Learning to Crawl

Contrary to what my blog may suggest, there is a lot going on in our lives besides trying to get more sleep!  One very exciting thing in particular.... Elijah is really REALLY close to crawling!  (I've been saying that for 2-3 weeks, but still.  REALLY close!)  It is so thrilling to watch him work so hard at something.  Once he could sit up really well on his own (around his 6 month birthday) he started working on balancing on his hands and knees.  At first, he could only hold that position for a few seconds before collapsing onto his belly.  But over the last few weeks he has gotten stronger and now when he's on the floor, he's almost always up on his hands and knees/toes.  He goes back and forth pushing up onto his toes and back onto his knees.  Over and over again he does that until he gets tired and collapses onto his belly.  But only for a second, and then he's back on his knees again.  For a long time he only moved his feet.  Then he started to move his arms.  Now he moves both, but he's just not coordinated enough to move in the forward direction.  On a slick or smooth surface, he can move backwards quite well.  I'm pretty sure he is trying to move forwards, but he pushes so hard with his hands, and his feet can't get traction on the smooth floor, so he slides backwards.  Sometimes it makes him very frustrated, but other times he pushes himself so far that he ends up next to a new fun toy, and he likes that!  It was also really exciting to watch him get in and out of crawling position from sitting all on his own for the first time.  He kinda walks his hands backwards until his bottom hits the floor.  He's not great at it, but he can definitely do it.  I know it will only be a few more days before he's really crawling.  As it is, he can move around the room a lot.  He's just not very efficient at it.  It takes him a long time to get anywhere, and he can't exactly move in the direction he wants to.  He pivots, moves backwards, and occasionally inches forwards.  We took a video a few nights ago of his first real "steps" crawling.

We have spent the last two weekends babyproofing the house so I think we're pretty much ready.  All the cabinets in the kitchen are locked up, there's a gate at the top of the stairs, and the TV was mounted to the wall.  I'm sure we'll have to do more at some point, but this is a good start.  I think our lives will change drastically when he gets really mobile.  I'm probably going to look back at these first 7 months and think how lucky I was that I could just put him down and not worry about him.  But crawling opens up a whole new world of games and exploration for Elijah.  I'm so excited to see what life with a mobile baby has in store!

Operation Cry It Out

Well that last blog described one really bad night that turned into 6 really bad nights.  In a row.  Seriously, Elijah did. not. sleep. for 6 NIGHTS IN A ROW.  It was the worst ever.  I mean way worse than when he was a newborn.  Because when he was a newborn, we didn't both have to get up and go to work the next day.  And my boob always did the trick to get him back to sleep.  Last week- not so.  He would cry and we tried to soothe him in the crib, but picking him up and rocking him worked almost instantly (in the beginning of the night- by about 4am there wasn't really anything that would get him back to sleep).  When we put him back in the crib and tiptoe out of the room, it would take about 15 minutes for him to wake up screaming again.  This happened in a 90 minute cycle all night long until about 4am when he just wouldn't go back to sleep.  And then we would have to try to shower and get ready for work with an extremely tired and cranky baby.

After a long conversation with my Mom brainstorming possible reasons (learning to crawl, separation anxiety, behavioral/ wanting to be held and rocked) I determined that I should go to the doctor to rule out any medical issues.  Since he was diagnosed with a double ear infection 10 days earlier, I thought that really might be it.  My Mom was convinced, anyways.  She told me that lying flat on his back could be painful for him if his ears are still infected.  I was imagining him in excruciating pain all night long.  This made me feel especially guilty because I was pretty close to letting him cry it out.  In fact, on Sunday morning we let him cry because we didn't have a choice- we had to get ready for church.  After spending 4:50am-6am trying to get him back to sleep we gave up and let him cry.  What if he was in pain that whole time and we just ignored him?  The thought made me want to cry.  So Monday morning we went to the doctor.  He told us that Elijah's ears were still infected, but not enough to cause severe pain that would keep him up all night.  He suggested that the sleeplessness was probably a mixture of ear infection and behavioral.  It may have started with pain and discomfort from an illness, and just continued after that because Elijah learned that if he cried we would come running.  He said he sees this a lot after an illness or travel.  I was so disappointed.  I was kinda hoping for the ear infection reason so that it would be an easy fix- pain mediation, antibiotic, done.  We had a difficult decision to make.  Ultimately, Daniel and I decided to let Elijah "cry it out".  To be honest, I never thought we would have to do that.  Elijah was always a great sleeper.  Most nights he woke up once around 2 or 3am and Daniel didn't mind getting up, feeding him 3 oz, and getting him back to sleep.  It was still disruptive to my sleep, but I felt like I couldn't complain as long as Daniel was the one getting up.  So I thought this would continue until Elijah got a little older and then he would slowly grow out of the one nighttime waking/feeding and we'd all be happy.  It was not to be.  We made up our minds.

I thought it would be torturous.  I could hardly stand to listen to Elijah cry for a few minutes, how could I let him cry until he fell asleep?  I thought it would take over an hour.  I really had to fight myself psychologically on this.  I saw it in two different ways:  one, Elijah would cry until he said to himself, "well, I guess Mom and Dad don't love me anymore and they won't come save me so I will just give up in despair and fall into a fitful distressed sleep" or two, Elijah would say to himself, "I can't manipulate them anymore, they've figured me out, so I better just go to sleep when they tell me to."  The first explanation breaks my heart.  The second gives me resolve to make this work.  So I told myself the second explanation over and over again until I believed it firmly.

On Monday night, we began Operation Cry It Out.  The first night, it took 35 minutes of crying for Elijah to fall asleep.  It wasn't constant screaming the whole 35 minutes.  At times it got pretty hysterical, but it was always broken up by a few moments of silence and some quieter whining.  We used the video monitor to make sure he was safe and not truly in distress.  It was pretty painless actually.  I was surprised when he fell asleep after only 35 minutes.  That night I wore earplugs and turned on a white noise app on my phone to drown out any crying in the middle of the night.  I truly have no idea how many times he woke up and cried that night.  I do know that he was crying when my alarm went off at 6am.  But I felt so amazing after just one night of sleep that it was sooooo worth it.  I felt refreshed and renewed for the first time in weeks.  On Tuesday night it took a grand total of 5 minutes of crying for Elijah to fall asleep.  Again, I don't know how many times he woke up that night because I wore earplugs and played white noise.  But again, he was crying when my alarm went off at 6am.  He went back to sleep shortly after and then woke up happy at 7am when it was time to go to school.  On Wednesday night, he didn't cry at all.  He played with his bear lovey in his crib and then when I checked the video monitor 15 minutes later, he was fast asleep.  I didn't wear earplugs and I didn't hear a peep out of him.  When my alarm went off in the morning, I could hear him thumping his legs in his crib.  He was awake, but quiet!  It was an incredible success and it took 2 nights.  TWO NIGHTS!  And he slept all the way through the night without a sound.  Amazing.  Okay, so it's only been 3 nights.  Maybe too soon to call it a complete success.  But I am absolutely thrilled so far.  How freeing it is.  We don't have to spend 30 minutes rocking, shushing, patting his back, etc. to get him to sleep.  I don't have to be in a constant state of alertness listening for his crying so I can rush in there and soothe him back to sleep.  I don't go to bed each night wondering if this will be a good night or a bad night.  I feel like a new person.  Well rested, energetic, ready to start the day when my alarm goes off.  It's wonderful.  And pretty painless over all.  And an unexpected perk- since he's not up eating 3 oz every single night, I have 3 oz of extra milk each day.  That translates into A LOT of frozen milk in our freezer!  I think there's a lot of bashing of the cry it out method, but for us it worked better than anything I could have imagined.

Struggling with Sleep

The last few weeks I have felt like I just cannot get enough sleep.  I know that every parent of a young child complains of sleep deprivation, but Elijah sleeps so well that there isn't any reason I should be tired.  Yet almost every day at work I get that post-lunch drowsiness and I find it so difficult to stay awake.  The problem is that around bedtime, I don't feel drowsy.  Since Elijah was born I have been able to go to bed between 8 and 9pm, and as his sleep has gotten better even close to 9:30 or 10pm.  But since daylight savings time I am just not tired until 10pm or even later.  This is a serious problem when my alarm goes off at 6am and I am desperate for another few minutes of sleep.  I literally lay in bed and try to come up with any scenario that allows me to stay in bed longer.  Sometimes I can convince Daniel to go into work late and I'll get maybe another 30 minutes.   But it is just never enough.  For the past week I have been determined to go to bed earlier, but it just never happens.  Even on nights when I have nothing planned, no chores on my to-do list, and no errands to run, I still somehow find myself up until 10pm.  Daniel thinks that 10pm-6am should be enough sleep. And I agree.  But I'm not getting solid sleep from 10pm-6am.  It's interrupted, usually once a night, but sometimes more.  And when my sleep is interrupted it's not a matter of just subtracting the time that I was awake in the middle of the night.  I think it really impacts the quality of my sleep negatively.  I also find it very difficult to go back to sleep.  Sometimes I am on edge, thinking that Eljiah is going to wake back up and start crying again. Other times I am so awake that it takes me a long time to get drowsy again and go back to sleep.  Ever since Elijah was born I have had this problem.  I am so worried about the amount of sleep I'm getting and how tired I am going to be the next day, that it causes me to lose more sleep.  It's a constant negative feedback loop.  I don't know how to get out of it.  Daniel thinks that I need to see a doctor and make sure everything is biologically normal.  I know that if your thyroid hormone levels are off that can cause you to feel tired.  I really don't think that's the issue, but I guess it's worth making an appointment.  I'm just so sick of feeling tired all the time.  It's gotten so bad that Daniel has been taking all of Elijah's night wake-ups just to help me to feel more rested in the morning.  He's also taken on a lot of the morning chores so that I can sleep in as late as possible.  I appreciate all of that so much, but it's just not enough.

Part of me wonders if it's related to breastfeeding.  I have to pump as late as possible before I go to bed, and then first thing when I wake up.  If I pump too soon before bed then I get so full of milk it wakes me up. And I'm so uncomfortable by morning that I have to pump.  I'm usually going about 8 1/2 or 9 hours at the most without pumping right now.  So that's the longest I can sleep at a time as well- even on the weekends.  And it takes me a full 30 minutes to pump each morning because I have so much milk.  I could sleep in 30 minutes later every single morning if I didn't have to pump. I'm wondering if I went back to getting up in the middle of the night to pump, if I could go to bed earlier.  Then I could go to bed as soon as I feel tired.  Right now I usually feel tired, then I have to pump, then put the milk in the fridge and clean the plastic parts, and then I can go to bed.  That takes about 30 minutes.  And I inevitably find something else that needs to be done- empty the dishwasher, fold the laundry, and it goes on.  If breastfeeding is the reason for my exhaustion all the time, then I'm just going to have to tough it out.  I can do it for 5 more months until Elijah turns 1.  And then as soon as we are done weaning, I will sleep for 14 hours straight!  It will be a wonderful night.

I'm writing about this today because last night was a particularly bad night.  Elijah just couldn't settle down and go to sleep.  It seemed like he was asleep, but then by the time I got back into bed I could hear him whining again.  I looked on the video monitor and watched him practice crawling in his crib!  In the middle of the night!  It looked almost like he was doing it in his sleep and then waking himself up.  It was the strangest thing.  Almost creepy to watch in the middle of the night like that.  After Daniel and I collectively spent about 2 hours trying to get him back to sleep, Daniel finally took him into the guest room and laid down with him.  That seemed to do the trick and together they slept there from 1am-6am.  But when Daniel got up to shower, he put Elijah back in the crib.  And sure enough, he woke up screaming.  I'm sure he didn't get enough sleep last night.  I woke up this morning literally feeling like I was up all night.  I was so grumpy and frustrated.  But then, when we arrived at Elijah's school, I opened the backseat and Elijah was staring right at me with the biggest smile on his face.  Right then, my grumpiness disappeared.  It's pretty amazing how he does that.  When I dropped him off I got to watch him interact with one of the drop-in babies.  It was the first time I saw him interacting with another kid in his class.  She was 9 months old and crawling, and Elijah reached for her every time she passed close to him.  He reached for her hair and her little ponytail.  His eyes were locked on her for a long time, and he started wiggling with excitement when she got close.  It was really fun to watch.  It turned my whole mood around.  I just love him so much.

Elijah's 6 month well visit

Elijah is SO CLOSE to crawling.  I think in another week or two he will be mobile.  And that is insane.  We spent all Sunday afternoon babyproofing.  I just could not believe we are already here.  I distinctly remember when Elijah was born thinking that babyproofing was so far in the future.  But not anymore.  He can actually move around quite a bit.  He gets up on his hands and knees and rocks and does a little bunny hop, but he hasn't figured out that he has to move his hands forward.  He can pivot a lot, and get between sitting and crawling position.  He also goes from his knees to his toes back and forth.  It's so exciting to watch.  On Sunday we also packed up his swing for good.  We've still used it here and there up until last week, but Daniel finally decided that Elijah sleeps better in the crib.  It took up so much space in his bedroom that we were happy to finally get rid of it.  When I get pregnant again, we'll trade it in for a better one.  And we also traded out Elijah's 3-6 month clothes for his 6-9 month clothes.  He still fits into the 6 month size just fine, but he also fits the 9 month size and it's easier to put on clothes that are bigger rather than pulling and stretching clothes that are smaller.  And, to be honest, I'm excited to have some new clothes to put on him.  Each time we switch out his clothes to the next size I have mixed feelings.  I'm excited to try the new ones and see some cute new outfits, but I'm also sad because there are always a few pieces that I just love and I'm sad to put away.  In this wardrobe it's his multi-colored striped long-sleeved onesie from Old Navy (that we got from Goodwill) and his overalls from babyGap (that we got at Goodwill).  Also his organic cotton pajamas from Costco that look like an old man dress shirt with tie and glasses in the breast pocket.  Also his fleece PJ's.  I will miss a lot of his bitty clothes.  But his new wardrobe is much more appropriate for Spring!  And then Summer!  Oh I am so excited to say goodbye to winter.  Not as much as last year, but still. Excited!

Elijah's 6 month check-up was on Friday.  He's been fighting a really bad cough since last Sunday, so I considered taking him in sooner, but for many reasons (that may or may not include cost, and work obligations)  I decided to hold off until his already scheduled well visit to have the cough checked out by the doctor.  And lo and behold, Elijah had a DOUBLE ear infection!  That I didn't even know about or suspect!  Cue the Mom guilt.  I felt absolutely horrible, though Jeff (Elijah's doctor) told us not to.  It made perfect sense though.  On Thursday Elijah didn't finish a bottle for the first time ever at day care.  And it happened again on Friday.  When I picked him up to take him to the doctor he was due for another bottle, and even though I kept offering it, he didn't want it.  He would take two sucks and then spit it out.  Now it makes sense: the sucking hurt his ears!  His appetite has been down a bit for the past few days, but yesterday it seemed mostly back to normal.  So it seems the antibiotics are working.  Also at his appointment we learned that he is in the 45th percentile for everything.  That means he is still gaining weight like a champ.  Jeff was very happy to see that.  His development is right on.  He got all the normal immunizations, plus the flu shot.  Thank goodness Daniel let me go down and fill his antibiotics prescription so I didn't have to be in the room when he got the shots.  Daniel also took care of the blood draw. (The doctor ordered a metabolic screen to check his kidney function after I mentioned that Elijah wakes up really puffy every morning). After the news of the ear infection I was pretty emotionally drained.  I don't think I could have handled watching Elijah get stuck with needles over and over.  By the time we finished with all of that, it was pretty much Elijah's bedtime.  What an exhausting afternoon for all of us.  

Despite the ear infection Elijah has been sleeping great lately.  He goes to bed around 6:30 and sleeps all the way until 6:30 or 7am the next morning, with 1 wake up around 2 or 3am and sometimes 1 wakeup around 9:30pm.  He's surprisingly consistent.  I had a talk with his teachers last Thursday morning because his napping was horrible.  For about 3 weeks he has been getting 2 35-45 minute naps.  He should be getting about 3 hours of naps total and he is getting nowhere near that.  His head teacher, Miss Amber, had a lot of excuses for his poor napping.  "He's older and more interested in everything going on"  "not every kid needs that much sleep"  "he's not fussy and he doesn't seem overtired"  "he really does get plenty of sleep, for a day care kid"  etc.  but despite that, he has been having much better naps for the two days since our little talk.  So I guess it worked.  I don't buy any of those excuses anyways.  I was quite irritated that she was defensive.  It was hard for me to bring it up at all, and even harder to stay firm while she gave excuses.  At home, Elijah sleeps for 1.5-2 hr at a time during the day, so I know he needs to sleep.  Not to mention he is exhausted every day when I pick him up.  It's times like that I wish Daniel was part of the drop off/pick up routine.  I'm so bad at confrontation.  Daniel's philosophy is that they work for us- it's their job to take care of our kid in the way that we want.  But I understand that they have 8 infants to take care of, and they can't make them all be quiet just so Elijah can sleep.  And his teachers can't MAKE him sleep, as much as they wish they could.  I asked that they just try their hardest to get him as close to 2 hours of sleep as possible.  And it seems that they have figured out a way to do that.  On Thursday and Friday he got 2- 1 hr+ naps in.  So even if I wasn't happy with how our conversation went, the results are exactly what I wanted.  I can't complain.  Hopefully it keeps up!

This weekend Nicole came to visit us.  I am so happy she made the effort to fly out here.  I would love to go visit her, but it's just not practical with a baby.  I really want Elijah to know her (and all his family members), so it means so much to me that she came out here for the weekend.  It was a blast.  And surprisingly, she was incredibly helpful!  It was so nice to have another pair of hands around to do the dishes or help with dinner.  I just always love being with my sister.  She and Daniel are the two people in the world that I feel I can really be myself around 100% of the time.  She just loved seeing Eljiah do all his cute baby things.  She wanted desperately to see him crawl, but he just wasn't quite there yet.  She did, however, get to see him in a few of the outfits she sent us.  He looked pretty darn adorable.  

I'm still thinking about our next child almost daily.  I talk about it a lot, so that Daniel can start getting used to the idea.  He is nowhere near ready to have another one, and neither am I.  But I'm getting closer and closer.  I still long for that beautiful breastfeeding experience that I feel I got cheated out of.  And part of me is hoping that with 2 children under 5, I'll get to stay home with them because it will be too expensive to put them both in day care.  We'll see.  For now I am thoroughly enjoying my sweet Lijah Bear.  He is the joy of my life and I adore every second of watching him grow up.  He is a special little boy.

My Thoughts on Breastfeeding on Elijah's 6 Month Birthday

Today Elijah turns 6 months old.  That means that we have officially hit my goal of 6 months exclusively breastfeeding.  Well, to be completely accurate, I should say 6 months without formula. Because we have started solids.  But that was truly our goal from the beginning- for breast milk to fulfill all of Elijah's milk needs for the first 6 months of his life.  And our best-case scenario is for it to last until his first birthday, and beyond if we wish.  Though I seriously doubt I will wish it.

When I was pregnant, breastfeeding was my single biggest concern.  I read anything and everything I could find.  I read a whole book specific to working moms.  I read all the la leche league FAQs and the whole chapter in "What to Expect When You're Expecting" and "What to Expect The First Year."  And I can honestly say, that nothing I read adequately prepared me.  There are many, many things that I completely missed.  Either they didn't make sense to me at the time and my brain edited them out of memory, or they were not explicitly explained in any of my sources.  Before Elijah was born I didn't know what clogged ducts were, had never heard of a nipple shield, didn't know that there was a right way to bottle feed a breastfed baby, naively thought that if I was "doing it right" then I wouldn't experience any pain or discomfort, and assumed that if I followed all of the "rules" of breastfeeding, then everything would work perfectly.  News flash: every baby is different.  And babies do not read up on breastfeeding.  After the first few days in the hospital, I thought we were one of the lucky few who find breastfeeding easy.  And I know that relatively speaking, we were.  But we still had our difficulties.

One of the most irritating parts of the breastfeeding culture is how closely tied it is to a specific parenting philosophy.  It is very difficult to find information about breastfeeding that doesn't also promote baby-wearing, co-sleeping, extended breastfeeding, anti-sleep training.... basically Attachment Parenting.  Breastfeeding does not equal Attachment Parenting.  Nor does it equal "crunchy" parenting.  I'm just a normal mom who wants to provide the best, most healthy food for her baby.  Without all of the judgment and guilt.  As a working mom, I need sleep.  Which means I cannot co-sleep.  I also have to introduce bottles at some point.  So if I could get some information about how to breastfeed that doesn't give me guilt for going to work every day, that would be really great.

The single best advice I received about breastfeeding came from my Mom.  She said this:  "Elijah is a person.  He has his own opinions, likes, and preferences."  That was a turning point in our breastfeeding relationship.  It led to the most difficult decision, but ultimately what was right for us.  Elijah preferred bottles so much that he refused to nurse half the time, and fussed the other half.  My supply had dropped to about half of what it was at its peak. That was the point that I stopped trying to nurse him and switched to exclusively pumping.  That decision allowed me to build my supply back up, and allowed us to make it to our 6 month goal.  

Ideally, I would still be nursing him today.  I would be nursing him for every meal if I could.  But I am a working mom, and I have to make sacrifices for that.  I have to remind myself daily of the benefits of exclusively pumping: not having to expose myself or use a cover-up in public, knowing exactly how much Elijah is eating, not having to fight with him to nurse, being able to feed him in the car, being able to get other things done now that he can hold his own bottle.... the list goes on and on.  But the truth is, if I could go back to nursing I would in a heartbeat.  That feeling of cradling him in my arms while he is stroking my hair and face with his hands, the satisfaction of knowing that only I can provide his most basic need, the pride that comes from knowing I am the only person in the world that has this bond with my baby, it's all worth more than the daily conveniences of bottle feeding.  So I know that with the next baby I will be very cautious with introducing bottles.  I will guard our nursing relationship like my life depends on it.  I will take a much longer maternity leave, take breaks from work to nurse my baby, and avoid bottles whenever possible.  But for now, I will take immense pride in the 6 months I have spent nursing and pumping for my baby.  I am in the scant 16 percent of American mothers who are exclusively breastfeeding at 6 months (according to the CDC).  As it stands, I spend at least 3 hours of my day pumping milk for my baby.  I spent months getting up at 1am to pump, even when Elijah slept through the night.  That just shows the commitment I have to my baby.  Here's hoping I can make it 6 months more.

Perfect Family Weekend

We had the best weekend we've had in a long time.  I credit that to spending some quality time with Elijah, and some quality time without him.

We got most of our "chores" done on Friday night, so on Saturday we just enjoyed our day.  Elijah tried peas for the first time, and as usual, he loved them!

It was a special treat for me that Daniel and Elijah went to the grocery store together and left me at home.  It's so rare that I get time at home by myself, so I really enjoy it when I do.  Soon after we all piled in the car and took a trip to Costco.  Elijah just loves to run errands with us.  He loves to look at all the people and all the busyness around us.  It keeps him entertained and happy for a long time.  We thought he would fall asleep at the store, but he didn't.  So by late afternoon, we realized he had been awake since 1:15pm.  That is a very long time for little baby Elijah.  But he just refused to take a nap when we got home.  Shannon, our babysitter, came over at 5 and we told her that he would be ready for bed pretty soon.  We got out the door just in time for our 5:30 reservations at Brook's steakhouse.  Daniel set up our little date during restaurant week.  It was so nice that he arranged for the babysitter, picked a restaurant, and made reservations all on his own.  We both enjoyed dinner so much.  The food was great, but kind of ordinary.  I had my first whole glass of wine- minus a few sips that Daniel had because I just couldn't finish it- since I found out I was pregnant over a year ago. It was so crowded, probably because of restaurant week.  When we got home, we were happy to find Elijah asleep in his crib, clutching a fleece blanket.  Every time I see him asleep it just melts my heart.  It sounded like everything went pretty well with Shannon (though not his usual bedtime routine, I'm sure).

That night Elijah slept horribly, we were up 5 or 6 times!  I have no idea what was waking him up.  He did take a nice long nap that morning which gave Daniel some time to work on his garden, and me time to give the kitchen a good cleaning.  I also got to spend some time browsing the internet on the couch.  That felt as nice as a vacation to a tropical island! When he woke up, we took a quick trip to Target to buy a few things we've had on our list for a while (plastic bibs, baby puffs, a new hose).  Then at 1pm, some friends came over and we all took a walk to the park for a picnic.  It was so warm and beautiful outside we just had to take advantage of it.  Elijah was as perfect as he could be.  He sat in his stroller pulled up to the side of the picnic table while we ate a leisurely lunch and caught up on our lives.  We got to meet our friend Jeff's new boyfriend.  He was absolutely delightful.  Some more friends met us there and by that time, Elijah was starting to get tired and/or hungry.  I pulled him out of the stroller and onto my lap, and he entertained everyone for a few minutes with his babbling, razzing, and bouncing.  I decided to walk him home and put him down for a nap, but everyone else stayed at the park.  Elijah fell asleep in the stroller about 2 minutes after we left.

He woke up very hungry and still tired 45 minutes later.  And of course we just couldn't get him to go back to sleep.  But he was in a pretty good mood the rest of the day.  At about 4:30 or 5, I asked Daniel if I could pretty please go lay down for a short nap.  He was more than willing to take care of Elijah so I could nap.  When I woke up, it was already 6:30 and Elijah was fast asleep in his crib.  I was so confused and disoriented.  I went upstairs and Daniel explained that he gave Elijah a bath and put him to bed with no problem.  He even gave him a bubble bath for the first time!

I was so grateful that he let me sleep, but also sad that I didn't get to kiss my baby goodnight.  I tiptoed into his room and laid my hand gently on his back.  He is so beautiful and perfect.  I apologized over and over for not helping out with bedtime, but Daniel said he was glad I got the sleep and it was no problem at all.  Yet another moment that I feel like I won the jackpot with him as my life partner.  He is just amazing.  Here's another moment: We had plans to get milkshakes after dinner to celebrate 6 months of exclusive breastfeeding.  I told him I really didn't feel like going out, and do you know what he said?  "Well, if you can spend all the time and effort breastfeeding for 6 months, I can spend 15 minutes of time and effort to go get you a milkshake."  Seriously.  He's amazing.

I went to sleep on Sunday night feeling like I had the most perfect weekend ever.  And then Elijah was up all night again ;-)  But my amazing husband didn't mind (or so he says) getting up each time and rocking him back to sleep. I'm a lucky wife.

Oh, and Happy 6 Months to my baby boy!!  Half a year, I can hardly believe it!

Different Kinds of Love

While I was pregnant with Elijah, I often wondered what it would feel like to have a human on the Earth that is genetically half me.  Of course there is no way to know until it actually happens.  I wondered if I would feel that overwhelming love that everyone talks about when they have a baby.  I assumed I would.  And I did.  But I should qualify that.  More than love, I felt an overwhelming need to protect this baby.  And that feeling persists to this day.  Just the thought of Elijah getting hurt in any way provokes and emotional response.  I can't stand to hear him cry.  When he does, I have this incredible need to pick him up and comfort him.  It's almost as if I can't control myself.  It's the worst in the car.  I'm driving, he's strapped in screaming, and there's nothing I can do.  I have even pulled over the car in order to get to the backseat and comfort Elijah.  Daniel has told me that he doesn't feel the same way.  He is much more able to withstand listening to Elijah cry.  Which leads me to believe there must be some kind of hormone, some kind of chemical reaction that provokes that emotional response.  A hormone that is present in mothers especially.  I wonder if all mothers feel it.  It's hard for me to believe that a mother who harms her child feels the same way.  It's that uncontrollable aspect that makes it so difficult for me to understand how any mother can hurt her child, or even give her child up for adoption.  It's distressing enough for me to be away from him while I'm at work.  I don't know what I would do if I knew I would never see him again.

Daniel and I discussed a few weeks ago how our love for Elijah compares to our love for each other.  It's a common question I've heard asked- "Who do you love more, your baby or your husband?"  I've heard many different answers to that question.  My response is cliche, but honest- I love them equally, but different.  That answer would have been very unsatisfying for me before I had Elijah.  You just don't get it until you experience it yourself. The kind of love you have for a child- the love that nurtures, protects, and begins at the very instant of conception- is so different from the love for a partner.  My love for Daniel is made up of mutual respect.  We both chose to love each other, and that love has grown and developed over the years.  I can't think of a specific moment that it began.  I also don't feel the same urge the same chemical response that I get with Elijah.  When I dig really deep, I have to say that I could possibly love Elijah more.  And it's because of that biological, chemical, hormonal, physiological love that I say that.  I just don't have that with Daniel.  And I'm okay with that.  I understand that evolutionarily, it makes sense for parents to have that bond with their children and not necessarily with their partner.  For the species to survive, children must be cared for.  Two parents increase the odds of survival, but they aren't both necessary.  In many ways, this makes the love Daniel and I have for each other even more special.  It's something we work on.  It's something we choose.  It's not biologically driven.  I think that makes it even more important to spend time to nurture it and develop it.  For each other, and for our baby boy.