Mama Thoughts

I've been thinking about this ever since I left the hospital.  If men gave birth... the world would be a very different place. First off, mothers wouldn't only be in the hospital for 48 hours.  Imagine a man pushing a baby out of himself and then hiking home and being expected to care for another.  Wouldn't happen.  Hospital stays would be covered for a minimum of a week... and people would definitely care for you for a much much longer time.  There's no way you'd be sent home with a squeeze bottle and a bag of icy pads and told "good luck!" There would be expectant mother and new mother parking in every single parking lot.  Especially in areas where it snows and has sub-zero temperatures. There would be a lane devoted to mothers on the roads.  Babies freak out at every red light.  They like motion.  It would be similar to how ambulances function at lights.  Each new mother would get a little button thingy that could turn lights f...

Today around 9am I was shushing my child to sleep for her nap when all of a sudden a bright light appeared from under the door.  Yanik did his damn-dest to light-proof that room including putting cardboard on the windows (very classy).  But all of a sudden the door frame lit up!  I assumed aliens were landing... but in fact the sun had come out!  I had never been in my child's room when there was sun.  After all... she's only 9 weeks old. God bless Chiberia. @#$% BUT! More importantly... welcome back sun!  We missed you so. Stay for awhile.  

Who knew that sleep was such a difficult thing?  Teaching your child to sleep is something that I had no idea I'd have to do.  I figured I'd just put them down or they'd fall asleep.  Little did I know that I have to become an intense observer as well as a little bit of a snake charmer in order to calm this little girl down and get her to sleep.  Today we had 2 2-hour naps.  This is totally amazing.  However then I done got carried away and took her on a walk outside for too long, she got overtired and then I had to wrestle with her for an hour to calm her down, I failed and now she's in her bedroom with her grandma taking a turn.  For now all is quiet... but I seriously have to watch everything about every day.  We can't take a walk for too long, we have to count yawns and we have to make sure that this little lady gets sleep... otherwise we all get terrorized for a few hours.   Hopefully this is a lesson that we can both learn together. ...

Dear lord in heaven. The sight out this window is solid snow fall.  Normally such a sight would give me child-like glee and excite me greatly... however I know that I won't be able to leave my alley tonight.  I know that if I did have work tomorrow I would never make it there.  I also know that my damn stroller won't be able to navigate the streets and so yet again I sit in my apartment on the couch during naps with nothing active to do. Next time we're having a baby in a different season.  Because really?! This winter has been enough to last me a long long while.

Yesterday brought a new realization.  Lilah knows who her mama is.  And she likes her.  :) We had a tough day yesterday.  We brought her to the doctor and she got some vaccines for her 2-month check up in preparation for going to day care in a little over a month.  We were warned that she might be fussier than usual.  We brought her to dad's house and then I had to go out for two hours on my own.  Dad and Grandpa were left with the little lady.  When I came back Grandpa informed me that he got to hear her scream it out for the first time.  When she woke up she was seriously upset.  I took her to nurse and it required me to walk around the bedroom and shush her at the same time continuously for 10 minutes straight in order for her to calm down enough to latch on.  She was pretty much attached to me for the rest of the day.  Every time I wandered away she would freak.  Strangely enough... I found this craziness endearing....

Colic. It happens to 5-25% of babies according to wikipedia.  It peaks between weeks 6 and 8.  We're at week 7... so that's a plus. There are a million ideas out there as to why colic happens and the causes of colic... but after reading as much as I could on the topic (which is a LOT) it turns out colic is really just a fancy name doctors give to a condition known as "your kid screams a lot and we have no idea what is going on so here's a name for it."  We know every trick in the book now.  We debug our child with a series of steps.  First-diaper, second-swaddle, third-feed (if she'll latch on without me walking around the house while feeding her in the dark), fourth-assault her with white noise, fifth- carry her in the "Yan" method (on her side facing away from you), sixth-take her into the bathroom and run all taps at full gush, seventh-bounce like your life depends on it.  Repeat.  Repeat.  Repeat. Eventually either one of us gives up an...

My eye has been twitching for about 4 days.  Normally whenever this happens I can eat a banana and get on with my life.  Not so much this time.  I know that these things are caused by magnesium deficiencies, so I've been eating dark chocolate (look it up... it's a great source!) but to no avail.  I even went to sleep last night at 9 pm and felt rested this morning when I woke up at 7:30 after our 5 night-time wake ups.  That should count!  But nope!  We're half-way through week 7 and I'm just continuing to twitch. My mom came over on Sunday and sat with our little lady so we could leave the house twice.  The first time we went to flotation tanks and floated for an hour in sensory-deprivation.  I was able to relax for the last 20 minutes of the experience... but it took a while to get into it.  Of course when I did relax all I could think about was our little girl. Crazy. Next we went to the movies and watched "Monuments Men" while...

Today was my 6 week appointment with the lady doctor.  They check you out, make sure all of your parts are how they need to be and where they need to be and then send you on your way.  They also give you a mood assessment.  I was asked to take a questionnaire 8 months into my pregnancy which asked me to rate myself, my attitude about life, as well as how anxious and sad I felt.  Anyone who knows me knows that I'm pretty much a happy-go-lucky person.  I've often been told by others who tend to drift towards depression that my presence is a help to them.  This questionnaire was the first time that I realized that things have definitely changed.  I answered every question pre-pregnancy with a completely sun-shiny response.  This time was a definite switch.  It wasn't that I was on the other end of the spectrum, however each question has 4 possible answers with sunshine on one end and rainclouds on the other.  Most of my answers had switc...