you thought it was the diapers…

You knew that creating another human being would to some extent add to the stress on the planet. You thought it had, in part, something to do with disposable diapers. In fact, it has to do with the take out containers that mom and dad go through since they can’t even conceive of having a spare moment, bit of energy, or free hand to cook at home.

You knew that people changed babies’ clothes constantly throughout the day. You thought it had something to do with how the little people spit up, throw up, pee, poop, and otherwise splooge on their outfits. In fact, it’s all about mom and dad spilling their take out dinner on the babies, since they just want to eat in peace and babies apparently scream when put down during dinner.

You’d seen moms walking around town with blankets thrown completely over their babies. You thought it had to do with keeping the sun and wind off of their tiny tykes. In fact, it instead has everything to do with hiding the little critters while walking to get your take out dinner, so not every stranger walking by puts their grubby hands all over your infant.

You figured that baby toys are made in bright colors to attract the baby’s attention and add to his development. In fact, the bright colors are to keep mom and dad awake for week nine of "Experiments in Sleep Deprivation."

the goddess within

We’ve recently borrowed a book from the library on techniques for calming a crying infant. I haven’t really read it yet. You see, whenever I try, my infant cries. Dilemma.

Although we haven’t read in any detail, we’ve scanned "the list". You know the list, don’t you? The list always consists of something like "The 12 Ps of Making Chili" or "The four Ws of (fill in the blank)." This one is all about Ss. So far, my husband has tried the Swaddling technique with some success, while I’m all about the Shushing, that is, white noise.

The whole idea surrounding these techniques is that you mimic the environment of the womb. The Swaddling – okay you get it. The white noise? Well, yes, according to this approach, the center for the creation of life sounds a bit like AM radio. I guess I never thought about it terribly hard, but if I had, I think I would have liked to imagine that the sound system of my womb might hearken of maybe a symphony, for example. Not the classical music that makes you want to puke (although it would seem that could be what’s on in the first trimester), but the really incredible kind of music that makes you think – "Geeeez, I wanna play the violin." Apparently, that’s not at all what’s going on in there. The uterus bops along to sounds closer to, say, a hair dryer. Who would have thought that the Goddess and Vidal Sassoon would have so much in common? Maybe the Goddess is indeed using a hair dryer. Maybe the Goddess is having a permanent bad hair day, which would explain a hell of a lot about the world.

For the last three days, I have put my baby to sleep to the lullaby of my very own, "pro-style", travel ready, hair dryer. It’s working pretty well. This could change children’s music forever. Titles on bedtime CDs might start to include things like "Daddy’s Electric Razor Goes Whir Whir Whir" and "Chainsaw Serenade." All this time we’ve been singing to kids, when really they just wanted to listen to the ceiling fan motor.

It’s possible the Goddess is just scrambling the signal in there so that the forces of evil can’t find the tiny new lives. Do you think babies hear a message in all that noise? Like, Paul is dead, or the winning Lotto numbers? Do you think it has meaning for them?

Mr. Sassoon, I’m appealing to you directly. – Spill the secrets of the Universe!

And an action fist shot. This is Isaac's "garden gnome" look. Hats are very important. On the tough days, make them look ridiculous, then you can laugh at them instead of catch a flight out.

really, we don't pose him with these power fists--it's all him!

renegade mom

I’d like to try to explain, or remind as the case may be, about how it feels when you start to venture out of the house solo after giving birth. First, I should mention this - When you are breastfeeding a baby weeks old, it is not as simple as just getting away, even when you have the chance. There is that little factor of the baby having to eat every couple hours. – At least that’s how often my little nursling guzzles. And let me clarify – that’s from start of feeding to start of feeding. In other words, if it takes about half an hour to get the critter fed, you get all of 90 minutes before you need to be back at your post – the boppy prison – exposing yourself to your newborn and any visitors that happen by. And in between snack time, from your new-found Barbie boobs, oozes the miracle of milk. It oozes onto your new blue top, your old silk blouse. It oozes in pretty wet patterns mysterious as crop circles.

But beyond the physical constraint of motherhood, there are the hormones. If you leave the room, much less the house, you feel as if you have betrayed your offspring and the rules of survival for your species. You feel they may die without you, or you without them, and, after only moments in front of the Suzy-Qs at the 7-11, you will be exposed for what you are: a fraud – posing as a woman entitled to five minutes alone – and a disgrace to humankind.

The first time I ever left my house without Isaac was a bizarre experience. It was a quick jaunt to the drugstore (for something for Isaac, of course). When I arrived, about seven minutes after I’d left my house, jittery and distracted, there were no parking spots in the lot. "See," an old inner voice told me, "Proof you shouldn’t be here." (Note to self: do not raise child under religion causing long-term guilt. = any religion?)

The next time I tried to get out it was to the grocery store. We had devised the plan early in the day: I would go shopping and Mike would stay home with the baby. It was simple, yet brilliant. I was excited all day in anticipation of my trip (I know, it’s sick. Just stay with me.).

The day wore on and I wore down until it was 8:30pm – 30 minutes before the store closed. I dashed away, leaving my baby tanked up on boob juice and sleeping soundly. I was feeling odd, but okay as I maneuvered through the aisles placing out of season fruits from South America in my cart.

I checked out right as the store was closing, having collected $60 worth of snacks. I chatted amiably with the checker as I swiped my credit card. …Declined. Re-swiped. Declined. My clerk buddy began to frown, all memory of the happy chit chat we had just shared now gone. Swiped again. Declined. Declined. Declined. Oh, fuck-a-roo-skis. The inner voice cackled into my ear, "Didn’t learn your lesson with the parking spots, huh? Well, screw with biological dependence and evolutionary schema and see where it gets you, Be-otch!" At least I had brought the cell phone leash and now I frantically called home to ask Mike if he had $60 in cash. The final nail in my coffin: I could hear my baby crying in the background. (RIP, you terrible mother, you) "$58.25…$58.50," my husband spoke into the phone as my son wailed on and on. "$59... $59.10…" (If there’s a god, you will kill me now! Kill me now!) The people behind me in line (oh, yes, there were people behind me in line) were expressing their annoyance freely and creatively by now.

Okay, we got it. Mike would be back with the money. I raced to the car, sans groceries, and started home. A couple blocks from the store I passed a cop. I’ll tell you all now, since I didn’t get to tell him, I don’t know how fast I was driving. In my rearview mirror, I saw him make a U-turn and my heart about crumbled. We’re talking my tiny little piddly town. My dull, quiet, whitebread town where your doggies are welcome in the bank. In other words – these cops are BORED and that means DANGEROUS! I have seen them give out tickets for stopping past the white line at the corner. These are the same people that as little kids, hit squirrels out of trees with homemade slingshots just to watch them fall. Shit!!!

I turned left. I turned left again. I turned right. I was lost in a neighborhood of skinny streets and lots of those holiday flags. Renegade mom. They would not bring me DOWN!

And so, yeah, as it turned out, copper didn’t catch up with me. Honestly, I have no idea if he was after me to begin with. But if he’d have caught me, I can tell you one thing for sure. It wouldn’t have been a speeding ticket I went home with. It would have been a citation for being a new mom away from her baby. Here’s an excerpt from the scene that would surely have ensued.

Cop peers in through the driver’s side window and, spotting the empty car seat in the back:
Do you know why I pulled you over?
I’m sorry, officer, I never speed, you see my credit card…
Ma’am, where’s the baby?
Baby?
Yes, the baby, ma’am. Didn’t you just have a baby?
Yes, I…
Where’s the baby, ma’am?
Where?
Ma’am, where – is - your - baby?
He’s, uh, at home.
I’m going to have to cite you for negligence.
Pardon? But, the baby is with his father and I just fed him.
Uh huh. (still writing ticket) Are you or are you not out without your baby?
Well, I thought…
No, ma’am you didn’t think. That’s the problem. It’s plain to anyone looking at you that you just had a baby and you have left that baby at home while you gallivant about town.
But I was just buying…
Save it for the judge, Lady. And by the way, you’re leaking.

the sound of mom

Ah, the good ole days. I remember when Isaac was just a baby – a few days old - and I could quickly quiet him with a whisper or a nonsense song. Now, he’s all of six weeks and good luck to me. Sometimes if he fidgets in his sleep I can still manage to lull him by letting him know I’m close by. A quick hello can do it. Most times, however, it’s to no avail.

It seems to me that these days, his reaction to my voice is one of increased distress. Like when he wakes from a nap fretting or when he’s wailing through a bath his dad is in charge of. I talk, he cries louder. He seems to be saying, "You were right there and not doing anything to soothe me?!?" and "You knew this was going on and did nothing to stop it?!?" respectively.

But mostly, I imagine he’s confused by my voice here on the outside. Home birth or not, maybe he’s concerned that he’s been switched. - Where’s the sarcastic lady with the sailor mouth? he’s probably thinking. She’s there; she’s just reeeeeally tired. What I could really use is someone to whisper to me, or sing me a nonsense song. I promise to go right to sleep.

"now we are six" (weeks), or, how to exploit your child

My child is a prodigy. He is six weeks old and already learning to count. Why else would Isaac have had me up at 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 last night? Between this development and the Isaac bobble head dolls I’m planning on marketing, he’s going to be big, I tell you, big, big! (Sleep and neck muscles are overrated.)

ENP

Besides, obviously being strapped for time and energy, I’ve frankly avoided writing this entry, but, alas, it must be written. It is the entry about the Evil Nurse Practitioner (ENP).

We were told that we should take our baby for a medical check (having birthed him at home) before he was ten days old. A nurse practitioner was recommended to us and we made an appointment. Right about the time of our appointment, after the initial magic of the first few days – cloistered in my bedroom with my mostly-sleeping infant and my husband – and while my body’s recovery was still preliminary at best, I got my first hint of emotional upset – "the weepies" we’ll call them, experienced by most brand new moms. And so, physically limited and emotionally strained, I set out for the ill-fated appointment with our ENP.

Okay everyone, listen for the bell (ding!) signaling key phrases to send the new, emotionally fragile, and hormonally ridiculous mom over the edge.

We arrive at the beautiful home of our ENP and take a seat while she finishes with another client -a dark-haired boy crawls out of a room to our left and is hauled back by his dad. After they’ve gone, ENP approaches us and we make introductory small talk which includes me telling her it’s our first time out with the little guy. "Are you sure you have the car seat installed correctly?" she quips (ding!) How I reacted: I stumbled apologetically telling her hurriedly, "Actually, we have an appointment with the highway patrol to have it checked, but they couldn’t get us in until Thursday, and…" She leaves the room to file something. How I should have reacted: "What car seat? He’s a little jaundiced so we stuck him on the dashboard in the sun."

We are ushered into the room where the pastel colors and teddy bear rockers clash strongly with our scowling ENP. She stares down at the forms on her desk and asks us questions so as to better fill in the boxes. Eventually, we find ourselves at this point: "He didn’t nurse at all in the first 24 hours?!?" (ding!) How I reacted: "Well, um, no, I mean, yes, I mean, he tried, I mean, I’m not sure…" How I should have reacted: "No." (My advice to new moms besides not to listen to any advice would be to write everything down. You will have liquid brain. You will not remember anything and people will ask you many details about how much, how often, when and if.)

Then she weighs him. His birth weight was 6 lbs. 7 oz. ENP put him on her scale and announces: "He’s 5 lbs. 2 oz." (ding!) "That’s not possible." I told her. "I think the scale is wrong." She didn’t even look in my direction. She wrote furiously on her forms. Finally, this: "I know my scale is accurate." (ding!) How I reacted: (Crying). How I should have reacted: "You numbskull. It’s about the two different scales not being calibrated to each other. He has not possibly lost over a pound."

More form scribbling. "He’s now in the fifth percentile for weight." (ding!) "And if you aren’t feeding him…" (ding! ding! ding!) From there, the conversation spiraled continually out of control, including talk of electric breast pumps and videos to loan and return visits for future weigh-ins. I will have the image long-burned into my brain of this large, rough gruff woman clutching a stuffed monkey to her generous bosom in order to illustrate to me various breastfeeding positions.

While I continued to weep, she proceeded to move ahead with talk of vitamin K shots and heel pricks/blood testing as well as discussions of dire consequences should we decline them. I never really imagined someone could fit the phrase "brain damage" into a conversation with such regularity. This woman was good.

I don’t know exactly what "bonding" involves. I’m told it’s a process. And from what I can tell, I’m not finished with that process yet. However, I can say that if it involves uncontrollable sobbing and the desire to jump out of your skin when a stranger sticks your child with needles and squeezes blood from his heel, then on that day, the fifth day of my son’s life, in the office of the ENP, our "bonding" took a huge step forward – My husband would comment later on my uttering of the phrase "Give me my baby!"

Then there is discussion of nutrition. Our ENP, at least 80 pounds overweight, raises both eyebrows at my disclosure of a vegetarian diet. "Your diet," she lets me know, "will help determine the neurological growth and brain development of your baby." (ding!)

You know the old joke about adding "in bed" to the end of any Chinese fortune cookie fortune? Well, just add "because you’re a terrible mother" to the end of anything anyone says to you about your baby in the first month. "You have to stay hydrated when you’re breastfeeding. You haven’t been drinking enough!…(because you’re a terrible mother!)" "I’d love to come over and help out!…(because you’re a terrible mother!)" Anything at all can be twisted into a baton with which the new mother batters herself about the face and head.

Really, I should have learned something from this birth. The one overriding feeling I had during labor – the only intuitive piece I could muster in all nine months and how I knew I was going to be just fine – was the idea that this baby knew what he was doing. I trusted my baby. And here I was throwing all that away to buy into the ways of an ENP SOB.

That afternoon, I call all three midwives and leave desperate messages. They are all in a meeting … with each other … and I can’t reach them. They must hurry before my baby starves to death. Penny comes by and brings us dinner, saint that she is, but can do nothing for my baby who is minute by minute wasting away. She is still there when Maggie calls to tell me she’s out of her meeting and on her way to my apartment with her scale (the scale that originally weighed Isaac – the one that counts). She arrives. She weighs him. The world begins again to turn. I exhale. "You are radiant!" Penny tells me on her way out. She kisses my cheek and vanishes. I stumble to the bathroom, pass the full-length mirror. My eyes are nearly swollen shut from crying for seven hours. Keep those lies coming!

The next day I call the ENP. I calmly inform her we will not be coming back – that day or ever. I calmly restate these things when she began the litany of "It’s your choice, but…" I must have seemed a different person all together than the blubbering fool who’d slunk away from her almost-mansion with my waif of a child less than 24 hours before. She seemed genuinely taken back and (dare I say) humbled when reality set in for her. How I reacted: "Thank you. Goodbye." How I should have reacted: "Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea. On a good night’s sleep, I can take you out."

Minotaurs

"…be careful! Minotaurs lie in wait in the labyrinths of memory." – Isabel Allende

I’m getting the feeling that everyone who hands out advice, or writes it down, carefully forgets the first two months – at least. Nothing applies yet. And I only know that now after running in circles trying to make things apply. He barely fits in the carriers; no, he is not sleeping through the night for godssake. Perhaps eager to show me another world of caretaking, people are obsessed with asking if he’s started to smile. No. Not that either. He’s too little. He’s little. Little. He makes some killer faces, but none of them include smiles. This is the raw stuff. Just hard.

My emotions ping pong violently around in a tiny box that I think is labeled "Monster." There is nowhere for them to go. If I feel them, I subject my baby to them. If I don't, I swallow them for later. They are trapped. And everything is true for only about an hour at a time. I don't know how to describe this.

The old ladies that staff the benefit thrift shops downtown love to coo over Isaac. Like everyone else, they have advice for me: Cherish this time, they tell me. It goes too fast and life can get pretty lonely. Memory is a funny thing. Spend ten hours alone in a little apartment with a five-week old and then we can talk about lonely.

the rest of the household

Some folks have been inquiring how the cats and the husband-guy are handling the new baby. Here's the report:
Zap Mama – my co-dependent, neurotic freak – much to my surprise, became again the mom she once was. For the first couple weeks of Isaac’s life, she ran to him at every sound he made. She stared at us while he cried, seeming to demand what exactly we might be doing to her baby. Now, she doesn’t rush to his side all the time – only at the most desperate-sounding of squeals, (like when I put him down while attempting to drain my mac of mac n cheese fame, aka my lunch, and he bawled like I’d abandoned him in a dark alley). More recently, Zap has instead put most of her energy toward running under foot while I carry baby. - In essence, things are back to normal. Emily is in need of super-attention since her little brother entered the picture, though these days she doesn’t always bolt at the first sign of a wiggle or a gurgle. When he fusses, she stares at him, comes to no conclusion about his origins or purpose, and leaves the room.

And then there is Mike. As anyone who knows him might expect, husband-guy has been a great help to me and has held up pretty well in handling the first weeks of parenthood. And he’s learning to give me less advice on breastfeeding, although he still wanders into that mine field once in a while. There are cracks here and there, however. I try not to mention the cut onions I found in the cabinet with the dishes, or the groceries that went missing for two days until I asked "Didn’t we buy watermelon?" and the bag was located out on the patio.

I think that couples must survive on the memory of each other in these first weeks. You have the vaguest of notions that the man over there, the one with the red-ringed eyes repeating "Take your foot out of your diaper. Take your foot out of…there you go!" resembles someone you once had a thing for, that there was a day not terribly long ago when you had enough time, inclination, and energy to make a baby.

the ultimate sacrifice

At about 7:00pm last night, with the baby recently fed and relatively content, I told Mike I needed to lie down for a little bit, but that I didn’t want to be out for the night. "If you fall asleep," he asked, "when do you want me to wake you up?" "Maybe half an hour."

At about 9:00pm, I opened my eyes as Mike tip-toed into the bedroom with a sleeping baby. Thank god he hadn’t listened to me, didn’t even remember the part of the conversation about the "half an hour" (that’s my guy). Mike put the baby down, and I mercifully kept sleeping another 2 ½ hours before I was called forth for snack time. After the 11:30pm feeding, there was a 2:00am feeding, and a 4:00am feeding/don’t want to go back to sleep time. I got Isaac situated again by 6:00am, and he, in turn, woke me up again at 7:00am. Some days you just have the munchies.

By 8:15, I was part of an all too familiar scene: I was reading – two articles down and one more given up on out of boredom – and quite awake, and the boys were asleep, Mike next to me, and Isaac crashed out on top of me.

I was too desperate for sleep and the odds of a re-awakening too risky to move my floppy baby. So, as I have many a night before, I attempted to just slide down, baby where he was, and get some rest. This move inevitably results in – the wedgy. Do I even have to mention that they don’t talk about this part of motherhood in any of the prenatal classes?

I’ve already lost my chance to guilt Isaac with the story of a long and painful birth, but I’ll always have the wedgy. Sure, sure, I’d throw myself in front of a U-Haul truck to save him if needed, but that’s a one-time, spontaneous sort of sacrifice. It’s the little everyday things - the pebble in the shoe, pea in the mattress, underwear stuffed up the butt crack - that show your true love.

what’s in a name?

I never would have thought to name my baby Isaac, except that I…dreamed it. Uh, yeah, honest. It was the only baby dream to speak of that I remember. The day I found out I was pregnant, I had a dream where someone was writing down the name, underlined it and told me "This is the name you want." I wrote the name down in my journal, looked at it alone on the page, and hunkered back down into my denial for another 8 months. But meanwhile, I brought it up to Mike and when we found out the meaning we were sold. (His middle name, Raphael, is for my dad.)

The nickname situation is still up for grabs. There is "Ike" -- and then I have "Mike n Ike." There is Zac(h) -- and then every one thinks his name is Zachary. My current favorite is Izzy, which I'm getting lots of flack for. Is it not a mom's perogative?? As if kids on the playground won't be able to make fun of him no matter what his name is.

Now, time to show your true colors. When you hear "Isaac," (or "Ike"), besides an adorable 5-week old, you think of:
a) political candidates of the 1950s
b) that bastard that held Tina back from her full, leggy potential
c) bartenders on cruise ships
d) biblical figures that barely escape with their lives

Now, about the part where he has only his dad’s last name…

not to dwell on fashion but...

the same people size baby clothes as make women's jeans.

twelve minutes in the kitchen by myself

It’s midnight and I’m fighting with my three-week old. We’ve both agreed he’s hungry, we just can’t agree on the angle of boob that will satiate this hunger. He latches, detaches, latches, detaches. Throws his head back, flailing his tiny hands dangerously near my tender nipples and screams. We try again. I’ve been told not to expect any patterns of behavior or routines, that babies keep changing and changing what they do, when they do it, and how. But let me tell you, for the last week, this is our pattern.

I’ve been duped. Of breastfeeding my friends said: "I loved it!" "It was like a drug!" and "It was easy!" I hate my friends. And I hate breastfeeding. If you quote me, I’ll deny it. What? You’re gonna say you read it on the internet so it must be true? Nice try.

But before the Mommy SWAT teams come to drag me away, let this humble missal be my final triumph…

At 2:30am, I hear him again. He’s generally a calm baby and by the sound of the lose-his-mind cry I can tell he’s been trying to get my attention for a while. We engage in the dance – I offer boob, he rejects it, cries, tries his fist instead, cries some more. He latches then rears back, my nipple at last well-secured in his mouth. At 3:30, after achieving minimal ingestion of nourishment, I bounce him to a tenuous sleep and roll over.

But the gods are merciful this evening, and the Wee Beast does not awake again until 7:00, light already sifting through the blinds, the cats not having bothered to pester us for breakfast yet – they too are relieved. On a whole three-and-a-half-hour stretch of sleep he looks oh-so cute again. We coo at each other, and I feed him with mild success and renewed patience. Before he can decide he wants more, I bound out of bed (my prison so many mornings) and suggest to Mike that I’ll get breakfast for us.

I put on water for some Earl Grey (decaf, naturally. look, I just can’t breastfeed, I’m not a barbarian!). Something is spilled on the burner as usual and I turn on the blower to try to shoo away the stinky smoke. I clear off the counter happily, though I realize I’m destroying some system or other my husband has devised there. I find random items to create a breakfast out of = some cheese, some granola. I find the orange juice container in the frig with .01 drops of oj left and cheerily drip it into a plastic cup then crush the empty carton with fervor and toss it in the trash returning inches of sacred space to my life. I fill the cats’ water bowl and feed the extra water to the fern. Order and control have returned to my world. I am gleeful.

It then occurs to me that the blower is still creating white noise and whatever splooged on the burner is long gone. I hesitate, but turn it off. Sure enough, it had been drowning out a wee cry emanating from the bedroom. I taste the oj and dump it in the sink. It’s turned into iodine. I pile the rest of breakfast carefully onto my arm and head back to my bed. There, I find my son and husband locked in a staring contest. The baby is wearing the last un-peed-on outfit in the drawer and two different socks. I can see I’m not needed here. I drop off the food and jog back out to the living room where my journal has been sitting unheeded for days.

Haul me away if you want. Of freedom I say: "I loved it!" "It was like a drug!" and "It was easy!"

Isaac, Volume 1

I believe it’s a good thing that when I looked at my new-born son for the first time, I did not crush him to my chest and weep with recognition of "my baby". Rather, we stared at each other with mutual curiosity and befuddlement. It's a good thing because maybe I'll be less inclined to expect things of him and more apt to discover who he really is. For my part, I am still wondering about this little person and just how it's happened that he has been delivered to my care. (Nine months, labor, and how many blog entries later, I still don’t get it. Sue me.)

We’re getting to know each other -- slowly. It’s kind of, but not really, like when you meet someone you really click with and you stay up all night talking, except we just stay up all night and there’s not much talking. There’s some eating and some crying, a few nonsense songs, and a lot of time spent trying to figure out what the hell the other one wants.

That’s just it. Without clear cues, like for instance Isaac telling me "Mother, I’d care for a snack please." or "Would you be so kind as to unwrap my legs so I may kick violently while I’m filling my diaper?" – which would be helpful as cues go – we’re left to try to read each other on some other level.

Here’s what I’ve learned about my son in the first three weeks:

• He prefers one sock on at a time. It’s daring, I know, but with the aggressive marketing campaign I’ve laid out it should be hot on the runway this fall
• He must have his arms outside the covers at all times. The better to conjure spells at a moment’s notice. Screw preschool, I’m reserving this kid a space at Hogwart’s.
• He startles at things like the CD player changing CDs, but makes no response when the smoke alarm low battery warning shrieks. Awww, how sweet, selective hearing – definitely from his dad’s side.
• He wears his hats at jaunty angles and can take on the appearance of a fry cook, a sailor, a hip hop artist, or a Smurf, depending on his mood. Flexibility in today’s job market – a must!

Maybe it’s a rather paltry collection of information so far, but I suppose a mother has to start somewhere.

EDD and LMP

Today is my official due date. I think Isaac arriving two weeks earlier than the doctors predicted is his way of thumbing his nose at their method of counting. It’s just dumb. They devise your "EDD" (estimated due date) by counting from your "LMP" (last menstrual period) instead of the presumed date of conception. Huh?? Thus, they add in approximately two more weeks than the "gestational age". Who came up with this system?

The dreaded EDD and LMP show up everywhere – on every scribbled note and official record associated with my pregnancy. These dates will live in infamy. I’m just waiting for someone to give us some cutesy handmade frame-able thingy for Isaac – the kind that has his name embroidered on it flanked by teddy bears and blocks. Under that will be his date of birth. And in fire engine red above it all - the date of my LMP.

Good ole LMP even appears on the form for the birth information my midwife left me to file with the courts and get his birth certificate. Does the county really need to know the last time I had my period??!? I think of my recent struggles in searching for information on my family history. Just a marriage license here or there would do. A consistency of spellings could be helpful. A hint of the year so and so was born. And yet some day, when I’ve been long ago scattered to the Pacific, thanks to our obsessively modern record keeping, my descendents will know the day I stopped buying tampons.

And here I thought the medical community had no understanding of women’s bodies.

the shower

(not the baby kind, the kind you take to get clean)

I get to take one every other day or so it seems. That’s with Mike still home from work. We’ll see what happens in the near future. I’ve noticed a few things about the post-partum shower.

1. At some point, I wake to consciousness standing under the water, soap stilled in one hand, rocking. Am I rocking the new baby I hold most of the day now, or am I rocking to quiet myself?

2. Every now and then, for just the briefest moment, between the shampoo and the conditioner, I forget.

3. I admit that sometimes I spend a bit longer hidden away under the weak jets of rusty water that block out crying, a routine I have no grasp on, than I might need to for reasons of cleanliness.

correction

Doh! Thanks, Barb. My apologies for mis-posting the Witches' line from Macbeth - Of course it should be Double, double, toil and trouble... Shame on me. Happening already, is it? I'm slipping away from all I formerly knew...

While we're taking care of business, I just wanted to also mention thanks! to all who posted comments about the Little One. Cute these creatures, no? Trouble. Hey Tracy, I had a dream that I met you!

Mothering a newborn is as difficult as I’d imagined it to be. And actually, I underestimated what it would take for my own physical recovery. It’s a major double whammy. Makes me think of a comedian’s routine I heard once (I think it was Lewis Black) "Starbuck’s coffee’s expensive, but at least the lines are long."

Ah, what's that? The sweet sound of my infant? Must go.

the midwives

One of my friends has admitted that when I refer to the (three) midwives she can’t help but picture the opening scene of Macbeth - Boil boil toil and trouble! I have to remember to tell them that; they’d think it was very funny.

The midwives were/are so great. Literally spoon-feeding me after I gave birth, coming to the rescue when panic sets in, spending hours telling me everything is all right. There are no more scheduled visits until Isaac is six weeks. Of course I can call, but…There are other babies set to arrive. We have to recede into our own lives. The moments of terror can be blinding.

At one of the follow up visits with the midwives, they are gathered around my bed just as they were when I delivered Isaac. They are listening while I still marvel aloud at the work involved, not just in care, but in labor and in recovery. I feel gutted. And then, after the nipple cracks heal and sleep returns to normal – maybe decades from now, light years - I will be left to raise a boy in this world. It’s all huge. Pam nods. "That’s why women are opposed to war," she says softly, "they know what it takes to make a person."

breastfeeding

Angela: Did you moo?
Kitty: What?
Angela: Moo. It’ll make you feel better. Go ahead. Moo.
Kitty: ---
Angela: Mooooooo!
Kitty: Moo.
Angela: There. Feel better?
Kitty: What gives me the feeling I’m not just any cow, I’m one of those Far Side cows?