DAILY SNACK:
Bad Mother Edition
I was up late last night anyway.
Then, just before turning in at 2am,
Bats and scary butterflies invaded Young C’s dreams.
L’il I woke up and kept on waking on.
C couldn’t get back to sleep either.
Finally, finally, I somehow fell asleep.
5am and baby’s crying again.
She was tucked in beside me,
Drifting off at the breast,
When I smelled it.
That was a dirty smelling diaper.
And I left it ’till morning.
DAILY SNACK:
Bad Mother Edition
Wading pool season is about to open,
And we all needed swimsuits.
So I picked up my sister for backup,
And headed to the mall.
Finding trunks for Young C was easy enough.
But the racks of little girl one and two pieces were a mess.
Did they even have anything for babies?
And, ohmygod, look at how cute this is.
And I think I’ll look at suits for myself, too.
And lets just see about bras.
But where’s C?
Really. NO. Where is he?!
I’m yelling his name now,
Alerting everyone in the store that I am missing my child.
I found him
Playing in the far corner of the huge store.
And I really felt bad.
DAILY SNACK:
Bad Mother Edition
There had been four tuck-ins already.
He had been read to and sung to and snuggled and cuddled.
He went to the bathroom. Again.
He had a drink of milk. He ate an apple.
I was starting to get annoyed — this was my time.
I said goodnight again and tried to leave.
When he started screaming I lost it.
Lost. It.
“You are going to wake you sister.”
I was hissing.
I picked him up and carried him through the apartment.
I don’t think I knew where I was going.
I dropped him outside and told him not to come in until he was ready to sleep.
It wasn’t pretty.
But it worked.
I read a lot during my first pregnancy. I was learning about fetal development and the stages of labour and the mechanics of breastfeeding, sure. More than that, though, I was reading arguments about how to be a good mother. The only thing attachment parenting has in common with Ferberization is a conviction that it is the right way to care for a baby and that the other ways are wrong. I chose my camp. Attachment parenting, after all, was a much better accessory to my midwifery care and natural birth plans. I absorbed all the arguments and how-to’s and I believed in them.
I was already on a slippery slope, though. This was an unplanned pregnancy (no pre-conception check up – yikes) and I was a smoker and a bartender. I quit smoking and drinking and got a day job pronto. I couldn’t give up caffeine altogether, though, because hadn’t I done enough? I put on 15 pounds more than the recommended 20 – 35 and gave in and asked for an epidural when my cervix failed to dilate fast enough. My baby got jaundice because I couldn’t get him to latch on his first day which then meant that my milk didn’t come in fast enough, so we had to feed him (gasp) formula for a couple days. Still, I persevered. I breastfed and wore him around and gave him all my attention. I didn’t even listen to my ipod while pushing him in a stroller because that would be hogging the music.
DAILY SNACK:
Bad Mother Edition
More often than I care to admit.
I’d say that it happened today,
As though it were unusual.
As though it were the exception.
Normally, I’d make light of something like this,
Because it doesn’t sound like a big deal.
Not every once in a while, right?
But what if it’s most days?
Even most beautiful sunny summer days when boys should be romping around outside in the park?
And my kid didn’t get dressed until just before lunch.
Again.
DAILY SNACK:
Bad Mother Edition
I pushed my three-year-old in the stroller.
The baby was tucked into the wrap.
They were both asleep,
And I was motoring up Yonge Street.
“Wait!” A woman cried.
I stopped short, on edge.
“Your baby is falling out.”
“No. She’s not.”
“Oh, I see. Well, cover her head. It’s windy.”
I almost hit her.
And, out of spite, I did not cover my baby’s head.
Even though it was windy.
DAILY SNACK
They had the craft paper all spread out.
Body parts had been traced and duly decorated.
Polka dotted arms and legs,
Zebra-striped hands and feet.
Young C insisted on tracing his elbows and head.
“How about you, Mom?
Wanna trace your eyeballs?”
Product Review
I’m a few weeks into the not-so-solid feeding phase and still trying to catch my rhythm. The eternal and unsolvable problem when it comes to infant care is that you need to do things right away if you ever want to keep on top of it all. But infants are such babies and they really have no patience at all. So more often than not I finish spooning the pureed goop from bowl to baby and barely have time to walk the bowl to the dishwasher before L’il I is screeching and kicking and looking for an escape hatch. And Young C will usually pick this time to yell “Poo!” and starting running around in circles. I yank L’il I out of her highchair, toss her bib on the counter, kick the stepstool over to the toilet and chant “Run, run, run!” I’ll wind up wiping her face in the bathroom and then putting her down for a nap and trying to sneak in a little laptop-time while C (hopefully) amuses himself.
The next meal-time, then, starts off with a lot of cursing under my breath while I try to wipe/scrape dried up baby goop off all surfaces. That is why this was the best bib I ever owned:
DAILY SNACK
I was running back and forth,
Trying to make sure everything was packed.
Diapers, wipes, change of clothes.
Blankets, snacks, bibs and spoons.
Rattles and books and chew toys, too.
“I have just the thing, Mom! Just in case we need it.”
Young C ran over with a Connect Four travel-sized game.
And later, at dinner, it was just the thing.
DAILY SNACK
Her big blue baby eyes light right up.
Mouth stretches wide open and she laughs so hard.
She’s rocking back and forth now,
Arms and legs going a million miles a minute.
I take a couple pictures and put the camera away.
Cries of protest and resentment.