I Don't Want To

I'm having a bad case of the quits this morning. Talia is being... unpredictable. At night. When I am trying to sleep. When Scott is trying to sleep. When families are meant to be sleeping.

Apparently being unpredictable is entirely predictable, especially at 4 months and 6 months and then again around 8 to 9 months... all their blessed lives apparently, with teeny, tiny blocks of relief to keep you from doing real harm to yourself and those around you. So it's nothing to worry about. Thank God, I'm not worried. Angry, resentful, tired, depressed, unmotivated, blaming, unpleasant - yes. Worried? Not so much.

My house is not a complete mess. There are some dishes waiting for the dishwasher and the floor could stand to be swept. The bathroom would be glad of a cleaning but it's not like anything is growing anywhere it shouldn't. I should probably puree some pears, and wipe off her Bumbo seat and tray. There's a DVD due by 9pm, and I need to deposit a cheque at the bank. Scott wants me to hit a one day sale for him before 1pm. Oh, and the chicken in the fridge needs to be cooked or frozen before it becomes a $15 contribution to the landfill.

I don't waa-ant to...

So here's the bitch of it all. I know I don't have to. None of it. I can say no thank you to all of it. The world won't end if I have to throw chicken away. But I don't want to not do it either. I want to want to. Sick huh?

But not really. Because this life is so good. Even with the unpredictable nights. I am just so fucking thankful that I get to taste life this sweet. We have her. Much desired, long-hoped for her. We have a home that is wonderfully warm and cozy. I get to stay home and enjoy it every day because I have a husband who loves me and who works hard to make sure I can be here with the daughter he loves.

She is sitting up. All by herself. She scooches backwards all over the living room and is just so frikkin' pleased with herself all the damned time. She smiles at everyone and she is just fucking lovely. We sat in the surgical waiting room with Karen yesterday, waiting while Josh had his surgery and we were surrounded by Mums and Grandmas all waiting to hear that their sweet ones were okay, and my healthy happy Talia just smiled and smiled and charmed and glad-hearted the whole lot of them. She sat there being proof that God listens to Karen's prayers, all the while all of us praying that Josh would be well. Lord, I must be tired - I am crying my eyes out.

Anyway, I guess I just have to have quiet moments like now to know that despite my dusty floors, it is truly well with my soul. Still.

And just so you know, God heard the part where the surgery had to go well - the surgeon said it went as well as he could have hoped and he thinks they got the whole tumor. It doesn't make any of this over, but it felt like a gift, at least to me, like God had heard Talia and I praying for our friends. Now we keep praying for the rest of the healing to happen, and for little Josh to be restored and made whole, the way his Mum needs him to be.

I think that's enough for now.

Competing with Myself

Last night we were at Mum & Dad's house for dinner, and Mum pulled out my baby book. Sure enough, I got my first teeth at 5 months and about 10 days, just like Talia. Rolling over at the same time. We'll see about the walking and the talking. I definitely had it on her for weight - at 6 months I weighed 17lbs. Talia weighs 14 and a half. Of course, I was started on solids at TWO AND A HALF MONTHS! I think this is now considered a form of child abuse and if experts today were to be believed, I should be allergic to everything and probably diabetic. And obese. Oddly, I survived this and seem to be quite average and un-allergic. We'll see how long that lasts...

But there under the record of me eating about a pound of turkey a day at 5 months is this line: "Alison slept 'through the night' at about 3 weeks, although she wakes at 3 or 4am to keep us in line." And then later, "Alison slept 12 hours straight April 18th." Okay, not an exact quote but something like that.

And I was like, "Damn. Talia didn't sleep through the night at 3 weeks. What have I done wrong?"

Honestly, I'm not sure if I was comparing my Mum-ing (read: feeding & sleeping training, the only part of parenting that matters in the end) with my Mum, or baby Talia with baby Me but either way, I felt like shit because this other baby was clearly so much more successful at being a baby than Talia is. Seriously, this is how my mind works. Now in fairness, at 3 weeks it seems I weighed about 11 pounds. Talia didn't weigh 11 pounds until about 4 or 5 months and surely those extra pounds become extra sleep in some magical baby math formula.

But that's hardly the point. What concerns me this morning is that the competition and comparison is so built into mothering, so sewn into the fabric of parenting, that I can't even read my own damned baby book without evaluating how we're doing against my own baby story. I hate that. Because it makes every encounter with every other family an evaluation and I think that constant evaluation erodes community and friendships. And for someone who loves community so much, it is sad to know that my automatic, unthinking reaction is always something so diminishing to my truest heart's desire.

I think that what is true, is that gratitude is the only antidote to that. Being mindful of being thankful is the only cure I know for this form of mental illness, but it is so much work and so hard to do. I want to enjoy my friendships and the children in our world without grading them on some scale of success who's source I don't even know. I want to enjoy Talia, enjoy her unique life and not wreck it by holding it up against the little lives around us.

That's all. Today.

Our Daughter's Life of Crime

We're not sure what she's done, but it must be serious.



You know, it's one thing for all grown-ups to look a bit crazed &/or dangerous in their passport photos, but when a nearly-6-month-old looks felonious it becomes clear that it is truly a ploy by Them to make us all feel slightly unsure about our own trustworthiness.

More Firsts

Hmm. Well, the sleeping through the night was short-lived. I will not tell the whole story, but suffice to say I am blaming others, but hold some hope still that it could happen again one of these days. Perhaps the teething is lingering though? The last several nights, sleep has been very disturbed and as a result, Scott and I are becoming increasingly disturbed. Not as in 'bothered' but as in 'should be committed'. This too shall pass, right?

Despite the poor sleep, our girl remains a content and easy-going gal during the day. The last few days, Scott & I have been able spend non-nap hours playing all manner of fun games. Highlights include pass with the big red ball, being gobbled up by Daddy, shoulder rides and I Wish I Could Crawl which usually ends with whining. Talia also thinks a yawning face is hilarious but is quite upset by Daddy's low honking sound when she grabs his nose. Happily, it only took Scott half-a-dozen attempts to confirm that it really truly does upset her before he quit doing it. Aaahh, parenting together.

Oh, and she rolled over back to tummy yesterday! Big milestone, although completely accidental, and probably not to be repeated for a while. Still, it was fun to see.

All these moments are so wonderful though. They just make my heart glad. They embody goodness in the truest sense. Things are good in the Johnson Home these days, teething and night-waking notwithstanding. Sometimes when I am negotiating sleep with her, I forget for a moment how sweet it is. And that's probably okay. Because I just love that I am noticing how sweet it is the rest of the time. Really, most of the day, I just love this. Love this stage of our lives together. What a wonderful surprise that is. What good blessing.

But enough of the gush, now for the mush. With all this night-waking I decided we were eating solid foods this morning. Ha! She is interested for sure. In the spoon. Brown rice, not so much. Although the photos don't show this so much, she is a very clear non-verbal communicator so there was no misunderstanding her opinion on the experiment. Perhaps we'll try again next week? In the meantime, I'm pouring formula down her throat after every feeding. She will sleep again. Unless it's the damned teeth. Then I'm screwed.

What Good News Looks Like

I'm in a mood, have been for a day or so now, milestones be damned. Who can explain these things? I would prefer not to be, would prefer to be happy or at least not ... this. But whatever. It's that kind of day.

One thing that encouraged me though, was seeing Jolie taking her compost out. I wasn't so much encouraged by her green-ness, or her industriousness. Just by knowing she was there, living her life with her family - that was good news.

Here is the view from my back stairs:


Hmm. I hope Jolie and Andy don't see this photo - they might be worried. But it doesn't really look this grim in real life. To me, it always looks inviting and warm and fun and familiar and a bunch of other good things. I probably look over there five or 6 times a day in winter and 3 or 4 times that often the rest of the year. Just to see if they're there. Just to remember that if I need tomatoes, or a joke, or someone to check my pregnancy test, they're right there.

So today, in the midst of my mood, it was good news to know that if it gets bad, if it gets to the point where I can't step one foot further, I just have to lean out the back door and wail and probably someone over there will notice. Isn't that good news? I think so.

I wish good news made a bigger difference though.

Big Week in Taliaville

Oh, the milestones - they just keep rolling by.

It all started Monday with little white nubs on the lower gum. Hard core gnawing on anything that she could get in her mouth (thank you Uncle Bri for the well-timed teething toy!). Tuesday, I could feel little a little razor blade sharpness and that night & Wednesday night, the girl was up every couple of hours, not wanting to eat, but just kind of sleep-crying. Two bottom teeth. We did it!

Wednesday morning, my girl started saying "Mum". Well, more like "mammammammama" but every once in a while she slips in a "Mummmm" too. It's quite lovely and funny and now we can say her first word was Mum. Although maybe word should be in quotation marks. First "word". Yeah, that's closer.

And finally, 2 nights of sleeping through without a middle of the night meal, starting Thursday night.

It was indeed a big week. She is growing up our girl, and it is so nice.