I Promise I'm Still Cool

Sometimes I feel insecure around my childless friends because I’m poorly groomed and almost never night drive (bedtime is 7pm, yo).  I worry that I’ve lost my edge and that I am no longer cool.  Who are we kidding?  I wasn’t cool before.  But I could fake it by showing up at a bar and pretending not to have a sensory overload by nodding my head and nursing an adult beverage.  Now I am constantly RSVPing no to spur of the moment get-togethers and all my clothes are from Target and are made of jersey.  And the one who nurses beverages…also regularly poops her pants…and it’s not me (NOR HAS IT EVER BEEN!).

But then I got to thinking about all the things I do that actually make me the pinnacle of cool. I’m pretty sure the young folk don’t refer to themselves as cool.  They probably went back to groovy or something…but I can dig it. 

Things I do that are cool:

1.       Eat at trendy restaurants.  Portland is one of those super cool places where the best restaurants don’t take reservations so you have to wait two hours on a Sunday to get in.  NOT ME!  Because I go on Thursdays at 8 am!  No line!  Same food.  I’m up anyway. 

2.      Get drunk on weeknights.  At home.  In my basement.  On one large glass of white wine. 

3.      Wear leggings as pants.  That’s what the young people do, right?

4.      Rock the #ijustwokeuplikethis look.  I rock it best at 6:30 am.  And then just keep rocking it all day…and all niiiiiiight. 

5.      Have sick dance moves.  Or at least that’s what Booberry thinks.  She especially likes the pony, aka, when I pretend I am one and she’s “thrown” “WHOAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”  It’s like the greatest thing that ever happened to her. 

6.      Do drugs.  Just kidding.  Hugs not drugs. 

7.      Trash my house!  With thrown food and beverages. And toys.  And books.  And socks. 

8.      Over-exercise.  Triceps extension: lifting Booberry onto the slide. Squat: pick her up.  REPEAT ONE MILLION TIMES.  Cardio: wet swiffering my kitchen once every other day to help break up some of the crusted-on oatmeal.

9.      Go to parties:  I go to so many parties, you guys.  I went to two last weekend!  TWO! ON THE SAME DAY!  They were one year old bday parties.  Oh…does that not count?  Fine.  I can go to your adults-only party.  But I need to know about it a month or two in advance so I can lock down the in-laws to babysit.  If the in laws aren’t free, fine, I’ll just get a sitter.  But I’m only staying at your party until 10 pm because it’s not worth $15 dollars an hour for me to get drunk in your basement when it only costs me $15 over the course of three days to get drunk in mine off that one bottle of wine.   And I’m tired and have to get up at 6:30 no matter what day of the week it is. 

10.  Arrive places fashionably late because of oversleeping.  Booberry’s oversleeping , that is. 

I mean, do I really care about being cool anymore? NO.  But do I sometimes wake up on a Saturday and wish that slight headache and queasy feeling was due to hangover and not just being awoken from deep sleep by “DADA?!” echoing through the baby monitor?  I mean…no?  Did I even care before about packing my social calendar?  Not really. So what’s the deal?  Our lives are different but we are still the same people.  Aren’t we?  A year in (two, if you count the DD preggo months), sometimes it’s still surprising when the Doctor and I turn to each other and exclaim, “WHAT?!  A baby lives here?!”    Then she staggers drunkenly over to us, plants a wet kiss on each of our faces, and shakes her booty to the music.  And we party on.

Little Lessons from One Little Year

Beware the ides of March.  March 15, 2014 was my due date and not the day my Booberry was born.  I shudder to look at the picture of me taken on this day, way overflowing with life and so deeply uncomfortable in my own super stretched skin.  But looking back on the day got me reflecting on all the little things in my small world that I’ve learned this year. 

1.        Dresses are stupid for babies who are too little to crawl, and also for those who can crawl.  When they can’t crawl, they’re too squishy to look good in the dresses and, when they can, they get pissed off by tripping on the dress.

2.       You will still buy and receive and dress your baby girl in ONE MILLION DRESSES.  Because they are the cutest.

3.       You will get embarrassed/proud when people complement your baby’s accomplishments and beauty

4.       You do not know how to respond when people tell you how much your baby looks like you.  It’s awkward. 

5.       Baby girls can pee on you during a diaper change, too.  GENDER EQUALITY, PEOPLE!

6.       Your PJ pants are for at home.  Sweat pants are pharmacy acceptable.  Yoga pants are for almost everywhere.  Jeans are for social events.  Clean jeans are for meeting new people or childless friends.  Well-fitting jeans are cause for a night on the town.

7.       You will own a special pair of “nice yoga pants” which are for fancy times.

8.       All shoes must be slip on. Or at least slip off.  Slippers are good, too. 

9.       The swing is God…until she outgrows it…

10.   If you name it, you can say you sleep trained your kid.  “I used the ____ method.”

11.   Your baby’s throw up is not a big deal.  Someone else’s baby’s throw up is just as gross as all throw up used to be.

12.   You maybe have eaten after changing a poop diaper and only using hand sanitizer, not hand washing.  And by maybe, I mean many, many times. 

13.   Somedays you won’t care AT ALL about getting your “body back” (where’d it go?) and some days you will cry while getting dressed. 

14.   All your clothes will have weird stains.  Always.  And if they miraculously don’t, you have something in your hair anyway and you don’t even know what it is…and, best case scenario, it’s scrambled egg. 

15.   You get small pleasure out of telling your childless friends “don’t google mucus plug” knowing that they will. 

16.   You can never have too many zippy pjs.  Footless for walkers.

17.   You didn’t think it was possible to love your pets less than your baby but you do and you feel guilty.

18.   You didn’t think it was possible to love your baby more than your husband but you do and he knows it and both of you are cool with it and still love each other plenty.

19.   You cannot prevent her from attempting to kill herself and you cannot always catch her before she whacks her head on a chair leg and you have to be okay with that…but you hate yourself every time.

20.   There will be a day where you see your little squish walking in the living room, playing independently, chatting to herself and you will see a person, not a blob of a baby.  And you will be terrified of this person who lives in your house and all the ways you can screw her up and let her fall.  How big is baby? SO BIG!  How’d that happen so fast?

Happy Birthday, Baby Booberry!

Not about Babies! About BOOKS!

    Back in my childless teacher phase, I read at least a book a week.  They were almost always young adult and I would do book presentations for my class of gifted youngsters (future X-men).  Now I am in two book clubs and am so overwhelmed with reading those two books a month that I hardly have time to read anything else.  But I try, oh I TRY, to carry on!  Thank you, father, for the kindle a few years ago.  I can usually manage to read a chapter in the dark whilst rocking Booberry to drowsy.  And thank you to the Multnomah County Library for making it possible for me to save a few bucks and read some of these for freesies.  Because babies are expensive, yo, and they lick my books.  Booberry personally threw up on three board books last week.  One wasn’t even hers.  So it’s good that libraries exist and have e-books even though I miss the smell and the tactile satisfaction of paper books…mmmm….sensory bliss.  It’s ok.  I’ll have to get my jollies with board books and get on the e-book wagon. 

                Here are some books I read this year that I want to discuss.  In no particular order:

Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowl.  She is so hot right now.  And this book is great.  It’s a quiet young adult (some mature content) romance about a ginger (you know I have a thing for those) girl and a non-ginger boy.  The ginger thing isn’t a big part of the story really.  It’s about LOVE.  And I enjoyed it. 

Southern Reach Trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer.  I have read 2/3 of the trilogy.  This is also one of those trendy ones I heard about on the internets or somewhere.  IT IS WEIRD.  The pitch: it’s like X-files mated with Lost and did shrooms.  Which sounds like the best thing ever, right? But the style is self-proclaimed “weird.”  It’s about a scientific expedition into a mysterious Floridian Area X that has creepy, maybe alien, maybe nature-gone-mad elements.  There’s repetitive imagery and lots of mysteries.  And deadly fungus.  I had to take a break before doing the third book because the book sorta took me over like one of its spores and I couldn’t sleep. 

Where’d ya Go Bernadette by Maria Semple.  I read this AGAIN.  Why haven’t you read it yet?  It’s like if Desperate Housewives were written as a novel by a writer for Arrested Development (which Maria Semple was) and set in Seattle.  It’s light and easy to read without being stupid or “a girl book” as The Doctor would say.  

Red Rising by Pierce Brown.  This book got a lot of good buzz but didn’t actually catch on the way other YA violent sci fi has for whatever reason.  Reviews often say that it’s like a Hunger Gamesy Harry Potter. But it is SIGNIFICANTLY more violent than either of those.  Like, cringing while I read violent (which last happened to me during American Psycho to give you reference).  BUT IT’S COOL.  I am planning to read the sequel.  It’s about future colonists of the planets and has a Brave New World class structure with Capitol on crack type physical enhancements.  And there’s a school for training but it’s not wizards it’s WARRIORS.  It’d say it’s more male than a lot of YA today but I don’t mean that in a good or bad way. 

Sleep Donation by Karen Russell.  I HATED HATED HAAAAATED Swamplandia.  I threw it across the ROOooooom when I finished it, I hated it so much.  But I very much enjoyed this novella and wish to see the movie/read the whole thing should she ever flesh it out.  It had a Fahrenheit 451 vibe to it and is about what happens when people stop sleeping.  Cool concept well executed.

Sisterland by Curtis Sittenfeld.  I like alllll her books.  I recommend all of them.  This one is her newest and it really stuck with me because the characters seemed very much like people I could know/be.  It’s about twins who are psychic but not in a YA paranormal way, just in the way some people seem to think they’re psychic and you either believe them or you don’t.  One sister grows out of the novelty of her power and lives a pretty straight forward suburban life.  The other makes money on her gift and predicts a big earthquake which sends the community into a panic.  The plot is about the days leading up to the predicted event.  It’s quieter than my normal YA adventures and is much more grown up, albeit a light read.

Looking for Alaska by John Green.  He’s having a moment, of course and I love him and his books and his vlog and his run on sentences.  This is one of his earlier novels I hadn’t read.  It has echoes of Fault in ours Stars greatness but is more like a dark Abundance of Katherines. It’s heavy.  It has a pixie dream girl, of course.  It’s moody.  I liked it. 

Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri. NOPE!  Worst ever.  I voted for it in book club and could barely finish it.  The only reason I did is because there wasn’t an adequate Wikipedia summary.  I like her short stories and this is the first full novel I’ve read.  HATED.  Everyone in book club for the most part took issue with the main female, a cold, depressed person whose grief basically ruins everything for everyone for their whole lives.

Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire by Steve Perry.  Because I voted for the horrendous Lowland, I was coerced into picking this dud as the next book.  Nerds love it.  I am a nerd.  It was a huge waste of valuable reading time for me.  It takes place between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.  So basically, it’s filler.  SO ANNOYING.  Enjoy it if you like fan fiction. 

On Immunity by Eula Bliss.  Maybe the most important book I read this year.  As you know, I get really RAGEFUL when I think about anti-vaxers and their bioterrorist ideas about killing us all with pox parties.  Sometimes I think about Booberry getting measles (her heat rash yesterday set me off…she had epic heat rash and I was concerned) and I get whipped into a panicked frenzy and murderous ideas come popping up.  So I try to keep it civil.  This book helped. A journalist and mom, Bliss wasn’t sure about vaccines so she did her REAL research (not reading Bob Sears’ blog) and has come to the conclusion that, DUH, vaccines are a good idea.  The book explains why from a historical, lightly scientific, and emotional standpoint.  Basically this book gives me ammo when anti-vaxers start talking about “natural immunity.”  Too bad I bought the kindle version—otherwise I could just throw the book at them.  Like at their faces. 

Saga by Brian K Vaughan and Fiona Staples.  My first non-political allegory graphic novel!  The Doctor picked this for book club and I devoured over two days.  I let Booberry crawl around her room with her toys while I read it in the glider.  She kept coming up to me and wanting me to read it to her…but it has boobies.  Breastfeeding boobies, sure, but also sex and monster boobies.  It’s about star crossed future lovers who have a mixed race baby and have to flee their enemies and raise their girl in the midst of interplanetary war.  It’s super fun and amazing.  Plus it’s fast and has cool pictures.

Next up: Station Eleven. The premise is that it follows a group of traveling Shakespearean actors in a post-apocalyptic North America.  Basically, I’m pretty sure this book was written JUST FOR ME.  

Baby's First Holiday Season

The Holiday Season, by my estimation and backed up by decorations in stores, lasts from the month before Halloween through New Year’s Day. 

Halloween is my favorite holiday because costumes are the most fun ever.  It’s still fall and you can still go outside.

Then there is a fairly low-stress lull leading up until Thanksgiving.  It’s like epic denial…you know something is coming but you don’t have to deal with it yet.

Then Thanksgiving in all its salted glory rolls around AND THEN WE’RE OFFFFFFFFFF!

Black Friday is a holiday.  You can choose whether or not you celebrate it, but it’s Amurican and you can’t deny its existence…especially if you work in retail. 

And if you didn’t get all your gifts on Black Friday at midnight, don’t worry because next is my personal favorite: CYBER MONDAY where you can get allllll the deaaaaals without leaving your couch.  Cyber Monday took me like three hours to order like one box of pears this year because my child was demanding attention.  Darn kids and their non-understanding of consumerism holidays!

After you’ve finished your shopping, now it’s time to REALLY get into the spirit of Christmas by going to ALL THE TREE LIGHTINGS even if they’re lame and it’s cold and your baby totally doesn’t care and you don’t really like hot chocolate but it’s so cold that you hold it just so your fingers don’t freeze off and does the baby have hypothermia?  Or is she going to overheat from the following layers:

1.       Long sleeved onesie

2.      Leggings

3.      Socks on feet

4.      Hat

5.      Socks on hands because babies can’t HANDLE MITTENS

6.      Full body hooded fleece suit.

7.      Boots

8.      Jacket without a hood because that’s TOO MANY HOODS.

9.      Thick fleece blanket tucked all around her and pinning her into the stroller or against you in the carrier

10.  There’s no 10^th thing but I wish there was because it’s too insane that I have to put all that on my kid just to leave the house.  OH RIGHT.  DIAPER!  Which is, of course below everything and inevitably gets shit in the minute all 9 following layers are applied and you’re ready to go.  THEN YOU START OVER, SLAVE.

Did you survive the tree lighting? Now you’re READY FOR ZOO LIGHTS!  Babies love lights, right?!  It’s true.  And my baby’s favorite light was the one on the vending machine by the bathrooms which had a lion on it which she proudly exclaimed was a “DAT” (cat).  She cried the whole rest of Zoolights. 

Take your baby with you to cut down a Christmas tree and then decorate it and surround it with a baby gate and hope for the best.  Try not to think about your child dying by being crushed by a Christmas symbol.  Vacuum  constantly so she doesn’t ingest too many pine needles.

Your baby has just developed stranger anxiety.  Take her to meet Santa.  It will be fine.

Also holidays parties.  Dress your baby girl in the most bow-filled outfit and shove the Mary Janes on her precious toesies.  Make sure you have a back up precious outfit for when your little princess throws up on herself because, of course, she has gagged on her own snot.  Call it teething and TELL NO ONE because you cannot be quarantined right now.  YOU HAVE PLACES TO GO.

Your family is visiting I’m sure and they all want to hold the baby but you’re the one who still has to get up at 6am with her because she survives by drinking your bodily fluids so, even though you were up late cooking and making the house presentable for guests, you’re still up early.  Fortunately, spouse has time off so he relieves you and you either go back to bed or take a shower before everyone else needs to get in there…you choose bed and wear extra deodorant. 

You host Christmas Eve at your house because then you can be home in time for baby’s bedtime and can go put her to bed while your father in law does dishes because he’s super good at them but you have SO MANY DISHES that only one load makes it in and then there’s more dishes which your husband does (and tells you all about so you can throw him a parade). 

The baby is kinda worked up from hanging out with her cool older cousins who got cool light up laser guns from your cool sister and all the LIGHTS (baby loves lights) so bedtime takes a while and then you still have to stuff stockings and put presents under the tree and prep for Christmas morning breakfast. 

You can’t sleep because you’re excited/nervous for Christmas.  You hope you remembered everything and everyone and that everyone has a good time and enough food.  You stare at the  baby monitor until she wakes up and then you let her be really loud in the living room so everyone else wakes up and you can get to…

THE MAIN EVENT! 

Presents!

Everyone likes the presents!  Even the baby—you weren’t sure she cared.  She ate only a little wrapping paper.  You surprised your husband with an ornament with imprint of the baby’s foot and he was pleased. 

You don’t need any gifts because the greatest gift of all is seeing your family happy. 

Just kidding.  The best gift of all is a Roomba (thanks, Dad).

The baby has the best nap of her life after being worn out by pure commercial bliss and you make and eat a leisurely breakfast and all is well.  You made it.  You succeeded at Christmas.  You won Christmas.

Now you just have five more days of family togetherness and it’s NEW YEARS.

You have two options for your first NYE as a parent:

1.       Hire a babysitter and spend hundreds of dollars to go out to a lame bar and pay for overpriced drinks or go to a house party and make small talk while wondering if the girls there who have never had kids can see your spanx. 

2.      Stay home.  Go to bed at 9.

I’m choosing option 2.  Because, even though I won Christmas, I’m EXHAUSTED. 

I was too busy having fun with baby’s first holiday season to actual have all that much fun.

And one afternoon between Christmas and New Years, I crashed.  She wouldn’t go down for a nap, and I REALLY needed her to take that nap.  She was supposed to be falling asleep in my arms but instead she was smacking me in the face and banging her head into mine.  I started to cry, so tired from hosting and dressing myself and being around adult humans, that I almost didn’t realize what my child was doing.  She was pat patting me.  Until that day, she’d only ever pulled my (or the cats’…or the other kids’) hair.  But she was pat patting me.  And the banging of her head against me, that was her giving me kisses.  Wide open mouthed baby kisses.  Unprovoked love from a baby is a rare and glorious gift. 

Almost as good as a Roomba. 

New Year’s Day I will pack up all the Christmas décor and the husband will drag the tree to the curb.  I will let Roomba, my new bff, scoop up any holiday remnants and we will resume regular life.  I’m sure I will feel, as I do every year, a bittersweet nostalgia for the family togetherness, the claustrophobic crushing of love I feel when my house is full of people making messes and being nice to me.  I will feel like a weight is being lifted off of me.  And we’ll talk about next year.  Because this year was just a dress rehearsal…next year will be Toddler’s First Holiday Season and then, THEN, it’ll REALLY be crazy. 

The Creature

New policy: The first rule of baby sleep is you DO NOT talk about baby sleep.

Because the minute you talk about baby sleep, baby will CHANGE HOW SHE SLEEPS.  I bragged to ONE person--not even a parent, just a normal person--that Boo had been sleeping eleven hours straight at night…and she promptly stopped.  She also, just for fun, stopped with the blissful and surprising two hour morning naps and now just does an hour which is exactly enough time for me to fall asleep or start something fun or…clean, I guess.  But not enough time to REALLY have any free time or REALLY do anything at all.  Basically, I have enough time to read the internet and then she’s UP and giggling.

            Look at me breaking the first rule already. 

If she had her way, her ladyship Boo would be held all the time when she sleeps…which is just precious, of course, but we want to instill good habits and not suffocate her with our pillows by accident and whatnot, so we have the following “SLEEP ROUTINE” (the internet says it’s very important to have a sleep routine) in place:

1.       Boo looks tired.

2.      Feed Boo boobs

3.      Snuggle Boo with binky

4.      Remove binky and continue snuggling

5.      Try to put down Boo (pretend you’re going to put her to sleep on her back but gently encourage her to roll onto her stomach where she immediately takes on “child’s pose” with her baby booty in the air.  Pat pat booty and run away silently)

6.      ½ the time Boo wakes up crying

7.      Repeat previous steps

8.      If not successful, turn on projector playing classical music and walk away.  She usually stops crying and puts herself to sleep in under three minutes.

9.      If not, call in Doctor Daddy who is always successful in under ten minutes.  If he is not home or willing, start over. 

10.  She will be asleep within…five minutes to three hours and will stay asleep for one to eleven hours. 

      Did you know that babies aren’t consistent?  Or, rather, mine isn’t…I’m sure there are clockwork babies out there who do everything the same all the time and you can just live your life predictably and I’m sure your house is also very clean and you also work full time saving people’s lives or money or something. 

      During the day, she’s nearly a person lately.  She makes yummy noises when she eats people food and can clap her hands and crawl and stand up and pet (grab) the kitty.  She’s no longer just a squish of tears and poop.  For funsies, we looked up her horoscope and, I gotta say, she is pretty much living up to it as much as a baby can.  Aries are independent, driven, energetic, aggressive.  If you ever get the chance to witness Boo versus Catdome, you will agree.

But at night, The Creature emerges.  I’m not saying The Creature is bad, it’s just…not quite a person.  Ever since she was a tiny squish, nighttime Boo has been more bug than human.  When she was little, she had a green, Velcro swaddle that made her look just exactly like a larva.  And that’s what she was: squirmy body and a mouth, sucking the life force from me to sustain her.  Her night time cry is not like that of a day time baby.  It’s fetus-like, impulsive, and unemotional.  It’s just id.  It’s just want: hold me, feed me, I feel alone, make me feel less alone.  The Creature doesn’t know she’s a person.  The Creature still thinks she and I are the same person. 

The Creature is the cutest and the sweetest.  She is all mouth, no eyes.  Give her the binky and she immediately is subdued.  Give her the nook of my arm, and she shakes her head into it and her whole body relaxes.  And her little squish face is the most placid thing you’ll ever see.  Such a different face from that of the person emerging in the day time.  In the day time, she’s expressive and opinionated and not a little bit judgey.  At night, she’s just soft eyes, petal lips slightly parted.

The Creature does not care about my emotions or needs and I can’t blame her.  She doesn’t care that it’s inconvenient for me to sit upright, nuzzling her at all hours.  The Creature requires sleep.  The Creature does not find things funny, only cold or scary or displeasing or, eventually, acceptable. 

Sometimes I feel embittered toward The Creature because she occasionally sprouts a tooth and that means she must be held at all times.  But then I tell myself, stop.  Look at this little thing.  Soon she will change into something else entirely.  The larva will hatch or whatever bugs do, and she will be her own person in both the day and night.  She won’t reach for you with desperation, her eyes pinched tight, knowing you’re there because you’re always there, just waiting to be received in your arms.  Soon she will grow up.

The greatest wish you can wish for your kid is that they’ll grow up.  As much as we want to plead with them to stay little, you want them to move on with their lives, to be free.  To develop new skills and get big and tall.  To fly like a beautiful butterfly or some cliché like that. 

The Creature is okay by me.

The Creature is awake. 

This larva looked cute.

What Is the Opposite of Crunchy?

An expression used here in sunny Portland, Oregon (what?  It is sunny!) to describe a certain type of person is “crunchy.”  I assume it is used elsewhere as well.  It is a term with negative associations regarding the liberal, hippie-esque tendencies of some of our residents.  Different than hipsters (which run rampant here but you’d never know it if you asked them because they don’t like labels), crunchy granola people are the stereotype of an Oregonian from which some of us want to escape.  But they are not caricatures!  They’re real, live people!  They are generally easy to spot (hemp clothes) or even…smell, but, much like autism, crunchiness is a spectrum, so sometimes people hide behind non-vegan footwear and Starbucks coffee to reveal their inner crunchiness.  There’s also the opposite.  A kid can have a name that’s not on the top 100 for the year and might be in the puffiest cloth diaper there ever was but the parents can otherwise not strike you as crunchtastic. 

It’s a weird word to use: crunchy.  I like my granola crunchy…I’d say that’s good granola.  And these people don’t necessarily eat granola…especially if it’s not gluten free.  It’s certainly a judgment when you hear it.  As the Mommy Wars wage on (on facebook that is), I find myself trying to disassociate myself with the crunchies.  So what’s the opposite of crunchy?  Soft granola?  Bacon?  I don’t know.  It’s a strange form of categorization. 

The official term for “crunchy parenting” is “attachment parenting” which sounds fairly reasonable and has seven main tenants, most of which I do to an extent.  But that’s not what crunchiness has become.  Based on several very official online quizzes, here’s where I stand on the crunch meter. 

Birth Experience/Bonding. 

Crunch level: squishy

Reason: You may know from my previous rants and birth story that I had a deeply unnatural (supernatural?) birth experience.  AND I LOVED IT.  If I hadn’t had every medical intervention in the book, baby Booberry and I would be D-E-D dead.  And also my genital region would be forever destroyed by her giant, face-up head.  Because of my C-section, I did not get to do disgusting skin to skin with my bloody, gooey baby, though I would have.  I did it as soon as I could back in recovery and I was on SO MANY DRUGS, I only remember a flash (of first-latch pain) of it.  The thing that the crunchiest of crunchies does that makes me bonkers is not the having of the natural birth (DO WHAT YOU WANT), it’s the advocating of the more “natural” ways over trusting your doctor (WHO HAS A DOCTORATE IN YOUR VAGINA AND ITS FUNCTIONS).  It is intensely disrespectful to the doctor and nurses who put in years of training and hours of their lives (many of these hours at night) for you and your health.  I have heard a midwife say that doctors just push for C-sections to get it over and done with so they can be home for dinner.  Uhhhh nope.  My doctor was on call for a solid twenty-four hour stretch the day I was there.  He went home for breakfast seven hours after he surgically removed my baby at midnight after being with me for a full day before that.  I had the same nurse twenty of the twenty-six hours I was in labor.  No one is going home.  No one is rushing anyone.  Ok sorry, ranting again.  END OF RANT (for now).

Go to your baby when she cries.

Crunch level: this granola might be stale or overcooked

Reason: Here’s my hang up with cry it out (CIO for those of you IN A HURRY). My kid doesn’t know why she’s upset.  She just knows she feels sad and alone.  Have you ever been sad and alone in the dark and just wished you felt safe?  Have you ever had an inconsolable sadness?  I can make her sad feelings go away by holding her.  Sure, it would be convenient for me if she just put herself to sleep.  But I can wait.  I read an article that scarred me for life that said that kids’ cortisol levels (stress) are still high after they cry it out (as opposed to when they are held and compared to the mother’s cortisol levels during and after the baby is crying).  Is it true?  I don’t know.  I don’t care.  Yet.  I reserve the right to change my mind and get less crunchy and be hardened (see?  It’s a confusing metaphor) and let the child cry.  Because clearly kids who I know cried it out are fine and at least mostly well adjusted.  This is my crunchiest thing.

Breastfeeding. 

Crunch level: soft with a little crispiness

Reason: HERE IS MY BIGGEST SECRET.  For the first week, giant baby Booberry and I were out of sync and I didn’t make enough for her…and I SUPPLEMENTED WITH FORMULA.  Omg.  I am going to parenting hell.  And my kid is going have a lower IQ (because IQ is everything?).  I was full-blown afraid to tell people this.  Not because I was ashamed since my entire purpose as a woman is to give and sustain life (remember how I would have died without modern medicine?  Clearly survival of the fittest isn’t really a thing anymore), but because I was too tired and on drugs to fight the Mommy Battle regarding the use of formula.  So I would vaguely say, “she just ate” instead of “she had a bottle,” so no one would know my shame.  Then, everything worked out and now I am still the super special one who has to wear maxi-pads on my boobs because I am a milk over-achiever and I really do love breastfeeding.  I won’t do it forever, but I’ll keep it up for a while. 

Co-sleeping

Crunch level: homemade granola bar from a made up recipe

 Reason:  Attachment parents are all for co-sleeping.  At the very least, they say you should sleep with your baby in the same room with you for six months.  I did minimal online research on this and, generally, co-sleeping can be a SIDs risk and I’m too anxious about that kind of thing and also Catdome likes to co-sleep (on our faces) and he gets aggressive if we don’t love him enough.  So, we slept with her in the room with us until…four months.  Why four?  Totally arbitrary.  But I had the sneaking suspicion that sleep talking Doctor, aggressive cuddler Catdome, people getting up to pee in the night, and not wanting to go to bed at 7pm was leading to Boo waking up more than necessary.  So we moved her to her room and I didn’t sleep much that night, constantly wanting to go make sure she was still breathing.  And she totally slept better (until teething started).

Baby led weaning

Crunch level: oatmeal

Reason: This, as I understand it, is that instead of feeding your six-month old watered down baby food from a spoon, you give your baby chunks of actual food and see if they choke and die.  This is supposed to teach the baby…something valuable…

Amber teething necklaces

Crunch level: milk

Reason: NO MEDICAL PROOF.  Parents somewhere got the idea that you can put a pretty amber beaded necklace around your infant’s neck and it will relieve teething pain (through...magic?).  I’m sure babies will just forget that they like to chew on everything and that they only grab at everything with spastic fervor and just leave the tantalizing thing around their necks and not die.  Sarcasm!  I DON’T GET THIS ONE!

Fluoride

Crunch level: married

Reason: Portland had a vote right before we moved here that asked its residents if they wanted their tap water fluoridated.  Wealthy people, hippies, and those who hate dentists with a sociopathic passion voted that they didn’t want their pure, delicious (it is) water being poisoned with chemicals.  As much as I hate flossing, I am married to a dentist and he, despite the fact that lack of fluoridation would give him more patients, is pretty clear on the issue: kids need teeth.  Fluoridate.  He had an awkward argument with our neighbor at a block party when the poor neighbor, with no facts to back up his claim, “respectfully disagreed” that the water should be fluoridated.  Pretty sure we’re not going to get invited to any parties at his house…

Cloth diapering

Crunch level: store bought

Reason: I’m lazy. 

The environment

Crunch level: the box says it’s organic granola so I’ll buy it

Reason: I TRY.  I compost.  I recycle whenever possible.  I use green cleaning products on baby toys.  But, the day we ran out of hand sanitizer at my first teaching job was the day everyone got pink eye.  At another teaching job, I started Lysoling desks after a terrible bout of strep throat.  Sometimes I need me some CHEMICALS.  Also, I reallllllly want a minivan.

Dietary restrictions

Crunch level: Quaker Oat Bars from Target

Reason: I eat meat.  Sometimes I know that it is grass fed…sometimes it’s just the cheapest meat at the store.  I eat eggs.  Sometimes they come from my awesome neighbor and, yes, they taste better than the store-bought ones.  I eat dairy…all of it.  I eat gluten…omg so much gluten.  I eat sugar.  Also agave.  Also honey.  Also syrup.  Also coconut sugar.  All the sugars.  Even the fake sugars but I don’t like those as much.  I do not eat Little Caesars Hot and Ready because that is not food. 

Alternative Medicine

Crunch level: FDA approved

Reason: Ok. So I got acupuncture and it was amazing.  But, seriously, the term “naturopath” is not allowed in my house because it will start the Doctor on a looooonnnng rant or at least a complete lack of respect.  The internet says naturopathy is often lacking in “evidence based medicine.”  That’s about all I need, guys.  Just gimmie some non-anecdotal evidence.    I mean, sure, I rub coconut oil on myself sometimes but it’s because I like smelling like a cookie, not because it will cure ALL my ills. 

Which brings us to the biggie…

Vaccines

Crunch level: I WILL NEVER EAT THAT DISGUSTING GRANOLA DON’T EVEN SHOW IT TO ME

Reason: ex-MTV VGs are not medical experts.  Even though I had and really didn’t mind chicken pox as a kid, I did miss spring break because of it, so why do kids need to have chicken pox?  Chicken pox parties are the LEAST of our worries, though.  Here’s the deal, I don’t claim to know things.  I’m agnostic.  I refuse to commit to knowing much of anything for certain.  I can only go off of what I have reasonable proof and/or doubt of.  AND VACCINES ARE NECESSARY.  I don’t believe anyone is trying to hurt their kid (or anyone else’s if we’re gonna get into herd immunity issues), but this is getting ridiculous, Portland.  Get your shit together and do even a LITTLE research on this. 

True story: I totally paused writing this to go get a granola bar because all this talk of crunchiness made me really want one.  It’s gluten free…and I like it.  

But What Do You Do All Day?

In honor of the first day of school, I’d like to address the concept of “But what do you do all day?” which is something often asked stay at home moms (SAHMs as the internet refers to them...because WE DON'T HAVE TIME TO SPELL THIS SHIT OUT FOR YOU!).  I am a SAHM almost all the time (I teach one class on Saturdays which has been on summer hiatus).  I miss teaching full time so much but know that a life of never, EVER being alone for ten hours a day is not the life for me at the moment.  I’m super duper thankful to be able to stay home during this time. 

Not being accusatory at all, a friend of mine asked the age-old question, “What do you do all day?”  She wasn’t being malicious or judgmental the way a lot of people are who ask that question of women who “just” stay home.  She was curious.  So…here it is.  WHAT I DO ALL DAY (an amalgamation of a random Tuesday):

6:10: Doctor wakes up for work.  My boobs feel like ROCKS because Her Ladyship Booberry has deigned to sleep nine hours straight because she is the greatest creature that ever lived.  I ask him to check on Boo because she’s taken to sleeping directly on her face and I am worried she has suffocated and died.  He informs me she is still alive and goes to shower.  Either the noise, light, or passage of time wakes up Booberry who flips herself back onto her back and smacks her head on the side of the crib.  So I go in there, change her, and nurse her off Hambone (lefty, the dominant one) which is difficult because of my rock hard boobie and overactive let down.  I fill Boo’s ear with milk as she unlatches and I dissolve into swearing trying to get her back on.  I am thankful she doesn’t know how to repeat words yet.  She eats really fast now and soon I am a lopsided Picasso so I give her a binky and plop her in the crib while I pee (because I haven’t done that for nine hours) and then pump Flippy (the right, less dominant one).

6:45: Join the Doctor for breakfast in the kitchen.  I am winning today because I remembered to make him a lunch and it’s in the fridge (if I don’t make him a lunch, he eats tacos or Little Caesar’s Hot and Ready).  Before you commend me on my domesticity, let me tell you, his lunch consisted of: pizza from Friday night, carrot sticks which were already in the bag, a prepackaged thing of hummus, a yogurt, an apple, and two packs of fruit snacks.  Not exactly gourmet.  Boo happily plays in her exersaucer and laughs uproariously at Ruby who is staring her down from her perch on the counter (she gets ONE section of counter and NO I do not prepare food on that section).

7:10: Doctor leaves for work and I put Boo in the boppy (so far there has been binky, boppy, and exersaucer…the baby CRAP terminology could fill its own lexicon) and sing “Let it Go” (because it is ALWAYS in my head) to her while I put away the laundry I washed three days ago. 

8:00: Boo rubs her eyes so I feed her and put her in the swing (baby depository #4 if you count crib).  I wash pump parts while I wait for her to fall asleep.  Then I come down to the basement and exercise.  JUST KIDDING.  I go on facebook and, in the case of today, blog.  I did do a youtube exercise video two days ago, but I’m still too sore to go back.  Repeatedly and obsessively sneak back upstairs and check on Boo who is totally fine but I’m convinced is going to somehow fall out of the swing (she’s strapped in) and suffocate.

8:30: wipe down Boo’s toys which I haven’t done in several days.  Maybeeee do dishes.  Maaaaaybe fold laundry.  Read mom blogs and Portland parenting facebook articles.  Get dressed (into gym clothes).

9:30: Boo wakes up in the swing giggling and wiggling.  Feed her, change her, dress her, eat a snack (Kind bar chased with a few random chocolate chips), fill water bottle, put crap in car, put on minimal makeup because I look a little diseased, try to put my hair up but it’s too short, while she sits in the vibrating chair in the bathroom (device #5).  Put her in carseat (#6).  Go to car.  Get gas.  Also get coffee at the coffee stand that has Stumptown Cold Brew.  CHUG IT.  Feel awesome. 

10:00: MOM WALK!  I have been lucky enough to meet really nice mom friends who I get along with besides the fact that we have same-age kids.  We walk in the park and talk about our current obsession which lately has been sleep training (new topic from milk over/under supply issues).  Sweat excessively.  Boo naps intermittently.

12:00: Smoothie.  Feel guilty for going out for coffee and also now “lunch” because I have no job and could make both coffee and smoothies at home but I DIDN’T because I’m so, so hot and sweaty and probably badly sun burnt because I forgot sunscreen AGAIN and also I really want to keep socializing with the moms because parenting is a form of loneliness in which you are never alone.  Feed Boo under a nursing cover and drip sweat all over her.  Use nursing cover to wipe sweat. 

1:00: Home.  Shower while Boo sits in the chair and play peekaboo with the shower curtain.  Get dressed (into different gym clothes).  Eat another kind bar and a string cheese while making faces at her as she sits in the bumbo (#7).  Go to the living room and let her roll around on the floor which, in lieu of a rug, is adorned with one and a half (found a half on the street and thoroughly scrubbed it) of those giant foam puzzle pieces.  She starts fussing so we snuggle and I read her Peter Pan for a little while (in a British accent) but she gets bored and sleepy.  Change diaper.

2:30: Boo is fussing and in need of a solid nap so I take her into the basement and turn on Netflix while I nurse her.  She laughs manically at me which is adorable and a sign that she is super tired. 

3:00: She falls asleep in my arms and I let her stay there because it’s kinda my favorite thing in the whole world to hold a sweet, sleeping little Boo and also, if I try to “nap train” her and put her in her crib, she will become wide awake and start playing with her feet for the entirety of nap time.  Also, I kinda want to watch TV…

5:30: Doctor comes home and I have not made dinner or even thought about what I would make for dinner which is fine because he got Little Caesars’ Hot and Ready so he’s good to go so I “accidentally” wake up Boo because I’m starving and my bladder might explode and the Doctor snuggles her and I go up and heat up something that came in a bag from Trader Joes (thank you, world, for Trader Joe’s) and eat the whole thing out of a bowl while we finish whatever Parks and Recreation episode I was watching and then we go play with Boo on the floor mat for a while and I go to the gym (JUST KIDDING…I almost never do) and, if it’s nice, the Doctor straps Boo into the Ergo (#8) and we walk around the block and she falls asleep and then we come home and feed her avocado/breast milk which is hilarious. 

7:00: “Bedtime Routine” starts.  Bath if it’s bath night.  The Doctor does this mostly by himself because I have determined it would be good “bonding” for them.  During bath I lay out pjs and hopefully make Doctor’s lunch and check facebook.  Then pjs and I snuggle her while he reads her a story in our bed.  Then I take her to her room and nurse her in the rocking chair and then try to put her down.

8:30: She won’t let me put her down without waking up fully and crying like I’ve abandoned her and so I know she’s overtired and I have failed yet again to get her to bed before she’s become overtired and curse myself as a parent and then get over it because I WANT TO LIVE MY LIIIIIIFE and then nurse her again even though she doesn’t need it and text the Doctor to tag me out.  He takes her and shushes her while I lie listlessly in bed and go on facebook. 

8:35: She’s sound asleep in her crib doing the Rocky pose on her back because the Doctor is AWESOME (and doesn’t smell like food).  I give the Doctor a short neck rub because that’s the deal if he gets her to sleep successfully and we watch an episode of something and he rubs my feet because he’s cute.

9:30: The Doctor is sound asleep and snoring in his chair and Boo has woken up, turned onto her face, and put herself back to sleep. So I wake up the Doctor and we go to bed but we forgot to feed the cats so he gets up and then I forgot my water so I go get it and then we get into a discussion about how long it will be before everyone is cyborgs and, did he lock the door?  So he goes to check and Boo wakes up an little and I freak out but she’s just mantra crying not really crying and goes back to sleep.  I read a chapter of my library book on sleep training (which defines mantra crying).

10:30: Fall into a dreamless slumber.

4:00: My boobs hurt.  What time is it?  Booberry is still asleep on her face.  Is she dead?  No, probably not. Should I check?  Try not to check.  Go back to sleep. 

6:10: NEW DAY.

No, not every day is the same.  Every day she does something new and I have a different errand or activity.  It was a touch easier when she was a newborn who slept on the go, but she’s so much more fun now.  Would I miss her terribly if I were at work?  Yes.  Do I miss work?  Yes.  Do I want to go back to work?  Hell.  No.  This is fun.  Doesn’t it sound fun?

The part the average, childless person doesn’t see is the parts that make it amazing.  Holding her while she trusts me so immensely and sleeps deeper than she ever does on her own.  That won’t last.  Her deep laugh whenever I make a goofy face at her.  That won’t happen when she’s in school.  Her intense concentration when I show her how to pet Ruby without pulling out clumps of hair (Ruby is a good pet).  There will be a day when she doesn’t want to learn from me.  Singing her a lullaby that my mother would have sung to me were she not so tone deaf as I rock her to sleep at night (and then fail).  That won’t happen in a year.  Seeing her face light up when The Doctor walks in the door.  That look of surprise will fade once object permanence truly sets in. 

I used to leave my house at 6:45 to get to school and I’d get home near 6.  This is the second school year where I haven’t been there on the first day.  Last year I was unemployed and newly preggo.  Every day I’m not a classroom teacher, I try to remind myself to think of all the hours in between and all I did with her.  I try to think of the working parents who are happy to have the time in the world of adults during working hours, and how much they much look forward to the little moments at the end of the day that, on paper, seem so simple and probably boring. 

Sometimes I think of Milo from The Phantom Tollbooth.  When he was at home, he wanted to be at school.  When he was at school, he wanted to be at home.  I think, after a quarter of a century in a school setting, I’m finally ready to let Milo’s attitude go and live in the moment.  (Let it gooooooo, let it gooooo).

Because someday we’ll all be cyborgs anyway…