I Don't Mind

I don’t mind.

I don’t mind that you woke up for the fourth, fifth, sixth time tonight for no obvious reason. I don’t mind that it’s 4:35am.

I don’t mind that when I come into your room that you’re awake. Not wide awake, but definitely more awake than, you know, asleep.

I don’t mind bringing you downstairs to do the one thing that has always soothed you even in the deepest throes of colic: dancing to music. I picked Alkaline Trio this time.

I don’t mind having to turn off the computer screen and the nightlight while we dance because if I don’t you’ll stare at them and stay awake.

I don’t mind having to constantly readjust so that one hand is always holding your head as we dance. I know it helps you fall asleep and more importantly, I know you like it.

I don’t mind that you fight me again with increasingly quieter squawks. I know you want to experience the world around you instead of sleeping, and I hope you retain that curiosity as you get older.

I don’t mind that my feet are getting cold pacing the floor as you resist the sleep you so desperately need. I don’t mind that my arms ache from holding and swaying you.

I definitely don’t mind the way your body and head slowly get heavier against me as you drift off to sleep. One day I’ll remember this moment and I’ll miss it when you are grown. I don’t know what that feels like from experience, but the seed of that future loss was sown the day you were born and I am constantly aware of its presence. Sleep seems so important now, but I know it won’t some day.

I don’t mind walking you back upstairs and laying you down, taking extra, excruciating care to make sure I don’t wake you up.

Honestly I do mind a little bit when your eyes immediately snap open and you start to scream again the second you hit the bed.

But it's okay. Alkaline Trio has a lot of songs.

Motherhood Lately

Amelia is about 9 days away from turning 8 months old.

And where the hell that time went, I have absolutely no idea.

When she was first born, and really until she was about 4 1/2 months old, time could not have gone slower. As I've written about previously, she was very colicky, and with the specter of postpartum depression hanging over my head and the anxiety of being thrown into motherhood...let's just say it was a tough fourth trimester.

Everyone told me that it'd get easier, that it'd get better, that I'd forget the absolute drudgery of that time. I'm not far enough away from it to forget it (some days I think it's actually worse in my memory than it was in reality), but I can finally report that it did, in fact, get better.

At 7 1/2 months old, Amelia is bright, aware, engaging, communicative. She reaches both for me and for Rob, eats whatever we shovel into her mouth, doesn't (always) scream when I leave the room, is back to sleeping through the night in her own bed (knock on wood), is working toward crawling and walking simultaneously. She is still fussier than a lot of babies, but generally only when she's tired, lonely, hungry, or wakes up from a nap too early. If there is such a thing as an introverted baby, she is one; when we go somewhere new or when someone new comes to us, her fussiness ramps up a bit and she requires a fair amount of "recharge" time. Sometimes I worry that she is this way because in her first months we didn't go many places or meet new people, but either way it is how she is and we are learning to adapt to meet her needs. A lot of our day is still spent pulling her back from the brink of misery (for all involved) but it's about a thousand times less unpleasant than it was in her first few months.

I suppose that along with her evening out, we have gotten a lot better too. We are more used to her ups and her downs, we know what works and what doesn't, and we learn more about each other every second of every day. Before she was born I always thought there'd be a point at which we felt like we had the basics down and had a good flow; I've realized, though, that this point doesn't really exist at least in the way that I had expected. It might be that my baby is uniquely difficult, but it seems that she never has one habit for too long and as soon as we get accustomed to her she flips the tables on us.  The most recent example is that she was napping only in the carrier for months, and now putting her into the carrier launches a massive screaming fit. At the current moment I can only get her to nap in our bed with me there, and it takes a lot of fighting and nursing to make that happen. Another example is that she was almost 100% weaned onto formula for several weeks only to give up and refuse bottles in favor of breastfeeding again. It's taken awhile for my milk supply to respond to "unweaning" but I think we're in a good place. At this point I might just nurse forever for how well it works toward getting her to sleep.

This is one thing I would convey to expecting mothers from my experience: plan away if it helps you, but be ready for near-constant change. Don't internalize it, because it probably isn't your fault. Babies are terrible.

Aside from all that (or maybe partially because of it) motherhood is as amazing and beautiful. I don't know why I feel the need to clarify to the world that I love my kid--it should be a given--but I share a lot of the tough stuff so there's some positive for you too.

Happy week, friends!

In Which I Compare Parenthood to Fictionalized Serial Murder

You know that scene at the end of Se7en where (spoiler alert, if you just time traveled here from 1995) Morgan Freeman opens the package to find Gwyneth Paltrow's head, and he realizes that Kevin Spacey has totally used him and Brad Pitt to complete his murderous tableau, and that in his words, "John Doe has the upper hand"?

I had a realization the other day that that, for me, in a nutshell, is what it's like to have a baby.

WHAT'S IN THE FUCKING BOX? It's my sanity.

I've written before about how prior to Amelia's arrival I had read and saved dozens of blog posts that ranged in topics from sleep to Montessori activities to raising an "independent" child. They were all centered around one key idea, that by performing the correct steps in the correct sequence, you could in turn determine the child and person that your progeny would become. 

This concept appealed to me, since as an anxious person the ultimate goal of worrying and obsessing is to control a situation that is fundamentally uncontrollable. 

I realized in short order that not only are babies not blank slates, they also don't read or adhere to parenting advice. Or at least mine doesn't. The little rebel.

Though Amelia slept through the night by 5-6 weeks, we have since "regressed" to full-time cosleeping. It's literally the only way she will sleep. Not only does she need to be in our bed, but it means I can't leave the bed (even when she's asleep) without her screaming. And it's real screaming, not just angry baby noises. Despite the fact that when she was a newborn I made something of an effort to not hold her constantly, she is currently at least somewhat unhappy unless she is in my arms all the time. 

I'm revealing my own naivete, perhaps, when I admit that I thought if I had a good sleeper by 3 months or so then that was it. My work was done barring the occasional episode of teething or developmental leaps.

Going back to my metaphor, finally coming to and accepting the realization that parenting advice is really more of a guideline assuming you have a certain type of kid was a bit like Morgan Freeman opening the box and realizing that he never had the control he thought he did. 

I know that a lot of my parental desires boil down to wanting Amelia to be independent. That isn't because I want to be left alone or that I don't want her thinking she can depend on me; rather, I know from personal experience how hard it is to go through life requiring validation, constantly feeling uncomfortable in your own skin, never feeling truly comfortable being yourself. I don't want that for her. 

Perhaps appropriately given my own mental state, I don't want her to be like me.

But that's not what parenting is about, is it? Once you get past the obvious initial stage, it isn't about creating a person from scratch. It's growing a person, shaping a person. And that's exactly what she is--a person, albeit a small one.  Who she is is largely beyond my control, and while it is my job to guide her during her formative years, it is also to love her no matter who she is or who she becomes. Not only that, but who she is at 7 months is unlikely to be who she is at 7 or 17 or 70. 

If she's like me, maybe she'll feel fortunate that she has a mother who can understand her anxiety beyond tired platitudes like "just stop worrying." If she ends up being more independent like her dad, maybe she'll cherish the fact that she when she feels vulnerable she has a mom who is well-versed in the ways of fear.  Either way all I can do is what works best for the both of us and try to let go of the illusion of control.

And that, I guess, is why parenting is like finding a bloody head in a box in the best way possible.

What Parenthood Looks Like

I find that when it comes to motherhood, there are two general narratives you find online.

The first is of the mother that has everything together (or at least appears to), who has the Pinterest-worthy nursery and birthday parties, who speaks glowingly about every single phase of a child's life as being truly magical.  This mother inexplicably has white walls and light-colored carpets, always has the laundry done and makes her own baby food.  Even when this mom "keeps it simple" the result could still feasibly be its own magazine cover. She also probably cloth diapers and talks about how much easier it is (convinced this is a lie).

The second is an opposing vision: this mother loves her children as well, but neglects her significant other. She wears crusty, stained yoga pants, her hair hasn't seen shampoo in weeks. This mother defines her parenting style by the absence, rather than the presence, of overachievement. As proud of the other mother is of her parties and her nursery, this mom is just as proud of the fact that her children ate cereal for dinner while she drank her wine.

At this point I will say that I am not suggesting that either of these parents loves their child more or less than the other; indeed, though you find plenty of examples of both these narratives on the internet, I don't think either tell the entire picture.

The plunge into parenthood is fraught with as much guilt and insecurity as it is with joy and amazement. that much any parent will tell you.  With mothers in particular (in a biased, heternormative sense as that is my experience) I think many find it easier to express the push and pull in extremes, such as the extreme examples above.  This doesn't leave a lot of room for the grey areas into which most people fall. If there's one thing I've learned about parenting over the last 5.5 months, it's that you'll often find yourself immersed (submerged? drowning?) in nuance and grey areas.

All that said, I thought I'd share with you what parenting, and more specifically motherhood, look like for me--equal parts overachievement and "just getting by."

• No matter in which direction I look, there is at least one baby-related item in my periphery. 
• Spending an additional .50 on the "nice" baby food jars to compensate for the guilt of not making my own healthy baby food.
• Trying the Ferber method, then trying full-time cosleeping. Mixed results with both.
• Making sure the plastic toys I buy are BPA and phthalate free despite the fact that I can't tell you with any certainty exactly what BPA or phthalates are.
• Breastfeeding exclusively except for the odd bottle of formula to get a break.
• Babywearing, not for its supposed benefits but because it's the only way my baby naps that still allows me to get work done.
• I could not care less about the decor or cake for Amelia's first birthday.
• In a fit of exhaustion I might've told Amelia I'd sell her to the circus. 

So there you go. Parenthood. At least my kid should develop a good sense of humor out of all this.

The 5 People You Meet on Mom Forums

Here's a secret about me: one of my guilty pleasures is internet drama. When I come across a controversial article the first place I go is the comments. I'm a regular reader of the Scary Mommy Confessional. As a result of this guilty pleasure it is not surprising that I often find myself reading forums on BabyCenter.

For those of you who have not sunk into the depths of the Internet Mamarati, BabyCenter is what people warn you about when tell you not to Google anything. Sometimes I'm convinced that BabyCenter hires people to post ridiculous threads that get clicks because they are so fucking out there. I just can't (or don't want to) believe that people like this exist.

But they do, in some form, and below I've shared the five types of moms I've come across on mom forums.

HAVING IT ALL

1. The Overachieving Crunchy Mom: Many of the regulars on mom forums create a "signature" for themselves that appears every time they post. The Overachieving Crunchy Mom's signature is chock full of all her crunchy achievements with near-unintelligible acronyms. This mother practices EBF (extended breastfeeding) and CD (cloth diapering), doesn't vaccinate or try CIO (cry it out) and plans to "unschool" their darling LO (little one).  Because it isn't enough to just feel strongly about these things, this mom makes sure that all other posters know all the ins, outs, and questionable science behind all of it.

Example Posts: 

"Have you tried squirting breastmilk on your LO's cut/broken bone/eye? We've been EBFing our 4yo and breastmilk in her ear canal cured her multiple ear infections!"

"You took your baby to get shots at 2 months old? EDUCATE YOURSELF WITH THIS SERIES OF BLOG POSTS I FOUND, SHEEP."

*~*~*~*~*

2. The Sanctimommy: Mom forums are positively rife with this type of mom. This chick replies to every post, welcome or not, with passive-aggressive assurances of how much better of a mom she is and how what you're doing is not only wrong, but will most likely ruin your child for life. Every decision, no matter how tiny or seemingly insignificant, has massive, irreversible effects to this mother.

Example Posts:

"How could you leave your CHILD to cry for an hour? My child has never even cried for 20 seconds let alone an hour! It's called being a loving parent."

"I guess whatever works for your family, but I could never do that personally."

*~*~*~*~*

3. The Humblebragger Mom: Another frequent poster. This mom will reply to every anxiety-laden question by confirming another mom's fears with her own experiences. Worried about the fact that your child isn't rolling yet? This mom's baby has been rolling since she was 4 weeks old. Concerned about your baby's babbling skills? This mom's kid was speaking in full sentences as a fetus. But no worries y'all, babies develop at a different pace and I'm sure he will soon!

Example Posts:

"My husband and I have had sex 78 times a week starting when my baby was 2 weeks old!"

"My child has slept through the night since she was 3 days old! SO BLESSED."

*~*~*~*~*

4. The "Bumper" Mom: When a mom's post doesn't get a response quickly enough, this mom will comment with "bump" to return it to the top of the page..over and over and over again.

Example Post:

*Bump*

*Bump*

*Bump*

*~*~*~*~*

5. The TMI Mom: Motherhood tears down a lot of walls, particularly in the realm of bodily functions. For this mom, this manifests itself in sharing graphic photos of feces, vaginal discharge, and wounds.

Example Posts:

"I found red strings in my LO's poop today. GRAPHIC PHOTO."

"Does this cervical mucus mean I've ovulated?"

*~*~*~*~*

Want to hear a funny story? Some of these are based on actual conversations/replies on BabyCenter forums.  Motherhood is a whole other world, y'all. Don't Google.

Some Positivity

Both on Facebook and here, I tend to write a lot about the dirty side of parenting. This is both because I am generally a negative person and because I'm in what is by all accounts a pretty difficult stage of parenthood with a baby who is decidedly on the fussy end of the temperament spectrum.

A few friends, both parents and non-parents, have told me that they appreciate my thoughts on how parenting can suck. The rosy, unicorn-magic picture of motherhood tends to get a lot more play, and frankly that picture gets old, especially when you don't feel the magic as a mom or worry you won't when you have kids. Motherhood is isolating enough without feeling like you're the only one who is missing something that everyone else seems to have figured out.

That said, there's something to be said for some positivity among the "realness," and that's what I wanted to write here.

Motherhood has been the deepest, most real thing I've ever done. The love I feel for Amelia is mind-blowingly, soul-crushingly huge. I'm amazed by every bit of her, from her little turned-up nose to her long toes, to her grey and brown eyes, to the tiny red birthmark near her left elbow, to the veins in her forehead that come together to form a heart. The love and terror and joy and pain I feel with her is deeper, stranger and more foreign to me than anything I've ever felt before.

Even when Amelia screams, even when liking her feels difficult and exhausting, I never lose sight for a second how lucky we are to have her with us, healthy and increasingly happy. Lucky that my pregnancy was not only easy to come by but completely uneventful. Lucky that we get to experience the intensity of our love for her. Parenthood isn't for everyone, certainly, but we are so, so happy that she joined our family.

Amelia made us into parents, added light and love and noise to our home, added a leg to our journey that is unlike any that came before it. With every fiber, tendon, nerve, bone, cell in my body I love her and want to give everything I am to her.

So there you go. Some real positivity among the dirty, messy reality of parenting. I hope you are all having a lovely weekend.

An Anxious Mom's Tips for the First Three Months

Amelia turned 5 months old this week which is absolutely insane to me. Where did those five months even go?

Since I kept both myself and Amelia alive (with lots of help, obviously) for five months, I figured that I can finally consider myself qualified to give other anxious moms some advice for getting through the first three months of life with a baby.

1. Get yourself some (real) mom friends. One of the most invaluable resources I had during the first few months was regular contact with several friends whose babies were of the same age as Amelia. But if you're anything like me, you need to find friends that you can vent to and who won't judge you for thinking that having a baby kind of sucks sometimes. Friends you can text in the middle of the night because they're awake too. I can't overstate how helpful it is to have someone outside of your situation that could understand the unique mixture of love, frustration, guilt, terror and dislike that come with having a baby.

2. Don't stress too much about habits. Before I had a baby I read a lot about getting babies to sleep, and while some of it was helpful most of it lulled me into a false sense of control over everything. The fact is, based on my experience and the experience of other parents I know, your child is born with certain sleeping habits. There are certain things you can do to help encourage some habits over others, but really the baby is going to call the shots. I swore up and down that I'd never cosleep, but in the middle of the night when I didn't want to sit in a chair for a 20-minute feed only to have Amelia's eyes spring open the second I put her down, suddenly I didn't really care about habits I might be creating. Survive day to day and don't stress too much about habits you may be creating down the line. You'll have plenty of time for consistency later.

3.  Live second by second, day by day. I tend to get really anxious when I feel trapped. I know "trapped" is a crappy word to use when talking about your flesh and blood that you created, but knowing that I am a mother forever and that my life has been permanently changed always overwhelms me if I think about it too long. For someone like me who gets far too caught up in the future, I found in the first months that it helped to focus only on what was right in front of me.

4. Pick a mantra. Many people who know me know that I have a secret love for cheesy-ass country music. When Amelia was in the throes of colic, I remembered a stupid country song called "You're Gonna Miss This," and I'd often repeat the chorus to myself: "you're gonna miss this/you're gonna want this back/you're gonna wish these days/hadn't gone by so fast." Maudlin and cliched and ridiculous, but I found that saying it to myself helped keep the whole thing in perspective--this time was temporary and short-lived, and she'd be older before I knew it.

5. Be clear about your needs. I still struggle with this. I often expected Rob to anticipate my needs without actually conveying them, which meant that I was almost always left feeling resentful and put-upon (it helps that I sometimes love being a martyr. Wife of the year). When I started feeling more comfortable telling him "I need a nap, can you watch the baby?" I found that he was more than willing to help.  This goes for people outside of your relationship as well--other moms are often incredibly enthusiastic to lend a hand if you ask for it.

6. Sleep when the baby sleeps, but do other things too. I hated hearing "sleep when the baby sleeps," because while it is great advice, I found that watching the laundry and dog hair pile up caused me more stress than sleep deprivation. I started carving out time to fold laundry, do dishes, vacuum. It was surprisingly relaxing to do something that didn't need me, that didn't scream at me, that didn't make me feel completely inadequate.

7. Go easy on yourself. Take care of yourself and keep yourself healthy, both physically and mentally. If this means giving up breastfeeding, go for it. If it means putting your darling child in daycare once they are old enough, do it. Mom guilt is impossible to escape, but try to give yourself permission to be a person too. You are no less of a parent for doing so.

So there you have it, some of the things that kept me sane for months 1-3. If you have any to add please feel free to do so in the comments!