Fantasy...meet reality.

Remember how I said in a previous post that I couldn't wait to get to a nice quiet hotel room and sleep? Well, I did get to a hotel room, but it was anything other than nice and quiet. It was as though all the "bad mommy" karma came up and kicked me in the ass after wishing myself to a more peaceful place. It was loud - apparently the hotel had never heard of double-glazing their windows to cut down on street noise. It was less-than-pristine - I didn't even WANT to know whose hairs were those on the shower wall. It was BROKEN - if you advertise free wireless Internet service, then perhaps you should make sure that the service WORKS.

I was happy to head back home to my crazy, messy little house. It may not be quiet or clean or in working order; but then again, I don't expect it to be.

A view from the top

I write this at 30,000 feet, enduring a cross-country flight while shoved into a seat that seems to have been designed for someone who is 4'2". When the man in the seat in front of me reclined his seat, I thought my bookie had come to reclaim a bad debt. So, here I sit, unable to cross my legs, unable to open the screen on my laptop fully, wondering why I put myself through this torture. Oh yeah, it's a work trip.

Anyway, DOM, with her usual sense of timing, spiked a high fever yesterday, which means – joy of joys – that we got to visit with her several times over the course of the night last night. I felt bad for her because as her fever was spiking she was very obviously uncomfortable, but the early wake up call kept looming in the back of my mind.

She has an incredible ability to sense what would be the single most inconvenient time to get sick and then come down with a 112-degree fever or an illness requiring complete and total quarantine. So, for example, in the two days before I ran my first marathon, there she was barfing her way through the early hours of the morning. On those few occasions where both Mr. MOM and I have huge deadlines at work, she has come down with bronchiolitis or the flu or some other malady that sends us screaming to the doctor's office or the emergency room.

Now, you might say that perhaps we overreact in taking her in. But these trips are all doctor-suggested, after a long discussion of symptoms. I wouldn't be surprised to see our pediatrician tooling about town in a new Hummer, thanks to the billings from DOM's visits.

So, here I sit, wishing I had been more diligent with the yoga practice, hoping against hope that I left all her germs back home, because there is something wonderful waiting for me at the end of this trip – a nice, cozy hotel room that does not come equipped with a baby monitor. I know I'll pay for it when I get back home, but for now, the thought of two nights of peace and quiet – two nights of uninterrupted sleep – is almost intoxicating.

Detachment parenting

Navigating the world of parenting books and advice is like making your way through a minefield: there are so many passionate opinions out there about the "right" way to rear a child which warn that if you don't follow their advice your child is going to become needy/dependent/rebellious/insecure/less intelligent/a serial killer.

So, with great trepidation, I present to you the following article on attachment parenting from the Washington Post.

Parents Who Keep Their Children Close (washingtonpost.com)

Now, I don't know about the strength of your back, but if I were to carry DOM around in a sling all the time, I'd be in chiropractic or orthopedic care for the next 20 years. Egads - she weighs almost 30 pounds. Not to mention that even though we have a king-size bed, Mr. MOM complained vociferously about the large body pillow I insisted on sleeping with throughout pregnancy - he accused me of building a fort. With a husband, me, and two cats who believe that the bed rightfully belong to them and we just occupy their space for eight or so hours each night, I don't know where we'd put her.

In one particularly interesting part of the article, a proponent of attachment parenting says that "her husband's snoring wakes the baby, so the husband has been relegated to another room." If I tried to pull that on Mr. MOM, we'd be doing business with our friendly neighborhood divorce lawyers in no time.

As one of my girlfriends points out:

It's like the people who take childproofing their houses to the extreme. If the kid never bumps his head, he's never going to learn that some surfaces are not suitable for crashing into. Nobody is saying pay no attention to your child, but as with everything in life, there is a happy medium.

I understand and am all for making a child feel secure and loved, but a large part of raising a child who can function in this difficult world in which we live is developing his or her independence. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go pay attention to my child.

Redesign! Redesign!

Whew! After hours of effort and toil, the redesign of the site is finished! (Blogger --> Template --> Choose New Template; although I did modify it to include a list of blogs I'm reading.)

I can't fit into these genes

DOM's day care sent home the following note on her daily information sheet today: "[DOM] likes to sit on the toilet and sing songs."

She obviously gets that from Mr. MOM.

Tag - you're it!

One of the most wonderful things about having only one child in a two-parent family is that there is still some possibility that you can have time to yourself without overwhelming your spouse or having to barricade the children in a padded room devoid of sharp or heavy objects. I know that sounds selfish, but I was an only child myself, so I'm expected to be selfish and self-centered, right?

One of the unspoken rules in our house is that doing important or necessary work around the house trumps child care duties. So, if you've had enough of singing a particular song (yesterday's request - Yankee Doodle) or reading a particular book (yesterday's request - Clifford's Neighborhood) over and over and over again, then you can suddenly find something around the house that just needs to get done (laundry, cooking lunch/dinner, cleaning the living room, finding a new driver for the scanner) and hand off child care duties to the other spouse for an hour or so. There is such a thing as abuse of this privilege, though, and the punishment is not pretty. As a matter of fact, I think it's almost time for a "girls weekend" in New York...

Cartoon physics

I've been watching a lot of "Clifford the Big Red Dog" episodes recently. I know, I know - children shouldn't watch any TV until they are 2 years old. But I bet that recommendation wasn't written by the parent of a toddler. But I find myself getting annoyed by all the little quirks - like what Clifford can do with his ears and how the dogs can run all around the island without a leash. OK, so maybe I don't have enough to worry about.

Clifford the Big Red Dog

Perhaps she'll be good at Ms. PacMan

One particularly lovely souvenir of our visit to Mr. MOM's hometown last week was a sudden increase in DOM's biting frequency. In other words, if she was mad, she would bite. It was an outgrowth of being relentlessly badgered by her 3-year-old cousin and her not being able to express her anger or frustration in words. Even though he instigated many of the episodes, she still should not have bitten.

Having a child who bites is especially frustrating, in my opinion. As one of my girlfriends points out, many day cares will expel a child who bites repeatedly (which, considering how much we spend on day care each month, would save us a lot of money, but then I would have to quit work and would lose both the extra income and my sanity, so it's best to try to keep her where she is for a while longer. Like, say, until kindergarten. Or college.). Her daughter went through a biting phase, too. Her advice? Always call attention to the child's mouth (tapping it while saying "no biting") so that (s)he knows that it was the bite that was unacceptable. After nearly a week of such behavioral therapy, I can now say that DOM has stopped biting (me, at least), but she still really, really wants to do it. You can see the gleam in her eyes. That, and the forward lunge that accompanies each episode. At least she has stopped biting in time for the mosquitoes to start.

Sanity comes in the strangest places

Last week, Mr. MOM, DOM (daughter of MOM), and I had to travel to Mr. MOM's hometown for an unfortunate circumstance. Mr. MOM's mom was sick and not expected to last much longer. As Mr. MOM's brother and his family also live in another city, we all gathered in his mom's 2-bedroom, 1-bath apartment - 4 adults, 4 kids under the age of 5. That many children in that small of a space for more than a week was...well, we'll use the word "challenging." It certainly made me reconsider thoughts of child #2. For this career gal, amusing (and refereeing) several children in a strange setting ALL DAY LONG was exhausting and made me realize that DOM's day care is worth every penny we pay (and there sure are a lot of pennies that head over there).

Mr. MOM's brother has three children, the middle one being a very active 3-year-old boy. With a new (11-week-old) baby in the house, and being in the throes of the "terrible 3s" (no, they don't end magically at 2 years, 11 months, 29 days), he was acting out a lot. So was DOM, but that is for another post. One night, he refused to go to sleep, fighting and screaming the whole way. About two hours later, with the holy terror finally giving up and getting some Zs, his mother emerged from the room visibly shaken. Now, this is a mother of three - a social worker who is trained in child development - and she was beaten. She didn't know what to do with him anymore. So, I guided her to my oasis in the center of the storm: the one place that could always assure me that I wasn't alone, that my child's behavior was not an indicator that some day she would be a resident of a maximum security women's penitentiary:
BabyCenter.

After a half hour of browsing, she felt much better.

A day late, a crayon short

While, technically, I am not the last person on earth to publish a blog, I do have the sense that I'm arriving late to a very large and rowdy party. One where the guests started drinking at noon, and are now all laughing at each other's inside jokes and making plans for joint vacations to the Carribean.

Let me back up here.

Hi. Welcome to Revenge of the MOMMY. As a thirtysomething mother that is also employed full time, I thought it would make my not-yet-two-year-old daughter's life easier to have something that she can print out and take to her therapist's office 18 or so years down the road. It is also a place where I can vent my frustrations and not drive my husband (Mr. MOM) and friends (FOMs - friends of MOM) crazy with post-mortem analyses of every little thing she does. Posting will be irregular, depending on how much free time I have, how inspired I am, and how effective my medications are.

So, please: enjoy, comment, criticize, ignore. It's up to you.