Jack likes the pool
and Nora likes her mobile.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Thursday, July 30, 2009
So what was so bad about yesterday?
Today is better. I got a decent amount of (interrupted) sleep, and Andrew is home to enforce the toddler’s nap. And play with the toddler. And stuff. So I don’t feel like a horrible mother today. But, oh, yesterday.
I actually went down to the in-law’s yesterday so Jack could play with his beloved grandparents and swim in their pool and be entertained by someone other than me. This hour-long drive was possible thanks to the discovery of swaddling whilst in the car seat, a solution I did write about yesterday but which was cut off from my post for some reason. (That reason? My own failure to proofread.) I edited it today if you’re interested. Since Jack spent about three hours playing hard in the pool, I figured he’d fall asleep on the drive home and have at least an hour-long nap if not longer. Unfortunately, he heroically kept his droopy eyes open for the whole drive and then refused to nap once we got home. He did “rest,” but no nap, and that means no break for me.
Nevertheless, despite the lack of nap, Jack was basically cheery and easy to work with. A morning with Grandpa will do that, I guess. But I was hot, tired, and overwhelmed, so I started to cry – again – at about 4:00. Jack asked me why I was sad. “Because I don’t feel very well, today, Jack. I’m pretty tired.”
“Can I make you feel better? Do you want to take a nap?” asked Jack.
“I’d love to take a nap, honey, but I can’t if you’re awake,” I told him.
He nodded, then headed for his bedroom. “I’ll go take a nap so you can take a nap and feel better, Mommy,” he said.
Then I felt like a humongous jerk.
Now, I knew he wasn’t really going to take a nap, so I changed the dirty sheets on my bed. I was just getting started when he came in and said, “Do you feel better now, Mommy?”
“I do, Jack, thank you. Do you want to help me change the sheets? That will help me feel better too,” I said. So he helped. And he really did help as best he could; he held the corner of the fitted sheet so I could put the other ones on, and he tried to hang the flat sheet the way he thought it should go. (Draped over the “holy water;” he thinks the bedposts look like holy water fonts. They kind of do, actually.) Then he climbed up on the bed and said, “I’ll make you feel better,” and hugged me.
So while one part of me was saying, “See? Look what a sweetheart of a little kid you are raising!” the other part of me was saying, “YOU DO NOT DESERVE THIS GOLDEN CHILD.”
But then there was an incident after his failure to eat dinner wherein he dropped a blueberry on the floor and refused to pick it up and had a loud screaming tantrum while in time out. The first part of me started saying, “WHY DOES MY LIFE SUCK SO BAD?” while the other part of me was saying, “You should have made him take a nap! Now look at him!”
Now, I know I was being far too hard on myself. I know we’re none of us perfect. I even knew it at the time; I actually am able to keep at least one corner of my mind rational, even when I’ve completely lost the rest of it. But the mere fact of knowing I’m being irrational does not magically make the irrationality go away, and I spent some quality time after Andrew got home weeping about how horrible of a mother I am. Then of course, Jack came and gave me MORE hugs to make me feel better and then he told me he loves me, which just put me back in that first loop of what-a-good-kid-you-have-and-don’t-deserve. I’m even getting a little verklempt about it right this second – probably because the Nora-furnace is strapped to my body and I daren’t put her down if I want to finish this post.
Basically, I’m finding that on good days, the days when I’m on my own and still manage to get Nora to nap in her bed, Jack to nap at all, get dinner on the table, and keep the house from looking like it has been ransacked, I feel like I am superwoman. “I am amazing!” I tell myself, full of confidence and optimism. “I can do ANYTHING!”
But these days are counterbalanced by the days when it is all I can do to keep from screaming at my children. Yes, both of them, because, believe me, I want to scream at Nora too. And the thing is, on those days, I usually fail. OK, I may not scream at them, but I am certainly losing my temper on a regular basis, and they’re not even being particularly bad. Nora just wants to be held, after all, and Jack is pretty well-behaved as long as he’s not overtired. Of course he wants to dawdle and look at rocks before climbing into his car seat! He’s TWO.
Man. I hate to write in clichés, but it is just so so hard, you know? I am comforting myself with listening to stories of my mom’s difficulties after my second sister was born (apparently, she was… willful*) and Swistle’s post about having only two kids and how it was way harder than five. And also Paul’s comment about how “These are the best days to remember.”
Paul is a wise man, I think.
*Interesting side story: My eldest sister was astounded when she learned that my last sister (the second youngest in the family, played Kasey in The Movie.) and I thought that my mother never yelled and that our second sister is perfectly even-tempered. She had different impressions, you see. But Second Sister IS even-tempered NOW. She’s a special needs teacher, she’s so even tempered! I have never heard her raise her voice in my life. And my mother yelled at us now and then, but it always scared the bejeezus out of me because it was so rare. I guess she had gotten mellow by the sixth kid.
I actually went down to the in-law’s yesterday so Jack could play with his beloved grandparents and swim in their pool and be entertained by someone other than me. This hour-long drive was possible thanks to the discovery of swaddling whilst in the car seat, a solution I did write about yesterday but which was cut off from my post for some reason. (That reason? My own failure to proofread.) I edited it today if you’re interested. Since Jack spent about three hours playing hard in the pool, I figured he’d fall asleep on the drive home and have at least an hour-long nap if not longer. Unfortunately, he heroically kept his droopy eyes open for the whole drive and then refused to nap once we got home. He did “rest,” but no nap, and that means no break for me.
Nevertheless, despite the lack of nap, Jack was basically cheery and easy to work with. A morning with Grandpa will do that, I guess. But I was hot, tired, and overwhelmed, so I started to cry – again – at about 4:00. Jack asked me why I was sad. “Because I don’t feel very well, today, Jack. I’m pretty tired.”
“Can I make you feel better? Do you want to take a nap?” asked Jack.
“I’d love to take a nap, honey, but I can’t if you’re awake,” I told him.
He nodded, then headed for his bedroom. “I’ll go take a nap so you can take a nap and feel better, Mommy,” he said.
Then I felt like a humongous jerk.
Now, I knew he wasn’t really going to take a nap, so I changed the dirty sheets on my bed. I was just getting started when he came in and said, “Do you feel better now, Mommy?”
“I do, Jack, thank you. Do you want to help me change the sheets? That will help me feel better too,” I said. So he helped. And he really did help as best he could; he held the corner of the fitted sheet so I could put the other ones on, and he tried to hang the flat sheet the way he thought it should go. (Draped over the “holy water;” he thinks the bedposts look like holy water fonts. They kind of do, actually.) Then he climbed up on the bed and said, “I’ll make you feel better,” and hugged me.
So while one part of me was saying, “See? Look what a sweetheart of a little kid you are raising!” the other part of me was saying, “YOU DO NOT DESERVE THIS GOLDEN CHILD.”
But then there was an incident after his failure to eat dinner wherein he dropped a blueberry on the floor and refused to pick it up and had a loud screaming tantrum while in time out. The first part of me started saying, “WHY DOES MY LIFE SUCK SO BAD?” while the other part of me was saying, “You should have made him take a nap! Now look at him!”
Now, I know I was being far too hard on myself. I know we’re none of us perfect. I even knew it at the time; I actually am able to keep at least one corner of my mind rational, even when I’ve completely lost the rest of it. But the mere fact of knowing I’m being irrational does not magically make the irrationality go away, and I spent some quality time after Andrew got home weeping about how horrible of a mother I am. Then of course, Jack came and gave me MORE hugs to make me feel better and then he told me he loves me, which just put me back in that first loop of what-a-good-kid-you-have-and-don’t-deserve. I’m even getting a little verklempt about it right this second – probably because the Nora-furnace is strapped to my body and I daren’t put her down if I want to finish this post.
Basically, I’m finding that on good days, the days when I’m on my own and still manage to get Nora to nap in her bed, Jack to nap at all, get dinner on the table, and keep the house from looking like it has been ransacked, I feel like I am superwoman. “I am amazing!” I tell myself, full of confidence and optimism. “I can do ANYTHING!”
But these days are counterbalanced by the days when it is all I can do to keep from screaming at my children. Yes, both of them, because, believe me, I want to scream at Nora too. And the thing is, on those days, I usually fail. OK, I may not scream at them, but I am certainly losing my temper on a regular basis, and they’re not even being particularly bad. Nora just wants to be held, after all, and Jack is pretty well-behaved as long as he’s not overtired. Of course he wants to dawdle and look at rocks before climbing into his car seat! He’s TWO.
Man. I hate to write in clichés, but it is just so so hard, you know? I am comforting myself with listening to stories of my mom’s difficulties after my second sister was born (apparently, she was… willful*) and Swistle’s post about having only two kids and how it was way harder than five. And also Paul’s comment about how “These are the best days to remember.”
Paul is a wise man, I think.
*Interesting side story: My eldest sister was astounded when she learned that my last sister (the second youngest in the family, played Kasey in The Movie.) and I thought that my mother never yelled and that our second sister is perfectly even-tempered. She had different impressions, you see. But Second Sister IS even-tempered NOW. She’s a special needs teacher, she’s so even tempered! I have never heard her raise her voice in my life. And my mother yelled at us now and then, but it always scared the bejeezus out of me because it was so rare. I guess she had gotten mellow by the sixth kid.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
It was fifteen minutes this time
Edited to add the last two paragraphs that I inadvertently cut out last night. This is what happens when you don't have time to proofread, people.
I have been doing this two-kid thing for five weeks now, and I have NO IDEA how all you people with multiple babies find time to write thoughtful blog posts. If I have the time to write, I use it to a) sleep or b) read what other people are writing or c) clean the kitchen and or do other necessary household chores or d) watch TV. As such, I have decided to follow Arwen’s lead and write for fifteen minutes (or maybe only ten) at a whack. Note that I am not promising to write for fifteen minutes A DAY, like Arwen did, but instead am totally copping out. WHEN I write, in other words, I’ll write for fifteen minutes (or maybe only ten). How often that will be, I cannot say.
But I wanted to write today because today sort of… sucked royally. We’re having a mild of a heat wave up here in the northeast, and that makes holding a baby all the time somewhat of a hardship. I know I wrote that when Nora won’t go to sleep I just “pop her in the sling,” but that’s asking a lot when the dew point is 70. It’s sort of like strapping a humid furnace to your body.
The worst part is that all this heat and humidity is stripping me of all of my patience and turning me into a horrible mother – or at least that is how I feel. Poor Jack is bearing the brunt of my crankiness, particularly when I am trying to get us into the car. See, until very recently, Nora screamed pretty much the entire time she was in the car seat, and while my recent posts may have made it seem that I’ve been pretty blasé about this, it has in fact been draining the life force from me. I was routinely showing up at my mom’s pale and shaking, dreading the thirty-minute drive home. It’s very difficult to listen to your baby scream and scream and not be able to do a damn thing about it.
As a result, as soon as I got Nora strapped into her car seat, I would start to panic about the inevitable screaming and I’d say, “Jack, get in the car. Get in the car. GET IN THE CAR GET IN THE CAR GETINTHECARGETINTHECARGETINTHECAR!” when the poor kid was just being a normal two-year-old and trying to talk about the rock he found on the ground or whatever. I’ve tried to temper this by calmly talking to him ahead of time about how we had to GO GO GO once I got Nora into her car seat, and that has helped, but still.
Fortunately, I have recently discovered the secret to keeping Nora from screaming nonstop in the car seat: Swaddling. If I swaddle her in the seat, she only cries sometimes, and spends more time happy than screaming. But I’m still a little gun-shy, and still have a tendency to yell at Jack if he’s dawdling around and not getting in the car.
But now that I used up all my writing time writing about the car seat, I will have to wait until tomorrow to tell you about today and how it sucked. (Note: It was mostly due to my own craziness; for example, after praying that Jack would let Andrew put him to bed, I felt wounded to the quick when Jack said, “Daddy, I want you to put me to bed tonight. Not Mommy.”)
I have been doing this two-kid thing for five weeks now, and I have NO IDEA how all you people with multiple babies find time to write thoughtful blog posts. If I have the time to write, I use it to a) sleep or b) read what other people are writing or c) clean the kitchen and or do other necessary household chores or d) watch TV. As such, I have decided to follow Arwen’s lead and write for fifteen minutes (or maybe only ten) at a whack. Note that I am not promising to write for fifteen minutes A DAY, like Arwen did, but instead am totally copping out. WHEN I write, in other words, I’ll write for fifteen minutes (or maybe only ten). How often that will be, I cannot say.
But I wanted to write today because today sort of… sucked royally. We’re having a mild of a heat wave up here in the northeast, and that makes holding a baby all the time somewhat of a hardship. I know I wrote that when Nora won’t go to sleep I just “pop her in the sling,” but that’s asking a lot when the dew point is 70. It’s sort of like strapping a humid furnace to your body.
The worst part is that all this heat and humidity is stripping me of all of my patience and turning me into a horrible mother – or at least that is how I feel. Poor Jack is bearing the brunt of my crankiness, particularly when I am trying to get us into the car. See, until very recently, Nora screamed pretty much the entire time she was in the car seat, and while my recent posts may have made it seem that I’ve been pretty blasé about this, it has in fact been draining the life force from me. I was routinely showing up at my mom’s pale and shaking, dreading the thirty-minute drive home. It’s very difficult to listen to your baby scream and scream and not be able to do a damn thing about it.
As a result, as soon as I got Nora strapped into her car seat, I would start to panic about the inevitable screaming and I’d say, “Jack, get in the car. Get in the car. GET IN THE CAR GET IN THE CAR GETINTHECARGETINTHECARGETINTHECAR!” when the poor kid was just being a normal two-year-old and trying to talk about the rock he found on the ground or whatever. I’ve tried to temper this by calmly talking to him ahead of time about how we had to GO GO GO once I got Nora into her car seat, and that has helped, but still.
Fortunately, I have recently discovered the secret to keeping Nora from screaming nonstop in the car seat: Swaddling. If I swaddle her in the seat, she only cries sometimes, and spends more time happy than screaming. But I’m still a little gun-shy, and still have a tendency to yell at Jack if he’s dawdling around and not getting in the car.
But now that I used up all my writing time writing about the car seat, I will have to wait until tomorrow to tell you about today and how it sucked. (Note: It was mostly due to my own craziness; for example, after praying that Jack would let Andrew put him to bed, I felt wounded to the quick when Jack said, “Daddy, I want you to put me to bed tonight. Not Mommy.”)
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Things that should cost less
My sister and her family just moved into their first house (NEXT DOOR to one of my other sisters; I am SO JEALOUS) and was talking yesterday about how her father-in-law is going to buy them a new mailbox.
“Oh, yeah, mailboxes,” I said, remembering my attempt to buy a new mailbox when we first moved in. “That’s one of those things that you go out to buy, but then you don’t buy because they cost about eight times as much as you think.”
“Exactly!” she said.
“Yeah, you think, ‘What’s it going to cost, twenty bucks?’” I said.
Then my mom chimed in, “But they’re eighty.”
“The CHEAP ones are eighty,” said my sister.
So here is a list of things that you do not buy the first time you try to. I’m going to start with things I started to buy way back when I first became responsible for most of my own purchases, so it’s not all mailboxes and curtains. But, oh yes, curtains are ON THE LIST.
1. Socks
2. Sweatpants (I actually have never purchased sweatpants because they are insanely expensive)
3. Sweatshirts
4. Bras
5. Curtains
6. Mailboxes
7. Copper wiring (single most expensive item of the Bathroom Remodel)
8. Sheets
9. Pillows
10. Lamps
11. Rugs
12. Seriously, curtains cost way too much. They’re basically a hemmed sheet of fabric. What is the deal?
So what have I forgotten? What haven’t YOU bought?
“Oh, yeah, mailboxes,” I said, remembering my attempt to buy a new mailbox when we first moved in. “That’s one of those things that you go out to buy, but then you don’t buy because they cost about eight times as much as you think.”
“Exactly!” she said.
“Yeah, you think, ‘What’s it going to cost, twenty bucks?’” I said.
Then my mom chimed in, “But they’re eighty.”
“The CHEAP ones are eighty,” said my sister.
So here is a list of things that you do not buy the first time you try to. I’m going to start with things I started to buy way back when I first became responsible for most of my own purchases, so it’s not all mailboxes and curtains. But, oh yes, curtains are ON THE LIST.
1. Socks
2. Sweatpants (I actually have never purchased sweatpants because they are insanely expensive)
3. Sweatshirts
4. Bras
5. Curtains
6. Mailboxes
7. Copper wiring (single most expensive item of the Bathroom Remodel)
8. Sheets
9. Pillows
10. Lamps
11. Rugs
12. Seriously, curtains cost way too much. They’re basically a hemmed sheet of fabric. What is the deal?
So what have I forgotten? What haven’t YOU bought?
Sucker = Me
OK, OK. I give. I'm on Twitter. I do not promise to update frequently, but I was feeling left out. Username: DocMaureen. (DrMaureen was already taken, probably by the same person who STOLE drmaureen.com right out from under me.)
Now. Someone tell me how to use this new-fangled thing the kids are all talking about. But if Daniel Shore can do it, I can do it, right?
Now. Someone tell me how to use this new-fangled thing the kids are all talking about. But if Daniel Shore can do it, I can do it, right?
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
A question
If I continue to refuse to join Twitter, does that make me the crotchety old man of the internet? I already own an un-"smart" phone and I have no text messaging plan. I have to pay for each text message! Individually! And it takes me eleven thousand hours to type them!
Whoever thought the discharge would be the hardest part of the birth?
Latest post up at TheBump.com!
I will be posting Nora’s birth story on my personal blog once I get around to writing it, but I thought I’d take this opportunity to post Nora’s leaving-the-hospital story here. “Leaving-the-hospital story?” I can hear you saying. “What’s there to tell?”
Well, I’ll tell you.
I have, as you know, a toddler named Jack. When Jack was born, HIS leaving-the-hospital story was uneventful; the nurse gave me my discharge instructions and we left. Done and done. But Nora’s and my discharge was something else entirely. At first, it seemed like it would be no big deal. In the morning, I asked the nurses what was involved in the discharge and what time would it occur so that I could tell Andrew when to come get me. I was told that once the doctors had checked the two of us and given their all-clears, it was a simple matter of signing some paperwork and we could go. Thus, once Nora and I had seen our respective doctors, I called Andrew and told him he could come any time; we’d probably be ready in about ninety minutes.
Then I fed Nora and brought her back to the nursery so I could shower. On the way back to my room, I stopped at the nurses’ station to let them know the Social Security/birth certificate person had not yet been by with the forms. Then I went back to the room, undressed, and started to get in the shower.
Read more at TheBump.com!
I will be posting Nora’s birth story on my personal blog once I get around to writing it, but I thought I’d take this opportunity to post Nora’s leaving-the-hospital story here. “Leaving-the-hospital story?” I can hear you saying. “What’s there to tell?”
Well, I’ll tell you.
I have, as you know, a toddler named Jack. When Jack was born, HIS leaving-the-hospital story was uneventful; the nurse gave me my discharge instructions and we left. Done and done. But Nora’s and my discharge was something else entirely. At first, it seemed like it would be no big deal. In the morning, I asked the nurses what was involved in the discharge and what time would it occur so that I could tell Andrew when to come get me. I was told that once the doctors had checked the two of us and given their all-clears, it was a simple matter of signing some paperwork and we could go. Thus, once Nora and I had seen our respective doctors, I called Andrew and told him he could come any time; we’d probably be ready in about ninety minutes.
Then I fed Nora and brought her back to the nursery so I could shower. On the way back to my room, I stopped at the nurses’ station to let them know the Social Security/birth certificate person had not yet been by with the forms. Then I went back to the room, undressed, and started to get in the shower.
Read more at TheBump.com!
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