never forget this

Hayden has been in the habit lately of waking up at 4am and dicking around for about 45 minutes before going back to sleep. Any by dicking around I mean crawling around the bed on top of the husband and I, babbling to herself, repeatedly shouting out “Hi!!!” in hopes that someone will open their eyes and acknowledge her, and trying to gain access to my boobs. It’s all very annoying but I have begun to learn to accept it, and to just keep my eyes closed and eventually she will go back to sleep.

This morning, she woke at her usual ungodly hour and army-crawled over to me, wrapped herself around me, put her head on my shoulder and said: “mama….mama…” in the sweetest voice, then sighed deeply and went back to sleep.

Happiness, peace…have I been waiting all of my life for this? Yes. And here it is and I never want to forget this feeling. How could I ever have existed without these two little girls of mine in this universe with me?

Truly this is bliss.

happiness

Well, well, well.

I suppose I got a bit ahead of myself assuming that I would be blogging it up here on a regular basis. I’m not going to lie and say that I’ve been far too busy at work with, well, work. I’ve been working, yes, but I have also been catching up on all of the political news, celebrity fluff and other randomness and fantastical offerings from Google that I missed over the year I was on maternity leave.

I have a small corner office located in a relatively quiet part of the building. I can sort of see a window. I have plants. I have earphones so that I can listen to music and watch you tube videos with sound. I have privacy and freedom from the demands of small, tyrannical children. Each morning I come in, plop down in my chair, kick off my grown up shoes (read: uncomfortable high heels) and drink a HOT coffee until it is done. The demands of my job are spaced out and often, I am finished what I need to do with a few hours to spare each day.

At home, things are wonderful. Hayden has FINALLY starting sleeping all night. I’m still nursing her in the morning and before bed, but she no longer wakes to feed and I am feeling much better for it. Avery sleeps most of the night in her own room and then comes in to join Hayden, the husband and I after that. Eventually, the girls will share a room together, but not until Hayden is a bit older.

We threw a 3rd birthday party for Avery last weekend. She had a blast. I think we had about 10 kids, plus her two cousins, plus the adults and my mother and father in law. It went beautifully. The husband prepared the vegan fare (pizzas, soy hot dogs, pasta and potato salads and a chocolate “princess” cake with pink icing) and everyone enjoyed. I tossed a bunch of toys out in the backyard for the kids to play with rather than having any organized games (can you imagine organizing games for a bunch of three-and-unders?) My girlfriend Karen came to stay for the weekend with her son, and while it was a lot of extra work (more on that later), it was really nice to see her and her 9 month old.

Avery is happily attending pre-school two mornings a week and the rest of the time she is home with daddy and Hayden. My husband is wonderful with the girls and they are all so close. Our marriage is very strong again; we are both happy and feel like the best friends we used to be, before all of the chaos. As the girls are getting a little less demanding and we are getting our evenings back, I’m finding that we almost never argue. After we put the girls to bed, we sit out on the deck and have a glass of wine and talk.

Hayden is starting to talk. She is still pretty whiny and very clingy with both my husband and I, but I know that this too shall pass. The other day the husband had to go have a shower so he asked Avery to keep Hayden happy for a few minutes and Avery replied by saying: “Okay Daddy, no problem. I can make her happy; I have silly faces.”

Avery is so good with her sister. They are both such empathetic and loving people. I have no worries that they will be close for the rest of their lives.

I have a 3 year old, a fifteen month old, a husband, a full time job, and a house and garden to keep but somehow I am finding a balance. This is happiness, and I have been waiting for it for a long time.

adjustment period

I made it through 3 weeks so far. Being back at work is not what I thought it was going to be. I mean, the workload, the people, all that stuff is still the same. I really thought I was going to get a sort of mental break from being at home with the girls, and by association, I would be able to dig my personality back out from under the motherhood pile. This is silly now that I look back on it because my personality has never really gone anywhere; I’ve just added some new dimensions to it, namely dedicated mother.

As for the mental break, I don’t feel refreshed or free at all. I just miss Avery and Hayden terribly. The first week was by far the worst. I was crying every night after the girls went to bed. Coming back to work created such a deep sense of loss that I truly went into a sort of mourning period. I just kept agonizing about all of the time I am going to miss with them now. Hayden has been having a hard time with me being back too. I have been sneaking out of the house in the mornings so that she won’t see me. The husband tells me that she doesn’t cry for long after I leave, but when I come home she will not let me go. If she sees me walk in the door I can forget about going pee and getting changed out of my work clothes. She will scream and cry until she is in my arms.

I know this will get easier for Hayden and for me. Avery has accepted that I go to work now and she gives me a kiss and tells me she loves me before I leave. When I come home she bounces over to see me with a big smile on her face, ready to tell me about her day. I think going to pre-school three days a week has helped Avery to be apart from her father and I, and in turn she has been able to deal with me going back to work a lot better than she would have a few months ago.

Of course, my husband being home with the girls has made it a lot easier for me to leave. He was able to trade all of his day shifts for the year. We won’t have to worry about daycare (save for the few evenings a month when my girlfriend looks after the girls at her house for an hour while the husband leaves for work and I return home) until next January. I am looking into getting a nanny.

The guilt I assume will never go away. This is just something I am going to have to accept. I don’t know what is harder: staying home with the kids or working full-time. I know my patience was running thin towards the end of this maternity leave and I was looking forward to getting away for a bit, but now that I am working I feel even more stress trying to get everything done and then I am short with the girls anyway. And boy do I ever feel shitty about that. I am away from them all week and then I feel like a terrible mother if I lose my patience with them on the weekend.

Hayden is still waking up 3-4 times a night so I am definitely sleep-deprived, which I know contributes to the lack of patience.

Anyway.

There is a lot going on, not just as far as the girls’ development, but of course with family and friends and all that good stuff so I will make sure to explore these subjects more closely in the next entry. Until then, I will put my head down and work until the hours pass and I can be home with the girls again.

looking back, looking ahead

Where has the time gone?

Hayden is almost six months old, Avery has turned 2. I was going to give up on this blog because I don't even have time to take a shower these days, but the other day I was thinking that this is probably a good way to keep a record of the girls, help me blow off some steam, and to remind me to be thankful and appreciative of the litle things...and the big things.

Hayden was colicky from 6weeks old to about 3 months old. I was so worried that I was going to have a really unhappy, high needs baby. Avery was pretty high needs but never had the colic so I was not too impressed. In fact, I went down the rabbit hole again and fell under the spell of post-partum depression. I pulled myself out of it after a couple of months and have remained pretty happy since.

I've learned to appreciate babyhood, and also to let myself sometimes wish for it to be over, but only on the very hard days. I have learned to appreciate the relationship that my husband and I have. Having babies with someone changes a relationship in many ways. After my husband watched me try to push a baby out, have two c-sections, and help me go pee and wipe and put my underwear on me in the hospital, it has finally opened my eyes to the fact that this man loves me. All of me. And he loves our girls. I think he is one of the best fathers out there. We have bad days, but I would say that the good ones outnumber the hard ones.

I'm going to keep writing in this blog because I have lots to write about. I have wonderful, beautiful, happy children and I want to document them. I'm going to do my best to write often, though I think this is a lofty goal right now.

For now I'll squeeze a few sentences in here and there between baby naps and loads of laundry.

home with my girls

chocolate cookies

Avery: 20 months old.

I am hopelessly in love with this girl.

Dear Hayden

I am 32 weeks pregnant with you today. In exactly six weeks, at approximately 3:45pm, you will be born. Someday, when you and your sister look through your baby books, you’ll notice that I wrote her many letters when I was pregnant with her. Mostly, this is because I had a lot more time in those days, and the whole pregnancy thing was new and scary to me, and I was amazed that I was finally getting to become a mother. This time is equally amazing, but the anxiety and fear are absent, and most days I find that my mind is preoccupied with other things – usually things having to do with your sister Avery, or work, or family stuff.

You can be sure that you are just as wanted and loved (already) as Avery. We started trying for you in July of 2008. You daddy and I decided that we would like our children to be close together in age because we wanted them to be best friends for each other. I was pregnant with you in August. I found out two weeks after I had returned to work from my maternity leave with your sister. Daddy and I were thrilled.

You have been good to me throughout this pregnancy, and despite my gallstones, everything has gone very well. Though you will not be my first born, I can assure you that you are no less important, and in many ways, you are much luckier than your sister. You are being born to a mother who worked out all the kinks with the first baby and is much more confident in her skills now than she was the first time around. Avery taught me how to love unconditionally, to sacrifice my everything for another human being, to be patient, to enjoy breastfeeding, and to keep my babies close to me, even at night. Your daddy and I have a better, more secure and even more loving relationship with each other than we did before having children.

Also, I can’t tell you how thrilled I was to find out that you are a girl. I am in heaven. Two girls are what I have always wanted.

Daddy rearranged the bedroom and set up your co-sleeper yesterday. Your sister still sleeps with us and we don’t plan on changing that until everyone is ready. We got and still do get a lot of criticism for having our babies sleep in our room, but thankfully your daddy and I have ignored all of the bad advice. After we had Avery, your dad and I changed our lifestyle for the better. We became vegetarian, we stopped eating processed food, and we dug up our backyard and made it into one big vegetable garden. I embraced breastfeeding and nursed your sister until she weaned herself at 15 months and plan on doing the same with you. I learned to let housework and other things slide in favour of spending my time enjoying my baby and my husband. Perhaps one of the best things is that I am going to stay home with you and your sister for a few years. Your father and I have shifted our priorities and decided that family time is the most important thing. Work is necessary to provide us with an income but we can get away with having me at home for a few years and feel that this will be best for you and Avery. The hardest thing I ever did was leave your sister to go back to work full time.

I know Avery is going to be a wonderful big sister. You are coming into a loving, warm and happy house, and we are all so excited to meet you.

Until then, keep growing strong and I will see you soon my sweet girl.

Love,

Mum

xoxo

30 weeks pregnant

I’m still here. We have been battling virus after virus at our house these past few weeks and I swear I have never been so tired in my life.

I am now 30 weeks pregnant and Hayden is feeling pretty huge to me, maybe even bigger than Avery was at this point. It’s weird how this second pregnancy has not been as big of a deal as my first. I feel like time has flown by and some days I even forget that I’m pregnant (well, not lately given the size of my tummy). I guess with having a toddler, a full time job and all the other stuff in life, I just don’t have time to sit around and reflect on this pregnancy.

I have not written any letters to Hayden yet and I’m feeling a little guilty about that. I have made it a priority to do at least a couple of them before she is born. I am scheduled to have my c-section on April 16th at 3:45pm. I find it very strange to be able to write the exact date and time of the birth of my second daughter in my planner. Besides the horrible heartburn and the gallstones, this pregnancy has been a pretty good one. I can’t believe it’s almost over. Most days, I am filled with excitement about the new baby; on other days, I’m a little worried about Avery and how she is going to feel about the whole thing. I’m also worried that I’m going to have postpartum depression again. I have spoken to my OB about it and have the name and number of a psychologist but I just haven’t been able to bring myself to call. Every now and again, I get a faint hint of the depression and anxiety. Is this when I started to get it with Avery? Before I had her? I can’t remember. I know the feeling well though. These tiny little reminders of it could be nothing, or they could be the first few dark clouds passing over the sun before the storm rolls in.

I am going to see how I feel over the next few weeks and make a decision about the psychologist then.

In the meantime, I’m wrapping things up at work and looking forward to being able to be home with my children for a few years, because truly that makes me a very lucky mother indeed.

the halcyon holidays

It has been quite a while since I’ve updated this thing. Christmas was crazy and tantrum-filled (many of those tantrums were thrown by me) as we hauled ass from place to place, visiting people I could really care less about for the most part and explaining to family members over and over that no, we do not eat turkey – we are vegetarian – turkey is meat. So is chicken. So is fish. We don’t eat that shit. So don’t pass the fucking turkey thanks so much.

The husband was working day shift on Christmas Day so I went solo to my dad’s house with Avery. I made my dad promise me over and over that no one would be smoking in the house while his pregnant daughter and lovely granddaughter were there and he assured me that no one would be smoking in the house. As soon as his girlfriend’s broke-ass relatives arrived, they all grabbed the rye and headed for the basement where they proceeded to smoke like it was bingo night. I had to explain to my father and his girlfriend that even though those motherfuckers were smoking in the basement, it did not mean that the smoke was not travelling up through the house. Also, the dinner table was set up in the basement, so there was no way in hell I would be eating down there.

So after spending the entire afternoon running around after Avery without any help, she and I ended up eating upstairs by ourselves while all the assholes gorged downstairs. I’m happy to report that of the two turkeys cooked that day, one of them succeeded in sickening several of the dinner guests. Ha!

And sadly, after all of my plans to get my mother in law the most thoughtless, cheap and horrible birthday gift in the history of all birthday gifts, my gallbladder threw a wrench into the whole thing, choosing to attack me on not one, but two occasions before her birthday and I ended up re-gifting some crap that I got for early Christmas gifts from other thoughtless people. I did manage to include some dollar store candles that I am hoping will prove to be nothing more than lead filled fire hazards. I picture her sitting on her couch next to one as it burns away, pretending to read one of her Oprah’s book club books while inhaling the carcinogens. It warms the cockles of me heart, it does.

Anyhoo the big story of the Christmas holidays was the day that she and the other members of my dysfunctional in-laws came over to our house. Once everyone was seated, I brought her the birthday gift I got for her. She opened it and thanked me and then I notice her jump up, grab a card from her purse, then get a pen from her purse, open the card and begin writing in it. I did not think anything of it until I opened my birthday card from her and saw that in blue ink was written “Happy Birthday from blank and blank” and in black ink, hastily scribbled on the other side of the card read “you might want a massage after you have the baby so let us know and we will pay for it”.

She had failed to get my anything but a cheap card for my birthday. And once she realized that I am not a total shit like she is, and I actually made some effort for her, she tried to secretly write that massage crap in my card without me noticing.

That’s one.

Then, when Avery was trying to get my father in law to sit and colour with her, he kneeled down and drew a cat on the paper for her and then stood up to walk away. Avery chased after him to get him to come back and colour. My mother in law piped up “She wants you to draw with her” she said to him. And literally whining he said “I just did. I drew her a cat. What else am I supposed to draw?”

Rage is not the word. If he had turned and looked at me at that moment my eyes would have burned a hole through his flesh.

Dear readers (if there are any of you left), I am done with that family. I have not spoken to any of them since.

For now, this is all I care to write on the subject as I am still seething with rage. I am trying to calm down and not let it poison me, but today when my father in law called the house (I believe this is literally the 3rd time he has EVER called our house) it was not to check in and see how Avery was feeling after having been sick with fever for the last four days, it was to borrow my husband’s air-nailer.

I’m about ready to let loose. It’s going to happen soon. I will blog about the event Stay tuned.

this is going to be a long one...

As I heaved my pregnant body out of bed this morning and tried to waddle as quietly as I could out of the room so as not to wake Avery and the husband (yes she still sleeps in our bed – tsk tsk away if you must) the floor groaned underneath me as the weight of the day to come settled itself on my shoulders. As usual, I spend my time in the shower worrying and washing. I go over my to-do list while I blow dry my hair, and by the time I get in the car to head to the office, I feel overwhelmed.

It is silly, because I have a lot to be thankful for and not much to worry about. I just find that things start to get unmanageable at this time of year. I think this all began when my mother called the other day and began telling me how I have never done anything for her and I should be getting more involved in the ongoing divorce saga between her and my father and he is such an evil man and how can I still talk to him…and her psychiatrist thinks that her children should be doing more for her and don’t we understand how sick and depressed she is….blah blah blah. This was all while my daughter screamed and cried in the background for her dinner and husband was just coming in the door from work and my uterus was hardening itself up against the enormous amounts of stress hormones that my body was beginning to pump out as a result of this phone call. I think I am beginning to hate my mother.

This is a fairly usual conversation that my mother and I have. To get into the details and history of the relationship and the circumstances of everything on this blog would be a tremendous undertaking and one that I am not willing to put effort into. Suffice it to say that my mother is wrong and very selfish and I am pregnant, tired, looking after a toddler and truly do not need to put up with her shit anymore.

Next item:

Avery has become very obsessive about dirt. She does not like it on her hands (by dirt I mean food particles, marker, fluff from the carpet…I could go on) and the other day she took a cloth down from the countertop and began wiping the floor with it, grunting away on her hands and knees, saying “dirty, dirty” over and over again. At first, I thought it was really funny and got out the video camera. Then I started to wonder where she would be getting this from. I certainly never get down on my hands and knees to wash the floors. I am definitely not a clean freak either. I can only assume that she is getting it from her daycare provider – my girlfriend who lives next door. This woman has convinced my daughter that dirt, poop and wet socks are horrible things and Avery has absorbed all of this. She has truly become obsessed. Also, she is afraid of feathers (in particular the down feathers that sometimes escape from our duvet) and fluffy things on the carpets. I have to remove the offending feather or “fluffy” from her sight and flush it down the toilet where we stand and say goodbye to it while Avery furrows her brow and asks me 500 times if it is gone yet. Is this normal? I AM NOT encouraging this. I try to make it out like it is not a big deal but she remains upset. I don’t know what to do.

Next item:

Secret (fucking) Santa at work. You draw a name; you spend $20 on a gift for this person. I got the name of a contract employee who I do not know very well and who will be gone in a few months. I have left this to the last minute and now must run out at lunch and get something for Thursday this week. For fucks sake.

Next item:

The potluck, also this Thursday, at our office. I have volunteered to bring potato (fucking) salad. When am I going to make this? Husband is on nights and I have barely enough time to get dinner and bath done with a very demanding toddler at night. I have found a solution: I will buy a giant tub of potato salad from the market after work tonight and add some chives and possibly slices of kosher pickles to make it look authentic.

Next item:

Christmas (fucking) cards. Haven’t even started them. Was informed by husband that I need to get on this because we have received a bunch from some of the Captains and even the Chief of his department so I had better send them one as well. Ugh.

Next item:

Christmas day dinner at my father’s house with his girlfriend’s half-retarded family members, Avery and no husband because he is on day shift. My father asked that we do not do gifts this year, which is fine. He called me the other day to tell me that he hopes I will not be upset but he did get gifts for his girlfriend, her children (22 and 25) and MY OWN BROTHER but the whole “not doing gifts this year” still applies to me.

Next item:

Boxing Day with the in-laws. The only thing that is going to light up this day is the absolutely horrible gift I will be giving to my mother in law, which I still have not put together yet. But I am looking forward to that. As for the rest of it, I can only say that if I were not pregnant, I would be half in the bag by the time they came over to our house.

I think that about does it for now. I am going to muddle through this week and then try to mentally block out the holidays and soon it will all be over!

Fa la la la la.

Last night I had a dream. It scared the shit out of me.

I’d like to think that I’m not a complete wimp, but my sub-conscious decides to give me a reality check every once in awhile. I guess I thought I was just mildly upset about finding out I had gallstones. And I guess I was more angry than anything else initially about it because it’s one more fucking thing I have to deal with and now I have (almost) two babies to take care of and I can’t afford to be out of commission. Also, going under with anesthetic scares me.

Anyway, last night I dreamt that I was having my c-section. The husband was there and when they took Hayden out, he followed her over to the little “baby cleaning area” to take pictures, leaving me alone on the table. The nurse pulled the blue sheet that obscures ones view of the carnage away and I looked down to find that they had forgotten to stitch me up. Instead, the nurse had just covered the opening into my abdominal cavity with a white towel. At this point, something told me that I didn’t have much time so I called to my husband to bring the baby over to me but he wasn’t listening. It was all very dramatic. When I woke up from the dream, I was very upset. It was about 3am and I didn’t get much sleep after that. I kept worrying about dying and leaving my babies, and gallbladder surgery and anesthetic and infection in the hospital and blah, blah, blah.

I know that everything will be fine. I think that I have reached that point in my life when the realization that none of us are invincible has hit me. I am not invincible. I am meat and chemicals and brain and things can go wrong with those parts. I guess it didn’t bother me before because I didn’t have children who needed me. It’s so strange to feel so necessary and needed. Some days it takes my breath away. Some days I don’t even think about it.

The other night the husband and I were debating whether or not to stop in at a friend’s Christmas Party this weekend. We could drop Avery off next door for a couple of hours and drive the 40 minutes to our friend’s house, have a drink and a quick visit and then leave. We eventually decided that it wasn’t worth it. Then my husband said something that I had totally been thinking but was too afraid to say out loud for fear that he would think I was crazy. He said: “What if we got in a car accident on the way home and both died? You know, there are lots of drunks on the road at this time of year. Who the hell would Avery have if she didn’t have us?”

Holy shit. We are never getting in a car together again. Well, that’s a bit extreme. But obviously, both of us have seriously grown up a hell of a lot. And both of us are deeply connected to and in love with our baby. And it’s nice to know that I’m not the only crazy one in the house. It will be one of those fragile days for me I guess. Like I said, there are days when I do feel invincible still, but more in a determined way, not in an ignorant self-important way. Those are the days when you feel like a lion watching over your pride – you are big and strong and can protect your family from anything that comes along. I like those days the best.

But today, I am a rabbit.

mish mash

I’m finding it harder to concentrate at work these days. I can’t seem to motivate myself the way I used to. Perhaps this is because I know that I am not coming back after my maternity leave this time. I’ve flip-flopped on this a couple of times. Some days I realize how lucky I am to have such a great job within a 15 minute commute from my home. I worry that there will not be a position open for me in a few years time should I decide to come back. Technically, and legally, they only have to hold my job for me for a year. I know that they would take me back if something was available when I wanted to come back but there is no guarantee that there will be something and who the hell knows where we will be then anyway.

As much as I like my job, I do feel like it is a waste of time. I leave the house by 730am and I am gone all day until 430pm. I really miss that time with my daughter and she misses me. I sit behind a desk all day while my daughter plays, learns, laughs, bonds with other people (which is important, I know) but I miss a lot.

This morning as I sit here listening to the twit in the cubicle next to me scrape at the bottom of her empty yogurt container as if she hasn’t eaten in months (just buy a bigger yogurt next time), and delete yet another e-mail forward from the crazy cat lady who I now call “silent thunder” because she smells like farts every few minutes without making a sound, I am thankful that I get to stay home with my children. As “productive” as one might feel at work, I still think being home with your kids (and being happy) is the best way to spend time.

The egg is kicking away. Avery is finally weaned and I can say, very proudly, that it was on her schedule, and we took as much time as she needed to do it sensitively and compassionately. At night, instead of nursing her, we curl up in the bed and read a book. Then she snuggles into me and we stare at each other and whisper “night night” about a hundred times while she smiles at me and plays with my hair. Finally she closes her eyes and I feel her body relax and she is asleep. It is heavenly.

I got an OB the other day. She is a woman (yay!) and came highly recommended so I am hoping I’ll like her. She is going to be the person cutting me open after all so I hope I’m comfortable with her. I see her at the end of this month.

That’s it for now. Next time I update will probably be about my BRAND NEW FREAKING DIGITAL CAMERA that I am getting thanks to my husband and eBay. We managed to get it for $500 less than retail. I am finally going to have a decent camera. Things just keep getting better!

on motherhood

This week, I felt the egg move. I remember feeling Avery move pretty early on too, and I remember being told by my doctor and a few other people that what I was feeling was “just gas”. Of course, they were all wrong.

And you know what? There were a lot of “they’s” who were very wrong about a lot of things concerning pregnancy and birth and being a parent. Wouldn’t it be nice if I could go back in time and tell that to my newly pregnant self? However, I am a stronger girl for it and I feel that because I have stuck by most of my convictions, I have become a pretty good mother. And Avery in turn, is a happy little girl.

My husband and I don’t bother to discuss the specifics of how we raise our children with other people anymore. We found that we encountered a lot of criticism when we did, a lot of “well meant” advice that often times made us feel guilty and like we were doing the wrong thing. And I really don’t think we are so far off the “traditional” path of parenthood, but when you have your baby sleep in the bed with you, carry her in a sling everywhere all day, breastfeed on demand and wean when she is ready, you open yourself up to a lot of comments.

Now that I’m a mother, I cannot imagine trying to give another woman advice about how to take care of her children. Much of the time I think the advice I get from other women is bullshit. And much of the time I realize that, at least in our society, we try to fit out babies into our lives as best we can by scheduling them, getting them distraction toys like Exersaucers to sit in for hours (seriously, my nephew is in one for at least 3 hours a day) while we “get things done”, letting them cry it out so they learn sleep independence, carting them around in strollers and car seats instead of on us in slings, and in some cases, choosing to formula feed for the convenience factor.

As much as I think that all of that stuff is the “wrong way” to parent, I would never dream of criticizing another woman for doing those things. And one would think that given the fact that I have a healthy, happy, smart, loved baby that people would give me credit for the good job I have been doing. Instead they focus on the wrong things and tell me that my baby is manipulating me, or that I need to get her used to being on her own for independence.

I was at a Halloween party last weekend where all the mothers from one of my mom groups all got together with our babies and our husbands as an excuse to dress the kids up and get some cute pictures. For the entire 3 hours that I was there, I noticed that one of the babies, 10 months old, sat in a corner of the room by herself the entire time. Her mum came in, plunked her down, and then off she went to eat and socialize. The baby’s father was there too, but he was ignoring her as well. There were no tears, or even a peep for that matter, in fact both of the parents joked about how easy she was because they could just leave her alone and she didn’t mind. So is this baby independent? Or has she learned that she is not going to get the attention so she has become more inwardly focused? In our group, and in many others, she is deemed a good baby and it is left at that. But this baby rarely smiles when you coo at her and I think that is sad. I know my daughter can be rambunctious and full of energy all day long, which sometimes wears on me, but I am thankful that she is happy, curious and fun-loving as a result of being the centre of my life. Which is the way it should be, in my opinion.

I still take care of myself, I still make time for my husband and get out with friends, but Avery can count on me anytime she needs me. I know that this has made our relationship incredibly strong. How anyone could challenge me on that I don’t understand. I try to keep these things in mind as I prepare to have my second child.

Motherhood is hard enough on us. I think we can all do without the criticism.

the plastic baby bin

The other day, the husband and I were discussing our plans for the birth of number #2, or “the egg” as we now call him/her. Since I have to have a c-section again, I know I will be in the hospital for at least 2 nights. Originally, the husband suggested having my father stay over at our house overnight with Avery for those nights so that he could stay with me in the hospital. I realized immediately this would not work as a) Avery sleeps in a bed with us and there is no way in hell my dad would be able to put her down and go sleep somewhere else, and b) my dad is an alcoholic (between the hours of 3pm – bedtime) and I really don’t think that jives with taking care of my daughter.

A funny thing happened to me after I had a baby: I stopped being a total pussy. I waved my husbands suggestions of him staying with me off and told him that he could stay home with Avery and I could manage by myself in the hospital. I really do feel cool about that. When I was in the hospital after having Avery, I was terrified to be alone. Mostly because the surgery seriously restricted my movement, but also because I had a brand new baby and I didn’t know what to do.

This time, I could be abandoned on a desert island and I know I would be just fine. The only thing I have to worry about is being assertive enough with the nurses who insist I keep the new baby in that little plastic bin beside the bed while I sleep. Hell no sister. First of all, the bin is not right beside the bed, secondly, when the baby cries, I will have to page and wait for a nurse to get him/her for me. Fuck that shit yo. I’ll do what I did with Avery – the baby sleeps on me, I prop pillows around us so no one falls out of bed. What other mammal, or even animal for that matter has a baby and then leaves it on the other side of the nest/cave/in some bushes around the corner?

Anyway. I have an ultrasound next Thursday. This is the one that makes me nervous because we are seeing for the first time if everything is okay. I’m sure it is based on the fact that I have been so sick, I am beginning to look 5 months pregnant rather than 3, and I’m totally serious about this: I can feel some tiny little movements in there. Crazy, I know, but true.

We’re going to bring Avery with us so she can see the new baby, not that she’ll really care, but this is more for us than her I guess. My husband wanted all of us to be there because “it should be a family thing.” I think that is really sweet of him.

In other news: I have yet another cold and I am literally dragging myself through the day here at work. I have a feeling I will not be returning after lunch.

daycare woes

Avery cried for me when I dropped her off this morning. My heart shattered. Was I complaining about her not even saying goodbye to me before?

Each morning I pack up her breakfast, lunch and snacks to send her to daycare with. For the last three days I have been giving her yogurt, fruit and a slice of carrot loaf for breakfast. As I have not seen the carrot loaf come back in her bag at night, I guess I assumed she was eating it. So I keep packing it, thinking she really likes it. I casually asked my girlfriend about it this morning. It went something like this:

“She seems to like this carrot loaf. She has been eating it every morning right?” I ask.

“Oh no. She won’t even touch it. I kept trying but she wasn’t interested.” said girlfriend/caregiver.

“…” me. Wondering what the fuck she has been doing with the carrot loaf then. Is she eating it?

Also this morning: every single person in that house has a cold. A cold with a nasty cough. Fucking fantastic. Guess what we’ll all be doing next week? I just love having horrible colds whilst being pregnant and looking after a toddler. Oh yes, and working full time. Awesome.

I hate leaving my daughter and I especially hate leaving her in a house full of sick people. Not only that but since she has been going there on Monday, she has had bad gas and runny poop. Every day. Is it teething? Is my girlfriend sneaking her processed, non-organic crap food?

Tomorrow, thank jeebus, both my husband and I are home. I don’t think I could handle another day of leaving her at daycare. Remind me of this next year when I am home with two of them and complaining about not having any “me” time. Truly the current arrangement sucks more for all of us.

this week sucks

This is Avery’s first week of full-day daycare. She is only going Monday to Thursday, and she is being looked after by my girlfriend who literally lives next door to my house, but still I worried. On Monday morning I dropped her off and she didn’t even look back at me – just ran into the house to play with my girlfriend’s kids. I was pretty happy about this and felt a little less guilty than usual on my way to work (I feel guilty even if she is home with dad – I feel guilty that I have to leave her period) and then my girlfriend called me after lunch to let me know that she had been able to put Avery down for a nap with no problems.

This is the kid that I have to struggle with in order to get her to sleep. She will not go to sleep without nursing and usually it takes about 20-30 minutes to get her to pass out so I can sneak out of the room. Then I get about an hour of nap time from her.

My girlfriend walked her upstairs, told her it was “night-night” time, then laid her down in the playpen and walked out of the room. Avery went to sleep right away. She slept for two and a half freaking hours. No crying. Nothing. While I am very happy that she loves her daycare and has adjusted so well, part of me was kind of annoyed. What the hell have I been doing wrong? Last weekend, we went over to the house of a mum I met through one of my groups. A bunch of us went and brought the babies. I am the only mother still struggling with sleep issues. All of the other kids are either sleeping right through the night or waking only once. Last night Avery was up 7 times.

At work I hear some of the other mothers of toddlers talking about how well their kids are sleeping.

I know every child is different but I think I am getting pretty burnt out. Being pregnant doesn’t help as I am extra tired and definitely not getting the sleep I need. But come on. 7 times? And that is pretty average. Occasionally we have a few good nights where she will only wake up twice and settle herself, but I could use more of these nights.

Avery cannot wait to go over to my girlfriend’s house. Again, I am happy that she is so happy there but I feel jealous in this weird way. Avery wanders around chanting my girlfriends name and this morning I could barely get her shoes on she was so excited to go over there. I’m starting to feel like kind of a second rate mother. Like maybe Avery is happier over there than with me. When I went to pick her up last night she came over to me, smiling, handed me a toy and then took off again. This might sound ridiculous but I was shattered. I had to coax her to come home with me.

Maybe this is all normal, maybe its pregnancy hormones. Maybe I’m just overtired and overextended. With the husband working days, I’m alone for the morning and evening routines. I have to get all the shit together in the mornings, get myself ready, and get Avery ready by 7:30am. At night, I stop at the store; pick up Avery and then struggle to get everything tidied and dinner made. Then I have to pack lunches and breakfast for the next day.

This is gross, but you know what I realized the other day? I have been wearing the same bra for over 2 weeks. The other ones were washed and left in the laundry room to dry and I haven’t even bothered/found the time to go get a clean one. My hair was last washed 3 days ago and I am wearing yesterday’s leftover makeup. Tonight I have no fucking idea how to make dinner, give Avery a bath and then get myself in the shower all before her “bedtime”. And by bedtime I mean an hour of me trying to get her down.

10 weeks pregnant this Thursday. First ultrasound scheduled for October 16th. Hopefully all is well with “the egg” as my husband and I call the new baby. I find I barely even think about the pregnancy beyond taking my prenatal vitamin every morning.

This is why I am not going back to work for a few years after baby #2. How the hell do people do this 5 days a week every week?

sick sick sick

8 weeks this Thursday.

I don’t think I was this sick with Avery. I’ve been taking my Diclectin to combat the nausea, but it doesn’t seem to be doing the trick this time. I am having a really hard time eating anything. Breakfast is not so bad, but by lunch time I can’t even stand the thought of eating, let alone the smells from the cafeteria downstairs. Hopefully, this all goes away in the second trimester. I can deal with the tiredness, but feeling sick all the time really sucks.

Avery is doing really well. She’s talking up a storm (I think she can say about 10 words now). I can’t believe how much fun she is now. I am longing for the days (mere months from now) where I can be home with her again.

That’s all for now. Work has been terribly busy and I can’t seem to get everything done. Back to the grind.

a snapshot of family life

Each time I pick up the camcorder to record something Avery is doing, and husband is not in the room, I call out “I’m recording!” and then procede with my filming. So at the beginning of every single one of our home movies, you will hear me yelling out this warning. Every single one. I call it a warning because this is exactly what it is. I am trying to preserve our precious memories in such a way that they are free from ‘daily occurrences’ in our house that might either, a)embarrass us in the future when we are watching these videos, or b) render them completely unwatchable due to any one or even all of the following:

Language peppered with the word “fuck” in its various and varied forms.

Brief nudity (usually this occurs when husband come out of the kitchen to offer me a taste of what he is preparing for dinner and either has his pants pulled down to display his ass when he walks away, or the other form which involves the front of his pants and a zipper. I won’t go into this one, suffice it to say that these happen regularly enough to warrant my concern over them showing up on video).

Mother-in-law insults. Example: On one of our Christmas videos, I say “Sounds like what your mother does every night” in response to my husband instructing me to “put some alcohol (rubbing alcohol) on it” in reference to the cleaning and disinfecting of Avery’s high chair.

Our wrong and sometimes wholly inappropriate way of joking around with each other.

Arguments, name calling etc.

As careful as I am with this one part of our private lives, it did not stop me last evening from walking out onto the back patio, with baby in arms, while telling husband that I thought he was “a dick” and that I was “sick of listening to his shit” to the auditory delight of all of our neighbors who were outside barbequing their dinners.

Classy.

poo

Well, I must admit that returning to work has gone exceptionally well. And I’m going to be honest: I am enjoying being cloistered away in a little office, free of interruption (other than occasional office fucktard who comes to complain to me about some nonsense or to ask me how my weekend was) drinking my Starbucks – sorry – FINISHING my Starbucks while it is still warm. Oh the Googling I have been doing! You see, when you come back after maternity leave, in an office comprised of 90% women, everyone leaves you alone to “get adjusted”. I have nothing to do. This is heaven.

Mind you it’s not all roses. Avery is still waking up MANY times overnight. She has got to be the worst sleeper in the history of sleepers. Yesterday she had a 25 minute nap and then was up being her usual spastic self for the rest of the day until I finally wrestled her to sleep at 8pm, only to have her wake up half an hour later so that I had to spend another 20 minutes putting her back down. When I came out of the room, husband was beckoning me to the living room with a glass of red wine and an interesting documentary on the TV. As I crept quietly towards him I must have stepped on 18 strategically placed toys. I say strategically placed because I am convinced that she leaves these toys on the ground in the exact path we take to put her to bed. I picture her methodically dropping them as we carry her off to the bedroom as if leaving a path of stones behind her to mark her trail in the woods, knowing that mum and daddy will wake her up when they slip and fall or kick some noisy toy and start it singing and then she will be able to come out and play again. I managed to escape this fate last night. This is not usually the case.

At least she has started walking a bit by herself now, which makes life more interesting for her and helps us get more of her energy out. We have also taught her to say “poo” and then make the requisite grunting noises which accompany the process. Because we use cloth diapers, we have to dump her poop into the toilet. One day, when she was doing her usual screaming and writhing around on the change table, I decided to distract her by showing her what had just come out of her bum.

“Look,” I said. “Poo!”

I repeated this a couple of times until she finally said it. Then we cleaned her up, marched into the bathroom, and flushed to poop down the toilet while Avery yelled “BYE!” over and over. Now she tells us right before she goes (most of the time) which is fucking amazing, I think. Then she bears down and it is one of the cutest things I have ever seen.

On Saturday, the husband and I were at a hardware store. I was keeping Avery distracted by walking around with her while husband went to get something. We turned the corner where there was a bathroom on display. Avery tightened her grip on my hand and then started RUNNING towards the toilet screaming “BYE! BYE! BYE!”

It took us ten minutes to get her away from it.

I hope this means that the toilet training will go smoothly.

the size of watermelons

Today is my second day back at work from my maternity leave. Yesterday, if you can believe it, I was too busy to post. Instead of a long, weepy post about how much I miss Avery (and I do, in such a horrible, soul-draining way), I’m going to try to be a bit more upbeat.

Let’s start with the title of this post.

1. I have not stopped breastfeeding Avery. She was fine yesterday as she mostly eats solids all day anyway. I had no idea that missing one or two small feedings (or what I thought were small feedings) in a day would result in giant porno boobs. When I got home last night she nursed for like 20 minutes, just on one boob, while the other one leaked. Luckily, she nursed a few times last night and the engorgement went down on both sides. The problem now is that my tits appear to be confused and just keep producing. All day and all night. I just went to the washroom here and caught the side profile of myself in the mirror. The size of my breasts is ridiculous…so much so that I am actually feeling a little self-conscious about it.

2. Speaking of the mirror in the washroom here – my ass looks fantastic. Really. I put on my favourite black work pants this morning and I have to admit, things are looking pretty good.

3. Holy shit, my job is boring. I totally forgot about that while I was away.

4. I am already sick of the mindless, soul-sucking, eye-rollingly annoying, vapid conversations the women around here have with each other. I don’t care if the dress you are wearing to the party is “Bordeaux” coloured, or that the engagement ring your douche bag fiancé gave you is a “princess cut”. Please stop interrupting me while I am trying to get caught up on very important celebrity news on Perez Hilton.com

5. Hello again Internet. I’m back and I am going to enjoy hours of mindless Googling, uninterrupted by a whining 1 year old.

6. No one cool or interesting sits near me anymore.

7. I hope I get pregnant this month.