The Little Boy in the Attic

Alright, the little boy doesn’t live in an attic, he lives in the apartment upstairs from me but it sounded more interesting at first.

The Little Boy in the Upstairs Apartment(meh)

His name is Owen, a precocious and beautiful three-year old that spends his days racing from one end of the apartment to the next. Thankfully his mom is a working mom and little Owen, I’m sure, is off somewhere (not over my head) running till his heart’s content.

On occasion, I may  be privy to one of his record-breaking tantrums that he likes to throw from time to time which includes all that is needed to sound like he is dying. I know it’s a tantrum because in the middle of the stomping and wailing, you can hear, “No!” from sweet, tender little Owen repeated over and over.

When I see Owens mom I say nothing. She knows that I know about her sweet Owen. She also knows that I know that I’m in for it in the near future. God help us all.

I may not be able to say a word but I can cringe a bit.

After all, karma is a bitch.

Less of a Woman?

I read a story where Kate Winslet had lied in an interview about the birth of her first-born. She was ashamed of having had an emergency caesarean and that as a woman she should have been able to give birth as nature intended.

I admit that I felt a twinge of regret after having my emergency surgery but it was only slight. I know that my caesarean saved my daughter’s life and mine. She was frank breach and in distress. I will forever be grateful to the team of people who made her breath for the first time and then introduced me to her.

We as women should be supporting each other and not judging each other. I am not less of a mother because I didn’t spend 36 hours of pushing and cursing. There shouldn’t be a divide between Stay-at-home moms vs. Working moms, or Bottle fed vs. Breast fed. We are all just moms doing the best we can.

Below is a Love Letter to our c-section moms: http://thestir.cafemom.com/baby/131563/a_love_letter_

Classic Bedtime Failure #Imnotalone

Caving in to the Crying-It-Out Pressure

Update on having a set bedtime for Lenna: Not good.

I had one successful night and then we had a bad night where all was lost. After an hour of crying I caved. And once again, I woke up on the floor next to my daughter’s crib and she was snuggled up beside me.  This is hard.

My daughter with her Binky

My Problem: My mom calls me a nervous mom and therein lies my failure as a parent. It’s the truth, I am a little, but it still hurts my feelings that I come across as “nervous” to her. Yea, I want my little girl to eat. Yes, I want my little girl to get all the rest she can. Yes, I want her to grow up self-reliant and confidant and not mommy-dependent. She is already beautiful and smart.

So having said that; I promise not to weasel my way out of teaching the little one about bedtime.

I promise to keep at it with the finger foods, spoons, and sippy cups.

I promise to find a local liquor store and “relax a bit”.

hmm

Bedtime Routines & Other Cruel and Unusual Punishments

I lie this is only about one stupid bedtime routine.

The idea of change for me is scary but the importance of my little one’s sleep and mine depend on a bedtime routine that works. So here we go:

I started the morning by waking her early. My theory is she has a 4-6 hour awake time and her afternoon nap is interfering with the bedtime. Lenna wakes up from her afternoon nap at 3:30 (ish). The plan has been set in motion.

There really is no plan, I’m just trying to get the timing of “Drowsy & Bedtime crap” right.

• Dinner
• Bath
• PJ’s
• Playtime which includes Books – etc.
• Last Bottle
• Put in crib with Binky (Pacifier – please don’t judge) and pink Panda
• 5 minutes of crying -OR-15-30 minutes of fussing (Lenna fussed.)
• Return to give Binky and pink Panda
• 5 minutes of crying -OR- 15-30 minutes of fussing (Lenna cried for almost 30 seconds then fussed for 20 minutes.)

SLEEP

It’s really not any surprise she fell asleep easy, my daughter is amazing. I’m the one that fails at parenting.

S*** Happens

I was forewarned that as a mom, I will be peed on, pooped on, sneezed on, vomited on, and thrown food on. I expect this.

When I take my child’s diaper off I knowingly run the risk of any sort of icky accident that may occur. I still wasn’t prepared for this one.

Lenna loves to run from me as soon as the diaper is off (as all toddlers do). This morning I was feeling really slow and let her be for a minute. That’s when I heard the grunt. I look at her and see this big smile on her face. I approach her slowly as to not to scare the child but it was too late. She lunged forward in her favorite game of chase and took off leaving behind a little half circle of brown poo around the living room.

yea.

Once upon a Bedtime Routine #MSMommy

As a first time mom I relied heavy on the words of those that have experienced motherhood before me. ‘Sleep when the baby sleeps’. Check. Some advice contradicted other advice, I would get confused, get worried about being confused, get overwhelmed, then start to stress. And that’s why I gave up on taking advice and have been just winging it ever since.

mhmm Scary!

I instantly liked the idea of a bedtime routine when I first heard of it. I thought, “Yes. That is a go. We are definitely doing that.”

It never really worked for me. Rocking her to sleep worked well for a long time (4 or 5 months) but she finally caught on and will wrestle me down if she even suspects that is what I am trying to do. Falling asleep to a bottle used to work when she was a newborn but how do you keep a newborn awake?

I basically have gotten to the point where I now wait till she falls over with exhaustion where ever she may be. Let’s add this to the ever-growing list of ways that I am a failure as a parent.

Lenna’s Bedtime Routine

• Dinner
• Bath time (optional here)
• Play till Sleepy
• Bedroom to put on PJs
• Offer a Last Bottle
• Mommy lies down and impatiently waits for Little one to pass out of exhaustion
• **50/50 Whether or not she falls asleep on the bottle or lays down beside me and falls asleep.

Whatever happens after that last bottle it’s always late and I always end up waking up on her bedroom floor at 3am. I put her in her crib and get to my bed asap to catch a couple more hours of sleep.

Before you think it (probably too late) crying-it-out is too hard for me to deal with. It breaks my heart every single time. I guess I will have to wait till she’s 4 or 5 and then we can talk about bed time. HA! I have no idea what I’m doing!