glub glub

i am tired. and life goes on. this is how it is with newborns...it's kind of coming back to me, but it's all so foggy, i guess it's just more of a vague dejavu feeling (and yes, spell check says that's spelled wrong, but i know that it's something like that, dammit). i feel like i'm living life underwater...like when you try to have a tea party at the bottom of the swimming pool, or try to say things underwater and see if the other person can understand you. my eyes burn like i've been in chlorine and often times i cannot understand what someone else is trying to say, so i just smile and nod and think "whatever." i mean really, i kept harping on having a newborn...at 35...with a teenager in the house...and a preteen. but i never even began to take into consideration the whole proximity to christmas issue. yeah...glub, baby, glub.

and i was thinking tonight how pregnancies and babies kind of stick you on a health kick whether or not you want one. how you can't drink or smoke when you're pregnant. you have to eat well...for two. and then after baby's born i mean...you can drink...but not a lot...and after nine months of being pregnant, i find it best to not tempt myself. and this baby does not do well when i eat dairy...like, she cries and grunts and is in pain. so really...no drinking, no smoking, and no dairy. i'm sitting here eating this "dairy free frozen iced dessert" which basically tastes like frozen chocolate water...mmm....but i've almost knocked out the whole pint.

really, i just needed to get those things out because they're really weighing me down...killing my buzz. i am wasted tired. and it is a lonely feeling no matter who you've got to talk to because, well, i think it just has to be. babies don't talk and so mamas have to be alone, get quiet, remember how to communicate in those other ways. when i watch her, i see her change her expressions when she sleeps. i see things that make me laugh out loud or get tears in my eyes. i watch her look like me, like her brothers, like her dad. i watch her take in her world. i can tell when she's looking at something or just zoning out, getting ready to fall asleep. i see her dance with sleep, in and around sleep. i love to watch her relax. my favorite is when she makes really passionate noises...not cries...almost like crying, but she pauses in between...to give me time to think about what she's said.

she likes the indigo girls. ask her biggest brother...he tries to play all kinds of music for her on his guitar, but the only thing that soothes her is closer to fine. her littlest big brother got to hold her standing up tonight...this was huge for him...i don't know why kids are so adamant to try the very things you ask them not to...he'd mention it every other day or so..."i can't wait until i'm big enough to hold the baby standing up"...but he did really well. one of her middle big brothers constantly refers to himself in the third person when he talks to her...i wonder sometimes if she wonders who he's talking about...even though i know she's not quite there yet...it just strikes me as funny. and her other middle big brother finally held her for the first time two nights ago, even though he's almost six years older than the littlest big brother ("he's the only brother who hasn't held her standing up...well, the only big brother who's ALLOWED to hold her standing up that is...i'm not allowed yet"). he doesn't talk to her too much...he's like me...he's afraid of rejection from the babies...afraid they'll see some character flaw we're able to hide from older, less observant folks.

life is so different. it is so much harder in some ways. it is so much richer in some ways. it's so rich, it's like walking through sticky mud...makes you slow down...wears you out...gets frustrating, throws off your groove..but you also notice more stuff. you can look at your feet and dwell on being angry that your shoes are getting fucked up. you can fret at the time that's being wasted. or you can look around and see how much greener everything is after all the rain. of course, when it rains in the winter, there's not so much green. but there is still a beauty to things being bare...everything waiting for the next spring. mostly, i'm just excited i can type sentences...well, sort of...even while i'm so tired.

now i must go figure out what i've bought each child for christmas...i can't keep things straight in my head. and i need to go finish the last of my christmas cards. and drink some water...i keep forgetting to drink the damned water. how are you supposed to make breast milk when you forget to drink fluids?...glub glub

peace

dare i be so bold...

as to say i'm back? it'd be nice...but maybe this is just another visit, i don't know. i blog all the time in my head, though. just never really have the time to sit down and type it out. there are so many other hundreds of things i haven't yet gotten to...things i'm pretty severely behind on...but here i sit. must be time, i guess.

so i had the baby. a girl, ifyoucanbelieveit. i'm having a hard time believing it myself. things i forgot about having a newborn...

it is exhausting. like, i know what exhausting means. i understand intellectually what it means when someone says they're exhausted. i've even described myself as exhausted, and i really thought i was at the time. but i don't know that i've really experienced exhaustion in its truest sense since my youngest son turned a year old. but now...oh, now...i am really getting reacquainted with exhaustion. and really, i'm being a weinie about it because my baby girl, she sleeps pretty well, nurses pretty well...shame on me for complaining. but i will add, as a disclaimer, that i'd been getting a good eight hours a night for at least four years, and this has been quite a descension, which spell check says is not a word, but i'm saying it is.

healing...i forgot what healing was like after birth.

well, i hear a sweet fragile little cry coming my way. and it makes my breasts feel as though they're going through the little roller thing at the car wash that you send the chamois through...can't think of the word for some reason. anyway...i'll try again tomorrow.

mostly, though, it's really good. my therapist said, "love always softens you." and it's true. we're all just gloppy gloopy messes around here. milk, tears, smiles, spit up, laughter, sometimes a little drool...i think she may be each of her brothers first true love...and we are all grateful.

peace