The Long Game

One of the problems with my parenting method is that I tend to take a long game view of my children and their behaviors.  This means that I hope I am instilling good behaviors into them through modeling, positive reinforcement, and gentle corrections before hand, rather than constantly admonishing them after the fact.  This also means that you have no idea if what you are doing is actually working, until it works...or doesn't.  I believe that behaviors that are created this way become more deeply engrained, and things such as a fuss-free bed time routine and good meal manners have certainly come about this way for us.

A key behavior that I constantly stress to my kids is being kind to each other.  We talk about kindness all the time.  Seriously.  I don't think an hour goes by that I don't use the word "kind" to them.  I praise the slightest little kindness as though it were huge.  "That was SO nice of you to be careful when you were walking by your little sister so you didn't knock her over.  You are such a KIND person."  "Would you please put food in the dog bowls?  That would be very kind of you."  "I think you must be very tired, because yelling at the dog wasn't very kind, and isn't the way you usually behave."  I just keep hoping that the concept of "kind" becomes so a part of them that we have a lot more of the praise and very little of the correcting.

I also stress sharing in the same way.  Huge praise when it happens, and constant attempts to set them up for success, but you know how sharing goes with two toddlers.  Yeah, right.  Tonight, my older daughter was playing with a plastic fork.  She set it down for a moment, and the baby made a beeline for it.  The toddler turned around, saw the baby picking it up, and ran over to grab it away.  I said nothing.  I wanted to know how they would work it out.

When the baby just stood there looking sad, the toddler immediately put the fork back in her hand and said "Here, you can use this.  I love you much," and the baby hugged her sister.

Be still my mama heart.  It worked!  I'm sure tomorrow they will have a set back or twenty, but I can see that something is clicking in the quest for kindness.

How did they do it?

It is 7:13, my babies are both sleeping peacefully in their beds, and I have zero gas left in the tank of life.  I am sitting on the couch, and I just know that my arse is spreading as we speak because I just devoured a bagel with extra butter instead of the salad I had made for myself earlier.  I am spent.  And what do I have to show for it?  Not much, truthfully.

The house is in a bit of a state, we had leftovers for lunch and dinner, and I haven't even showered yet today.  The kids were happy and saw very little tv today, so that's a win, but here's the problem...getting my house in order tonight, if I manage to do so doesn't change anything.  I will gather my energy, scrub the house down, prep a nutritious breakfast, lunch, and dinner for tomorrow.  I will shower, and maybe even shave my legs.  Maybe.  And then tomorrow, it happens all over again.  Tomorrow night I will put the kids to bed and look around the house which will again be in a bit of a state.

Depending on how old you are, you may remember your mother, or your grandmother, or perhaps even your great-grandmother's house.  You may remember gleaming windows, a definitive lack of toilet bowl rings, clean shelves inside of the refrigerator, spotless baseboards.  Or maybe you remember none of that specifically, and just recall a sense of perfection and peace when you entered her home.  You surely remember the smell of the cookies she always baked for you, or that chicken dish that only she could make just so.  You do remember that, right?  Maybe it wasn't your mom, or grandma, but an elderly relative.  Either way, I'm sure you knew a woman who was the mistress of her domain, and not a single stray carper fiber was going to defy her.

How the hell did those women do it?

Oh.  Right.  They were a whole lot less lazy than we are.  They didn't spend time watching tv, or goofing around on Facebook.  They woke up before their husband, made the coffee and breakfast, and once they got their families successfully out the door, they got to work.  Real work, not the halfhearted we do aided by all of our gadgets and products.  They cooked, cleaned, mended, and cared for the babies still at home.  They made time for the things that were important, like their friends, and those friendships were more valuable than their breath.

They put their family first.

They are how I find the energy to get my heinie off of the couch and get on my knees to scrub the tub.  Out of sheer respect for my forebears, I will not fall into the quagmire of laziness.  I will stay off of Pinterest until behind the toilet has been sanitized.  I will be a housewife that my grandmother would be proud of.  I will say "I am a housewife" with pride, because it MEANS something.  It means that I am a part of a long tradition of hard work and dedication to one's family.

I'm Falling Apart, But My Family Isn't. Or, How Mama Got Her Groove Back.

My husband likes to joke that I'm ALWAYS hurt or sick.  It is starting to feel like he's right.  But, there may be a coming explanation for my constant injuries.

This has been a pretty wild week.  On Monday, I started having some chest pain, but thought nothing of it, because I often get chest pain and it goes away as mysteriously as it began.  By Tuesday night, it had gotten worse, and I was getting dizzy, so my husband took me to the hospital.  They couldn't find anything wrong, but based on my history of blood clots, they assumed that I had a blood clot in my lungs, and had me follow up with my hematologist.

My hematologist was on vacation, and the covering hematologist basically told me I was wasting his time, and that there was no way I had a clot if all of the tests were negative.  I'm not entirely sure why he was such a jerk.  I didn't just wander in off the streets looking for a Lovenox fix; I was sent by another doctor who was concerned about my history and didn't want to miss anything.  Moving on (though still irritated) I was sent to my primary care doctor.

That was another huge cluster.  The office had no power, but the amazing nurse practioner turned into a  Jack Russell Terrier on the hunt for a rodent, and was figuring this out by flash light if she had to.  She booked me appointments for an echocardiogram, as well as a cardiologist consult, and also recommended I start Prilosec just in case it was something silly like heart burn.  Heart burn sounded pretty good to me, so I left with my fingers crossed that this was just really bad heart burn.  Though, to be blunt, I knew it wasn't, because heart burn doesn't typically leave people dizzy and short of breath.

That night, she called me, and told me that she had a potential cause of this pain; I had a fracture on one of my vertebrae in roughly the same area.  This sounded like great news at first, because fractures heal. But then I realized that with no recent falls, this fracture was probably caused by osteoporosis.  And I'm only 34 years old.

That was a total bummer.  And more so of a bummer when my well-meaning husband pointed out that I need to start doing the things I want to do before I end up in too much pain to function.  But that statement shocked me into an epiphany.  Maybe he's right, but I'm not going to live that way.  I'm going to do all of the things I want because I want to share those experiences with my husband and babies, not out of fear of not being able to do them next year.

This morning, I brought my little ladies to a play date with two lovely women that I went to grade school with, and their charming little men.  It was a blast.  It hurt like a bastard, but it was worth every minute.  And tonight, I told everyone that someone else was here helping me, and I did it myself.  I can't remember the last time I've laughed so hard, or enjoyed life so much.  Tonight was a blessing.  Yes, it hurt, again, like a bastard, but I wouldn't trade it for all the healthy bones in the world.

There are some things I will do whether or not I have osteoporosis; I will continue to lose weight.  I will do this because I want to set a healthy example for my girls, but also because I want every bite that goes into my mouth to be an opportunity for healing and nutrition.  I will go back to Bikram yoga as soon as my knee and back permit, and the cardiologist clears me.  I will start swimming again.  I will start walking again.  I will pursue a healthy body because I love my family, but also because I love myself.  I will pursue a healthy mind for the same reason.

I will not permit my family to fall apart again, even if my body disintegrates bit by bit.  This is MY family, and MY life.

Birth is birth.

http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/why-love-c-section-scar-150400581.html

^ YES!

I have had two c sections, and I am DAMN proud of it.  I am so sick of the guilt and guilting that goes along with c section births.  To begin with, the way I gave birth does NOT affect you, unlike, say, the decision whether or not to vaccinate a child.  That decision happens to affect everyone in our society, so therefore, everyone is entitled to an opinion on your decision not to vaccinate.  Accept that, and move on.

Not that it matters, but both of my sections were life saving; the first was to save my daughter's life, and the second was because the doctor felt very strongly that I was a high risk for uterine rupture based on many factors, and according to the surgeon who did the procedure, he was absolutely right.  I would probably have blown like a geyser.

I will admit, I do regret not having had that moment of "Oh!  I'm in labor!"  Or that moment of "Push!  Push!"  But I am alive, and I have two healthy, beautiful little girls to show for it, so when women give me the pity face when they hear I had a couple of c sections, I just don't get it.

There are websites upon websites that are dedicated to helping women to "fight" against medical intervention during birth, and particularly against c sections.  They see c sections as unnecessary interventions performed by doctors who lose patience with the poor, long-laboring woman, and just haul off and slice that kid right out, to the eternal detriment of child and mother.  That DOES sound bad!  Oh my.  Either that, or they accuse women who've had c sections as lazy quitters who did it for vanity reasons.  Unless I am considering a career change, far more people are likely to see my stomach than my vagina, so there's that.

I'd like to know what fantasy-land these women are living in.  This is almost as bad as those wackadoos who talk about "birth rape."  Get over yourselves.  If you think you were "raped" by your birthing experience, I'd like to ask you quite seriously if you have ever really had anything bad happen to you, because it seems as though your definition of trauma is pretty fucked up.

I'd also like to point out that anything that happens to a woman in that birthing room is done with her consent.  They may feel like they were "bullied" into a section or an epidural, but nonetheless, it was done with their consent unless they were quite literally dying and the doctor did what needed to be done whether they liked it or not.  And even still, he probably tried damn hard to explain it to them and get consent before deciding that they were too addled from the dying and getting the consent from the father or partner.

But I digress.  Two c sections, a healthy mama and two healthy babies.  Why would anyone judge that?  Why am I to be pitied?  I really want to know.  Why would anyone tell me that my daughter's near death experience was CAUSED by medicine, not solved by it?  Here's what I know.  Had I been stubborn and refused the section, my daughter would be dead.  She was blue and it took about 5 minutes for them to get her breathing on her own.  Had I refused the second section, I'd probably be dead, likely along with my daughter unless someone was able to rush me to an OR and get her cut out in time.

Do I think that there are too many sections happening in this country?  Yes, probably.  But I also think that it is none of my business.  It doesn't affect me.  We can play the trickle down game and say that it affects me because of insurance deductibles and blah blah blah, but that money all ends up back in the economy in one way or another, so I don't buy that argument.  If, at the end of each birth, there is a healthy mama and baby, it isn't my business.

A Proud Moment

We went shoe shopping today, and my normally reserved toddler apparently decided to drop a love bomb on a random woman.  She was in her sixties, an employee of the shoe store, and a fairly nondescript person.  As we walked by her, she smiled at my girls, and my toddler stopped in her tracks and turned to face her.

"You have a sparkle shirt!  Thats so pretty," she said, staring at her.
"Oh my, thank you so much!"  The woman's smile grew.
"Oh wow, you have buttons on you shoes!"
The woman looked at me, and made all sorts of cooing noises about my little girl and how sweet she was, but my girlie was just getting started.
"You have a heart neckie! (necklace)  I love it!  Oh, you face is bootiful!  I like you yellow hair!"
This woman was melting faster than chocolate in August.
The woman's manager called her to help someone, and she drifted away unwillingly, as my little friend shouted "Goodbye!  Pleased to met you!"

I'm not sure what drove my daughter to do this.  She has never ever done this, even to people she knows and loves.  This was a completely ordinary woman.  When I got home and was telling my husband this story, he pointed out that our little girl is particularly perceptive and sensitive, and probably felt as though this woman needed this for some reason.  I'd like to think so.  It would be nice to think that my baby was that kind.  I hope that woman smiled for the rest of the day.

Falling Apart

My family is unraveling at the moment.  I had knee surgery on Friday after a long 5 months of waiting. My knee was in pretty rough shape, and will likely require one more surgery to make it right, but in the meantime, this will hopefully improve the pain to tolerable.  While I am out of commission, my family is kind of falling to pieces.

My husband is trying to be the mom, and is drowning in the housework.  He cannot for the life of him figure out how to get anything done while holding a child or how to redirect them to go play independently, so he is either holding somebody OR getting something done.  Which, as you moms know, is a recipe to get nothing done.

My oldest daughter is attaching herself to me like a limpet.  She won't let me out of her sight without thinking that I'm leaving.  If someone tries to take her away from me, she screams hysterically.  And the amount of worrying over me that she is doing is really sad to see in a two year old.  After I put ice on, she touches my knee and tells me it is too cold and I need a blankie for it.  If I walk with one crutch instead of two, she comes flying after me with the other.  Where is my brace?  Put a pillow under it while I'm sitting.  Go sit down.  She even "fixes" it with cream because she is pretty sure that is what the doctor does whenever I have an appointment.  She rubs cream all over my leg while adorably seriously saying "There, that's better.  I you doctor, I make you better.  I fix."  Yes, incredibly cute, but way too heavy for a two year old.

And the baby.  Well, she is taking this hard.  When I was pregnant with her, I was in and out of the hospital for a few months.  My older daughter would be very cool to me when I came home, and attach herself to whoever had been caring for her.  The baby is doing the same, which is predictable because she is the same age as my older daughter was.  It doesn't hurt my feelings.  I understand why she is doing it, and that it is a normal reaction from a one year old when there is this kind of upheaval in her world.  In a week or two, life will be back to normal, and we'll be back in our groove.  What pisses me off is the way certain other people are reacting to this behavior of hers.  There is some barely contained gloating which makes me want to fly off the handle.  I can't say any more about that, but oh, I want to.  I even typed it out, then deleted it.  And then typed it out again, then deleted it again.

Both of my girls have also been behaving pretty badly in general.  Their dad is at a loss, because he is having to deal with it, and he doesn't really understand that this is reactive behavior, and while it needs to be addressed, it doesn't REALLY need to be addressed all that strongly.  It will go away when life goes back to normal.  He is upset, they are upset, I am upset.  This is our life right now.

Either be the adult, or quit complaining.

I'm part of several moms groups, and a few of my groups have a few moms who complain about their children's behavior, but don't seem willing or capable of making the changes necessary to help their kid.  Case in point.  Your toddler isn't sleeping.  You will do "anything" except for let her cry.  Why?  What is so bad about a child having to cry at some point?  A toddler isn't capable of full reasoning, and you will not be able to explain to her that sleep is important.  Your options are to soothe her constantly, or let her cry.  It is fine if you opt to soothe her into oblivion, but then don't complain about it, for Pete's sake!

I read this over and over again, whether it be about sleeping, or behavior.  Either grow up and fix it, or accept that you live with a tyrant and you are ok with that.  I've said it before, and I'll say it again.  My children are not perfect.  They test boundaries constantly.  I had to haul my two year old out of a store over my shoulder the other day because she was being a serious turd, but the next time we went to a store, she was delightful.  She tested, and discovered the answer.  Problem solved.

My method is not acceptable to everyone.  Some find it too lenient because I neither raise my voice or raise my hand to my children.  Some find it too harsh because I demand certain behaviors and don't tolerate any less.  It works for me.  What you do should work for you too, and if it doesn't, consider changing it.  I'm not saying to do what I do, but if you are unhappy with your results, change the method.