Another trip to Washington

On Memorial Day weekend, I went back to Washington state with my sister Cindy and Jack.  We flew to Seattle but this time went straight to Grandview, in Eastern Washington, a 3 hours’ drive.

This time we bought a seat for Jack.  Cindy lugged on the big car seat and he did well on the flight up.  He slept on the plane, and was awake for the drive, but pretty cheerful for most of it.  We got to Grandma’s assisted living place at 6 PM, and visited with her a bit before heading off to the market to pick up food for dinner.

As usual, the crib was not set up in our room when we got there, but this time they managed to get it for us in just a few minutes.  By the time we got it set up and everyone fed, Jack didn’t go to sleep til nearly 9:45 (his normal bedtime is 8).  He slept pretty well in the hotel, but I was reminded of how nice it is not to sleep in the same room any more–he makes a lot of noise when he sleeps and I woke up a lot.

On Sunday, we spent the day at Grandma’s place.  By coincidence, some of our cousins were also in town, some of whom I hadn’t seen in 30 years!  (They are my dad’s first cousins.)  It was great to catch up with them.  Sunday evening we headed to the farm (my grandparents used to own it and sold it in the 1970s to people who are now like family to us).

We had a nice meal outside at the farm and Jack got to pet a bunny rabbit.  They had a new dog that was very friendly and Jack really liked petting her.  It was another late night for Jack, and he had a hard time falling asleep despite being exhausted (he’d napped for an hour at Grandma’s) so again he went to sleep about 9:45.  Slept ok again.  Ironically around midnight a family checked into the room above us with a crying baby.

Monday we met up with the cousins again, then headed to Grandma’s for a few more hours.  We left for the airport at 1 PM, but because of the Memorial Day traffic it ended up taking us 5 hours to get to the aiport.  Jack slept the first 1.5 hours but woke up when we hit stop-and-go traffic, and the poor little guy threw up his graham cracker snack.  He was fine afterwards though.

We just made our plane, but unfortunately time Jack didn’t fall asleep.  I spent the flight hunched over his car seat, singing softly and trying to keep him from a) opening and closing the window shade and b) putting his foot against the seatback tray.  I have to say I found it a bit stressful; thankfully it was a short flight.  Jack didn’t go to sleep til 10:30 that night!

On the flight to Seattle, before Jack fell asleep, he was drinking out of his sippy cup and banged it against the side of the plane a couple of times.  The person in the seat in front of us had her head resting against the side, and must have felt it, because she turned around and gave us The Look.  I know this look.. I have given it myself, to kicking children.  Can’t say I like being on the receiving end of it.  Ah well, part of parenting I guess.

All in all a hectic but very good trip.  Click on the picture above for more photos…

Moving On

Last week I went to see my OB/GYN for a check-up and to discuss the (gasp) idea of getting ready to try and get pregnant again.  I also want to get a mammogram.

My doctor thinks I should wean Jack.  1) Mammograms are much harder to read on women who are still nursing; 2) She wants me to take Metformin again (like I did before I got pregnant the first time) and I don’t want to breastfeed while on that; 3) Since it was so difficult to conceive last time, she thinks removing that as one more variable will help.

Obviously, this decision is up to me.  And I wish I felt I could wait.  Ideally, I’d keep nursing Jack a while longer, and I would rather have at least 3 years between children.  But with me turning 37 in two months, and the fact it took 2.5 years before… I just don’t feel like I can wait.  Both Chris and I would really like to have two kids.

The strange thing is, while I was driving home from the appointment, I started to cry.  I thought I’d be mostly relieved at the thought of not nursing any more.  But I realized I actually felt quite sad.  I was really surprised to feel that way.

I’ve actually cut way back on nursing recently.. I am down to three times a day (when he gets up, mid-afternoon, and before bed) and will probably drop the mid-afternoon one soon.  Jack doesn’t seem to miss the mid-morning one, and I don’t think he’ll miss the afternoon one.

I think part of the reason I don’t want to stop is because of how insanely difficult it was to make it work in the beginning.  That was one of the hardest months of my life, and if I didn’t have the support of Chris and the lactation consultant, I would have given up.  Add on all the pain, the infections, the pumping, the washing/sterilizing/carting around all the equipment.. it was not easy.  But I stuck with it, and now it seems weird to give up on something that was so difficult.

Anyway I just haven’t decided yet what I want to do.  I want to do what’s best for both Jack, and for me.  I made it to my goal of nursing for one year, and I’m very happy about that.

There was an interesting article in the Atlantic recently.  Some of it made me angry, but I think she has some  good points.  The biggest one is:  what ARE the true benefits of breastfeeding?  Right now, where I live, a lot of people look down on new mothers if they don’t breastfeed.  As if it’s absolute truth that breastfeeding is best.

Well, that seems to be the case:  but honestly, how could you prove it?  Are you going to find a bunch of women who have all the same factors in terms of education, background, parenting style, etc, then tell half of them to breastfeed and half to use formula?  It’s impossible.  And I hate that fact it’s so political:  moms have enough to worry about without feeling judged about their feeding choices.  Breastfeeding is easy for some people, but REALLY REALLY HARD for others.  And maybe the toll on the mother.. and on the marriage… just isn’t worth it.  If you had to choose between a happy formula-feeding mom and a miserable breastfeeding one, honestly, which is best for the baby?

I don’t mean to imply I’m miserable or anything!  Once Jack got things figured out and I didn’t have to pump so much, it got WAY easier, and I was very happy to breastfeed Jack.  My point is just, I wish we could all be more supportive of each other’s choices when it comes to this issue.

It IS a special bond that I have with Jack that no one else has.  I will miss that.  But I know there are plenty of other things he and I will have together, too, and I look forward to those.  I’ll just have to keep thinking about when it’s time to move on.

Preschool

Today I visited a preschool (a non co-op one, where you drop the kids off).  We’re not planning on putting Jack into that kind of preschool til probably next summer, when he’s a little over 2, but some of these places have years-long waiting lists!  Crazy.

I liked the place, and it’s a pretty convenient location.  I’m going to visit a few more.  Not sure yet how long we’d have Jack go for; maybe half-day 2 or 3 days a week.  Depends on whether I’m back to work, and whether or not we have another baby (!!).

Mothers must assume the responsibility to protect their children from any conceivable risk

This article captures something I’ve always felt about motherhood:

The rhetoric of the NBAC was hyperbolic, but it reflects a pervasive cultural view that mothers must assume the responsibility to protect their children from any conceivable risk.  In an era when the populace seems consumed with eliminating all kinds of risks, a cultural message has developed that mothers not only must protect their children from immediate threats but also must become experts in everything their children might encounter.  Mothers are held uniquely responsible for predicting and preventing any circumstance that might interfere with their children’s putatively normal development, and they are exhorted to optimize every dimension of children’s lives, beginning with the womb.  This moral code, a vision of “total motherhood,” is  frequently cast as a trade-off between what babies and children need versus what mothers might like.

Man, this is SO TRUE.  Somehow we mothers are given the responsibility for every aspect of our child’s life.  If we eat feta cheese or take a hot shower while pregnant, if we  choose not to breastfeed, if we choose not to feed them organic food, to take them to enriching classes and experiences, socialize them properly, if we do or do not work, if we fail to know which vaccines to give them and which to avoid, to choose the right school, the right hospital, the right doula, the right extra-curricular activities, to let them explore on their own to build self-confidence, but not TOO much or they might get kidnapped… it never ends.  Every fault the child has is because the mother didn’t do something right.

Obviously I don’t agree that this is right; of course it’s not all up to the mother.  But a lot of times it feels like society thinks that way.