Unwellness

what happened last night

5:20 Wes calls to see if I want to meet him in the North Slope for dinner after he fills orders for dog beds. I say yes. We plan to meet at 6:45 at the storage place.

6:25 After 20 minutes of kindly letting me unpack the kitchen, Beck revolts. I have a screaming baby on my hands and have to surrender to the need to nurse, having fruitlessly tried to pack the diaper bag and get his sweater on. I call Wes and breathlessly, angrily, exasperatedly tell him I am not sure we are coming. He says he will call when he is done at storage. He is cutting in and out on his cell phone and I hate him ridiculously for this, as though it is his fault. How dare he ask me out for dinner, after all....

6:45 The Beck is asleep. I MIRACULOUSLY get his sweater on and snap him into the car seat harness WITHOUT waking him up. I begin to get very full of myself. I decide that it really isn't so bad to have a child. I suddenly love Wes and feel romantic and happy that we are having a date. I gather the diaper bag and even remember to pack the ridiculous little shoes Wes likes so well so that we can put them on when he wakes up. I go out and set up the stroller frame and take the diaper bag outside. Then I start to carry the baby out in the car seat. And only then do I realize...
the necessary stroller adapter for the car seat is...
in the car...
which is 2 blocks away.

6:50 Lug everything back inside, except stroller frame, which is left hopefully outside even though I feel hopeless. Call Wes and start to cry. HATE him now. How dare he ask me out in such a last minute way. How DARE he. He SO does not understand what it is like to try to do things with a baby (um... yeah, I know, he did this already - I like to conveniently ignore that fact when angry). He SET ME UP - asking me out without helping to make sure that the getting out of the house part was possible. He left that damn adapter in the car! Sabotage! How DARE he.

6:52 Hang up on Wes while crying. Beck wakes up and begins crying.

7:00 Realize I could put Beck in the Ergo, since he is now awake, then walk to the car and get adapter, then walk back and put him in car seat and stroll back to car. But we are both crying now so this seems absolutely impossible and stupid. Call Wes to tell him this.

7:30 Wes comes home. I hate him. I storm around a lot and pout.

8:00 Wes wants to give Beck a bath and I try to help by filling tub. He remarks that the water is cooler than usual and I lose it, slamming doors and making things fall and crash to the ground, loudly proclaiming myself the worst mother ever.

I am better today, thanks.
Ahem.

It has taken me this entire week to get around to posting about the trip. Tuesday I was too crazed having just gotten home. Wednesday I installed the driver for the new card reader and loaded the photos. Yesterday I finally culled and edited. Now they are all sitting on the desktop and ready to make into a post. If the Beck stays asleep, I will be able to do this now.

Why is it SO hard to do things? How do other people get anything done? I feel like I am slow at this. Slow and dumb and lazy. Bleh.

me and mine meme

Jen at AddProb kindly tagged me to do this self-promoting meme, assisting in my goal of being a famous blogger. This person, a contributer at BlogHer, wants to interview 100 mommy bloggers next year. Strangely, I am now one of these sorts of bloggers  even though I still feel weird every time I use the word 'mommy' when referring to myself (how long doesit take to get used to? is it like 'wife'?). And so, the meme, an audition of sorts to become an interviewee.

Name of blog: unwellness
My name: bri
My About Page

I have been blogging for 5 years now, though my archives currently only reflect 3.5 years (the rest to be added back soon).

I tag Charlotte at dosmamas, Jennifer at Arcane Matters and my longtime friend Sarah/Stranger at Istanbul's Stranger. There are a lot more I would love to add, like complicated mama at letterstothebabiesthatlived and my best friend Melissa at margaretjames. So if you're interested, go to it. Heh.

Next time I sit down and blog it will be to share many fabulous details of our trip to CA and AZ, such as the fabulous day with Charlotte and family, the satisfaction of taking my son to the family beach house, and the marvel of Thai food with 4 generations.

off

Sunday: Hours of my life lost to Ba.bies.R.Us, the one across from Ik.ea. And then Ik.ea afterward. 'Nuff said.

Monday: Trying to pack for a week long trip with a baby who would. not. nap.

Today: Leaving on a jet plane. Momentarily.

Not sure how I thought I would blog every day what with this week long gap coming up. Have a good holiday, everyone. I'll update when possible.

i should split these into lots of posts but i never know when i will get to blog so here goes

Note: In this post, I make liberal use of Wikipedia as a source. Never do this. Wikipedia is not an acceptable source. A librarian is the last person on earth who should be using it to try to prove anything. It can be changed by anyone at any time (well, most articles) and is therefore not reliable. I yell at the teachers at my school when they let kids use this (which they do, constantly). I am doing it only because I have an infant in the next room who may wake up at any time and I don't have time to mess around with real research. I am doing my damn best here, OK. Shut up and be happy I took the time to link to anything at all.

1.
Dr. Sears is a right wing Christian. Seriously. Have you ever looked at the titles of his early books? OK. So this might not put him totally out of the running for me IF IF IF he disclosed this fact. Instead, this fact is something one must glean from looking at what one can find of his past. He says that he just tells people to parent like his sainted wife. Strangely, this method can sometimes be seen to tie the mother to the home and baby. Sort of like some bible-crazed Christians. Once it became profitable, the guy remade himself as a guru of "attachment parenting" which is a phrase he claimed to have invented. This article is really poorly written and sometimes makes no sense and is sometimes just wrong, but it was an interesting jumping off point. From it, I learned that Attachment Parenting is really just the Continuum Concept, written by Jean Liedloff in the 70's after she studied some tribe in South America. I think the author of the funky article is right and Sears renamed his theory most likely for the sake of aligning himself with the Attachment Theory rather than a study of a South American tribe. It seems he really did change the subtitle of his book Creative Parenting in the 80's, switching out the word 'attachment' for 'continuum'. In any case, I find it creepy. The whole thing. I think he is creepy and I think his theories, which are not his, are used in a creepy, woman-trapping manner. Attachment parenting, the continuum concept, is not a bad idea. Dr. Sears is a creep factory and the reason I claim to be a detachment parent.

2.
While I'm bashing and exposing, just wanted to be sure that people also know about the Baby Ein.stein study (study is linked in footnotes - pdf). They found that not only are they NOT educational, but they may actually be detrimental, resulting in significantly smaller vocabularies. Most interesting to me was that the finding correlated to these types of "educational" videos and not really to just letting your kid see TV or watching it with them. I would guess that this might be because parents think they are educational and just plop the kid down for longer than they might otherwise do.

Also, you should know that the Baby Ein.stein people are also right wingers. Gave money to Bush and then were lauded by him and seated in an honorable place at some speech.

And listen - I have ZERO issue with someone needing a break and using TV in order to get something done or eaten or sanity maintained. Just don't pretend it's educational. It's baby crack. And I am already using it ("Cat/I'm a kitty cat/and I dance dance dance and I dance dance dance").

3.
In keeping with my finding that parenthood is all about never knowing what you would do, I read some Weiss.bluth in the bookstore and nearly bought the book. He is so reasonable and lovely about young babies. He is against Pant.ley's pulling the nipple out of their mouth thing and says that there is no adverse effect to falling asleep while sucking. He also says not to worry about the putting them down awake thing. All of his advice seems contrary to all the other advice. I don't know. What it was good for was me shaking my head and realizing that Wes and I are in this as the sole experts on our kiddo and what we decide to do, as long as it's consistent, will be fine at any given point. And also he is only three months old and I should calm the hell down. I think I just started freaking out when we put him in the crib and I had to actually rouse myself and walk ten steps to the other room instead of having him delivered into my arms by Wes and placing him easily next to me when he was asleep again and never really having to wake up. I am far more tired now that I am so much more in charge of getting my ass up.

4.
Beck spits up so. fricking. much. Everything we read says this is normal and some kids spit up a lot and it won't stop until he's probably six months. Great. As long as it's not more than 1-2 tbsp and as long as he is gaining (which he is - 16 lbs now) it's fine. Any other spitter uppers out there to reassure us?

5. An announcement:

In keeping with my finding that parenthood is all about never knowing what you would do,

I am staying home with Beck for the rest of the school year.

Sometimes I am staringly lovingly at him and feeling all gorgeously mommy-ish and lovely and then I think,"Wait. It's only November. What the eff am I thinking?"

But it's good. The Beck won't have to do day care until age 2 (m-i-l will do next year) and I don't have to pump or force the bottle (which he hates and which we are lazy about trying to fix).

And since I have become the bossy commando mom of my August moms' group, it's for the best. I am much too busy arranging luncheons and mommy-and-me cocktail hour to do something silly like work.

chair photos

bullet points

- Yes, I am failing at NaBloPoMo. I hate trying to type extensively with one hand and I can't form a coherent though to save my life. Not conducive to constant, interesting blogging, this infancy thing.

- Oh, how I wish I could just have the Beck in the bed with us forever. It is SO much easier. I totally get why people do this. They are cuddly and cute and sweet and warm and nice. Until they aren't. Until they are suddenly pokey limbs and toes in your side and thrashing about all night. I must remember this. I must remember what it was like to share a bed with GMB at ages 6, 7, 8 and 9. Not. Fun. This is why we try to get them out of our beds before they know what is going on. Note to self. (First person to tell me all about how their kid slept with them until 18 months and then cutely removed themselves of their own volition with no tears or tantrums... gets a kick)

- In line with my new, very open-minded approach to child-rearing (by which I mean my acknowledgment that feeding on demand and holding him a lot seem to work out fine and therefore the attachment parents might not be so nutso), I read that No Cry book. And suddenly all my hardcore bias against attachment parenting came flooding back until I threw that book across the room and wanted to spit on its author. WHY why why must people be so judgmental? Just when *I* was learning to be all accepting of other viewpoints, I have to put up with page after page of Ms. Pant.ley's maligning of a method used by many many many of my friends to excellent effect and without trauma. She is SUCH a Cry It Out basher that I found it impossible to put up with her. Why couldn't she just say, 'CIO wasn't for me, here's what I did and how it worked, enjoy'? And you know she took her explanation of sleep continuity (that whole 'imagine someone took your pillow while you were sleeping' thing) directly from Fer.ber, practically word for word. Hmph.

So. What do I read next if it's too early for Fer.ber but too much to read Pant.ley? And preferably it would be something I could skim in the bookstore because I am not buying anymore of this schlock. I wonder if I can get away with returning No Cry?

- We went to Ikea last Saturday and we totally have to go again this weekend. And whoever said Beck would like highway driving better than stop and go city... was wrong. Screaming. All the way there and back. He loved Ikea, though. He is my child.

- The sleep plan is now just to put him down an hour earlier every few days. Or something. All I know is that he sleeps for an hour around 8 but if you try to stretch that to staying in the crib all night... you have a long, sad evening ahead. After two nights of trying to make him go to  sleep for hours and having to start and stop dinner prep, etc, we realized that for all these months of sharing a room, it never really got quiet and sleepish until 11. And 11 is when he wants to go to bed now. Duh. So we will work with his schedule and try to gradually increase the sleep. Works out well anyway since Wes is sad not to spend time with him when he gets home from work and this way they still get to hang out.

- There are apparently hundreds of bags of dirt in the basement ready for removal. I haven't seen it but Wes tells me it's impressive.

- We leave for CA in 5 days. I am determined not to leave the packing to the last minute this time. We may actually have found the packing supplies so this time should be better than Miami.

- We have not, however, located our coats. They are in a box somewhere, presumably. Our living room is a mountainous tower of boxes. It is overwhelming. We are cold.

- Today, our Beckett Ace is 3 months old. I am hopelessly in love.

- Here he is looking like a little Hobbit while giggling and riding in the Moses basket "bus" that Wes devised. Well, I thought the basket/Bumbo combination might be good for keeping him from falling out (a la crazed parent paranoia) and then Wes decided it was like a bus and that Gertie should ride in it, too, even though I am constantly trying to get him NOT to let the pets into the baby's stuff because, without fail, they then think it is theirs. Indeed, after the bus ride when we tried to get Gertie OUT of the "bus", she snarled and snapped. Not at Beck, just at Wes. She loves Beck. But my point was made. Ha.

one year

"Date of Your Last Menstrual Period?"

November 12, 2006.

new location, same great time

The Beck is officially sleeping in his crib, ladies and gentlemen.

Please note that this does not suggest anything like, "sleeping through the night" or even "sleeping more than 2 hours at a time ever."

But he is in his own room and seems to sleep maybe a tiny bit better without us snoring and tossing and yelling at dogs near him and his poor little feet outgrowing the box and hanging over the end.

It does seem that the swaddle may now be more important. When he was in his little box between our pillows,  we had determined that swaddling no longer seemed to make him sleep longer. In his crib, however, our boy is apparently mobile. We put him down on his back in the middle and within an hour he is screaming because he has "backbended" himself into the bars. At one horrifying point last night, I went in to find him bent backwards, his body fitted along the shape of the corner of the crib (he really does these backbend things) with his face all smushed up against the side. How did he get there? How does he move so much? Is he even safe in the damn crib? I swaddled him and it didn't happen again. But what to do? He eventually breaks all swaddles (please don't tell me about the Miracle blanket again - I said ALL and I meant it) and will again maneuver himself into odd corners. Help?

Which speaks to the biggest problem with the whole thing. He may be sleeping beautifully (other than the Headbangers Ball/Backbend Party) but I am sleeping fitfully and sadly. I miss my baby and I can't stop being terrified that he is going to stop breathing at any moment. I know, though, that this will be good once I am adjusted. I would love to cuddle my husband again and have more than a pillow's width of space for my shoulders. Baby in box, two adults and two dogs is just a wee bit cramped.

Yes, I missed NaBloPoMoing yesterday. Bite me. This post will be for Sunday. So there.

three things, one unspeakably gross

1.
Thursday night. Middle of the damn night. 4 am or something.

Wes is trying to wake me up, telling me that the baby is hungry and needs to eat. The baby is fussing/crying/wailing next to me in the box thing between our pillows. Each time Wes says, "Bri, wake up, you need to feed the baby," I respond, mumbling, "Feed him." Wes gets increasingly frustrated. This goes on for 20 minutes of me responding something like, "Feed him." And Wes saying, "Do I actually have to pick him up and give him to you? He's right next to you." And me saying, "Feeding him."

Yes, I was dreaming that I was feeding the baby. And I could have sworn it was real. And I couldn't figure out why Wes couldn't see it.

2.
In my post about singing strange songs to Beck, a commenter named Erin told us about the kitty cat dance on youtube. It is the oddest and most bizarrely addictive bit of media we have come across in some time. We are now watching it multiple times daily and singing it constantly.

3.
This morning I had Beck on my lap and Wes standing next to me as we watched aforementioned kitty cat dance for the umpteenth time. Beck was pooping audibly. There was a particularly loud bit from him, and I said, "I swear it feels like that one went directly on me." And Wes said, "Isn't it crazy how sometimes it feels like that when he's on your lap?" And then I put my hand under to check and then I said, "Yes, because it did go directly on me." I removed my hand to see it covered in poop. "Ohhhhh," we said, and started to laugh. Then I started to lift Beck to hand him off to Wes and we saw that my jeans were covered, "OOhhhhhhhh," we said, and started cracking up. Then I started to stand up and we saw that there was a giant puddle of poo in the desk chair. "Oooooooohhhhhhhhhhhh," we said and laughed until we cried.

I was in the bathtub naked from the waist down trying to scrub my jeans. Wes was in Beck's room changing him. We could both see, and yet neither of us could move, as Lexie the dog... cleaned up the poo on the desk chair.

what it cost us - literally

Prompted by j at cheese and whine to head to this "blogtavist" post at stirrup queens, I am joining in the gang who is disclosing the financial aspects of infertility and what mandated insurance coverage can do to help.

We have good insurance and we live in a state that mandates infertility coverage. What this meant for us is that we only had to pay for donor sperm. Our RE insisted on 2 vials per cycle, which cost us $450 each plus shipping. So more than a grand each month that we tried. We tried a total of eight times - five on no drugs except progesterone and three on Clomid.

I don't have much to complain about, even considering that expense - it was tax deductible, at least. As were the hundreds spent on donor profiles for the several rounds of donor selection we went through.

All of my office visits and procedures for IUI, monitoring and fertility testing were covered. Even the money spent on co-pays was reimbursed to us out of our tax-free medical savings account. As was the money spent on ovulation predictors and pregnancy tests (when I remembered to save receipts, anyway).

If I had not gotten pregnant after 2 more tries on Clomid (also covered by insurance, as were my progesterone, triggers and boosters), I would have gone on to IVF which would have been fully covered for, I believe, 3 tries. This is thanks to my husband's company's generous infertility coverage - the state mandates coverage but does not apparently specify how much, so even people with the same insurance company may have different coverage based on what the employer specifies (this is my understanding, anyway). If I took insurance from my job the coverage would have been enough for just one IVF. We pay maybe $25-30 a month for me to be on Wes', a decision made almost solely because of my infertility.

My experience of infertility was totally different from so many of my friends because I never had to worry about how or IF I could do something. I had plenty of options and assistance. Everyone deserves the same.