Lilith wants to party all night.

Sleepless nights

As much as I want to go to sleep...I am enjoying this time with Lilith. Someday she will not want to party all night. Someday she will not be this little. She will not be this tiny little baby forever. It will go by before I know it and then I will miss it when it is gone. l will blink and she will be a big fancy teenager who wants to run off to sleepovers with her BFF and leave mama behind and I will sit up late into the night wondering what she is doing and if she is okay and having fun. I will some day pack up the baby toys and remember being kept up reading the same touch and feel books over and over and over and wish for her to be excitedly trying to turn the pages left and right just one more time. I will have plenty of sleep when she is grown and independent. This period of time is so short in comparison to a lifespan, and so much more precious than whatever dreams I could possibly be having. So I will drink another cup of instant coffee, read her another book, give her another hug and kiss, and remind myself to be thankful for these moments. Things could be worse. :)

Mistakes

Confession time.
You all should know by now I am honest with you all about my feelings and actions. I truly try to not give off a "perfect mommy, perfect life" vibe or charade. Times are tough. I fuck up. I make mistakes.

Today I went out with a friend. I, of course, brought everything I needed except some form of baby carrier.... Now, I am obviously way too used to having it and using it on a daily basis and being reliant upon some form of baby carrier. Between my arms hurting and my abdominal muscles aching (diastasis recti and a hernia) I was having a tough time. We went to grab some food, then to the mall, then finally to the thrift store. At the thrift store my friend was awesome and let me use her stroller. Now, Lilith is not much of a stroller baby... she was fed up with it shortly after being put in it. She wanted to be held. I had been holding her the entire time we were out except for a little bit at the food place while I ate and a little bit at the mall while she played. She was getting a bit cranky even with me holding her and I was, quite honestly, so done with having my hands full and being in pain. I was carrying a baby, pushing a stroller, AND pushing a cart full of stuff. I needed new jeans and while there I picked up some winter clothes for her and a couple of cheap toys (A baby tambourine, a shape sorter, and this cute egg shape learning thing that can also go in her kitchen.) I nursed her twice while there without issue and she would chill out for a while. She was so over being held and restrained while I was picking out baby clothes. She wanted to be out down but I was not going to do that in the thrift store. So, I had like 5 pairs of jeans picked out that I needed to try on but could not (My friend has her own kid and a bad back). I was getting pissed off at her crying, screaming, wanting to be held but also demanding her freedom. I called Cellus because I was getting upset and thought talking to him might help (it did not) while on the phone though Lilith was just crying and screaming and throwing a fit in my arms directly in my ear and I had a headache by now. I truly was dead set to get jeans though because I needed new jeans and it is hard to find good jeans that fit me at thrift stores and I am trying to help save money buying used and such and was dead set on trying on twos somewhat unique jeans.
Anyway, Between the headache, bodyache, earache, tolerance and patience for baby cries/screams being burnt out, frustration at my arms being full of baby because I forgot the carrier (I really am spoiled by my carriers and hands free baby handling come to find out), and my feeling of possibly not being able to try on new jeans... I snapped. It was brief, it was somewhat loud, it was harsh, and it was a very sudden outburst of all my feelings bursting out of me. I snapped and took it out on my baby. I yelled at her. "SHUT. UP." I made my friend jump, I had some old guy stare in my direction, I made my child look at me with fear. Silent and shocked. I do not know if my husband said anything to me on the phone when it happened. As soon as it came out my stomach dropped and I about cried a river, I hugged her close and said fuck it, jeans can wait... I got off the phone and hugged and cuddled my baby and we walked toward the register so my friend could check out. As we were walking toward it I saw the scarves. I paused, breathed, made sure Lilith was calm, and grabbed one of them. I put her on my back in a rucksack carry. Now hands free, calmed down, and thinking more clearly I decided that I could handle my child and myself and attempt to go try on some jeans while wearing her on my back. It worked.

Lilith started to fall asleep on my back and try to nurse from my shoulder so we went and sat in a chair and nursed for a third time and she fell asleep. Once asleep I got my friend to assist me in tying her to me with the scarf I had grabbed and she slept the rest of the time looking around and checking out and even in the carseat all the way home.

I still snapped though. I yelled at my baby. Told her to shut up. I was "that mom" and while I could not care what that old man thought, or what the lady at the end of the aisle was thinking of me, my child was shocked and I felt shitty about it. She was scared. I put fear into her. Now, she got over it and is fine and this did not damage her for life or anything, but me? I feel like shit and cuddled the fuck out of her as she nursed and napped in the makeshift sling. I sang to her, said I love her, kissed her, and cried. It does not matter what those people thought, all I focused on was my baby and myself. I did not feel shame or embarrassment, I simply felt bad about letting myself snap and for yelling at my kid, no matter where we would have been.

 I hope that by sharing this I will help someone else feel not so alone, or not as deep into a black hole full of shit and guilt as I felt right after it happened. Though the guilt is a positive thing, it means I feel bad and am regretful and will try to do better in the future. It is okay to make mistakes, it is not okay to not learn from them. I made a mistake, and boy have I learned a lesson. <3

Thank you for listening and allowing me to open up to you all.

Yesterday marked TEN MONTHS of exclusive breastfeeding and cloth diapers. She is cruising, crawls fast, climbs anything and everything, loves going up stairs. She giggles and laughs, says "mama" "dada" and "up"(pronounces it up-ah) and enjoys being picked up and spun around and tossed in the air. She adores the cats, other babies, and her daddy is her favorite person in the world. She is social but cautious, and drums on things and "plays" piano... Still enjoys putting everything in her mouth, enjoys mainly just tasting foods still, and drinks water perfectly from a straw cup... :)

AND so far thankfully (for them) no one has directly given me a hard time for nursing in public!!! ;)

Pictures are 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 month milestone pictures.. :)

Sleep

Between teething and growth spurt sleep regression the past two weeks have been rough. Tired. Stressed to my limits. I can not pull sanity out of thin air.

Thankfully it seems to be ending soon... Motherhood is not for the weak. It is hard work. :)

8 months old doctor visit/well check up

LOVE Lilith's doctor. He was so awesome about everything still. He says her growth is great (and even said she is developmentally slightly ahead of the curve, not that it matters too much to me as all babies ARE different and go at their own pace, so I am NOT being all "omg my baby is soooo advanced!!!" or whatever, she is simply at the right level for her is all, lol). He said we don't really need to come in to update records "just in case she gets sick" (the only reason we go) but it's cool that we do that (and we will go in again at around 12 months still anyway). He has no problem with our cosleeping/bedsharing (He is just glad she has healthy sleep patterns) or BLW (the fact that we skip puree food and give her pieces of solid chucnks of whatever fruits and veggies and have around). AND he had nothing negative to say about her breastfeeding (and getting 99.9% of her nutrition from breastmilk rather than solids). Also, still not giving us any crap about not vaccinating, AND he happily checked out her chest sounds while we were there (She has a slight cough) and said she sounded fine (As in nothing serious) and he had no issue with us giving her the homeopathy, we even showed him the medicine bottle, (and actually stated cough meds, etc. are not really ideal to give to babies anyway). So, YAAAAAAY!!!! LOVE this man!!! 

Update

Whew. First time as doula to a hospital birth. Learned things, gained perspective, am more thankful/grateful than ever I chose to birth at home (It solidified why a hospital would have been a bad birth choice for me personally.)

Also, Lilith is a little over 8 months old!!! She is finally getting a little tooth popping through the gums (it's sharp too!!). She loves chewing on carrots and celery lately but still so not into actually eating anything but breastmilk. Which I'm totally cool with and expected. Yay!!

Oh, and I turned 24 this past weekend. We went to Ocean City in Maryland to celebrate. Spent Fri morning to Monday afternoon away from home and easily managed to do cloth diapers. I still don't understand why people think they are difficult or whatever. I know they are not for everyone, but they really aren't complicated or difficult to me. lol

So...Life is getting better... Still a bit mopey about  things but much more upbeat than I had been...

OH! also, while in OC I totally got dreadlocks. LOVE!!! :>