Well, it finally happened.
Saturday, in a burst of parental optimism, I decided to take both boys with me to the grocery store, my first attempt at such a feat. Everything was going fairly smoothly until we were shopping for the last item on our list, rice. I was trying to find the basmati when Henry said, "Look, Mommy, I found ketchup." I turned around to remind him that we have a "no picking things up" rule at the grocery store. One second after I told him this and also said, that's not ketchup, that's spaghetti sauce, so let's put it back -- CRASH.
For the first millisecond, I simply didn't believe it had happened. My child had not just dropped a glass jar of gourmet spaghetti sauce all over the floor and all over me. I was never going to be THAT MOTHER -- you know, the one who's kids are always running around, making messes, and generally causing everyone in their vicinity to regard them as if they have the swine flu. And yet, there I was, covered in spaghetti sauce, with Henry crying because he had cut his finger and Dean crying because Henry was crying. Believe me, I wanted to be crying, too.
The store employees were remarkably cheerful about the whole thing, and Henry's finger was fine. But I was still completely freaked out and just wanted to get out of that store FAST. So we skipped the rice (pretty much everyone had to skip the rice while they cleaned up the aisle) and I was grateful to find a line with just one other person in it. As I was signing my name on the slip, Dean decided he had had quite enough and began screaming at the top of his lungs. No amount of sweet talking and pacifier-bribing would quiet his crying, which then turned into gagging -- while he was still strapped into the car seat in the grocery cart. So then I had to hastily get him out of the seat while people are standing behind me, waiting to exit the store.
I was shaking by the time we all finally got into the car.
Wow. Now I know how THAT MOTHER feels and I will never again judge her so harshly.
The day ended up pretty well. Henry and I baked a chocloate chip banana cake from scratch -- it took most of the afternoon and at one point I think Dean and I had such a combination of spit up and flour on ourselves I couldn't tell which was which -- but I am glad we did it because it gave me some one-on-one time with Henry, at least while Dean was napping. After Dean went to bed for the evening, Henry and I stayed up and watched "James and the Giant Peach" and ate our cake. At one point Henry said, "Mommy, I love you. And I like you." And later on, he said, "This was a special night." When I asked why, he said it was because we got to bake a cake and watch a movie together.
Days like that make it so much easier to get over the recent turbulence I wrote about last post. He's improved a lot since then. I think maybe his teacher had the same realization we did about moving on to more challenging work, because he started coming home with books to read to us and his school work seemed to have gone to a new level. He can now spell almost anything if it follows phonetic rules and he really seems proud of his ability to read on his own. There were also dramatically fewer time outs reported.
He also did wonderfully in his little final performance for his acting class. It turns out he was the youngest by far. I think Matthew and I sometimes forget what a small child he still is -- seeing him there, surrounded by six year olds, and still managing to hold his own, really reminded us of how he is still a baby in some ways. When he came onstage, walking on tip-toes with his hands near his face like a little mouse, all the other parents went, "Awwww." He was too intimidated to end up playing the part in which he was cast, but he served admirably as the MC, introducing each scene with his teacher by his side. He was so thrilled to be in costume, with his face painted, and he just seemed to love every minute of it. We were so proud of him.
In Dean news, he is now grasping things and rolling over and developing a sense of humor. I got some full belly laughs when I tried sticking his toes in his mouth. He really loves his massage and yoga time, and I do, too -- it definitely helps me feel connected to him and I think will be a nice afternoon ritual when I go back to the office (next week is my last at home).
I am actively working to manage my migraines. They've picked up again since I started working, and tend to peak on Saturdays when I am juggling both boys on my own all day. I have a hard time accepting that they remain such a big factor in my life, but I am making a commitment to maintaining my biofeedback regimen and practicing the Heartmath techniques and just trying to S-L-O-W D-O-W-N every day. Why is relaxing so much effort?
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Friday, May 15, 2009
Transitions
Sorry for the hiatus, but resuming work has been a bit of a transition. I think I have the kinks worked out now, at least for the next couple of weeks, after which I'll have another transition as I return to the office.
The first week back was pretty rough, but not for the reasons I expected. Dean and Matthew handled being on their own just fine, and being able to nurse him throughout the day really made me feel connected. It was the actual WORK that was tough -- within an hour of starting work, I had three projects from three different bosses and everyone needed everything ASAP. With only six scheduled working hours a day on my proposed new part-time gig, I was really under the gun. I ended up having a migraine for three days in a row. Once I got everything done, however, things slowed down, and this last week was a more typical, manageable pace.
The other thing that made last week difficult was that Matthew had so many things going on. May is a really busy wedding month for him -- everyone wants their bridal portraits and engagement sessions done when the weather is nice, and of course they also book more weddings then. Last week he had a session -- either a portrait, or in one case, an actual weeknight wedding -- almost every single night of the week, in addition to his regularly scheduled Saturday wedding gig. So that meant right when I finished working, I had to switch into single-mom mode, all with a migraine or the effects of medication resulting therefrom. There was one afternoon in particular when the nitty-gritty of motherhood really hit me in the face. Ultimately, the kids have to eat, and at that moment there was only one person who could feed them, headache or no headache.
But all's well that ends well and this week was pretty good. No migraines, no evening portraits, I got my work done, and we even bought a new car. Yep, we traded in the Jetta station wagon for a six-person Mazda 5. It was a little sentimental letting the Jetta go. It was our first new car ever, and we bought it when I was pregnant with Henry. We brought him home from the hospital in that car, and it's been pretty good to us ever since. But now we have two kids, which means two car seats. And more and more often we were finding ourselves in a bind because we couldn't fit a third -- carpooling would mean Matthew couldn't bring Dean, and that would pretty unworkable once I'm back at the office. Plus, Henry actually has a social life now, yet we could never bring any of his friends anywhere if Dean was going, too, not unless we took two cars. Matthew was adamantly against getting a minivan, and we're not really SUV people, plus they tend to cost more than we wanted to spend. So we ended up with a silver Mazda 5. It's pretty cool, actually. I am most excited about the ipod jack. I realize this is de rigeur on most new cars these days, but the Jetta and the Versa don't have them, so I'm psyched.
Mother's Day was a long day, but a good one. It started with my sleeping in (after a early morning nursing session), followed by a lovely brunch Matthew cooked up, with my Mom bringing over the champagne for Mimosas. Then we spent the day cleaning the yard and the porch and bought some kiddie pools -- one small one to cool our feet on the porch, and another big one for Henry in the yard. It was a low key day, but I still ended up utterly exhausted by the evening, mostly because of issues with Henry. My dear sweet boy is turning into a bit of a behavioral challenge. The sweetness is still there, but there are equal doses of obstinance, flippancy, and sass. Plus, he seems to have inherited Matthew's absentmindedness. Even when he wants to do the right thing, he is easily distracted and often sluggish. He's also been getting "timeouts" at school. It turns out they use these more as cooling off periods for the kids and it isn't always necessarily a punishment, but apparently there are times when he simply will not obey his teacher. Earlier this week she called us to say he had thrown his work on the floor. Matthew and I ended up having a sort of intervention with him when he got home. Usually, he doesn't like to talk about his day right when he walks in from school, though I can often coax details out of him later at bathtime or when we're reading books. But this day we told him no TV (punishment you would think was akin to cutting off his toes), and we were going to talk. It was a revealing conversation, but we are still unsure of the solutions.
I am worried that the Montessori environment is not quite right for him. I thought at first it would be great because he could work independently and at his own pace. But over the past six months, he has gone from being a shy kid to being very outgoing -- he seems to really like group activities and he certainly has no shortage of energy. I think maybe having to sit in one place and do work all day without a lot of interaction with other kids is a bit much for him (you can usually hear a pin drop in his classroom). He also seems to be frustrated by some of his work, and I have to confess I myself can't imagine enjoying the repetitive nature of it, either. As I understand the Montessori philosophy, the kids learn component skills -- fine motor skills, abstract mathematic concepts, phonetic sounds -- before they learn how to integrate these. I know all parents think their kids are brilliant, and I certainly don't want to excuse garden variety bad behavior as being a result of my child's supposed exceptionality, but the fact is Henry tested with a very high IQ when he was evaluated for gifted. I am convinced he would be reading more now (though he's made great leaps in the past month) if he was given a chance to memorize words, rather than just learn phonetic sounds. And I am certain he would like math if he could see the point of it -- he has a very mathematical mind (Spoon in my head) but it seems to me like the work he's doing at school doesn't make a lot of sense to him.
Anyway, this is a long way of saying that we have concerns. We're taking the usual steps to address them -- staying in touch with his teachers, doing some behavior modification at home, trying to give him creative outlets like acting class (which he adores), and considering other possibilities for next year and beyond -- but in general it is just unsettling to feel like my little guy is not shining like I believe he could. The teacher sometimes complains that Henry is just "too silly." I can understand her impatience, but his innocent goofiness is one of the things I cherish about him. He is growing up so fast; there is plenty of time to be serious.
The first week back was pretty rough, but not for the reasons I expected. Dean and Matthew handled being on their own just fine, and being able to nurse him throughout the day really made me feel connected. It was the actual WORK that was tough -- within an hour of starting work, I had three projects from three different bosses and everyone needed everything ASAP. With only six scheduled working hours a day on my proposed new part-time gig, I was really under the gun. I ended up having a migraine for three days in a row. Once I got everything done, however, things slowed down, and this last week was a more typical, manageable pace.
The other thing that made last week difficult was that Matthew had so many things going on. May is a really busy wedding month for him -- everyone wants their bridal portraits and engagement sessions done when the weather is nice, and of course they also book more weddings then. Last week he had a session -- either a portrait, or in one case, an actual weeknight wedding -- almost every single night of the week, in addition to his regularly scheduled Saturday wedding gig. So that meant right when I finished working, I had to switch into single-mom mode, all with a migraine or the effects of medication resulting therefrom. There was one afternoon in particular when the nitty-gritty of motherhood really hit me in the face. Ultimately, the kids have to eat, and at that moment there was only one person who could feed them, headache or no headache.
But all's well that ends well and this week was pretty good. No migraines, no evening portraits, I got my work done, and we even bought a new car. Yep, we traded in the Jetta station wagon for a six-person Mazda 5. It was a little sentimental letting the Jetta go. It was our first new car ever, and we bought it when I was pregnant with Henry. We brought him home from the hospital in that car, and it's been pretty good to us ever since. But now we have two kids, which means two car seats. And more and more often we were finding ourselves in a bind because we couldn't fit a third -- carpooling would mean Matthew couldn't bring Dean, and that would pretty unworkable once I'm back at the office. Plus, Henry actually has a social life now, yet we could never bring any of his friends anywhere if Dean was going, too, not unless we took two cars. Matthew was adamantly against getting a minivan, and we're not really SUV people, plus they tend to cost more than we wanted to spend. So we ended up with a silver Mazda 5. It's pretty cool, actually. I am most excited about the ipod jack. I realize this is de rigeur on most new cars these days, but the Jetta and the Versa don't have them, so I'm psyched.
Mother's Day was a long day, but a good one. It started with my sleeping in (after a early morning nursing session), followed by a lovely brunch Matthew cooked up, with my Mom bringing over the champagne for Mimosas. Then we spent the day cleaning the yard and the porch and bought some kiddie pools -- one small one to cool our feet on the porch, and another big one for Henry in the yard. It was a low key day, but I still ended up utterly exhausted by the evening, mostly because of issues with Henry. My dear sweet boy is turning into a bit of a behavioral challenge. The sweetness is still there, but there are equal doses of obstinance, flippancy, and sass. Plus, he seems to have inherited Matthew's absentmindedness. Even when he wants to do the right thing, he is easily distracted and often sluggish. He's also been getting "timeouts" at school. It turns out they use these more as cooling off periods for the kids and it isn't always necessarily a punishment, but apparently there are times when he simply will not obey his teacher. Earlier this week she called us to say he had thrown his work on the floor. Matthew and I ended up having a sort of intervention with him when he got home. Usually, he doesn't like to talk about his day right when he walks in from school, though I can often coax details out of him later at bathtime or when we're reading books. But this day we told him no TV (punishment you would think was akin to cutting off his toes), and we were going to talk. It was a revealing conversation, but we are still unsure of the solutions.
I am worried that the Montessori environment is not quite right for him. I thought at first it would be great because he could work independently and at his own pace. But over the past six months, he has gone from being a shy kid to being very outgoing -- he seems to really like group activities and he certainly has no shortage of energy. I think maybe having to sit in one place and do work all day without a lot of interaction with other kids is a bit much for him (you can usually hear a pin drop in his classroom). He also seems to be frustrated by some of his work, and I have to confess I myself can't imagine enjoying the repetitive nature of it, either. As I understand the Montessori philosophy, the kids learn component skills -- fine motor skills, abstract mathematic concepts, phonetic sounds -- before they learn how to integrate these. I know all parents think their kids are brilliant, and I certainly don't want to excuse garden variety bad behavior as being a result of my child's supposed exceptionality, but the fact is Henry tested with a very high IQ when he was evaluated for gifted. I am convinced he would be reading more now (though he's made great leaps in the past month) if he was given a chance to memorize words, rather than just learn phonetic sounds. And I am certain he would like math if he could see the point of it -- he has a very mathematical mind (Spoon in my head) but it seems to me like the work he's doing at school doesn't make a lot of sense to him.
Anyway, this is a long way of saying that we have concerns. We're taking the usual steps to address them -- staying in touch with his teachers, doing some behavior modification at home, trying to give him creative outlets like acting class (which he adores), and considering other possibilities for next year and beyond -- but in general it is just unsettling to feel like my little guy is not shining like I believe he could. The teacher sometimes complains that Henry is just "too silly." I can understand her impatience, but his innocent goofiness is one of the things I cherish about him. He is growing up so fast; there is plenty of time to be serious.
Sunday, May 03, 2009
The End of Maternity Leave
Today was Dean's first trip to the zoo, as Henry pointed out, unprompted, as we got out of the car. I can't say he was more fascinated with it than he is by the sound of rain falling or the shadows over his changing table, but it was a successful trip nonetheless. Henry, of course, loved it, especially the new animatronic Dinosaur exhibit. I found it mildly reminiscent of the creepy drum-banging bears at the Chuck E. Cheese parties of my childhood, but he was totally into it. He also enjoyed smashing the stinging caterpillars with his shoes. I'm not sure people from outside South Louisiana can understand the menace of these horrid creatures, but they terrorized our childhoods. They are despicable. And they were everywhere, all over the zoo, hanging onto tree trunks, crisscrossing the sidewalks, even lying in wait at the end of the slides and tunnels on the playground. Maybe spraying the trees for them is bad for the zoo animals, or it goes against the zoo's environmental policies. I can only hope that the reason they did not exterminate them (as a bunch of neighbors banded together in our neighborhood to do this season) was not the one a zookeeper gave us as we instructed Henry to stomp on one: "Oh, no, don't kill it, it's a living creature." Only by the grace of my foot, you nincompoop. It's like keeping a wasp nest in a swingset -- there's a time and place for all creatures, I suppose, but a zoo playground is not one of them.
Anyway...
Matthew is in the kitchen chopping up some zucchini, fresh from our garden, for supper. Dean is napping, and Henry and I are both in the office, he playing computer games on Matthew's computer while I blog. Rain is falling (finally) gently outside. It's a mellow end to my three and half months of maternity leave. Tomorrow I start working again, albeit from home. Next month I'll be back in the office, hopefully on a reduced schedule I am still negotiating. It's because of the potential for that schedule that I think I am less freaked out than I might otherwise be about returning to work. Nevertheless, I am still feeling melancholic this evening. I cannot conceive of another time in my life when I will be off work for so long, short of retirement. Not that I have spent the time eating bon bons, but it has been nice to have this time, especially since the first two and half months were difficult, with the sleeplessness, migraines, and just general assault on normalcy that is life with a newborn. Being home and being the primary caretaker to Dean has meant I've gotten to fully bond with my little guy, to learn his likes and dislikes, his tickle spots and favorite games, the cry that means tired and the cry that means bored. I am just so in love with him.
I have two sons. This still seems both thrilling and strange to me. My experience of the "baby blues" this time (not to be confused with the more serious depression that only set in weeks later) was focused on how Dean is my last baby, my last newborn. The pain of this knowledge was so raw and piercing those first couple of weeks. I sometimes held him in my arms, rocking his sweet little body, crying until the wispy hairs on his head were soaking.
Time (and the misery of waking every two to three hours for two months) soothed some of that grief. Of course I know I could just decide to try again for another child -- but for ever so many reasons I know that is not going to happen. It was hard to conceive Henry, even harder to conceive Dean, and then there were the actual pregnancies themselves, fraught with pain and depression. I have two happy, healthy children, which is more than many people ever get. Even though it is not what I had in mind for so many years and even though it requires some emotional acceptance, it is enough.
In a way, the end of this maternity leave gives me an opportunity to reflect on all the good that is in my life. I feel like I have beein trying to get to this point for at least two years. Once I finally felt ready to be pregnant again, my polysyctic ovarian syndrome made conception very challenging -- drugs and doctors and my constant worry that I was doing the right thing weighed on me for months. Then we turned to adoption, going through all the interviews and paperwork and spending more money than I care to think about, only to have to abort the whole enterprise when international agreements feel through. Then it was back to fertility treatments. Dean was conceived on our last official "try", when I insisted on trying Clomid one more time, even though my doctor didn't hold out hope and the other drugs had not worked. I was so afraid something would go wrong throughout the whole pregnancy, especially when I had to medicate to get through the migraines.
And now, here he is, apparently healthy, unarguably happy, irrepressibly cute. I have two beautiful sons. I have a loving husband who is a terrific father. I have a job I actually like, a comfortable house in a neighborhood I love, and I am no longer feeling so weighed down by depression that I can't appreciate and enjoy these wonderful things.
So, yes, I am sad about maternity leave ending. But really, I have much to celebrate.
Anyway...
Matthew is in the kitchen chopping up some zucchini, fresh from our garden, for supper. Dean is napping, and Henry and I are both in the office, he playing computer games on Matthew's computer while I blog. Rain is falling (finally) gently outside. It's a mellow end to my three and half months of maternity leave. Tomorrow I start working again, albeit from home. Next month I'll be back in the office, hopefully on a reduced schedule I am still negotiating. It's because of the potential for that schedule that I think I am less freaked out than I might otherwise be about returning to work. Nevertheless, I am still feeling melancholic this evening. I cannot conceive of another time in my life when I will be off work for so long, short of retirement. Not that I have spent the time eating bon bons, but it has been nice to have this time, especially since the first two and half months were difficult, with the sleeplessness, migraines, and just general assault on normalcy that is life with a newborn. Being home and being the primary caretaker to Dean has meant I've gotten to fully bond with my little guy, to learn his likes and dislikes, his tickle spots and favorite games, the cry that means tired and the cry that means bored. I am just so in love with him.
I have two sons. This still seems both thrilling and strange to me. My experience of the "baby blues" this time (not to be confused with the more serious depression that only set in weeks later) was focused on how Dean is my last baby, my last newborn. The pain of this knowledge was so raw and piercing those first couple of weeks. I sometimes held him in my arms, rocking his sweet little body, crying until the wispy hairs on his head were soaking.
Time (and the misery of waking every two to three hours for two months) soothed some of that grief. Of course I know I could just decide to try again for another child -- but for ever so many reasons I know that is not going to happen. It was hard to conceive Henry, even harder to conceive Dean, and then there were the actual pregnancies themselves, fraught with pain and depression. I have two happy, healthy children, which is more than many people ever get. Even though it is not what I had in mind for so many years and even though it requires some emotional acceptance, it is enough.
In a way, the end of this maternity leave gives me an opportunity to reflect on all the good that is in my life. I feel like I have beein trying to get to this point for at least two years. Once I finally felt ready to be pregnant again, my polysyctic ovarian syndrome made conception very challenging -- drugs and doctors and my constant worry that I was doing the right thing weighed on me for months. Then we turned to adoption, going through all the interviews and paperwork and spending more money than I care to think about, only to have to abort the whole enterprise when international agreements feel through. Then it was back to fertility treatments. Dean was conceived on our last official "try", when I insisted on trying Clomid one more time, even though my doctor didn't hold out hope and the other drugs had not worked. I was so afraid something would go wrong throughout the whole pregnancy, especially when I had to medicate to get through the migraines.
And now, here he is, apparently healthy, unarguably happy, irrepressibly cute. I have two beautiful sons. I have a loving husband who is a terrific father. I have a job I actually like, a comfortable house in a neighborhood I love, and I am no longer feeling so weighed down by depression that I can't appreciate and enjoy these wonderful things.
So, yes, I am sad about maternity leave ending. But really, I have much to celebrate.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
