Baby Brother

Tonight String Bean informed me that she doesn’t play with boys much at school, because she just doesn’t like boys all that much. I chuckled and told her that’s pretty normal for her age, but that she’ll like them more as she grows up. She considered this briefly, then said, “Except a baby brother. I would really like to play with a baby brother. He’d be so cute, and I’d be very good friends with him.” She gave me a knowing look (or knowing, for a four-year-old). Rather than telling her there’s no chance of that happening, as both hubby and I agree we’re done having kids, I just changed the subject.

I remember having my own phase of wishing for a baby brother. It was derailed temporarily by my parents’ divorce, but then resumed when my step-father moved in with my mom. But I never got my baby brother. Instead, I learned to stop fighting with my sister so much, and we became best friends. Since my girls are already best friends, I haven’t got that in the pipeline to satisfy her wish. Instead, I guess I need to get her a little more cousin time. Sure, her cousin is a girl instead of a boy, but at 4 months old, baby girls and baby boys aren’t all that different. And after that, we’ll just see if another cousin comes along (when my sister and brother-in-law are ready, although my sister is already saying she wants another baby, and soon is fine by her), and maybe it’ll be a boy, the kind of boy String Bean thinks she’d like to play with and be very good friends with.

Perfect Baby

Up until this point, my sister has had just about the perfect baby. Not too fussy, no signs of colic, a good nurser, easily transitioned from mommy’s bed into her own crib, and she never makes a big deal about having a wet or dirty diaper. I had warned her that both of my girls hit a mysterious peak of fussiness between six and eight weeks, where they’d scream for hours despite being fed, changed, well-rested, cuddled, and entertained. Fortunately for my sister, my niece missed this milestone, and sailed right into her ninth week without a break in her happy disposition.

My niece is fifteen weeks old today, able to hold her head up and anxious to take in the world around her, quick to smile and laugh, eager to track every movement and sound around her, and fussy about all of it. She’s finally hit that point where eating and sleeping are her happy times, and the in-between periods are wearing my sister out with attempts to soothe her. She likes to sit upright, and take in the world, but her little head gets heavy quickly, and she gets fussy from that. So the logical thing would be to let her lie down, with a rattle or activity mat (or two very eager cousins) to entertain her, but she no longer likes to lie down, and this leads to fussiness.

Of course I’m sorry to see my sister struggling to keep this formerly content baby happy, and I wish I had some advice to offer, aside from the usual “she’ll grow out of this stage.” But on another level, I’m glad to know that she has a normal baby after all, and not the perfect little angel that made my girls look like thorny spawn.

Feeding Frenzy

One thing I’ve noticed about my youngest is that she’s not fundamentally opposed to food, just that she has an aversion to feeding herself. I can sit next to her and spoon an entire container of yogurt into her, or a full serving of Annie’s mac and cheese, or little bites of pizza, but if left with the food on a plate before her, the food never makes it into her mouth. Her arms just hang loosely at her sides, like they aren’t even a part of the eating process.

The funny thing is, when she was a baby, she hated being fed. She was a good nurser, loved snagging drinks out of her sister’s sippy cup of milk, but as soon as I got her into her high chair and put a bowl of mush in front of her, there was no way it was going down. She’d hit the spoon away, turn her head away, or just clamp her mouth shut. Back in those days, she preferred to feed herself. If I cut up pieces of fruit, cheese and made a pile of frozen peas on her plate, she’d happily browse the buffet, popping food into her mouth to gum down.

Now, she likes to stop by the kitchen during lunch to have a few bites of whatever sandwich her dad has made for lunch, or pause next to my salad bowl at dinner and ask me to feed her a piece of avocado, and she’ll even let her sister feed her with a fork (one of the cutest things to watch). But food sitting listlessly on a plate holds no appeal to her. Occasionally I’ll forget the new deal, that feeding her, almost two years after I quit trying, is now back in favor, and she’ll turn to me and say, “Mommy, will you feed me?” And the truth is, since I never got a chance to spoon-feed her as a baby, I don’t even mind. For now…

Cousin Love

My girls, who were so anxious to meet their new cousin a week after she was born, spent their entire first visit obsessed with my sister’s cat toys. They weren’t impressed by the sleeping swaddled baby who seemed oblivious to them, and barely interacted with her at all.

My sister recently came over with her now one-month-old baby for a visit. My niece is much more alert now, looking all around, making those ridiculously sweet grunting and squealing vocalizations, and she stretches with a single-minded joy, arching her narrow back and testing how far she can spread her toes. This time, with the ability to see their cousin’s eyes, feel her grasp, and convince themselves that her baby noises were just for them, my girls were all over her. Literally.

I gave the girls the run-down on the rules several times before my sister arrived: no touching baby’s face or hands, gentle touching of her belly, legs, and feet is okay, and no screaming in the room with her. They listened well and were able to repeat the rules back to me. Then our visitors arrived, and the girls squealed their welcome in ear-piercing tones (waking the sleeping baby), and proceeded to fight over who got to hold her precious hand.

My unflappable sister was her usual jovial self, gently admonishing them without seeming truly alarmed. I can count on one hand the number of first-time moms I’ve met who wouldn’t panic at the sight of two over-stimulated kids bearing down on her newborn. Actually, I can count them on one finger, as my sister is the only one I’ve met.

After the initial enthusiasm wore off, we were able to get the girls to only hold their cousin’s feet with that vice-grip of love. It’s a good approximation of how we all feel about this newest member of our family, the baby that it took a decade of trying for my sister to have. Most of us are better able to restrain ourselves in the baby’s presence, but as I watched my two girls beaming brightly down at the cousin who has just learned to smile and beamed right back at them, I was immensely grateful for the dog-pile of cousin love on my lap. We should all be so lucky, to enter the world with so much loving anticipation, an entire family desperate to meet us, and two adoring cousins gushing with joy at our mere presence.

Mother’s Day

Happy Mother’s Day, to all of you wonderful, strong, capable, glorious moms out there. And an especially happy Mother’s Day to all of you moms who are not feeling particularly wonderful, strong, capable, or glorious right now. We all have our days. Hang in there.

Hours before having her first baby, my sister said that motherhood always felt like an exclusive club that she couldn’t seem to get into. Well, after ten years of trying, and six losses along the way, she’s finally in the club. Where before she’d spot a woman cradling a newborn in a grocery store line and have to avert her gaze to hide her sadness and frustration, she now marches right up to her to compare notes. Welcome to the club, sweetie, we’re glad to have you.

I have other friends who are still on that rough, hopeful road, recovering from loss, waiting for the grief to subside before trying again. My heart goes out to all of them. I suffered two miscarriages myself on my own road to motherhood. It is an even more exclusive club, one nobody hopes to belong to, and one that can make Mother’s Day a hard day to get through. I hope you are kind to yourselves today, and remember that you are loved and supported on this sometimes painful journey.

I’d also like to take a moment to salute all of those surrogate moms out there. You know you have one. A teacher, a coworker, a friend’s mother you secretly idolized, some woman who championed something about you for no apparent reason. A woman who just believed in you, and made you believe a little more in yourself. I’ve been collecting mother-figures for years, and I think they all know who they are, and I hope they all know how much I appreciate them.

And last, but certainly not least, to my own mother, my role model for the tough no-nonsense woman that I never quite became, thanks for all of your years of love, laughter, sacrifice, and strength.

Sleep

Ah, the plight of the light sleeper. Sure, sleep when the baby sleeps, everyone said. They forget to tell you that the baby’s longest nap will be at 10am, when you can’t possibly make yourself sleep. Or that her naps will last all of 40 minutes, and if you’re like me, and it takes you 20 minutes to fall asleep, and you’re a light sleeper who jerks back awake at the sound of the baby stirring, you’ll get maybe 3 minutes sleep per 40-minute baby nap, and feel like you’d have been better off not even trying.

My sister is not a light sleeper. She’s one of those “anywhere, anytime” sleepers, and she seems to be coping with her newborn quite well, grabbing a 20-minute nap here, a 30-minute nap there, sleeping in that deep, restful way that I didn’t until my baby was no longer a baby. I’m not saying she’s not tired. She has the puffiness around the eyes and slowed-down thought processes that are the hallmark traits of any new mom, but she doesn’t seem to be suffering from total sleep deprivation the way I was when my firstborn was only a month old.

Part of that is mindset, I think. I expected to handle those early weeks of motherhood quite well. I figured as a lifelong insomniac and light sleeper I’ve had plenty of practice at functioning on far too little sleep. My mistake was the definition of “functioning.” I meant sitting at a computer in a quiet office, editing technical abstracts for 8 hours a day, on a steady stream of coffee. Not having to navigate a 2am diaper explosion while a baby screams to be fed, or trying to figure out how to calm a baby in a swing she hates while taking the shortest shower on record.

My sister also has the benefit of my experience to help her get through. I think while I expected the best-case scenario, she anticipated a much harder one than she got. I have to admit, I have a measure of pride in that. She’s the big sister, the brave adventurous one, and it feels good to be the one going through a tough experience first and doling out helpful advice for a change.

Costco

Shortly after my second daughter was born, I remember sending a text message to my sister to say, “I’m headed to Costco. Without kids!” She wrote back: “If a trip to Costco feels like a vacation, you need a little more kid-free time.” And she was right.

What I thought with my first child is that a good mother, especially one who recently quit a perfectly good job to stay home and raise that child, shouldn’t need help doing her new “job.” After all, I never needed help doing my old job. Never mind that my job as an editor came with clear-cut duties, regular praise for a job well-done, and Cal/OSHA-guaranteed breaks. And no screaming baby spitting up all over my shoulder as I tried to complete my daily task list.

With a husband on the road a lot for his new job, and my determination to be the perfect mom, I quickly wore down in my new position as stay-at-home mom. It wasn’t just that I had too much pride to ask for help (although that’s probably true, too), but I didn’t have many people to ask.

By the time my second child was born, I had learned a little more about the value of a sane, rested mother. About that time, my mother retired, and my father and step-mother had some time slots open up in their hectic schedules. Now, when my husband is gone on a long business trip, I usually hit my mother up to visit for a few days to help out. And every Tuesday and Thursday morning my dad and step-mom watch the girls for a couple of hours so I can have some alone time. If only I’d known that first time around what a necessary luxury this kid-free time is. Well, that’s all I have time to write today. My Tuesday break is almost over, and I’m off to Costco. Kid-free.

Aunthood

I'm the new aunt of a 2 week old baby. Sharing this experience with my sister has meant trotting out all of my old experiences with nursing, swaddling, pumping, preferred diaper rash creams, and foods that can cause gas in a nursing baby. Digging through my memory banks for these morsels of wisdom has done two things for me.

First, it's made me realize that my babies are no longer babies, in that terribly nostalgic way. As I watch my niece jut out her lower lip in preparation for a full-body cry, I remember that exact expression on my first daughter's face. As she fights heavy eyelids in the swing, I recall how my second daughter loved the swing so much that she napped in it for the first eight months of her life (second-time moms have none of the shame of first time ones, we do what we have to for peace and quiet).

Secondly, I'm oh-so-grateful that those zombie days and sleepless nights, bouts of inexplicable tears and swings between fatigue and manic elation are behind me. I remember several moments, running on a few hours sleep, gazing down at a fussing infant in my arms, at a loss for how to soothe whatever mystery problem was tormenting her, and thinking how ironic that a mother of a newborn is the least equipped person on the planet to be entrusted with the care of such a fragile new person.