So You Want to Know How Things are Going?

The other day a friend I haven't seen in a while said he was glad I was blogging again. I think he was being facetious.

I used to think blogging was hard when I had one baby. Psh. Way wrong.

More than two months since my last post. I hang my head in shame.

Mentally

Part of the reason why I haven't blogged, and probably the biggest reason, is that I think my brain has died. I'm in this constant fog of poor memory and fragmented thoughts and sentences. I tried reading a book a few weeks ago. I reread the same pages over and over and finally gave up because I had no idea what I was reading. It wasn't even a hard book. I also have pregnancy induced dyslexia. I read words as another closely spelled word, i.e. "peace" was actually "beach". I missed a church meeting this week because I've forgotten how to read calendars. An attorney friend of mine is convinced I will at some point work for her part time. I keep telling her that the academic part of my brain that enabled me to do my awesome paralegal-ing is gone. I worry it may be permanent.

In my defense, I have two babies under 16 months. Two babies. Not two children. Babies. We put our trash out the other day and the trash people brought it back to the house and dumped it out on the front porch because we'd reached the weekly limit of rank diapers. [Okay that's a lie but don't think it hasn't occurred to me it might actually happen.]

Physically

I am the heaviest, most out of shape I have ever been in my life. If I tried to play basketball right now, I would die. Luckily my pre-Holden-pregnancy jeans still fit. But I could maybe fit a leg in my pre-Sydney-pregnancy jeans. Some overly cheery OB doc said that your body is its healthiest right after you have a baby. Bahaha! Where'd she get her degree?!?!

From my favorite TV show: "You joined a gym??" "Yeah." "When??" "After I had Rory to lose the baby weight." "Did you go?" "Heck no. I was WAY too fat."

Sleeping

I've told Jericho on a number of occasions that he shouldn't expect anything substantial for dinner until Holden starts sleeping through the night. We have a somewhat working system for nighttime Holden duty. The first plan was for me to take duty on the nights during the week when Jericho works and he would take the weekends. After the third night of doing this, I woke in the morning to Jericho saying goodbye as he left for work, crying before I could even say anything. I was practically sleep crying. I'd reached a new area of ways to cry.

We now share the nights. Consecutive nights is what brings on the psychosis. Sometimes we do every other night. Sometimes we each take one in the same night. Sometimes the plan falls apart during the night because one of us has become immune to the sounds of the waking babies. One of us being me. Seriously. Some mornings I have to ask Jericho if/when Holden woke up. Holden sleeps five feet from my head.

Eating

Holden eats all.the.time. Sometimes during the day he eats almost every hour. I'm glad I decided not to nurse because it would have killed me. At his two-month check-up, he weighed in at one pound shy of doubling his birth weight. The average time for babies to do this is 6 months. I worry what his teen years will be like.

Outings

I've managed to venture out of the house with both babies. My first destination: Target. It was awesomely therapeutic. I made it out to the van with two happy babies - Syd in the cart, Holden in the Bjorn- looking around for my Mom Award. My next destination: Harris Teeter. I have a Wal-Mart and a Lowe's Foods two seconds from my house and the Harris Teeter is twenty minutes in an entirely different city. The twenty minute drive was so worth being at my favorite grocery store and, the real reason I made the drive, to get Sydney to fall asleep. The cashier asked me how old my babies were. One month and 14 months. She said I had my hands full. Why, yes, I do. Thanks for noticing. She didn't even ask me if I needed help out. She called over a nice man named Lee and he wheeled Sydney and my groceries to the mom-mobile.

[Aside: Do you hate the comments about having your hands full? Sometimes I want to respond with things like- "Actually, not really. I'm practically a superhero at this whole mom thing and it's total cake. I'm thinking of going on fertility for the next pregnancy so I can have triplets. I'm that good at this."]

This is my world. Jericho asks what I have planned for the day. Oh ya know, feed babies, change diapers, and if I have time, I'll eat something, maybe go to the bathroom a couple times, and if I can swing it, shower.

My world may often bring me to tears or cause me to drive around my town for half an hour listening to the soothing sounds of Harry Potter while both babies chill out. But every day I get to see these little faces. Sydney is a nut that constantly makes me laugh at her nuttiness. And Holden is the most angelic little stud. He smiles and sleeps and eats and smiles. I know every parent thinks it but I know my babies are the best.