Mom Enough

And I'm not talking about the time magazine cover... I find myself constantly debating in my head the type of mother I plan to be, and the things that I want to avoid doing and saying seem to be on constant repeat playing over and over and over. I want so badly to break away from the parenting style that I was brought up by. The choices my mom made, and still makes, haunt me. I know my husband gets sick of me saying things like, "If you ever hear me saying ...." or "If you ever see me doing..." and "If I ever... Please call me out!"

I know my case is much different or maybe even very similar to other moms out there. I was raised by a narcissist, and I know that I am not one, so I should find some solace in knowing that the things said and done to me will not be modeled for my little one. My mother has complained to us her whole life about how horrible her mother was to her and her siblings growing up. I don't want to do that, but I find myself complaining to my husband a lot lately. Dare I even say, within earshot of our daughter.

The most recent event actually warrants our discussion however. Here's a snippet: Mother of the Year plans a "family vacation" to California excluding her eldest daughter from the planning or even mentioning said plans. Daughter finds out from Mother-in-law about this family vacation which was posted on Facebook. When daughter asks mother about trip, mother says, "didn't think you'd be interested." When daughter plans to make her own travel arrangements to join the "family" mother says, "we have a lot planned, and it isn't a good idea." The end.

So mom enough. Am I mom enough for my daughter. At this point I don't think so, because after trying so hard not to be her, I am. I am complaining about the very things she once complained to us about. But the difference between her and I is I WILL BE MOM ENOUGH to change it right now. I will dig deep to accept the path that is before me, and let go of the path I thought I was heading down. I will accept my past for my past. Make peace with it. Be happy in each and every moment that I get to spend with my precious daughter.  And show her that her mom is Mom Enough to give her a childhood full of joy and happiness. Every single day.

So now, I must turn to Pinterest to rock her world!

Underachieving...

Pinterest makes me feel like less of a person. I don't mean to spend my free-time (all 27.5 minutes of it) scrolling through endless, and often repeating, pins of granola, granola, oh look more GRANOLA.   When I started the initial birthday planning process for DD I quickly skimmed some of the pins that related to my theme before deciding that they were all basically useless. So stay tuned for what I've concocted!  Then today, I turned to Pinterest once again to locate some breakfast ideas for DD. And I log off, feeling like a failure because I'm not spending 37 hours creating wonderful gourmet breakfasts for my dear family. Their imminent health problems are all my doing!

R saw our chiropractor yesterday for some allergy testing. She only made it through four foods before melting down. I love our Dr. But she hates him :(  Anyway, the culprit of her disrupted flora...HONEY. She has been consuming honey daily for over a year. I was trying to build her immunities to the local pollens, but I was causing her to be slightly broken inside. Fail. Dr. of course tells me to slow my roll. But in his, stop-being-so-ridiculous and listen to me shpeel, he said humans on average only consume 22 different foods!  22!  That's not many.

Enter BiPolar Mommy Brain. I must find as many diverse and wholesome recipes as I can find to feed my family. Operation new food throw down begins. We stopped by our favorite local health food store after leaving our Drs office. I loaded up on random breakfast cereals, some spirulina (also a new adventure), and some other necessities.

First up: Qia- chia, buckwheat, hemp cereal.  My 23 mo HATED IT. So she had yogurt for breakfast. DF of course. I'll try a few new recipes to see what I can come up with. Wish me luck!

BiPolar can take a #!

Yes, it's been a while. I get it. I haven't had a clear enough mind to devote to writing. I think about it though, often. Most of the time I have great inspiring potential posts when I'm nursing and rocking my bambino. Yup, still nursing AND rocking my almost 21 month old to sleep.   No big deal.

Life is quite fun now. I am an allergy free chef in the kitchen of yours truly.  Pretty much our whole family is GF and DF. In between dodging fish stick rockets I'm googling how to treat yet another diaper rash on her super sensitive bottom. She's still going potty 70% of the time in the toilet.

So Cat in the Hat is on the tube, a stock pot of diapers is on the stove, and my super awesome baby is curled up in my legs.

Yesterday's Fish Stick Fail- she hated them, and I don't blame her... I hate cod too. I don't know what I was thinking. You can find the recipe here. I used GF panko, and white balsamic vinegar.








Easter :)

I know it's been a while

But I've been trying to wrap my head around what I would like to say.  I keep thinking about my overall role as Mommy.  Parenthood.  BiPolar.  Just trying to get a grip on my life.  And honestly realizing that I am coming out from underneath the haze of everything that the first year brought to me.

We celebrated her 1 year birthday almost an entire month ago.  Ever since her party I have noticed that I am veiwing the world around me as if for the first time.  I know that I had/have post partum anxietyish symptoms.  I have been very honest with myself, and my family, about how I have been feeling.  I don't think I missed out on any of the wonderful memories that we have made this past year.  But for some reason I feel like I am starting to breathe again for the first time.

Maybe it's simply that I am finally adjusting to my new way of life.  *With Baby* or Child, or whatever.  It's just funny to me that yesterday I was thinking about all of the cliche things that you hear when you are pregnant for the first time and how it will change your life.  And then last night on my twitter feed I read a post from the Today Show about that very topic.  I wish someone would have told me that those little cliche's weren't cliche's at all!  They were fact.  But I think people feel the need to say them with a slight giggle to avoid their own uncomfortable realization of said fact.  CHILDREN CHANGE EVERYTHING

Not even in a negative way.  But let's take a minute to add BiPolar to the equation.  Now I firmly believe that every insurance company, public assistance program, family, dinosaur, you name it- should provide a doula/mommy assistant to every person post birth from birth to, oh say... 12 months.  Being a new mommy is hard work.  Doing it with everyone looking at you like you are crazy because you don't want to leave your baby's side is worse.

I know that I might be imagining some of the confused expressions when I talk about our Attachment Parenting lifestyle, but some are very real.  And some aren't confused at all.  Some are simply unspoken insults and expressions of, "oh my god, I thought you were normal, but clearly you are insane!"  In the past I used to spring into conversations within the first few minutes, "I'm BiPolar!"  Now it's "we cloth diaper & cosleep!"

So I guess what I'm trying to say is, wow!  No one could have ever prepared me for this.  But I wouldn't change a thing.

Broken Bank

Living paycheck to paycheck really sucks but somehow I'm still managing to make sure we have organic groceries going into our little tummy's because overall the food that we put in our bodies is the most important thing for making sure that we stay healthy. When you're poor you can't afford to be sick.  Especially since the doctor's that we go to we have to pay out of pocket for because the company refuses to cover alternative medicine.  Chiropractor.  Alternative medicine.

Sometimes I find myself getting really sad about the things that I want to buy baby but I can't.  I have to realize that she will never know because this is the time of her life that she's just enjoying every little thing around her and it doesn't matter if she's got on her new designer shoes today.  I hate my spoiled thinking brain!

And like rubbing salt in our wounds the news reported about how important it is to have a savings account for emergency expenses.  I screamed at the TV when I saw this because it's people like us, people like Travis and I, who are barely making it work.  We don't even have the extra $20 a week to put into savings!  I've tried that, and every single week when it's automatically deposited into my savings I have to pull it back over into my checking account just to cover our expenses. And that's just $20, the news recommends $50 a week!  Stupid news!

We're eating rice and beans for crying out loud!  Screw cutting out that $4 latte!

Na na na na life goes on...

Mood today: Looking up
Energy level: So so...

FFFFFFFFFFF Student loans!

Undone....

Diapers need stuffed, the kitchen needs to be cleaned, the floors need to be swept and mopped.  The dogs are barking, the baby might wake up soon...  But I decided I need to sit here and take a moment to reflect on how freaking lucky I am.

I will be 30 this week.  The big 3-0.  I have lived many places.  I have seen far too many things.  I have said many more things that I wish I could have erased.  But I have lived.  I am healthy.  My baby is healthy.  I struggle.  I never know what each day will bring.  If I will be able to muster the energy to make it from my morning cup of coffee to the last bite of my dinner in the evening.

I love my life.  Sometimes I find myself green with envy of friends and colleagues.  But then I look in the mirror and I can proudly say that I am HAPPY and I LOVE who I am.  Even though I have made many sacrifices over the last year, I have never gone without anything that I have needed.  I have just learned that I need a lot less than what I used to have.

I miss my sisters.  My mood is -----  Not really high, not low, just ----  I miss my sister.

Fingerprints...

The first week of every month (give or take a few days) is window and mirror cleaning week.  Today after shining our over-sized mirror in the living room I took a step back to admire my work and felt a sudden pang of sadness.

I read something earlier today about holding your child's hand as long as possible, or as much as possible, so that they know you're there for them.  I got teary eyed as the author described perfectly the sensations that you feel with that first finger squeeze.  And how as your baby grows their little hands become more under their control, and less instinctual reflexes.  So I made a point to notice how often we hold hands today.  I am happy to say that we touch a lot.  A perk of attachment parenting.

Where am I going with all of this....  Well this past week has been full of emotions for my little family.  My husband and I have had to make a lot of very difficult decisions and I have shed many tears.  I am sure I still have many more to shed too-  In addition to all of the chaos we have been experiencing Baby has continued to grow and develop and learn.  She hit some milestones this week that offered brief escapes for me from my personal dramas.  They were almost right on cue too-  I would be dealing with something exceptionally tough and then BAM- "Holy cow look at what she can do!"

So as I hold on to the normalcy's of our organized life I paused while cleaning.  I realized that I get to see all of those little growing fingerprints all month long, and then at the start of the next month the slate is wiped clean.  A fresh palate for her to manipulate however she chooses.  That mirror has held her hand-prints from birth- If only I hadn't wiped them all away.

Today my mood is a little low.  Still trucking, just partly cloudy.