3 months!

holy moly.

our lil’ bear is already three months old.  three months since that glorious day!  and while i don’t pine away for the first 6 weeks after she was born, i do pine away for our labor and birth experience.  so amazing.

and already three months ago…!

where does the time go?

i guess it goes into learning to roll over, smiling and then having a first giggle, finding hands to suck on and trying so hard to reach out for mama’s face without luck so far…yes, these are busy days for the bear family.

she is so fun…and funny, too.

in other developmental news, we approached an earlier bedtime…we started at 3:30a when she was born and slowly moved up to 11:30p.  we stayed there for a long while and finally moved up to 7:30p, which frankly i thought was fabulous…but it gets even better!  now, cross our fingers, we’ve settled on 6:15-6:30-ish and i think we’ll be here for a while until it likely gets a bit later again…maybe 7ish.

those evenings are a dream!

although, the minute i started to get used to this new routine, we had a rough night (last night)…a bit of trouble settling down and some gas pains in the night–ouch!

now i’m counting down to the end of the 3a feed…which i will very likely miss when the time comes.  such is life…a bundle of ambivalence.

i want her to grow and i want her to stay tiny forever.

                                               happy 3 months, lil’ bear!

flash back

i’ve been working on my resume and job-hunting a bit this week, as i contemplate my new role as mother and career woman (or so i am hoping).

in perusing my files i came across a short essay i wrote for a vocational and occupational class i took in 2008 as part of my graduate education.  it was to be my statement of intent—a declaration of my career goals and pursuits.  i wrote it just one week after the first day of my very first miscarriage, when i found it difficult to declare even what i’d wear that day, much less what i was going to do with my life.  my graduation was just a few months away and i didn’t care anymore…it reads as follows:

*******************************************

A mere eight weeks ago, my statement of intent may have read: when I graduate I plan to celebrate in a big way—months of celebration, culminating in a two week exotic vacation with my husband who consistently believes in my ability as a therapist even when I do not.  Along with celebrating, I also intend to begin the process of setting up my private practice by securing office space and designing my webpage.  I also intend to pursue possible agency work to gain experience and hours in a clinical setting.  I set goals for myself including securing fifteen clients by December 2008 and creating an office space that reflects warmth, tenderness and safety.  I felt like I would burst into the sky like a rocket ship from anticipation at the thought of embarking on fulfilling these goals and dreams.

Just four weeks ago, my statement of intent completely shifted when I discovered I was pregnant.  Fear and delight gripped me at the thought of rearranging my timeline, my vision of what life would look like in the coming months as I would need to make an enormous amount of space in my life for a tiny little bundle.  I had not previously known how deeply I desired to mother.  Then, my intention was to put my professional aspirations temporarily on hold, perhaps facilitating a group one night per week until I felt freer to pursue my goals.  I envisioned pushing back my “fifteen client” goal about two years from now.  I was beginning to wrap my mind around the possibility of being a mom and a therapist as a new “timeline” began to take shape in me.

In the wake of my miscarriage, I no longer have a clue what in the world I will be doing (or even feeling like doing) tomorrow, much less in three months.  At this moment in time the idea of making a declaration of my intentions, professing my hopes and dreams, feels unbearable.  I feel enraged.  I feel scared.  As it turns out, I was on the rocket ship Challenger, which exploded in mid-air.  In the wake of trauma and death, I am again so painfully aware of the fragility of life.  Making declarations such as these requires a level of bold courage and hope that I am currently not able to locate within myself.  However, I believe that tiny little pockets of hope are hidden among the ashes.  I will wait for them to bubble to the surface and I will honor my desire by continuing to hope for a future as a therapist and a mother, whatever shape that will take.  When I graduate, I intend to remain close to my heart, give myself as much space as possible to grieve and heal, and retain the tenderness and passion I have come to love about myself as a therapist.  Beyond that, I am unable to say at this point.  I will keep you posted.

*******************************************

may i say, i am SO relieved to be past those early, early days.  i do not know how i got through them…i do know that i felt clueless as to where i was headed or why.

and while the memories of my much desired pregnancies remain ever with me, i feel so different today.  i feel content in a new way that i’ve not previously known.  i feel inspired to pursue my career goals more freely and more fully than i have up to this point.  i feel empowered.

and i still don’t have a clue where i’m headed…but i know where i’ve been and i believe and trust that my biggest asset today is my ability to find my way through those painful, horrific seasons with some sort of dignity. 

what i know now that i didn’t know then is that i’d one day have a lil’ bear whose smile melts my heart to no end.

and she’s exactly 12 weeks old today!

i.am.so.grateful.

disappointing

i took a huge risk and invited my in-laws to come for a visit over father’s day weekend.  it would be their first time visiting us together (ever) and their first time meeting their newest grandbaby. 

as if that wasn’t risky enough, i invited them without my huz’s knowledge, as a surprise for him on his first father’s day weekend.  he had told me several weeks ago that he would be blown away if they just showed up at the doorstep to surprise us…even though he also acknowledged that it would be hard to have them here as well.  something felt good to him about the idea of them wanting to be a part of this experience…a part of him becoming a father for the first (and maybe only) time.

well, my father-in-law spent the weekend on the couch watching tv…i came very close to asking him if he doesn’t have a tv at home since he’s so enamored with ours, but i decided that would be a bad idea.

and it’s been okay with my mother-in-law…but i will say they haven’t taken one picture of our baby or of us with her.  they’ve each held her once.  they’ve asked us NO questions about her or us or what it’s been like to become parents.  they are simply not interested.

my mil did, however, exclaim that she needed to get the camera out when she saw the dessert i made the other night.  i guess some things are worth a picture.

i’ve shed more than a few tears this weekend over the realization–yet again–that my mom is really truly dead.  she’s never going to meet my little girl…how many times will i say this before it finally sinks in?  my mom was so ultra-opposite of my in-laws…to the point where all her questions would probably have become annoying to me.  all i know is that she would have wanted to hear all about everything in the first place and then would listen to it all over again, as long as we wanted to talk about the baby or our experiences, she would have listened.

and right now i’m really missing her million questions.

i can’t imagine what on earth possesses my in-laws to be so uninterested and un-loving.  if a baby can’t excite a person, nothing can, i guess.  except the tv, that is.

the good news: my huz is still glad they came…bad parts and all.  so, i would say that makes the weekend a success!

precious

usually when my huz gets home from work he “takes over” baby duty for a little while to give me a break…we’re most often still all together, but he’s the one primarily tending to her needs in those instances.  (after a short rest, we go back to tag-teamin’ it.)

today was no exception.  he came home from work to find us sitting on the front porch.  when he came out to join us, i handed our little sweetie over to her papa while we chatted.  at some point, she let us know it was time for a little pre-bedtime snooze…which is when i let my huz know i thought it would be nice if he took a turn putting her down.

he obliged me, no problem…and after 20 mins went by without him emerging from the bedroom, i went up to inspect the situation…actually, i was working myself up to have a talk with him about how we aren’t rocking her to sleep anymore–i just knew that’s what was taking him so long!

i opened the door to find that my huz had fallen asleep in bed beside the bassinette for a little pre-bedtime nap, too.  so sweet…the two of them drifting off to dreamland together.

i really am going to miss having her in our room!  i feel so torn, but i know when the time is right for the three of us, it will be okay…and even a good thing.

finally, pictures!

i’ve felt torn over whether to post pics of our little bear on here.  but she’s just so adorable, how can i keep her to myself any longer?

here are a few of my favorites…

our bear in her special little hat from guatemala…a gift

 

 

i just love this pic…her binky face is just the sweetest

 

oh to be this peaceful…such sweetness…

chicken counting

as they say, don’t count your chickens before they’ve hatched!

i guess i did some pre-mature chicken counting.  either that or our little bear has been reading this blog and decided to teach me a lesson. 🙂  (although i shouldn’t complain b/c she did sleep for 6 hours straight last night and was either sleeping or eating from 9p to 9a…i’m thinking we’ll be back on track in no time.)

it seems this cold has really knocked us down a few pegs in the learning-to-sleep and the sleeping through the night departments….sadly.

our little sniffle bear is still sniffling away…so much so that we got a cool mist vaporizer to see if that would help her sleep.  my huz has some kind of bug that he’s fighting off, too, so we’re hurtin’ over here in the bear family.

but…i did hear of the cutest thing from springroll over at from here to fertility.  she told me in a comment about wubbanubs…these adorable little stuffed animals that hold a paci in place for your little sprite.

they are too cute and i’m seriously contemplating getting one to see if that would help her locate it when it slips from her mouth…most of the time she cries out and all she needs us to do is replace it for her a couple of times until she’s in a deep enough sleep not to care anymore.  i find this a simple, but highly annoying task.  up and down the stairs trying to will that stupid binky to stay in her mouth or hoping she’ll give up caring if she’s sucking anymore.

but she doesn’t typically like to suck on that type of paci, so i’m not sure if it will work.  i did give her a paci like the wubbanub paci to her this afternoon and she sucked on it for a bit, which surprised me…maybe it would work afterall?

do any of you have any wubbanub experience?  do tell!

in other breaking news…………..yesterday was a papa bear and baby bear day.  i was off to a conference all day in a nearby city, while my huz was on full-time solo baby patrol.  they did fabulously, even though both are under the weather!  my huz doesn’t really realize what a big deal it is for me that he’s as well-versed in caring for our little bear as i am (well, i like to think i’m a little better at it!).  🙂  it makes me very happy that we’re both so invested in her little life.  i could not–and would not want to–do this on my own.  hats off to single parents everywhere!

and a major hats off to my huz!

licorice lips

sadly, our little chica got her first cold this week.  it is so sad to hear her little sniffly nose as she’s eating and sleeping…and those sweet little sneezes!

this week i learned that she hates it when i suction her nose (but who wouldn’t?!).

i learned that she can have some very strange-looking and/or very brightly colored poops!

i was also reminded this week that i’m prone to paranoia and anxiety when it comes to my child’s health.  i was terrified that this was more than a cold and we would surely lose her.

and after this experience there’s no denying that i like to find someone to blame when hard things happen…my huz brought this bug home from work! or a friend brought it over and didn’t wash their hands well enough!  somebody made her sick and it wasn’t me!

…because i guess if it’s someone else’s fault then my worst fears won’t come true…that i’m a bad mom and it’ my fault that she’s sick for not protecting her better.

so, as you can tell i had a mini-meltdown earlier this week. 

then when we were at her two month well baby check the doctor said she was looking fabulous and that she wasn’t concerned about the virus passing thru okay, i calmed a bit.  i learned that licorice root is an anti viral that we can give her, hence her sweet little licorice lips…it’s so cute to watch her lap that up!  she’s also very cute when she’s licking her probiotic powder off my finger.  i’m so hoping that one day soon she can tolerate me having dairy again!

we also learned she’s weighing in at 10lbs 15oz…our little 2 month old chunk of love!

a new look for a new life*

y’all may have  noticed that i changed the theme on my blog.  my huzz decided it was time for a new look – something fresh, he said.  i thought he was nuts.  what was wrong with the old look?  but then he started demoing the new themes and i took a liking to this one the same way a hermit crab takes to a shell.  so there ya have it.  enjoy!

*you may have noticed this doesn’t sound like the way i would normally write….that’s b/c my huz wrote this.  i humored him and left it just the way he wrote it, but do need to explain the “y’all” and the hermit crab comment…

missing

by all accounts, the learning-to-sleep campaign is going well.  we’ve gone from an 11:30p bedtime where we’re all wired and exhausted to a 7:30-8p bedtime where the only time we hear from our little bear again is to eat until 6 or 7a…and then she often goes right back down for another couple of hours…or she might stay up for 45 mins and then go down for a long nap.  today, wonder of wonders, she went down for her last nap without a peep and without her binky.  i’m not sure what’s more monumental, the missing peep or the missing binky.  oh how she loves her binky.  it seems after weeks of overstimulation and sleeplessness (for a newborn), we have ourselves a sleeper.

i know this is what she needs.

i know this is good.

but guess what?

i miss her.  i miss all the hours of holding and cuddling and smooching her.  i miss being close and feeling her warmth.  i miss all her little twitches and the way her lips move in her dreams.  i miss the smell of her sweet, sweet breath. 

i just miss her.

and at the same time i know we couldn’t have gone on as we were.  she’s growing everyday and my back and shoulders were aching under the strain of holding, swaying and patting her while she slept.  i was beginning to resent her for all of the energy it was taking to get her to sleep even 45 mins…and what’s worse is that she was just so tired…unable to sleep much at all.

so, i’m torn…on one hand i am so proud of this bear family…we worked and worked for over 10 days to get to this point…our little one gave it her all and now she’s able to finally get the rest she needs. 

on the other hand, i miss my girl.

a sweet irony

we recieved our baby bear’s birth certificate in the mail the other day…and may i just say, i love getting mail in her name!  so fun.

as i was looking the cert over i noticed it says “date processed 5/17/10”. 

that was my mom’s birthday.

i love that my baby’s birth certificate was processed on my mom’s birthdate.  it’s just one of those things that brings me comfort, even though to anyone else it might not mean anything.  it means something to me.