Ridiculous Circle

I think this is the case of reading too much... I am starting to feel guilty for letting Hayden sleep with me. But on the other hand, I cant feel guilty for doing what comforts my baby and gets me a decent amount of sleep. So there is quite a war going on right now. I am sure that a lot of mothers go through situations like this, but when its you, its a whole different story. And, of course, everyone has their own opinion... Some people say you are wrong, doing the wrong thing, and other people are going through the same thing and are just as confused as you are, and that doesn't help either. Hayden does ok sleeping his car seat for short amounts of time, but when he starts fussing, I cant leave him there... I think a big part of it is that Hayden doesn't really cry, so when he does, I know its because he NEEDS something. And I know he is only 5 weeks old, but I am confused about what to do. Matthew doesn't sleep at night (when he is here) so when he is with Hayden he waits ill he is in a deep sleep and then puts him in the car seat. Which worked for them, but during the week, I have him at night and by the time HE is sound asleep I am sound asleep. So that makes in difficult to make the transfer. Plus, Hayden takes after his mommy in that he has a great panache for dreaming, and vocalizing those dreams. So every time he laughs or squeals, or whimpers (which is often) I wake up, thinking HE is waking up. So I get lousy sleep. BUT when he sleeps with me, he is less vocal, so I am able to sleep better. And he doesn't wake up as often for feeding. If he is in the car seat he will go to sleep around 9 pm and then at midnight, 2 and 5. when he is with me he goes to sleep around 9 and wakes at midnight, feeds for longer, get changed, feeds on the other side, and then sleeps to 4 or 5,eats a little and sleeps again til 9ish. I cant make myself feel guilty about what seems to be working so then I feel even MORE guilty for feeling guilty. Its a ridiculous circle, but I cant stop it... I should be more concerned that I am doing my very best, and not focus on HOW I'm doing it just that I'm doing it.

How a baby changes your world...

1. You finally stop to smell the roses, because your baby is in your arms.

2. Where you once believed you were fearless, you now find yourself afraid.

3. The sacrifices you thought you made to have a child no longer seem like sacrifices.

4. You respect your body ... finally.

5. You respect your parents and love them in a new way

.6. You find that your baby's pain feels much worse than your own.

7. You believe once again in the things you believed in as a child.

8. You lose touch with the people in your life whom you should have banished years ago.

9. Your heart breaks much more easily.

10. You think of someone else 234,836,178,976 times a day.

11. Every day is a surprise.

12. Bodily functions are no longer repulsive. In fact, they please you. (Hooray for poop!)

13. You look at your baby in the mirror instead of yourself.

14. You become a morning person.

15. Your love becomes limitless, a superhuman power.

Cigarette Smoke vs. Dog Crap

So which is worse? If we blow our fans from front to back, we get our neighbors smoke blowing through our house (both sides smoke). If we blow the fans from back to front, we don't have the smoke problem cuz we have a dual direction fan so if they come out the back to smoke we can switch to exhaust, but it blows in the dog crap smell from their back yard. If you'll remember about a year ago, I posted about the neighbor's backyard being all dirt cuz their dog had killed all the grass, and the dirt was blowing through the window, well, same issue. No grass will grow in that dirt now and they don't come out to clean up the poop each time the dog craps. So It is a choice between cigarette smoke and dog crap smell (I am trying to ignore the thought of the crap particles that are also being blow into my home.) I hate neighbors. I CANNOT wait till we don't live in a house attached to someone else's. Not only that, but if we had air conditioning, none of this would be an issue!!! I wouldn't have to keep the windows open and have fans going. I know that an air conditioner wouldn't eliminate the smells completely but it would be better than this! I am seriously considering writing them a letter or something asking them to clean up after their dog in a timely manner. But I don't know what good it would do. They obviously don't care how their actions effect other people, but if I do nothing nothing will change. But when it comes to dealing with it, at least the smell of dog shit wont give my son asthma or hurt his lung development. I am just trying to keep him in the dining room area, and away from the window. I hate neighbors. No, I miss our neighbors that just moved out, the ones after the dog people who killed the lawn, and before these new ones. They were quiet and courteous. We basically didn't even know they were there. Too bad they didn't stay very long...

He always knows how to make me cry...

I came down today and he told me that Hayden made this for me. I cried like a baby... I love my husband.

What a night

Goodness, what a horrible night we had. I couldn't get Hayden to eat or to sleep. He would have his eyes closed for a minute and I would get all relaxed and doze off (yes, in a minute's time) and he would wake back up. After this happening at least 18 times, I was tired and frustrated... so I called Matthew to take him downstairs so I could get some sleep. I just couldn't take it anymore, and that's what he is here for (when he is here). It is one of the good things about him working nights cuz he doesn't lose any sleep (on the weekends) if I need him to watch the kid at night. Anyway, he said he couldn't get Hayden to eat or sleep either and got to the point where he just let Hayden cry himself to sleep. I am glad he did it, cuz I wouldn't have been able to let him cry like that. But it worked and he slept all night in his car seat. So I think that Matthew may have laid the groundwork for transitioning him from our bed, with me :(, to sleeping in his car seat. We'll see how it goes this weekend. I, on the other hand, had a GREAT night. I slept on my stomach for the first time in months. And I am a stomach sleeper so you can understand how happy this made me. I dint hear any crying...I was a rock. Speaking of rocks, though. A small downside to being dead to the world is that I didn't feed Hayden at all from 2am to 8:30 when I finally drug myself out of bed, not because I wanted to, but because I had to, very large, rocks on my chest in place of my boobs. I haven't been that engorged since my milk first came in! SO that is a downside, but the sleep made up for it! Oh, he's waking up, I had better go.

Happy Birthday!

We would like to wish Aunt Amanda a very happy 30th birthday!!!!

Love, Emily, Matthew and Hayden.

Cramps

Ah, cramps, how i have NOT missed these last months. I still have 3 weeks before I can get an IUD put back in, so I just have to deal with them. But I enjoyed living without any at all for 9 months. At least with the IUD they are barely noticeable.

Well. lets see whats new. Not really all that much. Hayden is really trying to roll over. He doesn't stay on his back ever. He always goes to his side. Not too much longer and he will be able to get on his tummy He is really good at holding his head up now. He still doesn't like to sleep by himself, but he does do about half the night in his car seat. he is sleeping for 5-6 hour stretches at night which is REALLY nice for mommy! He HATES to take a bath in the sink, but he LOVES the shower with mommy. If I do it in the sink he screams the whole time, but the shower works really well, and I don't have to worry about him peeing all over everything. I just put him in the car seat while I shower and then when I am done I just undress him and he takes his turn. So the bathroom is all warm from my shower before he has to get naked. He is getting more comfortable with Matthew. Which, I think, puts both of our minds at ease. He is making the BEST faces and I am trying to take lots of pictures of all of them, so you should have a fun Picture Thursday. Um, that is about it. He is having some moody days which makes it hard to do anything productive. But I don't have anywhere to be so I don't really mind all that much. I just sleep when he sleeps and I am still finding what works for us. But I tell you what, when he is sleeping, and I see that big ol' toothless grin... nothing else in the world matters.

Clarification.

I would just like to say that I HAVE a job. I actually have two jobs. Matthew keeps telling people that we cant do this and cant do that "until Emily gets a job." I have a job, and the way he is saying that makes it sound like lazy ass Emily doesn't have a job again... I do. And the a=way he is going I will end up back at it sooner than I expected.

My Favorites

I have been relying on other people to pass on the pictures I have been taking. I feel like Hayden has been attached to my boobs 20 hours out of the day so it doesn't leave much for anything else. We had to resort to the nipple shield and it has helped him tremendously, and I don't want to die anymore, so we are focusing on getting him back to his birth weight, so eating is all we do. He was 8 lbs 1 oz on Monday, so we are almost there, but he is a little behind on his weight gain yet. So that is our focus, so we eat on demand, and that seems to be all the time. I wonder what the recovery period is for breast milk replenishment? Eh, we're dealing. He does really good at night. The last couple night have been rough, he was pretty fussy and we didn't get to sleep until 5 am. But once he does get to sleep he sleeps for 4 to 5 hours at a time. Our challenge is the daylight. He doesn't have the darkness to let him know its night time, so at 9 pm we go up to our bedroom (cuz its the darkest) so he has that trigger. He doesn't know what time it is. So that is our newest challenge. That and he doesn't seem to be to comfortable with Matthew. I know they haven't had a real chance to bond, so Hayden fusses when ever I give him to Matthew. It is really bothering Matthew cuz he thinks that his son hates him. And then he gets all worked up and impatient with Hayden, which I think only feeds Hayden's reaction. I keep trying to tell him to stay calm, and just be patient but that's like trying to knock down a wall with water balloons. You cant get through and you just end up with a big mess. It seems like he thinks I am being condescending or something, but I am really just trying to get him to calm down so Hayden calms down. So we have to work on that too. I have started pumping so that Matthew can feed him when he is home, hoping that helps with the bonding. I just kinda wish Matthew had a bit more patience... I think I know who is responsible for that..wink, wink ;). So anyway, here are some of my favorite pictures.