Digits.

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This is my thousandth post since I started this blog. I kept watching the number tick up, and thinking to myself, “Wow! When I reach post #1,000 I better think of something important to say.” I’ve noticed some bloggers make a fancy birthday cake with a candle to celebrate their blogging milestones and such. 

I looked forward to making a milestone with my little blog, although why I thought I would do something fancy is beyond me. I had such high, misguided hopes for myself — so silly. Real life does not allow me to bake right now. In fact, I fed Asher Eggo waffles for lunch today. And breakfast. Shhhh.

Now that I’ve reached post #1,000, I sheepishly report that I did not make a cake or even procure a store-bought cupcake. I have no candles. I just had to look down and make sure I am wearing a shirt. I am a mess, a sleep-deprived mess, and I can’t string thought processes together. Case in point: my conversation with Husband last night. 

Me: I just realized that there are THIRTY fingers and toes in this house, in addition to my own, that I am responsible for trimming.

Husband: That’s a lot of digits.

Me: Oh my GOD. It really is.

Husband: (a few minutes later) There are 100 digits in this house.

Me: WHAT?!

Husband: A hundred digits. In this house. Five people with 20 digits each.

Me:  (silent horror.) 

And then we both started laughing semi-uncontrollably and I said something like, “HOW DID THAT HAPPEN!?!?!”

I know this sounds stupid (because it is), but seriously … how did that happen? So many fingers and toes. So many eyes staring at me. It’s almost like all these kids snuck up on us. I mean clearly they didn’t, but in my fog of exhaustion nothing adds up quite right.

Namaste.

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Today was the first day since I became a mother of three children (ages 4 and under) that I felt like I really might have a nervous breakdown. 

So I went through a list of things in my head that would make me feel better: Can I drink? No. It’s only 1 p.m. 

Can I take a nap? No. Children are crying.

Can I take a bath? Can I lock myself in a room somewhere? No. And no.

So here’s what I did. I drank some tea. Yes, really. I’m not joking, it was tea. And then I took a few nice, calm pictures to look at after they were all in bed so I could think to myself, “Oh, that wasn’t so bad.”


See, the picture thing totally worked. I’m already thinking to myself, “I didn’t have a bad day, really. It could have been worse.” Because honey … I know worse. Just take a gander at all of 2011’s blog entries.

I think that some mothers love the closeness of motherhood. The skin-to-skin contact, the drool, the smell of their kids, the experience of breastfeeding. It’s not that I necessarily dislike those things, but I can only handle so much of it before I need to step away. I think the term for it is “touched out.” I have three small children who are needy because they are so little, and my days are long and solitary. 

Thankfully, my trips to Crazytown after the births of my first and second children taught me some very valuable lessons. Because Husband works so much, we have an agreement that I am allowed to do pretty much whatever I need to do to stay sane. He’s very rarely on hand to help, which means I singlehandedly wrangle three kids day in and day out: meals, discipline, baths, bedtime, apologizing to the preschool for Maverick’s shenanigans … crying, tantrums, all of it. 

Therefore, he isn’t allowed to judge me or ask any questions other than “How much is that going to cost?” And after today, when I had to have my mother come over just so I could take a shower in peace, I decided it’s time to look into joining a gym. I was going to wait until Pepper was a little older, but apparently they will accept children 6 weeks and up SO WHAT AM I WAITING FOR?! I just have 4 more weeks to muddle through before I can enjoy a sweet hour of child-free yoga. 

Pepper’s already got her yoga pants on. She’s probably wondering, “When is she going to get her shiz together and get us to the gym?! Maybe if I scream a little more, she’ll get her ass in gear … “ 

My ass is in gear. Thank you daughter for helping me snap out of my fog — we have been in the house for entirely too many days in a row. Tomorrow we’ll go for a walk in the sun, and avoid traveling anyplace with “Crazy” in the name. Namaste!

Baby Steps.

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Greetings from a whirlwind of children and postpartum healing. I just wanted you to know that my silence does not mean that things are going badly. Things are actually going not badly.

Pepper is 11 days old. The scale says I have lost over 20 pounds, which I guess means all of that was baby and fluid and the remaining 30 must be straight up fat. I swore I would stick to the recommended 25-pound gain this time around, but because I’m such an overachiever I doubled it instead. 

I wore my Belly Bandit for 3 days straight, but when we got home from the hospital I ended up having to ditch it because I couldn’t handle wearing the wrap and the Ergo carrier, with the baby breathing on my chest and the summer heat that still makes the house hot in the afternoon despite cranking the A/C down to 65 degrees. It was beyond claustrophobic. So I threw my vanity out the window and decided I would rather have a flabby stomach for a little longer than ignoring my fussy baby who just wants to listen to her mother’s heartbeat. I can address my stretched-out midsection in a few months when I start going back to the gym, but Pepper seems to require listening to my heart for a certain number of hours per day right now …

And that is fine with me.


The Belly Bandit totally worked for the days that I wore it. At first I couldn’t close it — I had to lie on my hospital bed and wrench it shut with all my might and it was still not really shut all the way. But a few hours later, I tightened it and I continued to tighten it over the course of those three days. I didn’t realize it would be such an ordeal to wear it while also “wearing” the baby … they should mention that somewhere on their website. Maverick helpfully pointed out to me yesterday that my stomach still isn’t all the way flat. Yes … yes. I’m aware.

We are all adjusting to this new juggling act, but it’s really going fine. The boys both have some angst, but they are handling the arrival of their sister a lot better than what I was prepared for.

Because I’m having major mood swings, I waffle between thinking I have the sweetest children on Earth and thinking that they are all purposefully trying to send me to the asylum. I’ll feel like I have everything under control and then the next minute I feel like I have no business being a mother. Hormones are exhausting. I mean, men probably find women exhausting, but they should try actually being one.

Tomorrow, Husband and I are going on an actual date. I’m going to put on actual clothes and leave the house with an actual purse. It’s my first step towards normalcy, and I can’t wait.


Game Changers.

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There are a few things that have happened in the past week, aside from Pepper’s birth, which have changed my life. 

First, Husband got a big promotion. Like really big. I am so ridiculously proud of him I kind of want to cry every time I think about it. I know that this is a direct answer to so many prayers I have whispered during my crazy days at home, asking God to “PLEASE GIVE ME STRENGTH and help me to be a GOOD AND DECENT MOTHER to these children, and You know what would help me out too? A little financial freedom and a gym membership again.” Apparently He agreed with me.

So many things have been happening around here that we haven’t had a chance to properly celebrate and acknowledge this huge accomplishment. I am no longer the wife of a car salesman. I am now the wife of a Finance Manager.  

And all the people said … AMEN.

Here are some other, less consequential things that have helped my transition into mothering three children be slightly less shocking:

1. I have learned to trust myself. I thought I already trusted myself, but as it turns out there are different levels of confidence. I am proud of the choices I’ve made and continue to make.

2. I’m not medicated, but I plan to get medicated immediately if I start to go off the deep end. I think Pepper’s birth reminded me there is no medal for soldiering on when you can just take the drugs.

3. Baby gates. I finally bit the bullet and allowed Husband to put a horribly tacky baby gate up to keep Asher out of the kitchen … and off the dining room table … and out of the refrigerator … and away from the dishwasher. It may be tacky, but my life seems so much simpler now.

 
 Asher begs to differ.

4. A normal baby. I have never experienced the joy of a newborn who didn’t scream incessantly. Wow … life without colic is so different. If you have kids and none of them were colicky, count yourself blessed. For once, I can enjoy my infant without feeling like my stomach is all tied up in knots from endless hours of screaming. Maybe THAT is why I don’t need medication. 

I’d say our first week has been a surprising success.

  



I Am A Mother of Three.

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I am 5 days postpartum and have been trying to write this post ever since I got home: Pepper’s birth story. Currently I have one kid strapped to my chest, one kid plugged into the TV, and one kid corralled in a Pack N’ Play. Pretty much, if this post is going to happen, I am just going to have to make it happen.

We arrived at Woman’s Hospital at 5:00 a.m. on June 7, 2013 for my scheduled induction. I was a nervous wreck, but the hospital was quiet — peaceful, even — and that became the theme of the day. Tranquility. The birth of my third child was the most tranquil birth experience I could have hoped for.

My “birth experience” is kind of a blur, probably because I was so deep in my safe place. Like, deep. When I find myself in situations like childbirth, I check out. I couldn’t read, I couldn’t watch TV, I couldn’t hold a normal conversation. All I could do was sit and wait for the inevitable to happen and try not to freak the freak out. When I was in labor with Maverick in 2008, my nurse called me “stoic,” but actually, I’m just a check-outer. So on Friday, I literally spaced out for 7 hours and tried not to throw up.

The whole experience was just weird, but if you want details, I’ll give them to you: I was 3 centimeters dilated when we arrived that morning. By 6:30, I was hooked up to antibiotics for Group B Strep and the pitocin drip was on. By 9:30 I was ready for the epidural, because OMG … pitocin contractions are no joke. NO. JOKE.

By 10:30, the full round of antibiotics was complete and Dr. Boudreaux said it was fine to have the baby now, so they kicked the pitocin up again. At 1:00 I started to feel pressure, like a baby was literally about to fall out of my vagina and into the hospital bed, and at 1:35 p.m. after three pushes, my daughter was born.

May I introduce to you … Penelope Rose Hobbs. Our 7 pound, 6 ounce miracle.

Getting her first bath.

Her arrival into the world was peaceful, and she is just the sweetest baby. Penelope means “weaver of dreams,” and it fits her perfectly. She is so alert and calm, the nurses kept commenting on it. I hope she keeps it up, because I’m liking her disposition a lot.

Really looking at each other for the first time.
Mama and baby.
Daddy is over the MOON.

I spent my time at the hospital RESTING. I think I got more rest during my stay there than I have in months. My recovery has been a breeze — I only had to take one Percocet after she was born, and other than that, just Motrin and Tylenol. I kept thinking to myself, “this has been so easy.” Then we came home and the boys have been awesome. I feel like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop, for real life to kick in, for my uterus to fall out … SOMETHING.

But so far, life has blessed us beyond what I can put into words. Right now, I have everything.
 

Back to the older brothers. People keep asking how they are adjusting, and so far, it’s kind of scary how well they’ve done. Asher points at her and says “Pepper!” and tries to bring me things when she is crying. Maverick is my big helper — he has deemed himself Protector of Pepper and is taking that role very seriously. 

I am so proud of my boys, and so proud of my daughter, and even though I know the next few months are going to be tough …

It’s worth it.

She has dimples!
First trip to the pediatrician was SUCH a snooze fest.
Beautiful gift from my mother-in-law on the day of Pepper’s birth.


Things That Make Me Happy.

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Since I don’t know what kind of chaos will befall my home once #3 arrives tomorrow, I figured I better write one last Things That Make Me Happy post. You know … in case my hormones get all out of whack and I sound very UN-happy for the next few months, and people start e-mailing to see if I’m alright. 

Right now, today, I feel very happy. I’m going to hold onto that feeling and hope that it sticks around.

Flowers from my super-sweet baby shower.

One of the last pictures I’ll ever take like this. Love that Maverick is kissing his sister.
Love their opposite expressions.
This is seriously the cutest cake I’ve ever seen.
I have a whole series of these.

Truthfully, the thing that makes me the most happy is just knowing that tomorrow we will welcome our third and final child into this world and she will be loved, loved, loved.

Finito.

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I am finally (really, truly, for real) finished with the nursery!

The chevron rug from Urban Outfitters arrived yesterday, adding the final touch to Pepper’s eclectic room. Will she be an eclectic kind of girl?? We have no idea. Maybe she will grow up and beg for an LSU-themed room, and Husband’s dreams will finally come true. 

So much is happening this week in addition to the arrival of our youngest that I feel pretty overwhelmed, but I am trying to just give myself over to it and ride the ride. Tonight some very sweet girls are throwing me a baby shower, and I really can’t wait to sit around and eat cake and not be bothered by anyone or anything.

I have also decided that the best way to view my upcoming induction is to think of it as a tiny vacation away from my life, hanging out in bed with Husband sitting nearby, and no children running around. Yes, I will be hooked up to numerous machines and have people probing and poking me … but that’s not a far cry from my everyday life. The probing and poking part, I mean. At least the people poking me will be adults and can be reasoned with.