Square One. Again.

I've always found throwing rocks in the water very therapeutic,  I guess it's genetic.
Or maybe it's just fun.

So readers, I'm sure you've been up nights worrying about where we are and what we are doing :P

Full circle. We are back in Vancouver, ironically at almost the exact same time I had originally planned on returning when I set out for the North.

Everything feels new...again.

We moved from the North to North Van. I've never lived on the North Shore before so that's all new.

We are settling into our new apartment. It's all unpacked, save for a couple boxes that I just can't seem to face. Maybe hauling the last of the cardboard to the recycling makes it all real? Maybe it's just laziness.

I'm back to working out excessively and running. It seems to be my go-to when I'm in transition. I stopped for awhile in Smithers. Again, maybe that was just laziness...or perhaps I just finally felt like I had nothing to run from.

Settled.

Either way, I'm not feeling very settled right now.

Babe is happy as a lark for the most part. She loooooves her new school and her new bedroom and seems basically unscathed by the traumatic whirlwind that tore my private little island apart.

Our new place is great, a good place to sit still.

For any single moms out there starting over...or over again; Find Comfort.

I run. I visit old friends. I pvr'd yoga because I can only do it late at night despite having free yoga right here in my building. I paint my nails in front of cheesy movies about women finding themselves. (I know...eye roll)

I've also got this amazing girl who brings her massage table to your place. It works great for a single mom who has already put the kid to bed and is stressed to the max but chained to the house!

I got back on a horse. I've planned a spa day on the island and I'm pumped to model for a photoshoot on Hornby.

And thank God for my probably exhausted but ever-supportive group of friends. They have spent endless hours over the last weeks listening at nauseam to every tiny detail of my current situation. A special shout out goes to E who despite me falling out of contact when busy never fails me when I come crawling back and J2 who has done more to boost me back up in the last few weeks than I could have ever asked for.

Some days I have a lot of anger, some days it's mostly tears and others I seem to pull strength out of somewhere and take steps forward. It's so strange to go from planning a future with someone to a whole new world. New babysitters, new preschool, new apartment, new plans, new friends, new dates.

I did manage to haul Babe to Calgary in the middle of my fog for my grandfather's (Babe's Grandpa, Grandpa's) funeral. Honestly, I don't even remember much of those few days, or the rush to pack and make arrangements down here. But here we are. Getting into a whole new routine.

Sprinkling my grandparent's ashes on the farm.

Flying back to Smithers.

It's still light out enough in the evenings for me to run along the river. There's one point in the trail where I get hit with a sweet smell so strong it feels like I've passed back into spring. I can't figure out what it is but it is intoxicating and it instantly fills me with an appreciation for the little things which I desperately need right now. I've even stopped and searched, nose-first for what it is. I recognize it but I've never had a great recollection for smells and I can't find where it's coming from - but it's so strong and so pure. I can't pin it down and I can't keep it, but I'm so thankful for it while it's here.

There's another point in the loop where I run along a ledge that's less than a foot across. I really like that part. Its occurred to me that it's only a matter of time before I fall and it'll probably really hurt (relax, it's only three or four feet high). It'll be embarrassing too. But every time I do it I get such a sense of satisfaction from it yet at the same time I worry that it's reckless and in hindsight it will seem quite silly when I fall.

But maybe I won't fall. Maybe I'll get faster, maybe I'll find a higher ledge.

I probably will fall though and it'll probably mean a trip to the ER. And I promise I'll post the pics so you can get a giggle out of my foolishness.

But until the fall comes, it's like that sweet smell in the forest...I just can't get enough.

Kinda like love I guess.

Maybe.

Cozy pajamas: check
Glass of red wine: check
Tissues: check

Deep breath.

J moved out today. I'm a single mom.

It's been a long time coming. But with the boxes gone and half the closet standing empty it's now official.

I think it's better now than when Babe is older. But it's funny. You'd think a baby wouldn't understand what was happening. But she looked confused while arm fulls of J's things were leaving the apartment today. And after he left she sat on the floor and quietly waved for a couple minutes. My heart broke for her.

I've wanted to write about this situation for awhile but I've had a hard time deciding just how to go about it. I want to be honest and open about everything. For myself and for my readers.

For me, I want this blog to be an accurate record of my life with Babe, not just a picture that I am comfortable showing to others. And for any of you going through the trials of mommyhood, I want this blog to be a source of information, humour, understanding and support. So I feel like I need to be as open as I can.

But at the same time, there is someone else involved here. Someone who doesn't necessarily want to air our dirty laundry. And as angry as I am, I have to make an effort to be respectful.

Here I am faced with the same problem I had when keeping a diary of my pregnancy. Babe may read this one day. And while I want to write down everything that is happening, there are things that she doesn't need to know about. Things that might hurt her. Things that she may not want aired to the world. And I don't want her to think badly of her father because he loves her to bits.

So how do I go forward on this blog?

I'm literally sitting here tapping my fingers on the desk. Well, not now. Now I'm typing. But I was. I. Don't. Know. What. To. Say.

Things have been pretty bad for a long time. Since before I was pregnant. A long time ago we were really in love. But I guess it didn't last. I tried to hang on for too long. Tried to make it work. Tried to make him happy. After awhile I sort of gave up and I just wanted to move away after school finished. But then I got pregnant. And I'm so happy I did. I always wanted to be a mommy.

I wasn't one of those idiots that thought a baby could fix a relationship. I knew things were about to get even more difficult. But still, I hung on. I thought maybe he just needed time to adjust to the idea of parenthood. I thought maybe we can make things good again. Maybe we can be happy again.

There wasn't a lot of support during the pregnancy.

Still I thought, "If I can just limp us along until the birth", then we'll be a family and maybe we can be happy again.

And of course J loves his baby more than anything and was thrilled when she was born. In fact it was him that cried in the delivery room, not me.

But J was in the middle of his last semester at school. And he was really stressed out and irritable. So right from the beginning Babe and I were alone a lot.

I thought, if I just take care of everything until he is done school. Maybe we can be happy again.

But we had Christmas break and the lack of schoolwork didn't seem to relieve the tension. And then school ended and the tension in the house was still there. We still weren't happy.

(I should clarify) I was happy. Exhausted, emotional, scared and overworked. Sometimes stressed and often times lonely. But thrilled to be a mommy and optimistic. When I say we weren't happy, I mean with each other. And really - I mean he wasn't happy with me or, it seemed, with anything.

I did a lot of things alone with Babe. If you go back and re-read this blog you'll see that most of the time it was just the two of us.

J will say it was because of school, or work, or he was sick or too tired. I say the motivation just wasn't there. I had waited so long for my own baby that I was overloaded with things I wanted to do with her in the first year. I really wanted us to do things as a threesome and as the months went by and that never happened I got more and more hurt and more and more resentful. Until I couldn't hide the anger any longer.

And when I reached my limit I was mean about it. I was so angry and I didn't make the home a very nice place for J to be anymore. And I left with Babe every chance I got.

Here is where I have to be especially careful. While I would love nothing more than to drag J through the mud for the rest of this post it is neither helpful nor fair. And I've already had my Jerry Springer moments for this breakup. So I'll just skip ahead.

We have been separated since June 1st but we were still living together while J looked for a new place. I went to D.C. and then to Alberta. J stayed home and worked. And even though we had broken up and were drafting the custody papers I guess there was a little part of me that thought:

Maybe we can still be happy.

You know how even though you know that the relationship is done there is that little part of you that hasn't closed the door all the way. The little voice that says, maybe?

J closed that door.

I asked him to leave.

He's been gone for awhile and today he came and took his things.

My heart is broken. But I think it's more for the breakup of the family than for the removal of J from my life.

And maybe it's my age, maybe I shed so many tears on the relationships of my youth that I have few left to cry. Maybe it's because I have a baby to be strong for. Maybe it's because I got used to the idea of being a single mom over the last few months. But I seem to be powering through this breakup in a way I never did before. I transitioned smoothly from Sinead O'Conner's, "Nothing Compares To You" to Beyonce's, "Irreplacable" in a matter of days and I already have new hair and a re-organized house.

Babe and I are out and about doing things on our own - but then again, we always were. And despite what you may read between these lines, I'm not that angry. Not as angry as I thought I would still be.

It's going to be hard. Really, stinking, shitting, fucking, Goddamn hard. J and I haven't been apart that long and I already find I'm struggling. We weren't getting along but he was still around to hold Babe or take out the garbage. Now I find myself getting frustrated and taking it out on her. Especially because she still doesn't sleep well and I'm just so worn down. I raise my voice more than I want to. I grumble more than I should. And I've said mean things about her daddy in front of her (even though I know she doesn't understand me, that isn't the mom I want to be).

But going it alone is also forcing me to try harder. There's not a lot of room for vanity, ego or selfishness in motherhood and there is less in single motherhood. And I know I can do it better.

It's not the fairy tale I had hoped for. But what ever is? And maybe I do have a little hope that the three of us will find a new way to be happy. But for now "we" is Babe and I.

And we are going to be happy.

No maybes.

Sick Mommy.

So I've been really busy this past month but unfortunately most of it wasn't fun. First I had a breast infection caused by the antibiotics for my bout with mastitis. Then I had horrible food poisoning followed immediately with an excruciating tooth infection. And then this whole week has been wasted with a summer cold. Although you can't really call it a "summer cold" since Vancouver's summer hasn't even started yet - it's still mostly rain.

For the most part I have fallen into the rhythm of mommyhood...but that's when I'm healthy.

I've had plenty of practice being under the weather and saddled with kids. When I was a nanny I rarely phoned in sick. I felt bad doing it because it meant screwing up the parent's day and potentially causing them problems with their boss. So I usually just sucked it up, went in to work and had a TV day with my charges. But it always sucked having to cater to needy little monsters when I was feeling like death. As much as anyone loves babies and kids you're a liar if you don't admit that you just want them to bugger off and fend for themselves when you have the flu. But of course, as a nanny I still got to sleep through the nights undisturbed so it wasn't as bad as being a sick mommy.

Even though I know the drill being a sick mommy still sucks. Thank God I have a few tricks from my past. I pity all the poor first time mommies with no childcare experience that have to make it through their first illness with baby in tow. However my expertise still didn't stop me from running to my mommy when I fell ill.

I've always needed a lot of sleep and like most people, when I'm sick I need a lot more sleep. But getting sleep with a baby in the house is never easy. I was very lucky that my parents live close by and I was able to take Babe over to their house so they could watch her and I could focus on getting better.

The weekend that I had food poisoning and thought I was dying I spent almost the whole time under the covers and my mom would bring Babe to me when she needed cuddles or nursing. I don't know what I would've done without her.

Then the tooth infection kept me from getting sleep two nights in a row so when I finally was able to get an emergency root canal and was feeling better my mom again watched Babe so I could rest up.

After that we had a great trip to Washington D.C. and then right after I got home Babe and I caught a cold. This time my dad stepped up for me. Babe spent a few hours each day this week hanging with him in his office while I napped at my parent's house.

Here are the few tips I have for trying to survive motherhood while sick. Obviously if you can send the kids to daycare or hire a babysitter just do that.

• Sick days are sleep days. Do not try to cook or clean anything. When your child naps, just nap. Right away, stop what you're doing and lay the f**k down.

• Children need healthy food, but not on a sick day. Just feed them whatever will keep them alive until you're feeling better. Not candy, but anything remotely healthy that you don't have to fight with them to get down.

• Screw your no TV rule. As a nanny my kids rarely watched TV. But my deal for coming into work sick was that the kids would be watching the boob tube that day and if the parents didn't like it then I could just stay home. It's amazing what parents will allow a sitter to do when they have a business meeting in half an hour. If your kid is happy doing crafts or playing a board game independently than that's great but if they won't play without you then just put on a movie they love and doze beside them on the couch for two hours.  If your child is too young to sit through a movie then stockpile toys beside you on the floor, stretch out, put your head on a pillow and rest while you pass one at a time to baby. (This will probably only buy you half an hour.)

• If your kids are old enough and still healthy themselves try to arrange a play date at a friend's house and then sleep while they are gone.

• Pile toys on the floor in the bathroom and play with them - from the tub. (Don't do this if you are a nanny, it's not appropriate).

• If you have the energy to leave the house go to the toy store and pick out something new that will entertain them while you lounge on the sofa with a facecloth on your forehead. Alternatively - download a new iPad/iPhone app for them.

• Encourage older children (2.5+) to help their sick "patient". Let them fetch you water (clean up the spills tomorrow), put the thermometer under your tongue, and give you pretend medicine. If they have a toy doctor kit or just some kitchen utensils now is a good time to play hospital. You can just lay on the floor while they cover you with Band-Aids and look in your ears with the turkey baster. 

• Just about anything that is a novelty for them will hold their attention longer while you try to make the pounding in your head stop. Let them blow bubbles in the house. Mix up some water and cornstarch goop. Paint a picture for Daddy. Let them nap in a tent in the living room if it shuts them up for an hour. Nap with them in the tent if it shuts them up for an hour and a half. 

Of course most of these tips only work with toddlers and children, not babies. All you can really do with a baby is lay on the floor and try to relax while they play with blocks or crawl all over you...or pass the baby off onto someone else.

Babe and I are all better now and I'm hoping the Vancouver weather gets better too so that we can finally relax and enjoy the summer.

I love being healthy again!

A Blocked Booby.

OK. So I'm going to skip the post about our trip to La Conner and instead write about my recent trip to the ER. I'll post about the other trip next time.

So I've been struggling to get Babe into some sort of regular sleeping pattern. Currently she needs to nurse to fall asleep and then again (just for a minute) every time she wakes - which is about every half an hour throughout the night! And naps seem to be completely unpredictable. In an attempt to wean her from using the booby as a comfort tool I started nursing her before bed and then just trying to cuddle her to sleep. Then I rub her tummy when she would wake and only feed her twice. It was working until we went away on our trip. We were in a different room, a different bed and we were with the grandparents so the bedtime routine and the non-nursing plan went out the window.

I started again when we got home and she was just learning to fall asleep on her own when...my booby broke. The good one (I've since given up on the runt as it is slowly dying no matter what I do). Ever since the runt died I've been worried that something might happen to the good boob.

On the day it happened I was unsuccessfully trying to get Babe down for a nap at her new scheduled time, without the boob. It wasn't working and this time, because I was so tired myself, I did something I know from my experience as a nanny you should NEVER do in any discipline scenario - I gave in. I caved and said "F**k it," and I let her skip her nap. I gave her to J, which is a new treat now that he is done school and not yet working, and I went down for a nap myself.

When I awoke an hour later something was wrong. My breast felt really, really full and a little sore. I figured I just needed to nurse Babe and went to it. But Babe got frustrated quickly and I realized that no milk was coming out. After repeated attempts to nurse failed I tried pumping. Also a no go.

Now I was starting to panic because Babe won't drink from a bottle and of course it's not like I could just give her the other breast - damn you runt boob!

So I jumped in the shower and massaged the breast in the hot water, then tried again to pump and nurse. Nothing.

Envisioning the horrific freak-out Babe was sure to have when she realized that her precious booby was dead I raced off to the ER in desperation.

Like usual the ER was a zoo but I did get seen quite quickly, probably because the very lop-sidedness of my chest combined with the look of pain and irritation on my face was making everyone else in the waiting room uncomfortable. I guess there is something about a woman with one boob the size of a volleyball and one the size of a pancake that is more terrifying than a severed digit.

I think that doctors presume that a woman who has recently given birth has absolutely no shame or dignity left and are therefore perfect learning tools for medical students. I was seen by a couple of them before the "real doctor" finally came in. My personal favorite was the kid who took my medical history and asked me if the cesarean I had "was for the baby"?

This kid doesn't know a cesarean from an appendectomy and I'm supposed to entrust him with the great responsibility of ensuring my tit doesn't explode?! I think he could tell by the look on my face that it was time to get his supervisor.

I waited for another hour before a nurse found me in my room and realized that I had not been discharged as was written on my chart or whatever. No wonder no one was coming. And after a lot of confusion on the part of the male doctors (who by the way were all young and not at all skilled at hiding their disgust at the sight of my deformed breast) it was finally decided that a female OB should come to see me. So they called her and then promptly forgot about me again. I waited a couple more hours before the OB was able to sneak away from delivering babies and come help me out.

By this point my breast was very big, very sore and very lumpy. I could hardly move my arm because of the pain and I was feeling quite sorry for myself. I was also feeling lonely because of course J was at home with Babe and I was worried about her too. (She ended up drinking frozen breastmilk from a cup that night.)

When the doctor arrived (with another med student in tow) she said something that chilled me to my very core. She determined that she needed to get a breast pump and on her way out of the room she paused at the curtain and said, "I warn you, there is no pleasant way to fix this". Awesome.

Bless her soul she spent an hour rotating warm compresses, painful massage and pumping. I was offered morphine but when I heard that it would be administered through an IV that was the end of the pain management discussion. So I just closed my eyes and tried not to envision a giant zit popping, which I was assured would not be the case.

Only a little milk came out and after an hour the doctor had to go back to the maternity ward. So I was sent home with antibiotics and instructions to pump every hour or so.

After a lot of painful massage, pumping and compresses with a heating pad Babe actually broke the seal at her four am feed. She wasn't getting anything and then all of a sudden...she was choking on the milk it was coming out so fast! What a relief.

Now it's been a few days and I'm still pretty sore but at least the milk is flowing again and my right breast has reclaimed its title as "the good boob".

Thanks to my medical-field-friends S and L who gave me lots of advice and support. In fact L sent me some very helpful links on Mastitis and blocked ducts which I'll pass on below:

http://kellymom.com/bf/concerns/mother/mastitis/

http://www.breastfeedinginc.ca/content.php?pagename=doc-BD-M

Drugs and Lactation Database (LactMed) - "A peer-reviewed and fully referenced database of drugs to which breastfeeding mothers may be exposed. Among the data included are maternal and infant levels of drugs, possible effects on breastfed infants and on lactation, and alternate drugs to consider."

And just a note for any moms who might have the misfortune of getting blocked ducts or mastitis in the future:

A lot of people have told me about using cold cabbage leaves to relieve the pain. You place the big leaves over your breast like a bra. I've heard it works well, but the OB at the hospital told me that cabbage can actually dry up your milk supply and a better solution is to use refrigerated, grated potatoes. They give the same relieving effect but without the risk to the milk.

My Pregnancy Tumor: the pain in my neck.

This post is about the gross side of pregnancy not the beautiful hand-knitted booties side of pregnancy so if you aren't ready for a dose of reality, take a pass on this one:

After all of the wonderful pregnancy symptoms I have suffered through over the last nine months one symptom stands above the rest as being the most horrible.

I'm not talking about morning sickness, bloating or edema (none of which are fun). I'm talking about my pregnancy tumor aka: pyogenic granuloma. Google it, it's fucking gross. I don't have any photos of mine but if I did I wouldn't post it for you because frankly its way too embarrassing. But I did draw you a picture of it on paint and trust me, its a pretty accurate representation.

This is my awesome paint picture. I'm proud of it.

So it started as a tiny little bump on my neck that I thought was a pimple. It just showed up one night. After a couple of days it was bigger and looked like it was full of blood, so then I thought it must be a blood blister. Instead of leaving it alone I pricked it with a pin, thinking I could let out the blood and it would go away. It didn't go away. I thought maybe a drop of blood would come out but instead it bled for twenty minutes and didn't get any smaller.

I went to my family doctor and she told me what it was and that approximately five per cent of pregnant women get them. We decided to freeze it off with liquid nitrogen like you would a wart. Supposedly that works sometimes. It didn't work on my tumor. It just made my tumor angry and it got bigger. I was still optimistic at this point that all it needed was another hit, so I went to the doctor a few days later and we tried to freeze it off again. And again this angered my tumor and it got even bigger.

So for over a week it kept growing and I went through a ton of band aids covering it up every time I left the house. As if walking around with a blood-filled tumor on my neck wasn't bad enough it would also decide to rupture like a volcano at night when I was sleeping and I would wake up covered in blood and looking like an extra from The Walking Dead. Pyogenic granulomas have their own supply of blood vessels and when they bleed they really, really bleed. The last time it burst it took me over an hour and a half to get it to stop and I decided I'd had enough. By the time I went back to the doctor it had grown to the size of a blueberry! The doc sent me to see a plastic surgeon to get it removed.

To remove these things the doctor freezes the area around it and then performs a curettage and cauterisation (they cut it off and burn the wound). I was worried about having a local anesthetic while I was still pregnant, but I was also worried about the damn thing blowing a gasket while I was pushing in labour...as if bleeding from down there isn't bad enough. I was also sick of wasting what little sleep I was getting at night on blood clean-up. Still, I would have waited until after the birth and let the damn thing double in size again if the doctor hadn't assured me that a little freezing at this late stage in pregnancy isn't dangerous for the baby.

The procedure took only a couple minutes and I was sooooooooo relieved to walk out of the surgeon's office without the red blueberry on my neck! Of course I never gave any thought to the after pain and my inability to take pain meds right now. Once the freezing wore off it did start to hurt and two days later it is still very sore. But today was the first time in a month that I didn't have to leave the house with band aids and scarves covering my neck.

Hopefully all you future preggos out there will fall into the 95 per cent of people who don't get a pregnancy tumor. I wasn't that lucky, but hey it could be worse...according to the Internet many pregnant women get them in their mouths or on their lips. THAT would be waaaay worse.