This month

This month I had an accidental good sleeping baby. My baby napped in his swing for the first time in 4 months. It's been an hour! I don't know what to do with myself. I've already vacuumed the living room and cleaned the kitchen. I'm about to fold some laundry I guess. I did give him a bath and feed him before putting him in the swing, and Huckleberry said it was his nap time, but I put him there expecting to just do a few things and then put him down in the usual way. I'm afraid to leave him unattended in case he wakes up. He's almost too big for the swing now and he keeps trying to sit up in it when it's designed for him to be leaning back. Also, side note, my mom is coming for 2 weeks next Tuesday. I am beyond excited to have some more help. This is partly why I'm trying to clean. I want her to be able to enjoy quality time with LO. She lives 1700 miles away and hasn't been back since he was born. She stayed with us for his first week of life on the outside.

This month I set a timer for something (cooking, laundry) and then got naptrapped while DH was out. You'd think I would learn to set timers on my phone. On the plus side, I made lentils, carrot and green bean baby foods.

This month I had a panic attack when I looked at my baby's head. It looked like he has two coin-sized wounds on it. I racked my brain because I was trying to think where it could have come from. It looked like the skin had been rubbed off or a burn. Then I turned on the light and saw they were brown and not pink. Then I realized it was spilled coffee that had dried. And I could breathe again. Damn I love this baby.

This month I vacuum when I have time/energy/help. Kind of when the stars align. I keep dirty dishes in the dishwasher. I have a baby swing that looks on to the kitchen. I have an exersaucer in the garage by the washer and dryer. I have a rocker in the bedroom / bathroom. Baby watches me do chores. It helps pass the time in the day. What I am struggling with is meal planning and cooking.

This month my mom is visited for 2 weeks. It was so much easier to cook and clean and prepare for and teach my classes with an extra pair of hands. I don't know what I'll do when she leaves. 😭 My husband has been watching the baby during my office hours and classes. They seem to be establishing a good rapport. Dad feeds solids. So far he's tried plums, pears, apples, banana and rice cereal. Next we'll try some vegetables (carrots, green beans, squash) and protein (lentils, chicken, eggs). I was worried that solids would interfere with breastfeeding, but it doesn't seem like it has. Baby will nurse even right after the solid feeding. We had a fun family meal with LO in his Tripp Trapp and playing with his own spoon. We are also giving him a water filled sippy cup to play with.

This month my noise-canceling headphones did not at all take the edge off of a caregiver trying to put my baby down for a nap one floor up. My students were asking in the Zoom chat: is your baby alright?

This month I was so starving. Yet gaining weight. While BF. FML.

This month we tried mashed sweet potato and baby started choking. There were 3 adults there and we quickly got LO unstrapped from the high chair and did the back-whack to clear baby's airway. I wasn't stressed and I wasn't surprised. Just moments before it happened I was saying it was too thick and lumpy. Luckily baby wasn't traumatized because he wanted another bite after drinking some breastmilk. So we thinned and blended the rest before freezing it into cubes.

This month I spoiled my baby. What's beautiful is that my mom is visiting. Before she came out she was all for sleep training. She was like, you can't let them fall asleep on you... they will never learn to self-soothe. Then I had her watch the baby during one of my classes. Huckleberry was predicting a nap. He fussed a lot until the last 15 min of class. I went up to the bedroom to find baby asleep on her chest. My time with this little dude is so precious and my mothering instincts tell me he can self soothe just fine when he wants to. Why spend hours crying and insisting that he sleeps in his crib when he sleeps just fine without crying and I get cuddles? I also feel, like a birth plan, sleep training is a myth. It's some idea propagated to give parents an illusion of control, but it can also make parents feel anxious and like things that happen naturally aren't happening the way it says in the book. I feel my baby will grow up too fast, why rush to force him to be independent? I wish COVID wasn't a thing and I was still going to campus. I have good friends in the child and adolescent development department that could have helped me 'Emily Oster' this. Sometimes it helps to have scientific basis, sometimes I guess it's better to go by the individual child and family situation and do what is right for those circumstances. My baby was born with a hernia that got bad (his scrotum would be filled with his intestines until it was the size of an apple) when he cried. So I kind of have an aversion to him crying, even though his hernia has been repaired.

This month I prematurely cried in the shower thinking about how hard it will be when my mom leaves. 😭 I am extra grateful because lots of us are without family support due to COVID. Luckily my mom has been brave enough to take the risk of air travel. She's been feeding LO solids and supervising lots of reading and playtime. It's very validating to hear her say, "I had forgotten how much work it is keeping LO entertained." I also appreciate her saying, "I was 15 years younger than you when I had my first. Think how much more energy you would have had." I love soaking up the baby snuggles, and it is great to share those with my mom while I can. I sometimes feel like I have to put on a brave face and make parenting look effortless. It was fantastic to have my mom here during our weekly zoom call. She observed how difficult it is to keep the baby entertained and looking cute for a 75 minute video chat. Usually she is on the receiving end and doesn't see what goes into making that call a joyous moment.

This month I distinguish between "full feed" with multiple let downs and "snack" which happens during the day a lot now. If there's ANYTHING interesting going on, it'll be a snack feed where he clearly gets milk but doesn't linger. Maybe 5 min. For a full feed, it will be about 30 min with maybe a nap after.

This month I felt that tiny bit of rage when everyone in the house has pooped and showered and you're naptrapped. No shower. No time to poop. I woke up 30 minutes before my alarm and thought it would be cute to snuggle with my husband. He was like, "WTF and why are you crowding me in this bed?" I guess I should have taken the time to poop and shower. I hated seeing myself on a zoom class last night. My face is all red and splotchy. My hairline has receded. I feel stressed and it shows. Today I cried just snuggling LO. May be hormones. It's the 3rd week of the semester. Dunno how I will make it to week 16. I teach a 3 hour "night lab" 2 nights per week. Our longest meetings have only been 2 hours and I can't stand being away from my baby. I hate this. I also teach 2 x 75 min lectures, 2x per week and those aren't so bad. We're starting experiments in week 5 that may take the whole 3 hours. Keeping LO up late sucks. He's already struggling to sleep, both during the day and at night. It breaks my heart to see him all grouchy from too little sleep and not enough cuddles. DH is doing his best at keeping LO entertained and he's doing great at offering solids. My mom is here for another week to help us through this transition, but it's still hard. I don't miss the "career woman" I was before becoming a mom. Instead I miss the SAHM I was during my maternity leave but I can't afford to not work. In Spring, we might do day care. I might be teaching more classes. DH and I were just saying this morning that COVID continues to make everything more fluid, less certain.

This month my mom laughed when I showed her my son's baby book. For "world leaders" I put COVID-19. The virus is holding all of us hostage. Academia is a very grumpy place right now. Sending virtual hugs. Watched Disney's COCO tonight 💀 my son cried for a second helping of avocado at dinner 🥑 and we swear he is saying "mama" when he wants me 😭 My mom is here and she INSISTED on feeding LO Cherrios. She broke each "o" into 4 teeny pieces. It works ok. My baby is EBF but has been having purees for 3 weeks now. LO eats 2 cheerios per day in 8 teeny bites. I pretty much hold my breath and watch closely the whole time. 😳 I still take 1000 mg of lecithin per day.

This month we installed a convertable carseat. We have a long baby so the infant carseat was just about too small. My mom left. LO had his 6 month pediatrician appointment. I have all the feels. My baby wants to stand all day. We call it "ironing board" when he goes rigid and whines until he's in a standing position. He just rolled front to back unassisted for the first time yesterday.

This month I still get engorged when my baby is going through a growth spurt. Sometimes he nurses every hour in a 24 hour period for 3 days in a row but then goes back to eating every 2-3 hours.

This month I spent 2.5 hours and $16 to get a replacement tray for a hand-me-down Evenflo compact fold high chair. As DH pointed out, we could have bought a new one for $35 more but I am all about upcycling. Gripe: the Evenflo company didn't make it clear the model number of the chair, lots of models had replacement trays sold out, it isn't clear which models share a tray design and I don't know FOR SURE that what I ordered will fit the chair I have. Also they don't send confirmation email with order tracking info and my order number on the screen was quickly blocked by a pop-up about "refer a friend" Gratitude: I found an Evenflo exersaucer at the curb near my house in early May. I ordered a replacement spring for one of the legs and feet for the toy arch. They did arrive and we installed them and my baby is highly entertained in the exersaucer. I keep it in the garage for baby to watch me while I'm doing laundry. DH uses it to park baby while "tailgating" in our garage while waiting for me to finish a zoom class meeting. I'm a teacher!

This month I cried the entire week after my mom left just trying to keep up the routine we established. 3x per day solids for LO and 3 home-cooked meals for the adults. Not to mention a workout for me and 3-4 naps for baby. I am WFH with 3 college classes so that's 14 hours per week on Zoom plus prep and grading time. My husband tells me not to think of it all in a lump like that. I used to just go with the flow and take it one hour at a time, but since my mom left all I can think about is how much there is to do and how I can't possibly do it all. Tuesday night my husband sautéed some veggies for a quiche which I tried to bake yesterday. It came out underdone since I had forgotten to set a timer and I just pulled it out at a time that was convenient for LO's feeding and nap schedule. Then DH tried to eat a nearly raw pie crust and asked me all these questions like "how much longer should it be cooked" and "at what temperature" and I told him I barely had the mental and emotional bandwidth to throw it in the oven the first time and I certainly wasn't willing to help him troubleshoot it. I said "just throw it away." He was pretty shocked because I normally don't give up like that. To try to help me, he put the dirty laundry in the washer on his way to work. It's shocking how I feel like that's like tipping your waitress $0.01. You know? Like a tiny drop in the ocean of how much more help I need. And he acts so worn out after watching LO for 75 minutes (the duration of one of my Zoom classes). We are going without childcare. Everyone's like oooh, think how much money you're saving. I'm like yeah. That's true. Then this morning my husband says "Friday I'm taking off work to ride the train." We have a nonprofit based on educating people in Los Angeles how to ditch their car and take a bicycle on public transit. We agreed that our advocacy work would be paused during baby and COVID time. I have already asked him to CANCEL this session in the past but I guess his brain just couldn't retain the reasons why because he rescheduled it. And it's going to take HOURS for something OPTIONAL. WHY???? And then he says, "you and LO can come too." Uh no... pandemic much? WTH? Nonessential trip. No thank you. I'LL just be over here at home running the household like a MFing boss. And parenting our spawn. And working my paying part-time job. You go have fun with your little friend dear.

This month at the pediatrician I got samples of vitamin D drops. Add 0.25mL via syringe into the morning iron-fortified rice cereal. Lunch is puree of plum, banana, sweet potato, squash, carrots or apples. Dinner is puree of avocado. Have made but not yet introduced: green beans, lentils. Have not made or introduced: tofu, beef, chicken, broccoli, cauliflower, eggs, nut butter. DH gave baby a spoonful of milk leftover from his sugar cereal (Lucky Charms) and LO got a rash on his cheeks. So we did a few repeat exposures. DH said, "well if he doesn't like carrots, we can sweeten them with honey." I have to educate and keep a closer eye on that man!

This month I started watching "Workin' Moms" on Netflix. It's been a month of me working so I started watching. Definitely relatable, but also kind of made me sad because it centers around a f2f support group, which we don't have due to COVID. At the same time, yesterday we found two little paychecks in the mail for extra work I did last year pre-baby and a teeny glimmer of pride sparked inside me knowing I have rejoined the paid workforce. I know I can spend money even if I am doing the unpaid labor of raising our child, but a $1 with two or three zeros after it on top of my regular pay is kind of sweet. If only it weren't for COVID, I would go get a massage. More in savings I guess.

This month I resented my husband because he has autonomy. He is still working for pay (full-time, salary) and doing non-profit volunteering. Some f2f, some on Zoom. But he leaves the house every day. I ask him not to tell me about the volunteering because I resent that he has the autonomy to do it. While I'm over here paying attention to LO nearly 24/7 with the exception of my work (part-time, paid) that is 11 hours per week. During that time, DH takes LO outside so his crying doesn't interrupt my classes. DH doesn't even watch LO during my office hours. And during my labs, I take a breastfeeding break. So LO is nearby but not in the room. This morning I just asked DH when he would be home but he didn't appreciate my tone of voice. My nipples hurt. I feel drained.

This month, I found out that my baby loves drinking from a cup. We have these. I didn't buy them knowing LO would go straight to drinking from a cup, but he LOVES it. I call it "drowning practice" because it's pretty terrifying to watch, but the baby just laughs and keeps going back for more.

This month, I was teaching my class about infectious diseases and learned that the word "quarantine" comes from the Italian meaning 40 days. During the 12th century Plague, people self-quarantined. Imagine if we had only been impacted for 40 days. We're on day 186 now.

This month, the Wonder Weeks suggested that during a leap, baby might lose their appetite. That wasn't the case for us. We survived leap 5. While pregnant, we planned on sending LO to daycare since my husband works full time and I work part time. Now with classes virtual and my husband working only on call, we're getting by on our own, just the 3 of us. My husband is older than me, he's turning 48 this year, so we are definitely struggling to keep our energy up and joke all the time about how old we'll be when our son hits milestones like graduation, marriage and becoming a parent himself. I guess it gives us some incentive to take better care of ourselves. I like being a mom much more than I thought I would. I wish I had started having children sooner, but if I had, I wouldn't have had paid maternity leave. I wish I could be a SAHM. My maternity leave was so great. Juggling work and childcare is a real challenge. I look forward to being out of debt and post-COVID so we can do more traveling with LO.

This month, I took a weekend shower and immediately after self foot massage on my clean feet while DH rubs my shoulders and neck. It has been remarkably restorative. Sometimes I log in to my workout group, sit on a stack of pillows and breastfeed LO. It's like saying no to a workout and yes to a meditation. Then I join in on just the cool-down stretching, which is sometimes sun salutations, while LO is practicing tummy time. I have also had good success with Cosmic Kids yoga on YouTube being highly entertaining to LO while getting me moving. Even though it's a yoga sequence designed for kiddos, I still find my body is in a better state after doing it than before. We've been meal planning and cooking. While it is a lot of work, I have lost 4 pounds in 4 weeks. And I have a lot to lose. Mind you I gained about 1/2 pound per week since LO's birth until I finally turned it around by eating more protein and home-cooked food.

This month, my weekday showers were three eensy-weensy spiders, one B-I-N-G-O and one Hickory-Dickory Dock. Seriously my husband does not comprehend how tiring it is to not be able to shower without doing a literal song-and-dance. To his credit, he left me with a fridge full of healthy precooked meals, a clean kitchen and he put away the clean laundry. It was a beautiful sight to wake up to this morning.