We were on a family vacation last week. During that vacation, E turned one. I cannot believe how incredibly quickly that year went by. I mean, B's first year was fast, sure, but this past year? It was a heartbeat. And now my sweet baby girl is a year old. It has been absolutely awesome, watching her grow through her first year. She is an absolute delight, a tiny force of nature, a silly monkey.
Last Thursday, she was playing with her cousin and fell and hit her head. She was dazed and listless, so we called 911. Admittedly, I was basically incapacitated by panic. I won't even try to front. By the time the ambulance arrived, she was more or less back to normal, and by the time we got to the hospital, even more so. We stayed in the ER for about an hour and a half for observation, and in that time, she chowed a bottle and charmed the entire ER staff. Needless to say, this was even more indication that she was back to normal, so we were released. It was just a few hours, but it was the longest few hours of my life.
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
So Behind
I'm so behind on my blogging. I've begun several entries recently that went un-finished. I at least owe a brief download of what's up.
- Two weeks ago, my childhood friend Heather lost her husband in Afghanistan. He was a Marine EOD Tech (like the guys in The Hurt Locker), and a true American hero. Please join me in offering her prayers and healing energy as she navigates this unimaginably difficult journey.
-This Saturday is the March for Babies in Boston. I'll be participating once again with my family. Please consider supporting the March of Dimes. They are an amazing organization. I began my involvement after some dear friends lost their premature baby girl and I felt really helpless. Volunteering with them has been among the best experiences of my life.
-My seemingly invincible grandmother, who is 96 years old, is having a rough go of it. She's had them in the past and I've discussed them here, and she's bounced back in ways that have amazed her family. I know that she misses my grandfather every day, and I'm so grateful that she's stuck around for all of us.
-I still owe an update on the Liebster blog award I was nominated for several weeks ago. I haven't forgotten about it, per se...it's just that every time I think about the fact that I owe an update, I don't actually have the time to write one. I will.
-I also still owe an update on my PPD/PPA situation. I've stopped nursing and have begun meds and things seem to be improving a little bit. Hoping to continue that trend, and will update as the situation warrants.
Hope all is well with everyone.
- Two weeks ago, my childhood friend Heather lost her husband in Afghanistan. He was a Marine EOD Tech (like the guys in The Hurt Locker), and a true American hero. Please join me in offering her prayers and healing energy as she navigates this unimaginably difficult journey.
-This Saturday is the March for Babies in Boston. I'll be participating once again with my family. Please consider supporting the March of Dimes. They are an amazing organization. I began my involvement after some dear friends lost their premature baby girl and I felt really helpless. Volunteering with them has been among the best experiences of my life.
-My seemingly invincible grandmother, who is 96 years old, is having a rough go of it. She's had them in the past and I've discussed them here, and she's bounced back in ways that have amazed her family. I know that she misses my grandfather every day, and I'm so grateful that she's stuck around for all of us.
-I still owe an update on the Liebster blog award I was nominated for several weeks ago. I haven't forgotten about it, per se...it's just that every time I think about the fact that I owe an update, I don't actually have the time to write one. I will.
-I also still owe an update on my PPD/PPA situation. I've stopped nursing and have begun meds and things seem to be improving a little bit. Hoping to continue that trend, and will update as the situation warrants.
Hope all is well with everyone.
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Playing Nice
Why can't we just play nice? I mean, seriously, why can't we all just treat each other with respect and dignity and kindness?
I've been thinking about this a lot in relation to motherhood. The various camps we set up - the working vs. at homes; the breastfeeders vs. the bottle feeders - set up a kind of adversarial dynamic that seems so counterproductive to me. Certainly, there are exceptions, but for the vast majority, don't we all want to do what is best for our children and our families? And isn't what's best different for each family? And shouldn't we, within reason, understand and respect that?
I've been a working mom. I've been a stay at home mom. Both are absolutely brutally hard. Being a MOM is hard. Period. There are a million reasons why women choose each option. And there are women who don't so much choose an option as do what circumstance dictates. In fact, that was the case for me - I didn't CHOOSE to be a working mother, per se. I had a baby and at that time, we couldn't afford for me not to work, so work I did. Miserably. For two and a half years, until we felt like we were at a point when I could stay home for a while.
Now, I stay home. And it. Is. HARD. Anyone who claims it isn't has never done it full time. Full stop. You can stay home with your kids on your two week summer vacation and think, "This is cake!" But you don't know what being a stay at home mom is until you've done it in the dead of winter with a cranky toddler who's got a wicked case of cabin fever and it's literally too cold to play outside. And I'm not talking one day of that, either. I'm talking full on MONTHS of tedium. And as much as you love your kids, you can't help but feel stifled on a lot of those days. And then you feel guilty for not feeling constantly grateful and present.
And if you've never been a working mother, then you don't know what it is to be a working mother, either. You can judge the woman who harriedly drops her child off at daycare and realizes she's forgotten some daily item, and you can think, "HOW could she forget that?!" or whatever. But until you've BEEN that woman, trying to herd a one year old up, into clothes, through breakfast, into the car and into the school, you don't know how excruciating it is to kiss your baby goodbye for the day and cross your fingers that nothing horrible will happen to him while you're gone. And you don't know the crushing guilt you feel about that separation. And you don't know the seething jealousy you sometimes feel toward the women who get to spend all day with their kids.
On the breastfeeding front, there is a similar type of judgment. Listen. I agree, wholeheartedly, that breast is best. I do. I've breastfed both my children. I'm not going to lie to you here, it hasn't always been my favorite thing to do, but I've recognized its importance and benefits. HOWEVER. There are cases in which breastfeeding isn't feasible. I've had friends and relatives who haven't been able to breastfeed. Not who didn't feel like breastfeeding, but who couldn't. Maybe the baby didn't latch, maybe their production wasn't enough, whatever the reason, they couldn't sustain that human life without the aid of formula. And to them, I have said that formula, that option, exists for a REASON. Is it preferable to breast milk? No. But is it better than a malnourished baby? Oh, HELL yes. And yet, the judgment.
This particular issue is hitting very close to home for me right now, since I'm still battling the terrible anxiety, and in order to treat it properly, I will need to stop breastfeeding, since anxiety meds and breastfeeding don't mix. And the guilt I feel at the prospect of stopping breastfeeding is unreal, because after all...breast is best, right?
And yet, I have done nine months of breastfeeding. And the reality is that my anxiety being properly managed will be beneficial to both my children, won't it? Not that I've been unable to care for them or anything like that, but the fact is, kids are perceptive. So, if I'm anxious and scared and tense, they pick up on that, don't they? Probably. And I want to be fully myself for them. I want to be fully present. They are gifts. They are treasures. And I DO get to spend every day with them, and I don't want anxiety to cloud my enjoyment and gratitude.
To be continued, I suspect...
I've been thinking about this a lot in relation to motherhood. The various camps we set up - the working vs. at homes; the breastfeeders vs. the bottle feeders - set up a kind of adversarial dynamic that seems so counterproductive to me. Certainly, there are exceptions, but for the vast majority, don't we all want to do what is best for our children and our families? And isn't what's best different for each family? And shouldn't we, within reason, understand and respect that?
I've been a working mom. I've been a stay at home mom. Both are absolutely brutally hard. Being a MOM is hard. Period. There are a million reasons why women choose each option. And there are women who don't so much choose an option as do what circumstance dictates. In fact, that was the case for me - I didn't CHOOSE to be a working mother, per se. I had a baby and at that time, we couldn't afford for me not to work, so work I did. Miserably. For two and a half years, until we felt like we were at a point when I could stay home for a while.
Now, I stay home. And it. Is. HARD. Anyone who claims it isn't has never done it full time. Full stop. You can stay home with your kids on your two week summer vacation and think, "This is cake!" But you don't know what being a stay at home mom is until you've done it in the dead of winter with a cranky toddler who's got a wicked case of cabin fever and it's literally too cold to play outside. And I'm not talking one day of that, either. I'm talking full on MONTHS of tedium. And as much as you love your kids, you can't help but feel stifled on a lot of those days. And then you feel guilty for not feeling constantly grateful and present.
And if you've never been a working mother, then you don't know what it is to be a working mother, either. You can judge the woman who harriedly drops her child off at daycare and realizes she's forgotten some daily item, and you can think, "HOW could she forget that?!" or whatever. But until you've BEEN that woman, trying to herd a one year old up, into clothes, through breakfast, into the car and into the school, you don't know how excruciating it is to kiss your baby goodbye for the day and cross your fingers that nothing horrible will happen to him while you're gone. And you don't know the crushing guilt you feel about that separation. And you don't know the seething jealousy you sometimes feel toward the women who get to spend all day with their kids.
On the breastfeeding front, there is a similar type of judgment. Listen. I agree, wholeheartedly, that breast is best. I do. I've breastfed both my children. I'm not going to lie to you here, it hasn't always been my favorite thing to do, but I've recognized its importance and benefits. HOWEVER. There are cases in which breastfeeding isn't feasible. I've had friends and relatives who haven't been able to breastfeed. Not who didn't feel like breastfeeding, but who couldn't. Maybe the baby didn't latch, maybe their production wasn't enough, whatever the reason, they couldn't sustain that human life without the aid of formula. And to them, I have said that formula, that option, exists for a REASON. Is it preferable to breast milk? No. But is it better than a malnourished baby? Oh, HELL yes. And yet, the judgment.
This particular issue is hitting very close to home for me right now, since I'm still battling the terrible anxiety, and in order to treat it properly, I will need to stop breastfeeding, since anxiety meds and breastfeeding don't mix. And the guilt I feel at the prospect of stopping breastfeeding is unreal, because after all...breast is best, right?
And yet, I have done nine months of breastfeeding. And the reality is that my anxiety being properly managed will be beneficial to both my children, won't it? Not that I've been unable to care for them or anything like that, but the fact is, kids are perceptive. So, if I'm anxious and scared and tense, they pick up on that, don't they? Probably. And I want to be fully myself for them. I want to be fully present. They are gifts. They are treasures. And I DO get to spend every day with them, and I don't want anxiety to cloud my enjoyment and gratitude.
To be continued, I suspect...
Sunday, March 4, 2012
5
Five years ago tonight, I took a pregnancy test and it changed everything. We did the pregnancy test "just to rule it out," or so we thought. And thus began the biggest adventure of our lives...
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Thursday, February 16, 2012
If You're Going to Fight about Uteruses, Maybe Find Someone Who HAS One?
The Internet has been abuzz today with discussion and photographic evidence from the hearings about birth control...which seem not to involve any women. This seems rather counter-intuitive (and in fact counter-productive) to me. It also made me want to share some of my perspective on the topic.
I began a birth control protocol (daily pill) at 19. I was not (SO, SO, sadly NOT) sexually active at the time. What a lot of people, including a majority of men, including, I'm fairly certain, most of the men involved in today's hearings, do not realize, is that the same hormones that prevent you from getting pregnant also treat a host of other illnesses and issues. For me, it was an extremely painful affliction the details of which I won't go into here. After years of debilitating pain a couple of days per month, my doctor finally recommended and prescribed a birth control pill. And it helped. A LOT. It kept me from having to swallow quite such massive doses of Naproxen (the ingredient in Aleve, which back in the olden days was only available by prescription). It helped a variety of things.
Did I ever make use of my birth control pill as birth control? Sure, if I'm being completely honest, I did. Most of the time, I didn't rely solely on the pill, because the pill does not protect against STD's. And I mean, being on birth control certainly did not make me feel like I had license to be promiscuous. What it did was help me be in less pain, and have one more safety measure in place on those occasions when I chose to have sex. Which I did on occasion because I was an adult woman capable of making such decisions for myself.
When I lived in Georgia, my insurance didn't cover birth control, so I had to stop taking it (because I made very little money and birth control was less essential than my asthma and thyroid medications). And guess what happened? The pain came back, in spades. Guess what else happened? I still had sex (sorry, Mom, but I did). For me, and for a lot of women with similar medical reasons for taking birth control, the link between birth control and sex is not as straight-lined as that panel of privileged old men would believe.
Furthermore, even if it were, I really don't get what business it is of theirs. As I've said before, I do understand the argument against abortion. But there is a significant difference, to me, between being against abortion and thinking you get to have a say about what I do in my own sex life. This is such a gigantic step backwards I can barely even wrap my head around it.
I'm not sure how coherent this post even is because I'm rushing to get it done, as I have to go now and care for my two children, who, thanks in part to birth control, were born when I was good and ready to have them. And aren't they lucky to be raised by a mom who actively wanted them and jumped for joy with each positive pregnancy test?
I began a birth control protocol (daily pill) at 19. I was not (SO, SO, sadly NOT) sexually active at the time. What a lot of people, including a majority of men, including, I'm fairly certain, most of the men involved in today's hearings, do not realize, is that the same hormones that prevent you from getting pregnant also treat a host of other illnesses and issues. For me, it was an extremely painful affliction the details of which I won't go into here. After years of debilitating pain a couple of days per month, my doctor finally recommended and prescribed a birth control pill. And it helped. A LOT. It kept me from having to swallow quite such massive doses of Naproxen (the ingredient in Aleve, which back in the olden days was only available by prescription). It helped a variety of things.
Did I ever make use of my birth control pill as birth control? Sure, if I'm being completely honest, I did. Most of the time, I didn't rely solely on the pill, because the pill does not protect against STD's. And I mean, being on birth control certainly did not make me feel like I had license to be promiscuous. What it did was help me be in less pain, and have one more safety measure in place on those occasions when I chose to have sex. Which I did on occasion because I was an adult woman capable of making such decisions for myself.
When I lived in Georgia, my insurance didn't cover birth control, so I had to stop taking it (because I made very little money and birth control was less essential than my asthma and thyroid medications). And guess what happened? The pain came back, in spades. Guess what else happened? I still had sex (sorry, Mom, but I did). For me, and for a lot of women with similar medical reasons for taking birth control, the link between birth control and sex is not as straight-lined as that panel of privileged old men would believe.
Furthermore, even if it were, I really don't get what business it is of theirs. As I've said before, I do understand the argument against abortion. But there is a significant difference, to me, between being against abortion and thinking you get to have a say about what I do in my own sex life. This is such a gigantic step backwards I can barely even wrap my head around it.
I'm not sure how coherent this post even is because I'm rushing to get it done, as I have to go now and care for my two children, who, thanks in part to birth control, were born when I was good and ready to have them. And aren't they lucky to be raised by a mom who actively wanted them and jumped for joy with each positive pregnancy test?
Friday, February 10, 2012
Gratitude
A friend of mine posted this morning about a friend of hers who passed away a year ago today, from breast cancer. She was 32 years old and had a six month old baby. That? Is a tragedy. My heart goes out to her family, and to her, because I can imagine the pain of knowing you would never get to see that baby grow up (at least not here in the physical plain). It sucks.
And, having a six month old myself, it is a really good reminder of WHY it is so important to be grateful for every single day I have with my precious girl (and my boy, too). Even the miserable days are DAYS. We would all do well to remember that.
I also have a dear friend from college who is battling ovarian cancer, and I know she's going to kick its ass into next week. Part of the reason I know that? Because this is a woman who is REALLY GOOD at living in the now and appreciating life.
Gratitude is a powerful tool. It can change your entire perspective. Days I wake up and remember to take a minute to review all the things I'm grateful for are consistently better (by a large margin) than days I wake up and allow myself to feel beaten down.
Listen, I don't mean to preach here. I'm not in a position to lecture anyone. Just some observations for a Friday morning...especially since it being Friday topped my list this morning.
And, having a six month old myself, it is a really good reminder of WHY it is so important to be grateful for every single day I have with my precious girl (and my boy, too). Even the miserable days are DAYS. We would all do well to remember that.
I also have a dear friend from college who is battling ovarian cancer, and I know she's going to kick its ass into next week. Part of the reason I know that? Because this is a woman who is REALLY GOOD at living in the now and appreciating life.
Gratitude is a powerful tool. It can change your entire perspective. Days I wake up and remember to take a minute to review all the things I'm grateful for are consistently better (by a large margin) than days I wake up and allow myself to feel beaten down.
Listen, I don't mean to preach here. I'm not in a position to lecture anyone. Just some observations for a Friday morning...especially since it being Friday topped my list this morning.
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