sueeeus

This little love is breaking my heart.  He knows when I’m leaving him at daycare.  Now his lower lip protrudes and the tears well up when we walk through the door of our care giver’s home.  At first I distracted him with peek-a-boo, and ran out when he was under the blanket.  That worked one time.  I keep trying to find ways to distract him.  Yesterday I sat him down with his back to the door, put some toys in front of him and sat down with him to play for a moment.  That worked great.  I tried it again this morning, and out came the lip the moment I brought the toys over.  The tears, the sobs.   I’m fresh out of distractions.   Oh, how it wrenches my heart!

Such is the plight of the working mom.

Of course I’m biased, but I think he IS the best baby in the universe!  His hair is finally growing long enough to fall over, rather than stand straight up in all directions like a fuzzy little monkey.  Except he’s bald in back from rubbing his head back and forth, which makes for a very funny profile.  He’s learning to use his legs more now.  He puts his weight on them and practices standing.  When he’s on his tummy, he scoots his butt up and sort of kicks his legs.  He may crawl soon, at this rate!

I’m feeling a bit anxious about next week.  LB begins daycare on Monday.  While I’m very thankful for the help, there is a large part of me that is sad to leave my baby in the care of someone else for the better part of each day.  He will have excellent care and attention, and I will have a little more unencumbered time in which I can do things like make mad dashes to grocery stores without wrangling car seats and unruly nearly four year olds.

I figure it will take me three hours from the time I wake until I make it to the office, on the office days, and that is also somewhat stressful.  Three. Hours. For. Goodness’. Sake.  I need time to pump, wash the parts, pack them up along with the pump to tote to the office, pack the laptop, get myself dressed and ready, get the kids dressed and ready, load up the car, drop the boys off at daycare, then head in to the office.  Work.  Arrive home in time to pump again.  Wash up, make dinner, get as much ready as I can for the next day.

Office days will be very long for me, and I’m sure I will value my telecommuting days all that much more.  It’s important for me to go back to the office though.  I need the adult interaction.  I need to sumberge myself in the variety of personalities.

Until it all becomes part of my day to day, I think I’ll find myself anxious more often than not.  Change tends to be stressful, but I know I’ll settle in to a routine eventually.

Meanwhile, LB is expressing himself more and more!  His hungry cry is NNN-GHEEEEE, NNN-GHEEEEE, NNN-GHEEEEE.  See?  It even sounds like ‘hungry’!  My kid is a genius.  Genius!  He’s showing more emotions and slobbering like a fiend, chewing on his fingers until he practically gags himself (not such a genius in that regard).

I think he may be going through a growth spurt, because he’s taking quite a lot more milk it seems.  Yesterday he had 31 ounces (waking every 2-3 hours, which is NO picnic for me), when I think he’s been averaging closer to 22-26 before that.  That’s another thing I need to figure out – how many bottles to send with him to daycare, and how much fresh I’ll have ready for him, and how much refrigerated, and with all that, the instructions for which milk is which and the order in which to use it.  So complicated!  Maybe I’ll number the bottles.  I haven’t paid all that much attention to how much he has each day.  I feed him on demand, and I’m making enough to meet his needs, with some extra to freeze.  So this weekend I’m carefully noting how much he has each day, to help me figure out how much to send with him on Monday.

So many things to think about and prepare, when one sends one’s kid off to daycare!  I think I should try not to worry about next week, and just take each day as it comes, and do my best to keep up and stay afloat.  And somewhere in the midst of all that I will need to get some sleep.

There are two main trains of thought milling about my head right now.  One is that I need to go back to the office.  Need to.  Need some adult interaction, a change of environment, and a better defined routine.  Need it.

The other is that I have a new goal that I need to explore and fully define, but it’s a goal, nonetheless, and it’s important.  I’m sure it’s a repeat goal that I’ve attempted before, and abandoned, but it’s time for a resurrection.

There.  About the office.  I don’t recall feeling this caged the last time I was telecommuting full time.  Maybe it has something to do with the time of year.  BB was born in January, so spring was springing when I was returning to work.  There was more sunshine, there were flowers blooming, there were afternoon walks.  LB was born at the end of August, and we’re fast forwarding past autumn and into winter.  There is rain, and more rain, and wind and more rain.  The sky is darkening by 4 p.m.  Did I mention the rain?  There are no lovely afternoon walks, unless mad dashes through Costco and Fred Meyer count.  I’m only working three days a week, taking Tuesdays and Thursdays as vacation days so I can catch up on the sleep I missed while working Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.  Having over 20 years under my belt has its advantages.  I get 4 weeks of paid vacation a year, and I can roll a full year over, so I’ve banked 8 weeks that I’m using now, and I can spread it out for quite some time.  I think I can work 3 days a week until April, in fact, and still get paid for full time.  Woot!

But something is different and I’m feeling house-bound.  Stir crazy.  I don’t necessarily get more work done at the office, but it sure is nice to see people, and, dare I say it, social anxiety or not, be seen.  I miss my peeps.  Over twenty years with some of these people make them family.  We’ve spent the better part of our lives together.  I miss that.  I miss them.  I actually brought up the mother’s room calendar today, to see how many people were using it, and if I could fit my pumping schedule in.  A couple of the women have dropped out, and there’s a new one, but it looks like there is room for me.  Do I want to drag my pumping gear around with me?

And then there’s the pang, big time, I feel when considering sending LB off to daycare earlier than later.  He’s only a baby for such a short short time, and what kind of a person am I to send him off when I actually could keep him with me for a little while longer.  As long as he’s not interfering with my work, it’s reasonable to allow him to stay, and since he’s still sleeping through most of my working hours, it’s okay.  So if he’s sleeping, does it matter that he sleeps at my house or at the daycare?  I think I’ll consider starting him at daycare in January, after the bustle of the holidays is over.  He’ll be a little over 4 months old.

Sigh.

Did I mention that I Googled child care rates across the country and found that I’m fortunate enough to live in one of the more expensive states?  I wonder if that means our per capita earnings are accordingly higher?  Right.  I doubt it.  Anyhow, I’ll be getting a blazing steal of a bargain at $300/week for the two kids.  It’s way under the average, so I shouldn’t complain.

And now for the other item.  My goal.  I need to get to know myself better, get over myself, and fall in love with myself, if any of that makes sense.  Get over myself, because I get wrapped up in the same patterns and thoughts and depressions and cycles, over and over and over again.  It’s getting old.  I’m getting old.  And fall in love with myself, so that I can honor myself and accept myself and be comfortable with myself, and just cut myself some slack.  Walk the talk, so to speak.  Not have ridiculous expectations that can’t be met.  Relax a little, alright, already.  No conditions.  That’s the goal.  Unconditional love.  For my self.  I have no idea how to get there, but there it is.  That’s my goal.

I think that unconditional love will wash away a lot of stress and anxiety.  And guilt.

I perform fairly well under pressure. I just don’t like it.

This morning* I discovered that one of my important applications had a bug that was affecting customers world wide. Not good! So I had to scurry to figure out what changed between Friday and today. Because I certainly hadn’t changed anything. It’s so frustrating. More of why I hate Information Technology — nothing ever just stays put, and I like stability. Hence, I despise IT. It’s a quandary, because it affords a good part of my bread and butter. So. I found the problem and discovered it was most likely due to a server migration that took place two weeks ago, which I thought I had tested thoroughly. Apparently not. Argggggghh. So frustrating.

The point is, I was too busy frantically fixing everything and releasing the updated code, that when Harry woke up, I let him lounge about at my feet until I was finished. I’ve learned that the best way to have a harmonious morning is to get him dressed and out the door first thing. No lallygagging about. Just stick to the routine. No questions, no options. Stick to the routine. Break from the routine? The pleas begin, but once I get him in the car he’s okay because I distract him with a cd player and headphones. He feels special, wearing his own grown up headphones, and listens contently to his Disney tunes. When we get to the daycare, however, the floodgates open. He looks so sad and they don’t seem like crocodile tears. He hugs me and begs me to take him home. I hug him, kiss him, tell him I love him, and say “Have a happy day!” in my happiest voice. Then I leave. And feel awful.

I know he will be fine in 30 seconds or less. Even so. It gets me.

*I work from home on Mondays and Fridays. Lucky me!