Random Thoughts of the Day

1. Did anyone else who watched the Oscars last night think the dude from Counting Crows looked like one of those plastic heads in the Play-Doh Barber Shop set…like someone had pushed down on his head and made his hair squish up through the pre-drilled plastic holes?

2. If you DID watch the Oscars, did you see the commercial for the Oprah-sponsored movie that’s scheduled for next Sunday at 9/8 Central, and think, OH MY GOD, THEY’RE GOING TO PRE-EMPT DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES TWO FARGIN WEEKS IN A ROW!!!! (Yes, that was absolutely worthy of four exclamation points.) And did you then get all panicky and flustered, wondering what would become of your TV friends during those two seemingly-endless weeks?? No? Just me? Umm…okay then. Moving on…

3. If one were employed as a sales representative for a company which manufactured bar stools, would one be required to travel with a trunk full of…stool samples?

Mother of the Year Award

I read an article in Parents magazine the other day (yes, I read Parents magazine. Shut up.) titled “10 Things You Taught Your Baby Today.” It mentioned things like, “When you responded to my cries, I learned I can depend on you.”

Here’s what I taught Baby Boy today:

“I learned that when I start fussing because I’m sitting in a diaper full of poop, you’ll totally misread my signals and keep stuffing Cheerios in my mouth.”

To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there’s the rub.

It’s bad enough, people, that my every waking moment is fraught with stress and worry, and that I get precious little sleep these days. But now….NOW even my DREAMS are leaving me anxious and exhausted.

Last night I dreamt I was caring for THREE babies at the same time, two of which were newborn twins. The third baby was only a few months old. I laid the girl twin on a throw pillow that was on the floor at my feet (she must’ve been very tiny, or the pillow very large); she was asleep and curled into a little ball. The boy twin and the older baby, meanwhile, were both fussing, and I had one in each arm, rocking them both and trying to soothe them. Every few minutes the girl twin would stir, and I’d lean over (babies still in my arms) and pat her to soothe her back to sleep. I felt so frustrated and completely overwhelmed.

(I should mention that I had this dream when I dozed off while I was rocking Baby Boy about 4:00 this morning. He woke up coughing and crying about 3:30, and I didn’t get back to bed until 5:00. So the rocking-the-baby part of the dream totally makes sense.)

The worst part of the dream was…Deputy Dad was asleep THE ENTIRE TIME I was trying to juggle the three babies. I was so upset that he wasn’t helping me. It was all I could do not to be mad at him this morning.

Sick and tired of sick and tired, Part…..Oh hell, who can keep up anymore?

Took 2 of the 3 kids BACK to the doctor today.

Miss Attitude: Bronchitis. Antibiotics. Chest x-ray.

Baby Boy: Bronchiolitis. Double ear infection (again). Antibiotics. Chest x-ray.

Sigh. Do they make a pill for Mom’s-absolutely-going-out-of-her-freakin’-mind syndrome?

Huh?

Yesterday Deputy Dad and I ate lunch together. Without the kids. At a restaurant. With waitresses. And menus. And fresh flowers on the tables. And no drive-thru. And did I mention WITHOUT THE KIDS? (As Mouse would say, “R yew jillis?”)

Now. Where was I? Oh, yes. So we had a nice lunch together, just the two of us, WITHOUT THE KIDS, at the lovely little pasta place in town, which is run by ACTUAL ITALIAN people who know how to cook ACTUAL ITALIAN food, which is a rare find in an itty-bitty Texas town such as ours.

I had a yummy chicken sub, but I only ate half of it because I WANTED SOME DESSERT, DAMMIT, I NEVER ORDER DESSERT AND TODAY I JUST WILL, THANKYOUVERYMUCH. I had some oh-so-delicious cheesecake, with chocolate syrup. (Now I KNOW yew R jillis.) Say it with me, now….cheeeeeeesecake…..choooooocolate syyyyyyrup…..cheeeeeeeesecake…..

Oh, dear. I’ve lost my train of thought again.

Oh, yes. So I saved the other half of my sandwich for today, since I almost always work through lunch. I also saved the last couple of slices of the delicious hot bread they serve as an appetizer there.

I heated up my leftovers today, and when I started buttering the leftover bread (yes, of COURSE I grabbed the foil-topped plastic packs of butter to go with my leftover bread….what am I, stupid?), I noticed the butter’s packaging……

SunGlow
European Style Butter Blend

Now, my question is this: What exactly are the Europeans blending into my butter? Hmm?

Thank you, thank you, thank you

I can’t thank you all enough for your kind comments and thoughtful emails in response to Friday’s “Sick and tired” post and Saturday’s “Sleepless nights” post. I’ve read each one at least twice, and cried through several of them. Words are simply not enough to express my gratitude.

I am especially thankful for your thoughts and prayers. One or more of you must have a direct line to The Big Guy, ’cause Baby Boy slept through the night Saturday night for the first time in more than a week. As soon as I figure out which one of you to thank for that little miracle, I’ve got another special request involving a winning lottery ticket and the Top Gun version of Tom Cruise.

Thank you and God bless,
LadyBug

[Update: I should mention that yes, I did get some much-needed rest this weekend, in the form of several hours of sleep on Saturday night, as well as a couple of naps I took at hubby's insistence. I also had some Blue Bell Rocky Road ice cream, which is my own personal Ultimate Comfort Food and never fails to soothe my soul a bit; and I applied plenty more doses of chocolate throughout the weekend, for medicinal purposes, of course, mostly in the form of Hershey's Kisses. (Back atcha, Hershey, MWAH!) Thanks to all who inquired about my well-being. Many platonic, internet hugs and Hershey's Kisses to you all. Happy Valentine's Day.]

Semi-real-time blogging: Sleepless nights

Friday night, February 11

8:30PM — All the kids are in bed. I just put Baby Boy down, and I’m waiting to see if he’ll stay down or get back up. I tell Deputy Dad I’m gonna “check email real quick.” Roughly translated, this means I’m going to spend at least an hour reading my favorite blogs and catching up at the dooce comments section…oh, and maybe I’ll check email, too, while I’m on the computer. I try to send Deputy Dad to bed, but he says he’s gonna stay up, too, to see if Baby Boy settles down. Roughly translated, this means he’ll fall asleep on the couch within minutes.

9:00PM — Deputy Dad is asleep on the couch. I am shocked.

9:30PM — Deputy Dad is snoring so loudly I fear he’ll wake up Baby Boy. I wake him up and send him to bed.
I start wondering why the hell I’m not in bed, and I realize that I seem to think that, by staying up a little longer, I am somehow postponing the inevitable nighttime sick-baby drama…as if my going to bed is the catalyst that starts and fuels the chemical reaction that is the endless, sleepless night.

10:00PM — I give in to the exhaustion and decide to try to get some rest, opting to camp out on the couch for the night so Deputy Dad can get a full night’s sleep. (He owes me BIG TIME.) I try to go to sleep, but my mind is racing, wondering when Baby Boy will be up, listening to his breathing through the baby monitor…I can’t seem to quiet my thoughts.

12:00AM — Baby Boy wakes up coughing and fussing. Round 1 begins. I think I slept. Some. Maybe. It’s hard to tell. If I slept, it was the kind of sleep that makes you feel like you didn’t sleep….when you dream about trying to fall asleep, and you’re never sure if you actually slept at all. It was fitful, restless. I’m almost relieved to be called away from it. Almost. I pick Baby Boy up and sway with him and whisper to him and try to soothe him back to sleep. Put him back in his crib, tiptoe out of his room, lay back down on the couch…

12:05AM — This time I go in armed with the pacifier (his “buddy”, we call it). We’ve TWICE broken him of the evil parental torture that is the bedtime pacifier, but when a baby’s sick and fussy, Mama will do just about anything to soothe him (and maybe get a little rest for herself in the process).

12:07AM — Yeah. That worked well. I take Baby Boy to the rocker/recliner ’cause I’m too tired to stand in his room and sway back and forth anymore. I rock him and stroke his hair and comfort him when he coughs, patting his back semi-rhythmically….pat, pat, pat, doze….[squirm]…pat, pat, pat.

12:20AM — I stop rocking and recline the chair. His Highness Sir Coughs-A-Lot is not happy with the prospect that his mama might be slightly comfortable, and he proceeds to squirm and whine accordingly.

12:30AM — More coughing and somewhat labored breathing, also a just-this-side-of-too-warm baby forehead. Time for a dose of baby Tylenol and a breathing treatment. As I’m measuring the Tylenol, I notice both my shirt and the bridge of Baby Boy’s nose are dotted with dried baby boogers. I make a half-hearted attempt to brush them off my shirt, but leave his nose alone, as trying to clean his face would only ROYALLY PISS HIM OFF.

12:35AM — I realize I have a horrible headache. The kind that feels like ice picks in the backs of my eyeballs. I have no time or energy to deal with it, though, and we settle back into the rocker/recliner for Baby Boy’s breathing treatment. The dull drone of the nebulizer lulls him back to sleep. I try to doze off, I really try, but my mind is still racing.

1:00AM — I put Baby Boy back in his crib. End of Round 1. I head back to the couch, wondering how long it’ll be until Round 2.

1:13AM — If it’s only been 13 minutes, is it technically the start of Round 2? Or is it still Round 1? Pacifier, cuddle, sway, pat, pat, pat.

1:17AM — Almost every time he coughs, he wakes up and fusses a little. I bet his little throat is sore, poor baby. The Tylenol will help with the general throat pain, but it’ll probably still hurt when he coughs.

2:03AM — I feel the need to mention that it is, in fact, at the moment I am typing this, 2:03AM. I am actually typing all this in the middle of the sleepless night, and not saving it up to type in retrospect tomorrow, although I won’t post it until tomorrow or the next day or whenever, after the sleepless night has played itself out; but don’t bother telling me I should’ve been sleeping instead of typing this, ’cause I can’t rest with all these thoughts running through my head, anyway, and it helps to get them out, and boy is this one long run-on sentence or what.
Baby Boy seems to have settled. At least for a bit. I head back to the couch to try and rest.

2:30AM (or so) — I finally quiet my thoughts and drift off to sleep.

4:00AM — Deputy Dad. wakes. me. up. I resist the urge to scream obscenities and murder him with my bare hands. He tells me to come to bed. I refuse, telling him to go get some rest. I turn over and go back to sleep.

5:45AM — Baby Boy wakes up coughing and fussing. He slept for 3 hours, 45 minutes. That’s probably the longest stretch he’s slept in the last several nights. Time for more medicine. I go ahead and nurse him, hoping he’ll sleep a few more hours. It’s also time for another breathing treatment. He whines, gripes and squirms through this one.
[Side note: Did you know if you sing the same one or two lullabies to a baby from the time he's born (or in utero, even), that sometimes, sometimes, singing (or even humming) one of those songs will have an almost instantaneous calming effect on the baby? Not always, but sometimes. Often, even.]

6:30AM — As I am laying Baby Boy back in his crib, I hear Miss Attitude coughing. I move the nebulizer to her room and get her breathing treatment started.

6:35AM — The Drama Queen gets up to go potty.

6:42 AM — I listen to Miss Attitude and Baby Boy cough their heads off. I am screaming inside.

6:50AM — I start another breathing treatment for Miss Attitude. I realize I still have that headache. Both of the girls are still awake, the sun is coming up, and I’m losing hope that I’ll be able to get them to go back to sleep.

7:05AM — Miss Attitude’s coughing wakes up Deputy Dad. When I mention to him that he got about 10 hours of sleep, he says, “Well, when I laid back down after I woke you up, I had a hard time getting back to sleep.” In other words, he didn’t actually get the full TEN HOURS OF SLEEP. It may have been 9 3/4 hours, or even close to 9 1/2 hours. Poor baby. I once again resist the urge to scream obscenities and murder him with my bare hands.

7:10AM — His Highness Sir Coughs-A-Lot has requested my presence once again, and Princess Asthma shows no signs of relief. I have officially lost the battle to get everyone back to bed.
Good-Freakin’-Morning.

Sick and tired of sick and tired, Part III

I haven’t blogged lately about the plague of illnesses that has infiltrated our household and refuses to leave. I kind of figured everyone is as sick of reading about it as I am of dealing with it. But people, it’s been a hell of a week, and I just have to put some thoughts into words and send them out into the oblivion that is the blogosphere.

I took all three kids to the doctor again Tuesday afternoon. The appointment was supposed to have just been a follow-up for The Drama Queen and Baby Boy on their ear infections. But Miss Attitude was still having asthma trouble, so I had them work her in. Plus, Baby Boy had not been feeling well, and had starting a barking-seal-type cough Monday night. On the way to the doctor’s office Tuesday (Have I mentioned that we drive about an hour one-way to the pediatrician? So, taking the kids to the doctor is guaranteed to be at least a three-hour ordeal.), all three kids were coughing in the car. I was totally exhausted, driving and thinking, Will this never end?

Now, when I say I was totally exhausted, I mean I was truly, seriously fighting to stay awake. And, for the first time ever in my driving-life, I lost that battle. I have no idea what happened, except that I “woke up” to find myself driving in the grass, in the ditch, with the cruise control faithfully maintaining 70 MPH. I fought my natural instinct to slam on the brakes and somehow managed to keep control over the Suburban and slow down to a stop without injuring anyone or taking out any road signs. I was absolutely scared shitless, especially when I thought about What Could Have Happened. The very next day, Deputy Dad worked a wreck where the guy had fallen asleep and flipped his car. Broke his neck and back. Holy shit, that could’ve been me and my precious babies. Thank You, God, for watching out for us.

So. We made it to the pediatrician’s office (Mama still trembling profusely) with our bodies intact. Sickly, but intact. The Drama Queen’s ears looked fine, and she just needed a little medicine for her cough/runny nose. Miss Attitude was wheezing, so the doc put her back on her steroid, and we’ll continue to do her breathing treatments until her asthma trouble lets up (if that ever happens…please, God, when will that happen?). Baby Boy’s ears are fine (Thank goodness…took two rounds of antibiotics to clear them up.), but he’s wheezing again; so he’s back on the nebulizer (breathing treatments) again. Doc says when a baby gets RSV, and then gets better, and then gets another virus, the lungs are often susceptible to wheezing. Doesn’t mean he has RSV again or has asthma; just means he needs to go back on the breathing treatments again to clear his lungs up. That sounds encouraging, but this same thing happened when Miss Attitude was a baby, and she did develop asthma, which we’re still dealing with every day. And people, her asthma is kicking our asses this cold and flu season.

Baby Boy’s little cold was at its worst Wednesday night and last night. He was up no less than 8-10 times Wednesday night…running fever, coughing, fussing…just generally not feeling well at all. And last night……….I believe we slept from 12AM-3AM and off-and-on from 4:40AM-6:15AM. We were up with Baby Boy several times, plus Miss Attitude had an asthma attack about 4:00. I had just put Baby Boy back down, I believe, when she woke me up and said she needed a breathing treatment.

Deputy Dad and I are totally, completely exhausted. My brain no longer functions normally. I am totally useless at work. I cannot even string words together to make coherent sentences. (Was that a coherent sentence? Hope so. It took me about four attempts. I wish I were joking.)

Warning: I feel a long-winded ramble coming on….

When I don’t sleep, a fog starts to envelop my mind….my soul, even. This is a fairly new develop for me. I’ve never had a problem running on little or no sleep before…but, then again, I didn’t have three kids before. I find myself slipping into a…..darkness, I think. I’m having trouble putting this into words. Here’s an excerpt of a reply I sent the other day to an email from a concerned friend who was “checking on me”:

I’ve just been so totally stressed out…over the kids and their illnesses, over the bills, over the bills caused by the kids and their illnesses…..And I seem to be flirting with depression…although “flirting” sounds like I want depression to buy me a few drinks or something, which is really not the case…not that I couldn’t USE a few drinks! I have been a little antisocial lately, and I apologize for that. I guess I’ve just gotten so used to being at work or at home with the kids…..I don’t even know how to be “me” anymore. That sounds a little dramatic, I guess. (I don’t know WHERE [The Drama Queen] gets it.) But I am feeling slightly….I don’t know….disjointed or something. I keep waiting for the dark clouds to lift, thinking maybe things will be better when we’re all well again….but THAT’S JUST NOT HAPPENING. Sigh.

I guess that’s about the only way I could describe what’s going on in with my mental/emotional state lately. I don’t know if it might be PPD (Can you get post-partum depression when your baby’s almost 8 months old?) or just the stress of trying to take care of three kids and dealing with their collective illnesses. But last night, with Deputy Dad at work, as I was trying to cook supper, make Baby Boy some more baby food (yes, I make my own baby food), help The Drama Queen with her homework, get the girls into the shower, feed Baby Boy and soothe his fussiness (He cried the whole time I fed him his supper.), I just kept thinking, over and over, I am just NOT dealing with this very well. The girls were better than usual, only minimal bickering, took their showers without fighting or too much playing….and yet I found myself yelling at Miss Attitude for leaving her towel in the bathroom floor. And, even while I was yelling, I was thinking, WTF? It’s just a towel. Pick it up and shut the hell up. But I had just gotten through trying to feed Baby Boy, him crying between spoonfuls of sweet potatoes and green beans and rubbing food all over his face, into his eyebrows and his hair. I needed to get him into the bathtub…and what? A towel in the floor? Why, the audacity! So, I finally got him in the tub, and I just sat there by the bathtub and cried. (Hell, I’m crying now, just writing about it.) I just kept thinking, I am so totally NOT the mother I wanted to be. What the hell is wrong with me?

I’ve gone back and read this stupid thing four or five times now. I’m so hesitant to post it…..
I’ve always had such high expectations for myself, in everything I do. And I feel like posting this will be admitting that I’m failing.

I am aware enough of myself and my emotions to know that, given a few uninterrupted hours of sleep, I’d probably feel differently about…well, everything. It’s just that right now……right now, everything looks so bleak.

Boogers and Mucous and Snot….Oh My!

“A sneezer exhales with a speed of up to 146 m/s (312 miles per hour). “

Do you know what that means? Huh? Huh?
Well, just let me tell you what that means…

That means if you put a spoonful of food into a snotty baby’s mouth, you will find yourself on the receiving end of a sweet-pea-and-squash hurricane.

That’s what that means.

Wherein I give you a disturbing visual involving my boobs

The problem with pumping one’s breastmilk at work is that the act of pumping stretches the nipples to the far reaches of Southeast Asia, so that, unless one is draped in a tent, one’s nipples will enter a room at least ten seconds ahead of the rest of the body.