I know that it will be wonderful for him to spend so much quality time with his grandparents. We're done with breastfeeding during the day, so he doesn't need me that way. Three months ago I was crazy for some time for myself, and although I have the fear about my capacity to use my brain again, I know it will come back. It will be nice to have some money again. All these things are true.
But god, I have my first real case of mother guilt. It's the worse possible timing. My brother has turned up, like the bad penny he is. Dad's memory continues to decline - he hasn't worked in months now - and physical complications have meant mum has had to defer her Master's in order to take care of him. Cutting the breastfeeding down so much has made my period return, accompanied by all the usual associated fun. I got caught up in a Facebook discussion about 'controlled crying' with a bunch of Attachment Parenting disciples and even though I know we have done what felt right for us at every turn, and the point of my contribution was that everyone does the best they can and having judgy asshats for friends helps nobody, I still felt judged. I managed to restrain myself, but I felt the ridiculous desire to justify my choices to strangers; to explain the ins and outs of our particular situation and prove that my kid is just as happy and confident and undamaged as theirs.
The worst thing about this whole situation is that as the days tick by and all I want to do is spend every waking moment soaking him in to my bones, the trial runs continue and I'm spending less and less time with him than I ever have.
*Exhale*. It will be ok. We will all be ok. And in the meantime we have a metric fuckload of blackberries to take our minds off things.
Oh, mother guilt! Going back to work is hard, hard, hard. I'm still only doing little bits of freelancing here and there, but it's still challenging (especially with no childcare - I don't want to put Auden in a centre yet and we have no family willing or able to help). In some ways I've found it a lifesaver, in terms of being able to use my mind again and have some continuity with my life from before the baby. The first job was tough, and I messed it up in parts, but it didn't take long for me to pick things up again.
ReplyDeleteThe parenting wars are another means to get women tearing each other apart while the men get on with things, methinks. I had quite strong ideas about how I was going to raise my baby: as a feminist I objected to the philosophy of attachment parenting, yet in practice I've almost followed it to the letter. We bought a super-wanky Danish cot to demonstrate how we absolutely wouldn't co-sleep (ha ha ha).
Our treasured, plump, little First World babies are going to turn out just fine, either way.
As for the blackberries, colour me envious! I've been daydreaming about cooking with them. You'll laugh, but I spent $3.50 on a punnet containing seventeen biodynamic blackberries.
I can't imagine trying to work without someone taking care of the baby! Are you just sneaking bits in while he's asleep? Our laptops are basically baby crack. As soon as he sees those silver screens up, he's all over the machines, teaching us tricky new shortcuts with his enthusiastic keyboard thumping. I shudder to think what he would do with a pile of proofs. Apart from the fact that he lives in what was once the study, working from home with the kid on board is not an option here!
ReplyDeleteWe are very lucky to have the grandmothers. I think he is too little to go to childcare, but even if that was our only option, the three centres nearby that he's on the list for won't have space for him until next year. That's an 18-month wait! Ridiculous!
It does frustrate me that so much of the parenting finger-pointing is mother-focused. It's so unhelpful. I can be just as acerbic as the next inner city tosser, but if having a baby has taught me anything, it's that I don't know shit. I'd like to think I'm figuring my own kid out well enough, but as far as anyone else's baby and their situation goes... I have no clue, and no interest in chastising them for their choices.
I had similar feminist misgivings about parts of attachment parenting, but also, a lot of it just doesn't work for us. We co-slept a few times in the early days, out of sheer laziness, but it sucked for all involved, so the kid was back in his box on the floor. He was in our room for a good six months, but there was no way any of us were sleeping if he was in the bed. Same with the teaching him to sleep. (I refuse to call it 'controlled crying'. I don't think that's what we did.) He was one hundred thousand times happier once he figured out how to sleep for longer than 40 minutes at a stretch. The combined total of ten minutes of crying (not screaming, just crying) over three days was absolutely worth it. (Sorry, turns out I haven't managed to restrain myself from the justifications at all!)
Oh, blackberries. We haven't quite got to the freezing/jamming stage yet, but I think this weekend might be it. I must admit, I do do a happy little wiggle when I see them in the supermarket for $6. (But I still fork out for raspberries. Be still my beating heart. There is no greater smell in this universe than a punnet of fresh raspberries.) It actually was a rather therapeutic way to spend the baby-less afternoon, the blackberry picking. Much more pleasant than wrestling with enormous goats and their unkempt toenails.
You have goats? With toenails? Oh, the jealousy! I love goats like crazy, even the musky ones.
ReplyDeleteWork is weird to fit in. Proper proofing means I lock myself in the office all weekend, emerging to breastfeed (still every three hours - he's eleven months tomorrow) and blocking my ears to the constant drone of 'Mumumumumum! Mumumum!' and the occasional slap of small hands against the door. Right now I'm doing some light editing for a small literary publisher, which is ostensibly easier because I can do it on the laptop. What it really means is that I spend a lot of time on Twitter (I blame Kevin Rudd) and don't get very much work done at all. Auden is really easily bored now and he quite often starts crying if I open my laptop because it means he has to keep pottering around the same room with the same toys without my attention, so we've now joined up to two playgroups to try to balance things out more. He loves it, but I'm now even more tired and less inclined to do good work. Thank god this book is a thriller, so it's got a bit of momentum.
On top of his day job, K is currently editing an anthology and has just become managing editor of a poetry journal (note: unpaid!). As soon as Auden goes to bed, the laptops are out until at least one in the morning. It's insane.
I'm deeply impressed that you've got your small sleeping so well. The only people who know how to parent a kid are the kid's parents, I've discovered (and even then a lot of it is guesswork). Be gentle, love them, make sure they're fed and sheltered and educated and vaccinated. So much of the rest is just middle-class neurosis because we don't have bigger threats to our children, like typhoid.
We have goats! And Harry is most definitely musky. He is an enormous, amorous beast. There is a reason we have 'farm pants'. He's very fond of rubbing his giant head (and all its stink) up against anyone who crosses into his territory. But mama goat and baby Bess just smell like lovely warm wool. I heart them.
ReplyDeleteWow, still every three hours! Go you! My friend's baby was born on 4 April, so about the same age as Auden and he's still sucking it down at a similar rate. I am in awe.
Do you guys have a toy library nearby? Ours has been an absolute godsend with the boredom issue. New and amazing toys every three weeks! Or more often if we can manage it. We mostly borrow big stuff that there's no way we'd buy but that he loves clambering in and over and through. (Also things with the flashing lights and music. I hates them, but he thinks they're great. I can put up with them when I know they're only in the house for a fortnight!)
I seriously think we might be the same person. The Boy is writing his PhD, but also had five (unpaid!) articles published last year, and has another on the go due tomorrow. All this happens outside of the day job. Baby goes to bed, laptop city.
Look after yourself, my friend. It's a tough gig, this mothering business, even without the work issue to complicate matters. If I had amazeballs powers of greatness I would sort K-Rudd out for starters, and then conjure up a grandmother of just the right involvement level for you.