The pump

I was at a conference this past week in New York for two days.  During a breakout session, we had to speak about something that was on our minds, or close to our heart, while another person quietly listened, and I said, "I'm going to talk about my daughter, Annie."  So I did: I spoke about how I couldn't wait to get on that train home to see her.  I talked about the guilt that surrounds my decision to work.  I talked about how she has made me both whole, and has stripped the clarity from my thought process.  I talked about how nothing is fully right, or wrong, these days but my love for her is immense.

We only had a minute in this exercise, and the other person was not allowed to talk.  And to fill a minute of rapt attention and still silence, you talk.  You find yourself saying things you never articulated out loud.

I've found that I can balance being a working mother, but, damnit, it sometimes is just positively shitty.  Before I had her, things were clear: breast was best, of course I was going to work, no TV and only engaging toys, and I was going to read to my child every day and I was going to make homemade pureed sweet potatoes and quinoa and whatever else organic fare was trendy.  And now things are so very muddled to a murky grey and I can't believe there was a time when the resoluteness of my impending parenthood was so stark.  So I cling to what I can do, because there's a lot that I don't:  take the other day when I was lazy and plopped her on my lap and we both watched a steamy scene from The Vampire Diaries (her blue eyes wide as she sucked her pacifier gazing at the two main characters...well, going at it).  Also, the kid only gets a bath once a week.  This is very embarrassing but very true.

So I do what I can, and I've found there's one thing that makes me feel like a mother first and foremost during work.  There's one thing that makes me redeem myself just the slightest bit, that softens the blow of dropping her off at daycare all day, and that makes me feel close to her even when I'm in the city and she's in her infant room in the suburbs, and makes me forget that the last bath she has was eight days ago, and that is breastfeeding.

I know breastfeeding is not the only right choice, but for us it clicked.  I was very fortunate it came easily to us after the typical first-week "How the hell do I get this baby to stay on the boob?!" latching quandaries.  So I'm just going to talk about my experience with it, which is neither the right way nor the wrong way.

For my overnight conference everything I needed was no larger than a loaf of bread: I packed a small ziplock bag of make-up with my toothbrush and toothpaste and deodorant, a change of underwear, a hairbrush and a new shirt.  That was it.  It fit in my laptop bag.  My other bag, the larger one, had my breast pump with ice packs and extra bottles and flanges (the things that suction onto your boobs) and I was determined to make it work.  To walk through the door the following day with ice-cold milk, my womanliness dripping (almost literally) from me.  Being a new mom, and particularly (well, for me) a new working mom, has made me feel supremely inadequate in my motherhood.  I spend no more than an hour a day with Annie after work, and most of that time she is fussy and foul-tempered from a long day at daycare. So I cling to this: because I don't know 100% if I should be working (two elderly neighbors told me straight out I was making the wrong choice), and I don't know if we're doing enough tummy time (fine, we aren't), and I have a dark fear she may not have the deep, intense bond other babies have with their mothers, but at least I can do this for her. So I lugged that pump with me in the city and locked myself in a corner bathroom at the conference center and and turned the nob to max, thought of my love for that little girl, and turned that sucker on.

Do you know after a pumping session your nipples are a good half inch longer?

During lunch at the conference I called the hotel to confirm there was a fridge in my room.  "No." said the gentleman I spoke to.  "Can I have one?" I asked.  "Your room is too small," he replied.  I asked him to upgrade me.  He said the hotel was booked solid.  I then said, "It's for a medical reason," which is not truly a lie (perhaps?) but a tall tale, and I got my refrigerator.

But it had no freezer, and I needed to re-freeze my ice packs for the following day at the conference and traveling home.  I asked them to place my bag of ice packs in their restaurant freezer.  For good measure I added, "There's nothing funky in the bag, I swear."  Ten minutes later a hotel employee was at my door collecting my non-funky bag of ice packs.

I felt very motherly in that moment, even alone in my small hotel room in downtown Manhattan.

This baby gets more action than my husband.  (A lot more.)

Work tomorrow

The dichotomy of two very (white) things: one practical, one emotional.  My freezer milk stockpile, above (go me!), and my bear cub, below.

Tomorrow I return to work.  It's been a wrenching weekend (emotionally and literally): I had my first bout of food poisoning in my life starting on Friday evening.  Saturday was a feverish haze spent in the bathroom and shivering in bed.  Today is a bit better but I'm terrified about navigating my train commute sans bathroom (yikes!).

My hat's off to all working moms: I don't know how you do it, but I'm going to try my darndest.

Post-pregnancy: Crohn's and baby love

This was the front of our holiday card this year.  The photo is courtesy of Matt's super duper coworker who moonlights as a photographer, Jamie (check her out if you're in suburban Philly!), and the card is from Minted.  


Annie is tucked away in her Moby wrap with Dad, so that finally (woohoo, finally!) means I have a few moments to type.  


On Crohn's:  I went through a good week where my digestive system was absolutely, pitifully out of whack. It started about five days after Annie's delivery, which was not very fun as I was still in the heat of recovery from my (sigh) episiotomy.  You know you have a good marriage when your husband, very straight-faced, says after one of my bathroom runs, "Is your butt clean? (Thank you, honey.)  You should soak your butt in a bath so everything can heal."  (In truth, I ran several baths were I stole Annie's Burt's Bees bubble bath and I really do think it made everything better.)


Everything has settled down (I think I may have simply eaten some food that didn't agree with me) and I'm continuing with my maintenance medication, Pentasa.  My GI said to up my dosage following my delivery, but because my symptoms are currently in-check, and I'm breastfeeding, I'm very hesitant to do so.  There has been very little research on mesalamines and breastfeeding (although it is certain they do pass into the mother's breast milk), but due to the drug's category B status, there is currently little direct evidence of side effects to the baby except for an increase in diarrhea, although I still feel very "iffy" about the whole thing.  I think it's all about a balance of what's good for her, and for me, and it's something I will discuss when I see my doc in a few weeks.


On Motherhood: I spoke to my boss the other day and said very succinctly, "I love her to death, but I don't think I'm in love with motherhood yet."  I know it sounds harsh (and I thought about whether or not to even type this), but these past few weeks I've just felt out of it.  I miss being a part of humanity (even the crush of my god awful commute at times!).  I miss walking around the corner at work for a cup of coffee.  I miss my alone time where I could cuddle up with a good magazine in bed.  And even though I'm getting a decent amount of sleep, I am exhausted. Now when friends reach out (often over Gmail chat) I slowly peck out my responses with one hand, as I'm invariably holding and feeding her with the other.  How comes no one writes about this stuff?


The last few days, though, have been an absolute ball of bliss and I'm so relieved: her personality is coming out more and more and I'm finally interacting more and more with the little bugger.  I'm learning her grunts (and no, she does not coo, but grunts like an extra on The Walking Dead, and it's the dearest thing ever) and yesterday she had a blast grunting at her reflection in the mirror!  She even smiled!  We dance and look at the Christmas tree (she is absolutely, positively transfixed by the lights) and I'm starting to finally feel like more than a feeding trough.  I think she's beginning to really know Matt and me, and by golly, I think she likes us!  I return to work on February 13th, and I can safely say that date gets harder and harder to think about each and every day, and I've already had a few crying spells about it: 13 weeks just seems too young to put a little one in daycare.  It doesn't feel right at all, but it's our game plan for now.


Well, time to feed (but of course!).  Later we may go on a Trader Joe's outing and who knows what else the day holds in store for us.  I do know, however, it will be wonderful: I'm loving these little moments with Matt and Annie (or Jo-Jo as he calls her).