Saturday, January 23, 2010

Back on the Merry-Go-Round

Tonight, I decided to drop #3's bedtime feeding, bringing him down to one feeding per day.  I wasn't surprised that he handled it just fine.  I was surprised, although I shouldn't have been, that my body was ready to get back to its normal (not pregnant or breastfeeding) state.

Call it what you want - Aunt Flo, Margaret, the curse, my monthly bill, That Time of the Month - it's back.  And only maybe an hour or two after when I would have fed #3.

Strange how a woman's body works, how nature works.

Well, it certainly explains my insatiable desire for chocolate over the past few days.

Monday, January 18, 2010

Dirty Boys

I love my kids.  They are the lights of my life, and I wouldn't trade them for anything.

However, there are nights that they drive me up the wall, usually  bath night.

I swear, you would think I bathe the kids in acid, scrub them with steel wool, poke them in the eyes with red hot pokers, dry their hair with RPGs, and use pliers to pull their fingernails off.

But I don't.  They just yell like I do.

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Bittersweet

I'm in the process of weaning #3.  We're down to two feedings per day. 

Part of me is ready to move on - to have my body back, to shop for new clothes, jeans, shirts, bras, to not have to worry about leaking, to have a glass of wine whenever I feel like it, to not worry about everything that passes my lips lest it be harmful to a one-year-old.

Part of me is sad about this phase ending.  I love the physical closeness when I breastfeed.  I love that there is something that is given to my son that nobody but I can provide.  I love the knowledge that my body has the power to sustain another.

In all likelihood, this is the real end of the pregnancy/breastfeeding stage for me.  Although Hubster wants a daughter, I don't know if I want to go through another pregnancy, the all-hours-of-the-night feedings, the constant fatigue, that insanely tumultuous first year, the strain on the marriage, the recalibration of the family unit, the how-many-more-years-until-I-can-get-a-break? phase.  I worry how my emotional stability, our marriage, would weather this cycle again.

The only firm decision I've made is that I don't want to plan to have any more children.  However, if I do get pregnant again, I won't be upset; I'll know that it was meant to be.

Sunday, January 10, 2010

There's Gotta Be a Better Way

I just read an article on msnbc.com about permatemps

Seems that over the past several years, and especially as the result of the recent recession, many companies have been eliminating positions that can be filled by independent contractors.  These contractors might get a comparable salary to what they'd get were they full employees, but none of the benefits.  No medical or dental insurance, no 401k plan, no disability. 

If, as an independent contractor, you are not offered health care coverage, I presume you have to purchase it yourself.  I don't know anything about this because, thankfully, I have never been in this position, but isn't health care ridiculously expensive when purchased as an individual? 

Look, I understand disagreeing with the specifics of the proposed health care overhaul.  What I don't understand is why people are opposed to putting some sort of limit on how much it costs just to get health insurance.  Why should people whose employers don't offer them coverage have to pay through the nose for it? 

Why are so many people so okay with people - businesses, insurance companies, whoever - screwing over other people so they can make more money than the GDP of some small countries?  Whatever happened to helping your fellow man? 

Saturday, January 2, 2010

I *Don't* Get It

I just need to vent, because I don't get this.

You call one of your girlfriends on the phone to catch up and, inevitably, one of you will begin to explain a situation that's bothering you.  It could be about your job, your relationship, or that annoyingly rude customer service rep you talked to yesterday about an incorrect charge on your credit card.  When you're finished, the other person usually says something like, "Oh, I know!" or "I hate that" or "My husband does that and it drives me crazy!" or the succinct "Totally!"

In certain part of Connecticut, people don't say those things.  They tell you they *get* it - "I get it."  I have never heard that before I moved up here, and let me tell you, it's starting to drive me crazy.

Friday, January 1, 2010

Happy New Year!

First of all:  I prefer the term "two thousand ten" to "twenty-ten."  "Twenty-ten" is what comes after twenty-nine when my kids count.  Now that that's out of the way, I just have to say that the hubster and I decided to forgo the usual Dick Clark/Ryan Secrest and Carson Daly and instead watched Anderson Cooper and Kathy Griffin.

Holy crap were they hysterical.

That's about all for now.  Oh, and I want to start fleshing out some ideas I have.  Happy New Year, everyone!  Um, it's not a new decade.  Yet.