Summer: 35.5 Week Update

2011-06-22T23:34:00.001-07:00

I feel haunted by my uterus’ past. The crazy thing about Amelia’s birth is that it was out of the blue. I never got to the point where I was just waiting for baby or looking for signs. I was frantically putting things together and looking forward to a couple weeks of putting my feet up after a long semester. Even as they were pulling my baby out of me, I was in total disbelief as to the reality of her birth in that moment. And then she was here and that was that. Uterus was off the hook, having produced a healthy baby, albeit in a rather unsettling manner. Ahhh, the bliss of ignorance.

Despite that I am technically still 4.5 weeks from this pregnancy’s end date, the ghost of birthing past indicates that we are really looking at arrival much sooner. Because, if we look at the calendar and put this baby’s birth at the same exact day of gestation as Amelia, it would be . . . next Wednesday. You know, a WEEK from today. Um. Yeah.

This knowledge changes everything. I’m constantly looking for signs, waiting in imminence. Every little thing makes me wonder “Is this it? What does this mean? Is it almost time??” And I feel guilty doing anything too physical or tiring or hard thinking I might set something off and actually force myself into labor.

Last weekend, BabyGirl took to major movement, her head switching sides of my uterus, pushing out two feet from my body and causing crazy pain. “HOLY SHIT, She’s MOVING!” The pain was intense and the movement was large enough that I broke out in chills and felt dizzy. I thought I might actually puke except I worried that if I got up to run to the toilet, I’d pass out. Crazy. My best guess now is that maybe she was trying to get head down again and running into the barrier of septum in my babymaker. In any case, I totally freaked out thinking that either labor was beginning or that she would get stuck and rupture the sac. ACK! I sat perfectly still for a couple hours. Now, if I hadn’t had the previous experience, I wouldn’t have even thought about going into labor at 35 weeks. But see . . . haunted.

The good part of having experience is in being prepared. To an extent anyway. I’m going to the doctor each week now and this week, she did an external exam. I never got to the point of going weekly with Amelia and they definitely had no reason to check my cervix for signs of labor. This time, if there are signs, we might know in advance if my body is preparing for labor. Hopefully. Wouldn’t that be nice? The news as of today is that my cervix has begun to thin and soften but is still closed with no dilation. The baby’s butt is still downward but very high—meaning she hasn’t dropped yet. So labor is coming but nothing of immediate concern. Eep.

The doctor told me today that she expects me to make it to our next appointment—next Wednesday and if things are the same, to the scheduled C-section date! A lot can change in a week, but I am really trying to be positive about it. IthinkIcanIthinkIcanIthinkIcan. The big mystery is if I showed any real signs before Amelia came. There was nothing of note on my end, so who knows if my cervix showed any signs before—since nobody checked. So who knows. WHO KNOWS? It’s all a just a scary guessing game.

On the daily note, I’ve started scrubbing the house and spending hours putting the Baby’s room together. I even polished the furniture in Amelia’s room for the first time. Ever. ha. And cleaned the mirrored closet doors in her room—the ones covered in her little paw and mouth prints. And yet there are a MILLION things on my list of things to do! It’s killing me! Waking up at the break of dawn each day to get busy on a myriad of tasks just to poop out by 10 in time to hit the pool. Getting in the pool sounds like a luxury, but I believe it’s a medical necessity. As the pregnancy nears its ending, my poor body is just over it. Walking is my biggest chore these days. I’m not being dramatic either. My pelvis is bruised and ridiculously painful. The doctor told me that the cartlidge in the middle of the joint in the pubic bone (yeah, there’s a joint in there. Crazy) gets inflames sometimes and causes crazy pain. The popping I’ve had is a sure sign of that inflammation. :( It’s painful enough that picking my legs up to say, cross my legs while sitting or just to walk is very painful. The only relief is to not let my belly hang—which means not to stand. Or to hire a team of people to walk around holding it up for me. Because that would be fantastic. My doctor said I can try to ace bandage the belly to lift the uterus off my pelvic area for some relief but it would have to be one mighty ace bandage, let me tell you. A team of people would be far more effective. Or a pulley system. That might work. Otherwise, the pool is my respite. My weightless, cool, amazing respite. I go in every day and I’ve begged Justin to let me sleep there to no avail.

I guess that’s it for this week. Making it through next week will be a really big deal. And as we near Wednesday, my anxiety level may reach a fever pitch. BUT if I make it to Thursday, I’ll officially beat my own personal record on pregnancy. ha. Mind you, since I’ve got bags packed and sitting right by the front door, this baby is sure to beat the odds and wait.

I guess we’ll know soon enough.

Taking a Dive: Or Why Swim Lessons are Ruining My Life

2011-06-22T21:28:00.001-07:00

She talks about going to swim lessons all day and night. She tells her preschool teacher about them and brags about how brave she is in the water. She picks out her bathing suit the day before. She gabs it up all the way there. The swim teacher calls her name and she begins to cry. Monday, the teacher just picked her up and took her to the pool with success. Today, no such luck. She started screaming “NO MAMA I WANT TO GO HOME!” Like over and over again. And I had a split second to decide what to do. Take her home? Or push her forward with this harmless activity? And there I was, THAT mom, dragging the kicking, screaming child to the edge of the pool—in front of bleachers packed with parents. And when the teachers couldn’t coax her in, I PUT her in the pool and passed her off . . . still screaming. One of the teachers just took her around the pool all by herself while the class began. I moved my stuff to sit poolside, asking myself how long do I let this go on before I take the kid out of the water??? After she’d warmed up a bit, she was placed on the steps with the other little ones, where she turned to me, wailing and mouthing “mamamamamamamama. IwannagohomeIwannagohome.” I was simultaneously heartbroken and furious. I want to cry at that sad face and at the same time just drop her in so she can learn like those of us who grew up in the 80s. I mean, what the hell? Lessons are four days a week for two weeks. Today is the second to last day of the second week! And every third try or so she’s just fine. So . . . WHAT?! There’s no rhyme or reason about any of it and the worst part is that I never know how it’s going to go, so I worry all day. Never mind that I kill myself getting her ready and there every day just so I can sit in the sweltering heat to watch her cry on the steps. Today, I had to sit on a cement block near the pool so she could see me. Yep. Cement block—quite probably the only thing more uncomfortable than standing at the moment.

By the end, she had the one sweet teacher just totally snowed. When all the other kids were jumping in the water in the big pool, Amelia was comparing toenail polish with the high school lifeguard. And when the class walked back to their parents, she carried Amelia like a little baby saying to me, “I don’t want her feet to get hot. She’s just so cute. SOOOOO CUTE. I just love her to pieces. Soooo cute.” And I’m like, the hell? So at least she has a friend who doesn’t mind holding a private lesson for my inexplicably uncooperative child.

It’s important to note too, that Amelia comes to me saying, “MAMA! I jumped into the BIG pool! I’m such a BIG girl. I was sooooo brave.” Even though I saw her insist on having her hands held as she just falls into the water. No jumping involved. And then later, “I had good fun at swim lessons Mama.” Longest eight days ever.

The Child With a Death Wish and Misc. Update

2011-06-20T22:56:00.001-07:00

I rejected the notion of Terrible Twos and never once used the term for Amelia at that age. I think it’s a terrible thing to project onto little kids when they’re just acting their age and figuring things out. At two, Amelia certainly required more and more parenting than she had since being a newborn. Constant work, I thought, but mostly just emotional meltdowns on her part. She was never the destructive, screaming, tantruming kid that you see in the grocery store.

And there’s three. Holy hell. My babychild has decided that she wants to die by the hands of her mother. I don’t want to (just can’t) get into all of the tantrums, fits, problems one by one. I’ll just give a brief rundown for the sake of record and brevity. And for the sake of not forcing myself to relive any of these events.

Probably the worst day that we’ve had in the longest of times was last week. During the course of the “Four Hour Nap Battle” event that has taken over our household, she pooped her pants. Not once. Not twice. THREE TIMES. In the course of a couple hours. Odd? Um, yeah. Especially if you consider that Amelia has never pooped her pants. Listen—she has NEVER pooped her pants. Not one single time. And she expressed complete and total disgust at pooping in diapers from a very early age. How do you react to that? When you’re 8+ months pregnant, needing a nap yourself and with a bionic sniffer that does not appreciate poop? I gave her the benefit of the doubt the first time, lost my patience a little the second time, and then? The THIRD time? Yeah. Lost my shit. And when I asked her why (WHY WHY WHY?!) she was pooping her pants, she said “Because I love to” and it is only by the grace of Mother Earth herself that the child is still breathing. I put her in a diaper (for the first time in the day since maybe March of 2010) and sat on the couch and cried wondering what I was going to do if Amelia decided to start shitting herself a couple weeks before bringing a new baby into the house. All I could think was what in the world would I do if the Baby was here right now and screaming for milk or a change? And I am cleaning up shit out of my 3-year-old’s fingernails?! (Yeah, it was like THAT!)

Thankfully, she woke up the next morning and went right back to using the potty. Sparing her life appeared to have been a solid choice. . . This time.

In general, our biggest problems these days are general mischief. That the child doesn’t listen is among the worst. I swear, she’s always been so well behaved and easy to guide. Part of her being three has been about just abandoning rules and whatnots. Or better, hearing me say not to do something and then just doing it for the fun of rejecting her mother’s wishes. And maybe late to the game, she’s become that screaming child in the store/restaurant/restroom/anywhere. Usually after asking the same question 50 times and then finally melting into a screaming fit when the answer doesn’t change. So. Fun. And when it comes to nap? There is no faster route for me to completely lose my sanity than to try to get her to nap. And let me preface with this: I wouldn’t care if she napped if she could make it through the rest of the day. If she just gave up naps and was fine, then you can plan around that and work it into the day (although admittedly, I need the naps way more than ever right now too). However, when nap doesn’t work out (which is a solid 50% of the time), she is a total mess. MESS, I say. As in clumsy and getting hurt easily. And then the emotional meltdowns that eventually run together until she is just screaming and crying all the way through dinner, bath, and bed prep. Or crying the whole time getting dressed for swim lessons and then crying because we say she can’t go to swim lessons and THEN crying AT swim lessons and refusing to go in the pool—on the 4th day. ((shaking head)) So she’s beat by naptime and still refuses to sleep! And when I say refuses, I mean it directly. Amelia has always had to decide to sleep. It never happens to her or without her consent. Never. Happens. So when she wants to stay awake—even if she is exhausted—she stays awake. Awesome. And the whole ritual of my going into her room a million times and making threats, promises, bribes is just humiliating and aggravating.

And then there’s the constant drag on time. Trying to get her dressed and out the door is insane. You can get a shoe on and then she’s off dancing and singing out of the room for 10 minutes. You get the shirt on and she bolts out of her room get involved in some other activity, pantless. You get her to the car and she starts running circles around it while you stand at her door waiting for her to land long enough to throw her in her seat. All of this is only exacerbated that getting up and down is difficult for me and that running after her is just out of the question right now. This behavior is especially challenging for me because in a way, it’s just cute. She’s just a kid finding simple joys in every little thing. She doesn’t need to be in a hurry all the time. Or ever, as the case may be and lucky her! I agree that we should just let kids be kids and dance with one shoe on for as long as possible. BUT sometimes, you just need to get outthefuckingdoor. Sometimes, you don’t feel like sitting there and waiting for the OCD with ADD child to focus long enough to get her hair done because you have SOMEWHERE YOU NEED TO BE.

It really is lucky for all of us that she is ridiculously cute. If a porcupine has sharp quills, Amelia has that smile. Damn it. And the fact that she says, “mama? I love you” about 10 times a day is pretty life-saving too. And when I take her for a potty break in the late-night and she doesn’t even open her eyes, but asks “how’s the baby doing in there?” it definitely gives her some extra time on the planet.

Speaking of cute. Someone got a new do this weekend. I’ve been eyeing a cute little A-line cut for her for a while, but Justin was resistant. . . which of course is ridiculous since he NEVER does her hair! And then when it became more and more of a challenge to get her still enough to pull it off of her face, I got more insistent. THEN on Friday, Justin tried to brush her hair (so I could braid it, naturally), he discovered a huge, syrup-matted nest. “Time for a cut!” I said and that was it. Thankfully, we found a brand new place specializing in kids and CHEAP here in town. Like brand new. We were her first walk-in. Sweet! And half and hour later, we had this:

Soooo cute. And not a knot in sight. Even in the morning. No need for piggies or braids, just a little clip to keep it out of her face. We all LOVE it. It’s so nice to see her pretty little face all the time too. I made the bargain that it was just for summer . . . but we’ll see. . .

In other news, Amelia started swim lessons last week. Lord help us. She was all excited and has spent the last two summers in a pool almost every day. And then we get there. She refused to get in. They finally coaxed her in and she wouldn’t do anything. The next couple of days looked a bit better. She was making improvement, but not doing all of the things that the class was instructed to do. Then Thursday, the 4th day in a row and she absolutely refused to get in. Screaming, crying, etc. No luck. I didn’t know where to go from there. You don’t want to throw her in and make any fears completely worse, but why just stand there with her screaming? So we left. I don’t know if that is the best approach, but it was just a loss that day and she’d already been a mess for hours at that point (see above). Today was the first day of the second and last (thank goodness) day and again, she cried and clung to me. Thankfully, the teacher just walked over and scooped her up and carried her to the pool. She once again, had fun in the water, but didn’t do what the class was doing. Fancy that. Not paying attention. Too distracted to do what’s asked. hm. But otherwise, making some improvement and doing more things in our pool at home too. Though I could do without the death grip she uses on my legs with her pointy little toes and the scratches I get from her desperately clinging to my top.

This is the teacher trying to get her to lean back. Unsuccessfully. Notice that her posture and face are the same in every picture.

The best part is that when lessons are over, she tells me all about how brave she was and how she was swimming, etc. Today, when I asked her why she won’t put her face in the water like the other kids, she said, “I DID!” Oh. Right. So we’ll call what Amelia does “swimming.”

Don't Judge

2011-06-13T23:50:00.001-07:00

That's an ice pack. And it's already spent time with my hands. It sizzled on contact.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

One Month

2011-06-12T23:23:00.001-07:00

Baby Girl 2 will be here one month from now, one way or another. If all goes as planned, we will have showed up at the hospital by 530 am and would have met the baby by around 8. Seems so nice and clean that way. Wake up, get ready, show up, have baby. Of course, the big question is—will we make it there? July 12 is 38 weeks and Amelia arrived at 36w2d. That would put us more likely around June 28-30. Eep. We are essentially hoping (beyond hope) to make it to the 12th and preparing ourselves for arrival in a couple weeks. In effect, the next two weeks are packed! Probably the busiest weeks of summer for us—because we haven’t planned anything after 36 weeks. There is at least something and mostly multiple somethings going on every day until the 26th and then . . . nothing.

And I have to confess that I keep reminding myself that making it to the scheduled section would be a million times easier than going into labor (seriously. so. much. easier.), but I’ve definitely got the any-day-now look, puffiness, waddle, discomfort, and temperament about me. One more month seems impossibly far away.

Sausage fingers. I can’t bear to take a pic of my feet. I can just tell you that when I take my flip-flops off, the indent of the straps remains behind.

And in the end, the most important thing that I have to remember is that ultimately, I can’t control how the next few weeks will roll out. I can set the 12th up as a goal of sorts, but it’s out of my hands whether we get there. I shall continue searching the sky for shooting stars in the meantime. And if I was a betting woman, well, I’d be a little more . . . skeptical. My symptoms right now scream (BABY WILL BE HERE SOON!) or at least make me wonder how it’ll be possible to longer than a couple more weeks. Namely, I really worrying about my back. What started as little spasms a couple times a day have begun earlier in the day and recurred far more often. Besides that, it just aches in general and punishes me if I’m on my feet for too long. If it’s not my back, it’s my crotch killing me the most. Yeah, have you ever had your crotch POP?! Well I have. Every time I roll over in bed or try to get up. Turns out the pubic bone actually has a joint! Who KNEW?! But it does and it loosens up as you near birth—and for some women—it loosens too much and causes pain. ((Raising hand!)) Not to mention that every time I stand up, the baby just plops onto this loose crotch joint and make it feel like it’s about to snap. SNAP. You know, it actually feels like there’s a human sitting on my pubic bone. . . but wait. . . And the worst part? I don’t need that stupid joint to loosen at all! See, my baby is going to get ripped out of my abdomen, so not need for the loose crotch thing, thanks! Forget about the pressure this all causes on my bladder. . . Then the worst symptoms are the tiny ones that plague me all day. Like the heat that radiates my hands and feet ALL. DAY. LONG. Imagine your feet and hands 20 degrees hotter than the rest of your body. Makes sleeping a pleasure. Lastly, my belly is big. As in OUT there. It’s like I’ve grown an entire patio right off my front. Everyone thinks this is so great (“Lucky!” they say), but my babies tend to straight out front. And since they don’t lie up and down like they should, I think that makes this even more apparent. In any case, my poor belly has a perpetual bruise across the equator from my running into things or just scraping the corners of drawers, counters, etc. For example, washing dishes is almost impossible at this point. Bending over the sink to reach the dishes is not working out. And forget bending over. Amelia saw me struggling to put my underwear on the other day and ran over to help. She held one side up so I could sling my foot into the hole to pull them up! ha. She’s so sweet, I swear.

Alright. Sorry for the rant. I wanted to list my symptoms only for posterity. It’s hard to imagine, but I will someday forget about all these annoyances and therefore erase my own struggle. Although I don’t plan on forgetting the crotch-breaking thing.

If we end up with some ‘extra’ time into July, we will definitely be grateful. The Baby’s room won’t be together in two weeks. It just won’t, although I am hoping that by the end of this week, it will be much more livable than it is now. There have been delays because 1) the room is awkward and tiny and 2) there was a paint debacle that required the room be painted and then um, repainted. So that set us back a little time. Now we just have some last-minute projects to pull together. I wish we could do a grand reveal of the whole thing, but it will likely be a work in progress for a while after Baby is here. Largely because we want to do so much of it ourselves. Almost her entire room will be handmade. :)

Besides all things baby, we actually had a really busy weekend and a couple weeks ahead planned for Amelia. Here are some pics from the last couple days.

Thanks Babe for including my belly in this shot! :0

The Making of a Big Girl

2011-06-08T21:56:00.001-07:00

Amelia’s hit some serious milestones lately. (I almost said she’s ‘passed’ some serious milestones lately until I realized that made it sound like she had some kind of gastrointestinal problems. ha) They’ve gone undocumented largely because I only take pictures with my phone anymore. But they were the last steps away from toddlerhood and towards full-blown preschooler so require a mention.

After Amelia potty-trained last winter/spring, there were really only two more big bumps outta babyhood—moving out of the crib and then sleeping through the night without a diaper. These are both huge transitions for sure and required some timing and planning. With us moving in February, we decided that both of these transitions might just be more successful once we’d settled. Not only that, they kind of needed to go in order. I didn’t see the point in moving her out of the nighttime diaper if she was still in her crib—and therefore unable to go to the toilet in the night. Not fair, right? Luckily, we were able to make these moves on our own decision because Amelia never once expressed an interest in climbing out of her crib. I’m pretty sure that she’d still be sleeping in that thing just fine until her legs couldn’t fit any longer. I think in the end, she enjoyed having someone come get her every morning. and was fairly content being locked in. Her little OCD personality finds comfort in rigidity and narrow options. I honestly don’t know where she comes from.

In any case, we didn’t wait long after we moved to get her into the Big Girl Bed. She slept fine in the new house from the first night so there wasn’t much of a transition there. We just decided to go for it one Saturday. We’d been hyping it up to her for months. She could have a Big Girl Bed like her friends at preschool and THEN she’d be able to sleep in panties! Exciting stuff! Of course, we also braced for the worst. It seems like the real sleep horror stories always start with the Big Kid bed. . .

Of course she HAD to get her tool set out to help Daddy with the change. (Justin is amazing at letting her get in there and ‘help’ him even though it makes everything take longer and requires more patience than he carries in his skin. She loves using those tools and LOVES doing things just like her Daddy.)

Voila!

“Take my picture on the Big Goil Bed Mama!”

And wouldn’t you know that she went to bed that night and slept until the next morning! I figured she didn’t quite grasp the reality of her own freedom that night and expected her to lie in bed yelling for us in the morning. That would be the only explanation to her staying put all night, right? Until she came into our room the next morning saying, “Mamamama, I got out of bed and came to see you all by myself!” She was so proud. And apparently aware of her own freedom . . . and still stayed in bed all night?! Is it possible?

Not to say that we haven’t had to chase her back to bed a million times since then, but once asleep, the kid stays in bed. (Yikes, should I even say that out loud?) And instead of really getting up, she’ll stand at her door yelling “peeeepeeeee” waiting for an escort—which is actually annoying. However, all said, the big transition that Justin and I were dreading for over a year turned out to be mostly a non-issue. Phew. Finally a sleep transition that wasn’t a complete and total horror. And it turns out that all that hard work we’ve put into her sleeping over the years has paid off! Paid off, people! It’s not easy to draw those hard lines, but heaven knows it’s worth it when your babychild sleeps fairly reliably.

Of course, we’ll see how this all goes when Baby is here. I shudder to even consider the sleep problems of having TWO. gah.

And then it was decided that she needed new, Big Girl Bedding to make it official and special.

Rainbow and yellow dot reversible duvet cover, rainbow and yellow dot pillowcase, and crazy red stripe sheet. Made by moi, using various patterns I found online. The comforter is from Ikea (read: CHEAP) and I spent a fraction of what I would’ve paid for a crappy store-bought set. Turns out that the only options for girls’ bedding is pink, purple, and more pink. It’s not the color necessarily that is so annoying as much as the narrow option of two colors that are meant for girls. Really?! She loves, loves, LOVES her new bedding and it’s even been an incentive for her to go to bed. She picks each night which side of the comforter she wants touching her and the night it was all done (see pic), she asked to go to bed early! (And so began my obsession with all things home decor and DIY.)

Not long after she’d moved to the whole big bed thing, we decided to go for the nighttime diaper deal. This one is tricky. While Amelia has been in undies since she was about 20 months or so and completely potty trained by around 2. (That is, except for a stint last summer when she suddenly reverted back to serial accidents. This occurred when she was with the effing ex-nanny 4 days a week. Amazingly enough, two weeks into preschool and away from said useless nanny, she was miraculously potty trained again. pshhaw) Despite her early success without diapers, Amelia still woke up with a full diaper every morning until about a month ago. I never really pushed the night thing because everyone told me she’d eventually just wake up dry. I struggled to identify is she was just peeing in her sleep or if she didn’t bother holding it because she was in a diaper. We’d tried to go cold turkey before but she ended up in tears worried about peeing on her new, pretty sheets. So we decided to finish out the last pack of nighttime diapers (she’s been a super pee-er at night since before she was a year old and has had to use the nighttime dipes because she’d pee right through regular ones. eek) and go from there. Every night, I’d have her get a diaper out of her closet and count how many were left and then we’d say make a big deal about when they were gone, she’d get to sleep in panties. Oh and wouldn’t panties be more comfortable? Wouldn’t she feel like such a big girl going to bed in panties?? The problem? She was still not waking up with a dry diaper so I didn’t know what the deal was. Then, we had a conversation that went like this, “Sweetie, why don’t you try to keep your diaper dry tonight?”

“Because I pee in it.”

“But you don’t have to pee in it.”

“But it’s a diaper.”

“Do you want to just wear panties to bed.”

“No because then I can’t pee.”

“Well why don’t you try to not pee in your diaper?”

“Because it’s a diaper mama.”

So then I knew that she was never going to wake up in a dry diaper. As long as she had the diaper on, she’d pee. After all, isn’t that what a diaper is for?? She’d outsmarted the system. Cold turkey was the only option.

When the diapers were gone, she put panties on and went to bed. I think she had one accident that night and woke up terribly distraught. We changed her and the bed and then she made it till morning. Since then, it’s been a month of hit or miss. She has more successful, dry nights than not, but still a couple accidents a week probably. There’s no going back to diapers because, again, there’s no reason for her to stay dry in them. But I also think that she sleeps hard enough to not wake up sometimes when she has to pee. So onward we trudge. We’ve figured out that if we ‘wake’ her and take her for a potty break before we go to bed (around midnight or so), she stumbles like a drunk into the bathroom, pees, and runs back to bed. Typically, that’s enough to get her through the morning. It has been our trick for success so far. However, I wonder if it’s not helping her learn to hold it? I don’t know, but for now it works and I trust that she’ll figure it out. Either to hold it all night or to wake up and go on her own. . . Mostly successful, but ultimately still in the air for now.

THEN just after her birthday, Amelia promoted out of the 2-year-old class and into the 3-year-old room at school! A new teacher, routine, and classmates! Since she is slow to warm to new people, we were worried about this transition, but she appears to be doing well so far. I hear she’s a little clingy with her new teacher, but still doing just fine—even as she goes three days a week now instead of two! Such a big girl.

First day of her new class!

And just like that—Amelia Jane is a little kid. All traces of the baby are gone. There of course are still many a transition ahead, but in the last few months, all of those last baby to child steps have been taken. They were big steps, but she’s taken them smoothly and without too much ado. Funny how that happens.

Six.

2011-06-06T21:48:00.000-07:00

It was our anniversary yesterday. Six years since vowing to laugh at his jokes and make his favorite brownies as we watched the sunset behind us. And now we can finally say that we've been married for as long as we were together before marriage. And in very stereotypical married-with-kids fashion, we had no sitter and did essentially nothing to commemorate the occasion. It was our most uneventful anniversary yet, but fairly understandable. It was raining, I felt terrible, and we was Munchkin nipping on our heels too. However, after my meltdown and general down day Saturday, Justin--after spending the day RE-painting the baby's room--told me that he was going to stay home from work Sunday. I told him that it wasn't a big deal, our anniversary, and that it wouldn't kill me if we didn't do anything to celebrate. To which he said, "well, maybe it will kill me."

And that made me cry. Again. Har.

I spent yesterday thanking my lucky stars for my partner in this life. He has stood by my complete and total lunacy (see previous post on donuts) and handled the messiest of situations with grace. He is not a perfect person, but he is perfect for me, in about a million ways.

This past year of our marriage has been about all the "or" scenarios that traditional vows offer. . . in sickness, for poorer, in bad times. . , but we're still here and standing tall . . . enough anyway. So here's to a new year of recovery and arriving at our happiness by this time next year.

Losing It

2011-06-04T21:40:00.001-07:00

In honor of National Donut Day, which was yesterday but whatever, I promised Amelia we’d get donuts for breakfast this morning. She was so excited this morning that I was able to get her to get herself dressed, including putting pants on—which never happens. Granted, they were two inches too short and a might snug around the middle, but she was so proud, I just let it go. She had on shoes and even a sweater before I got out of bed. I loaded her into the car and off we went. There is only one donut shop in town and I decided to head there rather than settle for second-class grocery store varieties. We don’t get donuts but maybe twice a year so you may as well make it right. As we were driving, I realized I’d made a wrong turn. No big, we’ll just keep going. The thing about this new town of ours is that it is small. Everything is just a few miles a way at most . . . BUT it’s intertwined by two highways and a series of interconnected but not through streets. It’s a mess and for whatever reason, I haven’t figured it out yet. I am usually pretty directionally inclined, but since we’ve moved here, I’ve gotten lost more times than I can count. Not necessarily lost as much as taken a very long route to get somewhere relatively close. And the weird thing is that sometimes I get exactly where I’m going without a problem. Other times, I can’t find my way down the street. Well, today was one of those days. It didn’t help that it was pouring outside, already greying my mood. So we drove and turned around and turned around and drove. The excited chatter behind me stopped asking if we were close to the donut shop and when I looked back at Amelia, she was driving an imaginary steering wheel into a u-turn.

I’m not proud of it, but it took us almost 40 minutes to get there. The donut shop is probably about 7 miles away. I can’t explain it and it’s ridiculous, but that’s it. My kid, thankfully, is a cheery soul who was just happy to be on a fun outing. It seemed like forever for such a silly errand. Donuts shouldn’t be an hour-long adventure. We run out of the car and into the packed shop, getting soaked along the way. The line was wrapped around the store and to the front entrance, where we waited with anticipation. Amelia peered into the cases, carefully picking out the donut she wanted best. I couldn’t decide what to get or what Justin wanted, so I made the executive—and ridiculous—decision to just get a mixed dozen instead of 3. We finally got to the front of the line and the lady appeared miffed that we wanted a variety. The line was still long behind us and I had a 3-year-old on my hip helping me choose. This all included her going to the back for fresh maple bars (J’s favorite) and the line growing longer. With 12 donuts finally and neatly stacked in the lovely pink box, I reached for my wallet.

And it wasn’t in my purse.

I’d left it out last night after registering Amelia for swim lessons. I knew exactly where it was and it was not available to pay for the donuts. I looked at the donut lady and told her I didn’t have my wallet. She was visibly pissed. I asked her if I could come right back (even though it took me almost an hour to get there to begin with) to pick up the box. She said no because then other customers couldn’t have those donuts to choose from.

I grabbed Amelia’s hand and walked out of the teeny-tiny-packed shop with my head down. Just as we reached the door, Amelia asked, “What about my donut?!” and started crying as we walked to the car. She cried all the way to the car and when I picked her up to buckle her in, I saw her huge, crocodile tears. The sadness after such anticipation and excitement. I tried to tell her that I didn’t have my wallet to pay for them and that we’d have to come back, but she’s 3. And she’d watched the lady put her donut in the box and then we left—without it.

I got into the driver seat, put my face in my hands and just cried. Sobbing, choking, snot-bubbling tears. And Amelia cried right along in the back seat. It’d taken us so long to get there and she was so excited we waited in that line and picked out the perfect assortment and it was so humiliating and I’m so tired and this stupid cold won’t go away and I’m so goddamn pregnant and the stupid rain is ruining everything and it just . . . sucked. And I knew that she was just crying about a stupid donut, but I felt so bad for her because she was excited in a way that only a preschooler could be about something as simple as a chocolate sprinkled donut. And I thought it was such a heartbreaking scene, taking her by the hand out through that line of people as she cried after she’d been so patient with my stupidity in getting us there. I just fell apart.

Sometimes it really sucks to be the mommy.

Sisters

2011-06-03T15:36:00.001-07:00

I grew up in a hyper/overly-masculine house. ESPN played on our television like a broken record, even when the whole family was sitting to watch and half the family had no interest. The females did the cooking and cleaning and the males did the . . . well, lounging. Or playing. While Mom had the biggest influence and presence in parenting, dad dominated for no other reason than possessing maleness. I grew up with the distinct understanding that to be strong meant to adopt masculine traits and yet those traits made you a freak of a female. I was always classified as the Smart One while my brother was the Jock. Even though I was far more athletic than academic, I was a girl and therefore not a serious athlete. I remember feeling meek and insignificant and confused by all of these messages. I can’t identify exactly when the confusion confounded into resentment, but it did. I can still remember the day I was asked what class I was taking in summer school at the university. When I responded with “Women’s History,” there was a sneer and then a question, “Why would you wanna take a class like that? What could there possibly be to talk about?” And there it was. My whole life of confusion in one simple statement.

Of course, if you know me, you know that bringing value, life, and significance to women through history has become my life’s work since that fateful summer. But I digress.

My whole point is that it was a very male house. Femaleness was a curse, an insult, and something to endure. Not something to celebrate or find value in or enjoy. And I always wanted a sister. Desperately longed for a sisterhood. I wanted a little sister to teach and guide and love and a older sister to help me navigate my way. As I grew older, that feeling never went away. If anything, I grew to envy even more the relationships of my friends and their now-adult sisters. They have this built-in companion, one who knows them better than anyone and who unfailingly supports . . . in sisterhood. I always know that no matter how close to get to some of my friends, they will always have their sisters and therefore friends are just . . . not their sisters. That desire I had as a child to find comfort in other females only intensified in womanhood. Heaven knows it only gets harder to figure it all out.

As a result of my childhood, I always assumed I’d be the mother of boys. I felt that I’d be better at raising boys and certainly more comfortable, having shoved (or been shoved?) into the world of boys since I was very young. And as I evaluated my own desires, I came to realize that I didn’t necessarily desire sons as much as I just figured that’s what I would get. The thought of having a daughter only creeped into my consciousness when I was pregnant with Amelia and when it did, I came to the frightening epiphany that I wanted a girl. Desperately, longingly wanted a daughter. I wanted to have that relationship with my daughter like the one I had with my mom, even if it would be more difficult for me to navigate. I also assumed by then that there was NO way we’d have a girl. Just not possible. I even (confession alert)bought boy clothes while pregnant and never even went into the girls’ section. I planned for a son.

And then with this pregnancy, I thought for sure AGAIN that it was boy. It had to be. Just had to. Isn’t that how it goes? You get one of each. A perfect set? Not only that, but I also figured that since I am only just now getting used to the idea of having and raising a daughter that I’d be thrown for a loop with a boy. Not that I even think they need to be raised differently because of course I don’t. But by now, I’ve got the girl thing in motion and feel confident with it. Change in any way just would make it complicated. I once again, began picking out boy clothes and getting my mind set on having a son. It’s really not bad having a son and I would have been excited about it. . . however, with the possibility in front of us, I couldn’t help but wonder . . . hope . . . that we’d have another girl.

And now here we are. Probably about a month away (maybe less??) from having our second daughter. Daughters. Sisters. I never got to have a sister but Amelia and this baby will. I’m so happy for them. And maybe even a little envious. Except that I get to be their mama and live within and then probably later, just outside of their sisterhood. I will, at the very least, get to observe it up close and foster it as much as possible. And for me, I find complete and total joy in having a home and family that will be almost exactly the opposite of the one I had in terms of gender identification. Where my girls (I love, love, love that we will have ‘the girls’) will be free to be whomever they want and tackle the world without boundaries. Where Daddy gets roped into dance parties and plays model for makeup practice because he doesn’t see any of it as beneath him. And where female is synonymous with strength and happiness and possibility. And where athletic and wise and confident are not considered masculine but human and where loving, kindness, and feeling are not considered weaknesses. I love that we shall have giggly slumber parties and screaming emotional meltdowns. That we’ll share openly “I love yous” and hugs and kisses . . . into their adulthoods.

And I love that our girls will be sisters.

My Life in Print

2011-05-31T11:39:00.000-07:00

I've seen the title of this book out for weeks now and laughed but didn't think much of it. Then I saw this link of the audio version. It's more hilarious than I initially gave it credit for and I can so relate. Heaven knows I've muttered a few of these lines myself. At least I am not alone!

The Path to Crazytown

2011-05-30T20:27:00.001-07:00

Mom and I sewed like a couple of sweatshop wage-earners yesterday and got almost the whole baby’s room done. It was amazing how much we got done in a day. However, I came (limped) home feeling the consequences. My cold had worsened and my right hip felt like it’d been transplanted from the Tin Man by the time we were done. I left Amelia to sleep there because we’d gone too late and it seemed silly to keep her up only to rush home to bed. Thankfully, this allowed me to sleep in a bit and get a more sound rest for today.

Showed up at Mom’s around lunch time already feeling like a zombie. I could hardly keep my head up during lunch so I decided that maybe I’d take a nap with Amelia. She sleeps in a grownup bed there and we were both exhausted so I thought it would be the perfect opportunity for a snuggle nap! She was way excited so we went straight to naptime.

Every time I closed my eyes, she’d talk or whisper or something annoying. When I told her to close her eyes, she actually fell asleep for a minute before remembering that I was there and promptly snapped her little eyelids up again. After half an hour of trying to cuddle her tight enough to keep her from fidgeting and telling her to keep her eyes closed, I turned my back on her to fall asleep. Just as I started to doze and get those crazy thoughts that aren’t quite dreams but aren’t quite conscious, she’d say something to snap me out of it. “be quiet!” Dozzzzze. Poke. “Amelia don’t poke me and go to sleep.” Dooooozzze snooooorrrre. Poke. “knock it off or I am going to have to leave.” “No Mama, I want to take a nap with you. “Then GO TO SLEEP!” Doooozzzze. Snooooorrrre. Drooooool. Poke.

“Okay. I need to leave you alone so you can get some sleep. I’ve seen you rolling your eyes in the back of your head and I am obviously keeping you up.” Crying. Tears. Begging. “Don’t leave Mama!!” “Get some sleep, sweetie.”

Stomp downstairs and throw self on recliner. Close eyes. Begin to doze. Crazy thoughts. Sleep?

“WAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH”

Stomp upstairs. “WHAT IS WRONG?!”

“You left your sunglasses in here. You need to take them out.”

“Really? That’s what you’re screaming about?”

“Take them out of here.”

Back downstairs muttering various curses. Throw self on recliner. Close eyes.

Repeat above scenario three more times (substituting sunglasses for any other stupidfuckingreason she can’t sleep). Also substitute my mom for me in going upstairs because Grammy was worried that I’d kill the grandbaby.

On third run upstairs and over an hour and no sleep, I said, “Just bring her down. She’s obviously not sleeping so I’ll just take her home.”

In the next 20 minutes, insert five meltdowns around getting dressed, picking up toys, and going potty. One timeout.

In the car for home. She falls asleep 10 minutes later. Shit. Shit shit SHIT. Areyoufuckingkiddingme?! When we get home, I empty out the car before scooping up the sleeping child. Bring her inside, still asleep. She wakes up the second I try to put her in bed. Awesome.

Between dinner, bath, and bedtimes, insert at least another 5-10 meltdowns—including one over my not attaching the dustpan low enough on the broom. Oh yes. Real tears and snot bubbles and everything. Over the dustpan.

So let’s recap so far. No nap. Mama’s exhausted and sick and now dealing with an exhausted child who, because she didn’t nap, is more needy, whiny, and difficult than ever. At least bedtime should go easy right? No fighting from a tired baby! Right? RIGHT?!

Getting to bed included a few more meltdowns because you know, a cupboard was open in the kitchen. Seriously. Goodnight. I love you. Sweet dreams. See you in the morning. Blah. Blah.

Finally. ME time. Collapse into rocker with laptop to surf until a reasonable bed time (does 8 count??). Five minutes later, “WAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH” I tried to ignore it and let her work it out so it doesn’t turn into a game of back and forth—a game that we play all too often. “poooooo poooooooooo!!!!!” Yeah. She stands and her door and cries instead of just going to the bathroom by herself. I tell her to go to the potty. She comes stumbling out and I tell her to come sit with me. She climbs into my lap and lays on my chest. Sweet, I think. I’ll take this chance to just let her fall asleep on my chest. Heaven knows she won’t have the chance again soon. Ten minutes of sweet snuggles and rocking. . . and waiting. “Sweetie, do you want to fall asleep in mama’s arms tonight?” “Yeah.” She pulls my arms around her and snuggles in.

Fifteen minutes later, not sleeping. “Okay babygirl. I think you need to go to bed so you can sleep.”

“No mama. I want to sleep in your arms and rocking.”

“Okay, but just a few more minutes or you’ll need to go to bed by yourself okay?”

See? I am trying here. Do you SEE me trying again and again to be positive and caring and not evil mama?

Two minutes later. “Mama. I really need to get some rest. I can’t sit here with you. I’m really tired today. I didn’t take a nap today.” Pushes away from me and goes to bed.

Pregnant and Paranoid

2011-05-28T23:19:00.001-07:00

Part of pregnancy is the inevitable rise of crazy, irrational fears that begin to crowd their way into your regular, more functional thoughts. As the third trimester trucks on, these thoughts find their way into every part of your day. . . and night. They come in flooding emotional outbursts, in nightmares, in panic attacks, and generic meltdowns alike.

These days, paranoid thoughts are certainly threatening to put me in the mental ward. Here are the things making me crazy.

We are about to ruin Amelia’s life. It’s true that we originally wanted another child essentially as a gift to Amelia. We wanted her to have a shared experience with another and someone with whom she could find comfort as an adult. And yet, I just keep thinking that when she realizes that a whole babychild is here, she is going to be so disappointed. I actually predict that she’ll be great and loving and helpful with the baby. But sharing her parents? Dogs? Toys? Everything? She’s been the center of our obsessions for over three years. All alone. And he we are, turning her life upside down with another child that we shall love as much as HER?! That just has to hurt to the core for such a little kid. My brother was 4 when I was born and he still talks about my birth with bitterness and regret. I am positive that he believes to this day that his life would’ve been so much better had my parents stopped with him. What if Amelia feels like that too???

I can’t possibly love this baby as much as I love Amelia. I know that a lot of people fear that they just don’t know how their hearts can fit the love of another child. I have faith that your heart just grows to include the next baby. There isn’t a limit to the love we have. BUT Amelia’s got a three year start on her baby sister. The amount of thought, time, and energy that has gone into loving Amelia has been all-encompassing since the moment I met her. This new babygirl will never get the same. To her disadvantage, we already have a child who will continue requiring attention (if not completely increase the demand). Every little thing about her will not be a wonder to me the way it was with Amelia because we’ve already HAD Amelia! She won’t get her own clothes, shoes, toys, books, or parents. They will all come to her filtered by the use of her older sister. This blog is the perfect example. New Baby will never have her very own blog. She will get lumped into her sister’s tale. And to add to the above paranoid thought, Amelia will lose her own blog. Lose lose.

This baby won’t be healthy. When you have one child and that child is born healthy, functional, and beautiful, you realize that you’ve struck gold. That you rolled the dice of fate and won. To test fate for a second time and expect all to go well seems to me naive at best and completely foolish at worst. What makes us think we could be lucky enough to get another healthy baby? And wouldn’t it just figure that you finally give in to having another baby and worry completely about how to care for two only to find out that the second has special needs? I really don’t know if I trust my own luck that much. And heaven knows that if this pregnancy is any indication, this poor baby will be born sick. (Update: A week into summer relaxation time and I’m SICK AGAIN GODAMMIT.) We had a tough time with Amelia as a baby, but she was ultimately healthy.

This girl will be the opposite of Amelia in every way. Isn’t that the rule of parenting? You get used to one kid and then the other kid destroys everything you thought you knew. Now, if this baby is the opposite of her sister as a baby, I would be forever grateful. However, I’ve always considered the work we put in with Amelia as an infant set up for good toddler karma. Despite the fact that I’ve come close to killing her a few times lately, Amelia really is an amazing little kid. She is sweet, sensitive, funny, bright, and well behaved. The most oft-repeated comment I get from her teachers is “She is just soooo sweet. Is she always like that?!” She really is just a sweetie. She’s never been destructive or loud or anything that would bug me too much. What if this baby is an easy infant and then a terror kid? What if she’s fearless and a daredevil who doesn’t listen to her parents? What if she hates books or cuddling? What if she doesn’t communicate well or screams in the grocery store? What if she just isn’t as likeable?

I won’t recover. My body has felt permanent repercussions of carrying and delivering Amelia. Most notably, my back feels destroyed by the c-section and my core strength never returned after having everything moved around in surgery. Will the destruction be the same? I’m guessing it will be worse. Will I never feel like the person I was before in terms of physical ability?

I can’t mother two. I have no idea how anyone manages more than one child. Amelia takes up my whole day and all of my energy. The thought of adding a newborn, breastfeeding baby to that equation seems impossible. I’m not exaggerating. I honestly have not one idea how I will manage. Justin is gone for work 14 hours a day. How will I manage two children through the entire day and evening? What could possibly be left of me when the day is over? When Amelia was a newborn, I would count the hours until Justin got home and that was when he got home at THREE in the afternoon. It was just at my breaking point of the day too. Just the thought of getting Amelia ready for school with a lunch and backpack and clothed, making myself presentable enough to drop her off, and loading up both girls into the car makes me tired. Not to mention, taking care of the baby all day and then doing it all again to pick Amelia up, come home, and get dinner, bath, and bedtime taken care of for both babychildren. Impossible. Add in long, sleepless nights and I think this fear is completely rational. I can’t possibly be a good, present mother when life is impossible.

This baby will have reflux and colitis. I know that if this child has the same problems as Amelia, we would be much better armed with treatment options and survival tactics. I’ll have the advantage of knowing that it’s temporary and that she will still grow and someday be healthy—something that we really had no perspective on with Amelia. However, if we find out that this baby has the same problems, I will just fall apart and cry. CRY until the tears can’t cry anymore. Add a screaming, inconsolable baby to the above fear and get the straight jacket ready.

This baby won’t have any problems and will sleep great. I hardly even dare to think this is possible considering my luck, but I know that if this baby is . . . okay . . . I will finally have a normal baby experience. And then I will have to come to terms with how traumatic my first-time-mothering experience really was. I’m not sure I want to face all of that. . . but don’t get me wrong. I’m willing to try. That’s why it’s an irrational fear.

She won’t breastfeed. For all the struggles we had, Amelia ate like a champ. She loved to nurse and we were a very compatible nursing team. She never took chunks of my nipples with her and didn’t graze a lot. Amelia and her first year converted me to a breastfeeding believer. It became an important part of her and my health and such a pivotal part of my mothering experience. Going into the second time, it’s the one thing that I feel fairly comfortable with. . . and yet, I have this terrible fear that this baby won’t do it. That she won’t latch or will refuse the boob or will just destroy my boobs to the point of halting production or just won’t do it. Whereas I wouldn’t have disappointed if it didn’t work out the first time, I would be crushed if it didn’t work out this time.

I’m going to lose Amelia. Just by the nature of our schedules, this pregnancy, and continued illness, Amelia and Justin have spent a lot more time together than before. We basically have a mommy part of the week and then a daddy half. As a result, Amelia and Justin have gotten very close. I love watching their relationship strengthen and begin to resemble the one her and I have. However, one of my very biggest fears is that the relationship Amelia and I have will never be the same once this baby is born. She will inevitably spend more time with her daddy as a nursing mommy and baby are fairly inseparable. Her and I will just physically be unable to have the same relationship. If I have a c-section, I won’t be able to pick her up, snuggle with her too much, or tend to her either. I am absolutely terrified that the baby, though adding something amazing to our family, will detract from my closeness with Amelia. Her and I are so very close I just can’t imagine what it will be like for either of us to have another baby in the picture. I know that our relationship will change to adapt, but the thought of it changing at all . . . breaks my heart. And the truth is, it will never be the same. She’ll never be my only child, my only daughter again. It just hurts to think about losing this 3-year love affair we’ve had to any change or adjustment. And what if sharing the baby with mommy is traumatic for her and she just turns to her daddy as a replacement?

What if we don’t know anything? There should be some advantage to having the second child in that you’ve already had one. But what if everything we know turns out to be useless on this baby? What if it’s like starting all over? What if we have absolutely no skill or memory or ability to care for this baby? What if NOTHING we know works?
What if she comes too early and has to stay in the NICU? I always said that the saving grace with Amelia’s birth was that she was big and healthy enough to come home. I honestly don’t know what I would do if I had to leave the hospital and not take my baby! Amelia’s birth was tough but had a positive outcome. What if it actually goes worse this time?
What if I never get well again? Now about a month or so away from birth, I’m still sick. This means that I’ve been ill for essentially this entire pregnancy. But what if it has nothing to do with the pregnancy? What if I finally get relief from no longer being pregnant only to continue being ill. . . AND taking care of two children? I thought I was in the clear once school got out and the sun stayed warm, but here I sit, sick and desperate for relief. And worrying that I will never remember wellness again.

31 Week Update

2011-05-26T23:26:00.001-07:00

The doctor did an ultrasound to get a clear idea of Baby’s position last week. While most babies would still have plenty of time to move into birthing position, babies in a bicornuate uterus are most likely in their final position by this point. Oddly enough, BabyGirl had moved! All of a sudden, I’d noticed that her kicks were not where they were previously. I kept telling Justin (lucky dog) that I had crazy pressure on my pelvis and bladder. Maybe (maybe? MAYBE?!) she was head down? I don’t know. Quite frankly, it was a total mystery by the time we got to the ultrasound.

Well, it took exactly one second of ultrasound for the doctor to say, “breech!” Unlike Amelia, who was technically ‘transverse’ (read: completely sideways), this baby did in fact move from her previous position but not necessarily to the right position. ha. Well, she tried! She’s in the ‘frank breech’ position, which is the classic, butt-down breech position. You know, like this

She’s not quite as folded up as this picture indicates because her head is off to the side, under my right rib and her feet then are over on the left between my hips and ribs. So her body goes from my rib down to my pelvis and the legs go up to the other side. This is much different than Amelia, who stretched across my ribs from head to butt.

What does it mean?

It’s good news and bad news. The bad news is that if she stays where she is now, she will be undeliverable vaginally and require surgery. In fact, we’ve already schedule the surgery for 38 weeks just in case I make it that far. It’s bad news because breech babies have their own complications, most specifically with hip development. There’s some good news too! First, so far, I actually think Baby’s position is more comfortable than Amelia’s was. I’m not really wide across, so Amelia’s little body stretching across my ribs was horribly painful in the end. Beyond uncomfortable, I cried just from sheer pain in the last weeks with A. This baby is not in the right position, but at least still lying up and down rather than side to side. We are supposed to carry our babies lengthwise because we are longer than we are wide. So that’s good. And since she’s moved to this current position, the deep bruise I had in my uterus and side from her heels pressing me is getting a lot better. Yeah, that sucked. My big discomfort with this position is that she is literally sitting on my pelvic area and bladder. I am quite certain that I am going to piss myself at some point before this is over and/or my crotch is going to BREAK under the weight. (seriously, how do they cast a broken crotch?) Back to the good news. Another really good thing about this position—as opposed to Amelia’s—is that if her butt stays down, labor is potentially a lot less dangerous than it was the first time. Her bottom would prevent tiny parts and/or the umbilical cord from coming out in the event of cervical dilation. Little parts and cord coming out are crazy dangerous and with a quick labor, add a level of panicked rush to get to the hospital that was seriously stressing me out. We’d need to get to the hospital pretty quick regardless if I were in labor, but not in the same way as we would if the baby was feet down. That is more like call-an-ambulance kind of hurry than I’d prefer. Call me crazy.

So that’s that for now. We have a scheduled c-section with the anticipation of going into labor prior to that date. Doesn’t labor plus surgery sound awesome? ha. This time, I am determined to control as much of the experience as possible. I am going to meet with an anesthesiologist in advance and talk about the terrible reaction I had to the meds last time. It was definitely not typical and what made Amelia’s birth very emotionally difficult for me. Oh and physically too since I threw up for hours and hours violently. If the baby arrives safely, is healthy, AND I can manage to hold/feed her as soon as possible after birth, I will consider it a success. Again, call me crazy.

There’s the news for now. Everything else is right on target. Babygirl is measuring perfectly, my blood work is okay—anemic but not diabetic, and my blood pressure was already lower after only 2 hours of summer under my belt. ha. In all fairness, my BP is always pretty low, but it had gone up considerably while I was dealing with some stressful work stuff the week before finals. I think it was 118/60-something. Then the following week, two hours after finishing finals, it was down to 98/60 something. Things are going so well that the doc took me off the once-a-week visit schedule to two weeks between visits.

My only job from here is to stay pregnant!

Three.

2011-05-25T23:18:00.001-07:00

Amelia had a great third birthday. It was especially low-key compared to the previous two birthdays. Though I had an awesome idea for a fab party, we decided that it wasn’t doable this time. Not only am I in the 8th month of what has been an exhausting pregnancy, but school didn’t end until May 19th, which is about a week and a half later than normal AND only one day before Amelia’s birthday (thank goodness it wasn’t like that the year she was born!). Not to mention that it was hard to decide who to invite since she now has all of her school friends (whose parents we don’t know)! It was just a perfect storm of reasons why we shouldn’t have a party this year. We ended up having a great day and feeling really great about the compromised plan this year.

The day began when Amelia ran into our room in the morning shouting, “Mama Mama—there’s PRESENTS out there!” We’d left her wrapped gifts in the living room between her room and ours knowing she’d see them when she woke up. “It’s my BIRTHDAY today! I’m 3 now!”

She opened a couple of her presents in the morning.

This mailbox is awesome! She adores it. It has a working KEY and everything.

We’d gone back and forth on what to do on her birthday for a while. We’d considered the Zoo and/or Fairy Tale Town. However, as the day got closer, I realized that walking around the zoo/FTT all day would have pretty much knocked me out too much to get through the dinner party we planned. Plus, it just seemed like too much of a ‘day’ to slam the zoo into the first part, race home for nap, and then out to dinner. Too much for the 3-year-old AND the mama. Don’t forget I’d only given finals the day before and was about to hit that end-of-the-semester wall. The one that makes you want to sleep for a week of recovery. Yeah, that’s where I am right now. Anyway, in all honesty, Amelia is only three. She doesn’t need a huge, over-the-top, insanely scheduled day to be happy. We decided the night before her birthday to just head to the Fountains. It’s close to home, has lots to do for little ones, food onsite, AND not something we do every day. Totally doable in a half day. And much more relaxed than our other plans.

It turned out to be the perfect plan! We stopped by the playground.

Hey Amelia, how old are you???

Hey Amelia, how old are you??? That’s three, bitches! ha I love how she throws it out like a sign or something. Note her other hand also showing her new age.

She changed into her bathing suit just in time to hit the fountain play area. She literally round around the periphery, managing to stay completely dry for the longest time. Most kids run to the water, she makes her fun in avoiding it.

It only took one accidental, mistimed spray to get her into the spirit.

And by ‘accidental’ I mean Daddy throwing her in.

Serious cuteness.

After the water, we had lunch, which was exactly ten feet from the fountains. After yumminess, we had to do one more thing to make the day extra special for our locomotive-loving babychild.

Here’s my ticket!

Hey Amelia, are you happy to be in a TRAIN?! Hey Daddy, how’s that clown car working for you? lol If he could take a reasonable picture, he wouldn’t always have to be the one ‘on board.’ ha He really is such a trooper.

After the fabulous train ride—complete with a horn and bell—we packed it up to head home for a solid nap. You know, even big 3-year-olds need naps. And their pregnant mommies really do too. Amelia almost fell asleep on the short drive home. I can’t even think about the shape she would have been in if we’d dragged her through a quasi amusement park an hour away from home! Ack. So three cheers for scaling down and saving the whole family from unnecessary stress and hurry. And for knowing our limits. And to think that we had such a good time at, you know, a MALL. Love it.

After naps, we freshened up and headed to the mini party. All grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins aboard, which is a fairly small group. (Our siblings really need to breed a little quicker.) We reserved the party room at a small, family-owned local pizza joint close to our new house. We got a small bunch of balloons (yellow of course, because it’s her favorite—and she’ll tell you that whether you ask or not), put some yellow flowers in mason jars on the tables, brought an ice cream cake, and that was it. The pizza parlor was fantastic. They let us order pizzas in advance, had appetizers ready when we got there and took great care of us. We literally showed up and left mostly empty handed. It was a beautiful thing.

Cousins! How cute are they?! Amelia, 3 and Baby Cousin 1. Their birthdays are only 4 days apart. Can you imagine this picture next year? Three girls in three years (plus/minus a month or two) for this family. I can hardly wait. I see a braided ring-leader in our midst.

Grammy love. Who is happier here? I’m fairly certain that my mom would bypass both my brother and me if she could’ve gotten Amelia directly. Oh and see the ribbon in Amelia’s hair? Yeah, she thought it was SUCH a special day.

This is her face as everyone sang to her. Happy. Shy. Happy.

The mama and the baby. With the baby. The mama and the big girl and the baby? yikes. This is Amelia at exactly 3 and I’m 31+ weeks here.

I love this child.

Mama, Baby, Daddy. Bump. We don’t get a pic of the three of us but maybe once a year. It’s pretty striking to see how big she is here and how we look like a real family and like grown up parents. Weird. It’s weird to see myself pregnant with Amelia present because I associate pregnancy so much with just her. But here she is and here I am pregnant with another baby. Weird.

Maybe our last picture as a family of three?

All in all, it was a perfect kind of day. Amelia had a great time at the Fountains and loved that the whole family was there just for her birthday. She got spoiled with presents, but not over the top with more things than she can possibly play with. In keeping it simple, we made it possible to enjoy the day fully, rest, and relax. It was not easy to go against the norm for us but we were so very grateful for our own common sense this time around. I looooove doing fun crafty things for parties, but it just would’ve been too much this time. And frankly, I don’t think Amelia noticed one way or another. She’s only three. She doesn’t need 50 people around her to have fun or an amusement park. She came home saying “I had a great time at my pizza party. Birthdays are really, really fun, mama!” The funny thing is that we were still all exhausted when we got home! ha. We put Amelia to bed much later than normal and then went straight to bed ourselves. She woke up the next morning asking when it would be her birthday again. :)

This year, I really didn’t have time to sit and reflect a lot on Amelia’s turning 3. I’m pretty sure I’ve cried at the other birthdays, but this one just kind of came and went. Probably because school butted up so closely and distracted me from having a complete thought. Or maybe this year has been riddled with so many milestones that the birthday is hardly eventful in comparison. Mostly though, I just enjoy her in the now. As Amelia gets older, she certainly tries me in more ways than ever, but I just enjoy her more too. I’ve enjoyed each stage more than the last and that helps me not look back too much. As we emerge out of the twos (and into the lordhelpme threes), the thought I keep coming back to is that the baby is gone. Between two and three, every last bit of the babychild gives way to the little kid. The diapers (even at night) are gone, the crib is gone, sippy cups, and snacktrappers are all history. The funny mismatched words and phrases have lost out to complete sentences expressing cohesive (but mostly hilarious) thoughts. The diaper bag is in a closet somewhere, we don’t buy baby wipes anymore, and I no longer carry 5 pairs of undies in my purse. She dresses herself, brushes her own teeth, and has a strong opinion about all kinds of things. The baby is gone and we find ourselves in the company of a little girl. It’s rather shocking in some ways, but completely welcome in all ways. With the baby gone, I can honestly confess that I like her so much better now. I love the little kid. Love her! And when I think about her as a baby, I would absolutely prefer her of today no matter what. I know so many people who mourn the baby loss, but I see that period as the work that I put in to get the kid I have today. It’s a little scary how quickly she’s growing into a child and I am most certainly sentimental about each phase, but every stage has bested the previous so far, so I’ll take what I’ve got today and look forward to rather than resist tomorrow.

All that said, in some ways, it feels like she’s been in our lives forever. And in others, it seems like it was just yesterday that she looked like this.

It’s hard to believe that this little baby is about to be the big sister.

Now that makes me weepy.

Happy Day.

2011-05-20T22:48:00.001-07:00

We are all terribly exhausted tonight. I'm pecking away on my phone . . . from bed just to commemorate the day.

It was a day full of birthday fun for our little girl topped off with a family dinner party at the pizza parlor. It was obvious how great of a day Amelia had by the size of her meltdown before bed. It's always hard to say good bye to a fabulous day.

More as soon as we've all recovered.

Three years ago.

Two years ago.

One year ago.

Today.

It seems like forever since she was born and only yesterday since she was a little baby.

Life is funny like that I guess.

Happy Birthday to my sweet angel baby love.

28th Week Doctor Visit

2011-05-03T22:13:00.001-07:00

Went to the doctor yesterday and figured I’d post all of the updates here since I haven’t journaled in about oh, a lifetime it seems. At least not one during this pregnancy.

First of all, I have to say how much happier I am with our new doctor. When we moved, we took the opportunity to get out of Mercy Downtown medical group, which left us with a group of OBs (none of which were actually assigned to you) and delivering at Mercy General, which was ridiculously horrible. There, I had to talk to a different doctor every month and therefore repeat my concerns each month and even better, get an entirely different opinion from each doctor, which often contradicted with the last. Now we are set to deliver in one of the best, most modern birthing centers in the area and I have a private practice doctor who is fabulous (so far).

Going into the third trimester, I’m beginning to get a lot of anxiety about birth and delivery. We didn’t know anything was wrong before going into labor with Amelia and by the time we figured out what the problem was, she was here, perfectly healthy, and everything was fine. This time, I’m finding a lot more fear in the knowing and struggling with all of the possible scenarios. At the ultrasound last month, the baby’s head was downward but not quite in the right spot. As the she’s (we’ve) gotten bigger, it’s become increasingly obvious that she’s sideways. Her head is down, but tucked into my left hip bone. Her spine is down so she’s curled up and facing me with her butt and legs wrapped over to my right ribs. I think she’s like this

The doctor walked in yesterday, put her hands on my belly and said, “that baby is sideways.” How nice that she could tell and I didn’t have to convince her like I did with the yahoos when I was pregnant with Amelia. There is still time for the baby to get into the correct birthing position and we can all hope for that . . . but if you ask me, that babychild isn’t going anywhere. Amelia was sideways too but facing downward (with her feet where her head should have been) by this time in the pregnancy and never moved, despite that the doctors kept saying “that baby will move!” Turns out that only 1% of babies go into delivery lying transverse like this, but sometimes doctors forget about those exceptions. In any case, if I had to put money on it, I’d say that she’s stuck in there and already finding herself with too little room to recalibrate. The doctor thinks that by 32 weeks we’ll know for sure where she’ll stay.

If the baby stays in this position, that would eliminate a few of the possible scenarios. A sideways baby can’t come out through the designated path, so a cesarean would be the only option. As much as I completely despised having surgery to birth Amelia and how incredibly sick it made me and how torturous that recovery was, there is a little relief in possibly eliminating a series of possibilities that were overwhelming me. I was excited at the possibility of trying a med-free vaginal birth and letting my body actually do what it can do. There was something empowering in that possibility not to mention the much shorter recovery. I saw my sister-in-law a few hours after having our niece (med-free vaginal birth) and she was sitting up in bed, had showered, had nursed the baby, and looked just like herself—fresh and beautiful. It was about as opposite of my experience with Amelia as possible. At a few hours post-birth, I was still puking my guts up and trembling uncontrollably and unable to hold my baby. I didn’t even get out of bed for 24 hours and didn’t shower for several days, when I hunched over as the water loosened my bandage while Justin held me to keep me from passing out. Not pretty.

However, the thought of attempting a VBAC and then ending up in an emergency section is even worse than what I had the first time! What a gamble! Ack. What do you do?? The typical rate of ruptured uterus is low in a VBAC, but I don’t have a ‘normal’ uterus, so all bets are off the table on its reaction to labor/delivery.

So you see the dilemma. As it turns out, VBAC may not be an option. Disappointed? Definitely. Relieved? A little. Only because it takes some of the guess-work out.

Everyone says the second c-section is much easier than the first. But most of those people schedule the second one. They mark the calendar (seems weird to pick your baby’s birthday doesn’t it?), get a good night’s sleep (hopefully), put some makeup on (pictures!), and meet their families at the hospital for the big day. That DOES sound better than the original route. That 2:30 am wake-up call was a little . . . worrisome to say the least. However, with this baby, the best prediction is that I’ll probably deliver around 36 weeks again. Nobody would schedule a delivery before the baby is full term (which is at 37 weeks). You definitely want the baby to stay in for as long as possible. Just as Amelia was a whopping 6 pounds at birth, she could have easily been 3. Therefore, the probably scenario if Baby stays transverse and undeliverable without surgery is that we would have a planned cesarean section, but not scheduled. We’ll know very soon that a c-section is inevitable and everyone will plan on that outcome. However, more likely than not, I will go into labor before they could schedule the surgery. Sooooooo now my mind is just spinning, reeling with all of these possibilities as well. When/where? The trickiest thing about this scenario for us this time is that we have Amelia. Getting to the hospital will be incredibly urgent as the umbilical cord could come out without the head blocking the cervix, causing death. So we’d have to rush to get there just like last time, but the big difference is that we’ll have to drop Amelia off somewhere, wait for someone to pick her up, or otherwise, figure out what to do in that moment with/for her. It adds complication for certain. Not to mention that Justin works 12-hours shifts now and an hour away from home. All I can think about is if I go into labor when Amelia and I are home alone or out somewhere together. What would I do?! If things go as they did the first time, I’ll go directly into active, quick, painful labor within a few minutes of water breakage so I’m not sure driving us to the hospital would be the best idea . . .

So that’s the update for now. We have another appointment soon and as we go into 30 weeks and beyond, we’ll definitely be monitoring as much as possible for signs of labor. We know more this time, which is comforting, but frightening too. I’m only just now coming to terms with the trauma of Amelia’s birth. As I find myself nearing birth again, the feelings that buried themselves in relief after her arrival are surfacing and bringing me to tears almost every day in anxious anticipation, stress, and fear. I know that she got here just fine and all was good, but I’m now starting to realize how scary and traumatizing it all was at the time.

Next week, I have the glucose gestational diabetes test (fun!) and possibly another OB appointment. Can’t believe that I’ll be 30 weeks in a week. yikes. Just further reminder that there is no easy way out of this game . . .

Amusing Amelia

2011-05-02T22:09:00.000-07:00

Me: My poor Punkin! I am so sorry you have this terrible cough. I wish there was something I could do to make it go away.
Amelia: Don't worry Mama. Don't worry Mama. I feel better soon.

Me: Do you want to take a shower with me?
Amelia: No. I want to take a shower with Daddy.
Me: You don't want to take a shower with mama??
Amelia: Mama. I know that you like to take showers, but I like to take showers too and sometimes I just want to take a shower with Daddy, okay?

Amelia: I'm sorry I didn't take a nap today mama. I love you very much though!

The Truth Is

2011-04-26T21:54:00.001-07:00

All jokes and comments aside, the truth is that we knew we wanted another baby. As Amelia neared 2.5, and blossomed into the coolest little person, the light switch flipped on and I began to want another. Justin was already on board, largely for no other reason than he always planned on two children and only saw his future through that lens. This realization happened very quickly for me. I went from the “absolutely not. don’t even ASK about it” camp to “hey, wanna have another baby?” We talked about it and the rest goes like this.
Me: Just thinking about having another baby is making you look so hawt to me right now.
Him: Oh really, then let’s have another baby fer sher.
. . .

Next morning.
Yeah, I’m not ready for this. I don’t want to be pregnant. I really don’t want to wake up pregnant tomorrow. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.
Whoa. Um, seriously mixed signals here.
Let’s just talk about it for a while and maybe officially start trying next month. But I just can’t right now. I need some time to warm up to this whole thing.
Oooooohhhhkaaay. You just let me know.

After this, I went to school and told my sisterfriend Megan that we were going to start trying in November to get pregnant again. I’m now so glad that I did because so many were shocked by our announcement later, that everyone assumed that it was an ‘accident.’ But there it was, out loud.
Meanwhile, over the next couple weeks, I made several jokes about being pregnant at home. Ohhh, I can’t do that because of the baby. Haha Justin said. Really funny. We only talked about it for a second. It so wouldn’t happen like that. It took two months of trying with Amelia and we were totally trying!
Fast forward two weeks.
Um Babe, can you pick up a test on your way home?
Why? Babe, you are NOT pregnant. We aren’t even trying until next month. But fine.
And then, exactly two weeks after we put the topic on the table, it was already decided. Turns out, it really does just take ONE time without protection. All those after-school specials were totally right! Good thing I paid attention to those things, knowing how stinking fertile I am now.

In any case, there was a lot of doubt about this pregnancy from the beginning. There is fear in the knowing second time around. I shook for three hours after finding out this time, whereas there was celebration all around when we found out the first time. Ahhhh naiveté is so warm and fuzzy. There were doubts about the timing—our house is for sale, a move imminent, and without a destination. The trauma and following diagnosis after Amelia’s birth of the bicornuate uterus put this heavy black cloud over the whole shabang this time around—we weren’t aware of any of this during the first pregnancy. So the fear was far greater, the anxiety level peaked with the appearance of that little pink line, and we have struggled a lot since.

However, the one thing we knew for sure was that we wanted another little person in our lives. That our family felt that it was missing a piece and Amelia’s tale was incomplete as an only child. Having passed through the fog of pregnancy, birth, and infancy and into toddlerhood, I’d come to realize that it all culminates in a whole person. A person who will only continue growing and changing and getting more amazing. Amelia’s third year woke me up to the joy of watching this little person develop into an independent little soul. One who truly only gets better with time. In short, I began to realize that the part of the process that I struggled with the most was a means to the end. If this little person is the end, the pregnancy/infancy phases are just the means to achieving the end. Once I got that, it was a no-brainer decision. The second kid? Definitely. Getting me to sign on to the process was the hard part. Turned out that there wasn’t much need for debate, which even at the time, I knew was a blessing. I could easily have thought my way out of the whole thing time and again, while taking my husband on the roller coaster with me.

Because it wasn’t completely mapped out like everything else in my life, I’ve been able to blame everything on Justin. I’ve been telling him that it’s all his fault. He saw the window open just a tiny crack and jumped right through it before it slammed shut! lol The best part is that he doesn’t even deny it, sneaky bastid. The truth is that I just suck at being pregnant and have only a terrible baby experience in my story that kept me hesitant.

*wink*

In any case, the little baby on the way has been the only thing worth looking forward to for a while. And the vision of a house filled with the giggles and pitter-pattering feets of two conspiring kiddos is just . . . fantastic.

Little baby leg, ankle, and foot.

Sweet baby hand, in a fist, just about to touch the chin.

Whoa. Creepy 3D pic of face. lol

And the very best part of ALL?!

I couldn’t have even dreamed of it. Didn’t even dare.

(And in case you’re wondering what you’re looking at: This is sideways, so turn your head and you’ll see that the arrow is pointing right at the clitoris and has labia on each side. It’s definitely a girl. I’ve checked and rechecked.)

And the crazy part?

She looks just like her big sister in profile.

(I can’t show A’s ultrasound pics because they were on film, but the profile is identical.)
And the truth is, nothing makes me happier than the thought of raising sisters. SISTERS. *tears*

Today

2011-04-25T22:22:00.000-07:00

I haven't been very good about writing down the crazy, funny, brilliant things Amelia says throughout every day. I started a book once and jotted things down until she stole the book and colored on every page. She's obsessed with writing lists (I have no idea where she gets it) so any little book lying around turns into Amelia's list book.

In any case, since I'm desperately avoiding grading at the moment, here are just a few of the things she said today.

Me, with a big smile on my face looking at A in the back seat: Hey Amelia (wait for her to look up at me). I Looooooooove you!

Amelia: I want a snack.

Me: We're going to get Megan a birthday present. Do you want to help me pick something out?

Amelia: It's Megan's birthday? I would LOOOOOOOOOOVE to go to a party today!!

Me: Well she's not having a party Honey. We're just going to the store to get her a little present.

Amelia: Megan's getting presents for her birthday?

Me: Yes, just a little something.

Long pause.

Amelia: I want a birthday.

Me: Um, Amelia. What are you doing?

Amelia: Me and Minnie are at the movies.

Me: What's the paper?

Amelia: It's our popcorn. Want some?

Me: No thanks.

Amelia: Shhhh mama, we're watching a movie.

Me: I love you Baby.

Amelia: Aw, thanks Mama.

Me: Amelia, do you want to make the reservation for your birthday party?

Amelia: Is my birthday party today?

Me: No. It's still a few weeks away but we can go check it out and see if we like it.

Amelia: For my birthday party?! Will there be yellow presents?

Me: Let's just go check it out. (There and looking around) Do you think you'd like to have your little party here Punkin?

Amelia: YEAH! This is going to be the BEST PARTY EVER!

Me: Amelia can you please hand me the tape measure?

Amelia: I can't Mama. I'm catching ants with this rope--to keep them from getting the dogs!

Me: Amelia can you pick up your Easter eggs and jelly beans please?

Amelia: No Mama. They're vitamins and we're hiding!

Amelia: I need a snack. I need some jelly beans for snack. Ugh I'm full from jelly beans. I think I need a jelly bean to feel better.

Amelia (wrapping her arms around me): I love you soooo much Mama.

On Motherhood

2011-04-25T09:51:00.001-07:00

The journey of a feminist takes many turns and goes through many a transition. When I leave students with parting words after a semester of Women’s History—a truly life-changing class for most—I give them the tiniest bit of advice. . . to join the Sisterhood. Educated on the historical and current political issues facing women and young girls, they are eager to do something but don’t know where to start. Most of them don’t picture themselves with picket signs at the capitol so it’s important that they know there is a middle ground for women. In joining the Sisterhood, I say, we refuse to pick on each other for our parts, our adornments, our courage, our voices. We don’t slam each other to split the Sisterhood or to gain male approval. Instead, we give each other the benefit of the doubt and maybe even some support. The way that so many women make a million excuses for the men in their lives, so too do they refuse any flexibility with other women, even their best friends.

Having taught women’s issues for years, I found myself most profoundly affected by motherhood. Never before did I feel the glaring judgment of other women—or society at large—than I did as a new mom. As a woman, I’d grown up berating myself in front of the mirror since young childhood, but never doubted or blamed or ridiculed myself more than as a mother. When things got dicey with Amelia and it became apparent that she was not a ‘normal’ baby who followed the normal rules of infancy, I was shocked by the multitudes of comments, judgments, blames, and ‘advice’ that others gave me. I don’t think I’ll ever forget a woman who’d talked to Justin only briefly about Amelia came up to me and said, “I told your husband that crying is just what babies do.” I had a very quick flash of myself punching her in the face repeatedly before I calmly informed her that our baby didn’t cry. She screamed for hours and hours and hours at a time without consolation. Before she chirped about babies crying again, I cut her off and told her that Amelia had digestive issues that were very painful. She went on with some ‘advice’ from there, but I don’t remember the rest. I still don’t even know why I felt the need to explain myself to her, but I did and I had to explain this to everyone. I even had a very good friend suggest at one point that if I could just relax, then maybe Amelia could too. It still makes my skin crawl to think about that comment. Even after we had to take an ambulance to the hospital when she turned blue and appeared to DIE, the comments, critiques, and advice poured in. Everyone wants to feel validated by their own experience and therefore think that if I could just do what they did, my baby would be like theirs (which was often described as ‘good’ by the way, indicating that my baby, because she was hard, was therefore bad). It made the worst time of my life even more painful, isolating, and depressing. It made me feel like a failure and so very alone while also very defensive and angry. I remember confessing to a friend that I hated motherhood and even though it was in an email, I could just see her face recoil at the thought of my saying that out loud. And she was a friend who stuck it out to stay in touch with me. Most of them just disappeared. Even though Justin experienced this too we later learned that it hadn’t affected him nearly as horribly as it had me. The difference being that he didn’t feel the world blaming him or that his child’s inconsolable crying was somehow a reflection on him as a father.

Through it all, I realized something invaluable. I learned that as mothers, we all love our babies. We love our babies more than ourselves and would do anything for them. We love our babies the best we can. We do not love our babies through the same means, but with the same depths. That as mothers, we are the experts on our own children . . . sometimes even more than the experts. (holy shit, can you imagine coming to THAT conclusion?!) And that nobody else knows our babies the way we do as parents. And yet, under the glaring pressure, we push and judge each other so openly that even strangers, nonparents, and whomever else fall into the same game of blaming mom. It makes us feel validated when we know more than another or have a better behaved kid. At least 99.9% of our criticisms of other parents will hardly save a life—meaning we judge things that don’t matter. That aren’t going to kill a kid. Though this realization, I adopted a no-judgment policy. When the frazzled mom is leading three screaming children through Target long after bedtime, I just think to myself, “that poor mama must be having a hell of a day.” When I see the mom on her Blackberry at the park while her kid tries to get her attention, I give her the benefit of the doubt. It might be the only time she can be alone all day. Give her a break! We can’t all be ON and perfect all the time. And you know what? Sometimes those ugly moments happen out in the open. Shouldn’t we help each other out rather than take that vulnerable moment to point fingers? Add to it all the ongoing pressure to look as if our bodies never grew or birthed babies and is it any wonder that so many moms look like zombies? Like people who’ve just given up? Or that they act like zombies? And lash out at each other—the only other vulnerable people in their gaze?

Mothers of the same generation are each others’ greatest resource. Unfortunately, it’s motherhood that pulls us away from our friends and often strains the long-running friendships we had pre-baby. Just when we need it the most, the Sisterhood appears to vanish. And in working at my no-judgment policy, I find that I most often fail in refusing to judge myself.

Crash Landing

2011-04-24T19:47:00.000-07:00

Well, we got home on Friday and are now saddled with laundry, dishes, work, and cold weather. So much for a smooth transition from our lovely break. I ended up with shoddy wifi for most of the trip and on the nights when I sat down to blog earnestly (those do happen I swear), there was no connection so I wasn't able to update much.

We had a great time on vacation. It wasn't anything spectacular or even overly memorable except for the mere fact that we were together, all at once, for almost a week. Sounds simple enough but with our schedule the past few months, family time has narrowed to exactly one day a week--usually spent running errands and catching up on chores or attending obligatory functions. We spent many hours on the beach in both sunny and cloudy weather, just enjoying the slowness of downtime. Amelia and Justin made many a sand castle and I took walks and read with my toes in the sand. There were lots of snuggles and laughs and shared naps. Such simple, beautiful things.

I found it funny how excited Amelia was. Not just the day we got to the beach, but the whole week, every moment. She was just happy all of the time while we were on vacation. Like I said, it wasn't a busy, fun-filled time, just relaxing at the beach and . . . well, that's it. Perfect for us, but I worried it might be boring for Amelia. Instead, she was giddy for the whole trip. You'd think that a toddler's life is pretty nice just on a regular day, you know? For her to be soooo excited about vacation made me realize that the daily routine of her life requires rest and a break from time to time too. And I think she just revels in the time she gets to spend with both of her parents, which is highly unusual of late. Everything was exciting to her. Everything! It was hilarious and adorable. She even ran to nap time and went right to sleep. Every day. Even excited about that! ha. (heaven knows that didn't last) She never grew tired of the beach or the sunsets or the passing trains. Everything was just exciting.

Here are a few pics from the week.

We didn't make it back to the beach for a nighttime fire with s'mores so we made some in our room. Her first s'mores experience. She was really excited and thought they were yummy, but overall gave up on it because it made her hands too sticky. Put it on the counter and walked to the bathtub. I love her OCD ways.

And my personal favorite.

There are more pics I'd like to post too. I actually had Justin take a couple of A and I at the beach that turned out not horrible. . . but I'm having trouble with my camera. I can see the pictures on my camera, but they aren't showing up on my computer to transfer. I can seeeeee them right there! And can't get them? Yeah, driving me crazy. Other pics too including a couple pretty sunsets and whatnots. Boo on tricky technology, always making our lives complicated.

Looking at these pics is a real eye-opener. I can't believe how much Amelia's grown since she turned two! When we went to San Clemente last year, I thought she looked so grown up and more like a kid than a baby. . . but this year. Yikes!

What a difference a year makes.

May 2010

April 2011

Good grief! She looks like a childchild more than a babychild. And she's not even three yet. We noticed some other differences too this year. She slept in her own bed rather than a pack-n-play in our room, which was really nice. I may have slept with her a couple nights too just for the heck of it. The whole potty situation was a million times better than last year, when she was still a beginner. She could stay up later and get herself dressed as well. In so many ways, they really do get easier with the passing years. And I'm pretty sure that if any more years pass with us taking beach vacations, she'll never want to leave! As it was, she only wanted to come home to get the dogs to take them back to the beach. And today, after a 3-hour nap struggle and both of us frustrated out of our minds, she declared that she wanted to be at the beach! To which I could only respond honestly. "Me too, sister. Me too."

Now that we're home, everything kicks into high gear. We are headed into the third trimester (eek), and face 4 family birthdays in the next few weeks. Not to mention closing out the semester, which is always hectic, Mother's Day, and doctor's appointments. Something tells me we won't be relaxing on the beach again any time soon.

Day One: The (mostly) Open Road

2011-04-17T20:42:00.001-07:00

We made it safe and sound to San Clemente today! We also cut almost two HOURS off our drive time from last May. What a difference a year makes in the potty-training world! At this time last year, Amelia was potty-trained well, but not completely. She'd figured out that yelling "PEE PEE" made her parents drop everything and take her to the potty. It was the perfect out of any situation for her. . . like being in her car seat. So last year on our drive down, she said she had to pee every five minutes and being a newly potty-trained tot, we never knew whether to believe her. Yeah, so that sucked.
But today was a million times better! As exhausting as she can be, Amelia really is a great kid. She didn't so much as whimper once during the whole 8.5 hour trip! Not once. We didn't even have to bring out the big guns (DVD player/movie) until the last hour and a half. She took a nap and we stopped every two hours or so to hit the potty. That totally works out since I have the same pee schedule at the moment. No incidents whatsoever. In terms of the kid I mean.

However, any or all of the following may have occurred throughout the day.

*Amelia threw a map when she couldn't fold it.

*My feet and ankles swelled so badly that I couldn't move my foot and could feel my skin stretching.

*In trying to find a Starbucks (which should be easy since they're on every goddamn corner), Justin got us lost and we turned into an airport and then had to snake our way out.

* When realizing we'd turned into an airport, Justin began to laugh, while his swelling, sore, tired, hungry, been-driving-for-7-hours, pregnant wife yelled at him.

*While trying to recover from said debacle, Justin asked, "I wonder what airport this is?" To which was replied, "I don't know. Maybe it's the Bob Hope airport like the 50fuckingmillion signs around here say. Maybe if you read a goddamn sign, you could find a goddamn Starbucks!"

*While whizzing down the 5-South in LOS ANGELES, Justin felt something on his leg, went to scratch it and realized that it was LIZARD. On his leg! He promptly opened the door in the middle of the freeway and kicked the stowaway out.

*When we pulled in front of the apartment, I pointed out the window and asked Amelia if she could see the beach--to which she yelled, "I do see the beach mama! HOORAY HOORAY!"

*After getting Amelia down for bed, Justin wandered onto the balcony and glanced to his left--to see our vacation neighbors having sex right in front of the window facing the beach.

*Upon this discovery, I pressed my ear against the wall to hear.

I'll let you decide on the truthfulness of the above.

These are the only pics I got from today --- a long day of traveling.

Beach Bound! This was taken at our house at 8 am. Look how excited she is.

It was sunny for the whole drive and then we were welcomed by cloudy skies. Sad face. Supposed to be cloudy tomorrow and then sunny for the rest of the week. This is the view from our balcony. Happy face.

What shall tomorrow bring?

In the meantime

2011-04-15T23:06:00.001-07:00

You can’t just stop existing because you don’t feel well. The general summary of life has been fairly bleak of late, but we are still living our lives and doing plenty of laughing, playing, and dancing. What else can you do really?

In just a little over a day, we will be on our way to our happy place to spend time, just the three of us. School is out for Break and my shoulders feel lighter already. Looking forward to long, slow days and lots of lovely down time. I can’t wait to post pics and recaps of our trip—the last as a family of three—but in the meantime, I’ll share a fun adventure we had this week.

The College where I teach held a Kids Day event on Tuesday evening. I had no idea exactly what that meant or what to expect of this event, but decided that since it started just as I’d normally pick Amelia up from preschool, we could stop on by and check it out. It was hosted by the Early Childhood Development Club on campus and geared towards preschoolers. Oh and the best part—it was totally free! Nice. Not only that, but I have a strong desire to have Amelia on campus as much as possible as she grows up. I love that I get to work at a place where people are standing around talking about Shakespeare and political theory. I want her to take in the college atmosphere for all of its guitar/bongo-circle glory. I think she’s so lucky to grow up with that as her mom’s office, surrounded by bright, inspiring young people. But I digress.

Kids Day totally rocked! I had no idea what to expect and it was just fabulous! The ECDC had student-run booths of various learning/developmental categories throughout the theater lawn. Everything was free, age-appropriate, creative, and just plain FUN. The students put together some really cute ideas for the kids, all of which were very simple and doable at home too. I didn’t take my camera, but I took lots of pics with my phone.

This is Amelia’s friend Molly. Her mama teaches too and the girls go to school together. They’re buds. These are their crowns, made out of paper plates and decorated by the girls.

Then there was the water table. There was a whole system of PVC piping sitting in a kiddie pool with water. They had funnels, water bottles, cups, and other containers for the kids to filly up and poor into the ‘tunnels.’ It was definitely the most engaging booth for Amelia, who likes nothing more than to fill a cup with water and poor it into another. We stayed at this booth for a long time, until Miss Pants decided to clothesline a much smaller baby girl in order to reach a container.

At this painting booth, there were panty hose full of sand (large) and then dipped in paper plates full of color. The kids could swing and drop the socks to make paint splotches. Yeah, it was messy. And so much fun!

I even got whacked with a sock newly loaded with read paint. Eh, what are you gonna do?! When at Kids Day, you get paint splotched.

MY personal favorite activity was this one. They painted the kids’ feet with rollers and then let them walk the runway of paper to make footprints! Love! Oh and yeah, the girls LOVED it too. They ran up and down that paper table many a time.

Look at me Mama! I’m painting with my FEEEET!

How stinking cute is that? This activity was over once they accidentally got paint on the TOP of Amelia’s foot. She’s not down with that and had to immediately clean her feet. Game over. She got a lot of good runs in though, so no worries.

Which reminds me—They also had a couple booths related to tactile learning. They had a booth where kids could feel ‘slime’ and play with the wonder of Corn Starch ‘melting’ playdoh. Amelia wouldn’t even go near those booths. The babychild despises having her hands dirty. HATES it. “Amelia do you want to touch that cool slime.” “No.” And on we went. I love that kid and her weirdness. She doesn’t even love finger painting much at all. She spends the whole time washing her hands. ha.

Anyway, back to Kids Day. They had another fun table where they had bowls of various noise-making materials (rice, dried pasta, beans, etc.) set out for the kids to load into toilet paper rolls to make shakers. They sealed one end, let the kids fill the tubes, and then sealed the other end. FAB. As it turns out, making your own noise shaker is some serious business.

And lawd how that noise shaker made the girl happy!

But her very favorite thing? Of the whole event? OH my goodness.

Toilet-paper-tube-and-yarn BINOCULARS. Woot! Can you see that smile? She was quite the explorer with her “eye-nock-uh-lers".” Oh and note the shaker in the other hand. She’s set!

Once she had her binoculars, I was a fit of giggles for the rest of the evening. She used them for everything! Like she couldn’t see without them. Hilarious.

Here she is watching the Storyteller—who was about 10 feet away. Love. It.

Kids Day was fantastic! I can’t wait to go again next year. It’s the perfect combination of my role as mama and job as an educator. The kids got to have a fabulous time and the students got to put their learning to practical use and to gain experience with children and teaching themselves. All good things. And fun was had by all.

Looking Forward by Looking Back

2011-04-14T20:53:00.000-07:00

In just a couple short days, we will be on our way to an early summer vacation--otherwise known as Spring Break! We are forcing it a bit with the timing this year because we probably shouldn't wait until the end of May like we'd prefer, seeing as I'll be 30-something weeks pregnant by then and staying pretty close to home. In any case, we are going to beautiful San Clemente and while I haven't had but a minute to think about it yet since I am still in classes, I browsed through some pics from last year, just day dreaming.

Can. Not. Wait.

Sharing

2011-04-12T23:10:00.001-07:00

*WARNING* This is a stream-of-consciousness post. Not for those who prefer editing or organization or logic. /warning

This post was supposed to be all about rainbows and butterflies as I carried on about how wonderful good health, spring, and relocation have served us over the last few weeks. And in a turn of I-couldn’t-have-made-it-up-if-I-tried luck, we wound up sick. Again.

AGAIN.

I literally left class on Tuesday, bouncy and relieved. The semester’s last hurdle was over, the sun was out, and I had been breathing well for two whole weeks. The good fortune! And when I picked up Amelia from school, she had green stuff coming out of her nose and eyes. EYES. Green solid shit coming out of the babychild’s EYES, I tell you. Every frantic interweb search declared that any such nonsense needed doctor attention immediately. Lovely! Okay, I figured an allergy attack of some sort. Treatable. NOT contagious. And then she woke up the next morning with swollen, oozy, red eyes. Good morning Pink Eye.

Still, the ignorant optimist inside thought, ‘hey all kids get pink eye. It’s nasty, but just some stupid eye thing. No big. You can do this.’

You’d think by now that idiot optimist would just shrivel up and die. Or at least shut the eff up once in a while, just out of repeated failure.

At the doctor’s office, we discovered that the doctor didn’t really know what was going on except that obviously Amelia had an infection in her eye that needed drops. Oh and here’s some nasal spray too in case the runny nose is from allergies. Again. No Prob. She’ll be better in 2-5 days and completely cleared for school in 24 hours. Sweet. Totally doable. And then the hives appeared. And the fever. And I started feeling sick too. Two calls to the Advice Nurse, one call to her doctor, and another trip to Urgent Care later and it was clear that Amelia was having an allergic reaction to something that nobody wanted to attribute to the meds, but that was clearly from the MEDS. At the UC, it was determined that she’d caught a virus that had affected her eyes in addition to just making her sick. You know, a virus. Something that mom can catch too.

Evidence.

Swollen puffy eyes.

Hives. They started like this and then covered her from head to toe! “My Body itches Mama!”

And so it goes.

When news got out that we were sick again, I had more than one exasperated exclamation of “how do you get so sick all the time?!” It’s almost accusatory, but wrapped in sympathy too. In any case, I’ve been thinking about it a lot. Feeling defensive maybe, but also in my own exasperation. I mean W.T.F? How many times can one person get sick in the course of a season? To date, I haven’t been healthy for more than two weeks since Thanksgiving. THANKSGIVING. And when I tell people that I live with a 2-year-old trudging her way through her first year in preschool, they respond with “But she’s building an immune system. What’s WRONG WITH YOU?!”

So this is what I figured out. There are many things to blame, I’m sure. Pregnancy ails your immune system. Just when I should be adding hours to my sleep schedule, I am getting less sleep than ever. Can’t be good. But all in all, when I analyze my daily life, there’s something that stands out.

See, um, Amelia and I are close. Not like cute mama/daughter close, but borderline obsessive. Maybe a little unhealthy. Maybe a little silly. Maybe cringe-worthy and a little embarrassing. But it is. And we are. When people keep asking me how I catch toddler illnesses so easily, I guess it makes sense.

Amelia and I spend a lot of time together. I don’t work a Monday through Friday 8-5 standard job. I’m home with Amelia several days a week, just her and I. And then several other days a week with I’m home with her and her dad. Her dad works crazy long shift for half the week, making those long days mama/baby days. If I am not with her, I am at work. That is it. It’s ridiculous, the extent to which that statement is true. It’s regretful on my part in many ways (I mean, mom could use a freaking pedicure every once in a while!), it is the truth all the same. We are, I believe, spiritually connected. Cut from the same cloth. I just get her.

Oh and there were those months when she was the baby nobody could love and I held her close and cried right along. When nobody would listen to me about her abnormal crying, I knew only one thing for certain: that I was the expert on her and no stats or books or others’ experiences could cloud that. In the quiet, lonely moments of new motherhood, she was there. And in the quiet, lonely moments of my life today, she is still my partner. Or shadow. Or appendage as the case may be. And when we are together, even now, we are almost always touching. Even just sitting on the couch requires her hands wrapped around my arm. When she’s within my reach, she holds my fingers. When I sit at the bench table in the kitchen, I put her on one end and sit at the other. She slides her plate over, and sits beside me. Not just beside me, but overlapping me. On top of me to an extent so I can’t lift my own fork. This physical attachment has become a joke in our house. Justin can only laugh as she plops down on top of me in whatever situation we find ourselves. He thinks it’s just hilarious.

And the attachment is on my end too. Her new big girl bed has allowed me to slip into bed and snuggle my baby close every night. It has, and I’m crazy embarrassed to admit this, saved me from the humiliation of having my husband actually find me in our daughter’s crib. When we snuggle in the dark before sleep, our foreheads touch and fingers intertwine and sometimes we just look at each other. I whisper the things to her there that I want to stick. I’ll love you forever, Angel. There’s nothing you could ever do to make me not love you. You will always be my sweet baby love. And I would be absolutely lying if I said that I didn’t love and need those moments with her because I do.

However, it’s safe to say that I don’t shower/bathe, eat, drink, or do anything really by myself. (Seriously, there have been meltdowns because I wanted to *gasp* shower alone.)

All this on normal days in normal times.

And when she’s sick? Fuhgetaboutit. The child literally attaches herself to me. When Amelia doesn’t feel well, she develops complete tunnel vision, a world in which nobody exists but mama. Her daddy, whom she adores in a way that she could never love me, becomes totally invisible. Her Grammy, with whom she acts ridiculous and free of discipline and drenched in blind love, might as well be a troll when Amelia is sick. She blows past both of them screaming for maaaaaamaaaaa.

Innocent enough? Yeah, but it gets a lot worse. It’s beyond measure, the neeeeed she has for mama when she is sick. The other night, I couldn’t leave her with her Grammy for two seconds to pee. I had to literally push her off of me so I could stand to pull my pants up. This produced tears. Real, sad, huge tears. Because I had to pull my pants up, people! It can be exhausting. Last week, in the midst of the pink eye/hives/virus debacle, she screamed her way through a bath because god forbid, her adoring, amazing, loving daddy had the nerve to steal her from me to get clean for a few minutes. As soon as she was out of the tub, she came wailing through the house maaaaaammaaaaaa as if she’d just been tortured by some horrible child hater. She was screaming with her eyes closed, located me by sheer magnetism, and jumped into my lap, hair soaking wet, unbrushed, naked. She curled up in my blanket on my lap.

And fell right to sleep. She never even opened her eyes. Or brushed her hair. And let me tell you that picking up this dead weighted sleeping child, while scooting off the couch, and 6 months pregnant (with utero baby stretching to obscene lengths) was a sight to behold. Justin had to act like the human crane to get me up.

In any case, is it any surprise that I’m always sick? We share everything down to the space we take up on the planet. And the air we breathe.

And the crazy thing is that it’s worthy of complaint. It’s completely exhausting and draining and frustrating and literally sickening. It is why I have stayed up all night holding her so she can sleep upright and breathe, while sick and in need of rest myself. It is why I can’t get better and struggle with my own health. It is why motherhood is impossible and insane. It is not enviable in the slightest. And it is what makes me feel like I have superpowers too. Because nobody else can really do what mama does.

On Finding Out

2011-03-27T23:09:00.001-07:00

I can’t find my camera cord, so this will have to be another (new/quality) pic-less post.

We didn’t find out the baby’s sex when I was pregnant with Amelia. It wasn’t that big of a deal to us to not find out, but I was shocked by the hostile reactions we got from people when we told them that we didn’t know! It only goes to show how gendered we are as a society that people put so much emphasis on the knowing—as if there are life-shattering revelations to be found in the baby’s sex. My favorite part was answering people’s stupid questions.

Did you find out the baby’s gender?
--Well, we did not find out the baby’s sex, but I suppose we won’t know the gender for many years, seeing as there’s so many options and that’s really up to the baby.

What kind of baby are you having?
--The human kind, of course!

What are you having?
--A baby.
No, did you find out if it’s a boy or girl?
--We didn’t have to find out, we know that it’s one or the other.

Don't you WANT to know?!
--This question came out incredulously, an accusation shrouded by the question mark. As if I was already neglecting the fine details of my child for not knowing. My response? Of COURSE we wanted to know! But see, we would know. We would know the sex of that baby for the rest of his/her life. We would only not know for a few months.

That people would react negatively to the above responses shocked me the most. They acted like I’d offended them! As if they weren’t the ones asking about the contents of my uterus as if the answers somehow affected their lives. Never a thought entered their minds that maybe their desires to project a truckload of their own expectations, roles, and judgments on my unborn child might have been offensive to me, the mama. The mere thought of people making an entire identity out of such a tiny detail of this little person made my skin crawl. The truth is, it just didn’t matter to us, the outcome of the sex mystery. There are NO losing options in this game and to us, the parents, the treatment, love, and expectations would be the same either way.

Though it was our own personal decision to not find out the sex, I realized that it set many people on the defensive. I don’t judge people who do find out at all. Just didn’t want to find out for us. However, as soon as people knew that we were waiting until birth, they often went into a steep conversation of defending the choice to find out the sex of their baby. I guess it makes people feel threatened? I don’t know. But I got a slew of excuses from people that made me think about the whole issue more than most probably do. And over time, I came to realize that most of the explanations people give for themselves are pretty bogus. These are the top ‘reasons’ people find out and my response.

You didn’t find out?! I could NEVER do that!
--Of course you could. If they couldn’t identify it for your baby, you would survive. If it wasn’t an option to find out, you would survive. Our parents didn’t know and well, I think they managed. Not only that, but see, you don’t know at all for the first 20 weeks and you were just fine. If you don’t find out the sex at the Big Ultrasound, you leave knowing exactly as you knew before you went. That means, nothing changes and you’d go on just like before.

I am too much of a planner to not find out.
--My personal favorite! And absolutely false. I have three calendars, set my alarm for phone calls, send myself reminder emails, print 5 maps for every trip. I research lunch dates and got pregnant by charting my temperature every day for 2 months. I have a book full of lists on me at any given time and list books all over my house. See, I plan. I mean, I plan some shit. For realsies. We planned the month that we’d start trying to get pregnant a year in advance! And as far as I can tell, there is no planning for a baby that requires knowledge of the baby’s sex. Babies need diapers and food and sleep, no matter the genitals they possess. They need clothes and love and warmth. Babies, in terms of their clothes, walls, or sheets, really don’t care about pink or blue. I know. It’s shocking . . . but they don’t. There is not one single thing that we had to wait to plan for Amelia’s birth until we saw what she was packin in her crotch. Not. One. Thing.

When it comes down to it, people find out the sex of their babies because they want to. They are curious and don’t want to wait. What’s the big deal? Why don’t they just say that? It’s totally understandable. If you could look at a wrapped package for months or look inside to see the contents, of course you’d want to know! There’s no criticism in that. The dumb excuses? Yeah, they’re just bullshit.

This is what I can tell you about our experience with Amelia. We waited all 36 weeks leading to her birth to find out. We had hours and hours of fun and exciting conversations about the ‘what ifs.’ We created two lists of names in great anticipation. We disagreed about what the baby would be and made bets to the outcome. It was really fun. This huge mystery just sitting there waiting to be exposed. Certain the baby was a boy, I began to realize that I longed for a daughter. Maybe even because I thought for sure that I was having a boy, I couldn’t even let myself think for a moment there was a girl in there. Even strangers would walk up to me and point to my bulging uterus and say “that’s a boy in there!” Boys are great and I was happy to consider myself the mom of a boy. But this wistful voice in my head just desired a girl so very badly. Then when I went into labor, we found ourselves thrown into a frightful and traumatic event. Despite the fear of that night, the whole experienced was laced with the thrill and excitement of finding out, after all of that speculation, the sex of the baby. Which list of names would apply? Daughter or son? No losing options, but so exciting to find out. And when I heard “girl” . . . it just . . . still makes me cry. The most memorable moment in my life. Numb from the chin down, cut open from hip to hip, shaking violently, and an emotional mess at 430 in the morning, it will always be among the most magical moments I’ve experienced. Ever. Only sheer jubilation and blessing. An experience that could have never happened in an ultrasound room. An experience that would not have been without the mystery that we’d kept from ourselves. There was really nothing positive about Amelia’s birth and it was an overall horrible time. But all of it gets overshadowed by the awe I felt in seeing her and finding out that she was my daughter.

For at least 6 months after her birth, I would still find myself shocked and amazed and grateful that she is a she. Amazing in a way that life hardly ever offers us.

What’s in there?!

Not even the roughest night could stifle my joy.

(I mean, Jesus, I look like death here--but also peaceful and happy. lol)

With all of that said, we planned initially to not find out with this baby too. Knowing the experience that was finding out at birth, we didn’t want to rob ourselves of that true, sheer joy offered in the surprise.

And then things got shitty. Like, super, crazy, are-we-ever-going-to-make-it shitty. Setting aside real, grown-up LIFE stresses just to focus on health and breathing felt life-changing. Coming to the conclusion that everything we valued about ourselves was perhaps not worth valuing at all made us reevaluate everything. Our house, the shining symbol of our come uppance in the world, the actual manifestation of our own work and successes was, in the end, just a building with walls within which we refused to sink to our own destruction. Reorganizing our own goals and priorities and saying and also believing that home has nothing to do with the walls with which you surround yourself but everything about the people who hold you. Some seriously deep shit that we’ve been going through. It’s felt good to get back to basics and strip away all the stuff that gets in the way of life’s really important things, but a lot of painful work to get there too. In the past 6 months, we’ve really gone through many things that would have been very stressful alone, much less all at once. To be very frank, this pregnancy has been more of a burden than anything else. Not only has it added to my illnesses and exhaustion and inability to get better, but it has made everything else more stressful. Moving? While pregnant? Not awesome. Then the thought of adding another child to my situation has had me incredibly down. I’m already exhausted and struggling with health issues. How can I possibly nurse another child and still mother a 3-year-old? On more than one occasion, tears flowed as I asked myself “WHAT THE FUCK WAS I THINKING? WHAT MADE ME THINK I CAN DO THIS?! I DEFINITELY CAN NOT DO THIS!” (I’ve been sick enough to resign myself to never getting better so a brighter, healthier future is difficult to imagine, even if it sounds irrational.) And when the baby started moving a lot inside, I’d say, “really? You too?” Something else sucking the life outta me! I can’t do it! And worse, I didn’t know if I even wanted to. At all. On Justin’s end, his approach was to ignore the pregnancy altogether. Stressed enough about everything else, he could just put it out of his head and deal with it when the baby arrives. I would literally have to remind him that a baby was on the way, even as it got into the months and well, hard to ignore. (Don’t even get me started on how huge I am!) As you can imagine, that kinda sucked for me too. A pregnancy that was killing me for a baby I didn’t know if I wanted, and a husband ignoring it all.

Then we thought about it. And we thought that maybe, hopefully, if we found out the sex of this baby, it would help us 1) gain some reality in the situation—ahem JUSTIN! and 2) get excited about it. Maybe, we thought, if we knew the sex, it might help us see this as an actual baby instead of a miscellaneous burdensome it. The actual answer—boy/girl wouldn’t affect the excitement level, but just the knowing might help turn us around to actually, I don’t know, looking forward to the little bugger coming instead of just stress about it or even (dare I say it) dread it. And maybe it would put a fire in us to actually prepare ourselves, house, and daughter for the new baby. It might even help pull us out of this dark thicket of clouds we’ve been swimming in for the past few months and make us um, (dare I say it?) happy? Is it possible, we wondered?

Should we?

So we did.

And it DID.