Dear 2009 -

Goodbye friend. You were a year filled with anxiety for me. You had your ups, and you certainly had your downs, but in the end, I want to thank you for a wonderful year.

I can only hope 2010 blesses us the way that 2009 did.

A confession

I miss being pregnant. I miss the cute belly (even if it was covered in nasty stretch marks). I will admit to missing being fawned over, although its pretty awesome to have my little guy get all the attention - I'll settle for that.

But most of all I miss what everyone said I would miss - baby kicks and turns and jabs and punches. I miss nudging Hunter in the butt and seeing his foot poke me somewhere else. I miss hiccups on my hip bone and standing in the shower watching him go nuts when I turn the spray on. Or drinking a Sprite and feeling him go crazy 20 minutes later.

Don't get me wrong. NOTHING compares to having him in my arms. But somedays I miss when it was just the two of us and I didn't have to share him with everyone else.

Totally makes me think I want to do this again and soon. Mission - find a new house, get financially secure in said new house, then get knocked up again and hopefully next time I can stay home with both of my babies. Should I be so lucky to be able to conceive so fast and successfully in the future of course.

***

In other things, I hope all you readers (how few or many there are) had a fantastic Christmas with your families and friends. What a difference a year makes - last year at this time I was just beginning to mourn the loss of a pregnancy and future I wanted. I was mad and thought it could never get better. Joe and I were blessed to make and bake Hunter so soon after that loss. Now I have exactly what I wanted the most. I can only hope for those of you that are suffering this holiday season with unfulfilled dreams, that your 2010 Christmas will be a complete turn around.

Hunter got lots of presents, clothes and toys, as did Mama! And wonderful time spent with DH's family. Tomorrow my parents come up to celebrate.

Monday marks the countdown of 2 weeks until I return to work. This is an entirely separate post filled with anxiety that I will soon sit down and write. But for now I just want to pretend that life can always be this good.

I will say that the US sucks, and I wish we lived in Canada. Then I'd have 3 more months of good times with my baby. Damn you United States maternity leave. *Shakes angry fist and hopes Obama hears in the next 2 weeks and pushes a bill through Congress in record time so that I can continue being a temporary SAHM*

8 weeks

Age - 8 weeks
Weight - Not sure - won't find out until the 21st at his 2 month.
Height - 21.5 inches was his last height - see above for when he will be measured again.
Sleeping habit - Pretty good! He sleeps until 2:30-4 (so from 9:00 to then) then again until about 7. I can't complain. I've been bad with insomnia lately.
Eating habits - 4 oz every 2.5 - 3 hours during the day, about every 4 hours at night. If he goes 3 hours or longer now, I give him 5 oz and he usually wants the whole thing.
Favorite activity - Looking at himself in the mirror, and smiling. - Same as last week!
Cutest Moment of the Week - The giggle fest he had to a Toby Keith song the other day. So cute!
Firsts -First trip to a restaurant and to IA City!

I got my Beco baby carrier the other day and I LOVE it. I love baby wearing - its such an awesome way to feel close to my little guy and get stuff done!

Oops!

Seven weeks is a few days behind!

7 weeks

Age - 7 weeks
Weight - Not sure - won't find out until the 21st at his 2 month.
Height - 21.5 inches was his last height - see above for when he will be measured again.
Sleeping habit - Ugh. He sleeps until like 1 or 2 (from 9 - 1 or 2) then again until 4 or so. Lately he has been nutso fussy from about 4 o'clock on and has ended up in bed with us until 6:30. I hate doing this even if it seems like thats what he needs. I just don't feel safe.
Eating habits - 4 oz every 2.5 - 3 hours during the day, about every 4 hours at night. If he goes 3 hours or longer now, I give him 5 oz and he usually wants the whole thing.
Favorite activity - Looking at himself in the mirror, and smiling.
Cutest Moment of the Week - We made up a song called "All the Single Babies" and he just loves smiling and laughing to it!
Firsts -First trip to Hy-Vee (grocery store)? That's about it.

I have gone to the dark side.

Not really.

But I just realized that I am TOTALLY into attachment parenting.

Not all the theories. I hate bed - sharing (I'm scared when we bed share, I love the snuggle time though), and I love my stroller. And I formula feed.

But I am totally into baby-wearing, not letting Hunter CIO, rocking him to sleep, anti sleep training, room sharing for extended periods of time. It just feels right. Especially with the fact that eventually I will be back at work. To me, this means that when I'm home with Hunter, I want to be able to just be around him - if that means cooking dinner while he's in a baby carrier/mei tai that I may or may not have ordered (Ooops! Merry Christmas to me!) so we can dance around and chit chat while I'm being productive then so be it!

I never ever EVER thought I would write this post.

But damn, this weekend I made my own Moby and I LOVE IT. I think even more so than Hunter!

The Aftermath

So, I was talking to some friends who are all planning on TTC in the next months/year. And I hate to be the bitch in the situation, but it appears to me that a lot of women have some unrealistic expectations about pregnancy. Alas, I must be a bitch and tell the world what they don't want to hear.

1. Stretch marks are either going to happen, or not happen to you. Regardless of lotions you rub, oils you rub, pills you take, what you weighed before pregnancy, blah blah blah. They happen. Or you get lucky, and they don't. But if you've gotten stretch marks before on another body part, you're probably going to get them again.

My belly looks literally like its gone through a VERY bad knife fight. Bright purple stretch marks everywhere. They'll fade. I'm not going to be sappy and call them badges of pride. Because they're not. They're nasty little assholes that happened because genetically, thats what my skin does. And pregnancy stretches shit out. Which brings me to my next point.

2. Belly flab. Lucky are the women who deliver and have a flat belly soon after. I've been walking 3.5 miles everyday since 1 week PP. (Well, I skip Sundays). I've also been doing the 30 DS. I still have a mommy pouch. Will it go away? Possibly. But its not going to be immediate. My poor belly skin got tortured by growing at a ridiculous rate with an almost 9 lb baby. So I am going to wear empire shirts and jeans one size bigger because it doesn't go away right away.

3. Hips. Mine spread. I really sincerely doubt that I will ever go back to my pre-pregnancy size because the same thing happened to my mom. But damn, I guess my pelvis had to get bigger to get that little sucker out of there.

4. PP bleeding. Is nasty and long and gross. And things will come out of your body for weeks after you have a baby. And it will be gross.

5. Bladder control. I have yet to get back to 100%. Can I hold it? Yes. Should I do jumping jacks without peeing first? No.

6. Weight gain during pregnancy sometimes can't be helped. I watched what I ate (most of the time, yes I ate cake and cookies at times, but I did that before....and after too) and worked out almost every day. And I still gained a huge amount of weight. And it wasn't just water weight. I still have about 9-10 lbs to go before I'm back to where I was.

7. Tears. Episiotomies. THEY HAPPEN. You're pushing a giant kid (in my case) out of your vag. Its going to tear. But its hopefully going to get better. A lot of how severe you're going to tear isn't controllable and depends on how fast you labor, how large your kid is, etc etc. So please please don't tell me "Oh I am doing Kegels to prevent tearing during labor." Bitch please. That's like saying you're walking 2 miles a day to train for a marathon. It ain't the same.

8. You might think you can go without an epidural. And a lot of women VERY WELL MIGHT BE ABLE TO. But don't sit there and tell me that you're definitely never going to have an epidural. Wait until you're so exhausted from being in labor for 24 hours straight. Or you're vomiting from pitocin induced contractions. Wait until you're there before you SWEAR it's not going to happen. (This in no way is meant to be a slam at women who want to go natural - its totally and completely do-able - just a pet peeve of mine when people that haven't been through it swear they're NEVER EVER EVER going to take the pain meds).

9. Its painful, its going to be painful unless you are incredibly lucky. Even with an epidural, at some point you are likely to experience pain.

10. You lose a lot of control during the birth process. Its really up to your body and the baby at that point. Its scary but worth it.

So thats my main complaints. I hate to be that way, but I feel like a lot of people have an idealized concept about birth and I do what I can to kill dreams. I know that I appreciated the warning and was glad that most of the above listed things weren't as bad as I thought they were going to be.

Except the stretch marks. And the belly pouch. Those suck.

Also, don't ask unless you want the truth. Because I'm not going to sugar coat it just so you're not scared.

6 weeks

In 6 short weeks, my baby has gone from a little wee guy to a big boy whose slowly starting to explore his world! I am just trying to hold on to him as much as I can - first its not wanting to be held 24/7 and next thing you know he'll be leaving for college!!! Mmkay, so maybe I am jumping the gun, but I just love this little man so much. I actually get jealous when Joe holds him at night - I miss his little snuggly butt! Man, going back to work is going to be SO HARD - for me, probably not for Hunter at all!

Anyways, without further ado:

Age - 6 weeks
Weight - Unsure, last check up was 11 lbs
Height - 21.5 inches (again at last check up)
Sleeping habit - He sleeps for about 3.5 -4 hours from 9 pm on, then typically gets up around 4/4:30 - then sleeps until 6:30 or so.
Eating habits - 4 oz every 2.5 - 3 hours during the day, about every 4 hours at night.
Favorite activity - Starting at himself in the mirror in the car - or the mirror that I bought for him. Or smiling at his bears in his pack and play - or just taking a nap on Mom!
Cutest Moment of the Week - This morning at midnight when I went to change him, he was laughing and smiling so much!! The rule is to not "engage" your baby at night but I couldn't help giggling and smiling back at him.
Milestones - Being six weeks old! Peeing through his nightgown and swaddle blanket TWICE IN ONE NIGHT!!