I’m pretty sure I’ve got the wrong attitude about this parenting thing. I’ve always been a negative, pessimistic person and I don’t know why I thought I would feel any differently after having a baby. I’m not sure where my pessimism comes from. Perhaps from a childhood marred by parental divorce and being a hopeless nerd who was regularly teased, I learned to expect the worst from people and life. I know a lot of my stress is self-inflicted by thinking negatively and creating drama where there isn’t any, instead of making the best of a situation. This is definitely something I’d like to improve about myself, as soon as I figure out how.
Ever since Rory was born, I’ve felt like every time she cries is a crisis and I need to avoid this at all costs. Obviously, babies cry, so I realize it’s impossible to keep her from doing this all the time. But now I tend to avoid doing pretty much anything for fear that she will cry. My bathing schedule is less than stellar. My workout schedule is worse. I hardly ever leave the house because she cries in the car and I worry she’ll cry wherever we are going and annoy people. Thus, days when I shower, put on clothes other than sweats, and actually exit the house are a rare accomplishment. Most of the time I’m sitting around, putting her in the rotation of swing-playmat-bouncy seat-rocking chair trying to keep her happy, all the while plotting my midnight escape to Mexico to be the cat-sitter of a rich man named Carlos.
I’ve been reading a lot of “mommy blogs” lately (ugh!) and am secretly jealous of all the ladies who seem to have no problem going out to workout classes or shopping or other activities without it being a grand spectacle. I can’t seem to figure out how they do it. I put Rory in the car and drove to Starbucks this morning just to grab a drink at the drive-thru, and by the time we were driving home she was already fussing. Maybe it’s just that she’s still little and it will get better when she’s older. I don’t know. I’d just prefer the feeling of “what did we get ourselves into” to go away and to feel like I have a life again. Not the life I had before, just a life where I don’t feel chained to the house. Maybe I’m expecting too much, too soon. I am new at this business.
On a separate note: Rory has been extra fussy the past couple days. She’s also been drooling a lot and chewing on her fist. Can she be teething already?! I can kind of see two little spots on her bottom gum that I guess could eventually be teeth coming through. I tried to feel them with my finger but it’s just kind of slimy and she tries to suck my finger so hard that I can’t really maneuver in there. Ugh!!
Give her teething toys. But other than that–babies do ry (My keyboard letter there is stuk, sorry), some more than others. It’s okay, and you don’t need to organize your whole life around avoiding it and esp. about avoiding her “annoying” people–god, a baby’s wails are less annoying than adults are the minute they speak. Seriously…I am also a negative pessimist, a grandma now who had a verrrry hard time with motherhood, so I feel for you. But I think what helps people like us the most is not neessrily hanging, but learning to like ourselves the way we are, whih is more true and honest than most people. Realize that the only reason they seem happier or well-adjusted is they don’t go as deeply inside.
By: marcys on November 4, 2009
at 6:25 pm
PS That “hanging” is the word for “altering”!
By: marcys on November 4, 2009
at 6:43 pm
Post more! I say this knowing that you’re busy with a newborn, as I am too, but you’re really freaking funny about it, and your blog posts are highly entertaining. A friend just sent me one of your entries, and I spent the last 45 minutes reading all of the rest of them and trying really hard not to laugh uproariously because my guy is asleep on me in his Moby and I don’t want to wake him. You should make this thread into a book and publish at some point.
-A fellow hypochondriac-shut-in new mom
By: Another mommy on November 5, 2009
at 1:33 pm