The Perks of Being Me

I'm finding it difficult to keep a level head these days. I almost feel like I'm suffering from bipolar disorder. One moment I am so incredibly happy, I could dance around my kitchen singing at the top of my lungs. And then there are moments, like the other day, when I almost burst into tears in the middle of work from all of the stresses and terrible things going on around me. I could easily slip into some kind of crazy person depression. Lord knows that both Nicholas and I have enough going on to justifiably crawl into bed and not leave for three weeks. What keeps me motivated? What keeps me out of bed and constantly moving forward? My family. My sweet 5 month old boy, my amazingly supportive and understanding husband, my sister who, with two little ones of her own, can 110% relate to me with so many things, and everyone else who supports us and encourages us to keep on keepin' on.
For those of you who don't know, one of my father-in-law's was diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor a year and a half ago. He had a major brain surgery last June to remove as much of the tumor as possible and underwent chemo and radiation thereafter. In January, his MRI showed what looked like a recurrence. It was finally confirmed about a month ago that the tumor was back, plus two more areas of concern. Because it came back in more than one place and because of the locations, the surgeons do not want to operate. This has, understandably, been extremely difficult for the entire family. We all love him so much and it is beyond difficult to witness this happen to such a wonderful man. Sometimes, I feel pressure to stay strong for my husband. Like I need to hide my sadness from him. I just don't want him to have to comfort me, I need to be the one doing the comforting. But then I realize that I have every right to be sad and come to terms with those feelings, so Nicholas and I end up comforting each other. It's not about one person being the rock and the other being the mess. We're both the mess and the rock. Sometimes all it takes is to just hold one another on the couch until the moment passes. I know that this sounds mega depressing, but it's not like this happens every day. It's just those moments that come with having something like this in your family. I'm not going to try and hide from it and act like everything is OK 100% of the time, because it's not. This is about raw honesty, not about putting on a show.
Changing the subject - we've had a very crazy week at work. There is a huge project that my boss wants to get done ASAP meaning that we're working until 7pm on Friday and a full 8 hours on Saturday every weekend until the project is finished. Well, guess what, after everyone put in their time this weekend, it's still not even close to being finished.
Pre-baby, this wasn't an issue. A mild inconvenience, but overall, not the end of the world. Now, it's scrambling to find a babysitter and forcing myself to be OK with coming home in time to kiss my son goodnight during the week and being apart from him almost all day over our weekends. Let me just tell you, that sucks. But the money will be oh so good. We're getting overtime for all of these hours worked, so that's not bad at all. Dolla Dolla bills ya'll!

But you know what, I was reading The Perks of Being a Wallflower earlier today and I realized that my life is pretty good. The dollar sign in my bank account doesn't define my life. Yes, it limits me to an extent, but overall, I'm a lucky and happy person. Life is difficult and we cannot control everything around us. We just have top learn how to batten down the hatches and make due with the cards that we're dealt. It's OK to be sad when things get rough, but I'm thankful for every morning that I wake up as a wife, mother, daughter, and friend. My husband kisses me goodnight every night, even if I'm not fully awake, I can feel and I know without a doubt that he loves me. My son is beautiful and healthy. What more can a girl as for?

Lucas and my sweet nephew, Andrew

 

My big boy in his door jumper

 

My dad and all of the kiddos at Halloween

 

 

 

Sleep Training Chapter 2: Rise of the Sleep Sac!

I come to you this morning feeling a bit groggy, legs wobbly, and tummy grumbling for some bacon! However, I am so incredibly happy! I've got my 90's music playlist jamming on the iMac that lives on the breakfast table in our kitchen, oven preheating for some biscuits which will go oh-so-wonderfully well with the turkey bacon and eggs that will be made later. I bough myself some Cinnabon coffee creamer for my morning coffee (much needed). And oh yea... my baby is freaking awesome!

I'm so incredibly proud of my boy! For the past 3 weeks, he has been in his crib for both of his daytime naps and all night to sleep. It has not been without difficulty, but he is now so good at sleeping independently! Perhaps, I should start from the beginning....


In my last post, I think that I told you that we were going to try crying it out. Yea, that made me feel so bad that it didn't last long at all. Nicholas found an article on the internet about a woman who wrote about her experience of weaning her baby from co-sleeping and making the transition to sleeping in the crib. Here is the link. In short, she explains that babies need to learn that sleep is not something that is scary or lonely. Therefore, when the baby cries, pick him up and snuggle until he falls asleep in your arms. Do the "limp wrist test" (pick up the babies arm and drop it, if it falls without resistance, he is likely in a good, deep sleep). Then put him down in the crib. Do this as many times as it takes and if he ends up back in the "family bed," then try again at a later date.  This is very similar to the dreaded sleep training that we tried before, only with a little more snuggles and comfort for baby.

This went SO MUCH better than our sleep training before.

The first night was a little difficult, but after an hour or two, he got the hang of it and fell asleep. The second night was better, and by the third night, he was already a pro! Twice he slept through the night, however, he will usually wake up once at 3:45 or 4am or so. I'd feed him and he'd go right to sleep.

Friday, we took him in for his 4 month appointment, all it well! The nurse practitioner said that he doesn't need to eat at that time, so since then I've been just getting up to snuggle him and comfort him back to sleep rather than nursing.

Another new and exciting development, we started him on some solids! He has done 2 weeks of oatmeal and tonight, we started him on peas! We bought a bag of organic frozen green peas, steamed them, and put them in the magic bullet with some water. We made probably close to a month's worth of peas for him that is now taking up residence in my freezer.

Also in breaking news, I am 99% sure that I am going to stop breastfeeding at 6 months. I just don't think that I can do 12 months. Everyone says that it's the first 6 months where breastmilk is the most beneficial. I just think that I am done. Yes, it saves us a ton of money, however, my life revolves around my boobs. I'm just kinda over it. And this doesn't feel like a selfish decision because I stuck with it all of those times that I wanted to quit. Each time I was frustrated and wanted to give up, I kept going. Why? For my son. I think that my time doing this is done. I'd like to get back to some normalcy. I'd like to not worry about making sure I've got fresh pads in my bra, dealing with the pain of being full when we go somewhere that takes a while (weddings, road trips, bachelorette parties, etc.). Not having to worry about making sure that I pump at 3 hour intervals at work to make sure that I keep my supply up. Having a baby if a lot on your plate as it is, I would just like to take away some of that stress, especially when I'm dealing with the consequences of long term sleep deprivation. It's like I have pregnancy brain again. My doctor's recommendation, get more sleep. Thanks, doc.

Me and hubs at a friend/co-worker's wedding 2 weekends ago.

Bug eating some peas last night.

The Tornado That Is My Life

Ok, maybe tornado is a bit of an exaggeration. I've just been really busy lately. It seems like there is always something going on. Bug has started to smile, laugh, grab his feet, and teething has begun. Lord help us all.  Also, little bug is 3 months old! Only two short weeks away from being 4 months old! It feels like it has been both the blink of an eye and en eternity at the same time. Other people that I know had their babies after me and they seems to be growing up so fast! Sometimes it baffles me that my baby is even older than they are! And yes, I am still breastfeeding. It has gotten leaps and bounds easier! Bug will eat from both sides in about 10-15 minutes now. He is also almost sleeping through the night. We're at a point now where he will wake up only once and that's usually at about 5-6am. Not bad considering the fact that he is going to bed at 9.Still co-sleeping, although I'd prefer that we didn't. I am ready to have my bed back! Not to mention, I want to get him started on a set schedule soon.

I'm not sure if I mentioned this in a previous post, but our bosses (I say "our" because both me and hubs work at the same law firm) has us set up to work from home. I am in the office TUES and THURS while Nicholas is at home with bug and Nicholas is in the office MON and WED while I am at home with bug. On FRI, we're both in the office and we bring bug with us since our office hours are 8am-noon. I tell you all of this because our VPN (device/system that gives us the ability to work from home) has been down for the past 4 weeks. Yes, this means that we have had to bring our baby into the office for the past FOUR WEEKS. I am so far beyond the point of being severely pissed that I almost don't even care anymore. On second though, no, I am still really pissed about this. Our lives are negatively effected by this in multiple ways. (1) My son doesn't take good naps there because there is just so much going on. (2) I don't get nearly enough done because he gets fussy, or he's "talking" to himself too loudly while someone is on the phone. It's nothing like when we're at home where I'm quite productive and he is in his comfortable element. (3) My dog is messing up my house. Chloe is apparantly a sensative soul and she got used to us being home most of the time. The change must've been difficult on her because she has started to scratch at our walls putting multiple holes in the sheet rock. Awesome. (4) I have ZERO energy to work out when we get home from work. When I could work from home, I would wake up at 5am, eat breakfast, do some work, and at about 11am before lunch, I would do  my Yoga Meltdown DVD. Yea, I haven't done that mess in 4 weeks and my flabby gut shows it. Today, I had to squeeze into the fat girl pants that I wore the week after Lucas was born. I haven't put on much weight on the scale, but I certainly feel the difference in how my jeans fit. Case and point, this sucks. BUT - the VPN should be fixed by the end of next week. FINGERS CROSSED!!!

Bug taking a nap at the office with his bear, "muchacho."

Once we are up and running again, I plan to start baby boot camp in my house! Crib training will begin again with both naps and night time sleep. I am going to try 2 methods for doing said crib training (both exponentially easier than the previous sleep training, that was a nightmare).
METHOD NO. 1: Put baby in his crib awake, but drowsy. Stay in the room with baby until he falls asleep so that he doesn't feel abandoned and also to stick that pacie back in his mouth when he spits it out. We all know that it is going to happen. After a few nights, start to stay in the room with him, but stand further and further towards the door until you are eventually out of the room.
METHOD NO. 2:  Cry it out. Today, Nicholas was cleaning out the swing because of a poop explosion while I was out of the house. Since he was busy cleaning up poop, he put Lucas in his crib. Of course, he cried for about 20 minutes, but then he fell asleep! And guess what? He is perfectly fine. No harm, no foul. I'm willing to give it a try.


I went on a bachelorette girls weekend in Tybee Island/Savannah with some friends of mine. We stayed in a condo on the beach. We stayed in Friday night, got in the hot tub, walked down on the beach, and had a few drinks. Saturday, we spent the day in Savannah walking around downtown, had lunch at Paula Deen's restaurant, Lady & Sons, and then walked some more down on Riverstreet. That night, we went to downtown Savannah all dolled up in a 1950's pinup theme and had a few drinks at a few bars and watched my beloved GA Bulldogs lose to Clemson. BOOOOOOO!!!!!!! Sunday was the beach/recovery day. We were going to go to a place on the island for dinner, but everywhere is a whole in the wall type place and we had 10 girls, not so easy to get a table. So we decided to eat at Uncle Bubba's which is Paula Deen's brother's restaurant. Guess who was there???? PAULA DEEN!!!! Yup, I got to meet her, got a video of her saying "Hey Ya'll". It was pretty cool. Monday morning, we packed up and headed home!

Me with Paula Deen. Fist bumping. Awww yeaaa.

 

50's pinup night

 

I had so much fun on the trip with my friends, but I missed my family so much! I am very glad to be home!!!

 

Ghosts of Friendships Past

Today, as I was eating my lunch, some old memories popped into my head. Memories of friends that I no longer speak with. I felt really nostalgic and a little sad. And then I thought of why I no longer speak with these people who I shared such a great time in my life with.

I am not friends with these people anymore because of two individuals in particular. These two people have done me very wrong in the past. Forever tainted my friendships with the remainder of the group. And yet I miss them. What is wrong with me? These two people have treated me worse than anyone in my life and I'm sure that they don't think twice about it. But me, I think about them quite often. Oddly enough, I don't think of them with a shred of anger in my bones. Part of me wants to reach out to them and see how they are doing, see if we can make amends. Again, I say, what is wrong with me?

While chewing on my fried chicken house salad from Zaxby's, I realized that I had the urge to reconnect with these people and forgive and forget all that happened because they meant so much to me. For me at least, the people who hurt me the most are the people who I care for the most. If someone is mean to me that I don't care about, it'll bother me for a day or two and then I'll move on. But these people, I would say that I cared for them like you would siblings. I loved them. I think that's why I'm having difficulty moving on when this occurred years ago.

Don't get me wrong, I am happy with my life the way it is. I love my family and the friends that I do have are amazing! It just sucks that some very important friendships to me were lost and likely will never be recovered. Sad days.

But here I am now, snuggling my sweet baby boy while my wonderful husband is at work and it is all good.

BTW - little bug has started standing up when we hold him. His little legs are getting so strong!

My big standing boy!

Breastfeeding

Breastfeeding is extremely difficult. When I was pregnant, I decided that I would do my best and breastfeed for as long as I could. We took a class on it at the hospital before Lucas was born to try to mentally prepare myself as best as I could. Nothing can really truly prepare you for it. Just like nothing can really prepare you for the feelings of seeing and holding your baby for the first time or the level of difficultly that comes with being a new parent. But I went into it knowing that it was going to be hard, telling myself that I will do my very best.

Here I am 7 weeks later and still going strong. I think that I had so much success because I had a good foundation to build off of. Lucas came out ready to eat! He had no troubles latching on at all! the nurse at the hospital gave me a nipple shield to help draw it up into his mouth easier. He went to town! That was one of my biggest fears. In the class that we took, other moms that had tried it before said that they failed because their LO (little one) didn't latch on properly and they were too exhausted from giving birth to try too terribly hard to get it right. Thank goodness I didn't have that problem, or else I think that I would've ended up like that as well. So thanks Lucas!

The other really big thing that has helped me is support. This is so frustrating and terrible sometimes that you NEED a good support person (or people) to go to in those tough times. I had multiple outlets for support: my best friend's sister, Sarah (she gave her baby girl breast milk through the first year), the breast feeding support group on babycenter.com, the May 2013 board (group of women who had babies in May 2013) on babycenter.com, and the Pumping Moms board on babycenter.com. A very useful website about breastfeeding that helped answer a lot of my questions was kellymom.com. It is FILLED with info on breastfeeding: how many ounces do babies eat, how long do they feed for, what foods/drinks to avoid while breastfeeding, etc. This is where I learned the rule of thumb of drinking while breastfeeding: if you're sober enough to drive, then you're sober enough to nurse. I like that! One drink and I'm good! And if I do have a little too much, I pump and dump! Not to sound like an alcoholic, but if I couldn't drink, then I don't know if I would still be doing this. Not because I drink a lot, but because I've had 10 months of not being able to do many, many things. I don't want to commit myself to another 12 months of limiting things and not doing certain things. I need some freedom, as much freedom as breastfeeding will allow!

Which leads me to the first few weeks of breastfeeding. You have no freedom at all. You cannot go anywhere unless you're comfortable bfing in public, which I'm not. You're life revolves around your boobies and it is maddening. Your husband cannot feed the baby, your family or visitors cannot feed the baby, it's all on your shoulders (or should I say "chest"). Anytime that you have people over, you can bet that you will need to nurse at least once before they leave. For me, I felt awkward nursing in front of people. This lead to me feeling badly leaving the room to nurse Lucas when I know that people came to visit to see him. I got over it a little bit and didn't feel so weird around my mom, sister, MIL, and a few close friends. But it took me a while and even then, I tried to be as covered up as possible. I've always been weird about my body, I don't know why. Even in high school, I didn't like changing in front of my friends (still don't).

Anywho, there were countless late night feedings where I decided that it would be the last time that I nursed him. Multiple nights when I told Nicholas to give Lucas a formula bottle because I just needed a minute of peace and time to myself. I cried, texted Sarah (friend's sister) asking her when does this get easier???? Posted the same question to get the opinion of other mommies who have been through this on the Breast Feeding Support board. Everyone said that it gets better after the 6th week. They were right.

My mom fronted us the money for a breast pump so that I wasn't the only person who can feed our son. Nicholas and I came up with a good system that give me more freedom but also allows my to not have to nurse in public: when we know that we're going to go somewhere and be gone fora while, we bring a formula bottle with us to give to him when he gets hungry. A little bit of supplementation with formula is perfectly fine. It gave him a little constipation after a while, but I got approval from the pediatrician to give him 1oz of white grape juice and VUA-LA! Three hours later he had a massive blowout. Pediatrician also told me that it's perfectly normal for a breastfed baby to go up to one week without pooping and that as long as he is still having just as many wet diapers, there is no cause for concern. Interesting!

But I just feel like the pump saved my sanity. I love the pump. I only nurse him for his middle of the night feeding now and that's really only because I don't feel like pumping at 4am and also because I don't have a big enough stash built up to give him a bag of pumped milk at night without replacing it with a new pumped bag.

So for now, that's how this is going. It has not been easy and sometimes I even resent pumping (it's not exactly fun). But it's not nearly as bad as it was. So if you're thinking of doing it, don't let me scare you off, but be realistic and call/text/fb message me if you need some help or support!

Just a few maternity photos that my MIL took for us. Random, I know, but I love them and wanted to share.

The first week

My first week home from the hospital with little bug was absolutely terrible. I was bleeding, sore, hormonal, and had no idea what I was doing with this tiny little person.

I had Lucas on Tuesday, May 21st. We came home the next evening, around 5:00pm. We stopped by our office on the way home to show him off. A girl was holding him and he was crying like crazy. She tried to calm him down and nothing she did worked. I could see the panic in her eyes that people have when it's someone else baby and you cannot make it stop crying (I've had that panic multiple times before with my sister's babies). So I picked him up and he instantly stopped crying. I felt like I had mommy super powers. I thought to myself, "damn straight, I'm the momma!" That was a pretty cool moment for me.

The next few days are a big blur of visitors, diapers, crying (lots of crying, for both him and me), and questioning everything that I was doing. I was worried about taking care of his little pete correctly after the circumcision, making sure that the umbilical cord stump wasn't being suffocated by the diaper and not getting wet with his baths, and just trying to figure him out in general. The books say that you will start to recognize what your baby needs by his different cries. They lied. At least to me. All of his cries sound the same. I am only just now, 7 (almost 8) weeks later, getting to know what he needs when he is crying. Not because his cries sound different, but because I know his little schedule now. And even still, it's mostly a trial and error process to get him to stop. For example: He was crying when we got home from lunch just now and I knew that it wasn't because he was hungry because he just ate before we left. So I noticed that he was a little wet. Not really enough to make him cry, but I changed him anyways. He still was not happy. It's about time for me to pump, so I couldn't very well hold him, so I put him in his bouncy seat next to me, strapped him in, and popped the pacifier in his mouth. That seems to have worked for a little while. He was kicking his legs around like a happy baby for a while which leads me to believe that he was just bored and wanted to do something (like kick his legs). He just got a little fussy, so I bent over and popped the pacifier that had fallen out back into his mouth. He seems to be happy. So really, I still have no idea why he cries. I just try a bunch of things until something works.

Anyhoo, the most distinct memory of my first week home with him was the Sunday after he was born. Nicholas and baby were taking a nap snuggling together and I was laying next to them trying to do the same. I just could not seem to shut off my brain long enough to sleep.  It was terrible because I was exhausted and really wanted to sleep, but I just couldn't. I grabbed the telephone and walked out to the back deck with the dogs and called my sister. I just started bawling out of no where. I don't remember what I was so upset about. All I remember is that it was over something that, logically, I knew I shouldn't be upset about. Unfortunately, crazy hormones do not listen to logic and cause you to be a huge crying mess regardless of whether or not you know better. This is a prime reason why I called Renee rather than discussing with Nicholas. Men do not understand raging hormones. They understand logic. Therefore, the one time that  I did try to discuss my feelings with him, he got frustrated with me when his logic-talk did not calm me down at all. In the end, one event that was both extremely frustrating and so incredibly helpful happened to help me get out of my hormonal funk: my dog rolled around in a giant mud puddle.

Parker Brown absolutely hates his flea and ticked medication, which Nicholas had administered only hours before I let them outside with me for my crazy lady call to my sister. Apparently, while I was distracted with my breakdown, P Brown decided to try to rub off all of his flea meds in some mud. I flipped out when  I saw him. He is a big dog, 110lbs. So it's a big deal for him to be completely covered in mud. I got off of the phone with Renee and went inside to see if Nicholas was awake. He was not. Still sleeping soundly with little love. I decide no to wake him and do my best to take care of the issue myself. Now the decision: hose or bath tub? I had never used our water hose before and it's connected in the front yard and not the back, so I wasn't about to deal with finding a place to hook it up in the back and lugging it back there. I decided to grab a towel for his paws and lead him through the house to the bathroom.

Chloe (lab-pit mix) and Parker (shepherd-hound mix)

Bathing this giant brown mess was so therapeutic of me. I needed this disaster to happen for multiple reasons. (1) It was a distraction from all things baby. This was something that I was doing that had nothing to do with Lucas at all whatsoever. And that was nice. Keep in mind that this happened on the Sunday after he was born. I had 5 days of obsessing over every little thing that had to do with Lucas and was so exhausted by it all that it took everything in me to take a shower and change my pants on a daily basis. So this break, while it took work to bathe that big brown monster, was very much so welcome. (2) I yelled and cried some more. I think that I did end up waking up Nicholas from the yelling. I was scolding P Brown for his mischievous behavior and also letting off some steam from being so tightly wound for the past few days. Poor P Brown.  I apologized for all of the yelling later after I had calmed down a bit.

So thanks Parker Brown Town for keeping me sane!

Night 1 - The Results

Well, that was terrible.

We got him in his jammies, read him a book, and put him in the crib all by 9:00pm. I have no idea how many times we went in there to comfort/calm him. We would get him back to sleep in our arms but the moment we put him down back in the crib, he'd wake up. He never went even 5 minutes of being ok and sleeping between us going in there. It was exhausting.

At 11:40pm he was screaming at the top of his lungs and nothing would make him happy. So, Nicholas made him a bottle and I fed him. Once he was fed and changed, I decided to try swaddling him with his arms free (he likes to move his arms) so that maybe he would enjoy the closeness of the swaddle like the closeness of being held.

I'm not sure if it was the combo of the bottle and the swaddle, but he slept for one hour in the crib!!!

It was literally the exact moment that Nicholas and I went to lay down in our bed to go to sleep that he woke up and starting screaming again. 1:00am and I'm done with this mess for tonight. I haven't slept all day or all night and neither has Lucas. I told Nicholas to go get him and bring him in bed with us.

I do not consider this a failure. Lucas is very little and he didn't sleep for more than an hour during the day for a nap plus that hour stretch in the crib when he is supposed to be getting 15-16 hours of sleep on a daily basis. He needed sleep.

Our victories of the night: He experienced that the world will not end if he sleeps in his crib. He spent some time in the crib to get familiar with being in there alone.

Oh well, we shall try again tonight.
Wish us luck!

Sleep Training - Night 1

Tonight is night one of sleep training my little Lucas. I am no longer comfortable co-sleeping. Not because I'm worries that something might happen to him or even on a physical comfort level. I just feel like I am doing him a dis-service. He needs to learn to sleep on his own and self soothe. I also need to learn to let go a little. He is my little baby, but I need to learn some separation myself.

Enter sleep training.

I do not know if that is the clinical term for this business, but it works for me! I was doing some research on no-cry methods of getting babies to sleep on their own. My reasons: (1) Lucas is too young to cry it out (2) Even if he was old enough to cry it out, it would break my heart to hear him do that. Therefore, I googled no-cry methods.

This is where I found what we're going to try tonight. http://www.babycenter.com/0_baby-sleep-training-no-tears-methods_1497581.bc?page=1

We are going to be trying method #3 by Tracy Hogg author of Secrets of the Baby Whisperer. I haven't read the book, just the breif description and what someone else wrote about it:
"...sleep associations should be positive but disagreed with his techniques. She cautioned against letting your baby depend on "props" such as nursing, patting, and rocking to get to sleep. Instead, Hogg’s approach calls for going to your baby when he cries, picking him up, and putting him back down as many times as necessary.

Her technique's a middle ground between attachment parenting (such as Sears) and CIO techniques (such as the progressive waiting approach popularized by sleep specialist Richard Ferber)."

"I tried Tracy Hogg's approach: Don't leave the baby to cry! Instead, when he starts up, go in there, pick him up, and love him until he stops. Once he's calm, lay him back down. If he starts crying again, repeat. Eventually he'll know it's time to sleep. Hogg said she had to do it 126 times with one child, but it dropped to 30 the next night, four the next, and soon she didn't have to do it at all. I tried this with my 3-month-old and it worked like a charm!"

One Hundred and twenty six times. Holy crap. This is going to suck.


Husband and I have prepared ourselves with a drive to the liquor store (yes, you can breastfeed and drink, just in moderation). We gave each other a little pep talk this afternoon about how neither of us are allowed to get grumpy if this first night ends up taking all night. That is only going to make this lovely little adventure all the more terrible for us. So strap on your happy pants, it's going to be a long night in the Sarabia household!


This is going to be especially difficult for me because I have been up since 6am with no naps today. NO NAPS. Not to mention the 2 times he woke up last night to eat. Gotta love those growth spurts. he decided to really get his 6 week spurt at 7 weeks. Fun.


Since our office closes at noon on Fridays, I decided to let Nicholas have a nice morning/afternoon with a quiet house (see previous post regarding the importance of breaks) and took little bug to work with me. After work, bug and I went and had lunch with my work besties and then some hardcore shopping. 2.5 hours worth thank you very much.

 Christie and "little bug"

Immediately after our shop-a-thon,  I came home, pumped my boobs, and headed out for dinner with my sister and her kiddos. This was interesting: Me, Nicholas, our 7 week old, my sister, her three year old, and her one year old. Wow. I'm pretty sure people were looking at us like we were crazy to even attempt such a thing as having dinner in public with three small children. Yea, it wasn't easy.

After dinner, time to get baby in his jammies and begin this awful journey. In the 20 minutes that it took to write this post, we've had to go into the nursery and calm him down 3 times. I'm scared for what the rest of the night has in store.

Pray for me.

A much needed break

I am a a firm believer that as parents, sometimes you need a break from parenting. Parenting is exhausting and takes everything you've got until by the end of the day (8:30-9:00pm), you're a zombie. The night time is usually when I make all of my rash decisions such as "I'm quitting breastfeeding." Well, really that's the only one. But when Nicholas tells me OK, it's OK if I quit, that's when I come back with "No, I'll keep doing it." I think that for me, I just have to know that the option is there for me to quit, that I'm not trapped in it. I need to know that my husband will support my decision if I did decide to stop. Yea, I'm cray-cray.

But this is why I think that we all need a little break, for our sanity.

Nicholas and I give each other little daily breaks. For me, he lets me take naps during the day and takes care of little bug without waking me. If Lucas gets hungry, Nicholas gives him a pumped bottle or maybe even a formula bottle. Giving him a formula bottle is a much safer decision than waking me. For him, I don't wake him up at night for feedings and diaper changes anymore. I let him sleep. These breaks are small, but very much so needed.

Nicholas and I were fortunate to have a big break yesterday. His mom and her husband watched Lucas while he and I went out to lunch and picked up a few things from Wal Mart. Since he is so little, it wasn't all that different. Usually when we go out and we take him with us, he just sleeps in the car seat and only wakes for a diaper change. But still, it was nice to not have to stop my meal for a diaper change. So thanks MIL (mother in law)!!

Friday night, I gave Nicholas another big break. Our friends Sarah, Eric, and Taylor came over. The ladies stayed here with me and Lucas while the guys went out for dinner and drinks, a man date if you will. We ladies watched episodes from season 6 of FRIENDS, our favorite tv show ever, got subs and frozen yogurt moose tracks ice cream from Publix, and drank wine. It was nice. Lucas was a good baby and Nicholas came back slightly inebriated. He really needed that, I think.

Sarah, Taylor, and I orchestrated this night because Nicholas does things like that for a me a lot. In the 6, almost 7, weeks that Lucas has been with us, I've got out with my girlfriends at least 2-3 times for dinner and drinks while Nicholas watched the babe. He deserved the same treatment. It's nice to get out of the house and cut loose for a few hours!

Hubs was not too terribly delighted to see me catching candid photos of him playing his violin. But I just love it so much when he does!

Humans can be so nice

Nicholas and I took baby to IHop in Monroe this morning for a delightful brunch! We were planning on going for breakfast, but packing up baby and diaper bags and changing last minute poops cause it to be more like brunch by the time we got there.

A lot of fellow patrons were asking questions about Lucas such as how old he is, how much he weighed when we was born, etc. They also said that he was cute, but everyone says that when they see babies. It made me smile anyways.

The kindness of the human race really shined when our plates were cleared and the lady that was sitting behind us got up, came over, and told us that she paid for our bill. How nice is that?!

Sometimes I try to be that nice person to give back some good into the world. However, this is usually at a drive thru like Chick Fil A or McDonalds where the bill is unlikely to be more than $10.00.

But I am just inspired by the random generosity of a stranger. I love people today.

So Happy 4th of July Americans! Go out and be good people, the world needs it!

"Mommy Guilt," Co-sleeping, and Shorts Shopping

I apologize in advance for large gaps in between posts. I cannot begin to stress the level of exhaustion that comes with working full time and taking care of an infant. That's right folks, my baby boy is no longer considered a newborn! He's getting so old! .... you know I'm joking, right?

At a whopping 6 weeks pp, I now have my IUD, Mirena, and the green light to do normal things again! WOOT WOOT! I'm not too terribly sure how much longer I want to breast feed. 6 weeks was my first goal that I wanted to hit and now that I'm here, my next goal of 3 months seems like a world away. And this leads me into what we fellow mamma's call "mommy guilt."

Mommy guilt is something that my sister told me about a few days ago. She was discussing this phenomenon with another mom at the gym. They diagnosed that feeling of guilt that comes with almost every decision that you make with your kids. "Is it too soon to move him to the crib?" "How much longer should I let him co-sleep with us?" "Am I a bad mom for hating breastfeeding?" "Am I a bad mom for being this exhausted?" Yup, all of those questions that run through the mommy mind on a daily basis come along with a healthy dosage of guilt. My most recent guilt producing thought: I wish that my IUD would make my milk dry up on it's own so that it's not my decision to stop breastfeeding and I don't seem so weak.

Now, don't take that last statement as me saying that I think that people who stop breastfeeding are weak. This is my own personal thoughts for my breastfeeding experience. Because this crap is so physically demanding (shocking considering it's just a baby eating from you, right? wrong. It is much harder than I ever imagined) I had to make this a challenge for myself. To keep doing it, I had to keep telling myself on a daily basis that if I've made it this far, surely I can go one more day, week, month, 12 MONTHS! ...We'll see about that.


The runner-up in the mommy guilt department is co-sleeping. I never in a million years thought that I would be one of those people who slept with their babies. My pre Lucas brain thought that this was a dangerous practice done by those parents that we consider "attachment parents" or as I call them, "tree hugging parents" (they are the parent equivalent to tree huggers). Again, in my pre Lucas mind, I thought that that this was bad for baby and his development of becoming an independent person and that the people who did this were just lazy.

Hahahaha, yea, Lucas sleeps with us. Commence the judging. It's ok, I did it too.

He sleeps either on my chest or in the crook of my arm by my side. It's crazy how wrong I was. Now that I'm in the situation myself and going through all of this, I understand the benefits to co-sleeping. Sure, I am still worries about hindering his sleep independence (mommy guilt) but the benefits that I feel far outweigh the mommy guilt. My reasons are three fold: 1. He is simply too young to let him cry it out. He did not take the transition to the crib well AT ALL. That was a 2hr battle that I was just not down for. We will continue to try every now and then as he gets older, but for now, no thanks. 2. It is so much easier to nurse him if he is in the bed with me. I shake Nicholas awake to go and change his diaper and then when he brings him back, just pop out the old milk supplier whilst still laying comfortably on my side and BAM! My son is eating and I didn't have to move or become fully conscious. WIN! And finally, 3. He sleeps sooo much better! For the past 2 weeks, little bug has been waking up only once in the night! This usually occurs between 3:30am and 4:30am. That still sucks, but it sure beats the pants off of waking every 2-3 hours.

So go ahead and judge me and think me a tree hugging parent, but my baby is sleeping better and therefore I am sleeping better. I just ask you to do one thing: when you're up feeding your baby at midnight, 2:00am and 4:00am, just take a moment and reflect on the fact that I am sleeping and you are not. <- That's a little mean sounding and I almost went back and deleted it. Almost.

And now for the positive spin to my post: short shopping.

You might be asking yourself, how is shopping for shorts after having a baby a positive thing? You are just as surprised as I was! On a Friday I went shopping for a bathing suit and that next day, I went shopping for some shorts that actually fit me so that I could officially retire my maternity shorts until the next one comes. The experience was actually not bad, it was downright enjoyable! I was expecting the usual bout of depression that usually comes with shopping since I am no longer a 110lb 18 year old. You know those girls that were super skinny in high school and then gained about 20-30 lbs by the time they were 21? That's me! Surely if clothes shopping was depressing before, it would be worse after popping out a person, right?

Wrong. I bought a bathing suit that covered all of my wobbly bits (phrase stolen from "Bridget Jones Diary," gotta give credit where credit is due) but still looks respectably sexy. It's black, of course, and the bottoms are more like a skirt to help hide the thunder thighs that I've got going on. I've always been a busty gal, but now that I'm a momma, I'm not so comfortable with them being on display. These things are my child's food source (it is unknown for how much longer) and I'm a married woman! So guess what, I'm covered, comfortable, and feeling pretty good! Stretch marks be damned!

My shorts, now a size 10. My hips and thighs are pretty large and in charge these days and I'm oddly ok with that. I am a freaking woman! I had a freaking baby! I feel like my wide hips are my trophy of that accomplishment. So hang a "wide load" sign on my butt and sound the alarm! 'Cause me and my size 10 shorts are coming through!

Moral of the story: be comfortable with yourself. The mommy guilt and the extra cushioning around your bottom just don't matter. What does matter is that you are doing your best as a parent and your husband and baby love you just the way you are! There is no need to put so much pressure on yourself. You doing your best is all that anyone can ask for. Chin up butter cup, you're doing great!

Time to wrap this puppy up, it's past 11:00pm and my dinner is now ready! That's right, dinner. I am becoming nocturnal apparently. Since me and hubs have tomorrow off of work, I decided to take a nap from 7:30 - 10:00 since I was so exhausted from working from home and taking care of Lucas all day and I wanted to spend some time with my hubs! So, until next time my friends!

And here's my hubs open-mouthed sleeping with my little chunk. Love it! 

(Nicholas will kill me for posting this) :)

The Birth Story

I was 40 weeks and 6 days pregnant when I went into labor. Believe me, I was sooo ready to be done with pregnancy! I couldn't sleep well, I was always really hot, my hands feet and face were swollen past the point of recognition, and Lucas liked to stretch out and press his feet hard against my right side and his back hard against my left side. Really fun stuff.

May 20 - The Monday before I went into labor. I went to the doctor for a stress test to make sure that his heart rate was strong and steady, considering I was almost one week overdue, and to strip my membranes. This is a procedure that 50% of the time causes labor to begin within 24-48 hours. If you want more details on that, Google it. I was told that this will cause mild cramping and anytime I feel cramping or contractions, I should walk for 30 minutes. I was still only 1.5cm and not signs of anything happening anytime soon. So, I went to work like usual. Told my boss that I will likely be clocking out randomly and walking laps around the building, and went about my merry way. I felt mild period-like cramps, so I got my large self up from my desk and walked around in the May GA heat for 30 minutes as instructed. Repeat 3-4 times throughout the day and still, no baby. Fast forward to that night: I take a shower and did another suggestion by the doctor (I'm sure that you can guess what that one is), and still nothing.

May 21 6:00am - I wake myself up thinking that I have to go to the bathroom, feeling a little crampy, but it went away. Then, as I'm washing my hands, the crampy-ness comes back. I'm more awake now and realize that this is a pretty serious cramp, like a strong period cramp. I lay back down, and another one comes. Then another. I'm pretty nervous now, not too sure if this is labor or not. It feels too much like a period cramp to be labor, right? I whip out my contraction counter app on my phone and start to time those puppies. When I realize that they are pretty consistent, I pick up the phone and call my sister. We are on the phone for about 20 minutes when I notice that those "cramps"  are about 2.5 minutes apart and lasting 45-50 seconds a piece. I frantically hang up and call the doctor and leave a message at the paging service. Dr. Hood calls back. He is notorious for having a bad bedside manor and, trust me, he is no peach at 6am either. He tells me to go ahead and head to the hospital. This is when I wake up Nicholas. He is still groggy and taking his time brushing his teeth and getting dressed. The, now confirmed, contractions are getting stronger and more painful by the minute, so I go into monster mode and yell at him to get a move on! He realizes that I am in serious pain and promptly picks up the pace.

The car ride was terrible. Every single bump in the rode felt like torture. Every red light was my nemesis. Finally - we're at Gwinnett Medical Center's Women's Pavilion. I sign some paperwork that seems to take forever. ADVICE - fill out your pre-admission forms and send them in as soon as you can! I turned all of mine in months prior and it still took a few minutes to get all of my stuff together. I cannot imagine what it would've been like if I hadn't. And of course, the person doing all of my stuff is a trainee. Great.

I get into the pre-admission room, pee in a cup, and get a gown on. At this point, my contractions hurt like the dickens and I'm yelling out words that I would not want my mother to hear. Nick's mother was in the room at this point, excited for the upcoming birth of her first grandchild. I was embarrassed to be in such a foul mood and saying these bad words with her around, but at this point, I didn't care. I just wanted to get from contraction to contraction without throwing up. I have no idea how long I was in the pre-admission room for. It felt like both an eternity and also like 5 minutes. When you're in that kind of pain, time is irrelevant. I just know that I was 2cm when I first got there and was at 4cm when they took me back to the labor and delivery room where I would stay until my son was born. Room 620 I believe. The room was huge. I looked to my right and there is the table where they will put my baby boy once he is born. It was unreal. This was actually happening. I am going to give birth today. TODAY.

My nurse, Sandi, was amazing. She started me on a local anesthetic in my IV drip to help with the pain. I'd say that it took my pain level from an 8 down to a 6. Not too much help, but enough to keep me from saying too many bad words. This pain, I suffered in silence for the most part. Unless Nicholas wasn't looking at me. I learned that to cope with the pain, I needed to focus on other things. So, I did two things: stare into Nick's eyes and squeeze his hand in 4-pump intervals, counting in my head: 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4, and so on.

At some point (again, all sense of time is lost), the anesthesiologist arrives! MY SAVIOR! He too has a trainee with him. Apparently this trainee administered my epidural and I had no idea. Whatever, it worked! The epidural itself didn't hurt, it was just uncomfortable. When they say "you'll feel a little pressure" that's exactly what they mean. It's an odd sensation. The worst part about the epidural is how you have to sit in order to receive it. My belly is huge and contracting painfully. I sit on the edge of the bed with my feet over the side in between Nick's legs on his chair (they raised my bed high so that my back was at a good level for the doc). I have to hunch my back to the point to where I cannot hunch any further. My chin in pressed firmly into my chest, my belly is smushed against my boobs, and I have to sit like this for 3-5 minutes through the contractions not moving at all. Lovely.

It was all worth it! The epidural was my best friend. I went from being the scary pregnant lady that no one wanted to be around, to being the life of the party! I was cracking jokes with my family (everyone had arrived by this point) and with the nurse. But then came the scary part: baby boy's heart rate took a dip. I had 3 strong contractions in a row (who knew? I was in blissful ignorance) and Lucas' heart didn't have time to recover from them, causing his heart rate to drop. An army of 5 nurses came into my room and are staring at the monitor and they put an oxygen mask on me. I had to wear that for about 30 minutes. My midwife said that if I wasn't as far along as I was, she would've had me sent off for a C-section. Thank goodness that wasn't necessary. But he did recover and all was well. I am very thankful for the calm, cool, collectiveness of my nurse. Because she wasn't worried, it helped me not to be worried. She was the bees knees.

It is now about 10:30 and I am 8cm and in a -1 station. By 11:30, I was 9cm and at a 0 station. Sometime between noon and 12:20 rolls around and I am STARVING and at a lovely 10cm and ready to push. Just waiting for my midwife to get back. She did not think that this would go as quickly as it did and went back into the office for her appointments that day. Lucas had other plans. I start pushing at 12:48 and my son is born at 12:58pm. I am speechless.

My sweet, amazing husband starts to cry at the first sight of our son. Me, I am in a stunned state of shock and awe. I see this pale blonde, almost bald, baby that I just gave birth to. He isn't crying yet. I am frozen in time and staring at Jonne (my midwife) hanging him upside down checking him out. I barely remember Nicholas cutting the cord. It was almost like and out of body experience. It wasn't until they took him over to the table to clean him off that I snapped out of it. What did it? He started to cry. The first sound that I hear my baby make. The most beautiful sound in the world. This is when I started to cry. Jonne is attending to my nether-regions and I am craning my neck to see past the nurses and past Nicholas with the video camera to see our boy. All I get are glimpses. But then they bring him to me and I hold him and nurse him for the first time. Indescribable. He is warm and soft and the most perfectly colored newborn I've ever seen. No red splotches, no vernix caseosa coating (cottage cheese looking stuff that most newborns have). He is perfectly pink. I just look at him and feel him in my arms and my life is changed.

This 8oz baby and this man leaning over him to my left with the look of pure joy on his face, they are my entire world. The annoyances of being almost one week over due and the pain of labor are a distant memory now. They seem like nothing compared to what it felt like to hold my son and kiss my husband who is now the father of my child. I could do this again.

Later, much later.

One.

Creative title huh? I find it appropriate considering this is my first post.

I suppose I'll start this off by saying what I want my blog to be about and why I wanted to start a blog in the first place. Well, I got the idea to do this today, whilst blow-drying my hair (where all strokes of genius are born). I was thinking about how freaking difficult it is to be a mom and be responsible for keeping a helpless human alive. Not only that, but every single decision that you make has a drastic impact on this little person. I was thinking to myself that no one ever talks about how hard it is. Everyone in social media (Facebook and Instagram are my only sources here, I am not a fan of tweeting) only ever post things like "oh look how cute my baby is" and "having such a great day with my little one!" That's all well and good, and yes, I myself post things like that because, well, we are having a great day and my baby is adorable and the world simply must know!  Just kidding, but really, my baby is pretty cute. I guess what I'm trying to say is that no one ever talks about the hardships that come along with this full time job. Going into it, you know it's going to be difficult. You know that you're not ever going to get any sleep and you're "me" time will drastically decrease in frequency. But you don't really know. There is no way to prepare yourself for how it actually is when that alien creature that has been kicking you comes into the world and is no longer that thing you feel, but it's that baby that needs you.

To get back on track, I wanted to start this blog because everyone needs someone that is going through the same thing to relate to. As a new parent, you need to have someone that is going through or has already gone through, the hardships that come along with bringing that bundle of baby home from the hospital. I am very lucky to have my older sister who has a 3 year old and a 1 year old to talk to. This made me think that it must have been so much more difficult for her because she didn't have someone that she was this close to when she was going through this with her first baby. I wanted my blog, if anyone ever reads it, to serve the purpose of 1. telling the truth and not sugar coating what it's like to have a baby, be a mom, etc. 2. document my stories and experiences so that I can one day come back and read these older entries and remember the things that I will likely forget and 3. have some quiet time (the "me" time in the title) away from everything else. I need that little break for my sanity and to reduce stress levels.

Don't get me wrong, I love my son and I love my husband and I am 100% delighted with our decision to start a family. I would never in a million years give my son back and go back to the easier, more care free life of pre-Lucas. He is forever in heart. But everyone needs to vent and let off some steam. This is my safe place to do so. I love my husband to pieces, but sometimes, men don't understand and cannot relate to the emotions and ways of thinking of a woman.

So here I am, beginning the journey of blogging. I hope that my musings are helpful and entertaining to the one or two people that may read this.

Enjoy.