WWBD? What Would Bunny Do? (Ella Ella Ella)

I had my 20 week ultrasound last week, everything is in its proper place, it seems, the heart is pumping properly, baby kidneys are functioning, 10 fingers, 10 toes, and after a few moments of struggling with a stubborn and comfortable fetus, the ultrasound tech was able to see that we are likely having a baby girl this time.  A girl baby is not as easy to say with certainty, all we know is that there are no testicles.

Now what? I don't even know where to begin.  I'm a huge player in the cult of the girl.  I was a Girl Scout longer than it was cool (wait, it was cool at one point, right?), I went to an all girl's high school and an all women's college.  I have been a feminist since before I knew there was a special word for it, eat sleep and breathe all things equality, mostly with the well being of women and children first and foremost in my mind. I have always imagined having a daughter of my own. Maybe because I was a girl, it is something I can relate to. I have never been a little boy (although, please, do your gentle hearts a favor and go listen to "When I Was a Boy" by Dar Williams when you're done here [sentimental cry face]. If you don't get a lump in your throat, then you need a hug as big as life itself. Carry on).

 Maybe I want to replicate and see from the other side what it was to be my mother.  Those formative moments stick to my memory-- the time she told me "girls can be whatever they want to be when they grow up", and I challenged her.  I thought it over and remember thinking "ok, I've got it.  Girls can't be firemen and boys can't be cheerleaders". Bunny was not having any of that, and corrected me.  Then, I remember, argumentative as ever, telling her that I knew girls could not grow up to be dads (Funny, how my 'gotcha' moment 25 years ago is now my jumping off point today. Like HELL girls can't grow up to be dads! I know of plenty of little girls who grew up to be great dads). The finer points of gender identity aside, my mother never let me think of myself as "just a girl". I want to feel the pride my mother must have felt when she finally knew that feminism "clicked" for me, when she knew there was no going back. But can I carry on that legacy? Can I promise to challenge every stinky, stupid stereotype I see, in language my daughter will understand? Will I get lazy and give in when Cinderella comes seeping in through the cracks in the doors, bringing her sister-princess along for the ride? Will I tarnish every viewing of my own beloved The Little Mermaid by asking Girl Baby if she really thinks trading one's voice for the pursuit of a love interest is really the healthiest way to start a relationship? Can I just let her enjoy the simplicity of Disney's rigid gender roles? Will I force her to play with Isaac's tool bench trough the denial of a pair of glass slippers,  or  maybe she will just gravitate toward it anyway? What did my parents do? Well, they built me a Barbie house of my own, if that's any indication.  I guess I'd better dust off my old tool belt (just kidding, I don't have one.  Eek!).


As I grew older, my mother never shied away from talking about the realities of pending adulthood.  Not one to mice words, the phrases I remember her dishing out most frequently were "They all look the same upside down", referring to how many men view women, and that men's brains react to beautiful women the same way they react to money and cocaine.  She kept it real, these lessons started around sixth grade.  She wasn't being a misogynist or man hater, she just wanted to make sure I remembered myself as I became an adult.  She was warning me that as I aged I was going to encounter men who do or say anything for sex, that I would find men who wanted to collect, own, control and possess me in the same way they wanted to win money or get high. She didn't want me to consider, for one moment, that fairy tales came true-- or even happened. She wasn't a dream crusher-- she wanted her daughters to have dreams about something other than boys. No daughter of hers was going to be looking for a mythical knight. Not when she had outfitted us in our own armor. (Worth mentioning that we did read a lot of fairy tales.  The Grimm's versions.  Eyes gettin' pecked out everywhere.  Also, we began to receive condoms in our Christmas stockings somewhere around 17 or 18. Like I said, she kept it real.  Real uncomfortable!) With all this as my jumping-off point, I love to think that I am going to be the most sex-positive mom out there.  The fact bringer, the truth teller.  I will be body positive, careful not to shame myself or others, I will be a crusader for my children in the complicated realm of adulthood. I will shield them from the hyper-sexualized world that seems to start around age six these days, I will let them ask questions and be honest with my answers...I think.  Until I watch an episode  of "Friends" with one of my nieces, and squirm when something remotely sexual comes on. Do I say something? Do I ignore this situation or explain it? Does she even notice that this is adult content? Am I doomed to eternal awkwardness for ever and ever into eternity? Is she old enough for this talk yet? It's certainly not my place to have the 'big' talk.  Is that even still a thing? Does she have questions? How will I know if I don't ask? She needs you to be a role model, Sarah, get it together! ok. So then I go "this seems a little mature for us to be watching right now" and turn to something like the Disney channel or maybe suggest we go make popcorn. Cool aunt fail. In this realm, I need more practice. I need more guts.  I need more Bunny B.

I've been doing this all week.  Back and forth.  I want to buy a cute "girl" outfit to celebrate our news.  But...should it be a dress? Should it have pink? Ruffles? It won't say "princess", that's for sure, or have writing on the rear (so help me GOD, if any daughter of mine...). What color for the nursery? Gaah! This poor babe is going to wear nothing but white onesies and live in a colorless void, all due to my inability to make a decision! I try to remember that I turned out to be a pretty ardent feminist in spite of wearing a dress now and again, playing Barbies and having a room decorated with flowers. What would Bunny do? This is the umbrella that covers me in moments of crisis, of doubt and in times when I just need a shove in the right direction.  What would Bunny do? Have a Manhattan and...probably encourage me to go read a book.  I can accomplish half of that, I suppose.  Now if I could only find a book...


 What really amazes me about my mom is that she was able to be a strong role model for me without the umbrella of her own. My mother lost her own mom when she was only thirteen years old.  As I age, in a way, I bring the shadow of Bunny along with me. "By this age, my mother was (getting married, had two kids, was working on her masters, had a perm, wore shoulder pads)" what have you, "all without her mother". Every time. Without her own mother's hand to guide her, she managed to raise us all.  With only the memory of Louise to answer her when she asked "how would my mother handle this?", she got through it. How fortunate I am to have someone so wonderful to turn to, while she had her mother only as a reference. Half an umbrella on what certainly must have been some rainy days.


 We all must wonder if our parents are proud, if they are satisfied with what we have done with the gift of life they have given us.  I didn't realize until I was a parent that it works the other way around: I'm just thrilled for the gift that the children have given me by existing.  They can do whatever they want with their lives. With that mentality, I, my mother,  and surely her mother, set about parenting.  We all teach our children how we value them, and how they should value themselves.  I suppose I will let the tool bench sit and hope it gets as much use as the Barbie house.  I will consent to Cinderella, on occasion, but not without letting my feelings be known. No pink Lincoln Logs shall pass over my threshold, however, nor shall a professional wrestling match be viewed. Grandparents and over-zealous girlfriends can offer her the tulle alternatives to the overalls I provide.  She can sweet talk her dad into her first pair of fancy shoes. I know how those things go, Girl Baby, for I invented those moves, and  my job is not only to be your mom, but it's also to be your Fairy God Feminist.  Sorry,  but I must stay the course.  For you.

Does Anyone Want To Talk About *gulp* Homebirths?

Of course you do! And I only kind of do.  I mean, I think.  I'm getting a little hot and sweaty just typing this, but lets just go with it, shall we?  So, I'm knocked up again, it seems.  I like to use "knocked" because it annoys me to call it anything other than what it is, a happy accident of nature.  I've discussed this before in previous posts, but I will mention again that I can be very squeamish and prude when it comes to some things (obviously not all things, I blog about birth and pregnancy), and I don't like to walk around like getting pregnant was any great accomplishment of mine.  It really only takes a few bottles glasses of wine, it seems, so lets save the hi-fives for when this version is out of me.  As I've said, that's where the real work is.
 So here we are again.  Me, a fetus, and a whole wide Internet full of things to worry about until Isaac wakes up from his nap (which, god willing and the creeks don't rise, will be a two-hour deal today)-- And before I get started, let me just say that home birth is something I'm thinking about. Don't send me 800 links to advocacy sites-- or scary "warning" ones, either. Also, I like you, but I don't want pictures of your home birth in my inbox, nothing against your placenta or anything. And let's keep in mind that the Sarah who is hastily writing this before the door of Nap Time Freedom slams shut on me once again, is the same Sarah who will request a Vicoden for a paper cut, has complete resentment for my oral surgeon for removing my wisdom teeth--6 years ago (I even hate waiting on him. Flashbacks), and in general, is as opposed to general discomfort as one human can possibly be.  Princess and the Pea level of pain-aversion. I am also the kind of person who will congratulate herself for sticking to a week-long vegetarian diet, only to look down on day 3 and realize I'm eating a bacon cheese burger. Or will make plans to build a houseboat, but fail at even building a bench.  The same Sarah with 5 colleges and twice as many majors under her belt with only one degree to show for it...For me,  thinking about committing to something that is 5 months away and actually doing it are two different things, two different Sarahs.  So don't worry yet, Mom.

But, as we have learned from previous experience, the baby does eventually come our, one way or another, like it or not. That is where pregnancy differs from houseboats.  It will come as no surprise to those who read my post about having Isaac that I suffered a little bit of what is called Birth Trauma.  I left the whole experience feeling like a failure.  All that work, all that pushing, all those swear words, and I still couldn't get him out.  I was torn in ways that really frightened me and made it so, so hard to be a new mother. I was afraid of my own body for months.  Months. I reverted to some sort of catatonia at follow-up appointments, unable to really express how shitty I felt about Isaac's birth- I didn't think I was allowed to feel that way. What, was I going to turn to my Doctor and be like "you really could have done better in there. I had no idea what I was doing and you made me feel like a child!"? She would have looked at me like "who are you, again?".  Of course it sucked.  It's having a baby, for gods sake. What did I expect? Awesome-ness? Well, it turns out, there are ways to experience birth differently.  There are woman who use words like "happy" and "blissful" and "empowered" and "not so horrible I swear I'll never have another child again, just sew me shut now and lets get the fk out of this hospital so I never have to even think about this even one more time". Maybe I'd like to be one of those woman this time.  Perhaps my days of being a scared little girl are behind me.  I'd like to stop feeling like asking anyone who was there "did I do OK? Why was that so bad? Why do I feel like I did it wrong?" I'd like to see a stronger side of me bringing my baby into the world.
So why not just an unmedicated birth, then? Well. Have you ever been to a bar, wanted a dirty martini, up, with 2 olives, but just went with tap water, no ice, instead? Really? Cause I never have.  There are lots of metaphors about temptation out there, and I fit them all. I find it difficult to imagine the Sarah I know in hospital full of pain-relief interventions and not take each and every one (except the one that made me trip balls). Those nurses are pushers! Lovely, well meaning, supportive and knowledgeable, yes, but pushers just the same.

Nurse: Sarah, want some dru-
Me: YEP.

I know myself. I know that given the choice, I would be way more likely to give birth in a tub in my living room than say no to an epidural.
So now we've talked about it.  Well, I have talked a little about it to a computer screen. If anyone has any stories, I'd love to hear them (but please, please don't link this page to a forum where those mean OB nurses can comment on this birth decision, too.  I couldn't take that again!)  It seems from  what I hear from the few women I know who gave birth at home, none of them regret the experience, or feel traumatized.  I, however, do know many who felt very negatively about their hospital births. That piques my interest-- but as I said-- that is all.  I didn't order a birthing tub, I haven't contacted my insurer or midwife about it (um, or even Matt), and heck, the kidney stones haven't even kicked in yet! I'm sure they'll come along to ensure that I am tethered to each and every intravenous tube the birthing center has to offer! And also, I imagine that having the baby at home would require me to clean up a little around this dump - and we all know how I feel about that!

How We Spent Our Summer Vacation

Please excuse the extended absence from this blog.  My computer was down and the kid got sick, we went out of town, I got another job and I had to work a double. Sort of. Mostly I am a procrastinator of the first order. When I begin to feel like I should write, suddenly all of these super important tasks come to mind. I begin to remember that I have to knit that scarf I promised someone ages ago, start the laundry, go for a run, see if I still owe my 9th grade algebra teacher any back homework, give the dog a bath, reconsider going back to college to finish my degree...anything to avoid actually sitting down to do one of the things I enjoy most in the world. I have spoken before of my paralyzing fear of both taxidermy and public humiliation resulting from failure. This is how it manifests. And I am not the only writer who experiences this form of writer's block, which is self-imposed and therefore more of a writers' avoidance. I know because I was Googling it while waiting for my math teacher's return email.  I think I may have found the cure. The only thing I hate more than hypothetically bombing at a blog I don't get paid to write, is cleaning. Whenever that vacuum cleaner comes out, it is like a from the muses. My brain rolls and tumbles with all the amazing and hilarious anecdotes I could be writing about and sharing with my friends, who are also probably sitting at their desks Googling things like "what is the scientific name for 'fear of taxidermy'", to avoid their obligations, and see my link pop up in their news feed. (By the way, Automatonaphobia is the closest I could come up with, and it is a fear of life-like but inanimate objects. And it seems that plenty of other Google users share my fear, too).

Nightmare.  I got sick even looking for this image. If you ever want to sleep soundly again, never Google "taxidermy animal using a typewriter".  Or anything like that.  Trust.

So today I made up some story to my husband about wanting to shampoo the carpets. Mostly so he'd take Isaac and our niece Reilly the hell out of the house for a few minutes, and also because it is beginning to smell like a barn in here, with the heat and humidity and yet-unwashed dog. After about ten whole minutes of valiant effort on my part, I realized that our stupid carpets will never be clean, we should just have hardwood so I can aggressively avoid cleaning something different for a change, and that I should probably over-share the hell out of our most recent adventure with Isaac, one that gives "our little bruiser" and whole new, and scary meaning.


On the Saturday before the restaurant where we work closed down for a week, Isaac woke up from his nap covered in bruises. Head to toe. He had a goose-egg on the back of his head like Wile E. Coyote has after meeting with the business end of an Acme anvil. His legs looked like he'd been thrown down the stairs. Now, I knew none of this had happened to him. Either Matt or I are nearly constantly with him, and when we aren't, my sister or our super trustworthy sitter have him. I knew someone would have alerted me if the boy had a run-in with the Roadrunner. I freaked, but I like to keep my freak-outs in perspective. Things could get out of hand if I let each and every fear reach maximum saturation. I called my mother, sister, husband and babysitter. Everyone said that it was strange, sudden and unexplained, and that I should call the doctor immediately. We got an emergency appointment an hour later. Four hours after that, we were on our way to Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester NY for treatment. Isaac had a dangerously low platelet count of 3000. Apparently a healthy adult has somewhere around 150,000 and up. His count was so low that he could bleed to death if he fell. But the good news! It wasn't Leukemia. That is  one thing that all the bruising could signal. But it wasn't. It isn't. And it won't be. It is something called Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, and this translates to "low platelet count for unknown reasons" (don't worry, even the doctors stumbled over it most times, just say ITP). He got a treatment called WinRho, which gave his platelet-attacking antibodies the ol' Scooby-Doo, dressing up his red blood cells as a decoy so his platelets have a chance to regrow. It worked terrifically. He's back in business, by the following Thursday his platelet count was up to 328,000, and we were home. So I am no longer helmet shopping or attempting to encase him in bubble wrap, and by most accounts, ITP is usually a one time thing.

I don't want, for a minute, to pretend that I had the sickest kid on the planet, or in the hospital, or on our floor even. I didn't  It was scary, it was nerve-wracking. But for all my history of Worst-Case Scenario-ing everything, I did not do that for Isaac. He seemed to feel and act fine, so I had not one ounce of panic in me. About a minute of relief-tears upon hearing we had to rush him to a major children's hospital for an emergency treatment, yes. Full-on fear? No. I don't know if that is a mother's self-preservation instinct, a delusional optimism, the benefit of having a scientist for a mother, the push of my friends and family's prayers being answered or what. I did bargain. For a hot minute I thought that if I were somehow nicer to Isaac, he wouldn't be sick. If I just let him eat all those crackers instead of dinner. If I let him climb the stairs every time he wanted to, if I allowed him to scream at the top of his lungs in the grocery store and stand on the couch, if I could allow him to be a bad boy, a baby, a kid in all the ways he wanted to be, he wouldn't actually have a low platelet count. It would be a misunderstanding and we could just forget the whole thing ever happened. No needles, no worry, no conversations about the "L" word I mentioned earlier. I can't imagine how parents with really sick kids do it. I mean, I knew that giving in and letting him devour the dog food (yeah, he's still doing that), is not going to magically cure his illness. His platelets aren't making an active choice to die-off because I make him wear pants and won't allow him to hit the cats. He's still in need of parenting. I still have to make all the right choices that will help him grow into a good person-  not one who screams bloody murder if he's not allowed eat hand-fulls of kibble while standing on the furniture. What about the parents of the 50 pound 10 year old we saw, with no hair, getting his exercise by walking around the nurses station? Do they feel constantly compelled to allow endless Star Wars marathons and Frozen Cokes for lunch? The mind reels at just how difficult saying "no" must be when it is said to the sick and weak little person walking around with your heart in his failing body.

I have thought about this post, in one form or another, from about Day 3 of being a parent. It occurred to me that the only thing more painful than childbirth is being a parent. The agony of pushing his entire body out of mine was nothing compared to the agony of knowing that he is now separate from me. The world has him now, and there is only so much I can do to protect him.What a crazy balancing act we play, as parents. This last week has certainly been one of blessing-counting. There is nothing like staying two nights in a children's hospital to make you realize how sick your kid isn't. (And, it is worth mentioning, nothing like two nights sleeping in a hospital pull-out chair to make you realize how indispensable places like the Ronald McDonald House must be for families whose children are.  http://rmhc.org/, if you're the donating type).

 Oh, the little Hartley/Vallely byproduct didn't mind being center of attention at all! Flirting with the nurses and everything.


Alright, you got your cry out of me, Matt will be home any minute with the Romanian Demons (that is what Reilly mistakenly called Loony Tune's Tasmanian Devil yesterday.  I'm keeping it), and I think the Water Vacuum (another one of Reilly's gems) is still running where I left it to write this not-so hilarious piece.  Hope you still like me!

The World Is A Deadly, Dangerous Place

OK, well, anything beyond our living room is dangerous.  So not the whole world. Isaac, you see, is a crawler.  And a world-class speed crawler, at that.  We have caged in the living room, and fingers crossed that he doesn't discover how to use stairs in the next five minutes, we have established a baby safe zone.  For the most part.  I mean, yeah, I caught him chewing on a few extension chords here and there, sure.  And he does, of course, attempt to spill my morning coffee on himself just about every day (usually he just grabs for the identical decoy coffee mug that I set out for him while I hide in the corner and secretly sip on the real mug. Who's the smart guy now, sneaky baby?). And there was the one time he succeeded in pulling down the baby gate.  But he was fine.  I don't know why toy manufacturers insist on making baby toys in bright colors with all the flashing lights and goofy noises.  Those very elements seem to signal "Baby Toy", and thus "giant waste of plastic that I will play with exactly once and then abandon for the stereo knob and something sharp". Please, Playskool, make baby toys that look like everyday objects, just without the eye-poking-outness and potential for electrical shock.
At least he hasn't made it in to the dining room. Sigh...yet...The dining room is baby Shangri La, filled to the brim with all the good stuff. No fake, Elmo cell phones in here! No one is trying to pull the wool over his eyes with board books or plastic cups. In this strictly off-limits, grown-ups only room of horrors, we have the real deal. A wall of book cases, overflowing with treasured and well worn volumes of poetry, art and cook books, just waiting to be de-shelveved and gleefully ripped to shreds.  Beyond that is the china cabinet to which I cannot seem to locate the key, so our beautiful wedding china is just waiting to be the victim of  toddler curiosity. We also house the computer, the printer, vacuum cleaners, under-the-stairs half bath (a garbage can for picking and grazing! Toilet seat left conveniently up for easy toy-dunking and accidental drowning!), not to mention my coffee corner, and, worst of all: the entrance to the kitchen.  If Odysseus does somehow survive the gauntlet of the dining room, the River Styx, if you will, he will find himself in Mommy Hades. Baby Death Trap. Kitchen. We keep the kitchen neat enough.  I have moved the poisons to slightly less accessible cabinets; I don't cook, so the oven is never on; I keep the dryer door shut so he doesn't take to hiding in there, not to be discovered until I finally get around do doing the laundry.  I still cannot shake the feeling that he is going to choke on some over-looked dog biscuit, learn how to open child-proof caps and chug the floor cleaner, climb the chairs and fall off the table...On the rare occasion we do let him crawl around in there, he actually does very little damage.  His worst offense is, by far, the tipping of the dog dish.  He loves that game.  Beating a parent to the dog's water dish brings joy to that chubby baby's heart like no other scheme.  When he succeeds in covering himself, and the whole kitchen floor, in cold dog-drool water, he is the winner.  The winner of the moment, winner of the clothes change wrestling match, winner over the seriously worried dog, winner of the day. And I, Mommy Over-It, is the clear loser.  This is inevitably the point where I give up. It is automatically Jammies Time.  I don't care if it is only 1 in the afternoon.  Jammies. Just woke up? Back into jammies.  Why? Because the all the fight has left me. I know I lost. This James Bond of Household Dangers has out-foxed me again. The only way I can regain control is to jammie up. You may have won this round, Little Hartley, but I know something you don't know.  That thing is the future.  In your future, if you survive another day of rusty-nail discovering, cat-tail pulling and shoe-chewing (WHY does he want to do that???!), you are going to eventually go to bed. And do you know what my giant, red wine glass, that I waste no time in filling, says on it? V. For "Victory".  It doesn't, actually, but it I should totally get one that does.

Mommy's First Halloween

Oh yeah, Halloween...so just when I think I've gotten the "cool mom" thing down, something happens to call my bluff--like, I actually have to leave the house.  That is where things usually start to go wrong.  Clearly, if I am to be an effortlessly hip parent, I am going to need some more practice.  For those of you aspiring to this end someday, I have some recommendations: go find a heavy, unhappy bowing ball.  Place it in a car seat and drag it around town.  Try to look skinny and not at all burdened.  Then, get home and take all the things in your living room and toss them in the air.  Because, for some reason, that is what living rooms have to look like after a child comes in to your life.  No real explanation, just a fact.  Try to pick up while either A) holding the bowling ball or B) while the bowling ball sleeps for 26 minutes. GO.
Now it's Halloween.  A new week of WTFParent. First year holidays have always been a mystery to me.  He has no teeth. He can barely eat the Kit Kats I give him now! What is he going to do with a bag full? So we have to pick out a costume.  Obviously, a Star Wars costume is in order...oh wait, our niece is going to be a witch and wants Isaac to match.  The girl wants to use our son as an accessory? Ok! He's a bat.  Problem solved.  Only we got invited to this party and...maybe I should just knit him a Yoda costume. Today. No big.  I'm cool. I have a blog and I knit things and enable my husband's Star Wars problem. This will be a breeze. Also, everyone will think I'm awesome (as in: I will inspire in them an awe like no other when they behold my perfect son's Yoda hat). I am going to make my costume today as well.  And Occupy Wall Street.  And clean. And start boyman on peas, which I will make myself (I can't believe I didn't grow any this summer) and nurse every feeding, too, because I have been relying too much on the bottle.
I hate the guy who shows up to the party AT 7:00.  Whenever I host a party, I invite one of my closest friends to arrive at 6:45 just to insulate me from 7:00 guy. "Wow! Hi! Look at you! Right on time! And with a sheet pizza! Even though it's a dinner party.  Awesome.  Can I take your coat?" So today, after making 2 costumes, experimenting with peas, going to the craft store at 3pm on the Saturday before Halloween (cause I'm not only a hip and cool Do It Yourself-er, I was also born yesterday), getting both cranky Yoda, his witchy cousin and myself ready for the party...it was only 6:27. "Everybody in the car! Not you Jackson, Good Lord, why EVERY TIME that I call the dog he's deaf and suddenly I say 'car' and he can fucking hear? Look out, Jackson.  Lookout. Lookout. Lookout lookout lookout! Isaac, I know, we're going. Reilly, get your broom. Do I have my phone? Do you have my phone? No, I do. Do I have the baby? Do I have the keys?..." This seems endless. Nope. Losing all sorts of cool by the second, I get the masses (minus the seriously dejected canine) into the car, determined not to be the 7:00 guy.  How in the world am I running ahead of schedule? As I drive aimlessly around town, trying to kill time and lull the baby into a deep, blissful sleep that will allow me to have fun, I school Reilly on the art of being "fashionably late". We talk about when it is ok to be late, when it is never ok and when it is  preferred. 6:55.  "ok! Who wants McDonalds?!" Cool Auntship redeemed, child fed, time squandered, cooperate profits expanded, conscience crushed...now it is finally 7. Only 20 more minutes...
At the party: Isaac screamed at every loving, wonderful and dear former mother of an infant who tried to take him off my hands for 5 seconds, Reilly looked like the most miserable witch of all time, dire and as serious as a child can be at a Halloween party that features mini-quiche; Isaac ate the feathers of my bird costume, and as he grabbed a fistful, I remembered just how allergic I am to feathers and hoped that eating them is not, somehow, the same as sleeping on them. Reilly went home, Isaac feigned enjoyment, no one, not one person said "what an  AMAZING hat! and YOU made it?! TODAY?!"...all in all...Never Again. 
I lost this round, folks.  I tried. I did all the right things. Everything was so homemade, so simple and so wonderful. It matched.  It wasn't overdone. It was miserable. In the mirror, as I poured myself the great glass of wine I so richly deserved, I saw a zombie.  No really.  The eye makeup I wore to accentuate my Crow or Raven costume (whatever), had positively smeared under my eyes. Yes. My $3.99 eyeshadow failed me. Staring back at me was the zombie with which I threaten my infant son (a practice I plan to continue, by the way). It's not that I resemble or relate to the walking dead (though I do). It is not that having a babe robs you of your humanity and leaves you a (metaphorical) brain-sucking nobody (and it does)...  Not the problem. It's just that I talked to people. All night. While I looked like this. Somehow thinking I was pulling this whole thing off. Cool-O-Meter reading: Zero.

A Little Note On Competitive Momming...

And I say "Momming" because I don't see a lot of people who identify as "dads" or just plain "parents" out there attacking each other online.  I have been going back and forth on this post- join in the attacking by attacking the attackers? Or just shut the f up and let them be? But grrr they got under my skin. That, and Matt's eyes are starting to glaze over when I bring up the subject again, much in the same way mine do when he starts talking about beef and radish caviar or quarterbacks.  So I must vent.
I am so disheartened by what I read women writing to and about each other on these horribl(ly addictive) blogs!  I'm not sure why I keep going back to check out the "comments" section of each and every post that piques my interest (it may or may not have something to do with my complete and utter lack of adult conversation during an average day). It is kind of like when someone takes a bite out of some questionable food and says "Eww! That's disgusting! Here, try it!" and you do...I just keep logging on to watch these meanies tear one another apart. Who knew that giving birth and nursing your baby was like, the new PhD? I mean, it is incredibly difficult. That's no secret.  But, if you'll ride this argument out with me: for cisgendered women who are able and willing, isn't having a baby and feeding it kind of...average? I know emotionally it feels just amazing and extraordinary to the individual.  It really does, you'll find no argument from me on that point.  But biologically, it is doing what is expected.  You're a C student.  Raising a child, having a healthy, functioning family to show for your efforts--that is what earns you the "A", if you will.  Yet here these women are, technologically beating the hell out of one another, hiding behind handles like "emmasmom247", for the  heinous crime of supplementing breast milk with the occasional bottle of formula.  It is disgusting!  I recently saw a post from a mother who said she was excited to not breast feed.  You and me both, sister! So I checked it out.  There were 200+ comments about how awful and selfish the poster was! What?! Obviously, if you haven't heard that "breast is best" then you're parenting from the stone age of the 1950s or, you know, have other shit going on in your life and don't obsess over how other people feed their children. I'm nursing Isaac, I know it is the best for him-- but lord almighty, I cannot WAIT to hang up my nursing bras for good.  Is it selfish to fantasize about leaving the house? To dream of one day soothing him without having to disrobe? Am I "Mean Mommy" because I would like someone else to feed the baby for one hot god damned second while I get up to pee could you please stop screaming for just that long?  "Parenting is a sacrifice" they say and "it is your job to change your schedule for your baby's". Well, yeah, no shit.  Parenting is one sacrifice after another.  You trade in your home, your routine, your life, your relationships, your body, your train of thought, your clean car, and very often your dignity for your little Ruiner.  There are so many sacrifices, so many decisions made on your child's behalf, to brutalize a mother for choosing formula over breast milk is just absurd to me! It is not like she posted a blog entitled "Jesus, I Wish I'd Had Another Abortion" or "I Can't Wait to Feed My Baby Nothing But Maple Syrup and Scalding Hot Oil". She is going with the worst-best option.  When she starts putting slurrpies in that baby bottle, sure let's lose it on her.  But for now, let her live.
And, in my opinion, it is when we begin to conflate the duties of parenting with the tasks of a job that we begin to go off track. Taking care of a child is WAY bigger than a job.  My job I can leave.  I go to it willingly, I work as hard as required, I get to leave when the day is done. Being a parent is an all-the time thing.  When I'm at my job I'm still a parent but when I'm home with the kid I'm sure as hell not a waitress.  If I don't do my best at work I could get fired, I could loose customers, I could incur the wrath of my co-workers. But life goes on.  If I screw up at parenting? The consequences are much worse.  Meth Head worse. And as much as I wish I could pay my heating bill with coos and baby smiles, I get paid to do my job. Unfortunately, in this country you don't get paid to parent. So there's one good reason not to devalue the all-consuming duties of parenting by calling it a job. Also, a job requires a certain level of training, often an education and sometimes a very good deal of schooling.  You don't need those to be a good parent.  You do, however, need them to be a good surgeon. People spend years and years working on their careers and have every reason to be proud of that, to value that.  Liking your job, loving your job, going to your job, none of those things make you a bad parent! I bet it makes many people a better parent.  Having an identity outside your home is not only OK but it is your right! Women worked really hard to earn the right to have both identities.
I guess I'd gotten into my head that breast feeding was a feminist act: that women were coming around and reclaiming parenting from major corporations.  Like selling water in a plastic bottle, feeding your baby with evaporated milk by-product isn't necessary. We come with ready-made baby food so why buy it? Now, however, I feel so put-off by the Breast Feeding Volunteer Police Department that I could buy stock in Similac just to make a point. I feel like being a breast feeding enforcer is about as feminist a statement as voting for Sarah Palin: kind of what we had in mind...but not really. If women are using it as just another reason for snarky back-stabbing and shit talk then I'm not sure it's a bandwagon I want to jump on. So Ike and I are going to chug on, he with his fat-boy eating habits and me fumbling with my nursing bra, until one day when I'll be free of the very rewarding and very exacting job of feeding homeboy from my own body. I'm comfortable with my ambivalence. I envy women who have the wherewithal to nurse baby after baby for years at a time.  I also ain't mad at formula users either.  How could you be?

The Little Stranger

And he is pretty strange.  Well, mad.  And hungry.  And he looks like a frog.  After nine months of preparation and worry with a giant human growing inside of you, you finally give birth and there is a teeny tiny baby looking all wobbly and upset waiting for you to know what to do with him.  He arrives with his own set of needs and preferences.  I find that so strange.  How does someone so new have an opinion on seemingly everything? And how in the world did I not know how to solve his ailments intuitively? I felt every movement he made from the first second possible and I can't explain why he likes to sleep sitting up or has a mini panic attack if he isn't fed within 1 minute of waking.  I guess all babies have the same basic needs but I am still getting used to the idea that I am the person who provides for those needs.
When Matt and I took the labor and delivery class offered by our hospital I remember the moment reality began to sink in.  The nurse teaching the course was talking us through the different stages of labor (I suggest now they change the names of those stages as part of my new Honesty About Childbirth Initiative.  Stage 1 shall now be called "I Can Probably Do This As Long As I Stay Calm", Stage 2 "Yeah, I'm Gonna Need Those Drugs You Kept Offering Earlier", and finally, Stage 3 "I Heard You. I Am Pushing. And If You're So Great At All This Why Don't You Get Up Here and Have This Damn Baby Yourself Cause I'm Going Home".)  She began discussing Stage 2 she mentioned that now is when the real "discomfort" (their word) starts to kick in and "when the moms start getting a little upset".  I remember thinking "why would my mom be upset? Ohhhh.  You mean me, the mom.  Oh shit. I'm gonna be a mom". And in the delivery room the midwife kept asking me if I was "afraid of the pain", which admittedly, I kind of was, but what I was really afraid of was the baby.  I couldn't say as much because I couldn't talk at the time, but what I was thinking was "no, I'm terrified that if I keep pushing I am going to have a kid!"  I really, really wanted to be done with the labor but the prospect of becoming a parent was enough for me to want to stall.  A little.
           I studied Early Childhood Education in college, have read about infant and fetal development extensively before I even thought about starting a family of my own, and worked in an early childhood center in the infant room.  Also, I love my own mother with a cult-like devotion. Strangely, aside from my love for my own mother and my education providing all evidence to the contrary, I realize now I have been assuming I would have to earn my child's love.  Like, if I mess up enough midnight feedings by being really annoyed at the fact that it's a midnight feeding, my baby is going to resent me and wind up with tattoos and run away to Alaska after sophomore year in college to write, but not well, and end up frozen to death in a van.  Or go to business school and join the Young Republicans.  But it doesn't work like that.  When he is fussing and he hears my voice, it soothes him.  Wild.  He prefers my company and my solutions to his little poop-pants needs.  I fix it.  Me, just stupid old me who has been making a joke out of this whole thing for months now, is, by this guy's standards, doing the right things.  He doesn't know any better.  It took me a while to realize this, as I am primarily the one he is yelling at all day long, but I don't have to convince him of anything.  I just have to be willing to let him nurse 22 hours a day and not mind terribly when he tries to pee on me (his aim is still a little weak).  I have screwed up a lot in my life-- my completion rate of Things That Really Matter, sucks.  I dropped the ball with college- all 3 times. I have been a waitress for a decade- just waiting for something to fall into my lap, I guess.  Having a baby is the one thing I couldn't fail out of, couldn't not show up for.  Now that I'm stuck with him, and he doesn't seem to mind that too much, I think its possible that I might just see this thing through.  That's not to say he won't end up living with us well into his 30s while working on his "music career" out of a slap-dash recording studio in our garage that features a beer bottle pyramid, or working for Michele Bachmann's re-election campaign.  But some things can't be helped.