Holiday travels, losing weight, and my sweet baby boy

A month has passed since my last post. It's been a busy month.

Little Man and I came back from Puerto Vallarta with colds, but by the 20th of December it looked like we'd kicked them. Then the cold virus caught a second wind and we were both feeling lousy again, just in time for the trip to Canada.

It was below zero on both the C and the F temperature scales in Winnipeg. I wore Little Man in the Baby Bjorn most of the time, with my coat pulled around us both. He stayed warm, though his poor face got chafed from rubbing against my sweaters. Most of the fabrics I wear are soft and light so they don't bother his skin, but fabrics I can wear year-round in California can only be worn there in the summertime.

The change in climate really created sinus issues for the Little Man -- saline drops weren't working to clear him up so I ended up giving him benedryl so he could drink his milk. To make things even more interesting, my breastmilk dried up shortly after we got back from Mexico, so the poor little guy was on formula. Stinky coming out, formula is.

The visit with M's family was great. Little Man is blessed with an easy disposition so he didn't seem to mind being passed around between the 20+ people at the gathering on Christmas Day. He just needed to spend a few minutes with me every hour to re-charge and he was good. His great-grandmothers were over-joyed to see him. I'm a bit of a sap and cried when they held him.

We were inundated with gifts for the Little Man. Fortunately, we had a second suitcase that was lightly packed so we could bring most of it back with us. Lots of toys and cute little outfits. We were there a week and nearly every day we were off somewhere doing something -- Boxing Day at the Mall, seeing The Hobbit, dinner with Cousins, making sure M's mother got her fair share of time with her grandchild, etc. The nice thing about all the spare adults around was that I got some baby-free time and much-needed naps. Best of all, M's father is even better with the Little Man than he is, so I felt comfortable leaving the baby with him for a couple of hours while M showed me some of his old stomping grounds and tourist sights. I told him he was very fortunate to have grown up in a population center rather than in some small town on the Plains. The capitol of Manitoba had the financial resources to fund the education of a child prodigy, and he had access to universities and college-educated people in far larger numbers than he otherwise would have.

Thankfully, the trip home was a lot less eventful than the leg to Canada was. No cancelled / redirected flights that meant hours waiting for standby and then traveling a day later -- no, just a plane that wouldn't start because it was too cold outside. We left Winnipeg an hour late and had to run to catch our connecting flight in Denver: 40 gates wearing a baby and two shoulder bags! M waited to get the baby seat and the rollaway bag. Fortunately, the airline held the flight for 15 minutes so that we and 40 other people wouldn't be stranded. Little Man was an angel on the flights. Once again he charmed everyone around us, and he fussed very little.

It was nice to get home. My old friend Dato and his partner took advantage of the house-sitting offer which got them away from the rain and cold along the Oregon coast. It was mostly sunny and dry here, so they got to spend a couple of days exploring San Francisco. The weather in SF is always better in winter than in summer. Funny how that works :)

Now that we're home, I want to start working on getting my milk production going again, but before we do that, I need to tackle the intra-abdominal pressure that is giving me both acid reflux and constipation. It really sucks that I'd never had a problem with either until Little Man was born and now the problems are big enough to affect how I sleep, how I eat, and what medications and supplements I take. I'm pretty anemic these days, but I can't take iron or even just a multi-vitamin with iron because it really binds me up and even stool softeners and milk of magnesia can take 3 days to produce a bowel movement. I saw the doctor and we're trying a week of really upping the fiber in my diet to see if that produces desired changes, otherwise, it is on to scanning or scoping. I've a feeling something is going on in my colon -- literally -- whenever I bend over I can feel something move inside me, like the kick of a baby or the snick of a ligament being pulled and then settling back into place.

That, and I've dropped nearly 15# since Thanksgiving, without trying, and much of that time with reduced or no breastmilk production. Call me silly, but I think the milk drying up is a sign something is going on.

With regards to weightloss, I've been really good about watching my portion sizes. I ate my fair share of Christmas treats -- but not too many. A sweet-tooth was never my problem, nor was junk-food. No, I was a gourmand with portion-control issues and a serious hormonal imbalance.  Lovely enough, having Little Man seems to have balanced out a lot of the hormonal weirdness of PCOS, which has made losing weight the past 7 months much easier than the prior few years. So I'm down 70# from my pre-pregnancy weight. My goal is to drop another 30# in 2013. That should put me solidly in the size 12 to 14 range and my BMI in the 20s, where it belongs, and down 160# from my highest weight in 2007. After that, it's all maintenance. I've three very good reasons to keep my weight down and be healthy and fit: me, Little Man, and M. I want to be around to see Little Man grow up and help M raise him, and given that I'll be 45 in a couple of months, its important that I take my health very seriously. I'm not 30 anymore :)

Once Little Man is over his cold I'm going to get us both on a sleep-play-feeding schedule. He's dabbling with solid foods, but I'd like to get him eating more. He's not crawling yet, but he does wriggle himself around pretty well on his belly. He's getting close to cutting a bottom tooth, I think, and he's chewing on everything he can get his hands on. He's passing things from hand-to-hand now. He knows his name. He's babbling more, and he's getting good at vocalizing when he's unhappy (grumbling) as well as laughing and cooing when he's happy. He's a fun, sweet baby, and most days I feel incredibly blessed.

2012 was an amazing year for me. Lots of changes. I've got high hopes for 2013.

Relationship after baby

I was prepared for our relationship to change as a result of Little Man's arrival, and things have changed. Not really for better or worse. They're just different.

I knew our relationship was pretty solid -- it was a major factor in my choice to proceed with a high-risk unplanned pregnancy at age 43 -- but it's proving even more solid than I'd thought. Or perhaps it's that having a baby together has gelled things for us even further. It feels good. Feels right. We're relaxed and happy with each other most of the time, and that impacts Little Man. He's a very easy, happy, loving baby. In the past month, as the baby has gotten a little more independent of me, M has really stepped up his game. He takes Little Man off my hands and has learned to distinguish between a fussy baby that he can console, and one who can only be consoled by mommy. I actually got to spend an hour digging in the garden this weekend, putting arabian jasmine and hibiscus in the ground, and digging up and transplanting a bird of paradise, some fountain grass, lavender, and rosemary. I got dirt under my fingernails and sweat in my eyes and it felt good!

I really like the relationship I have with Little Man's father. He's a good man, a kind and appreciative man. His biggest complaint about me is that I don't give him enough opportunity to do things for me. His second biggest complaint is that I'm not back to normal emotionally. I know that he was looking forward to having me "back" once the baby was born, and I did warn him that I'd still be under the influence of hormones while I'm lactating, but, well, I'm just not as unflappable as I was before-baby, and that is hard on him.  There are moments when he really irritates the hell out of me. Most of the time I know it's about me -- know that he is who he is and if something he does irritates me, that's about me, not him. It's not his nature to deliberately try to piss me off, and sometimes... sometimes I have to remind myself of that. Just like I remind him not to take my irritability personally. Being over-tired and hormonal does strange things to people, and all we can do is try to keep our heads and be compassionate with each other in the aftermath of any heated exchanges.

He's still my best friend, M is. I enjoy his company. He makes me laugh. I can talk with him about just about anything. He's communicative about his unmet needs, which keeps baby-related resentments to a minimum. He's incredibly supportive. He's always asking me what he can do for me, how he can help me achieve my goals. I'm incredibly grateful that he is such a strong breadwinner that he can support our family on his income alone -- in the Bay Area, which is so incredibly expensive to live in. And in exchange, I do my best to be frugal. He is often exasperated by my frugality, so he doesn't give me a hard time when I do spend money. I've done really well with regards to spending on the baby -- scored a lot of great stuff on Craig's List. I actually just bought the first item of baby clothes at a store last week -- an outfit for family photos next month.


Before the photos, we're going on a trip to Puerto Vallarta. I wanted to get some experience with airports and flying with the baby before heading off to Canada to meet M's family at Christmas time. When he asked where I wanted to go, I told him a quick hop to Las Vegas, or LA, or maybe San Diego for a night or two. He knows I don't care for Vegas or LA, and he wasn't interested in San Diego, so he suggested Hawaii. I love Hawaii, particularly the Big Island, but for a first time flight with a 5 month old, a 5 hour trip is daunting. However, given that we do have a passport for Little Man already, that opened up the possibility of flying south, to Mexico. Cabo San Lucas was our first thought, but then a friend suggested the more tropical Puerto Vallerta, which is just a 3.5 hour flight from SFO. Given that we were in Bali just a year ago, I've definitely got what we need for the tropics -- including SPF 50 for the baby.

As for Little Man, he's developing quite well. He's not the butter-ball people expect breastmilk-fed babies to be, though he does have a little roll on each of his thighs. He's sitting up under his own power most of the time -- until he loses interest in being upright, and then he falls over like a puppet. He's started taking control of his bottle from me when he doesn't like how I'm holding it, and as long as it's not too full, he can feed himself. Now that I've finally gotten rid of laryngitis and am talking to him more, he's more talkative -- doing his baby babble. I am amazed by how his dexterity improves daily. His strong little legs support him very well when I've got them shoulder-width apart, and his balance is improving enough that he can stand unsupported for about 5 seconds at a time. He's a cheerful baby, charming people with his big grins, and is rarely fussy or cranky in public. I took him into San Francisco to meet up with Jem and her daughter Rosie for lunch and a museum tour and he did great the whole trip -- including both legs of the BART ride.

Life is good. Not at all what I expected for myself at this age. But good. I'm blessed, and I know it.

Time flies

The past few weeks have been busy ones.

Little Man seems to be developing more rapidly. He moved his walker toward me for the first time. He's started doing repetitive gestures, like putting his pacifier in his mouth and pulling it out, again and again. I notice him inspecting things with his hands and his eyes. This morning he was laying on my chest and we were doing some eye-gazing. He reached his little hand out and stroked my cheek. I smiled. He stroked my cheek again. And again. I stroked the side of his face with my fingertips. His eyes widened and his mouth made this little 'O' of surprise. He stroked my face and I stroked his, too, and then he smiled beatifically at me. It was a moment of real connection and intimacy that left me glowing inside.

My days seem to fly by. We still don't have a routine down yet, but I'm working on it.

During the day he naps for very short periods of time, usually 10 to 20 minutes, every two to three hours. Every once in a while he will nap for an hour or more, but it is sadly quite rare, so I rarely have time to myself to do the simplest things, never mind write blog posts. I'm somehow managing to keep up with laundry and most days, the dishes, but the floors and bathrooms are rather neglected.  To top things off, the acid reflux is still making me cough at night, and I've had laryngitis for weeks. It's pretty miserable.

The new fence we had installed looks phenomenal. I hadn't realized how much effort it took not to notice the ugliness of the old fence when I was on the patio or gardening in the back yard. Of course the reason we replaced it wasn't primarily aesthetic-- it was safety. It was leaning rather dangerously in a few spots and dry rot and termites had damaged enough of the boards that I worried Alex might scuttle through by moving a board aside. But no more.  We're in the process of water sealing the fence, which is time consuming given that it's 220 feet long, 6 feet high, with another foot of lattice.

 Now I'm looking forward to updating the landscaping, moving some plants around. I've got a hydrangea that needs to be moved now that the city cut down the big trees in the parking strip-- it's getting too much afternoon sun. And the impatiens solenii that I planted this spring are getting too much sun, too. Conversely, the previous owners planted day lilies and African irises on the north facing side of the house, so they hardly bloom. I'll be moving them and planting them around the bottlebrush tree, which produces a natural herbicide that keeps grasses and weeds at bay, but which doesn't seem to bother bulbs/corms. The Arabian jasmine and the hibiscus will be going into the ground soon, once things cool down a bit more. I still have to decide whether I'm going put the wisteria in the ground or leave it in the planter. The nice thing about living in California is that it's rarely a bad time to plant, and nearly everything grows. The difficulty lies in finding the time to garden with an infant needing my attention.

We're looking at taking a short holiday somewhere so we can get the flight experience in with Little Man before the big year-end trip to meet M's grandmothers. His passport arrived in the mail this week, which opens up the possibility of a trip to Cabo San Lucas as well as Vegas and Hawaii.  M would prefer somewhere tropical-- it's been a year since our trip to Bali. I'm just not sure I want our trial flight to be 5 hours long (Hawaii).

Have infant, will I travel?

I find myself wondering how much having a child will impact my enjoyment of traveling. 

Three years ago I was on holiday in Japan with M. It was a great vacation, timed perfectly with the cherry blossoms. I particularly loved Kyoto. We stayed at the Hiiragiya Ryokan (Japanese guesthouse) and explored Kyoto, Himeji, and Nara from our base there. I call myself a wordsmith but I find it difficult to put into words what it is to experience Japan in the Spring. Fortunately for me, every time I look out my windows and see the cherry, peach, or plum trees in bloom, memories rise, making me smile.

Six months ago we were vacationing in Bali. What a slice of paradise that island is! The sights, the scents, the ever-present ocean, the food, and of course, the people. We spent the majority of our time on the eastern coast of Bali, at a lovely little resort called Puri Bagus Candidasa. Expense-wise Bali is a very reasonable place to vacation -- it's the 20+ hours of travel time that are daunting.

Birthdays in Monterey and Calistoga. Weekends in Vegas and Santa Barbara. For much of my adult life I've been able to just take off and go somewhere -- anywhere -- at a moment's notice. Even as recently as a year ago it was not uncommon for me to hop into a car at midnight and drive three hours to spend a few days with friends or family. I'm notorious for my spontaneity.

And now I'm 7 months along in an unexpected pregnancy.

I planned to drive south to spend some time with my parents next week, but it is a trip of over 200 miles, and M reminded me that I can't even sit for an hour without getting cramps somewhere, and much of the drive is through a very sparsely populated part of California, so if anything happened... I felt a small flash of irritation, but had to admit his objections were valid.

Road trips and long flights, I fear, are going to be a thing of the past. At least for a while.

In December we intend to go to Canada to see M's family. I expect that will be our first major travel-related undertaking. The baby will be nearly 7 months by then. I dread being that couple everyone hates for bringing a screaming baby on a long flight. I'm hoping that eventually we'll get air-travel with a child down to a fine art. It would be wonderful to be able to share our love of travel with our son.