whoa whoa whoa!! how is it possible that a whole month has passed by yet it also feels like time has stood still? i can't believe my baby is already a month old today, while it also feels like i've been living in a stagnant cycle of crying, diapers and bottles. and somehow it also feels like i've been doing this for four years already. that's what sleep deprivation does to you i guess!
Cameron is doing well. he's thriving as he should i suppose. my once 7lb 10oz son has acquired a dad bod and is weighing in at just over 10lbs. his umbilical cord fell off almost two weeks into birth. i found it on the couch a couple hours after we partook in a skin-to-skin nap. i thought it was bug but nope, it was a piece of dehydrated lifeline. his circumcision healed up nicely right around the same time. thank god! it was a chore trying to squeeze vaseline on that thing like a bee hive. boy-moms know what i'm talkin' about. aside from that, i don't know what to say about him. i always see people document things on their child's monthly photos about what they like/dislike, what they've discovered and any milestones they've hit. but so far Cam is a typical newborn. he eats, sleeps, poops and cries. i guess i could elaborate on those. he's eating up to 4oz at a time now. he sleeps well at night and only really wakes for feedings but we put him right back to sleep and he has no problem with that. his poops have been various colors, shades and consistencies thus far, sometimes even within the same diaper. so weird. and he cries. or fusses. i'd love to say more about him but that sort of sums up his life so far. i'll let you know when he's more interesting. right now his little intricacies are cute and noticeable for me but even so, i know his 'smile' is just a reflex. and that when he grabs my finger he has no idea his hand even exists yet so it's meaningless.
as far as i go...well. i've had my downs and my downs. but i'm looking forward to the ups and i'm now starting to see a flicker of a light at the end of the tunnel. if you recall in my last blog post, i was a disheveled mess. i can't say that i'm not still that, but i'm a little bit of a lesser mess now. as every day goes by i feel slightly more confident. whether it's taking him on walks with the ergobaby or putting him in the car and using the stroller, i've overcome the fear of doing new things. when he was about two weeks old i took him in a stroller down Geary Street for a walk by myself. ten blocks in he started crying his face off and i panicked. luckily we were by a Kaiser clinic. i knew they'd have a lobby so i ducked in there and fed/changed him. after that i rushed back to the car where Ted was and proclaimed that "that was intense. whyyyyyy did i try to do that? let's just stay at home for like six months." today was the very first time i left the house with him alone in my car that wasn't just walking out to the park across the street. i took him to a friend's house a whopping half a mile away. it seems like nothing but it's a feat for me.
otherwise, i've still googled way too much stuff. i'm trying to figure out what to believe or what guidelines i should be following. for a few days Cam ate like 32oz in a day, which seems like waaaaayy too much for a kid his age and i kept wondering if i was overfeeding him and setting him up for a lifestyle of obesity. i can't tell the difference between his cries which makes me feel like i don't know my kid. but to tell you the truth, i don't know my kid. actually, at this point i couldn't even tell you the difference between a cry and fussiness. it all sounds the same to me. is he hungry? tired? needs a diaper change? i don't know! but as days go by i'm more and more okay with not knowing and just figuring it out. and if it's none of those things and he's fussy still, i'll just do whatever until he's not fussy. i always thought that i had to find a reason for why he's fussy but i'm learning that sometimes you just have no effing clue and you just deal with it. instead of following the foreshadowing of The Wonder Weeks or any other book that tells you what you can expect exactly when, i'll just take the fussiness as it comes and just make it through. that's the plan anyway. i can't keep trying to find an explanation for everything because there are too many variables and there's almost never a definitive answer considering this guy can't tell me whether he's crying because of gas, colic, or because i'm holding him in a way he doesn't love.
i decided about a week ago that i was going to quit the breastfeeding thing and straight up use formula. for me, the benefit of pumping didn't outweigh the negatives i felt. sitting attached to a machine every 2-3 hours and not spending that time with my newborn made me feel shitty. also having to wash pump parts and staying awake after bottle feeding to pump after already being sleep deprived from every night prior will wear you down. and for what? the 2oz or less i made with each pump session? this kid eats more than that. it just wasn't worth our time. and i'm so much happier now that i don't have all of that on my shoulders. fuck the judgmental pro-breastfeeding people out there who think you're not being a good mom if you don't offer up 'breast is best' for your baby. i won't bond with my kid? pretty sure when he loves me and kisses me goodnight when he's 2, he's bonded. plus, i'm still going to be feeding him and clothing him for yeaaarrrrrsss to come. pretty sure he's not going to know whether i gave him that 'golden' breast milk when he's yelling at me to give him a lollipop.
do i still cry? yeah. for sure. but less. as i let go of control over my life (or my once upon a time life) and allow myself to grasp the idea that i'm a 'mom' with everything that word encompasses, i start to believe that i can do it. and i can be less selfish. but are there moments where i wonder "what if we just didn't have kids at all?" or "what if we just have one kid because i'm not sure i can do this twice?" yeah. HELL YEAH. once or twice i've been out to pick up some butter at the grocery store without Cam attached to me and for a moment i forget i have a baby and it feels nice to have that freedom. but then i see an infant who is four months old being toted along to lunch with her mom and friends or i see a five year old running around the playground laughing so hard it hurts and i can see what this is all worth. there's a lot of sacrifice in the beginning (and probably for the rest of my life) of a life with kids but in the end the sacrifice, tantrums, uncertainty and change in self identity will never overshadow the hugs, laughs and joy that enhance your life as a family. sometimes i still wish i could've just popped out a toddler (or at the very least a 4 month old) and skipped the whole newborn thing but i'll bet that in a year from now i'm going to miss these newborn moments.
check back next month. hopefully i'll be all like "wow this baby thing is amazing. how could i have ever bitched about any of it before? every moment is savored and i would totally do this again." we'll see. i'm told things get better every month so i'm hoping to see some smiles or recognition coming from that little face. but in the meantime he is pretty cute to look at.
one month. we did it! month 2, please be kind to me.
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