I recently commented on a BBC birth board, offering virtual hugs and hope to a woman who just miscarried. She was blaming herself and I offered the 1 in 4 statistic. And yes, I noted that I refused to blame myself for my eight losses.
She replied and asked how I kept going.
I kept going because I truly believed that the spirit of the baby I was trying to have was haunting me.
I always worry that framing my perseverance this way makes me out to be a loon, but sometimes vocabulary fails us, and honestly, it's the most accurate way I can get my point across.
There's a movie out on Netflix now called "Private Life" and by all reports it's a horrifyingly accurate portrayal of a couple in their forties trying to have a baby, ultimately exploring donor eggs and adoption. The reviews of it on various support boards have all been positive so....
I downloaded it last night and wanted to check out a few minutes of it. The opening scene has Paul Giamatti stabbing Katherine Hahn in the ass with what is supposed to be a progesterone needle. Everything about the staging, her position on the bed, his apology for hitting a nerve, the bad of frozen peas, every fucking thing about the first four minutes of this movie told me I need to get in the proper headspace to watch it. It was TOO real. Not that I watch much these days, because S is only sleeping in 3 hours stretches at night right now.
I'll try to watch it this weekend and post a review, but keep in mind my inlaws are staying over this weekend, so watching a movie from start to finish is sort of aspirational. I gave Viking the heads up that he might want to see it with me, he loves Paul Giamatti. But I am also worried about being a crying mess from it.
Friday, October 12, 2018
Monday, October 1, 2018
Future gymnast
Check out this picture of 8 month old Samantha and bear witness to the reason I needed an emergency C-Section. According to Viking, this is exactly how she was positioned when I was laboring.
Thursday, September 20, 2018
New Normal and Atonement
Hello world. I'm an employer now, to a Nanny. It's been three weeks and I am breathing a huge sigh of relief. She's great. Both girls appear to love her, she's smart and compassionate and I am totally remembering now how I gravitated towards her during those foggy days of my maternity leave.
In short I got really fucking lucky that the universe placed her in my path and that I have the resources to make it work.
This week marked the Jewish New Year, and Yom Kippur, our day of atonement.
I've been thinking about presence. How present are we in our day to day lives? When I'm scrolling on my phone in the wee hours of the night while nursing Samantha, what does that say about my connectedness to her in those moments?
I was thinking about the many times - like most parents - that I am scrolling on Twitter or FB or IG when sitting with my children. The moments I am missing and the behavior I am modeling.
And so when I asked for forgiveness in prayer, and set out my resolutions for the new year, they largely centered around my phone addiction. There was some other stuff too (like no longer angrily criticizing the Viking for his piss-poor cleaning habits in front of Niblet).... but honestly, thinking about the zombies we are becoming as a human race is more than a little frightening.
Also frightening is the bombardment of imagery and information and triggers. I scrolled past pictures of babies killed in Yemen the other night. WHILE I WAS NURSING.
I am here, alive and ostensibly healthy, with a beautiful home and a hot husband and my daughters stare up at me with their big beautiful eyes and I need to be present. In the moment. Either fully invested in the beauty around me or grappling with whatever they bring me - whether it's hunger cries, the need to be worn like a baby kangaroo, or help with Common Core math (which blows, btw).
So I asked for forgiveness for those days and night staring at a tiny rectangle that generally causes my cortisol levels to rise. I need to be present. I want and need to be connected to the people in front of me. The people I love so much, who I went to hell and back for.
(I came across this video on one of these late nights. It's utterly terrifying, and left me gutted, so seriously, you can choose to not watch it, hell in some ways I wish I never saw it. But I used to love MOBY, and the song is an earworm, and I think it kinda captures where my head was at this Yom Kippur).
In short I got really fucking lucky that the universe placed her in my path and that I have the resources to make it work.
This week marked the Jewish New Year, and Yom Kippur, our day of atonement.
I've been thinking about presence. How present are we in our day to day lives? When I'm scrolling on my phone in the wee hours of the night while nursing Samantha, what does that say about my connectedness to her in those moments?
I was thinking about the many times - like most parents - that I am scrolling on Twitter or FB or IG when sitting with my children. The moments I am missing and the behavior I am modeling.
And so when I asked for forgiveness in prayer, and set out my resolutions for the new year, they largely centered around my phone addiction. There was some other stuff too (like no longer angrily criticizing the Viking for his piss-poor cleaning habits in front of Niblet).... but honestly, thinking about the zombies we are becoming as a human race is more than a little frightening.
Also frightening is the bombardment of imagery and information and triggers. I scrolled past pictures of babies killed in Yemen the other night. WHILE I WAS NURSING.
I am here, alive and ostensibly healthy, with a beautiful home and a hot husband and my daughters stare up at me with their big beautiful eyes and I need to be present. In the moment. Either fully invested in the beauty around me or grappling with whatever they bring me - whether it's hunger cries, the need to be worn like a baby kangaroo, or help with Common Core math (which blows, btw).
So I asked for forgiveness for those days and night staring at a tiny rectangle that generally causes my cortisol levels to rise. I need to be present. I want and need to be connected to the people in front of me. The people I love so much, who I went to hell and back for.
(I came across this video on one of these late nights. It's utterly terrifying, and left me gutted, so seriously, you can choose to not watch it, hell in some ways I wish I never saw it. But I used to love MOBY, and the song is an earworm, and I think it kinda captures where my head was at this Yom Kippur).
Wednesday, August 29, 2018
The great clean
Man, this summer is flying by. I got a week at the ocean, which let me tell ya, is a little less restorative when you're still not sleeping. But beautiful, nonetheless.
This weekend, the last weekend before school starts, I will be cleaning. And then cleaning some more.
Our new nanny, C, starts on Tuesday. All of the tax filings are in, the paperwork is signed and the payroll is set up. I'm an employer now, and hopefully will be a good one?
Samantha has done so well at our local daycare center, of course I am second-guessing my decision to pull her out. She's honestly such a chill baby though, that I have to believe that she will thrive with C. I know that Niblet will fare far better with someone who pick her up from school, get her to finish her homework, feed her and then chauffer her to her myriad of after-school lessons.
But before any of this starts, I have to clean. Here is just a sampling of the things lined up in and crammed into the hallways and corners of my house that people are currently bumping into, sitting on or tripping over:
- Two sleeping bags, unfolded
- A trash bag filled with Niblet's shoes (collected from all over the downstairs, to be put away in her room)
- An empty giant cardboard box that Princess is no longer into
- A door that needs to be hung
- A box of Tools that would be ostensibly used to hang the door
- Viking's dirty socks
- A bag of extra linens that we took to our beach rental
- target bags filled with school supplies
- books
- unused mason jars
- Dust balls
Sigh.
This weekend, the last weekend before school starts, I will be cleaning. And then cleaning some more.
Our new nanny, C, starts on Tuesday. All of the tax filings are in, the paperwork is signed and the payroll is set up. I'm an employer now, and hopefully will be a good one?
Samantha has done so well at our local daycare center, of course I am second-guessing my decision to pull her out. She's honestly such a chill baby though, that I have to believe that she will thrive with C. I know that Niblet will fare far better with someone who pick her up from school, get her to finish her homework, feed her and then chauffer her to her myriad of after-school lessons.
But before any of this starts, I have to clean. Here is just a sampling of the things lined up in and crammed into the hallways and corners of my house that people are currently bumping into, sitting on or tripping over:
- Two sleeping bags, unfolded
- A trash bag filled with Niblet's shoes (collected from all over the downstairs, to be put away in her room)
- An empty giant cardboard box that Princess is no longer into
- A door that needs to be hung
- A box of Tools that would be ostensibly used to hang the door
- Viking's dirty socks
- A bag of extra linens that we took to our beach rental
- target bags filled with school supplies
- books
- unused mason jars
- Dust balls
Sigh.
Monday, August 13, 2018
Intrusive thoughts
I was tempted to hit up my therapist the other day. It's been maybe four months since I last saw her, and while I had my shaky days, I thought I was ultimately handling life pretty well.
And then I read about the Orca. The grieving Orca, who carried her dead calf for a thousand miles, nearly starving herself in the process. And I felt fucking gutted. Just completely numb with sad.
Today I read that she has let her calf go, and is back to what appears to be "normal" behavior.
The Orca story captured so much. The enormous pain of losing Celine, and grief for letting her go. The no-longer existential ecological threat we're living under (the Orca population is endangered because we have obliterated their primary salmon source). Climate inaction and maternal grief in one click.
Tack on to this the horrific child casualties in the middle east, and the trauma endured by immigrant and refugee children in the US and abroad. All just scrolling and scrolling while nursing to the light of one's phone at 3am.
I don't really think your particular political persuasion matters - the pain of innocents is sometimes too much to bear.
I wonder whether as a species we were built to absorb the quantities of information we're absorbing. But make no mistake about it, we're hooked, it's an addiction.
"Just stay off of twitter and facebook," I could hear my therapist saying. Maybe just stick to Instagram, right?
The thing is I can *feel* the cortisol levels rising in my bloodstream every night. And yet I can't quit. I removed the apps from my phones, but short of throwing them away I feel stuck. And occasionally hopeless.
I work to improve wages and benefits for low-wage health care workers. I like to think that I am helping democratize the workplace, and as a result, providing a more stable economic life for families in my very VERY poor city. I also do a lot of research on population health outcomes as related to workforce training. But at the end of the day I feel utterly useless.
The only thing that seems to sustain me these days are the three humans I live with, who happen to share the same face (I'm the "one of these things is not like the other in my family"). Viking, Niblet and Nutmeg are my tether to sanity.
That's a very heavy burden for them. I know, because most of my life I've played the same role for my own depressed parents.
Unlike my parents, I don't actually spend a lot of time in that dark place. People who know me IRL know I laugh a lot. I entertain friends constantly. I surround myself with children and feed on their silliness. I hug my husband and get him to give me nightly backrubs. I dance. I move. I endorphin the fuck out of my life.
But it all comes to a head at 2 or 3am. How will I keep my girls safe? How do I raise them with optimism and strength?
And then I read about the Orca. The grieving Orca, who carried her dead calf for a thousand miles, nearly starving herself in the process. And I felt fucking gutted. Just completely numb with sad.
Today I read that she has let her calf go, and is back to what appears to be "normal" behavior.
The Orca story captured so much. The enormous pain of losing Celine, and grief for letting her go. The no-longer existential ecological threat we're living under (the Orca population is endangered because we have obliterated their primary salmon source). Climate inaction and maternal grief in one click.
Tack on to this the horrific child casualties in the middle east, and the trauma endured by immigrant and refugee children in the US and abroad. All just scrolling and scrolling while nursing to the light of one's phone at 3am.
I don't really think your particular political persuasion matters - the pain of innocents is sometimes too much to bear.
I wonder whether as a species we were built to absorb the quantities of information we're absorbing. But make no mistake about it, we're hooked, it's an addiction.
"Just stay off of twitter and facebook," I could hear my therapist saying. Maybe just stick to Instagram, right?
The thing is I can *feel* the cortisol levels rising in my bloodstream every night. And yet I can't quit. I removed the apps from my phones, but short of throwing them away I feel stuck. And occasionally hopeless.
I work to improve wages and benefits for low-wage health care workers. I like to think that I am helping democratize the workplace, and as a result, providing a more stable economic life for families in my very VERY poor city. I also do a lot of research on population health outcomes as related to workforce training. But at the end of the day I feel utterly useless.
The only thing that seems to sustain me these days are the three humans I live with, who happen to share the same face (I'm the "one of these things is not like the other in my family"). Viking, Niblet and Nutmeg are my tether to sanity.
That's a very heavy burden for them. I know, because most of my life I've played the same role for my own depressed parents.
Unlike my parents, I don't actually spend a lot of time in that dark place. People who know me IRL know I laugh a lot. I entertain friends constantly. I surround myself with children and feed on their silliness. I hug my husband and get him to give me nightly backrubs. I dance. I move. I endorphin the fuck out of my life.
But it all comes to a head at 2 or 3am. How will I keep my girls safe? How do I raise them with optimism and strength?
Sunday, July 22, 2018
a new normal and household changes
I started back at work two days ago and Samantha started at daycare.
The last six months were surreal. My daughter is to put it simply, the most. The most adorable. The most joyous. The most hilarious. The most loving. I can't even being to start with how my life will always be pre-Samantha and post-Samantha.
Niblet is adjusting to her new normal too, and I think with some grace. She had a few rough months there. "Mom, you spend all of your time with Samantha." I think you should look at it like Mom is keeping the baby alive. Most of this time was spent with her nursing (boy could girlfriend feed on demand). I totally get how our lives were upended with this living breathing creature that was either latched on to me or burrowed into me like a baby kangaroo. Totally get it Niblet.
Today, I can finally get out of the house a bit sans baby. She HATED her father for months, now she tolerates him and even flashes him some smiles now and again. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't flattered. As a result, Niblet is more confident with her too. She picks her up more, changes diapers and plays with her more regularly. It's the most beautiful thing to see, these two girls, who look so much a like, nearly ten years apart.
Daycare was indeed harder on me than Samantha. But due to some crazy scheduling in Niblet's school year that has her taking on so many extracurricular activities, we are looking at hiring a nanny. Insanely Bourgie, I know. But right now the universe has Samantha at Daycare, Niblet at aftercare, and then potentially a third baby sitter to reliably get her to all of her after school stuff. Our childcare is like a very shaky house of cards.
And as the universe would have it, she plopped a nanny in front of me. Literally, at Niblet's school. I met her when picking Niblet up every day, she was picking up some of her school mates. For four months she and I would stand in the school parking lot and talk about everything under the sun - from the latest Ali Wong netflix special to why organizing closets is so hard. I liked her a lot, and asked her if she ever had free time to babysit.
Well, the last day of school she came up to me ( "So, this is sort of awkward...") and asked if we would ever consider hiring a nanny. Geez, it wasn't something we ever thought we could afford, but sure let's talk. Turns out her family is only employing her until Labor Day. I talked to her current family, and a few others - she's reliable, kind, their kids love her and she made their lives a million times easier. Think a slightly punk rock Mary Poppins. We'd end up pretty broke for a few years, but we'd be close to broke regardless with the daycare costs. I've perfected recipes with rice and beans these last few months on unpaid leave.
Everything about babies involves second guessing.
-Conceiving (Should we? If so, when?)
-Fertility (Can we? Should we be doing something different? IVF? New doctor? Pills and supplements? )
-Pregnancy (Is this safe? Is there risk? Will I have regrets?)
-Childbirth (midwife? hospital? High risk OB?)
-Infant care (Nursing? Formula? everything else that's frightening on Dr Google)
-Childcare (Do I stay home unpaid? Daycare? Home daycare? Nanny? Pray?)
I am among the fortunate. Niblet's grandmother watched her for a YEAR after I went back to work with her. This go around I have had sleepless nights thinking about childcare (well, she's not sleeping through the night anyways). But I also was recently promoted, so I have a little more flexibility and disposable income. So many mamas in my country don't. It's a fucking heartache.
The last six months were surreal. My daughter is to put it simply, the most. The most adorable. The most joyous. The most hilarious. The most loving. I can't even being to start with how my life will always be pre-Samantha and post-Samantha.
Niblet is adjusting to her new normal too, and I think with some grace. She had a few rough months there. "Mom, you spend all of your time with Samantha." I think you should look at it like Mom is keeping the baby alive. Most of this time was spent with her nursing (boy could girlfriend feed on demand). I totally get how our lives were upended with this living breathing creature that was either latched on to me or burrowed into me like a baby kangaroo. Totally get it Niblet.
Today, I can finally get out of the house a bit sans baby. She HATED her father for months, now she tolerates him and even flashes him some smiles now and again. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't flattered. As a result, Niblet is more confident with her too. She picks her up more, changes diapers and plays with her more regularly. It's the most beautiful thing to see, these two girls, who look so much a like, nearly ten years apart.
Daycare was indeed harder on me than Samantha. But due to some crazy scheduling in Niblet's school year that has her taking on so many extracurricular activities, we are looking at hiring a nanny. Insanely Bourgie, I know. But right now the universe has Samantha at Daycare, Niblet at aftercare, and then potentially a third baby sitter to reliably get her to all of her after school stuff. Our childcare is like a very shaky house of cards.
And as the universe would have it, she plopped a nanny in front of me. Literally, at Niblet's school. I met her when picking Niblet up every day, she was picking up some of her school mates. For four months she and I would stand in the school parking lot and talk about everything under the sun - from the latest Ali Wong netflix special to why organizing closets is so hard. I liked her a lot, and asked her if she ever had free time to babysit.
Well, the last day of school she came up to me ( "So, this is sort of awkward...") and asked if we would ever consider hiring a nanny. Geez, it wasn't something we ever thought we could afford, but sure let's talk. Turns out her family is only employing her until Labor Day. I talked to her current family, and a few others - she's reliable, kind, their kids love her and she made their lives a million times easier. Think a slightly punk rock Mary Poppins. We'd end up pretty broke for a few years, but we'd be close to broke regardless with the daycare costs. I've perfected recipes with rice and beans these last few months on unpaid leave.
Everything about babies involves second guessing.
-Conceiving (Should we? If so, when?)
-Fertility (Can we? Should we be doing something different? IVF? New doctor? Pills and supplements? )
-Pregnancy (Is this safe? Is there risk? Will I have regrets?)
-Childbirth (midwife? hospital? High risk OB?)
-Infant care (Nursing? Formula? everything else that's frightening on Dr Google)
-Childcare (Do I stay home unpaid? Daycare? Home daycare? Nanny? Pray?)
I am among the fortunate. Niblet's grandmother watched her for a YEAR after I went back to work with her. This go around I have had sleepless nights thinking about childcare (well, she's not sleeping through the night anyways). But I also was recently promoted, so I have a little more flexibility and disposable income. So many mamas in my country don't. It's a fucking heartache.
Tuesday, June 19, 2018
A brief interlude of rage
Ok, so let me state at the outset that I'm good friends with an immigration attorney, and I'm one of those people who has been criticizing US immigration policy for some time now. Many of our deportations were cruel and shitty under Bush, and later Obama (seeing those cage pictures on the news attributed to his administration was not a surprise) and now...
I can't. I just can't. I stare into my 5 month old's big blue eyes and imagine her crying. This isn't hard to do, she's a baby she cries ALL. THE. TIME. But I think about how she cries when I don't pick her up immediately because, I don't know, I'm driving the car or sitting on a toilet or standing over a pan with flaming hot sesame oil sizzing towards my eyeballs. And I imagine her cries when I am eventually going to be self-separated from her when I return to work. But I have the minimal solace that she will be at a daycare where I know that she will be held and she will be soothed and I will rush out of work like the fucking flash to have her in my arms again. And I will gladly nurse her as many times at night as she wants just to be near her. I say this not as some awful sanctimommy, but with some degree of matter-of-factness, because this is how we rolled with Niblet when I had to return to work nine years ago. Yes it sucked, and yes I was tired, but when you have to leave your baby for the day, you will do what you gotta do.
The news is wrenching and awful and frightening and TRIGGERING AS FUCK.
And look, mass incarceration, it's sort of the American way. I live in a city where families are torn apart every day, and children are hurled into a foster system that can eat them alive.
But this, this is all too much. I attempted to explain some of it to Niblet this morning on our drive to camp, and she was just.... appalled.
That's all I've got. Oh, and if you think that children who don't speak English, and in many cases, don't speak Spanish, should have access to legal representation as well as an advocate who can help them reunite with their family, well, RAICES is a good organization to donate money to:
https://actionnetwork.org/campaigns/endfamilyseparation
I can't. I just can't. I stare into my 5 month old's big blue eyes and imagine her crying. This isn't hard to do, she's a baby she cries ALL. THE. TIME. But I think about how she cries when I don't pick her up immediately because, I don't know, I'm driving the car or sitting on a toilet or standing over a pan with flaming hot sesame oil sizzing towards my eyeballs. And I imagine her cries when I am eventually going to be self-separated from her when I return to work. But I have the minimal solace that she will be at a daycare where I know that she will be held and she will be soothed and I will rush out of work like the fucking flash to have her in my arms again. And I will gladly nurse her as many times at night as she wants just to be near her. I say this not as some awful sanctimommy, but with some degree of matter-of-factness, because this is how we rolled with Niblet when I had to return to work nine years ago. Yes it sucked, and yes I was tired, but when you have to leave your baby for the day, you will do what you gotta do.
The news is wrenching and awful and frightening and TRIGGERING AS FUCK.
And look, mass incarceration, it's sort of the American way. I live in a city where families are torn apart every day, and children are hurled into a foster system that can eat them alive.
But this, this is all too much. I attempted to explain some of it to Niblet this morning on our drive to camp, and she was just.... appalled.
That's all I've got. Oh, and if you think that children who don't speak English, and in many cases, don't speak Spanish, should have access to legal representation as well as an advocate who can help them reunite with their family, well, RAICES is a good organization to donate money to:
https://actionnetwork.org/campaigns/endfamilyseparation
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