breastfeeding

more to come on this topic, but thought this blog post was great. http://mamamojo.wordpress.com/2007/09/12/breastfeeding-in-public-warning-offensive-content/

Merry Christmas Tessapup!

Let it snow

Needless to say, and like most of the general population, I love snow days. This, however, is a rarity. 2 feet of snow in less than 24 hours? Amazing. And in Virginia! The great and terrible thing about this town is its reaction to snow. People flood the town, buying groceries, stocking up on canned goods: "Have you heard we're supposed to get an inch?! An inch! We better be prepared!" or "Close up shop! It's time to batten down the hatches!" Like it's the F-ING apocalypse!! Now, I'm not from New England, but New Jersey has seen its fair share of snow. Growing up, there were quite a few blizzards. But here, it snows an inch and the whole town shuts down. Traffic lights flash, schools are closed, accidents like crazy.
But this, this snowstorm calls for some attention. We're seeing more snow than has been seen since 1969. Record breaking! News making! Will we survive? DO WE HAVE ENOUGH MILK???
One thing I love about this type of snow is that the whole town becomes your playground. Boundaries between yard and road, road and street, street and parking lot, are broken. Everything is covered in white, and you are free to go where you please. Dashing through the street, with not a car in sight! It's totally post-apocalyptic. Or like the horror films where towns are deserted because everyone has become a zombie. You can do whatever you want! People take to smoking pot in the streets, wine is poured before 5, responsibilities are eradicated. Time stops. It's a free world!
And it's great while it lasts. But after, it's worse than a Monday. It's like 50 Mondays from your year piled up and saved for one day. Because everything you didn't do is still there, waiting for you. And the real world is a much harsher, colder, muddier version than before.
But who cares! Carpe Diem. I'm going to go play in the snow.

falling in love

With all that has been happening the past 5 months, and the 9 months before that, it takes a lot to slow down and really think about it, especially because it is an always present, always noticeable thing. But there are times when it just explodes in my face and I am totally overcome with it.
I've been falling in love.
It started with that little bean on the ultrasound screen, with that tiny quick flutter of a heartbeat. And then it was the movement within, that little "Here I am. I'm here to stay, and we are always together," that came with feeling a baby move inside. The centering, the turning inward when you know you are becoming a mother. The realization that you are doing something more beautiful, more important, than anything you have ever done before. And then you grow bigger and bigger, more noticeable every day, and you are fulfilling the most basic, natural, biological need that you body knows. Carrying a child, what your body was built for.
And then you wait. And wait. And finally, you for the first time look into your baby's face, and it is like everything you ever knew disappeared. The you before, the life before, nothing before ever existed. This baby all of a sudden fills your entire heart, just completely takes it over, and you feel like it can't possibly fit inside you any more. But each day you spend with that baby, it grows, and grows, and the love you had the day before doubles. And this happens every day.
And here I am, all of a sudden, with a 5 month old baby girl who I love twice as much every day as I did the day before. Infinite.
It is moments when I go in to get her out of her crib, and a slow smile dawns on her sleepy face like it is the best day in the world. And (selfishly) when her father holds her, and the whole time, she watches my every move with a huge smile. Eyes only for me. When she nuzzles her head into my chest and digs her feet into my belly, telling me it's time for sleep. When she lights up and laughs when I clap and say, "yay, tessa!!" How she is forming her own person, her independence, and after months of being a one-way relationship, she's becoming herself to the bone. Unchangeable.
I can't think about her without smiling. I miss her when she sleeps. I don't want to spend a second away from her. I am falling completely, utterly in love with this little girl.

MIA

I've been MIA... my apologies.
Things have been pretty crazy on my end. Holidays were great, got to see lots of important people (you know who you are!) and by the time I got home I had a TON of work to do. It's the last week of classes until Nursing school starts in March and as usual, I've saved all of my work for the very end. I get procrastinator of the year award- 5 tests and a paper, all in one week. GO ME. SO as you can imagine, I've been swamped.
Fortunately, A has been "babysitting," so I've been able to do a lot of work.
-Side Note A) Isn't it f-ing retarded that some dads call taking care of the kids "babysitting?" SERIOUSLY? Whatever.
-Side Note B) I just finished doing work in the library- killing time before A picks me up.. This place is terrible. Ok, it's a library. Not a homeless shelter. I don't think a single person in this place has showered in the last year. The guy at the table across from me must have narcolepsy. He keeps snoring and his lady friend wakes him up and literally seconds later he is snoring again. This has been going on for 2 hours. No lie. The guy behind me smells like a shoe found inside a dumpster filled with used diapers and dead bodies and gallons and gallons of spoiled milk.
Anyway, BIG DEVELOPMENTS:
After much thought and consideration and a wonderful, generous offer from Dad and Kim, I've decided that in February, Tessa and I will be moving to NJ to live with them until I'm through with nursing school (about a year.) A will be staying here, hopefully working, hopefully resolving some current issues.
Some of you know about the ongoing problems we've been having, but the long and the short of it is the need for financial stability and security, as well as time to see if we can resolve relationship conflicts that have slowly become unbearable.
OK- gotta cut this short. A's here to pick me up. More to come.

Update time

Happy 5 Month Birthday to Tessa (tomorrow)!
Just a monthly update for everybody. We had our Dr's appointment the other day. Everything is (mostly) good- her health is perfect, development is right on track (we like to think she's VERY advanced though..) and growth is normal. She is still a really big baby, coming in this month at 17lbs 14oz and 25 3/4 inches up from 16lb 10oz and 25 inches. That puts her at 90% and 75% respectively. The baby that was leaving as we arrived at the appointment was 2 weeks younger than Tessa and I totally thought she was around 2 months- Dr. Ogan informed me that I'm not such a good judge of age since my baby is rather large...
2 vaccinations and she didn't even scream this time!
She has been rolling over like crazy (and getting pissed once she's on her belly.. "who put me here!! I didn't ask to be put on my belly!" She's sitting upright supported, not long before she'll be doing it on her own. Tessa has become quite the nosy baby- grabbing everything in sight. We put her on the table in the bumbo seat at dinner time and she grabs for everything, including food and knives. Time to start baby-proofing.
She's using a sippy cup! Not quite sure how to tip it back to get the fluids to flow so she arches her back until she's practically horizontal to get it to work! It's hysterical.
We started solids. The piglet loves everything regardless of flavor or consistency, even eating the cereal puffs and pieces of turkey at Thanksgiving. She gets the solids about every other day and at 6 months it'll be once a day.
What else... Oh yeah, SLEEP. We've been having a rough time. In the past month she went from 7/8 hour stretches to 2 or 3 hours. Like a newborn. I understand now why sleep deprivation is used as torture. Dr said a temporary change in bedtime should work so it's back to 9ish, and with the new white noise CD, she's back to long stretches, thank god. If she weren't so cute, we would have been considering adoption.
Regardless of anything, I am so grateful to have a happy, healthy baby.

The Carnage

About 90 percent of the time, I am OK with this parenting stuff. I do my research thoroughly, lots of reading, asking around, tried and true, and hypothesis testing. 90 percent of the time, it works out. 5 percent of the time, I'm a little lost. I need help. I don't really know what to do, like this sleep issue (for another post). And the other 5 percent, I think I'm really going to lose it. Like today.
I am okay dealing with bodily fluids. They really don't bother me. Shit is not my favorite area of parenting, but I deal- wipe up the mess and get on with your life.
Not today.
Tessa has started eating solids. It's a lot of fun watching that little face make all sorts of expressions when she tastes something new or discovers the strange texture of oatmeal. It's fun to feed her while I eat because she STARES at my food going from plate to fork or spoon to mouth, and most of the time reaches for it. She wants a piece of the fun. Understandable. The downside to starting solids? The shit changes. It goes from liquidy easy-to-clean poopy to stinky, thick, messy, sticky crap. Tessa discovered a cracker the other day, loved it to pieces, literally, and had oatmeal with apple today. She hadn't pooped in 3 days. I should have known what was coming to me.
It started when I saw the brown stripe above her pants. This means that the poop has exploded up the front and likely the back of the diaper and has seeped through her clothes. I brought her to the changing table, took off her pants, undid her diaper, and that, my friends, is when the fun started.
It was HUGE. ENORMOUS. And the second the diaper was opened, her hands went right for it. Then her feet. I wiped the hands, knowing their next stop would be her mouth. I went to work on her feet so they wouldn't smear all over the table. Then the hands went back in. And while I was trying to clean her hands again, the shit got all over the table. And within seconds, it was on her elbows, legs, belly, head, and my hands, arms, and shirt. It was uncontrollable. While Tessa was flailing all over, having the time of her life at her own little poop party, I was trying to get more wipes out which got stuck and the whole damn package ended up across the room, so there I was, no wipes, shit all over, hair in my face and no way to get it out, the table covered, baby covered, me covered, and I lost it. I just lost it. I started shrieking because WHY was there no one there to help me and this was DEFINITELY someone else's fault (can't blame the baby, definitely can't blame self, so pick anyone else) I don't know who but it was SOMEONE's fault and WHY ISN'T ANYONE HELPING ME!!!!!!! Meanwhile, Tessa is laying there in her mess thinking I am the FUNNIEST crazy mom in the entire world. Laughing her poopy little ass off while I'm shrieking and practically in tears. Woe is me.
It was like a scene from a battlefield, only instead of the blood of a million soldiers, it was like a million soldiers pooped themselves. The carnage of it. I'll never forget this day. The Great Poop of 2009? Look it up on wikipedia.
Eventually I stripped baby and self and got us both to the bath to be de-pooped because a whole package of wipes wasn't enough for that explosion. And settled myself down, because after all, it was just a poop, everything and everyone can be washed and that will solve the problem.
At the end of the day, I think I do pretty damn well for a first time mom. It is just these brief moments that I know I'm being tested. Do you have what it takes to get through the baby months? Because you know childhood and the teenage years are really going to give you a run for your money. You better know what you are getting yourself into.

Tessa HATES tummy time

sickly

So I went to the doctor's yesterday- not H1N1 (which for some reason always reminds me of HNIC) but strep and a cold. Let me tell you: being sick and taking care of a baby is NOT fun. I just want someone to rub my feet, make me tea, and read to me in bed while I drift off into a delirious slumber, something akin to Alice in Wonderland. Did that happen? NO. Yes, A took the day off to "help" with tessa, but really... you get my drift. There was no foot rubbing or tea making. Needless to say, I threw a small fit before locking myself in the bedroom for the night.
Where am I going with this?
On another note, I've booked my trip to NJ and will arrive the 27th at 2 something pm. I am SO looking forward to some alone time with some of my favorite people in the world!

procrastination.

I began this blog when Tessa was 5 weeks old. Today I logged on for the first time since, deleted the post, and started over.

a) I am a procrastinator.

b) I struggle with what I want this to be- an outlet, of course. For whom? Myself, obviously. For which people in my life? Do I want to censor and let it be for everyone, open for judgment, criticism.. Or do I want to pour my heart out to my closest and best? Is it a way of keeping distant friends and family updated, or a way to make sense of the dark, hidden tangles of my brain?

c) Should there be a c)?

d) I am so inspired by some blogs that I read that I fear mine will be a silly little nugget in comparison.

Suffering from a cold, or H1N1, depending on what mood I'm in. Off to the couch to bury my nose in the latest book from Diana Gabaldon, and enjoy an hour of silence until A gets home with the Pup.