KISSES

Weird kid. Really, really weird kid. He is going through a phase or something, he's just very grumpy and fussy, the baltic amber necklace helps a ton, though. Last night was terrible - we didn't get him to sleep until 11:00pm, and had been trying since 8:30 (his usual bed time). Naps are never long enough and not nearly close enough together; the other day he only took one 1 hour nap.

     Another weird thing is that he is hating change? He hates his diaper changed, his clothes changed, he hates a change of scenery. Anything different, he hates. Usually my mom comes to see him in the mornings, she missed three mornings in a row and he was acting like the world was over! I mean, I can understand that he loves his grandma and he needs stability, but our lives are stable and moderately consistent. I think whatever is going on, he must be going through something. 

     Also, today he was very lovey; he was giving kisses to everyone (including our neighbor, Parker)! He's so full of love and weird things, I can't help but adore the kid.

 

Precious moments

We went to the Loveland Living Planet Aquarium for my birthday and it was spectacular! Charles-Winston was a bit fussy throughout our busy day, but other than that he did wonderfully.

     First we went into the shark tunnel where Charles-Winston was kicking his legs in excitement as we watched the fish swim overhead. We continued into the Tropical fish exhibit, where they kept fish as well as birds and Charles-Winston was screeching right along with the birds we heard. After that came the penguin enclosure, he LOVED penguins! He had more excitement towards those short, flightless birds than I've ever seen displayed. Last, but surely not least we watched the otters wrestling and playing together, in and out of water. Charles-Winston loved it but in a much sweeter, precious way. He kept giving the otters "kisses", he'd lean in with his mouth open and make a short sucking sound on the glass over and over and over as he has so frequently demonstrated towards loved ones. 

     I went to the aquarium to see the fish, but got so much more satisfaction out of watching my son's reactions that I ended up looking at him almost the entire time.

"kissing" the otters

laughing at the penguins

Exciting things are happening!

Charles-Winston is crawling! Well, not so much crawling as a mixture between scooting and army crawling, but we're still very excited. I've been waiting for the day that I can say with confidence that my baby is mobile, and today is that day! Benjamin and I couldn't be prouder of him. Benjamin is the most excited I've ever seen him, he's about to burst with pride and joy, and of course I'm just beaming. I feel like screaming "THAT'S MY SON!" and sharing this moment with the entire world. 

     The second thing I have been waiting to brag about is the fact that Charles-Winston is HUGE! When we took him in for his shots, he finally got classified as something besides the 30th percentile, and advanced all the way up to the 58th percentile! He's wearing all 6-9 month clothes, which is in his age category, so it's not super fascinating, but this kid was wearing size newborn for the first three months of his life. 

     We have some rough days, but overall I'm so in love with my boy, I'm so in love with my family and I'm so in love with my life.

Today

      Today I don’t want to be a mom.

     What’s wrong with me? I love being a mom, in fact there is nothing I love more. Charles-Winston is being more difficult than usual; I haven’t been able to find a reprieve. I’m just sick of everyone depending on me. There’s endless yelling and screaming. I’m sick of Benjamin not being able to do ANYTHING without me. And I’m so, so, extremely tired of everybody trying to feed my baby things that aren’t age appropriate! Can’t he just eat his baby food? He’s happy with it, why isn’t anyone else?

     Today his crying is grating on my last nerve and its taking everything I have not to just hole up and hide away. I’m coping with my stress and anxiety, just not in the kind way that I normally choose to.  I only have patience for Charles-Winston, not for my cousins, not for my siblings, not even for Benjamin.

     Charles-Winston kept me up a lot last night and only took one nap that lasted one hour today.

     Today it sucks to be a mom.

Date night

Benjamin and I left Charles-Winston behind with our friends and went out to dinner. I had terrible anxiety leading up to it, but in all honesty, it was really, really nice. Being baby-free for a few hours was more relieving than I could've imagined. Benjamin and I decided to keep the conversation off Charles-Winston and make tonight about just us. I think a date night was long overdue, it was actually fun, nice and probably good for our marriage.

     Our friends, Logan, Kura and Parker said Charles-Winston had a lot of fun and was pretty mellow the whole time, which was good to hear because he always behaves mischievously when I'm his designated caretaker. 

     We had a really good time, and we did it without our kid. Tonight I realized it's completely alright to focus on me sometimes - meet my needs first and allow someone else to take care of the baby. 

The story of us

It was 2012 and I was in love. I was convinced I was gonna marry him. His name was Dane and we'd been dating for a year when I met Benjamin. 
     Benjamin was everything Dane wasn't. It was so easy and natural for me to be around Benjamin, with Dane things were confusing and frustrating. They couldn't be less similar. He was daring, funny, restrained, he loved things that I hated, he wasn't a bad boy but he definitely wasn't a good one. I didn't realize I was in love with Benjamin for a long, long time. 

     Benjamin and I couldn't get enough of each other. I didn't know I could be such best friends with someone. We were extremely opposite, but similar enough to compromise. Benjamin was the most caring male I'd ever met. He was so sweet and kind and gentle. I found myself staying up at night thinking about him. When we started dating, in November of 2012 we couldn't get enough of each other, we built blanket forts, we experimentally made vegan foods, etc., it didn't matter what we did as long as we were together.

     I wasn't surprised when I found out I was pregnant in April. I think somewhere in my subconscious I already knew. So, we moved in together and Benjamin supported me and our unborn child. 
     Since we had Charles-Winston our marriage has been sort of rocky, but I think it's on the mend now that he is sleeping better. It's really hard to feel loving towards someone when all you want to do is deck them. 
     It'd be hard for me to understand how two completely different people could love each other so passionately if I wasn't one of them.
     I'm so proud that Benjamin stepped up to the plate and became the father and husband he is today, he's such a great influence on both Charles-Winston and I. We can't wait to spend the rest of our lives together.

Shots fired

Today my sweet baby boy had to get his immunizations. Just by that sentence, you already know it was a terrible day. 

     So of course, the whole day I'm dragging my feet and very anxious, then we get to the doctors and Charles-Winston had no idea what was coming, he's laughing and smiling at the doctor. Then came the shots. Weirdly enough he had one oral "shot", it was like the same thing as a regular immunization, but he just drank it, so that was cool. When the phlebotomist jabbed him the first time he did one long cry with a seemingly everlasting scream and then he gave me the ultimate look of betrayal. The woman causing all this pain and confusion was pretty speedy and efficient, but she just kept going at it, one after the other and my precious child was pinned down and screaming at the top of his lungs. Fortunately, this time I was brave enough not to leave him at this time of need (last time I had to leave the room, it was just too much for me). I held his hand and when she was done, I held him and he quickly forgot all about it.

     My theory about these kinds of things is that the baby is like totally fine 5 minutes later, but the mothers, they'll be scarred for life. Charles-Winston seems to be completely fine now, in fact at this moment, he's laughing in the other room with his dad, so it can't be that rough.

Out of my mind

Albert Einstein defined insanity as "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." Well, he obviously wasn't a parent.

     I've tried letting Charles-Winston cry it out, I've tried co-sleeping, I've tried letting him work it out by himself, but I'm tired of waiting. I feel insane because every night when I put him to sleep, I pray that he'll sleep through the night and every night I wake up to a crying baby.

     I'm getting really annoyed of waking up several times a night, every single night endlessly. I don't know how to help him sleep through the night though because when he wakes up, he chugs 7 oz from his bottle and then does the same thing a few hours later. He's waking up because he's hungry and that's the only reason why I don't just put in some ear plugs and go back to sleep. 

     I'm seriously at the end of my rope. He shouldn't be 6.5 months old and still waking up 3-5 times a night. I need to find some sort of solution because I've been taking the nights by myself for the past few months while I let Benjamin sleep, only occasionally asking him for help. 

     I need a change and I don't see one in the near future. It's enough to make anyone crazy. I'm so sick of waiting for something that isn't going to happen. Maybe I'm already out of my mind.

Simply today

So, today we went to Walmart and perused - Charles-Winston loved it. I try to get out of the house at least once a day, even if it's just to walk around somewhere with air conditioning. We put him in that weird blue, cushion-y thing (pictured in post He's turning into a person) so he could sit in the kid holding spot without falling over and hurting himself; he kept looking all over the place, I showed him some hallmark cards and we bought potato wedges and he ate one of those. It surely wasn't anything interesting, but he really loved it.

     I took my mom's car through the car wash and he was so freaked out, it was comical. I had my sister hold his hand and comfort him. He was wide eyed the entire time, and he kept whipping his head left and right, at times so quickly it looked like an indecisive cartoon character. I spent the entire time laughing at his reaction and enjoying it. When we got to the vacuuming part, Benjamin sucked up his hand and he screamed with enjoyment, I think he thought it tickled. 

     He's the most enjoyable thing to be around, he brings excitement and laughter with him wherever he goes. I love all the small things he does, every day is a new adventure full of discoveries with Charles-Winston.

Being a mother

Being a mother means a lot of things to me. It means that I sacrifice showering every day for the off chance that my baby could be upset for one second while I'm unavailable. It means that in some twisted way, I enjoy being woken up every night. It means that I now never buy anything for myself because I actually want to buy him meaningless things that he'll never remember - he has drawers of toys and I only have one pair of actual pants (that fit since I gave birth).

     Being a parent is a strange phenomenon, I think my brain must've gone through some sort of transformation after I gave birth. Charles-Winston is the best thing that's ever happened to me, even though I get pounded night after night waking up all the time with no recovery period. I used to think I was tired before I was a mom. Now, sex is planned, it's a miracle if I sleep through the night, showering more than twice a week is a godsend, and infant tylenol is a blessing - none of these things even occurred to me before I had a kid.

     And yet I love it. More than anything I've ever done before, I enjoy it with every cell of my being. I'm good at being a mother, I'm really good at it and I take pride in that. 

     I gave Charles-Winston a heartbeat, but he gave me a life.

He's turning into a person

Charles-Winston has several entertaining quirks that I love to show off to people. One of my all time favorites is that when he cries, I begin to applaud and he will stop crying. Every. Single. Time. 

     When he wants to stand up he gets these extremely straight legs and throws his body backwards, it doesn't matter what's going on or where he is - in his car seat, in his crib, if someone is holding him, etc.. If he wants to stand up, he'll stand up.
     When anybody tells him "Hey, handsome" he grins from ear to ear and he just loves any attention. When he laughs he leans back like he's really into it. 

     When you tell him "kisses" he opens his mouth as wide as he can and leans forward until his lips make contact with whatever he's kissing. This morning he and I were watching my pet fish (for some reason it really excites him) and he kept trying to kiss them, it was so funny and so sad. He kept opening his mouth and then hitting his head on the glass tank wall. When I said "kisses" he looked at me, smiled and then tried again. He also tries to kiss himself whenever put in front of a mirror, he laughs and smiles at himself too.

     There's a million little things I could describe about him that I love, he's got a BIG personality. But all in all it's the little things like smiling and kissing that are my favorite. 

Too loving for my own good

I've been thinking about having another baby. Not "have" myself since Charles-Winston's conception was extraordinarily painful and only proceeded to get worse until he was two weeks old. (I'll start with the cons so that this post ends on a positive note.)

     Adopting a baby is expensive and I have no money. I have a deep seeded fear that either the new kid, or Charles-Winston would be cuter and there is no way of fixing that. How could I ever love someone as much as I love the baby I already have? If Benjamin and I had to deal with a newborn again we'd probably die in some horrible suicide-homicide and drop the baby -that we supposedly paid a ton of money for- off at a government facility to be cared for. I might not bond with the adopted baby as well as I bonded with Charles-Winston. The newcomer might grow to resent me or claim that I'm biased towards Charles-Winston because we won't be bonded by blood. THERE ARE SO MANY THINGS THAT COULD GO WRONG.

     Some reasons I would do it include, but are not limited to: I don't want to have an only child. I don't want to have that small of a family. Benjamin wants a girl (heaven knows why). I feel like my family needs to grow. I love children/being a mother. A puppy is not enough to satiate my instinct to care for something. And though it seems cliche I have so much love to give.

     Now these lists could go on and on, but frankly I'm sick of this topic and obviously it's not getting anywhere, just as soon as one side advances, the other side sends in reinforcements and the battle will never be over. But, I've got a long time to think it over, it's just been on my mind lately.