Blogger FAIL!

Here we have a beautiful, awesome blog. And two mamas who are totally into the idea of imperfect parenting... and then there is me, who is just TOTAL FAIL when it comes to maintaining more than one blog. (I also let my son's blog go to seed...)

January resolution: I am going to reaffirm my commitment to this blog. I shall post at least once a week. I shall fail and bounce back!

This week's imperfection: I could not let my husband handle one night on his own. For fuck's sake! I have been the go-to night parent for so fucking long, and I couldn't just try to see if my husband could handle one night? I am afraid of becoming my mother, afraid of abandoning my child, afraid of being abandoned all over again...

My triumph is that I am considering going away for a weekend by myself. I haven't committed to it (we're still maybe going as a family) but I think that going on my own would be a Very Good Thing. Totally wabi sabi because I will be terrified at the huge change, but... I need it. And Rems could use a lot more daddy time.

Imperfect Podcasting: Night Issues

I recorded the only-second-ever Wabi Sabi Mamas podcast, mostly for Thordora:) I talk about night weaning success-in-progress and older munchkins' waking problems.

... And a Status Report from the Land of Triangle Family

Firstly, with the exception of increasingly-spaced twinges of pumpkin-belly-missing, I am so on board with the single child plan. Triangle Family it is- so be it.

I'm calling night-weaning a success-in-progress. She still asks to nurse when she wakes (if she wakes, and lo! there are nights when she doesn't) but accepts the new rule: there are no nummins when the sun's down. Several clever family members and friends have observed that I sneakily chose the rule knowing the sun is waning and I predict she'll slowly wean by Winter Solstice. Now that I'm sleeping, I'm feeling a great deal more flexible about when/if/how/whatever to completely wean. I love that she's able to participate in this transition. It was a stroke of genius to find a time frame she can observe herself. I think I stole the idea from Martha Sears, but let's just credit my sun-worshiping pagan self, OK?

Ongoing thing: Single motherhood with a father in the house. The Bird will not let him coparent. Nor is he allowed to touch me affectionately in her presence. Observe:

Bu: *hugs and kisses me* "Love you."
Birdy: "Noooo!!!! MY mama!"
Bu: "Yes, honey, but she's my wife, too. I love Mommy too."
Birdy: "No! MY Yife!

All day Sunday I was her mommy AND her "yife." Meh. At least it was highly amusing, as was Bu saying, "You're a baby. You don't have a wife yet." (Not sure if this was silliness, or pro-LGBT language to please and entertain me, or if he didn't even notice...)

Adorableness aside, it's really frustrating both of us that she won't interact with Bu as much as she will me. We are both charmed by her new preference for being home with us. Since she's been in the grandies' care since almost birth during the work week, she's always been very attached to them. It's kind of a little parenting ego boost for us now that she blisses out when we pick her up. She says "My house! I home! Boo home!" and it's like Neverland with chocolate sprinkles or something.

Speaking of Neverland, I'm reinventing it with such wild artistic license Mr. Barry would either shudder with disgust or lavish me with praise... maybe both. We have no Peter Pan books in the house (which is a sacrelige) but I showed the baby a few minutes of the movie. She loves the story but the movie's too scary. She asks for a Pan story every night, so I get to exercise my inventiveness while she drifts to sleep.

Right now, the overall mood is a seesaw one between glowing, self-congratulatory awe and O Plz Goddess don't let us throttle the toddler. We're riding it, it's cool.

Weaning Theory Part 1: The Summit and the Wisdom of Doc G.

The Bu and I held another Parenting and Wellness Summit in our Art + Junk Room. As all such meetings have been, it was chaired by Mr. E after finding his Mz. R.E. in full-on wigging mode while attempting to sketch a little bit during the Our Miss E.'s nap. Like all Parenting and Wellness talks, the conclusion reached is that a massive amount of my stress is due to sleep issues. The only strategy that seems available to us is to night wean at the least. The mister is gently lobbying for a total embargo of boobie exports to babybellyland in order to bolster relations between the elder E's and create a New Sleep Deal for mama.

As most weaning discussions happen on days of strung-out craziness, my side of the dialogue is a tearful chaos of IDUNNOWHATTODO! Only that's the crazy talking because it's clear what I need to do:

1. Determine if, indeed, my own sanity is a priority. If yes, then
2. Realize I must wean her at night.
   

OK. Only I don't know hoooowwwww. But that's more crazy, because, my doods, I totally did it. Successfully. I then caved during a tummy bug and nursed her back to health and back to our time-honored habit of night wakings. My tactic was Dr. Gordon's plan, which is tailored for crunchy, weepy, worn-the-fuck-out, toddler-nursing mommy-messes. His plan has logical steps and gentle, supportive language and theory. It worked beautifully at 18 months. I'm a little fretful that my 27 month old will be a harder sell, but I'll get into that in my next weaning post. I have several. Perhaps, for balance, Lexi can weigh in on life as a toddler nurser who does not have Teh Crazy?

Meditation on Meaning and Mothering

I had an insight this morning. Or a couple. Yes. I had two poignant insights that might be important only to the mind of a mom who was awake no fewer than six times to nurse her toddler then had to go to work.

My first insight was a little diagram image of my priorities that popped up all visual and organized in my head. It went Tiny Her, Him, Work, Art, Housework, Money.... on downward in increasingly small fonts until the tiny, squeaky-meek little 'me' box at the bottom of the pile was microscopic. Oh, I thought. The "oh" of the dawning realization variety. Mentally I tried to imagine a pretty graph of overlapping circles where the ME section was a warm pale color- possibly peach- that gently blended in perfect graph harmony with all the other neat little divisions of life. It fell apart a little bit because immediately the next epiphany slapped me and was more grounded and more describable. (It came with a blog post fully written and edited, and almost hit the publish button for me.)

Weary Hippie Mother in Appalachia Insight the Second:

Here's what bugs about my own little parenting zeitgeist: it's the lack of value given to my choices. I've never encountered hostility directly in my family, neighbors, or out in my town. No one has asked me to cover my nursing child or reprimanded me about the dangers of co-sleeping. Instead I get these amused little reactions like I am the most adorable little eccentric- just about completely harmless- when people find out the barely-touched crib was Freecycled before the baby was walking, or see us nursing, or ask me if my handmade sling is safe. I'm thrilled that I've had a comfortable time of it- I was braced (after too many hours of web-based mamadrama) to be assaulted with judgmental people.

My complaint, now that my new insight has helped me articulate it, is that my parenting choices are seen as indulgent. (Also, I can hear people scoffing: 'parenting choices' is a phrase full of pretentious over-thinking.) It's in the way doctors presume that breast milk is of no nutritive importance after six months or a year. It's the way people just warn sleep sharers that the kids will never leave the bed. It's the convenient loss of the history of midwives. and ignoring C-section rates.

I won't pretend for politics or good press that night nursing isn't exhausting me, or that my husband isn't dying to have me back in our bed full-time. I just want to own my reasons. I want to say, yes my mother-milk is important to my small picky-eating baby. I want to acknowledge my belief that small children need a warm, comforting body next to theirs at night. Now that I'm moving toward a new phase with weaning I need to express that nursing for two years has been a gift to Molly. My waiting to wean at an age that's radical in my neighborhood isn't a sentimental avoidance of choice- it's a real decision. It's all so complex with ideas of sacrifice (and motherhood culturally is far too tangled up in that for me to even scratch the surface) but my reasons, and my choices, are expressions of love and of careful thought, and of intention.

Adventures in Bedsharing

Here is how the Bird finally fell asleep tonight: Back to back, with her legs inside the butt of my shorts. She is insane. I probably am too for allowing it, but it was nearing eleven o'clock and bedtimes after nine p.m. make me a crazed monster mommy who will do anything to knock the baby out.

Wabi Sabi Mamas Podcast!

I created a free (and rather extensively and strangely ad-heavy, sorry...) podcast for the Wabi Sabi Mamas. Here is the inaugural post: Heidi muses about mommy-led weaning with baby cues:)

Sleep Article Reaction: Hear Mama Bear Growl

Hmm. My husband just linked me to this Time/CNN article about "how not to get your baby to sleep," in light of a bad night. (The Bird woke at 2:00 a.m., demanded/announced, "Up!" and was awake until 3:30.)

I predict Hathor will have a field day with this... I read it knowing I was going to ignore it or possibly rankle at it: Bu said it cautions against co-sleeping. It does so with some sneaky faulty logic. There are studies that show that kids who don't get enough sleep overall in a 24 hour period have such and such problems. Then it says that co-sleeping can contribute to frequent waking and uses the previous study to show that co-sleeping is undesirable. However, the study didn't address continuous sleep versus sleep with wakings.

In the article's defense, I'm totally on board with the TV restrictions.

In crunchy parenting's defense, don't you fucking call mamas who sleep with their babies "maladaptive." Is the entire mammal class of animals maladaptive? I find that ridiculous.

hormonal ravages + no sleep + no support = very, very grumpy mama

Last night was our third night in a row of very, very little sleep. Molly would fall asleep fine, then wake crying for me less than an hour later, and until the morning alarm, she nursed damn near constantly. She'd fall asleep and I'd latch her off and roll her over and then in 15-30 minutes she'd demand to nurse again. She isn't hitting a deep extended sleep until about 5:30 a.m. The seven o'clock alarm has turned into an 8 o'clock one so I get at least a little rest.

It's so frustrating, but more frustrating is feeling pressure about bitching. A sleepy mama has got to bitch. When I let loose on friends and family, I hear how the baby should be sleeping through the night and she is using me as a pacifier. (I have to contradict here: a pacifier is a substitute for a breast, not the other way around.) Or she's too old to be nursing. I feel like if I complain about her nursing habits, I'm a bad breastfeeding advocate. I have the small local group of crunchy mamas I can whine too, but there's something keeping me from feeling like one of them- none of the active core group there works. None of them have ever made me feel any animosity or condescension or whatever- but I really think that's an internal thing I have. Some hidden class issue is keeping me from really reaching out to these very sweet supportive women.

My plan is to suck it up and vent on our message group. I'm reminding myself that she does this consistently during my period and it'll pass. I'm doing the inner pep talk thing and trying to get on board with the idea that I can be a huge boobie cheerleader (um, both as in "love me some big boobies" and in the sense of supporting greatly) and still want to scream

GET this succubus child off me and let me SLEEP!

So I'm going to go and scream that email a helpmeplease email to my granola brigade and find me some support.