Playing Hooky

Yesterday morning when I walked into baby girl's room to get her ready for school, she immediately shouted, "No Mommy! NO MOMMY!" and burst into tears, begging for her father.

And that's just about how the rest of my day went, too. Food didn't sit well. The people I work with asked stupid, inane questions. I felt tired and crampy. BLAH.

All I could think about all day was spending time with my baby. When 4 o'clock rolled around, I decided I didn't want to waste another second sitting behind my desk. I left. A whole 30 minutes early.

I know 30 minutes doesn't seem like much in the course of a day, but it was a stolen 30 minutes, and extra 30 minutes that my soul craved. I picked her up from school and we went to a park and played in the gorgeous sunshine. For 30 minutes, we climbed stairs and slid down slides and played peek-a-boo around the playground. We searched for big sticks and small sticks and berries. We passed rocks back and forth. We hid my phone and keys and then found them again. We pointed out birds and planes and clouds and bumblebees and itsy-bitsy-spiders. I watched my baby girl, my toddler, my daughter play with the other children there, laughed at her loudly identifying which ones weren't wearing shoes, a small crime in her 18-month-old world. I told her to jump up when she tripped and she told me to jump up when I sat down to take a break. I marveled at her courage as she passed, shaking, from the top of the ladder to the safety of the platform, high above my head. I melted at her need for me to hold her hand.

That stolen 30 minutes with her undid the hours and hours of funk that had swarmed around me all day.

When I was in school, I was never one to play hooky. Maybe I just never had a good enough alternative option.

She is my sunshine. 

She makes me happy when skies are gray.

A Kauz Close to Home

If you've been following this blog for any amount of time, you probably know that TH is an immigrant, that his family fled the former USSR as refugees, spending six months as refugees in Europe before being accepted by a sponsoring organization here in the states and being brought over to start new lives here.

And, you undoubtedly know that we're expecting our second baby, Dos (no, we don't have a name yet. Yes, we are taking any and all suggestions and offers at clever marketing schemes), in less than two months. Dos will be inheriting the nursery, and baby girl will graduate to her big-girl room, a transition that we hope to have underway in the next week or so (eek!).

Thankfully we painted the nursery blue stars the first time around, even for our sweet baby girl, so we don't actually have to do a lot of redecorating to get it ready for a boy. The flowers have come down, as has the pink sparkly tutu. And in their place, we are adding . . . wait for it . . . ready? . . . rockets and robots! BAM! What a fun, boyish theme that fits right in with the stars! I'm so excited to see this new iteration on our nursery take shape.

So now you might be wondering why I started a post about Dos's nursery with a note about his daddy's past. Enter Kauzbots.

http://www.kauzbots.com/

This amazing company (seriously, why can't I have these kinds of awesome ideas myself??) makes plush stuffed robots that each represent a different social-awareness cause--10% of the sale of every robot goes directly to that 'bot's representative cause.

See that pink one front and center? That's Kaprice. 10% of her goes to support the fight against breast cancer. The yellow one is Karthy and supports the fight against autism. The red one is Karson and supports the fight against HIV/Aids. Purple--Kourage--childhood cancer.

And see that black 'bot in the middle? That's Kiefer. He supports the fight to help refugees the world over find security, food, and a new home in which they, too, can build new lives.

Hi there, Kiefer. This 'bot will be finding a home in our new nursery, for our new son, a son who embodies the hopes and dreams of my husband and his family during their time as refugees.

Check out all the Kauzbots and their causes here. And buy one (or six)--an adorably cute, snuggly way to support the kauzes close to your own hearts.

Mommy's Scars

To my children,

Mommy had another scar made on her this morning. This time on my back. It will be small, like the other 22 small scars I have covering my body. Not like the one long, big scar.

I know, as you grow, you will see people's scars. You will stare. And wonder. You might think the scars are scary. You might thing the person has done something bad, something wrong, to earn them. You might be glad, one day, that you have no scars yourself to mar your own smooth skin.

I know, as you grow, you will see my scars. Your eyes, your soft finger pads, will trace them and wonder. I don't know what you'll think of them. I don't know if you'll think of them as blemishes, imperfections. I don't know if you will find them scary. Or embarrassing. I don't know if you'll wish for a mommy who didn't have any scars.

In those moments, I want you to know that scars aren't scary. They aren't bad. They aren't imperfections.

Scars are beautiful.

Scars mean the person has survived. They mean the person has healed from something dangerous that may have happened to them. Scars are a testament to life. My scars, my 22-now-23 small ones and my one big one, mean that I am here today to tell you this story. To love you. To kiss your sweet cheeks and hold you in my arms.

When your eyes, your soft fingers, find a scar on these arms as they wrap around you, I want you to smile, and snuggle into my warmth, and thank it.

Because it is what has allowed us our time together.

Love,
Mom

I Wonder If She'll Ever Know

My local chat board of moms and I got into a discussion about this blog post today.  In it, a mom posts about feeling like she might love her son just a little more than her daughter. She says, "My daughter was my first baby, and born under not-ideal circumstances (taken away from me right after birth, not brought back for awhile; I was sick a lot in the first several months too and it was hard to care for her).  Being my first, I was so uncertain as it was; the extra difficult circumstances made things even worse.  There were times I literally couldn’t care for her in the early weeks because I was too sick.  We struggled with breastfeeding too.  It took us months to bond at all.  That’s really a story for another day, though."

My chat board discussed, some haranguing the woman, others attempting more empathy.

In my response, I noted that though I don't yet know what it's like to compare the love I have for two children, I can relate to much of what she says about her difficult beginnings with her first. About how difficult beginnings can impact the formation of the relationship, set the tone for the pattern of interaction and response and feelings.

I said, "I won't recount my entire birth story here, but by the time she was born, I was so out of it that I don't remember much. It was going on two hours before I got to hold her. I didn't have the overwhelming-love-bomb feeling go off. I had anxiety attacks in the hospital. We had problems the first couple of weeks with her weight gain and I was nervous and on-edge the entire time, coupled with feeling like a failure b/c of the birth experience. My sister would say things like, "Is it just like more love than you ever thought you'd feel?" and I didn't know how to answer her because I didn't know what she was talking about.

Having our relationship start off mired in such anxiety set a tone that took a long time to battle through. When left alone with her, my first reaction was always anxiety . . . even though when we actually were alone together, I was always happier and at peace than I had feared I'd be. It took me a solid four-five months before I realized that I was having fun, that I did enjoy being a mom, that being alone with her made me happy, not anxious.

Another mom noted what I said and said it had been much the same way with her and her son, and that her husband is her son's preferred parent, even now, now when it's been months, years since she felt that anxiety and distance. And that maybe my daughter is the daddy's girl she is for much the same reason.

It hurt to read that. To realize that she probably had a point. That it was me, it was my own reaction to her as a newborn, to motherhood, that led her to feel more comfortable with her dad, who has never been anxious around her, who fell into fatherhood as easily and naturally as falling into a pool on a hot summer day. That her tiny, perfect infant instincts could sense my anxiety, my worry, my fog, and that it forever altered the course of our relationship.

It more than hurt. It broke my heart.

I wonder if my daughter will ever know how much I love her. How much my heart thrills to see her smile. How it terrifies me to see her in pain or fear. How much I want to wrap my arms around her and soak her in like an elixir. How much I need her. How comfortable I am around her, now that I've found my footing as a mother, now that I've emerged from the cloud of her birth, of the worry of her newborn days. How much she is a part of me. How my heart explodes when she runs to me and throws her arms around my legs. How she's the first thing I think of when I wake up in the morning, the last thing I think of at night. How much she lights up my life. How much meaning and direction she gives me.

I've noted a couple of times here, I think, how much it can hurt my feelings when she reaches for her dad rather than me, how it's his comfort she seeks when hurt or scared rather than mine. And how I decided one day to stop being hurt by it and to start simply accepting it as part of her, deciding to love her for who she is, not who I wish she was. What a pill to swallow to realize one day that it's very likely my fault that she is this way. That I drove that distance between us.

So what now?

Now nothing. I was the way I was, and I forgive myself for that. I did the best I could. I was the best mom I could be given the circumstances. And now things have changed, gotten better, settled down. And I'll still be the best mom I can be. And she is the way she is, and I love her for that. I love her and accept her and will be the mom she needs, the mom who . . . well, who loves her and accepts her.

I can't change the past but I can control the future. She may be a daddy's girl. She may have been driven to be one by a mom who didn't know what to do, how to act. And all I can do now is continue to give her a mother who also offers comfort and support and unconditional love at any moment of the day for whenever she needs it. For whenever she wants it.

I just hope that one day, even if it's only beneath the surface, subconsciously, like a soul sighing and relaxing into open arms, she realizes it.

30 weeks pregnant.

That's like, really pregnant, y'all.

Like, nearing the end, my back hurts, my hips hurt, my crotch hurts, I don't sleep well, and I will bitchslap every rude person I meet kind of pregnant.

I'm excited. And nervous. And already a little sad that it's almost over. There's the very real possibility that this will be it as far as me and pregnancy. I know it will hurt, on the other side, to look back and remember what it was like to have a belly, to feel my baby(ies) kick me from the inside, and know that those experiences are in the past.

I guess it's kind of like the last day of the vacation of a lifetime. You know tomorrow will bring a return to normal, and the fantasy world you've been living in will soon just be that again--a fantasy. So you pack the last day full, you soak up the scenery and the activities and the culture and the language and the food and the feel of the foreign wind on your skin. You revel in it. You roll around in it, getting its scent all over you. You live and breathe it, refusing to let any of those last few minutes and hours be lost to thoughts of reality.

So hello, back pain! It's you again, hips! Why no, I didn't just ride a horse bare-back for four hours, but damn I love my crotch feeling like I did! Hello small, dark hours of the night; you would pass right by while I snoozed on if not for this frequent urge to pee. What a blessing to get to see you for the limited time we have! And crazy, crazy hormones that flash boil at the slightest social infractions of others, ah, you are such a wild ride. I'm going to throw my arms in the air and scream on the downhills and laugh maniacally on the curves and enjoy it all for what it's worth while I still have time.

Wanna See Our Motley Crew?

Here's the sneak peek from the family maternity session we had done over the weekend (that I blogged about here, somehow conveniently mentioning the lack of shower but leaving out the "bath" I took by wiping myself down with Wet Ones while I got dressed. Oh yeah.).

Check us out!

You know a photographer is good when she can make this momma (on any day) and my amazingly-awesome-but-cranky-mc-crankypants-that-day daughter look so fantastic!!

I am in awe.

Here's her blog if you want to check out her other fantastic work.

http://www.libbyannphotography.com/blog/

I cannot WAIT to see the rest.

The challenge will be picking the ONE photo to keep. I'm sure I'll post again here when it's time so that y'all can help me decide. :-)

The Danger of Complacency

There are a million-and-a-half different ways to parent.

Every day, every parent makes a million-and-a-half different decisions. Some of them are tiny decisions, insignificant in the grand scheme of things: what to dress the child in. Whether to turn on the mobile or the projector. Shake the bear that jingles or the duck that crinkles?

Some of them, though, are big decisions. How to feed your child. How to respond to your child's cry. Where your child should sleep.

In the big-picture spectrum of parenting styles, TH and I tend toward the careful. When I was pregnant with baby girl, I didn't eat lunch meat or drink alcohol or ingest caffeine. Those temporary sacrifices, really a blip in the overall time line of my life, were so easy for me to make when I believed I was protecting my child.

When she was born, I read books on newborn care. I read online forums. I questioned doctors about best practices and safety concerns. And my cautious nature extended into my parenting of my outside baby. I didn't flout guidelines. I didn't assume that I, as a first-time parent, knew more about taking care of my baby than others who had decades of experience. And one of the biggest areas of focus for me was sleep safety.

We coslept for the first 12 weeks of her life. To be clear, that means we slept in the same room. Our pediatrician told us that studies show cosleeping can actually reduce the risk of SIDS. That was all I needed to hear. Despite the fact that she was a crazy-loud sleeper and I was a crazy-light sleeper and that meant that everyone in the house got good sleep except me, we had her right next to my side of the bed in a bassinet for the first 12 weeks.

We never had bumpers on her crib. Too risky and I wasn't willing to take that risk with her health, with her life. She is now nearly 1.5 years old and she still sleeps, quite happily, in a sleep sack. There are no pillows. No blankets.

And we never once shared a bed.

I had read too many stories like these, but honestly it would only have taken one. One story of an infant dying because they shared a bed with his or her parent. And what a tragedy that there are so many more stories like this than just one.

It was hard, at times, not to bed share. My desire to snuggle with my newborn was no less than any other new mom. My desire to sleep a little extra while my baby nursed at my breast while we laid in bed together was no less than any other new mom. The stories of snuggly naps taken together sounded so sweet. It was hard. But I knew, in my heart, that for me, risking my child's life to satisfy my own desire to snuggle was simply not something I could do.

So we were cautious.

And now I'm pregnant again. We have another newborn on the way. Another life that will be utterly, wholly, and completely dependent on us for survival.

It is so, so tempting to relax a bit. We've now done this once. And baby girl is healthy, thriving, happy.  Did me not eating lunch meat or drinking alcohol or ingesting caffeine while pregnant really make that big of a difference? I'm surrounded with stories of "I did xyz, and my child is fine." In fact, for every story you find of a child not being fine, there are a thousand stories of children in the exact same circumstances surviving, thriving. So am I sitting here, the schmuck who is giving up things that aren't necessary when my child would really be fine if I didn't?

Maybe. It's possible. Probable even, given the statistics.

Especially since my own stories can now be added to the mix. Of my own baby thriving. Of my own daughter being perfectly fine.

It is so incredibly tempting to relax my discipline this time around.

But that's where complacency enters. And with complacency comes danger. Maybe it's only a fractional percentage of danger, but it's danger nonetheless. Doesn't Dos deserve the same care with his life as we gave to his sister?

When my mother had my older brother, back in the mid-seventies, she placed his bassinet carrier on the passenger-side floor of her car and drove an hour south with him to show him off to her company and friends. There were no child seat laws at the time. Infants rode in cars completely unrestrained. And you know what? The number of kids who survived that time, that practice, that danger, was thousands of times higher than the number of kids who didn't. For every story there was of an infant or child killed in a car wreck because they were unrestrained, you'll find thousands of stories of infants or children who rode like that every day of their young lives and turned out "just fine." And yet no one in their right mind would ride with an infant unrestrained these days. Because "just fine" doesn't negate the danger.

One of the new challenges we will face parenting our second child will be battling against the lure of complacency. Of remembering the reasons we were cautious with baby girl and honoring and valuing those reasons with Dos. It is a tragedy that there are stories like these in today's world when they are so easily avoided. So easily.

There is danger in complacency. And we must all remember that risking a child's life is never worth the relatively insignificant gain you might receive.