Back in the Saddle Again

Today was my first day back to work after being on maternity leave for the last 9 weeks.  Dropping my new baby off at daycare was the 2nd most traumatic thing that had already happened to me before 7:30am that morning. The most traumatic event was discovering I still needed to wear maternity clothes to work; nothing else fit.  Added to that was the fact that most of the maternity clothes I had were actually borrowed from a good friend I work with.  So, yes I'm showing up to work too fat to fit into anything and no, I can't give you back your clothes that I've had for almost a year, but you can still see them everyday......as I wear them around the office.

Driving to the daycare to drop my baby off, I was thinking, "Wow - it sure is hot already......I hope W is getting enough air back there.....well I guess he is; he's not making a sound so he must not be uncomfortable......OHMIGOD!.....WHAT IF I'M SO TIRED IN THE MORNING BECAUSE I'M STILL NOT GETTING ANY SLEEP AND I FORGET TO DROP HIM OFF AND JUST DRIVE TO WORK AND FORGET HE'S IN THERE AND SINCE I HAVE A VAN, I CAN'T JUST GLANCE IN THE BACK AND SEE THAT HE'S THERE AND THEN I GO ALL DAY AND HE DIES FROM HEATSTROKE?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.....you know just the typical stuff all new moms think about.

So, I finally made it to work and was able to quit crying for most of the drive there.  And I was even able to make it to 8:30am before I called and checked on him.  Work was work for the most part - only now instead of having to pee every hour and eat every two hours - like I was 9 weeks ago - I'm now getting up every three hours to pump.

That in itself is such a process in the workplace.  For starters - the room where I can pump is not located right by my office and it is also an empty room that anyone can use.  Therefore I cannot leave anything in it and so I must take luggage with me every 3 hours to this room.  I also have to walk right by my supervisor and her boss and quite a few other people to get to this room.  I might as well put a cow bell around my neck and moo all the way to the room; that's basically how inconspicuous I am every time I go there.  It wouldn't matter though if no one saw me go to the room or not; they would still know what I'm doing in there.  The walls are pretty much made out of thick, insulated...paper and my pump sounds like a snow blower, so there is no mistaking what Elsie is doing behind that door.  And guess who's office is just on the other side of this room?  My Director - my boss's boss.  I know when I'm in there I can hear him talking on his phone - so I'm pretty sure he can hear me lactating.  I can just picture him on the phone saying, "Hey - can I call you back; I can barely hear you over my coordinators boobs."  Or worse - what if he goes home at night and his wife asks him how his day was and he says, "Oh....I have such a headache from all the noise; my coordinator must have put a new battery in the pump."  The straw in that milkshake is that when I'm done, I have to take my pump parts to the bathroom to rinse them out.  I always try to hurry and not be seen because I either get the uncomfortable, grossed-out look or the, "Oh, how sweet - she's sustaining life with her ta-tas" look.

I called the daycare one more time that day to check on W.  He did fine at daycare; I was the who didn't handle the day very well.

Tomorrow's a new day.

I wrote my self a reminder on a post-it note to remember to check the back of the van when I get to work in the morning.    

Nair for your hair

My daughter is 10 - going on 18.  She is at that wonderful age of being way too old for her age (having been exposed to the music and movie stars of today) and way too naive (having been held on tightly to by her mother and father and everyone else who adores her).  What you get with this combination is a girl who wants to wear bootie shorts and hooker boots -but then stinks to high hell because you can't convince her that she needs to wear deodorant.

 The other night, she very casually says to me, "Mom - I want to start shaving my legs."  Before I shout out the obvious - "Are you crazy!" - I try to remember when I started shaving my legs.  I don't recall when I started, but I know I was already shaving by the time I was in sixth grade and she is going into the fifth.  I also know I didn't even ask my mom if I could - so I suppose it was good that she was at least asking me.  If I would have asked my mother - I might have been spared some of the painful life lessons of the lady bic.

So - to just put everything right out on the table - I said.....

MOM:  Now - you know, the only part on your body you can shave is your legs.

DAUGHTER:   Oh, I know - gross!  I realize she thinks I mean her lady parts.

MOM:   No - I mean, you can't shave your arms or stomach or anything like that.  (One of the things I wish my mom would have told me.)

DAUGHTER:  You can't?  (See what I mean by the maturity/immaturity combo.)

But I forgot to even elaborate on that because my mind is stuck back on her reference to shaving lady parts.  I'm thinking, "How does she even know you shave lady parts?  What trash on TV has she seen now?  Or, what if her friends are already shaving their lady parts?! Wait a minute -  she doesn't even have hair on her lady parts - does she???  I think when I saw her change the last time she didn't, but maybe in two days she's sprouted a full bush!  OH GOD - I'M NOT READY FOR PUBIC HAIR!"

DAUGHTER:  Well Kelly (her step-mom) says I can just use this stuff you rub on and then use this mitten-like thing and buff it off.

So - I told my daughter my Nair story.  I was a little older than her and decide to give the old Nair a try.  I don't really remember if it worked or not on my legs.  What I do remember is that I thought I would see if it worked on my upper lip.  I now know why they make Nair for the face - because if you put regular Nair on your face, it will melt the entire first layer of skin right off.  I ended up with a chemical burn, across my lip, in the shape of a mustache.......that turned into a nasty green infection.....that turned into impetigo.....that spread all over my body.  Good thing I got that peach fuzz off my upper lip - I mean, that's embarrassing for a girl in Junior High to have!

So, I think that story pretty much covered the topic of not shaving anything but your legs.

To this day - when I tell anyone else that story - I tell people that while I was putting it on my legs, I accidentally got some on my lip.  :)

7 weeks after birth of 4th child

My son is 7 weeks old.  When he was born he was sick and had to spend a week in the NICU (which traumatized me by the way).  I swear I came home from the hospital with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.  When he was sleeping I studied his chest thinking, "He's not breathing!"  And then thinking, "He's breathing too hard!"  When my husband put him to sleep in his crib, I practically hit him upside the head with my Boppy pillow and screamed, "How can I see when he quits breathing if he's not right here with me?!"  I should point out that my son was only sick for a short time and his problems were completely resolved by the time he left the hospital.  He didn't have to have to be on any medication or come home with any monitors, so my husband wasn't completely off base when he looked at me said, "You need to ask your Dr. for a pill for that or something."

So......it only took my baby about 2 weeks to totally train me.  After the crib incident with my husband, I decided it was best just to sleep with my baby.  ( I had a C-section and couldn't even bend over to wipe my own ass, let alone roll over, so I wasn't real worried about smothering my child.  In fact, I still couldn't get up into our bed, so I was still sleeping on the couch.  But.....I'm sure no mother ever thought they would smother their baby, so I worked it out where I slept sitting up - leaning on the arm of the couch - holding the baby in the crook of my arm.  7 weeks later, here we still are.

I'm also breastfeeding and thanks to the NICU who obsessed over how much my baby was eating and made me believe that unless I nursed him for an hour he wasn't getting enough - I study his fat rolls everyday, just to be sure they are getting fatter.  My husband can't get out of the shower without me saying, "Hey- would you weigh yourself and then hold the baby and weigh yourself again?"  I basically have had a boob in his mouth since he came home; I don't even bother wearing a shirt anymore.  I'm guessing it's okay for your baby to double their weight by the time they are 7 weeks old?

The ironic part is I am not a new mother.  I have 3 other kids!

And yes, before you ask......I meant to have four kids.