Two evenings ago I noticed my throat was a little scratchy. The next day I was definitely sick. Not terribly sick, but some kind of virus. My throat hurts a little bit and my sinuses are plugged up. (Fucking sinuses, it’s always you.) I’m generally okay during the day, other than a sickly exhaustion, but at night the sinus party hits full swing.

Last night sucked. She slept great until 1am and then it was fidgeting and squirming and whimpering all night. Then there was me, snorting and gagging.

She had finally gotten comfortable and fallen asleep and I realized I needed to blow my nose and didn’t have a tissue. I carefully slid out of bed, tip-toed out the door into the bathroom, and blew my nose on a tissue.

“Waaahhhh!” said Kate. I raced back in to find her sitting up, eyes closed, crying pathetically for me. I gathered her in my arms, whispered shhh, shhh and laid her back down and nursed her to sleep again. She, thankfully, fell asleep. I got comfortable and snuggled in.

And then I felt my nose start dripping and I realized I forgot to bring tissues in with me. I wasn’t going to leave and wake Kate up again so I ended up cursing silently and groping around in the crib for an old burp rag.

The real kicker, though, was half an hour later. I had to roll over to let the mass of sludge in my sinuses squick from one side to the other. I grabbed my pillow to reposition it and there, right under my pillow, were two tissues.

::

Thankfully Kate isn’t full-out sick (yet) but either she has a bit of it or she’s coming down with it (or it’s something else entirely). She’s very clingy, very tired, and of course not sleeping well at night. I’m really hoping she’ll skip this one. It’s hard enough trying to take care of a clingy baby when I feel like crud. Today I laid on her bed for a while, letting her play with toys and crawl on me while I was semi-comatose. (But not asleep – I learned the hard way not to take my eyes off her while she’s playing nearby or I may end up with a concussion.) She wants to play and be active, she just doesn’t want me more than arm’s length away.

On the good side, at least the phase of I don’t want to sleep I want to crawl/pull up and I’m going to scream at you for half an hour has passed. She goes to bed so easily again. Not every time, but when she’s tired all I have to do is nurse her, give her her paci, and then wait for her to fall asleep. I’m even scooting back a little bit so she’s not cuddled right into me, and putting her on her belly. And she just… falls asleep. (Of course then I have to wait FOREVER for her to fall asleep deep enough that I can open the door without waking her up. It’s like she gets 95% of the way there and then just hangs.) This makes bed time FAR more pleasant for all involved.

On the bad side, she wakes up every freaking hour. Sometimes half an hour. Even after I bring her to bed with me, where I am sleeping touching her, she’s still waking up every 2 hours. Every 2 hours! All night long! Aaaggghhhhhhh. And she’s crying and whimpering and fidgeting so there’s definitely something bothering her. At least I kind of hope so, because then it will go back to “normal” when it’s over with.

Given how she was chomping viciously on her paci all day I’m putting money on teeth. She uses her paci on and off during the day. It was only during naptime but she seems to need it more right now. Today every 5 minutes she was pushing it to the side of her mouth and really gnawing on the thing. If the paci wasn’t on hand then she stuck her fingers in her mouth. Or my knee, or the couch arm, or the table. My child still has no teeth so I am just waiting.

Just this evening my throat started hurting so apparently I am getting sick. I hope that’s not what is bugging her. Ugh.

Den was home today so this morning when Kate woke up he took her so I could sleep for a tiny bit longer. I loved him a lot for that (and wished I could stay in bed longer, but I had to get up). When I got up she immediately wanted to be held by me and started whining and crying whenever I tried putting her down. Again. I put her down for a nap, which she woke up from less than 30 minutes later. I quickly fled out the door to work telling Den, “Good luck!!” I’m not sure I’ve ever been so relieved to go to work. I still was just so drained from yesterday.

I came home to a much different baby! She must have had a good day with daddy, she took a nap with him, played a lot. Maybe she just needed a day to get over the trauma of us leaving her, I don’t know. Plus my head was reset. That helps. A lot.

At 8pm she started getting whiny so I got her changed and put her down. She nursed a lot, took her paci and then fell asleep in like 5 seconds. No holding, no rocking, no singing, no fighting, no crying. She just put her hand on my chest, sighed, and fell asleep. Yaaaayyyyyyy! Yes she has woken up about 3 times in the past 4 hours, but every time has been the same, quick and easy. Actually the first time she hadn’t even moved and didn’t need me to do a thing, I just layed down beside her, facing her, she reached out her hand to touch me and fell immediately back asleep. So sweet.

I had to apologize to my poor husband today though. Last night I really kind of let loose on him and for no real reason. I was so frustrated with Kate but it’s not like you can blame the baby for being a baby, and not like you can let it out on them. So, sadly, he catches the brunt of my frustration. Even when I know it’s not his fault and that there is nothing he can do, he has to go to work and make the money that lets me stay home with Kate, plus he doesn’t have boobs.

::

Kate’s schedule also came up in conversation tonight when I came home from work.

D: “She needs a nap, I think.”
N: “Well, it’s too late now, hope she makes it til bedtime.”
D: “What do you mean, too late?”
N: “She needs to be awake from her last nap by 6pm or she won’t go to bed!”
D: “But doesn’t she go down for a nap at 6??”
N: “No, that was LAST month! Now she can’t.”
D: [massively exasperated] “You need to write me a schedule or something!!”

So I’m writing him a schedule. I really do forget how well I know her rhythms, that I take it for granted. I forget that he works all day, he doesn’t know our little routines. I have all these little mental notes about her likes and dislikes, her patterns, her expectations. He certainly knows her most of anyone else in the world besides me, and he knows little things about her that I don’t, little things she does for him that she doesn’t for me. But still, I forget. And it’s not fair for me to be frustrated with him for not giving her milk before a meal if I never happened to mention that, or that she can’t sleep after 6 anymore.

He is really enjoying his Mondays with her. It’s a chance not just for them to spend time together, he spends a lot of time with her every evening. But it’s different when he’s with her all day, when he has to handle lunch and naps and changing and play time. It really gives him a chance to get to see her during the day, to learn more about her and to come up with their own things. I may be the mommy, but she thinks daddy is pretty damn cool, too.

This was a very long day. Yesterday was a date night for Den and I, we got to go out and have a couple of drinks and eat and dance and hang out with people. It was fun! However, it also meant that Kate was going to go to bed late. Which would have been fine by itself, had I not woken up at 7am with a raging headache and night sweats because of the two drinks I had. (Note to self: I am now a major lightweight, do not attempt more than two drinks, holy smokes.) Since I was up early, she soon followed. And thus started the day of a thousand whines.

What I can’t figure out is why when a baby is really tired they don’t, oh you know, friggin sleep. I got my headache to go away and I wanted to crash, and Kate clearly needed more sleep but oh no, she wouldn’t. She was just this squirmy mass of whiny crawling spazz. After a few hours of that we did manage to take a long (2 hour) nap together, and I thought, great, now I’ve fixed it! Wrong. She was better, but not fixed. Second nap of the day she fought me again. I wrapped her up tight in my arms and finally she gave in. She was down for 2 more hours. I was gleeful. Another 2 hour nap! Surely now evening will go easier! And to be fair, we had a good evening. We played, we ate, we took a shower/bath and splashed and laughed. She got tired and whiny at 8 and I whisked her off to bed and she actually went down easy! I felt pretty pleased with myself, I will admit. I was still in good humor. Amazing, since Den was working today and then went out to a superbowl party, so all of The Day of Whines was me and only me. But I did it! I sat down at my computer, opened my game, and relaxed.

For all of 10 minutes. The dogs barked and I realized I’d left them in our bedroom, which happens to be right next to Kate’s bedroom. I flew down the hall and opened the door only to find the asshole dog ON our bed. (Which he has not been allowed on in well over a year.) Kate didn’t wake up, thank goodness. Den got home and took the dogs downstairs – I was still pissed at Zeeke, but I am frequently pissed at Zeeke. I was letting it go. And then of course Kate woke up. Den got her and spent some time with her because I think my brain turned to mush at the idea of fighting her yet again to go to sleep. I just couldn’t dredge up the energy.

When Den went to bed I put her down too. Or tried to. You know that feeling when your patience is just totally fried but you know you need to hold it together? You can’t get mad at the child, obviously, you can’t walk away (because she’s overtired and NEEDS TO SLEEP or it will just get WORSE), you just count to ten over and over again and hold your breath and dig your fingernails in. That was me tonight. I laid there fighting her FOR AN HOUR. First she cried. Then she did the back arching, pushing away from me thing. Then she tried climbing me. (Did I mention how she pinches HARD while doing that? I don’t have visible bruises, but my arms are literally sore from the grabbing and pinching.) I thought she had fallen asleep roughly 5 times, and just when I’d start to relax that it was over she’d kick me again and start all over. I wanted to cry. I really, really wanted to cry. And she was so tired! I ended up throwing my arm over her legs so she couldn’t get up or crawl, and faking being asleep (But peeking every few seconds because she has a habit of jabbing me in the eyes, yanking my hair and/or headbutting me when I have my eyes closed.) She kept trying to push to her knees and I’d lean on her a little more so she couldn’t, she’d cry then put her head down and drift off again. I’m pretty sure we laid there for half an hour like that, her kicking me every 60 seconds or so (just to underscore the fact that she WAS NOT asleep and didn’t WANT to be), giving a little cry every 5 minutes.

Finally she sighed. I didn’t dare move. I rolled over and just laid there, staring at the ceiling in the dark, terrified that me opening the door to leave would wake her up again. My patience ran out about an hour earlier. If she woke up yet again I may have to run outside into the snow screaming obscenities.

So, she is finally asleep but it’s nearly midnight. So much for me having a couple hours to myself tonight. I’m so fried. Almost makes date night not even worth it.

I’ve known this song for a long time and it’s always made me tear up when I hear it…. the soft, haunting music and the touching lyrics. It means even more now.

Lifehouse – Everything

Find Me Here
Speak To Me
I want to feel you
I need to hear you
You are the light
That’s leading me
To the place
where I find peace, again.

You are the strength, that keeps me walking.
You are the hope, that keeps me trusting.
You are the life, to my soul.
You are my purpose, you’re everything.

And how can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?

You calm the storms, and you give me rest.
You hold me in your hands, you won’t let me fall.
You still my heart, and you take my breath away.
Would you take me in? Take me deeper now?

And How can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?
And how can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?

Cause you’re all I want, you’re all I need
You’re everything, everything
You’re all I want, you’re all I need
You’re everything, everything.
You’re all I want, you’re all I need.
You’re everything, everything
You’re all I want, you’re all I need.
You’re everything, everything.

And how can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?
And how can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better, any better than this.

And How can I stand here with you and not be moved by you?
Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?

Would you tell me how could it be any better than this?

It occurred to me today that it’s February. I’m still trying to mentally adjust to the new year, it always takes a few months to reorient the calendar in my head. But it’s February already. One month until Devin’s birthday. I can already feel things lurking.

I am happy, absolutely. Joyous. I feel like I’ve been given a new life to live. At the same time, though, I feel like little things poke holes, casting fishhooks in through the light and yanking out a big globular shadow. Then the moment passes, the hook falls out and the shadow gets sucked back under again. But it’s still there.

Empathy. I feel a lot of empathy. I’ve always been a caring, sensitive person, but now I don’t just feel bad for other people, I feel it myself too. Less “Wow that’s terrible” and more “I know how that feels and I never, ever want to feel it again.”

::

I don’t know why eyes are so important to me. Maybe because I always pictured Devin with blue eyes. Kate’s are looking more and more brown and it makes me sad – not because I don’t like brown, but because I wanted them to be blue, I wanted them to be like I pictured Devin’s.

Every time we go over to see the twins, the cousins, I study their eyes, too. Their big sister’s are brown, so for a long time it was just a curiosity. Now they are going more and more blue. It hit me hard. They got boys, and now boys with blue eyes. It’s not fair. (It will never be fair.)

::

I see friends talk about how different their children are and it reminds me that we really have no idea who Devin would have been. I forget, sometimes, because Kate looked so similar to him when she was born. They were both small-side-of-average babies, her being 7lbs at birth and him being on track for the same. When I look at her I see him, too. She’s still so petite, 20th percentile in height and weight. I see friends with small girls and big chubby boy babies and I wonder, would that have been him? In my head he’s a petite boy like his sister, but would he have been a roly-poly one? Would he be racing through baby clothes sizes?

I know Kate. I know she’s spunky and outgoing. She plays well independently but always checks in for cuddles. She likes to screech and doesn’t babble. She hated laying down as a newborn and is determined to figure out walking.

I always felt like Devin was shy. Active, but reserved. Sometimes I get these pictures in my mind of what I think he would look like, act like – but they’re blurry. They’re made-up. How I wish I had a crystal ball.

::

We’ve been talking about when we go back to do IVF again, talking about this hypothetical sibling for Kate. We really want to have another, but at the same time Kate fills me up so completely with love and joy I know I would be okay if we never could. But at the same time the thought leaves such a pang – not just because we want Kate to have a sibling to grow up with, but that she should already have a sibling to grow up with.

I’m supposed to have two children, damnit. I’m supposed to have two.

Kate is turning into a full-blown water baby.

When she was a newborn I had a very carefully selected, large, one-piece, rated-best baby bathtub. She hated it the moment I put her down on it. Hysterical screaming. I attempted it about twice and then resorted to just washing her down with a cloth and washing her head by holding her over the sink. Then someone online suggested bathing with her. That sounded a little crazy, but I tried it. Wow, what a difference! I used my legs as an incline to rest her on, I could wash her, move her around, and it was fun! I didn’t do it frequently, but she didn’t really need many baths (she was never a spitter). While bathing with me she learned to kick her feet in the water. She learned to sit up and splash. She discovered the drain and played with her tubby toys. She learned to float.

Because I was in there with her I was able to fill it up higher than I would otherwise have, let her float and kick and swim. We also have a detachable shower head so we use that to hose her down. I was always careful about not getting water in her eyes at all – I wanted to keep the experience as positive as possible – but Den discovered that she doesn’t really mind it. With water running down her face she looks up and smiles. (Unless she inhales some. Different reaction, then.) I soap her up, rinse her off, and then let her play.

Well it all worked, apparently, because she gets so excited at bath time now. She stands up at the tub looking in and squeals, reaching forward to try to touch the faucet. If I’m holding her in my arms when I wash my hands she’s diving forward to touch the water. At work last week she found the cats’ water fountain and had a blast splashing in it beside me. (She was soaked, the floor was soaked, and the cats were all like WTF?!)

The bath was usually a mid-day event for us. After a nap, mid-afternoon when she was awake and I wanted to get clean. It wasn’t at all a part of our evening routine until…. solids. Oh boy, dinner. Sticky hands, sticky face, stained shirt… okay kid, you’re going in the bath. So now it’s an evening occasion every day, soon as she’s done eating dinner. And she knows it. Tonight when she was done eating I wiped her off, wiped down and removed the highchair tray, then went to turn on the bath water while she was still contained in the chair. As soon as I turned on the water I heard shrieks of joy from the living room and I returned to find her waving her arms about in excitement.

I can’t wait until summer. We’re going to have to get a little kiddie pool!

So that last post? I went to bed because I didn’t hear her moving around anymore. I then woke up at 6am with a start and realized she never woke up. First emotion: elation! Second emotion: fear. I tried going back to bed but that wasn’t happening. I crept into her room and laid my hand lightly on her back to feel her breathing in and out. I then did it again, just for extra reassurance. My therapist told me the first time she slept through the night I’d think something happened to her… well she was right. Not freaking out of my mind panic, but just the kind of nagging “what if” that you really can’t let go of until you check just to be SURE. Of course she was fine, she had just slept through the night. 7 hours. Without me. In her room. Holy SHIT. This kid still typically goes 2 hours without me, max. When I went in there I found her sound asleep on the other side of the bed where she had crawled over onto my blanket (I keep one in there for when I sleep with her). Apparently she likes the softer feeling… not that I blame her. Most importantly she clearly woke up, move around and put herself back to sleep. Without crying. And slept another 3+ hours.

My excitement about this event was slightly diminished by a few comments of, “8 months old and her first time sleeping through the night? Wow, I’m sorry.” I don’t even bother getting into the whole explanation. I can sort of understand – if I was getting up and running into her room five times a night I would indeed be rather sleep-deprived and would want the situation to change as soon as possible. But I’m not, and I don’t. To me it’s like her learning how to crawl…. it’s another milestone in her development, whether it happens at 3 months or 9 months.

Also I really have to bite my tongue around the people who told us that she would never learn to sleep if we didn’t let her cry to “teach” her. No crying. No training. Just gentle encouragement and little baby steps along the way. I’m pretty certain that one day she’ll be sleeping on her own in her own room every night, one day I’ll be able to read her a story and kiss her and she’ll fall asleep. But it was nice that people made me feel slightly neurotic about her sleep habits, I really needed that. Maybe it’s a rite of passage that all mothers need to worry that they’re screwing up their children.

The night following she did not sleep through again, but I was actually really glad she didn’t. Den was out late and I was tired so I went to bed after putting Kate down. I was tired and yet… I just layed there, awake. My baby was asleep in her own room, my husband was out, and the dogs were downstairs (they have to stay downstairs until he comes home because they bark like mad when he comes in). Normally we’re all in the bedroom. Normally there’s three of us sharing the bed. Now I can go without my husband, he snores. But wow did I feel lonely. And I realized how much better I feel when she’s sleeping next to me. Yes it’s a little harder physically, I have to sleep in certain positions and give up a portion of my side of the bed (who am I kidding, I have to give up most of it!). But emotionally and mentally it is so much easier. It is so reassuring to be able to touch her, to see her breathing. It’s such a special time when we go to bed to cuddle up to her, to hold her while she is peaceful and sleeping. One day she’ll be too big and the moment will have passed. I will always be thankful that I took the opportunity while I had it.

I can see why sleep becomes the thing on your mind when you have a child. It is the deciding factor in how a day goes.

Kate just dropped down to 2 naps a day. She was on 3-4 (depending on their length) but after our vacation I was having such a hell of a time with bedtime. She was in that rough stage where if she didn’t get an evening nap she melted down, but if she did get one she was wired at bedtime. That was not an easy transition, but now we have had several days of 2 naps and they’ve been good – even when they are shorter than we would all prefer. I did figure out that in lieu of an evening nap she needs an evening nursing session in the dark: some down time with no stimulus so she gets a good meal in, a cuddle, and then she’s ready to go for the rest of the evening. Mostly I’m appreciating how easy it is to put her to sleep again. By 9pm she’s rubbing her eyes and starting to wind herself down. Going to bed is no longer the epic struggle it was. I am so thankful.

During that time of nap transition and new skills we ended up taking a step backward on the getting Kate to fall asleep on her own progression. The only way she’d fall asleep is if I held her wrapped in my arms tight, she’d screech a few times and then drop off. If I let her go she’d roll away and try climbing me or crawling away. But now? Now she wants to have her head pillowed on my arm, my arms wrapped around her, in order for her to fall asleep. Not that I mind the cuddles (I admit, I took a while to step back again, because I just love that time with her). So I’ve just been working with her on getting her sleepy and moving a couple inches away again. Some days she’s okay with it, other days she’s not.

Today for her first nap I hadn’t eaten breakfast and she was grabbing me hard when pulling up. After about 15 minutes of being pummeled I walked out of her bedroom and said to Den, “Switch!” I knew he couldn’t get her to sleep but I just needed a break while I grabbed some cereal to eat. 15 minutes later Den creeps out of the room – alone. “She fell asleep! Just put her head down and fell asleep!” He was so excited! I was rather stunned. First time she’s ever done that!

Tonight we had a hiccup in the guise of poopy butt after she went to bed, but after that was discovered and fixed she slept 3 hours. Now it’s 2am, I’m still awake and I can hear little sounds from her room – whimpers and “uhh”. Sometimes one short cry. Obviously she isn’t asleep. But I can’t figure out if she’s awake-awake or if she’s only semi-awake and falling back asleep. This has been going on for 20 minutes now. I generally only go in there if she actually cries. Guess I’m going to sit here for a while… I’m not going to lay down only to have her crying for me two minutes later! … 15 minutes later I think she put herself back to sleep! Holy smokes!

I feel like I’ve spent my whole life playing catch-up… not-good-enough. I have a serious lazy streak that combats daily with my obsessive personality. I always feel like I’m 10 steps behind… that I should be more organized, more tidy, more on top of things. Den and I are moderately organized people. We have calendars. We’re punctual. We take on responsibilities. But we’re forgetful and somewhat spacey (thus the need for the calendars – if it isn’t written down it does NOT get remembered). We’re “I’ll do it tomorrow” types.

If there is anything being a parent has taught me, it’s that I will NEVER be “all caught up.” Not ever. My house will never be perfectly organized. My calendar will never be perfectly scheduled, my days never perfectly planned. Kids just change too frequently! We settle into a routine and it works for a while, and then suddenly it stops working and everything goes to hell… until you figure out the new routine. She gets sick, misses a nap, has a bad night, poops when I don’t expect it… the list just goes on and on.

And you know what, I think I’m finally getting it – I think I’m finally okay with it. I always thought that I should have it all together, that I was somehow failing. I’m realizing that it’s a myth. We all just live day to day, especially with a family. The moms who say they have everything going perfectly? They’re lying. Right now I love more than anything sitting down with a friend and admitting all the things that we don’t have quite done yet, that the kids aren’t sleeping through the night yet, that the house is always cluttered in some way. I like honesty, it’s reassuring.

I forgot I was supposed to be at a Dentist appointment yesterday. The couple of bills that are payed by check are sometimes a couple days late (thank goodness for scheduled online bill pay for the rest). The dining table is half usable and half piled with photo albums and magazines and weird shit I don’t have a spot to put away. We’ve figured out Kate’s nap schedule for the moment, but next week it could very well change. That’s just the way it goes. I’m learning to just roll with the punches.