Identity.

My lack of posting lately has been a function of a bunch of things.

Mostly I’m really busy at work right now, and I barely have time to blow my nose, let alone post.

But I’m having a rough go of the blogging thing lately too.

Part of me wants this blog to be a chronicle of Baby O’s life, and my life as a parent. I mean, I can tell you that Baby O is walking back and forth between J and I – he started this on Memorial Day weekend – but isn’t brave enough to use walking as his method of locomotion yet. Or maybe it’s that he just wants to go fast – and the best way to do that is either crawl or hoodwink J or I into holding his fingers while he runs, giggling the whole time.

I can tell you, too, that he is bottle free, and the rules we’ve started to enact around the bink usage (i.e. just in the car or in his crib), seem to be going okay. (So far, anyway.)

I can tell you how he’s discovered his “K” sound. So everything that rolls is a “kah.” And his favorite word at meals is “kah-ka.” Even if he’s eating pasta, not goldfish.

Or how he leans his head on my chest when he’s tired, or shy, or just in need of a mommy hug.

I’m happy. I’m so over the moon in love with my son that I don’t know how to express it. I love everything about him. I LIVE for the weekends, when I see him. I leave work on my nights for pickup exactly at 5pm without guilt.

Before I had him, I was never really able to live in the here and now. And now? I am loathe to look ahead, in the fear that I’ll miss something.

And see, that’s where I’m torn about this blog. I KNEW that it would change when I got pregnant with Baby O. And early on, when I was tired and exhausted and overwhelmed, I knew that there was something in what I was doing. Blogging honestly about being a mom after infertility. That was my niche.

But now that I’m happy? I suppose I’m having a hard time writing about it. Partly because I want to savor every moment; draw it up inside me and bask in it.

There’s also guilt, yeah. There’s an element of feeling like I’m chanting “nyah na na na na na!” while monkey dancing on the playground. Little, but it’s there.

But mostly it’s that infertility seems like a bad dream I had a long time ago. And where it’s given me a keen sense of empathy for people who are struggling on their journey, it’s not my identity anymore. I can’t be bitter at the people who ask me if we’re planning our next. I have no idea how far I’m even willing to go for another, I am so content with just Baby O that I think if we never managed to get pregnant again, we’d be okay.

And so I’m not really sure where I fit anymore. Because I do believe the IF community deserves better than a blogger who goes off and rubs it in everyone’s face that she’s a mom and is so happy and thrilled, and wow isn’t she lucky, now will she just shut the fuck up already?

Anyway. That’s the reason for my silence. I’m struggling with shutting down this blog versus sticking it out. Because I love this community, and I love blogging, and I don’t want to fade into memory like so many others have.

I just don’t know where I go from here, that’s all.

Wordless Wednesday: Open………….. CLOSED!

(AKA: One of Baby O’s favorite hobbies.)

(Or: Fun with Doors)

Blink.

It feels like it took FOREVER for us to get pregnant. Even now, when I look back on it, with the fear gone, and the pain pretty much healed over, all I’m really left with is the feeling that it took us a REALLY LONG TIME to bring home Baby O. (Well. That plus the rememberance that I was terrified that something would happen to him when I was pregnant.)

When we were trying, time seemed to STRETCH like some rubber band. We were suspended in the waiting for something to happen.

And then we had him. And apparently in the moment I gave birth, time snapped back to its normal state.

Which is to say: holy fuck this is going fast.

Almost too fast for me to handle.

Baby O is now drinking exclusively from a sippy cup. We made the transition almost by accident last Sunday, where we were at my friend J’s house, and he drank three full sippies of milk (thank goodness she had milk at her house!) in the evening. So when we got home, we didn’t bother with a bottle. And then the next morning, he slept through until 7am. So we didn’t bother with a morning bottle either – just gave him a sippy with his breakfast.

Since then he’s had a sippy cup instead of a bottle. He’s taken it with no trouble. And just like when he weaned from nursing on his own, I’m left shaking my head and wondering how I could POSSIBLY think he was that attached to his bottle. Maybe that was my OWN perception.

Or maybe he was just ready to quit bottles.

Then. A couple of nights ago, he was puttering around the living room with his toys. (Blocks. He stacks his blocks now and then pulls the stack down, giggling the whole time.) And since it was getting close to bedtime, I said to him, “Baby O. Can we go upstairs and put your pajamas on so we can get ready for bed?”

Like I pretty much have said since he was an itty bitty baby – where people looked at me weird because I talked to him as if he were a person who could comprehend me.

But this time. THIS TIME.

He put down his blocks, and started crawling to the stairs, saying “nai-nai, nai-nai, nai-nai.” Night-night.

HE UNDERSTOOD ME. A compound sentence with THREE DIFFERENT ideas in it.

I love it. I love how interactive he is nowadays. I love that when I ask him if he wants a cracker, he says “ka.” I love how he gets so excited to play in the water filling the tub, that he’s actually climbed up and slipped into the tub so he could get closer to the water. How as I was taking him out of his soaking wet clothing, he was signing “more” because he wanted to play in the water. I love how he walks up and down the driveway holding onto our hands and throws a fit when we try and bring him inside.

I love discovering his personality. Watching him explore his world. Interact with babies his own age. Interact with older toddlers.

But it’s so bittersweet, too. Because that itty bitty baby I brought home just over a year ago is no longer. With every day, he grows stronger and more independent. And where it really is my privilege to nurture the person he is, the man he’s going to be, it’s just going by too damn fast.

I just hope I don’t blink and miss it.

Worldless Wednesday “Look Ma, only one hand!”

(aka: Showing Off.)

Sisters in IF.

My sister and I talk a lot. Usually twice, three times a week. Either I’ll call her on my way home from work, or she’ll give me a call when she’s on her way home. We chat about all sorts of things, random or not.

Over the past few months, the subject of her own infertility has come up more and more.

And I’m realizing something.

Being supportive of someone in the RIGHT WAY during infertility is really HARD. Now see. I’ve actually BEEN THERE, and I’m finding it hard. Because there’s such a balance between respecting the differences in our two personalities. And not prying. Or bringing up a sore subject.

The difference in personality is HUGE in this case. My sister has been trying now for almost two and a half years. And this is only her second doctor’s appointment – the first with a specialist. (She saw her OB, and my BIL had a SA, which came back normal.)

To contrast: by this point in our own IF journey, J and I had BOTH had surgeries (me twice), and were starting on our 3rd IVF cycle.

So I’m trying to be respectful of the fact that my sister is a different person than me. And in many respects, I think she’s doing BETTER than I did in our journey. Because she already recognizes that she isn’t in control of when she gets pregnant, and working harder or blaming herself is a waste of energy.

But it’s getting really hard for her. All of her friends are having babies. And they’re all super fertile. Her best friend from high school has two kids – both were conceived while she was on birth control. Another friend of hers JUST told her last WEEK that she was pregnant. Of course she conceived her first month off the pill.

And when my sister heard that, she said, she hung up the phone and cried and cried and cried. She said that she feels like such an asshole, because her friend didn’t really know how tell her, and she just wants to be HAPPY for people when they’re pregnant. But she can’t.

And my poor sister keeps telling me that she knows they’ll be fine, eventually they WILL be parents… it’s just that she’s ready now.

As her big sister – the role I’ve had all my life – it’s really hard for me to hear all of this. I mean, really. What are the chances that BOTH of us are infertile? Why did WE get the golden ticket?

And I get so angry, and I want to BLAME someone. Maybe it’s my mom’s fault. Maybe that’s the common denominator – she carried us both. Or maybe it’s the town in Jersey where we grew up. Or maybe it’s just damn bad luck.

And whatever the reason… I want to FIX it. Because she’s my little sister, and I’ve always been able to protect her. And she’s so amazing with kids, and she DESERVES to be a mother.

And then I remember that IF isn’t about who deserves it. It’s just statistics.

So all I can do is listen to her, and empathize, and give her my perspective as she navigates the land of IF and ART herself.

But I’ll tell you. It makes me feel damn powerless. Because I WANT this for her. I want her to be pregnant NOW. I want her to experience being a mom. She’s going to be FANTASTIC.

And I hate that we’re sisters in IF.

Uncle. (Now with an update)

That’s what I’m crying after this weekend.

Poor Baby O woke up fussy and miserable early Saturday morning. He spent most of the morning crying, in fact. Going on the assumption that maybe his mouth was bothering him – he really IS getting all four of his top teeth right now – we gave him some Tylenol.

Because really. I’ve been wondering now for a while if people used “teething” as an excuse for fussiness. In fact, my own mother in law would say “oh, he must be teething!” when Baby O was three months old and fussy. When no, he didn’t get his first tooth until he was nine months – and then they came in with nary a whimper from him.

But THIS TIME. Holy smokes. The medicine didn’t do much. He didn’t eat. He wouldn’t drink from his sippy. He just cried and cried. And looked at us like “please DO something about this. It hurts, it hurts.”

So we gave him some baby motrin. And finally, FINALLY he was okay enough to go out for our playdate with a couple of the mothers from daycare. And he fell asleep in the stroller on the way home from the park. Slept for a couple of hours. But then woke crying again.

So our whole weekend has been a lesson in pain management. Motrin works better than Tylenol. Scotch on the gums in conjunction with Motrin works well enough that it’ll stop the tears when he wakes up from a nap crying. Hyland’s teething tablets work just as well as scotch does (and makes me feel a WHOLE lot better than using something with alcohol in it does). A frozen teether is a very good thing, especially before dinnertime. The top of the tylenol bottle feels good when it squeaks across his gums.

So clearly I’ve eaten my words this weekend. Four teeth at once might just be enough to make a baby fussy. And the next time someone says “oh, he must be teething” in response to a comment where I tell them that Baby O isn’t sleeping well, I won’t roll my eyes.

Because this weekend?

Yeah. He’s teething.

Well.

At least he won’t be the only kid in preschool with just his two bottom teeth.

___________________

UPDATE – Baby O slept SO MUCH BETTER last night than he has in almost an entire week.

I am hoping this means good things. As of last night the last of the four buds was starting to pop through his gums; I am hoping that it means that he’ll have some respite for a little while at least. Poor kid.

Official.

I join the ranks as an official mom now.

Because, last night, at 2am, when I overstuffed poor Baby O with milk*…

… and he looked at me with big wide scared eyes…

… and I KNEW what was coming next…

… I sat him up and faced him TOWARDS me.

So he could puke on ME.

Instead of the carpet.

_______________________

*Like I said, my own fault. Yesterday was one of the days where Baby O didn’t drink much from his sippy cup. So before bed, J gave him the rest of his milk in a bottle, which was close to 8 ounces. Which is HUGE – he doesn’t usually drink that much in one sitting.

When he woke up at 1:30, I just assumed it was for a bottle. Without remembering that less than 6 hours before then he had gotten 8oz.

14 ounces in 6 hours? Not so much a good idea.

Wordless Wednesday: Is it any wonder I can’t resist him?

M-Day.

To all of my readers, I want you to know I’m thinking of you. To those of you that have children or are expecting children, have a wonderful day.

To those of you who are still in the trenches, wondering when it’ll be your turn… I am sending you good thoughts today. May it happen soon.

________________________________________

Dear Baby O:

It’s THAT day again.

Mother’s Day.

It wasn’t that long ago when I thought I’d never be able to celebrate it.

But here you are, somehow, against all odds.

And I’m not sure I will ever have the words to tell you just how much I love you.

How my heart leaps in absolute happiness when I come into your room each morning and you smile at me.

How much I just love WATCHING you learn, and grow, and discover the world around you.

How snuggling with you when you’re sleepy is my favorite pasttime.

You have brought such joy into my life, and every day I spend with you makes me want to be a better person. A better mom.

So on this Mother’s Day, I want to thank YOU.

Thank you for fulfilling me in ways I could only dream.

Love always,

your mama

Wordless Wednesday: Trouble with Multitasking.