But you know what is different this time around?  My little sister is going through some of the same things right along with me. She had her baby just a few weeks before Baby O.

Here’s how a typical phone call with sis tends to start:

Me: Hey. You busy?

Sis: No. Just sitting here nursing.

Me: Hey – Guess what I’m doing?

Sis: Nursing?

Me: Yup. How’d you guess?

It can be so reassuring to know that someone else is going through the same things you are going through. Sis may be living all the way in New York while I sit here in Texas, but we both sit on our couch every day, gazing at our baby’s face and gritting our teeth while we look at the dust-bunnies roll like tumbleweeds across the floor, knowing that there isn’t a chance in hell that they will be cleaned up anytime soon.  We are both putting our babies ahead of our disheveled homes.

Just the other day I had to call Sis to vent about how people keep pointing out the spit-up that continually appears on my shirt or on Baby O’s mouth/lips/neck-folds/shirt. I mean, how dare they point out the unavoidable obvious, like I should be doing something about it. I’ve somewhat come to terms with the way I look and smell, but the masses haven’t.  You know who else understands this? Sis does. I love that. Then we talked about how, no matter how much we try, we can’t seem to get the spit up to land on the burp rag. Our babies seem to almost always aim elsewhere. On the arm, down the sleeve, on the neck, and the worst – between the boobs! Who else can you call, other than your sister, to vent about cold clammy baby vomit dribbling down your chest?

We are helping each other in other ways, too. Since I’m nursing my 4th and she is nursing for the first time, I’ve been putting my counseling skills to use with some breastfeeding assistance. I’m not sure if I’m always helping, but I’m trying my best. What she probably doesn’t know is how she is helping me. This is my fourth child and I think if I didn’t pay attention, I just might get lost in the stress of dealing with a household where the needs of 4 demanding children are constantly battling with my sanity. Talking to my sister as she nurses her little one reminds me that it’s OK to occasionally sit and focus on Baby O without guilt, because every baby is a new relationship. I’m falling in love once again, much like the first time, and nourishing that relationship in these early days of spit-up and sleeplessness is important and necessary.

Thank goodness for sisters.

[Thanks to John 'K' for the above photo.]

So the other night I was sitting around with DDalmost-6 and we were talking about what we might name the baby. DD started suggesting the most wonderful, magical, and sometimes hilarious names. I started writing them all down. For DD, this was about figuring about the best names for the baby. For me, it was about reveling in her mind and her world. Reading over the names again, it brings a smile to my face to imagine how her imagination works. It makes me happy to see that her world is so filled with joy.

Here’s what we came up with: Fairy Princess, Purple Petunia, Tinkerbelle, Videa, Fishy, Magic Wand, Diamond Star, Star, Pumpkin, Mulan, Rainbow, Ornament, Christmas Tree, Tulip, Tree, Pink Tulip, Glitter, Rainbow Sparkles, Moon, Waves, Sparkle Princess, Vine, Plant, Rain, Rain Cloud, Rain Rain Go Away, Rabbit, Ocean Leaf, Booger, Ocean, Dark Star, Ocean Boat, Pretty Clover, Rainbow Star, Rainbow Heart, Starlight Starbright, Autumn Rain, Spring, Fall, Valentines Heart, Butterfly, Sunshine Flower, Blue Butterfly, Rainbow Diamond, Jingle Heart, Jingle Song.

When I suggest “Soda” (a la Seinfeld), DD replied, “Well, that’s kinda crazy food. You’d eat up your name!” Evidently “Soda” is just too crazy for a girl that thinks “Rain Rain Go Away” is a great name.

We decided on a few vetoed names: Dracula, Drac, Blood, Vampire Blood.

At the tail end of the brainstorming session, DS8 came in to suggest a few: Green Vine, Belly Big, Naked Butt. Another window on another kid’s mind. Sweet.

I’m kind of partial to Belly Big. I’m thinking about how this time is probably going to be my last time with a belly quite so big. I’m looking forward to that.

[Photo Credit: miri695]

My current child is 16 months right now. She nurses most nights every 2 hours, in my estimation. I never sleep through nightly nursing sessions, as many nursing mothers can, just because I’m not capable of it. I just can’t sleep through the sessions for some reason. So I’m up over the course of the night A LOT! I am seriously touched out on a regular basis, sometimes to the point that I feel like I might just scream. Seriously. and this is not my only child that has nursed at night regularly. My first nursed every two hours at night until he was 2.5 years old (he spontaneously night-weaned when I was pregnant with number 2). and my second child nursed at night regularly until she was 4.

The most important things I’ve done to make the nights tolerable are this:

1. I make sure I’m physically in bed at night, trying to sleep, for at least 10 hours.
2. My husband is required to get up at least one hour earlier than me and take the baby out of the bed and out of the room to give me a break.

#1 is important because I have to get around 7.5-8 hours of sleep in order to be a happy mom. So if I’m up all night nursing, I have to be in bed for much longer than those 8 hours. So if that means I have to go to bed at 8 or 9 pm, I do it. For me, I’m willing to skip interacting with the husband in the evening, or watching TV, or whatever. Sleep is more important to me. If the baby isn’t ready to sleep when I go to bed, my husband hangs out with her and the other kids while I get a head start on sleep. He knows to bring the baby in when she is *really tired and ready to nurse* (sometimes he rushes it when she just starts to get cranky, and then I have to lecture him a bit!).

#2 is sooooo important because I’m usually totally touched out by the end of the night, and I absolutely need that hour or so totally alone in bed to recharge. It really helps me so much. When my husband takes the baby out of bed in morning, he sometimes just sits with the sleeping baby on his chest in front of his laptop. Or if the baby wakes up, he feeds her breakfast and reads to her and stuff.

Here’s another thing I’ve done to cope: I’ve adjusted my expectations. I know this sounds kind of simplistic, but bear with me. There were some nights when all I could think about was getting the baby detached from my breast so that I could roll over and sleep without touching her. By the end of the night, I’d spent most of the night trying to detach and feeling stressed and miserable when it didn’t work for at least half of the nursing sessions. Plus, I was exhausted and angry about it. It was bad. Then, one night, I sort of went into it thinking that I was going to make the best of it, making sure I had a really comfortable pillow for my lower back, and just trying to relax and sleep and get comfortable in the nursing position. After those nights, even if I spent equal times nursing, I realized I felt better. I didn’t realize the difference at first, until I talked about it with my husband. and then it was like, “Eureka!” So now I try to go into the night just figuring that I’m going to be attached to the baby most of the time. Not that I don’t often try to detach. But I try not to get all caught up in focusing on getting away from her. And it makes me feel so much better when morning comes. If I’ve managed to have a few hours of independent sleep, that an extra bit of coolness. If I’ve spent most of the night with a baby attached to my breast, that’s OK, too, because I didn’t set myself up for failure in the beginning.

One last coping strategy that comes to mind: Use childbirth coping strategies to get yourself by in the most stressful moments. I was reminded to use the childbirth strategies when my first was getting older, and he was sort of giving me “the willies” when we nursed (people who have nursed older children sometimes have this toe-curling sensation than can really bug you.) A fantastic unschooling parent suggested that I use coping strategies to get through the rough patches. Now I use the coping strategies when I feel touched out and really want to run away. My favorite coping strategies are listed in Birthing from Within: An Extra-Ordinary Guide to Childbirth Preparation .  They have all sorts of visualization strategies that have really worked for me. My favorites are “spiraling” and “Quaker listening”. You can use these visualizations to either distract yourself from freaking out, or you can use these things to relax. It’s really similar to childbirth in a way. In labor, you have this pain sensation. So you need to focus on other things to reduce the pain. With being touched out, the replacement for pain is the sensation of this nursling who is nursing and being in constant contact with you. We love our kids, but sometimes the sensations just become too much for us (just like in birth). There is one visualization that involves spiraling smoke from your core, which can help you to relax and fall back asleep at the same time.

I love that birth metaphor. Just like we go through the pain (and hopefully, pleasure) of birth for our babies, we sometimes have to go through some more stressful things in meeting their needs in the early years. It’s also  important to remember that we often need a partner’s support in breastfeeding,  just like we need our partner’s support during labor and birth. [This is, of course, if we have a partner in our bedroom at night. This may be more difficult for single parents!] Our partners may have no idea what “being touched out” feels like, as they may have had no idea what giving birth is like. But partners can still try to understand and help us through it. If we explain that the work of breastfeeding is just a continuation of the work of labor and birth, perhaps the partners will feel more able to give us the help we need to cope with night nursing.

[Photo credit: Raphael Goetter]

Where human milk is available for free for all those rare circumstances when a baby might need it, and for as long as the baby needs it.

Where there are comfortable benches anywhere a breastfeeding mother might need one – in the supermarket, at the pharmacy, on the sidewalk. Not just at the playground.

Where, when people see a woman bottle feeding a baby, they assume it must be a babysitter, or perhaps a mother with a severe medical conditions that prevented her from breastfeeding (very rare), not a mother for whom the breastfeeding support was lacking, because breastfeeding is truly the norm.

Where new mothers aren’t worried or nervous about the idea of breastfeeding in public, and where they feel confident going out to breastfeed for the first time.

Where there are strong laws with severe penalties for those that would try to stop a mother from breastfeeding, but where these laws are mostly unnecessary and rarely used, because people don’t harass breastfeeding mothers.

Where new mothers learn about breastfeeding from their families and friends, and from years of seeing people breastfeeding out in public, and where breastfeeding classes are unneeded and are a thing of the past.

Where breastfeeding rates are way way up, and breast cancer rates are down.

Where people on talk shows don’t debate whether nursing a 6 or 7 year old is wrong, because they trust breastfeeding mothers, and know  breast feeding has nothing to do with sex.

Where children are used to seeing breastfeeding going on everywhere, and no one worries what a child might think or do if they see a mother breastfeeding her child.

Where the sight of a breastfeeding mother makes everyone smile and where we all feel healthy enough inside ourselves to take pleasure in seeing a happily breastfeeding baby.

Where health-care professionals don’t give out incorrect information to nursing mothers, and where dentists don’t moonlight as experts on parenting.

Where a mother who is having breastfeeding difficulties can call any number of friends and family members to come and help her out, and where people all around her will rally to support her breastfeeding relationship, and where she knows she can turn in any direction for breastfeeding help.

Happy World Breastfeeding Week 2010 (August 1-7, 2010)!!

If you are having difficulty breastfeeding, call a La Leche League Leader for free help.

Look at my nostrils, world, and despair

I’ve been noticing how M, now 7, has become more and more social as time has gone on.  Socialization is, of course, one of the hot button issues when it comes to learning outside of school.  Why people think learning to be social with 30 other kids who are also learning to be social makes sense – especially when the main lessons are to sit down, be quiet and do what you’re told – is beyond me.  (If recess were 6 hours long, I could see school as a place to learn social skills, but not in a classroom.)

I wouldn’t have noticed his social skills much if it weren’t for other parents noting repeatedly that he is/was quiet, or adults who talked to him and tried to force the conversation along by noting how quiet he was.  Sometimes they were genuinely nice about making gentle jokes, but often it came across as a bit rude and judgmental.

To me, he was just himself.  I would know, since I was a quiet, shy kid with memories of being forced to be social.  I recalled feeling angry and embarrassed.  I was ok to let M be and not embarrass him needlessly.

It wasn’t always easy – sometimes people would say Hi to him and ask his name and he wouldn’t respond.  Or sometimes he would turn around and walk away.  I felt embarrassed on occasion and had to remind myself that it was about him, not me.  Once we had some privacy, I’d talk to him about politeness and why responding to questions about his name may be a nice thing to do.  He’d listen, and sometimes he’d respond to me, sometimes he wouldn’t.  That’s just him and how he felt at the time.

But from time to time, there would be glimpses of his growth and self-confidence.  When he was comfortable, he would often not stop talking.  He was like that at home, of course, and with family.  But one day he spent well over an hour talking to a neighbor’s relative visiting from Mexico.  An almost stranger, yet he was yabbering away.  We have no clue what they were talking about, but that doesn’t matter.  What matters is that he was confident and comfortable in that moment, with that person.

In the past year he’s finally started to make polite responses when strangers say Hi or ask his name.  Ever since we moved to the beach, he’s shown a much greater interest in meeting and playing with new kids at the beach.  We’ve given him suggestions on how to break the ice – smile, say Hola, offer a toy to play with.  He rarely takes the suggestion immediately, but he remembers (he’s always been like that – we can explain something and he’ll know it months later).

Yesterday he saw a kid on the beach, a younger kid with his parents.  The mother was familiar as she works in a store we’ve been in a few times.  He went over to where they were and the next thing we knew, he was yabbering away with the mom.  I realized then that he had the confidence in himself to just go and do it, and I felt happy for him – and a bit sad that the little boy isn’t so little anymore.

I should have seen it coming – he’s been more likely to ask strangers questions, like when looking for something in a store.  I wonder if it’s osmosis as I’ve found myself starting conversations with strangers everywhere I go – which was not common at all in the US.

I feel so privileged to witness this growth.  It’s a natural, wonderful progression – and it’s just him being himself.  We could have pushed him to be like this or that, but as we trusted, he grew at his own time and pace.  I believe the long-term benefits of self-confidence are well worth a couple of short years of not conforming to social expectations.