My soap box

Something is eating away at me. I didn't really know what it was until yesterday. Here it goes...I feel enormously guilty about not breastfeeding my kid. I shrugged it off.  Heartbroken as I was, it just was not meant to be. I have watched my one of my dearest BFF's  struggle with breastfeeding. She is determined like I have never seen before to make her body produce enough. She is hell bent that she is NOT going to feed her baby formula. Where was my fire when my daughter stopped cooperating? Where was my drive to produce when I was pumping less than one ounce? Now Ashley is 3 and a half months old and been strictly on formula for about a month and a half.  I got 2 months in doing both breast milk and formula. So, yesterday at work, this nursing bit was eating away at me. I started researching BF (breast fed) babies vs. FF (Formula Fed) babies. The articles all read about the same. FF babies are heavier, longer, more prone to obesity, their immune systems are not as strong, etc... Great news *insert sarcasm here*. I had read this all before, only this time my heart ached and my stomach churned after each word. What a sucky mom I was, setting my kid up for failure before she even busted out the gates of life!! THEN, to make matters worse, I stumbled on a blog. What a mistake. This was parents, both men and women going back and forth at each other about breastfeeding.  If you ever want a good physiological experiment read some of this. Women attacking each other, anonymously, over this message board, for example"BF is 95% effort and 5% nature", "there is NO such thing as a woman who "can't" produce enough milk", "if you aren't producing, you are trying", "you're just lazy"....I WAS APPALLED. I had always wondered when I saw the news reports of kids being bullied at school, "who are these kid's parents that allow these bullies to act this way?!" I just found their parents!!!! 

Here is my soap box...We live in America. This allows all of us the liberty of freedom of speech. I get and appreciate that. I don't believe that means we use that to harm others. I don't believe we need to exercise this right every chance we get just so our voice/opinion is heard.  As a society we thrive on gossip and trash TV & magazines. Believe me, I subscribe to the same tempts...I love to catch up on the Kardashian's of this world. But none if this gives me or anyone else the right to judge a mom, who is already self conscious enough, about whether she BF's or NOT!! There were several entries from husbands and mom's about how they had tried laundry lists of recommendations to produce more BM with out success, cried for days, weeks, months at the "failure to produce". My heart ached for them. I understood so much of what they were saying.  My blood boiled as I read the comments back at them condemning their efforts as "not enough". How dare they. I thought to myself "what a candid snapshot of America". There are bullies in our schools because there are bullies in this world, this "adult" world. Bullies that hide out under the anonymity of the internet where you can be called "kid200sunshine" and say anything you want with no consequence. The truth is, there is a devastating consequence. In stead of supporting each other, we are cutting each other. Women cutting other women where it hurts most, critiquing them as a Mom. There is nothing in life that will make you feel more vulnerable than having a kid.

My challenge to myself and all you Mom's and women out there: BE NICE. Be gentle with each other. Be kind with your words and choose them carefully. You don't have to be "right" all the time. Your way may not be the best way. We don't all know it all. Be supportive. Be SELF REFLECTIVE. Take a good hard look at yourself and your actions. Are you a nice person? are you sensitive to others? 

When you think about the kind of world you want your precious baby to grow up in...what do you see? are you an example of that? We are all doing the best we can, to be the best Mommy's we can be. We are held hostage to our own up bringing and our own defaults. That doesn't mean we can't get better. That doesn't mean we can't learn something new.

I will not be reading anymore message boards. I'm judging them...they are trash. Like Mama's used to say...If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. What a great piece of advice.

...back to work...

As I shimmed into my maternity jeans thinking damn, I left these in the dryer too long, the pit in my stomach grew. Today was the day I had been dreading for 90 days, since the minute she was born. I was going back to work. It seemed like ages since I had been there. I tried on about 4 shirts and after leaving a heap on the floor decided on a t-shirt and cardigan. At least my arms didn't look too fat. arg. Sweatpants and sweatshirts didn't scream baby weight but my old pre-preggo clothes did. The anticipation mounted. How would I feel, would I still have "it", could I still do my job and be a mommy, wife, friend, daughter, blogger I loved being....I had gotten so comfortable in those roles. But it had to be done, rip the band aid off. 

As I drove away from day care, crying, I knew she would be okay. I knew the girls would take care of her. But I looked back at the empty hole where the car seat was and just sighed. I am paying someone to spend the best part of the day with my baby. Awesome. This is how it works for so many mommy's. AND IT SUCKS.  There is no nice way to put it. I live in this toilet swirl of doubt, guilt, sadness. Doubting we were making the right decision, guilty that I was excited to get back to the land of the working girl, sad because I already missed her like crazy. Why does this have to be so hard???

Women worked tirelessly so that girls like me could GO to work and hold a position better than "secretary"(although still a very honorable job). Why then do I wish we still lived in a society where women stayed home and that was acceptable? Why am I bitter that "the Jones" came along and lured us into more and more things we had to have? Why as I drive to my beautiful office, sit proudly as the office manager of three offices for a fortune 500 company do I wish I did not have this opportunity in the first place? THEN also wish for that regional manager position, wish I was on a book tour or a host on DWTS...then it would be okay that I worked because the money would be better, could have a traveling nanny and so on. Sigh...I guess what I am getting at is, why, why is it that women are tormented with these irrational and emotional thoughts as mommy's?  I want to be with my kid all day, know exactly what she does. I want to be at my office solving problems and feeling the rush of the corporate grind. Is that too much to ask?! 

The first day back to work was great. My baby did great. She probably really liked it at day care. When I got home I was so excited to see her. I felt so lucky to hold her and rock her to sleep. She is sleeping in her own bed, a product of me going back to work. The empty pack and play I see when I go to sleep tonight is a painful reminder of how quickly it feels like time is slipping away. What is next graduation, college, marriage, babies...ahhhhhhh! 

I am sitting here at 10:00pm at night (I should totally be asleep), watching the baby monitor, listening to my husband snore and loving my life. This parent trap is hard. It's hard on a woman, a marriage and your soul. Oddly, I feel a rush of being alive; having a purpose. I will get out of those dang maternity jeans, my arms won't feel so fat and my sweet daughter will still appreciate my love whether I work our side of the home or not. I don't know what the future holds for me as a working girl, as a mom, or a woman. I do know, I found my self again during that 90 days.  Maybe that's what its all about, digging deep and looking at life as LIVING not just being. My job now is to produce a good human being. What I do for a living just pays for it.

The final farewell....

I missed it. I arrived 13 1/2 hours late. My Grandpa passed away at 1:30am on 11/1/2011. I packed my 3 month old up, decided to forgo my 1st week back to work and on a whim booked a flight Sunday night for Tuesday. He would for sure make it until I go there. The travel went off with out a hitch. Ashley was fantastic. Once I arrived home, I got the news. I had missed him. I couldn't believe it. How could he do this to me! How could he leave me! I think the truth is he knew I, along with my cousins, were coming and he did not want us to see him in the condition he was in.

As I sit here and type this I am wearing his Marine's sweatshirt. It still smells like him. Tears stream down my face because I know in a short time that smell will no longer linger. I think I am still in shock. I keep expecting him to call or walk in the door. We are all busy with funeral arrangements, answering the phone, and making final plans. That certainly helps but soon enough we will all be home and the reality will set in.

I know God does not barter with us. I know he does not trade one life for another. But at this moment as I look back I feel blessed. With Grandpa being sick I was not able to talk to him as often as I would normally. In the last three months I have been so busy as a new mom I have just been able to keep up with the basic updates. I am been so wound up about day care and going back to work that I put Grandpa being sick on the back burner. Surly he would pull through, he always did. I feel like God was trying to tell me, "you know I'm going to take Grandpa, but in return I will heal your heart with a new life". Don't get me wrong, my heart is BROKEN, but when I look at my daughter, I smile and think how much Grandpa would have loved to hold her, how much he already loved her. She will never know him as I did. I realize that was never possible. Now I know he is watching over her and continuing to watch over me. 

I find myself thinking of things I need to tell him; try and imagine what he would say. I think of how life just goes on. As I picked this sweatshirt out of his closet I almost didn't want to move it. He was the last one to touch it, fold it and put it on the shelf. I wanted to stare long enough and pray I never forgot what his closet looked like or what the notes in his calendar looked like. It's like time is frozen in that room. 

As I sit here, I still cannot believe he will not be at the other end of the telephone line. He will not be there to greet me when I go home. He will not be there to physically see the rest of my life or watch my daughter grow.  But I am forever grateful he did see as much as he did. I am so blessed to have had him in my life. So long for now GP, so long.