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Saturday, April 10, 2004

This is not something I thought I’d post about, but a confluence of events seems to indicate that it’s time.

It’s also not something I think you’ll all be thrilled to read, so if you’re uncomfortable with attachment parenting or extended breastfeeding, move along…

So, I was just putzing around when I started emailing with Genuine about my wine-and-chocolate dessert, and his wife asked me to hoist one for her, and I said, are you kidding? By the third pregnancy, I was hoisting my own.

This dovetails with the conversation I had with the doctor today while determining the proper prescription for me. He started to write an Rx for one antibiotic, when he looked up and asked if I was by any chance nursing. “Technically, yes. But not much. I can have amoxycillin, keflex, or augmentin.”

He looked at me skeptically and began to thumb through his little med reference booklet. *sigh* “My OBGYN has prescribed all of those for me before, even while pregnant, so I am sure they would be fine this time, too.”

“Um, how often do you nurse?” “Not much.” “Well, what do they eat during the day?” I looked down at my 2 year old daughter and 3 1/2 year old son and wondered what he was thinking. “Um, well, they are all old enough to eat anything they want. It’s just a psychological tether and a bonding thing. And it’s just Daphne.” “Oh, so you aren’t nursing them all?” “NO! Heh.” “OK, I had to ask. We just had someone in here that nursed hers until they were 6.” “Ahahahahahaha. No.”

All of this got me thinking. Aside from a 3-month break in 1997, during which time I was actively trying to conceive after a loss, I have been either pregnant or nursing pretty much continuously since December, 1996. That’s seven years, four months, and ten days. Holy little green tomatoes.

Most of my friends’ babies weaned themselves before 12 months, but I seem to be putting out either chocolate milk or crack cocaine, because my kids fight me tooth and nail for extended nursing rights.

To be fair, after Dylan suffered major heart damage with viral myocarditis as a newborn, my pediatrician (the coolest one on the planet BTW) encouraged us to go as long as we could both stand it to boost his immune system. All it took was for him to mention that it would only take one good, strong cold or flu to kill our son in the first year and I was right there with the program, fully and completely over whatever pressure I was feeling from those who looked askance at family beds, attachment parenting, and extended breastfeeding. They weren’t the ones wearing my breasts, I was, and mine was the only opinion that mattered in the end.

Brief aside: I’m not kidding about the whole family bed thing. If I have to line up syringes on my nightstand for round-the-clock administration to a newborn, I am not walking down the hall to get the baby. Period. I want that little sucker right where I can hear him breathing.

For six months, I carried a clipboard charting out the various medications, dosages, and schedules; believe me, when you are already sleep deprived and suffering from postpartum depression, you do NOT want to confuse the blood pressure medication with the morphine with the steroids with the stuff that makes his heart beat strongly enough to keep him alive. I couldn’t even think Babywise for months without wanting to kick something.

It seems to be true, though, that some children will want to go on longer than the most devoted attachment parenting devotees, and I actually found myself with tandem nurslings after I fell pregnant again when Dylan was just 9 months old.

Oh, and I would go on and on, but my daughter is currently wailing and clutching my jammies and begging me to take her to bed…

And oh look, here is her brother, wanting to snuggle in with us. Is this bad?

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Saturday, April 10, 2004

Weblogs

I always say I’ll resist posting strange keyword referrals, but damn.

Princeton nude olympics photo archives
what is mrs. polie’s first name
wash my shirt bitch

And here are some from the logs, but, alas, I don’t have the links…

reverse cowboy blog
moo moo i love you i know you re a cow but anything will do
new barbies w/ gray hair
over mommy s knee for a spanking (knock it off, Genuine)
mommy loves kids to fucking with photos
kissing my roommate lesbian
discovery kids no really

Saturday, April 10, 2004

Me, Me, Me

1 glass chilled Toasted Head chardonnay
1 6 oz. Dove solid chocolate bunny (furtively pilfered from MIL’s care packge (“Huh? Oh, mommy didn’t get one this year…”)
3 fed, bathed, jammied children, nestled in front of Disney du jour
1 comfy computer chair

Add cool breeze to warm air and mix in one soft cotton tanktop and drawstring loungers.

Bliss.

Saturday, April 10, 2004

Family

We just returned from the doctor, who declared me strep-free, but something-else-full. Pharyngitis of idiopathic origin. AKA who-knows-wtf-it-is-so-here’s-some-antibiotics-just-in-case.

While we were there, the nurse asked if Dylan and Daphne were twins. *sigh* “No, they’re just really close in age. Eighteen months.” “We spaced the birth control.” “We’re Irish Catholics.” Actually the last two statements, while true, were uttered on the inside.

The doctor made up for it, though, when he expressed surprise that there was a third child at home, a six-year-old. “Wow, you must have started young!” “No, I’m 35. I was 29 when I had my first.” “Oh. That’s right. [peers closely] You could have fooled me. I would have guessed mid-20’s.”

And he wasn’t even trying to sell me something. I grinned.

So now we’re home while Gil and Logan are at t-ball. I just don’t feel up to going over there. Besides, I can put the kids in the living room at their little table with juice, yogurt and goldfish crackers to watch Dora, something that would never happen on Gil’s watch. He’d freak if he could see them in there, unsupervised with cultured edibles. Heh. Makes it twice the fun, in my opinion.

(OK, OK, I put a splat mat down; I’m not a total idiot. And if you haven’t discovered the Land of Nod yet, go there now. It’s fabul-great, as Jilbur would say.)

Oh, love this: Dylan just walked in with his empty goldfish bowl to complain that they tasted yucky. “I see you managed to eat them all, though.” “But they tasted yucky because they had germs on them.” “Hmmm. What did these germs look like?” “Rug.” “Well, no wonder.”

Saturday, April 10, 2004

Me, Me, Me

Now, I have something very shocking to tell you, and I know it’s something that none of you anticipated; I was blown away myself when I learned of it:

As soon as my project was completed, I got sick.

Whahuafuaaa? What are the odds? I mean, I was getting at least 4-5 hours of sleep a night, in 18-minute chunks, and was eating frequent meals—M&Ms for protein and mini-Milky Ways for calcium—and taking lots of (blogging) breaks.

I was exercising my heart vigorously, I mean what else are deadlines for, right? And I got plenty of fresh air each time I rolled down my window at the drive-thru. What could go wrong?

First, within two days of turning in that report, our house was ravaged by the stomach flu. Which doesn’t really need to be revisited here.

Then all week, a strange, low-level bug with aches and hmmm… what’s that term? It’s so apt… ah, yes: total freaking ragginess.

And now, I am fairly certain I have strep throat. Thirty seconds with my trusty compact mirror and a light revealed pretty little spots at the back of my throat, the icing on the two-ton lymph glands taking up residence under my chin. All kidding aside, I could just let my neck go limp and have a nap; they’ll hold my head right up.

I have concluded from this puzzling sequence of events that changes to how future projects are assigned and completed will be necessary. For instance, if the timeline is such that I have to spend my well-earned respite going for tests and feeling generally miserable, the least my bosses can do is carry these glands around themselves. I’d be more than happy to help find a place to store them.

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