Mommy Ever After » families

Baby it’s Cold Outside.

mommyeverafter — Mon, 24 Nov 2014 15:06:43 +0000

This past week has been a blur of sick days.
Today is another one (more on that, later.)

I am endlessly grateful that it has just been some lingering respiratory things and maybe a touch of the stomach flu,

as it is almost the one year anniversary of our week in the hospital with a sick 2 month old with RSV. That was also the worst time in my entire life.

So while this week has been less than desirable, I can’t even call it bad.

There were playdates that had to be cancelled and there was food that couldn’t be eaten and I was up a lot of the past two nights listening to my daughter cough and cough.

But her spirits have been great, and I savored the days of cuddling.

I spent the entirety of Sunday in my pajamas. We played with baby dolls and a doctor’s kit and magnatiles and her hair and I even got her to sit with me for five minutes of this past week’s Grey’s Anatomy that I still have not been able to catch up on. (Don’t judge!)

But the highlight of the weekend was most definitely the music. We used the XBox 1 app that is attached to our big living room TV to play both XBox radio and YouTube videos, and got to go through a great array of music, from spooky to hip hop to holiday.

And then, we stumbled upon the holy grail: Idina Menzel and Michael Buble singing “Baby it’s Cold Outside”, as child actors mouth the words and dance along in a twenties style extravaganza. My daughter was hooked in three seconds.

This was awesome for so many reasons, not the least of which being that I now finally have someone with whom I can sing the duet. She makes me be the boy, but whatever.

We must have watched this adorable music video 15 times over the past two days. We hummed around the house. She even sat in the bathroom as I took a shower so that she could get the benefits from the steam and we practiced the duet from over the glass shower door.

So despite the frigid temps and the horrid cough, we were still able to muster up the strength for an ottoman stage performance, in our pjs, and it was the bright spot in an otherwise dreary week.

Things right now may be slightly less than ideal–and I struggle with keeping my glass half full–but I got to spend a few minutes on a freezing Sunday night in November with my two kids in my arms, dancing to holiday music.

This time last year, that would have been an impossibility.

For this, I am grateful; I am warm.

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Super.

mommyeverafter — Mon, 27 Oct 2014 02:18:20 +0000

This weekend my baby turned one.
I type these words with tears in my eyes. Some are happy tears, some are grateful tears, and some, I will admit, are wistful.
My son; this child of mine has surprised me from the very beginning.
He surprised me when I peed on a stick and saw two lines. Really? But it happened so fast.
And then he surprised me when the ultrasound tech, during my 12 week scan, told me that he saw “something between the legs”. He surprised me by being a boy.
He surprised me by being in the transverse position in my belly.
He surprised me at 4 am, 4 days before his scheduled C-Section, by waking me with painful contractions.
He surprised me by having a prominent cleft chin, bright blue eyes and golden red hair.
And the list goes on and on.
So now this little baby, my once tiny, almost 8 lb bundle whom I held in the delivery room just an hour after his birth, as he latched on like a pro and nursed, making me feel whole and at home, is no longer tiny. Quite the opposite, in fact. He is a boy. He stands on his own two feet (literally). He is on the verge of walking. He says real words.
He eats pulled pork and an avocado a day and squeals for seaweed.
He knows how to work the tv remote.
And so, in order to honor our boy, we decided that he needed a little reminder of just how special he is.
It feels as though I was just writing about my daughter’s first birthday. I wrote about themes and there was fanfare.
But for my son, for obvious reasons, we kept it small. Just his baby friends and our parents.
But just because it was small, it does not mean that it was not mighty.

We gave my son a Halloween party; We all dressed as super heroes and he danced along as we sang “Happy Birthday” and he face-planted into his cake and it was amazing.
But was more amazing was that I realized the strength of the team that surrounded me; My dearest friends who became family in the past year; The babies whom I get to raise as my children’s cousins. I love them so much. They’ve made me an aunt.
Because we made a family for ourselves. And my family is strong. They have exhibited superhuman strength in the past year,
like nothing I have ever seen before.
When I needed help, my friends and family rallied around me like this incredible, nurturing, giving, selfless Justice League.
My team is stupendous. They are super, indeed.
Happy First Birthday to the sweetest boy I have ever known.
You are strong, yet gentle,
sensitive and smiley,
and you have made me who I am today.
The sky’s the limit, kid.
I can’t wait to see where this world takes you. Or, more appropriately,
where you take this world.

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Threadbare

mommyeverafter — Fri, 09 May 2014 23:35:21 +0000

Tonight, as I toweled myself off after my shower,
this old post popped into my head.
As I looked in the mirror I saw tired eyes,
hair that has not been washed since Monday morning (which is a new record, even for me. And no, Twin, it doesn’t even look dirty)
and I thought to myself, threadbare.
The real definition of the word is “becoming thin and tattered with age.”
I think that this past week did a number on me,
as I was already fragile from these past few months.
This week, over and over again, I thanked my lucky stars for my carbon monoxide detector,
and that something pulled me out of bed at 5am to hear it’s far away beeps.
So many people reached out to me this week. They asked if I was OK, asked to help, and told me that my story has haunted them, or motivated them to make changes in their home.
My husband and I are so glad to raise awareness on something so important, but, as he said, we’re ready to stop being the poster children for these hard things.
So I looked myself in the mirror,
and I smoothed on my eye creams and oils and moisturizers (I may never wash my hair but I am crazy for my skincare regimen)
and put on a t-shirt from one of my sister’s old Phish shows and a pair of her silk shorts,
and I realized that, as I wrote in that post so long ago,
I may be threadbare
and a bit of an eyesore
but I am still standing.
Through terrifying surgeries, heartbreaking complications,
losing too much blood and the devastating loss of good friends in my time of need,
through floods and hospital stays and times that were sad and scary and surreal
I am here. I am strong. I may look thin, I may look weak, I may have dirty hair, but I have survived.
I didn’t know that I would.
I am so grateful that I have.
And, just like my daughter’s hospital hat years ago,
I am now the best.
I am the best me I have ever been.
Here’s to the future,
and here’s to the past.

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