And… Back to Reality

…I laid in the near-dark, feeding E2 down for the night, her little body curled into mine, and me drifting in and out of semi-sleep as she fed…   I pulled the covers a little tighter over the two of us, and allowed myself to drift back into sleep for a while longer…
Yada yada yada.  [...]

Read Full Post »

The Better Decision

I laid in the near-dark, feeding E2 down for the night, her little body curled into mine, and me drifting in and out of semi-sleep as she fed.  After awhile, I became conscious that she’d stopped and I could feel her breath, slow and even, across my skin.  I gently pulled my top back into [...]

Read Full Post »

I’m So Glad I am a Stay-at-Home Mother

Three times in the last five weeks…  Three times!  And that’s a lot really — I’m exhausted.  Am I talking about sex? No.  Dates with my husband? No.  Attempts to start weight lifting again? Nope.  Trips to the Emergency Room, that’s what I’m talking about.  And those were just the (dubious) highlights — in between [...]

Read Full Post »

Questions About Death

Just of late, my elder daughter has been a bit… concerned about death.  She knows that people die, but she doesn’t really understand what that means.  So she’s trying to wrap her four-year-old brain around it.  She plays games about dying.  She sings songs about dying.  She discusses dying.  And she asks a lot of [...]

Read Full Post »

Follow-Up

In the end, we did go to the emergency room, and a very good thing too.  As I said in the postscript to my last blog post, E2 got me back up again around 3.15am (though I say she “got me up”, I had yet to actually sleep) and, this time, she was having to [...]

Read Full Post »

Breathe, Breathe, My Daughter Breathe

Another night of watching her breathe, of watching her chest rise and fall and having to make that judgment call.  What has caused E1’s nose to run and M’s throat to feel a bit scratchy has attacked E2 ferociously.  She is wheezing and rasping… and I know those sounds so well.
She spent the day trying [...]

Read Full Post »

Extended Breastfeeding: What’s on the Cutting Room Floor

I was contacted recently by a television producer from LA who was looking for people to take part in a documentary she is making about extended breastfeeding.  I was excited, flattered, and… a little wary.  Depending how it’s handled, the women on the programme could end up looking like amazing mothers or absolute freaks.  I [...]

Read Full Post »

I Am

For all the books and classes and preparation, I anticipated there’d be a lot to giving birth.  I thought there’d be choices, decisions to be made, forks in the road left or right…  I envisioned myself as a cognizant, informed participant.  All those long months, while I waited in excited anticipation of that wonderful day, [...]

Read Full Post »

Zombies Undead but the Boy Lives Forever

I was standing at the sink doing the dishes and M was scraping the last of tonight’s dinner into a bowl for tomorrow’s lunch.  E2 came around the corner and stood in the doorway.
M looked at her for a moment, and then said, “If she were a zombie…”  I thought I’d misheard him, turned the [...]

Read Full Post »

Rise and Fall

This time I spotted the signs much quicker — the belly breathing; the way the base of her neck caved in on the inhale; the listlessness, so much so that she was lying flattened on the floor and wouldn’t even lift her head — and I knew what to do.  My mother held her [...]

Read Full Post »