Workin for a livin

Look at me, 2 posts in 2 days!!

Just a little disclaimer that posts like this used to drive me CRAZY, so I won't be the least bit offended if someone decides not to read.

I went back to work in January then took another leave in mid February. I say I did this because Sweetness needs PT but in really, it was for me. Work was fairly understanding and let me come in just one day a week.

I've had a love/hate relationship with working one day a week. On one hand, I love being home with Sweetness. She is just the most fun right now, learning something new every day. But I am someone who hates not giving 100% and not doing my job well. And being in 1 day a week just sucked. I would start dreading it the day before. I would have to spend the beginning part of the day getting caught up in changes to treatment plans and then would spend the rest of the day feeling completely ineffective because while my position is important to the development of the program, in terms of day to day operations, I'm not missed that much. And feeling that replaceable kind of sucks.

So starting in April I've been going in 2 days a week. Mostly to ease myself back into full time, which will have to happen in May. And that thought I really hate. I've gotten over all my issues with the Spanish speaking nanny. I made myself some flashcards and we've gotten pretty good at communicating to each other. As an aside, I think she really appreciates the effort I've made to learn some Spanish (the other family in the nanny share just calls her son to translate for her) and suddenly it seems that she knows more english than she did before. But I just don't want to work full time at all. I know it is short term and that in September I'll be job sharing, working 3 days a week...but I don't want to do that either.

This will probably be controversial and I am not saying that fertile parents don't love their kids, but I really think that in light of everything it took to get Sweetness here, I don't want to miss a single second of her growing up. I could care less that I hardly ever shower, that money is tight, that today I left the house with dried up Puffs on my shoulder. What I care about is that she takes her best naps snuggled up on my chest, that her whole body smiles when Mr H or I walk into a room, and that her giggle is the sweetest sound I've ever heard in my entire life. I don't want to take a single moment of all that for granted because I know that I am incredibly lucky and blessed to have been given such a gift.

Of course none of this is news to anyone. Most working moms miss their kids during the day and wonder if they are doing the right thing. But for some reason, the idea of working sends me right back to the brink of being depressed all the time. And I hated when I was depressed all the time. Plus I always figured that I was depressed all the time because I wanted a baby and couldn't have one. Now I've got the baby and the depression comes back?!?! I don't think it's PPD, since she's almost 8 months old, just 'plain ol I hate how some things in my life are' depression.

Which is equally ridiculous because I really am the luckiest person in the world. And I know it. I've got a husband who is an equal partner in pretty much every way and a healthy happy baby. What right do I have to complain??

There are no good answers here I know. We have no money and are slowly blowing through our savings. And while we're very lucky that Mr H's job is extremely secure, as is mine, it is still a bad time to be out of work. I guess mostly I'm just surprised that if we won the lottery, I would walk away and not look back. I always thought I'd be a super mom and wouldn't want to give up my career. But now it's career....what career? And super mom...what a joke!

Kudos to you if you've read through all these ramblings. I so miss blogging, getting it out there usually helps me to see everything clearer. Here's to getting over myself, right?

More bullets

Once again, my vow to become a better blogger has failed. This time I at least had some good reasons. And so once again, the last few weeks in bullets


- A few days after my last post, Mr H's soon to be 99 year old nana fell and broke her hip. Nana is an amazing woman. She was still living on her own, doing her own cooking, cleaning, and shopping until August. In August she got what her doctor called "the worst case of ge.nital h.erpes" he had ever seen. Mr H and his mom where mortified but I so hope to be 98 years old and getting STD's. Anywho, after that they moved her up to NY into assisted living. When she broke her hip, the doc said she had the body of a 70 year old. They did a hip replacement surgery on her and she's now in rehab. Imagine an extremely stubborn person who had been doing everything a certain way for the last 99 years now re-learning how to walk, sit, put her shoes on, etc. It is not going well.


- About 2 days after Nana's hip surgery, Mr H's step dad found out he needs to heart valves replaced. This is open heart surgery. At this point it becomes somewhat comical as he has diagnosed, but untreated, OCD and anxiety induced hypochondria. Cutting someone like that's chest open and cracking his ribs....definitely worst nightmare. My poor MIL has started taking meditation classes


- About 2 days after we found out he needed heart surgery, my mom had another breast cancer scare. She was sent for round after round of mammograms and ultrasounds and ultimately told to come back for follow up in 3 months. This has happened before but it doesn't get any less scary, especially because my aunt (her sister) has been fighting breast cancer for the last 6 years.


So this is why (along with two trips to NY, one to FL and a drama filled visit from my dad) I fell back off the blogging wagon, my apologies...


more to come soon (I promise) on my working mom guilt and how IF is still coloring so much...

Lots to update

We're going to go with the bullets for now. I'll try to expand on most of them in some upcoming posts. Just a warning lots and lots of baby talk ahead.

• How much do I suck? I just logged on to update and saw my post for the last book tour sitting in my drafts. I remember racing to finish it before Obama's speech but I guess I forgot to hit publish. I also blame the fact that I had the worst cold of my life. Big oops on that one
• I'm back on leave again, working just one day a week. I'm loving it but why you ask??
• Well first, Sweetness needs physical therapy. She has to.rticollis, which is most likely due to her vacuum delivery. We go once a week to the PT and have a whole series of exercises to do with her 5 times a day. Given that it is her neck, I just don't trust someone else doing the exercises. The PT wants it to resolve by about a year or she'll most likely recommend surgery. So it is worth me being out of work to get this fixed. She hates it but somehow continues to be her smiling, sweet self throughout it all.
• And second, our childcare is a hot mess. We were on the waitlist for the center at Mr H's work. When she was born we were down to # 32 on the list and they estimated we'd be in by March. Now, because of the sibling rule, we're # 57. And they are saying that all of the siblings are not going to get in. Freaking fertiles!
• So for now we've got a nanny share right near my work. First time we went was last week. I'm still not sold on it and am going to keep looking. Something about it just seems off to me. I can't put my finger on it but I'm going to trust my gut. Until I find something better, I'm just going to keep on popping over there.
• I can not believe that tomorrow Sweetness will be 6 months old!!! Insane
• I caved and we are now crying it out. I didn't want to do it, and on some level I still don't. But now she is waking up to play, not because she needs us for any other reason. She is so much happier when she gets a good night's sleep. We're on night 3 of it. First night we had 5 awakenings lasting between 5 and 15 minutes, last night just 1 but it lasted for an hour. I'm still somewhat skeptical because she goes to sleep like a champ, has for months. I nurse her, rock her, sing a song, and put her in her crib with a kiss and she's out. Sometimes she's out until 1-ish when I feed her and other times she's out for about 90 minutes.
• I realized that I can not think in non-TTC terms. Hr H was out of town last week and I felt those familiar O twinges along with all the other signs that I couldn't miss if I wanted to. My first thought...damn, we missed our chance this month. Ummmm...that would actually involve me letting him touch me and having the energy for such a thing! I seriously wonder how anyone has Irish twins!

Wow--those are some long bullets. My apologies for being MIA. I've been reading and following along with all of you. I've just been a VERY bad commentor. I'm going to try to be better though.

dreams

Before I start with the post in my head, can I just say how much I LOVE the st.arbucks by work? First, they remembered me when I came back from my leave and made me feel like Norm from Cheers. And then today, after ordering my drink and realizing I forgot my wallet (oops), they told me not to worry about it. Now that is customer service!

Anywho, back to my dreams. Last night I dreamt that I was pregnant again. No worries, I highly doubt that I actually am but it still made me think. While I would love to be pregnant again sometime, now is definitely not that time. But this made me realize I need to be a good girl and make my doctors appt. I'm overdue for my annual (I really think I should get a pass on that...how many times was a doc up in my business already??) and while I'm there I'll talk to him about the testing for the BRCA gene and how that would effect future treatments. While he probably won't be as knowledgeable about it all as my RE, he does do some infertility treatments so it'll at least be a step in my info gathering phase. And it is a step that is covered by my insurance.

And for nightmares, a woman I work with just found out she is pregnant with her second girl. Apparently that is her worst nightmare. I honestly didn't even know what to say. I did say "I'm so glad the baby is healthy and fine" to which she replied, "Of course". But the best part of it all is that her husband is mad at her! I guess he missed the news that the sperm determines the sex. Ahh...ignorance at its finest.

Last Chance

to vote for Mel!! If you haven't done it yet, you MUST click over right now and vote for Stirrup Queens.

week 1 down

I think Sweetness caught on yesterday that the bottle was her only daytime option. At her 2 feeds she ate 3.5 and then 4 oz. I still need to look up and see how much she should be getting but at this point any increase is progress in the right direction. And I have decided that there is some consistency to her inconsistency...she has 1 great night followed by 1 horrific night. That's the pattern. We do the same exact bedtime routine at roughly the same time but it doesn't seem to matter. The only thing I have noticed is that the closer to 7:30 she goes to sleep, the better the night is. Last night was 8:20. We did start the bedtime routine around 7 but she decided to go back for seconds and thirds at the all you can eat boob buffet.

So thanks for your help and advice. And I know this is all to be expected and it'll get easier for me. (she's doing just fine). Yesterday was the first time she's had a 'first' without me and it kinda sucked. But I did ok, and was just as excited when I saw it later on that night. And as an aside this is a first that could greatly help our sleep...she took her pacifier out and put it back in her mouth all on her own!! Now if only she could manage that hand-mouth coordination at 2 AM!!

consistency

That's all I'm asking for. But I guess it is way too much for a 4 month old to give. Monday night she slept amazing, Tuesday night was another story. Up pretty much every hour or so. Sometimes screaming, sometimes all smiles. Made yesterday a mess. And then last night was almost as perfect as could be. I just don't get it.

The whole barely eating from the bottle thing is killing me though. Because she slept so badly the other night I didn't wake her up before I left, just pumped and left a bottle for Mr H. She ate 1.5 oz. Her next bottle, about 2 oz and the next, well that just put her over the edge and she barely touched it. So then when I got home and was feeding her before bed, she was ravenously hungry. She ate like she has never eaten before. Typically she drains a side in under 10 minutes and is done. Last night's feeding lasted almost 40. Which of course broke my heart. I just sobbed as she was eating. I know she'll get used to the bottle and it will get better but right now I just feel like I am completely failing her. My poor baby spent all day hungry, probably waiting for me, and I wasn't there for her. It kills me. Being exhausted didn't help though. Today I'm much more well rested and my boss, once again proving how awesome she is, told me to come in at 9:30 today. So I got to sleep in a little and spend the morning snuggling Sweetness.

And the only good thing about having to pump at work...I am now caught up on everyone's blogs and actually have time to post myself!! Yeah, yeah, yeah, I should probably be working...