The Terrible Thirteens* …or how I almost came to lose my mind in the space of a fortnight ;o)

As I type this, which I’ve been trying to do for oh, about 2 weeks now, Baby F. is crying in her bedroom. The bedroom, whose door I’m sitting directly in front of. That she can see me from. That I’m only about 10 feet from.

I think I’ve been very lucky so far with Baby F. She wasn’t colicky, she slept through the night almost immediately after arriving home from the hospital, she’s good with people, friendly and sweet….

So maybe I had it coming after being so fortunate ;o). 

We had a period almost like this late last year. I call that time my lost Autumn. The season, principally late October and all – and I do mean all - of November, when she decided she’d become inconsolable and unhappy regardless of anything I did. And so I stopped doing pretty much anything besides feeding and changing and trying to amuse her.  My sleeping went kaput, I became a daytime zombie, and I fell into a terrible hole from which I just managed to emerge sometime around December 1^st or so.

But then it was all okay again. As quickly as the weirdness came, it went away. And all rejoiced, for Baby F. was truly merciful ;o)

But now it’s back. The weirdness, the tantrums, the indiscriminate screaming, the crazy flailing.

Even worse than before. 

Now she can crawl. The developmental stage that we were so pleased with, has now turned into a source of daily grief. Because with the ability to crawl, comes the unwillingness to stay still anywhere. Where before, that long gone time of 2 weeks ago , she was perfectly happy to amuse herself in her bedroom  - secure with a door gate (and it’s a large room) – she now freaks out at being placed in it.

Baby F. alternates between wanting to have some hugs and a cuddle on my lap to immediately pulling ‘The Matrix’ and throwing herself completely back, horizontally, with a stretch and a tautness that before seeing it, I’d have thought impossible from any human, much less a baby. 

And sure, some of these little tantrums are likely teething related. 

But only a very select few.

For the most part, she’s just going through a really bad phase.

I know this rationally, of course.

Both I and Papa-in-Training have Googled our hearts out and consulted whatever books we’ve picked up along the way or that fellow Mamas and Papas have kindly passed on to us. So we know this is not unusual or odd.

But knowing this and dealing with it on a daily basis is another thing altogether. I’m finding it very hard to deal with it. I dread Mondays and having to take care of Baby F. on my own until either Papa-in-Training comes home or Vóvó drops by for a wee visit. And of course I feel like crap for feeling this way. But when you have tons of things to do, your apartment is in shambles, you’re neglecting your friends, and your baby is being impossible, it’s hard not to end up feeling crappy.

Weekends help tremendously, when Papa-in-Training pretty much takes over and I get to at least have a semblance of some time without having to take care of a wailing baby, whether it be to have a proper shower, write a letter or tidy up a closet.

But it’s not quite enough right now.

We’re pretty much stuck, the two of us. 

Baby F. with the wailing and the flailing and me with the guilt at not really knowing how to or wanting to deal with it, but of course doing it.

I hope this ‘phase’ goes away soon so we can get back to being semi-productive and having fun learning and playing, instead of near-constant tantrums. 

I know it will. We’ll just have to wait it out. 

Wish us luck :o)



*Thirteen months, of course, not thirteen years ;o).

Raider of every last book

We knew from the beginning, even before Baby F. was born, that we wanted her to be bilingual. I’m originally from Portugal and all of my family speaks Portuguese. A few of the younger members can speak English, but for the most part it’s Portuguese all the way on my side.

We read the articles about how Baby F.’s language development might be slightly delayed due to the dual nature of her learning, but also read about how babies eventually caught up. We thought it well worth the small delay, since to do otherwise would cut her off from half of her family – the larger half too ;o)

The way we’ve managed it so far is thus:

During the day, Mama-in-Training, aka moi, and Baby F., speak in Portuguese…well, I speak and she mostly babbles. Then in the evening when Papa-in-Training comes home, we switch to English. I try my hardest to only use Portuguese during the day, although of course, the occasional English word slides in unannounced. Mostly when I encounter something apocalyptic in her diaper or when the cats have once again rebelled and attempted to take over our flat ;o)

I think it’s going pretty well – she babbles a whole lot, even when she’s just on her own, playing.

But the best part is that she has now spoken her first words!

And Ta Da! -  they’re in both languages!

She can say Mama – which is the same in Portuguese and English - as well as Daddy; but most importantly for her everyday life, she’s said gato, which is cat in Portuguese.  She sort of ignores the hard g and instead says 'ahto', but she definitely says it. She almost said Oscar today (one of the cats’ names), but I think that’s still a bit too complicated. I’m pretty pleased with 'ahto' for now :o)

She can recognize many other words though and point to the objects they stand for, which is just in keeping with a child her age. Today’s recognized item was meia, or sock. She looooooves her socks. Particularly loves to take them off and chew on them. Sometimes she likes to chew on them while they’re still attached to her feet – she’s all sorts of flexy…then again, so is her mama. I could’ve been Daniel Day-Lewis’s stand-in for My Left Foot. Really. It's a bit freaky ;o)

And reading to her / reading while nursing her or while near her, seems to be paying off as she absolutely loves to ‘read’. Loves to look at books - although honestly at this point, she mostly looks at them upside down – and loves to play with and grab them off shelves.

Exhibit A:

'I'll just take a look at one wee little book, shall i?'

Exhibit B:

'Every book in the world...i must haz them!'

Cue Papa-in-Training’s reaction upon entering Baby F.’s room:
'WTF?!?'

What he didn’t see was that after the first bookshelf cube was emptied, Baby F. wanted to start in on the upper one. I told her no, to which she promptly reacted to by wailing her head off.

Ah, the joys of reading  :P

Time keeps on ticking, ticking, ticking into the future...with apologies to Steve Miller ;o)

Gaaaaaaaaaah!

How can it be March already? I've blinked and Christmas flew by. Then my birthday. Then Baby F.'s birthday. Then Presidents' Day.
Will I next blink and it'll be Easter?

Wait.

Is it Easter already?

Did i miss it?

Gaaaaaaaaah!

Everyone tells you when you're a new mom that time flies. To appreciate the baby years because they'll soon be gone and you'll have a grumpy teenager in your hands...not literally in your hands, 'cause then they'd be like Thumbelina, but i digress...

But then you actually have a baby.

And if you stay home with her as i did (no idea if the same applies for work-outside-the -home mamas), you scoff and tell them, Pshaw, I say! Pshaw, to your idea of time flying.

Because time draaaaaaaaags when you stay home with a newborn. The days go on for weeks, months even. You hope it's a Friday and realize it's only 9:30 am on Monday, so sleep-deprived and disoriented have you become.

But then something happens around month 9th or so of taking care of your newborn. And suddenly, you can't keep up with time. It flies, it gallops, it slips past you without even a 'How do you do?'

And all that slowness that you complained about almost constantly? That vague tortoise-like feeling you experienced on a daily basis? It's gone. And left in its' place is a sense of not being able to keep up, leaving things to the side, always being behind, because the days are so fast!

Of course, time is only an illusion, a man-made construct to help us organize our lives. We all know the feeling of those last 10 minutes of a class in the 6th grade - how excruciatingly long they were - and how 10 days of a wonderful vacation can feel like merely a moment. But geesh, i really wasn't expecting such a drastic change.

I'm trying as much as i can to appreciate each moment with baby F. and i think I'm managing for the most part. Ironically enough the thing that i think made the first months seem to drag so much, the lack of sleep, is still a constant in my everyday. I've always had sleep issues but they've obviously been exacerbated by having a little one that occasionally wakes up during the night.

But that's actually the funniest bit...she doesn't even wake up that often during the night. Almost not at all. And when she does, Papa-in-training is the one to soothe her 'cause i just seem to get her too excited and even more awake.

What she does do though is take long naps...on top of me. And yep, she's almost 13 months and i haven't yet managed to break her out of that habit :o(

So i end up spending upwards of 3 hours during the day sitting down without being able to move a great deal. And i don't get to do most of anything during the day...which then leads me to staying up late at night trying to catch up, to write a friend, to do some writing, to do some tidying up.

But getting back to my original thought...

Even though my sleep is still crap, suddenly the days aren't so slow anymore. And I'm not really sure why.
Until i figure out why, I'll just keep on enjoying getting to see Frida grow and learn new things.

Artwork made for our friend's birthday using Penguin cover Postcards :o)

P.S. Because i always like to have a pic of something I made/did in each post, and since he finally received it, here's one my friend took of a birthday present Papa-in-Training and moi made for him.

P.P.S. Programming note: If you like Pawn Stars at all but like your items a bit weirder and heck, even a bit scarier, then fire up your Netflix and throw Oddities in your Queue. Lovely store-owners with super eclectic tastes. I've sort of devoured most of the available episodes within the last 3 days...i did mention the whole being trapped under a baby thing, didn't i? ;o)