Five Months

Dearest Leah,

I don’t know which I love more, your big gummy smiles when you first wake up or your exuberant belly laughs when I nibble at your tiny toes. Both just about send me over the edge. Sometimes you laugh at a song or a silly face, and sometimes it’s just a big sigh from me that does the trick. Either way kiddo, keep up the great work, cause when you laugh and smile at me NOTHING. ELSE. MATTERS.

Recently you’ve started to get so much stronger, especially at holding up your head.  I love sitting you up and watching you look around as though it’s a completely different world in this position. I got you one of those jumperoo thingies and can’t wait to see you go to town in it.  At the moment you could pretty much careless, but I know you’ll come around…

You have really started to figure out where your mouth is, and you certainly don’t hesitate putting just about everything in it. But it’s mostly your hands or your shirt. And your thumb! You discovered your thumb! Super cute, but I suddenly feel like I should start putting away for future orthodontist appointments. It’s amazing to see you start to understand that your hands and toys can be chewed on, even though when you try to get a toy in your mouth you mostly hit yourself in the face, but the point is; you get it! So cool.

Since we moved you to your crib full time a few weeks ago you’ve been sleeping a lot better. It makes me sad not to have you right next to me in your bassinet, but I’m happy that you’re comfy in your crib. You’ve even slept through the night a handful of times, even though I never do. I’ll wake up at 3:30 expecting you to get up “any minute now” and then toss and turn until my alarm goes off, or you eventually wake up a few hours later. There doesn’t seem to be a rhyme or reason to your longer stints. I’ve monitored naps and even tried inducing a milk coma, but it just seems like you do it when you need it. And that works for me.  All in all I can’t complain about your sleep habits these days, and I almost feel bad telling the blogosphere that I had nothing to do with your new ability to sleep at least six hours straight. I put you down between 7-8pm depending on your cues, and then you typically don’t get up until 2:30 or 3:00am. The only problem I have though is the fact that I don’t go to bed until 10:30 or 11, so I don’t get as much sleep as I could. BAD momma!

The time since you’ve been born has gone by obscenely fast, but for some reason this past month in particular has flown by. While I love seeing you make all of this progress in the physical and cognitive aspects, it makes me a little sad that you are moving more and more away from the infant stage. Still its impossible not to look forward to seeing who you'll become.

Can't wait to see what next month brings.

Love, Momma

Unclenching

Holy Crap, where did May go?!


I’m not sure how things work in your house, but in G-Town USA, Momma carries the brunt of the domestic work load. Brian and I have lived this way since we got married. I love my domesticity. I live for my home life and there is truly no place else I’d rather be. This works out well for us, because Brian is the hardest working most driven, and passionate person I have ever met. He works 65+ hours a week outside the home, and I work 119 in it. But that doesn’t mean that Brian works less than me. His job is very demanding, and intense, and he gets an obscene amount of things done in a short period of time. You could say that his job is a sprint, and mine a marathon.

Where am I going with all this, you ask? Well, I’d like to lay out a little life lesson that smacked me upside the sinuses the week before last. I contracted my first cold since having Leah, and holy crow did it knock me on my ass.  (thanks again for sharing that with me dear!) I’ve always had allergies, so when I felt more congested than normal that last Thursday, I didn’t really question it. Until late Friday morning came and suddenly I was only congested on one side – that’s how I can tell, allergies are always both sides. By Friday afternoon my wheels were falling off and I was having trouble keeping up with a baby who can’t even crawl yet. And I was only able to dip my toe in the pity pool for a second when I realized that I had been hugging and kissing and breathing on Leah all day long (before I realized I was sick). And I started to panic. I couldn’t stand the idea of her getting sick, and it possibly being my fault. So Saturday morning when I woke up feeling like snot covered death, I knew I would have ask for help. Since Brian works every Saturday I called my Mother-in-law and asked her to hang out with Leah while I tried not to croak in my bedroom. Not easy for me, but I knew it was the best thing for Leah to not be around me, and for me to get some rest. 


Would you believe I was too sick to care about having to listen to my MIL hold and sing and baby-talk to Leah? Good, cause I wasn’t and it bugged the crap out of me every single second she was there. 
How about some points for keeping my mouth shut, cause I just let them do their thing and didn’t say a single word? Nope, cause she is great with Leah, and I’m an asshole for being annoyed to begin with.

But this isn’t about my Mother-in-law.  It’s about the dynamic between Brian and I. And the lesson I’m learning about letting go and letting Brian do his thing with Leah. It’s a really sketchy line between helping him understand her cues and not making him feel like a useless failure. I tend to prattle on from the other room about what every coo or cry means. And I don’t do this because I’m a know it all. (At least I don't think I am... I mean, I don’t try to be) I do it because I ache to care of her every second of every moment. I trust Brian implicitly, but the fact is I’m with her more. I know her better. And I know that her fussiness is a slippery slope. If you don’t catch it early enough she will crash and burn and take you down with her. That mostly applies to being tired, because she tends to get overtired very quickly and then it’s really hell getting her down for a nap or bed time. So how do I find a healthy balance between helping Brian understand and anticipate her needs, and not letting her suffer because he doesn't realize she's about to fall apart but I don't want to nag him?

Well I got a crash course in learning to let go this past weekend while I was sick. I didn't want to be around Leah more than I had to, and the times that I did I was wearing a surgical mask. (Is that nuts?) So I had to let Brian do the bulk of the work. It was SO hard to not be the one caring for her, especially when she was crying because it wasn’t what she was used to. And I know realistically, she was FINE. He wasn't forcing her to watch Moonshiners or holding her up by her ankles. It’s just horrible to listen to her crying, when I know it’s something I can fix right away. I’m happy to say however that he took the reins like a champ. I was so proud and grateful and impressed. But not one bit surprised. He's great with her, and the coolest part about it is, it's because he wanted to be. And sometimes the desire is more important than the know-how. I want to feel okay with her crying a little while she’s getting used to him caring for her, and putting her to bed. But a big part of me feels like it will be better for her if we wait until she isn’t so little to get her used to this. Ultimately I want him to be involved, and not because I need a break, but because I want her to feel as used to him as she is to me. I want him to know that bond. Where I struggle is being okay with her crying. We are not going to practice the Cry It Out method, so I’m having a hard time with where this transition falls. (not judging anyone on CIO, that’s just how I feel)

So I’m back to my semi-healthy self again, and back to running our daily and nightly routines. But the battle still continues. And I don’t mean that to sound like we fight constantly. I mean it’s a battle to constantly try to foresee her ever changing needs while cementing routines that work for her and us, and adapting to how that changes the dynamics in our marriage. It’s just as hard as I heard it would be, so maybe this is why I am desperately trying to control what few things I still have a handle on? Does that make sense?


Stay Tuned.