Mommy Confessions: The Dark Side

In the two and a half months since I last wrote, my daughter was born, my parents have come to the states and gone back home, my sister got married, my son turned two, and my daily life has become entirely unpredictable and chaotic (at times). While the months leading up to my precious baby's birth felt endless--especially the last four weeks--the weeks since her birth (seven, by the way) have been a complete whirlwind. Seven weeks have never gone by faster. But in those seven weeks, I've discovered something about myself: I don't like newborns. Now don't take that the wrong way. I love my baby girl. I absolutely love her. But I absolutely can't stand the newborn phase. And I'll be honest, Raelyn isn't a super difficult baby. She actually sleeps very well at night and overall, is a pretty relaxed, calm baby. And quite honestly, my feelings have far less to do with her and more to do with newborns in general. So let's take a little walk through my anti-newborn feelings, shall we? I know you're excited.

• There's no consistency. I don't necessarily need every hour scheduled, but it's really hard to keep a toddler entertained without ever leaving the house because the baby needs a nap every 45 minutes. Except for, you know, TV. Which, believe me, Logan has watched in great abundance. Hours. Every day. Mommy of the year, right here. 
• You can't reason with a newborn. As I'm typing this, my dear husband is driving around with Raelyn because she was screaming bloody murder. She decided not to take her usual long (2 to 3 hour) afternoon nap, so she was overtired. But instead of staying calm and nursing or enjoying the swaying of her swing, she was just screaming. Red faced, nothing would calm her down screaming. And since Travis offered to pick up my fifth antibiotic since giving birth (more on that momentarily), he said he'd take her with him and see if she'd sleep in the car or Ergo carrier in the store. Since he's not home yet, I assume it's working. [Nobody wants to walk around a store or drive endlessly with a screaming infant. Even my chill, nothing gets him rattled, husband.] I've become so accustomed to reasoning with Logan (not that it always works, but sometimes it does) when he cries, that it's hard to remember that Raelyn doesn't understand anything I say. 
• My body hates postpartum. I had mastitis (a breast infection, just in case you didn't know) three times with Logan. It was excruciatingly painful and took me until six weeks postpartum to feel better. It felt like an eternity. So this time, I was convinced that I knew what to do differently. I knew how to nurse and pump and heal any nipple cracks--everything was going to be fine. Then one week in, I saw the first signs of mastitis. Redness and heat. Called the doctor, got on an antibiotic, and the redness and heat went away in a couple days. I knew--I just knew that I'd beat mastitis this time and I was thrilled. I found a way to heal my nipple cracks by the time I was three weeks postpartum and figured I was good to go. But then my postpartum body scoffed at my over confidence. I woke up from a nap with an extremely tender hard spot on my breast that rivaled labor pains. I thought it was a clogged duct, but after nearly three days of trying to unclog it, nothing had worked. I started getting chills and fever, and saw a lactation consultant who told me to go see my doctor. I started another antibiotic and...nothing. By the end of my two weeks on the meds, nothing had changed. I was then referred to a general surgeon. He found an abscess in my breast and did a needle aspiration on it. You want to know what's worse than a needle in your spine for an epidural? That's right, a giant needle in your breast. And then I started another antibiotic only to get a call today saying that I need to switch antibiotics. I have another appointment tomorrow morning with the surgeon, and I'm hoping and praying that I don't need another aspiration.. but more than that, I don't want surgery. Did I mention that my body hates postpartum? 
• Spit up. I hate the spit up. Endless stinky spit up. Everywhere.
• Endless nursing. I feel like a cow. 
• I'm all jiggly. A big belly while you're pregnant is cute and round and expected. A jiggly, squishy belly after the baby, while perhaps expected, is no fun. 

I know I'm making new mommy-hood sound horrible. But really, all the early newborn misery is worth it. Also, my postpartum experience is not normal. According to the endless articles I've read about mastitis and abscesses, only about 10% of breastfeeding mothers get mastitis. And only 3% of those women get abscesses. So that means that in a room of 1,000 breastfeeding moms, only three will get abscesses. I'm a lightning rod for these things, but apparently most people are safe. Also, I know a lot of people that love the newborn phase. They love the sleepy, cuddly baby phase. And some babies don't spit up as much as mine do. And some mothers love the long nursing sessions. And some women are only jiggly for a week or two. Or not at all. So if you're reading this and you're either expecting a baby or plan to have one in the future and I've made it sound like the worst thing in the world, just remember that these things are mostly only true for me. I stand by my claim that newborns are inconsistent and unreasonable, but most people know that going in. Plus, Logan was actually easy to take places. He would fall asleep in the car constantly and would sleep for hours. Raelyn doesn't like her carseat, rarely falls asleep in the car, and if she does, she wakes up as soon as we stop the car. Every baby is different. Raelyn sleeps a lot at night. Three, four, almost five hours in a row sometimes. Logan didn't do that. He was an all-night nurser. Every two hours from when he started nursing. So when he nursed for half an hour, I then got to sleep for no more than an hour and a half before he wanted to eat again. 

Needless to say, I'm in the thick of it right now. I'm ready for this abscess to heal. I'm sick of taking endless medications. I want to be able to go grocery shopping again. I want Logan to watch less TV and have less tablet time. (But what's a mom to do when the baby won't sleep in the living room or anywhere near big brother because he's so incredibly loud and talks constantly? This mom turns on an episode of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and then leaves and nurses the baby to sleep in the bedroom with the door closed, lights off, sound machine blaring, and hopes beyond all hope that her toddler isn't doing something crazy. And that he won't come in the room and wake up the baby.) 

And someday this will all end. I don't know when that day will come, but it will. I won't remember any of this. I'll just have a beautiful, healthy daughter out of it. 

Toddler Words Are Hard to Type

Blue Bell Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough ice cream has made its way back into my life. I also bought some chocolate ice cream cones, so I get to eat my ice cream as if I went to an ice cream shop and paid a ton of money for one scoop of ice cream. It's entirely psychological, but it makes the ice cream taste better. It does, however, mean that I can't add the fudge sauce and strawberries and bananas I bought to go with my ice cream, so eventually I'll have to have a banana-strawberry split in a bowl. Switch things up once in a while. I could feel bad about eating ice cream everyday, but that really takes the fun out of it. Plus, ice cream is full of calcium and I'm really really terrible at getting all my calcium, so I'm actually being pretty health-conscious by guaranteeing some calcium every single day. It's for the baby. Raelyn needs lots of calcium. And chunks of cookie dough. ;)

Aside from that, I'm about to embark on a week of endless rain, no Mother's Day Out, no library Toddler Time, and absolutely no idea what I'm going to do to keep my child entertained. We can't go to the park or the zoo because of the stupid rain. We could go to a museum or an indoor play place, but I figure every single mom in the same situation as I'm in (or in an even more dire situation: more than one child!) will have the same idea and every indoor place will be packed out. So I might introduce Logan to playing in the rain at some point. I'm just dreading the inevitable "play rain" request I'll hear for the next month, regardless of whether there's actually any rain to play in, if he actually enjoys playing in the rain. But we'll see how the week goes. Maybe the rain will subside earlier than predicted and at least half our week will be salvaged. One can only hope.

Now that Logan is talking (and talking and talking and talking), I thought it was time to share some wonderful Logan Quotes with you. He's only at the two-to-three-word sentence phase, so we don't have any hysterically funny things yet, but I'm hopeful they'll come soon.

• The other day, Logan asked for a snack of cheese and crackers. I sliced three slices of cheddar cheese and gave him five crackers. He devoured the crackers and ate one slice of cheese. Then he gave me a slice of cheese. Then he picked up the last piece of cheese, threw it on the carpet, and said, "Walk cheese." For some very odd reason, my 21 month old son wanted to walk on his cheese. I don't even know where he could have come up with such an idea. But since he had thoughtfully announced his intentions, I was able to rescue the cheese before he mashed it into our area rug. 
• "Mommy floor" (which sounds more like "mommy war") is his all time favorite request all. day. long. Big pregnant mommy isn't allowed to sit on the couch. No, no. I get to sit on the floor while Logan plays with his toys the same way he'd play with them if I were on the couch. You want to know the worst part? Trying to get up off the floor multiple times a day. My very thoughtful husband thought he could simply help pull me to my feet. But no. No, when you're pregnant (at least, when you're me and pregnant) you have to get on your hands and knees and then step with one foot, using that first leg as a pushing off point for the rest of you, before finally ending up on your feet. If that sounds confusing and far too complicated, that's because it is. 
• Travis introduced Logan to guitars this past week. He played Old McDonald Had A Farm, so now Logan asks for "tar E-I-E" constantly. I have to remind him that Mommy doesn't play the guitar, so he'll have to wait for Daddy to get home. Travis "gave" Logan his ukulele, which Logan calls "my tar." I tried to move it the other day because it seemed like it was in the way and Logan said, "My tar no Mommy's." Well OK then. 
• Logan's word for yogurt is "ee aw." I have no idea why. I've tried to have him repeat "yo-gurt" slowly and carefully, but he always says "ee aw." And if he says "nack me," that means he wants a banana for snack. The number seven is the same word he uses for "hungry": honey. He still calls a spoon a "moo" and crackers are "dadu." However, I have hope that he'll get it eventually because he has always called a horse a "nee." Then he started saying it "neigh" and for the last few days he can officially say "horse." And "aws" was his word for any kind of sauce (BBQ, ketchup, salad dressing, applesauce). BUT, just this week, he has now differentiated between regular old sauces and applesauce! He now says, "appos aws." Woohoo! So there's hope yet for ee aw and me and dadu. :) 
• And his newest word is "dice." It took me a couple days, but I now know that dice means toys.

Typing toddler words requires way too many quotation marks and commas. Goodness gracious. Anyway, he has so many words now, I can't even keep track of all of them. The downside of his broadening vocabulary is when he gets a bit too confident that we can understand him, so he starts jabbering on in absolute gibberish and then, when I can't understand him,  dramatically covers his face with his hands and flops on the ground. For a few days he would also mash his face into the floor, but he kept getting dog fur in his mouth, so he revised his dramatic "my parents don't understand me" routine. Seemed like a smart move to me. 

As for an ever-lovely pregnancy update, I sometimes pee four times an hour. Sometimes I can make it two hours, but that's only if I don't stand up and Raelyn doesn't kick my bladder. My ample bathroom visits, however, have given Logan plenty of time to learn how to climb in and out of the bathtub. My arms and legs and, let's be honest, my entire body is very achy most of the time. My feet don't like supporting all this extra weight, so by the end of the day (the end of the day is 7 pm, by the way) I flop onto the couch and await my daily foot massage from my incredibly sweet, wonderful husband. He's pretty awesome and basically the only reason I'm still capable of walking. Other than all the physical ailments, I've now started nesting a bit. I convinced Travis to let me get a nice rocker recliner for Raelyn's room, and will probably live in that chair a couple months from now. We painted her room a wonderfully relaxing shade of grey and I've cleaned a few doors and baseboards. Travis is going to build a changing table/dresser and very soon I'll be adding light pink touches to my baby girl's room. I'm embracing the girly-ness wholeheartedly--and I really like light pink. :) 

Alright, that pretty much does it. My son is slowly waking up and he's super cute when he's just woken up from his nap. (Assuming he took a nice long nap and is fully well-rested, of course.)

Babies and Toddlers and Giant Bellies and Sweet Tea

I cut my nails yesterday. Once I cut my nails, I love typing. It's just an enjoyable thing to do. I've been known to take typing speed tests online simply because I love typing. But not with long nails. They're cumbersome and slow me down. So thanks to my wonderful use of time yesterday, I'm finally writing again. Logan is napping, and I got enough sleep last night that I don't need to nap today. And since I cleaned the house yesterday, I don't need to do anything but vacuum (which takes all of ten minutes, really). Right now I'm sitting on the couch listening to the very quiet dishwasher, relishing the fact that unless I have to pee (a likely occurrence actually), I don't have to move even an inch. Oh how I hope Logan naps for a couple hours today.

My weeks have suddenly gone from long and exhausting to completely manageable and only sometimes exhausting. My incredibly sweet husband agreed to let me put Logan in a once-a-week Mother's Day Out program at a local church. Wednesdays are glorious! I drop Logan off at 9:00 am and don't have to pick him up until 2:00. That's five beautiful hours to do whatever I need to do! Yesterday I did some grocery shopping without a toddler trying to dive out of the cart; I vacuumed and mopped the kitchen/dining room/living room; I folded laundry; I cleaned the guest bathroom; and I had a wonderful lunch date with my hubby. It's our new thing. We meet at a restaurant on Wednesdays and enjoy a very nice lunch date. Every week!! No toddler running around the restaurant... no toddler screaming to get out of his high chair... I'd forgotten how relaxing and enjoyable eating out can be. (Don't get me wrong. Occasionally Logan is wonderful at restaurants... but he has to be really hungry and not tired. And at lunch time, that's highly unlikely.) So needless to say, my weeks have improved immensely since Logan started MDO. Next week I have a prenatal appointment right after I drop him off. I'm so glad I get to go to appointments by myself now! I really should be an MDO spokesperson. Especially for pregnant Mamas that have frequent doctor's appointments. No one wants to take an impatient, high energy toddler along for those ever-exciting prenatal appointments. I could probably go on for hours about how wonderful Wednesdays are, but I think you get the picture. I'll move on.

We found out this month that we are having a baby girl: Raelyn Abigail. Even though I had insisted that I had no inkling as to what we were having this time around, I think deep down I was expecting another boy. So when the ultrasound tech said it was most assuredly a girl, I was pretty shocked. Travis was more shocked than I was. Hah! I don't think he knew what to say or think after that. We're excited, of course, but I think we thought it'd be a lot of fun for Logan to have a little brother to play with. That's not to say he can't have fun with a little sister, but I think it goes without saying that boys and girls are pretty different. ;) I was a puzzle-doing, book-reading, doll-playing kind of girl. So if Raelyn is anything like me, she's not going to be all that interested in climbing and throwing balls and building endless towers (and then taking them apart/knocking them over) as Logan is. But we'll see what happens. Maybe she'll think her big brother is so cool that she'll want to do everything he does. :) I have to admit, I'm having a lot of fun planning a baby girl's nursery. I'm not much for doing nursery themes, but I love feminine colors and such. I didn't really get to do much for Logan's nursery since we didn't even move into our house until two weeks after he was born. At that point, I didn't care much what the nursery looked like as long as it had what I needed. We added some decorations (and when I say "we" I mean my mom and Travis) over the next few months and now it looks pretty cute, but I had very little to do with it. I picked out the color of the walls. And that's it. So this time around, I'm excited to have a (hopefully) ready-to-go pretty nursery for my baby girl.

Someone asked me how much longer I have in my pregnancy yesterday. I told her 13 weeks. She thought I was almost finished. That should tell you how much bigger I am this time around. I looked at my bump pictures from last time and I was about the same size I am now (at 27 weeks) at 36 weeks or so last time. I've already gained as much weight as I did the whole 40 weeks with Logan. I'm gaining more on other parts of my body--my hips getting the worst of it, I think. I don't know what to do about it except try to go on walks with Logan or something. The extra weight is making my feet ache so quickly though. I dread my weigh-ins. My doctor doesn't seem concerned and all my maternity clothes from last time (except for one pair of jeans) still fit, so I'm trying not to stress too much about my rapidly growing self. But this, my friends, is why there aren't frequent bump pictures this time around. Now I completely understand why bump pictures tend to happen during a woman's first pregnancy... and then not again. I don't feel cute. I just feel large. Hah. But as much as I look forward to not being pregnant and getting to lose this extra weight, I'm genuinely enjoying my time with Logan, one-on-one. He just switched from "mama" and "dada" to "mommy" and "daddy," and it's so cute! I didn't know that happened so early! :) He's learning so many words all the time, and it's amazing to hear his vocabulary broaden each week!

Every day I have to resist the urge to buy a gallon of McAlister's sweet tea. I'm addicted. I've tried making it at home, but they must use some kind of special blend because my tea is never as good. No matter what. Ah, my baby boy is awake. Break time is over. And the vacuuming didn't happen. Oh well.