breastfeeding

I am very pro-breastfeeding for all the obvious reasons. With Riley, I told myself I had to nurse for at least 6 months. Then a year rolled around and I couldn't imagine stopping. Another important part of breast-feeding is how it stops....and for me...self weaning is the only thing that seems right. So Riley self weaned down to 2 times a day, morning and night, at 14 months. And then by 18 months she was down to just one feeding at night before bed. She easily let this go when I offered her a bottle of warm water at bedtime. Yes, water. (I was very weird....still am I guess....but I think cows milk is so gross and couldn't imagine giving it to a baby). Nursing her for 18 months was great. She was ready to stop and I was emotionally ready for her to move on.

It is slightly different with Milo. As I mentioned, he bites. Riley never bit. He bit so hard once in january when he was cutting his second top tooth, that I had this horrible, painful puncture wound that felt like I was being stabbed every time he latched for 3 weeks. He flails and thrashes around, latching and unlatching and it is like holding a bag of kittens. Wild, feral kittens on crack. In a bag that weighs 20 lbs.

Another thing is this: I would like to have another baby. Not right this second....but yes, in the next 6 months or so, We would like to start trying again (I say "we"....but have not really told my husband yet). I want him to have a sibling close in age...no more than 2 1/2- 3 years apart....which means I need to start trying in August. As in THIS august. Weird, right?
I am one of those weird chicks that doesn't get her period, thus making it impossible to pregnant, as long as I am breastfeeding. Even after I was down to the 2 nursings a day with Riley....and then not at all past 18 months....i didn't get my period again until she was almost 2.

So....what to do. The best part is that Milo will not take a bottle, pacifier, sippy cup....

Ug.

Don't get me wrong, I still love it 90% of the time. I am not ready to give it up, and I really don't think that is even possible right now. I have no idea how I would even begin....it is still such a huge part of mothering right now. I nurse, on demand, many times a day. And when he is not a biting bag of feral kittens, I love it. It is so cozy and warm. It is the only time he really slows down and cuddles (he is very busy right now, like most 10 month olds) and I love that I have a food source, ready to whip out, anywhere, anytime. And if that grosses you out, well, you should probably look away.... :)

Kira

my best friend from college....one of my most favorite people in world...has a baby girl, Kira, who is one month younger than Milo...and last week Kira had croup...my friend didn't like the way her breathing sounded so took her to the ER...they admitted her and put her on oxygen for the night....but then next day she wasn't better...then they decided to put her on a ventilator because she was having a lot of trouble breathing....and then the doctor couldn't get the tube down her throat. so the did an emergency scope and discovered she has a web of cartilage blocking her airway and vocal chords. (this explains the cute, soft, raspy voice she has always had...and her wheezing that her pediatrician said was nothing to worry about).

So they gave her a tracheotomy. then the next day her lungs collapsed and her trach failed. so they put tubes in her lungs and re-did the trach. so Kira was totally sedated, with a feeding tube, a trach, and a ventilator. imagine seeing your baby like that. imagine not being able to hold your baby, nurse them, comfort them....

i can't put in words how this feels. no words really capture the feeling in your chest when your friend is watching her baby struggle for life. her whole life has crashed in front of her...

and you read stories of these type of things happening to people....but they never happen to you..your family...your best friend's 9 month old baby. until it does.

and i just want her better.

and i keep looking at Milo and crying. because he is healthy and i love him so much. every time i complain about his biting or his lack of sleeping....i am then flooded with the realization that he is healthy. and i should just squeeze him and cuddle him and enjoy all of this. take a deep breath when it gets stressful, and enjoy.

Kira is now stable. she is being lifeflighted to Seattle Childrens tomorrow (they live in Montana). She will have surgery later this week to remove the cartilage...

so, here i am, asking for everyone to send healing thoughts to Kira.

i took this pic in January when they visited...

babywearing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

pics from the last couple months

monster baby

i feel like i am dodging collections when i think about this blog. it is like that "oh crap!! i know! i know, i know I KNOW!! i just keep FORGETTING to send the check!!" feeling....i have been meaning to update for so long....and then i forget and then i feel crappy about it.

i mean....not that i get collections phone calls or anything. well, not since college. but who doesn't get sent to collections in college, right?

ummm...

moving on!

i am sure no one reads this anymore....because that is what happens when you stop blogging....but i am going to try to be better...really....seriously...

Milo is 10 months. He likes playing with his dirty clothes basket (takes all the dirty clothes out and flings there all over the room), the dishwasher, the heat vent, and the plunger.

those are his go-to fave toys.

he bites like a piranha, scratches, pinches, headbutts....

so, as you can see, it is all roses and gumdrops around here.

just a little post baby self loathing.

i wrote this about about 6 weeks ago...forgot to post...whoopsie!




My first born turned 8 last friday. EIGHT. I know what you are thinking, I don't look/ act old enough to have an 8 year old. I know, I know. Go on.

We went to a tea with 3 of her friends. 8 is this weird contrast of still being little enough to have a tea party and want to sit next to the stuffed teddy bear....with singing every lyric of that obnoxious song "alllll around the worllllld....can you hear me? Alllll around the world, city to city". On the drive home one of her cute little friends had a little handheld nintendo D-somethingerather thingiemabob that you can play AWESOME games on and it takes pictures.....and she was on this little game thing the whole tea party. And when I asked about it she said "it is only $250".

So I kind of wanted to break it into a thousand pieces and tell her that she should tell her parents that $250 would be better spent on some MANNERS....but I didn't.


Which brings me too: the rage.


What is up with this weird post-partum hormonal rage fest?


Wait.


Am I just an asshole?


No, no. I assure you....I may be an asshole at times, yes. And I do have these visions of doing and saying asshole like things all the time...but, who doesn't? Right? Anyone?


But....I mentioned the funk before. This is common. Ask any new-ish mom. There is a time, after you emerge from the post infant blur/ fog/ cloud....where the lines are all so blurry and you must redefine where you start and the baby stops and where oh where did the "me" go? The me that is not a mom of a baby, the me that wears real clothes not just pink pajama pants and old navy tank tops, the me that remembers to shower and wear mascara.

So I went through the funk. I felt fat and pathetic and FRUMP. Oh god, so frumpy. Pathetically frump....and pissed about it. I am not frump. I am hot. I am fun. I am sexy. I am fucking hilarious and I can flirt the pants off men and women. But I had to remember this because when I looked in the mirror and FRUMP looked back at me....I believed it. I was like, oh. Hi. This is you now, I guess. Well, ok.

So yeah. Funk. Then....anger. Hormonal anger. Anger directed at myself for agreeing, even for a minute, that I was frump.

And then I got the worst haircut of my life. I am not overreacting here. It was like the floppy butt cut of boys in 1993. The long bowl-ish butt flop top over short sides. And I wanted to claw my face off. I was a miserable human for....oh about a week. Which is too long to hate yourself when you have a family to love and a life to get back too.

Funny how it all builds....and one day you get a haircut and the tree branch snaps and the avalanche levels the side of a mountain. The tree branch was my hair. The snow on top of that tree branch? A sick baby the week before....the lack of sleep, the spoiled, rude 8 year old, the fat loaf belly in the mirror, not getting carded for booze, some comment from my mom that was of course innocent like all insulting comments from my mom....it all builds and builds...and then *snap*

After a week of rage, I hired a babysitter, went running, bought a tanning package, went tanning, took a shower, shaved my furry legs and pits, and got a new HOT haircut.

watch out, world, i'm back.