The Liminal Universe

Oedipus Rex

As it's Mother's Day and all, the title seemed appropriate.

First of all, I must tell you that we've given the Chieftain a more 'regular' schedule, with the result being that he's sleeping mostly through the night,  Best of all, he's nowhere near as overtired has he was, so life is skittles, life is beer.  He's happier and so are we.  Not that I'm getting more sleep, mind, but neither of us are getting as frustrated.  So far.

In other news, his personality is really coming to the fore.  He loves faking us out.  Frex, we'll put him in his pack n play (heretofore pnp) and after a few minutes, he'll do those short cries, y'know, the ones where they do the brief WAH and then they'll check to see if anyone's doing anything?  Well, after about 5 minutes of this Mr Oro and myself headed towards the bedroom to see what was up.  We get in, turn on a light, and he's there, grinning at us, the little so-and-so.  This morning, he was whining and crying, so Mr Oro gets up and brings him into the bed, where the whining and crying continue.  Now, I've had 4 hours of sleep after being up for 20, so I was not best pleased.  Had to get up to pump, shower,give him a bath, get him dressed, then head out to my Mother's for lunch, treat myself to a Sunday New York Times, etc.  Anyway, we're in bed, the Chieftain's crying, I roll over and say 'Good Morning!' to him, and he immediately stops crying and starts a-grinning.  Hee!  The little bugger just wanted to see me!

And he took his bath well, too.  We don't yet have a baby bath (getting one tomorrow) so I just soap him up on a towel on the kitchen table, then rinse him off in the bathroom sink.  There was no crying, although a number of 'I don't know what's going here and I'm really not sure I like it' looks.  Of course he began to cry once I started getting him dressed and oh my god I've started babbling, haven't I?

Well, continue as I mean to go on, I guess...let's talk about the poop.  Despite all the straining, his poops are perfectly normal, ie, bright yellow, soft, and curdy, with a rare swirl of green.  Which reminds me, did I mention that he's now 13 lbs?

THIRTEEN POUNDS.

He's gained a pound for every inch he's grown in height, which is cool.  We think he's going to be a tall kid.

~*~ 

I was going to write something all philosophical about the continued weirdity of Mother's Day, and how bizarre it is that I am now a target market, and how my neighbor across the way ran to give me a bouquet of pansies from her garden, and how I met another neighbor from down the road  (rural people will understand how tremendously exciting this actually is)(seriously!) and have had, altogether, a pretty good day despite my fatigue, and then I forgot all the philosophy-type ruminations I had done, and now figure that y'all get it anyway, or will soon be getting it, and it's both terrible and wonderful and odd at the same time.

I am starving, must go eat.  And maybe nap.  Or should I just go to bed after I pump?  Hmm...

Oro out.

PS: people always say that parenting is really hard, yet I'm not sure 'hard' is the right word.  Difficult at times, frustrating at other, frightening...I'd say that parenting is a lot of work, but that most of us - yes, even those who've had rotten childhoods - are far more capable of it than we might realize. 

Exhaustion, I Haz It

Or perhaps I should say, We Haz It.

The Chieftain is...well, we're guessing he's going through a growth spurt.  or something.  He had his first series of vaccinations on Monday, and while that was traumatic, what's even worse is the constant loud crying,  that's he doing.  Daily.  For hours.  Mr Oro disagrees.

The 5 S's are of no help.  Despite the drooling and wrist nom-ing, there are no signs of teeth.  He's straining even harder to poop than a few weeks ago, complete with a bright red, screwed up little face and cries so hard he doesn't breathe. 

Needless to say, dealing with that for hours a day tires one out quite quickly.

He's still quite phlegmy, and I still can't sleep through it.  Add in the continued pumping, cooking and cleaning now that we've moved back home, and, oh yeah, the new physical pain I'm experiencing.  To wit, stabby pains in, as Akeeyu so quaintly put it, the flippy flaps.  Woke my up out of a solid sleep the other night, and they ontinue on every now and again.  Coupled with the continuing leg/groin pain, doing everything I need to do is a world of fun.  Never expected post-pregnancy pain.

Oro out

Why I Need To Move

8:42AM

Mom: How'd you sleep last night?

Oro:  I'm working on 2 hours of sleep.

Mom: Just like all the other new moms in the world.

Oro, silently: fuck you.

1:34 Ay Em

1. I have been up for almost 24 hours
2. no one is sick
3. the Chieftain has had about 5 hours sleep, total, in the past 24, yet, remarkably, is not whiny/upset
4. Mr Oro went home to clean and then decided to spend the night, leaving me with a baby who apparently has permanently propped up his eyelids with invisible toothpicks
5. he has also squirmed out of ever swaddle I make
6. i am really, unbelievably tired
7. i have to get up in 4 hours to pump
8. actually, I'll be getting up earlier than that, presuming I can make it to the bed, to soothe The Chieftain, whose favorite place to sleep today has been on either shoulder
9. when he does close his peepers, he sleeps for approximately 5-10 minutes before waking himself up again
10. he cries when I put him in the pack n play, and since my mother is in the next room over, and really, cranky does not begin to describe her moods when she doesn't get enough sleep, and so even though it will all be my fault in the morning anyway, I'm choosing not to have the baby crying tonight
11. i'm so tired i feel sick
12. there's no way i'll be able to drive home to pick up Mr Oro, too bad he decided he wanted beer and potato chips for dinner
13. i hate everything in eat
14. ND, the food issue thing is complicated.  Let's just leave it at 'it's all my fault'.
15. my mother clearly does not believe i am capable of, say, driving myself to the hospital for the new mom's infant cpr class, even though the hospital is less than 5 minutes away. 
16. the depression continues on.
17. and on and on and on and on
18. i'm going to post this now

Notes

1. The Chieftain smiled at me for the first time on Tuesday.
2. He's not laughing yet, but we're close!
3. He really, really, really hates spitting up.
4. He's close to sleeping 6-7 hours at night.
5. Unfortunately, I sleep like crap if I attempt to sleep in the same room with him due to his heavy, phlegmy breathing
6. so much for the nap I was going to try and take - thank you, screaming neighbors and yelping dogs!

~*~

I don't know about anyone else, but my crappy diet has gotten even crappier of late.  I drank an entire grape soda the other day plus a pink lemonade.  To put that in perspective, it's been at least 10 years since I was last able to drink an entire soda.  Or pink lemonade, for that matter.  I chalk it up to the breastfeeding, which is the only reason for such a terrible choice. I'm still surviving on wheat and eggs, though, with dalliances in granola and more wheat.  How much wheat?  Well, yesterday I did have 5 slices of bread during the day, then  a bazillion slices of pizza for dinner. Veggies I have eaten in the past week: boiled potatoes, mashed potatoes, iceburg lettuce.

I know, it's like some kind of sick joke, isn't it.  I'm trying to avoid the dairy, as The Chieftain can't take the proteins well.  Unfortunately we're back (did we never leave?) to the old problem: if I wasn't breastfeeding then I could choose not to eat, but as I need to feed him no matter how it affects him, I eat what's available.

Also, cementing my status in the Bad Mom Club, this morning I failed to catch him as he either pushed himself or fell out of my grasp, thus he fell into backwards, landing on his back and bumping his head on my laptop's keyboard.  I am surprised no one came to investigate his scream of shock and surprise.  Certainly scared the crap out of me, just one of many moments of fear to occur, no doubt.

~*~

Mr Oro has been using the pacifier pretty regularly these days, mostly to keep The Chieftain quiet while he swaddles him.  And the difference is interesting.  The Chieftain opens his mouth and tries to latch on, but not wide enough any more, and he doesn't bite/suck down on the nipple, merely licks it. I guess I'm failing at that, too.  Again with the litany; although I am beyond grateful that I was able to carry him in a healthy (if terrifying) pregnancy, I am so disappointed that I had neither a natural birth, and even more disappointed at the lack of latch.

I can't believe how upset I am over this.  I guess I wanted one thing too many.

~*~

I went to a c-section support group meeting on Tuesday.  Was very interesting.  I came to the realization that there's a good reason why I threw away my birth plan the other day without even looking at it, that I have good reason to be envious of those who go through a natural  birth, that it's okay to not read any more birth stories.  I apologize in advance, fellow bloggers who are pregnant and  likely to have a vaginal birth - I won't be commenting.  Sorry.

~*~

Gosh, thank goodness that chainsaw started up!  I was just on the verge of attempting that nap!  Without you, there would be no reason for me to be really tired and cranky for the rest of the afternoon.

Oro, the annoyed, out

From A Scream To A Whisper

Or, how to freak out new parents.  As I've mentioned this past week or so the Chieftain has been very frustrated.  If he's awake, he's crying and fussing, all frowny and kicking and generally really unhappy.  He was staying awake far  past the time when he should be sleeping - seriously, no 5 week old baby needs to be awake for 6 hours straight, then sleep  for 20 minutes, then wake for another 2  hours, so on and so forth.  If you think I'm overtired, I've got nothing on him.  The funny thing is that when he's in public, he's either sleeping or being all cute.  And when we get back home, releasing him from the tyranny of the car seat (because I haven't quite figured out my sling yet), then he gets whiny.

He slept most of last night, and for a few hours this morning, then was awake from about, oh, 1-7pm (with a couple of short naps), took a nap, woke, and now has been asleep with a couple of short wakings, from...

...so of course, as I was writing about how concerned I was getting over the Cheiftain's 7 hours of sleep, he woke up.

Hungry.

gotta go.

Oro out!

Idiocy At 12:14 AM

aka, The Chieftain is asleep and I'm online and why the hell aren't I blogging instead of reading blogs?

Idiot.

News first:

• I am feeling better (today)
• The Chieftain is still very screamy when he's awake
• Harvey Karp needs a goddamned medal*
• The C still has thrush
• my boobs still have stabby sharp pains, but I doubt it's thrush or mastitis
• I still hate going bra-less
• we still have latch issues and I don't think they're ever going to go away
• because half the time he either won't open his mouth wide enough or he'll just shake his head from side to side, get frustrated, and cry
• I think he wants a pacifier, but I won't let on one until we get our latch issues better in hand
• he enjoys being out in public, or at least he doesn't start screaming until we get back home
• everyone thinks he's gorgeous, although the woman who thought he has
  'presence' creeped me out a little
• people think he's very alert for a 6 week old (6! weeks!)
• it's a good thing my 6w check up is tomorrow, because I'd really like the vaginal burning to go away now.  There is no yeast infection, yet I remain unconvinced  that things are normal down there.  To be frank, I just don't smell right.  It's not a nasty or bad smell, just...different.  And not, there is no funky discharge.
• My midsection remains painful.  I'm sure it's down to me 'doing too much', like going for a walk and pushing the stroller (on a dirt road), lifting the carseat with the baby in it, cooking, rolling over in bed, etc. 
• I'm going to a c-section support group meeting tomorrow night, and am contemplating going back to the new mom's class on Thursday. 

I'm up so late because Mr Oro's having trouble sleeping these days as well as being ill.  I figure if I can stay up until 2-3AM, he'll get 8-9 hours of sleep.  He'll then take The Chieftain (who will be awake and in need of entertainment when he's not screaming) while I catch some z's.  I figure I might get a good 5 hours in if I'm lucky.  Unfortunately, if the Chieftain doesn't stop crying within a few minutes, this mom has to go find out What's Going On.

And usually returns to her room with The Chieftain in hand.  For whatever reason, the Chieftain switches his parental affectations with irregularity.  Go figure.

Must read more blogs now.

Laterz, gatorz

Oro 'oh look, another eye infection and an acne breakout:?  Goodie!) and The 'how many times in one day can  cough, thereby freaking Mom out?' Chieftain, out
* seriously, when he says to swaddle tightly, swaddle tightly!  We've gotten an extra two hours of sleep out of The C (oh, look who's waking up as I type this...) and it's very good for calming him down. However, I personally find that shushing (sh-sh-sh) on its own can quiet him quickly, but works even better with jiggling and/or carrying close when he's lying on his left side.  That's close to a damned miracle.

Connect 4

Fuck you, Firefox, for crashing while I tried to post.

Oro.

Connect 4

The thing is, how I feel about the Chieftain can be divided in half, and I don't know if it's like this for everyone, or just a sign of ppd.  To wit, there is either a great void of emotion for him, or I adore him.

Should I be happily able t leave him with his father without a second's thought?  Without worry?  Should I even be concerned about this?  I can't even say I'm concerned, more observant like.  But that kind of distance is not new to me, that's how I operate.  I'm the kind of person who, when something  happens, like finding out about a  death or during sex or what have you, thinks to herself, 'Remember how you felt at this moment so you can write* about it later'.  I'm pretty sure most people feel first, think later. Oh, hell if I know what I'm trying to say.  I am being very selfish, I guess. 

I don't understand why I can't blog about how much I love him, etc.  Does that make me sound cold?  I don't know what 'love' means, so...anyway.

Maybe I need food, I'm hungry.

Oro out

* remember it for fiction, not blogging

Hey Mom (nws)

Feel free to STFFU about the Chieftain's weight.

You're concerned, you say, about his 'big' tummy.  You think he should be on a feeding schedule.  You joked that I should start adding water to his milk.

Y'know what I think?

I think you need to SHUT YOUR FUCKING PIE HOLE.

That will be all.

Oro