That off week was just that. An off week.
Let me say that it's a bit hard to express things not going perfectly well to a community of women who struggle with infertility when you've got an infant on your hands. Thank you for reading what I had to say and not jumping down my throat.
I'm much less lonely, and less down. I've had some insomnia (which is odd when your 2.5 month-old is sleeping through the night. You're tired, but not for the obvious reason), and some anxiety, but all in all, I think things are good.
I've become more proactive in scheduling outings and visits with friends, on top of weekly activities like yoga and our informal mama's group on Friday. I think I've also relaxed into the role a bit more, and stopped trying so hard to get shit done. Working without interruptions is a pipe dream.
I've also started taking the steps I feel I need to take to sort of wrap up (to avoid using the term closure) the stuff around the birth. And by stuff I mean the story, the thoughts and the emotions linked to what happened. And by what happened, I mean mostly the hemorrhage, but also the birth and the high blood pressure stuff. I've loosely mapped out three steps to this wrap up.
Step 1: talk about what happened to people who care about me and have time to listen. This is mainly so that I can have a full story of what happened by asking what others remember about it. Also, it helps to talk about it out loud so that I can stop running the scenario in my head over and over again (which I was doing for the first two months).
Step 2: Send out thank you cards to the care providers who helped me during the birth and postpartum complications.
Step 3: Write out the details of the birth story and subsequent complications so that I've got a fleshed out narrative.*
Step 1 is mostly done. I've reviewed what happened in therapy, and with my therapist's suggestion, talked about it with those who were involved (Mr. A, friends who helped that night or weekend). Step 2 is well underway, and I would say that it has helped a great deal. And now, for your part. I can do step 3 in my journal, but I think I will do it here on my blog. It will be incredibly boring. You do not have to read it (or anything I write for that matter). But I'm asking you to be patient while I crank out a few posts containing waaaaaaaayyyy too many boring details about gross and scary stuff. I need to tell the story and then move on.
*Psychologists are annoying like that. Can't help it.
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
just sayin'
I spend a lot of time alone with Gummy. I talk to her in English, then in French. She gurgles and smiles sometimes. Or grunts. Sometimes she farts, often to register disapproval, like when I change her diaper at 3am before feeding her.
But mostly, I'm with my thoughts.
I had a pretty lonely week last week. I wondered if it was PPD (postpartum depression) visiting. I felt like PPD and I we were two cats on a fence, vying for the same backyard. We were checking each other out, ready to pounce at the first sign of weakness in the other.
I think I won that round, though. It was just loneliness. I didn't have too much scheduled and what I had scheduled fell through.
Monday: I went to the community centre for parent and child time. The place was crawling with toddlers and moms of toddlers who were way too exhausted to talk to me and my angelic looking infant. The moms that had infants also had toddlers, and were busy intellectually stimulating two progeny instead of one. So, no chance to make a connection. I left. One facilitator ran after me and said I should go to the infant time.
Tuesday: The other Augusta was nursing a sick baby. So, they didn't come to yoga. Only that annoying woman with the cute baby boy who she WON'T VACCINATE* was there, so I made myself scarce after class, lest she wanted to hang out again.
Wednesday: I had planned to attend the infant time at the community centre, held at their location at the mall, and to arrive early to get Gummy a sun hat. I realize early that the infant program runs on Tuesday for parents and their infants of 0 to 6 months, and Wednesdays for parents and their infants of 6 to 12 months. I had until then believed infant time was both on Tuesday and Wednesday, regardless of said infant's age. Plans foiled again.
Thursday: I planned to stay home and work on Gummy's napping (and get thank you cards all done. ha!). It sounds so ridiculous to write it like that, but that's what I thought at the time. We'll stay home and I'll put her down for several naps and she'll be blissed out on sleep and I'll win a "mother-of-the-year-award". Snort. She had terrible naps and went to bed cranky and exhausted at 8:45pm. No awards were handed out.
Friday: Mom's group at my house in the morning and out-of-town friends visiting in the afternoon. It was a lovely day. Gummy had great naps.
In that lonely week, I was often lured by the dangerous and seductive self-shaming thought that goes like this: "you've waited so damn long to have a baby, now that you have one, you need to enjoy every second of being a mother" I was helped by convincing myself that having the baby you wait so damn long for does allow you to press the reset button and become like every other mama out there. New parents are allowed to struggle and find some areas of parenting difficult. They are allowed to have an adjustment period to parenthood. Why shouldn't I also be allowed to adjust?
Consider yourself pressed, reset button. I'm just like any ordinary mother out there with my cute DE baby.
*Don't get me started on that
But mostly, I'm with my thoughts.
I had a pretty lonely week last week. I wondered if it was PPD (postpartum depression) visiting. I felt like PPD and I we were two cats on a fence, vying for the same backyard. We were checking each other out, ready to pounce at the first sign of weakness in the other.
I think I won that round, though. It was just loneliness. I didn't have too much scheduled and what I had scheduled fell through.
Monday: I went to the community centre for parent and child time. The place was crawling with toddlers and moms of toddlers who were way too exhausted to talk to me and my angelic looking infant. The moms that had infants also had toddlers, and were busy intellectually stimulating two progeny instead of one. So, no chance to make a connection. I left. One facilitator ran after me and said I should go to the infant time.
Tuesday: The other Augusta was nursing a sick baby. So, they didn't come to yoga. Only that annoying woman with the cute baby boy who she WON'T VACCINATE* was there, so I made myself scarce after class, lest she wanted to hang out again.
Wednesday: I had planned to attend the infant time at the community centre, held at their location at the mall, and to arrive early to get Gummy a sun hat. I realize early that the infant program runs on Tuesday for parents and their infants of 0 to 6 months, and Wednesdays for parents and their infants of 6 to 12 months. I had until then believed infant time was both on Tuesday and Wednesday, regardless of said infant's age. Plans foiled again.
Thursday: I planned to stay home and work on Gummy's napping (and get thank you cards all done. ha!). It sounds so ridiculous to write it like that, but that's what I thought at the time. We'll stay home and I'll put her down for several naps and she'll be blissed out on sleep and I'll win a "mother-of-the-year-award". Snort. She had terrible naps and went to bed cranky and exhausted at 8:45pm. No awards were handed out.
Friday: Mom's group at my house in the morning and out-of-town friends visiting in the afternoon. It was a lovely day. Gummy had great naps.
In that lonely week, I was often lured by the dangerous and seductive self-shaming thought that goes like this: "you've waited so damn long to have a baby, now that you have one, you need to enjoy every second of being a mother" I was helped by convincing myself that having the baby you wait so damn long for does allow you to press the reset button and become like every other mama out there. New parents are allowed to struggle and find some areas of parenting difficult. They are allowed to have an adjustment period to parenthood. Why shouldn't I also be allowed to adjust?
Consider yourself pressed, reset button. I'm just like any ordinary mother out there with my cute DE baby.
*Don't get me started on that
Sunday, May 5, 2013
Third Party
I recently read the post by Kelly Wendel on PVED in which she defends her choice of creating a family using third party conception. In her post, she cites different authors who argue against third party reproduction and ART in general, and I have read none of these. Truth is, I don't have that kind of time to waste right now. I have a 2-month-old to raise. But reading the post made me think about the hoopla related to third party conception, mainly the crap being issued by the religious right. There are, I believe, interesting and legitimate issues to be pondered with third party conception. Issues that I have pondered hard and long on this road. The potential for abuse is high in a situation where money is paid for human organs/tissue, and Mr. A and I had much to resolve internally before we were able to do DE in the US. When we started down this road, we didn't think we would go ahead and pay for gametes. But life experiences bring you to different decisions. As a general rule, I don't believe women are being exploited in donating their eggs, but I think some women potentially are. I don't think the industry as a whole is exploitative, but I think it has the potential to be. I obviously had to be ok with our clinic and the way we believed they treated donors; but ultimately, I had to trust that they were well treated without knowing for sure.
Anyway.
In the time I've not been blogging and not been commenting in the last week (sorry, lovelies, I've been going for long walks with my girl and spending less time on the computer), I've been thinking about this idea of third party conception and what it means to me these days.
At this point, third party conception has become symbolic of something I am working on in my life: accepting help. Not just begrudgingly, or shamefully, or because I am so broken and dying and won't make it without help. No. Just accepting help because I need help.
Like everyone on this green planet, I need help sometimes. Because of my particular psychology, this is a challenge. I should be able to handle it all on my own. I was an enormous burden for my mother as a child, and so burdening others is something I fear like the plague. I will bend myself into all kinds of non-Augusta shapes to avoid burdening others, lest they start thinking I'm annoying and abandon me. Asking for help is part of that pattern.
In this quest to have a child, I've had no choice but to ask for A LOT OF help. I've had to ask for eggs. Twice. Once from a friend and once from a stranger. And most importantly, I've needed to receive their gift. With my whole grateful being, my job has been to just receive. Fuck, that's hard.
I haven't told you much of the story around the birth and the postpartum circus. I think I will, but it's a bit epic and I need to keep digesting it before I lay it all out here. But I'll say here that Mr. A and I needed a lot of help during that time, and we received more than we could have ever asked for. Two women friends of ours gave us breast milk so that we could feed Gummy in the early days when I was trying to breastfeed but wasn't producing milk. Three different sets of friends took Gummy in overnight when I was in hospital. One of our friends breastfed Gummy on an overnight, because she had lots of milk to give to her daughter and to mine. Another friend who is a midwife came to spend the day with me at the hospital after the postpartum hemorrhage so that she could help me sort out what had happened and what could happen as a result (ie try to avoid a hysterectomy if possible). Meals were delivered twice a week for 5-6 weeks after the birth so that we didn't have to cook.
So when I think of third party conception and people getting their panties in a knot about how wrong this might be in the eyes of their chosen deity, I feel like yawning in their face. That stuff is so esoteric to me. How about we look at what love and altruism really mean on this earth at this time. For me, there is something divine about the gifts I have received, from the egg donor, and from all the people who have supported us as we struggled to have a child.
Anyway.
In the time I've not been blogging and not been commenting in the last week (sorry, lovelies, I've been going for long walks with my girl and spending less time on the computer), I've been thinking about this idea of third party conception and what it means to me these days.
At this point, third party conception has become symbolic of something I am working on in my life: accepting help. Not just begrudgingly, or shamefully, or because I am so broken and dying and won't make it without help. No. Just accepting help because I need help.
Like everyone on this green planet, I need help sometimes. Because of my particular psychology, this is a challenge. I should be able to handle it all on my own. I was an enormous burden for my mother as a child, and so burdening others is something I fear like the plague. I will bend myself into all kinds of non-Augusta shapes to avoid burdening others, lest they start thinking I'm annoying and abandon me. Asking for help is part of that pattern.
In this quest to have a child, I've had no choice but to ask for A LOT OF help. I've had to ask for eggs. Twice. Once from a friend and once from a stranger. And most importantly, I've needed to receive their gift. With my whole grateful being, my job has been to just receive. Fuck, that's hard.
I haven't told you much of the story around the birth and the postpartum circus. I think I will, but it's a bit epic and I need to keep digesting it before I lay it all out here. But I'll say here that Mr. A and I needed a lot of help during that time, and we received more than we could have ever asked for. Two women friends of ours gave us breast milk so that we could feed Gummy in the early days when I was trying to breastfeed but wasn't producing milk. Three different sets of friends took Gummy in overnight when I was in hospital. One of our friends breastfed Gummy on an overnight, because she had lots of milk to give to her daughter and to mine. Another friend who is a midwife came to spend the day with me at the hospital after the postpartum hemorrhage so that she could help me sort out what had happened and what could happen as a result (ie try to avoid a hysterectomy if possible). Meals were delivered twice a week for 5-6 weeks after the birth so that we didn't have to cook.
So when I think of third party conception and people getting their panties in a knot about how wrong this might be in the eyes of their chosen deity, I feel like yawning in their face. That stuff is so esoteric to me. How about we look at what love and altruism really mean on this earth at this time. For me, there is something divine about the gifts I have received, from the egg donor, and from all the people who have supported us as we struggled to have a child.
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
NIAW - reflections on IF
Happy National Infertility Awareness Week.
I know what you're thinking. What part of infertility is happy?
I set that up like I was going to tell you all the redeeming things about IF. Like I was going to tell you that now that I have a baby, it's all good. Like I was going to tell you that IF taught me some valuable life lessons.
Nope. Sorry.
Infertility sucked a#%.
But it has been the dark forest through which I needed to walk to get to this.
I am still infertile.
And now I am also a mother.
I know what you're thinking. What part of infertility is happy?
I set that up like I was going to tell you all the redeeming things about IF. Like I was going to tell you that now that I have a baby, it's all good. Like I was going to tell you that IF taught me some valuable life lessons.
Nope. Sorry.
Infertility sucked a#%.
But it has been the dark forest through which I needed to walk to get to this.
I am still infertile.
And now I am also a mother.
 |
| 5-day blastocyst photo and 3-week-old Gummy in the flesh, with her parents. |
Friday, April 19, 2013
don't touch my bebeh
Many a pregnant woman dreads the belly rub from a stranger. I was fearing it myself a few months ago, as my expanding belly became more appealing to the common groper. I am happy to report that it never happened, despite my apprehension that it was just a matter of time before someone would touch my abdomen without my permission. Some close friends rubbed my belly after I gave them permission and that was a-ok. My mom rubbed it once after asking me, but it turns out I really meant to say no, so I backed away and that was that. Thankfully, no one else tried to cop a feel.
I was taking a walk yesterday with gummy in the mo.by. This woman clad in a completely coral outfit (coral sweat pants and coral t-shirt. Did she have coral socks and coral underwear? I didn't care to know) came up to me cooing over my baby. And then, she did the thing that annoys me the most: she tried to touch my baby's face.
This happened twice before, which annoyed me then too. Granted, once she was touched by a 2.5-year-old who was excited to see her. I wasn't as annoyed with this child, as I was scared for my own. The 2.5-year-old had just been sick with a cold and my baby was only 3-weeks old. I could picture myself in the emergency room AGAIN in short order. But no. My baby was fine. The other time, we were walking downtown and this woman from church tried to touch my baby's face. I wanted to punch her.
Faced with the situation of strangers touching my baby's face, I see only two options:
Option 1
Barricade myself and gummy inside our home. Deal with crushing isolation and develop PPD (like I'm not already at huge risk. So, no.)
Option 2 (the option I've been exercising)
Swat at the ladies' hands like they are flies. Yes, you read correctly. Swat at them.
I'm incredibly surprised at how emboldened I've become as a new mother. I don't want anyone's germs on my brand new, immuno-fragile (what's the word here, science bloggers?) baby. So I've been, reflexively at first, and now consciously, swatting people's hands off my girl. It goes against every fiber of my good-girl upbringing, and it is incredibly satisfying.
So if we see each other on the street and you want to touch my baby, please identify yourself as a fellow blogger. I'll bust out the hand sanitizer and let you tickle her very fat cheeks.
I was taking a walk yesterday with gummy in the mo.by. This woman clad in a completely coral outfit (coral sweat pants and coral t-shirt. Did she have coral socks and coral underwear? I didn't care to know) came up to me cooing over my baby. And then, she did the thing that annoys me the most: she tried to touch my baby's face.
This happened twice before, which annoyed me then too. Granted, once she was touched by a 2.5-year-old who was excited to see her. I wasn't as annoyed with this child, as I was scared for my own. The 2.5-year-old had just been sick with a cold and my baby was only 3-weeks old. I could picture myself in the emergency room AGAIN in short order. But no. My baby was fine. The other time, we were walking downtown and this woman from church tried to touch my baby's face. I wanted to punch her.
Faced with the situation of strangers touching my baby's face, I see only two options:
Option 1
Barricade myself and gummy inside our home. Deal with crushing isolation and develop PPD (like I'm not already at huge risk. So, no.)
Option 2 (the option I've been exercising)
Swat at the ladies' hands like they are flies. Yes, you read correctly. Swat at them.
I'm incredibly surprised at how emboldened I've become as a new mother. I don't want anyone's germs on my brand new, immuno-fragile (what's the word here, science bloggers?) baby. So I've been, reflexively at first, and now consciously, swatting people's hands off my girl. It goes against every fiber of my good-girl upbringing, and it is incredibly satisfying.
So if we see each other on the street and you want to touch my baby, please identify yourself as a fellow blogger. I'll bust out the hand sanitizer and let you tickle her very fat cheeks.
Sunday, April 7, 2013
new season
Babies are born everyday. This fact is so painfully salient to us when none of those babies born on all of those days are ours. We see it on facebook, we get birth announcements by email or snail mail, we bump into a neighbor who lets us know the young woman in the third house from ours just had her baby. It all feels like a gong show, doesn't it. I experienced it like a wave of saltwater constantly pouring over my head, never letting me catch my breath. Like an assault. It left me feeling so completely powerless and dejected. Everyone has babies. I can't have a baby.
And what of those babies?
And what of those lovely couples having the babies that I just couldn't bring myself to hate, even though they were embodying everything that brought me pain?
I felt so torn about those babies, about those couples. Some couples were easy to dismiss using a mental short cut that allowed me to reduce their existence to "fertiles" instead of "people". I could do that with people I didn't know well, and it helped me be such a crass reductionist. I didn't have the energy to see them as people. I know I am capable of more, but I also know I was hurting. And then there were couples or women with whom I was close, and in that lied the true learning for me. I couldn't dismiss them: they were dear to me and in order to continue those friendships, I had to dig a little deeper. I couldn't always do that, but I am glad I made the decision to try.
But the babies, even though I ignored a lot of them, the babies got to me. What had they done? They didn't ask to be born. But here they were, and they deserved and were celebrated by everyone. And it killed me a little to not be able to fully celebrate their births. I understood why and I cut myself some slack about it (since, you know, the newborns wouldn't be aware of my less-than-whole excitement about their births). But it still killed me a little inside.
I didn't know if having a baby would change that for me. I hoped it would, but I wasn't counting on it. But oh my, it DID change in such a big way.
There were a few babies born around the time of gummy's birth or shortly thereafter. I noticed the contrast right away. It thrilled me to receive the birth announcements. THRILLED ME. I am so surprised by it and so incredibly delighted. It's like trying out a new food you're sure you will hate, and you taste it and it's the most delicious thing you've had. ever.
It hit me last week, when I went for a walk with another Augusta. She and I know each other through Mr. A, but not very well at all. We were in the same prenatal yoga class in the fall, and were always friendly towards each other. On one of the many monitoring visits to the hospitals in the 2 weeks before gummy's birth, we met her and her husband in triage. She was coming in to be induced. We were being sent home to wait a little longer for our induction. I couldn't stop thinking of her for those days after we saw them.
Augusta and I (she goes by Augie and I go by 'Gusta) connected over email and went for a walk together last week. It was a glorious spring day, and it was a wonderful walk. I enjoyed her company so very much. The line between fertile and infertile didn't matter as much. We were both new mothers, walking our darling girls in their strollers on a spring day. Her sweet girl is so beautiful (and in an uncanny way, she and gummy look like twins). As we walked, we saw a patch of snow drops with some purple crocuses amidst them. We stopped to admire the flowers and let their beauty, and that of the day and our new motherhood fill our hearts.
Then, the other Augusta said: "It's like the flowers are celebrating our babies' birth."
And I couldn't agree more.*
*And I am so relieved that my heart is showing signs of not being completely embittered by the experience of infertility.
And what of those babies?
And what of those lovely couples having the babies that I just couldn't bring myself to hate, even though they were embodying everything that brought me pain?
I felt so torn about those babies, about those couples. Some couples were easy to dismiss using a mental short cut that allowed me to reduce their existence to "fertiles" instead of "people". I could do that with people I didn't know well, and it helped me be such a crass reductionist. I didn't have the energy to see them as people. I know I am capable of more, but I also know I was hurting. And then there were couples or women with whom I was close, and in that lied the true learning for me. I couldn't dismiss them: they were dear to me and in order to continue those friendships, I had to dig a little deeper. I couldn't always do that, but I am glad I made the decision to try.
But the babies, even though I ignored a lot of them, the babies got to me. What had they done? They didn't ask to be born. But here they were, and they deserved and were celebrated by everyone. And it killed me a little to not be able to fully celebrate their births. I understood why and I cut myself some slack about it (since, you know, the newborns wouldn't be aware of my less-than-whole excitement about their births). But it still killed me a little inside.
I didn't know if having a baby would change that for me. I hoped it would, but I wasn't counting on it. But oh my, it DID change in such a big way.
There were a few babies born around the time of gummy's birth or shortly thereafter. I noticed the contrast right away. It thrilled me to receive the birth announcements. THRILLED ME. I am so surprised by it and so incredibly delighted. It's like trying out a new food you're sure you will hate, and you taste it and it's the most delicious thing you've had. ever.
It hit me last week, when I went for a walk with another Augusta. She and I know each other through Mr. A, but not very well at all. We were in the same prenatal yoga class in the fall, and were always friendly towards each other. On one of the many monitoring visits to the hospitals in the 2 weeks before gummy's birth, we met her and her husband in triage. She was coming in to be induced. We were being sent home to wait a little longer for our induction. I couldn't stop thinking of her for those days after we saw them.
Augusta and I (she goes by Augie and I go by 'Gusta) connected over email and went for a walk together last week. It was a glorious spring day, and it was a wonderful walk. I enjoyed her company so very much. The line between fertile and infertile didn't matter as much. We were both new mothers, walking our darling girls in their strollers on a spring day. Her sweet girl is so beautiful (and in an uncanny way, she and gummy look like twins). As we walked, we saw a patch of snow drops with some purple crocuses amidst them. We stopped to admire the flowers and let their beauty, and that of the day and our new motherhood fill our hearts.
Then, the other Augusta said: "It's like the flowers are celebrating our babies' birth."
And I couldn't agree more.*
 |
| borrowed from www.puddle-cottage.co.uk |
*And I am so relieved that my heart is showing signs of not being completely embittered by the experience of infertility.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
The first month
My daughter is one month old today. And it still thrills me to say my daughter.
For those of you still awaiting your first child, please don't give up (and please don't read this post if you're not up for it - this is hard shit you're going through and there's no need to make it harder by reading about some blogger's baby bliss). So far, this experience is beyond amazing. I cannot find the words to say how grateful I am that we KEPT FIGHTING to become parents. All the effort, the years, the tears, the fists shaking at the sky, the early morning trips for monitoring, the international treatment, EVERYTHING was worth it when I hold and look at Gummy.
just look at her
Here are a few observations on her first month of life.
Sleeping: Much like her parents, this girl likes her sleep. She has stretches of 4-5 hours at night, and 2, 3 or 4 hours during the day. Lots of REM sleep - bodes well for her neurons.
Eating: She eats formula. I am still a bit sad about the breast feeding not working out, but I feel better about it. You extraordinary women have really helped me accept that this was the right decision. I told my doctor this morning, and she also supported me in the decision to give up on breastfeeding.
Gazing: I noticed that in her first few days of life, she could not hold my gaze at all. After about a week, she started being able to hold it for at least 5 seconds. I love that she now focuses on my face and holds my gaze as I am talking to her.
Bilingualism: Operation One Parent One Language is going ok so far. I can't help speaking to her in English most of the time, because it's now the language I use most in my life. However, I read to her and speak to her in French every day. So far, she is using neither English nor French to respond.
Early Modeling Career: We had our newborn photo shoot on Sunday and she did great! She was actually a total ham. The photographer sent us a few shots as a sneak peak and we were very pleased with how those turned out.
Early Hiking Career: Gummy Girl has been out on many walks already. None have actually been in the woods yet, but there are trees where we've walked. I have even been able to strap on the ergo carrier myself and take her out for 20-30 minutes. So far, her reaction to walking has been to fall asleep. I take that to mean that she is comfortable with the activity, which as with the sleeping, this reflects that she is her parents' girl.
Dining Out: Newborns are extremely portable, it turns out. We've been out to several restaurants in town for breakfasts, lunches and even fancy dinners, all of which she handled beautifully.
Assertiveness: So far, Gummy's temperament is awesome. She is calm and content most of the time. That is, until she needs something. Then she lets us know. Gently at first, but if need be, she will get loud. I love a girl who knows what she wants and can express her needs.
For those of you still awaiting your first child, please don't give up (and please don't read this post if you're not up for it - this is hard shit you're going through and there's no need to make it harder by reading about some blogger's baby bliss). So far, this experience is beyond amazing. I cannot find the words to say how grateful I am that we KEPT FIGHTING to become parents. All the effort, the years, the tears, the fists shaking at the sky, the early morning trips for monitoring, the international treatment, EVERYTHING was worth it when I hold and look at Gummy.
just look at her
 |
| Gummy Girl in dad's arms |
Sleeping: Much like her parents, this girl likes her sleep. She has stretches of 4-5 hours at night, and 2, 3 or 4 hours during the day. Lots of REM sleep - bodes well for her neurons.
Eating: She eats formula. I am still a bit sad about the breast feeding not working out, but I feel better about it. You extraordinary women have really helped me accept that this was the right decision. I told my doctor this morning, and she also supported me in the decision to give up on breastfeeding.
Gazing: I noticed that in her first few days of life, she could not hold my gaze at all. After about a week, she started being able to hold it for at least 5 seconds. I love that she now focuses on my face and holds my gaze as I am talking to her.
Bilingualism: Operation One Parent One Language is going ok so far. I can't help speaking to her in English most of the time, because it's now the language I use most in my life. However, I read to her and speak to her in French every day. So far, she is using neither English nor French to respond.
Early Modeling Career: We had our newborn photo shoot on Sunday and she did great! She was actually a total ham. The photographer sent us a few shots as a sneak peak and we were very pleased with how those turned out.
Early Hiking Career: Gummy Girl has been out on many walks already. None have actually been in the woods yet, but there are trees where we've walked. I have even been able to strap on the ergo carrier myself and take her out for 20-30 minutes. So far, her reaction to walking has been to fall asleep. I take that to mean that she is comfortable with the activity, which as with the sleeping, this reflects that she is her parents' girl.
Dining Out: Newborns are extremely portable, it turns out. We've been out to several restaurants in town for breakfasts, lunches and even fancy dinners, all of which she handled beautifully.
Assertiveness: So far, Gummy's temperament is awesome. She is calm and content most of the time. That is, until she needs something. Then she lets us know. Gently at first, but if need be, she will get loud. I love a girl who knows what she wants and can express her needs.
Happy One Month, Gummy Girl
 |
| One month today! |
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