Sleeping Through the Night Already!

Well, my little baby girl has been consistently sleeping for over 8 hours for over a week now. It's nice to be able to get a solid 5-6 hours of sleep, but there's a part of me that's extremely sad. After all, sleeping through the night is a "milestone", and there's something truly wonderful about those 2am nursing sessions. Sure, you're exhausted, but your little newborn gazes into your eyes, and those eyelids begin to droop as she continues to nurse, until finally they're closed, and you realize she's stopped nursing and you're just enjoying your sleeping baby in your arms.
Of course, I still have these sessions, usually shortly after dinner, but there's something magical about those overnight sessions. There isn't the chaos in the periphery. There's no TV playing Curious George, no toddler trying to get you to play ball, no outside noise. Daddy isn't screaming "stop eating the cat!". Just you and your nursing baby in the starlight. And those nights are gone.
She also rolled over the other day, from her tummy to her back. I was all excited, and then terribly sad. Another milestone crossed, all too fast. They're so small and helpless for such a short time.

A productive day?

Some days are just odd. I hope this isn't a majority of mom days, but alas, they probably are.

So I'm in "the groove" today - working away for 20 minutes, playing with my son for 20 minutes, nursing my daughter, back to work. I got the front hedge trimmed and cleaned up, got my son to help me pick up the towned twigs in the front yard for a little bit, and even got it all out for today's trash. Then we played chase up and down the sidewalk, back inside for more work, lunch, naptime for the kids while I worked my arse off for my employer, then playing blocks, and we went out to Friendly's for dinner as a "spring is here and we've got a coupon!" treat.
Then it's bath, books, bed for the toddler son, and nurse until she finally falls asleep for the daughter. Then I'm back to work for the job while I watch Law and Order. Now it's the end of the day, and I feel like I've accomplished nothing. My to-do list is longer than ever, and I feel like I didn't spend enough time with my kids today, even though I was here all day. Being physically here and being completely here for my kids are two different things. It seems like everything I got crossed off the to-do list is so inconsequential. Great, the front rhododendron isn't overgrowing. Big fat hairy deal. Ugh. Maybe tomorrow I'll feel a little better about crossing off all the drivel on the to-do list.

Speech Evaluation Checkup

My son had his 3-month "checkup" from Early Intervention. We reviewed all the goals we set out 3 months ago, and while there's progress, none of the goals have been achieved yet.
It's difficult to describe the pain a mom feels when her son is 29 months old, and has yet to say "Mama". Most children are saying "mama" and "dada" at about 12 months old. When I take my son to playgroups, I see little 14 month olds crying for their mothers with wails of "Mommeeeeeeeee!" and my heart just breaks. Why did my son have to go through all the pain of his surgery? I always feel like I should have done more to get him over his oral trauma from his hernia. I feel like I should have tried harder and longer to breastfeed him, so his mouth muscles would have developed at a normal pace instead of this terrible underdevelopment. I wish I could take all these problems and bear the burden myself, so he doesn't have to go through this.
And there's a selfish element too. I want my son to run up to me saying "Mommy!" instead of a nondescript grunt. I'm frustrated at my inability to communicate with my son, and I've begun to learn sign language in earnest, so I can actually "talk" to him.
Difficult as this is for me, I'm continually stepping back and reminding myself of one simple truth: if it's this frustrating for me, just think how frustrating it is for him. No wonder he's having meltdowns. All he wants are some grapes from the fridge, and he can't tell me that. All he can do is point and grunt out a nondescript "ehhhh ehhhhh". He'll make the sign for food, and I'll give him something to eat. But he'll get upset, shake his head, and throw the food. Then he'll point to the fridge and make the sign for food again, with a lot less patience. it's obvious he has a specific food in mind, but his frustration at his inability to articulate *which* food he wants causes a complete meltdown in the kitchen. I'm not a psychic, so I'm busy trying to figure out which food he wants before I'm stomping on the kitchen floor wailing in frustration too!

The end of my breeding days

Last week, my husband went and had a vasectomy. We decided that if I didn't have a c-section, he was going to get fixed. After our daughter was born without a c-section, we continued with this plan. We even started joking with each other that we'd better make our birth control permanent ASAP, because we might decide to have an accident. It's easy to catch "baby fever" when your daughter is a breeze to take care of.
I'm still wrestling my emotional self to accept this decision. Logically there can be no other decision. I'm no spring chicken. 40 is fast approaching, and our bank account is always close to the zero mark. We're living hand to mouth most days, and more than once we haven't been able to pay the utility bill in full. We seem to be eating a lot more rice and pasta instead of steak and shrimp. So a third child is simply out of the question, if we want to pay for the first 2 kids college, and possibly go out to eat once a month.
But that means no more pregnancy. No more birth, no more brand new infant in my arms. My daughter rolled over just the other day. Her head control is such that she's no longer got that "bobble-head" look when she lifts her head. And tummy time means head up, staring into the playmat's mirror. She's already starting to grab at toys, too. So today, as I watched her grab for her crinkly butterfly toy hanging overhead, I willed her to stop growing and stay that beautiful little infant I gave birth to mere weeks ago. I wished I could have another, even though my mortgage payment is looming over me like a vulture circling a dying animal. It's these emotionally charged moments, the ones that yank at your heartstrings and have you praying for them never to end, that stomp my logical self into oblivion and scream for another conception. One of my email lists was discussing this, and it was suggested that this wrestling is because we love our motherhood so much, it's tough to let go of those moments. The next time I'll get to experience those moments are if I'll be blessed enough to be a grandmother. I certainly hope I will be.

Lost a friend? Say it ain't so!

Tonight was laundry night. I figured I'd try and catch up on phone calls, since my son was home asleep with dad, and my daughter was somewhat asleep in her car seat. I called my best friend. Or perhaps former best friend.
I called to just plain old catch up. I had asked her how things were going with her, and she asked if I had read her blog lately. Well, no, I hadn't. I have a 28-month old and an 11-week old, I'm working full time and going to school part time. That leaves less than no time to read blogs. I don't even have time to write in my own blog! Alas, she was a little annoyed that I hadn't read her blog. I apologized for not having the time to read her blog, and asked her to fill me in. So she did. She mentioned what was going on, and that she was planning on having a baby soon. I joked that she should think again, since my daughter had woken up and started screaming. She didn't take it as a joke, unfortunately and started giving me a speech about how she knows exactly what she's getting in to. Okay, my bad, I obviously didn't make it clear that it was a joke. So I tried to put a spin on it, saying it was a fairly bad day. She said she knew, that I only called when things went wrong and I needed reassurance, never when things were okay. Ouch, that hurt even more.
So I attempted to turn this conversation around, and said I was excited to help her have her baby. Nope, she said I wasn't going to be there, since I had screwed up her bachelorette party so badly. That was it - my heart was just ripped out at this point.
I was 9 weeks pregnant at her wedding, and was maid of honor. She asked for nothing - she did everything herself. She never even called for reassurances. I was supposed to plan her Bachelorette party, but her sister-in-law offered to plan her Bachelorette party, and I agreed, since I was trying to work, go to school, raise my 18-month old son, and somehow stay pregnant (I was having pain and spot-bleeding, so a miscarriage was a big concern). Well, the Bachelorette party was very nice. We had a little Henna body-painting party, and ate a ton of food at her sister-in-law's house. But she wanted the whole movie-style Bachelorette party, with the excessive drinking, and young men in G-strings gyrating on your lap while you slap their buns and stuff dollar bills down their almost nonexistent underwear. Well, that's not what the sister-in-law planned, and I unfortunately didn't get involved in the planning of the Bachelorette party. Even I was surprised that there wasn't any good old objectification of men at this party. But that was really my fault for not making sure what she wanted was in the Bachelorette party plans. So now, I feel like I've lost a friend because I dropped the ball on this Bachelorette party. I also feel terrible that she thinks I only call her when something's wrong. Even though there wasn't anything wrong, I was just trying to get in a little conversation in one of my rare windows of opportunity for a possibly uninterrupted telephone call.

So now, I sit here feeling like I've let my best friend down so significantly that I might have permanently damaged the relationship. I already have problems with lasting friendships with women. I seem to only be able to have lasting friendships with men. I don't relate to women very well, so when I developed this friendship 14 years ago, I was thrilled to finally have a female friend. Now, I think I've completely ruined it. I feel just terrible.

So what do I do? I was thinking of possibly arranging a big party to a male strip club around her first anniversary (June). But now I seem to be second-guessing everything I want to do to make it up to her. Will this just be seen as a cheap attempt to "win" back her friendship? I'm crushed that I've lost her over this, and I just don't know if anything I do will ever make it up to her. I guess I'll call her husband tomorrow some time and see what he thinks I should do.

I've been wrapped up in trying to spend time with my kids for the past 2 1/2 years, and I've neglected my best friend because I chose family first. I just don't think it's fair that I have to choose between the two. Why is it that we have to sacrifice our friendships to maintain a close family? I can see why parents of young children only have friends who are parents of young children - they can both empathize and sympathize with situations like this.

From seeing my last post, it's obvious I haven't reserved any time for myself in my life. I've sacrificed not only my friends, but my own sanity time in my day for my family. Well, perhaps this phone call will at least kick me into taking back a little time out of my days for myself. It's obvious that I desperately need it in order to preserve my sanity!