Tag Archives for parenting

the acrobatic feat that parenting is


times magazine

Originally uploaded by moyalynne

it is *leanne’s birthday* — and she and i had this exhausting (yet now run-of-the-mill) email exchange about how to manage, in general, our lives:

leanne:

on march 29 …..

you have a dentist appt at 8am

lucy’s due at c5 at 9:30am — which is a bit awkward since she usually goes down for a nap at 9am so maybe we can ask on thursday if we can bring her by at 8:45am or so before she gets nap-fussy.

so i’ll be dropoff person for lucy

i’m going to oakland at 2pm to pickup otivo’s colo servers with elizabeth. lucy is due to be picked up at 3:30

would you like to be pickup person for lucy?

then, next day, march 30, you could do dropoff alone and i’ll do pickup alone?

all of this makes me nervous.

moya:

so far we’ve all done really well.
i think we’ve discussed the rest but here goes with my memory:

monday evening
?see robert and dave?
gather and prepare bottles for tuesday morning; refrigerate

tuesday march 29
i leave by 8am from home for dr N
you pack the milk i pumped monday and a couple more bottles of formula and leave the same time and we walk partway together.
you have the most emotional farewell and good luck. you write that i will be there by three to feed lucy her afternoon meal.
i go immediately from dentist to work (do i drive to dentist?) and i pump at work @ 11a.
—> one of us or both calls to see how it’s going <–
i meet with guido and other guys at 1. i leave by 2. @ around 2:45~3, i drive into the parking garage, arrive @ c5, pick her up and take her and eat at otivo or i feed her there and then take her to otivo. you arrive back from colo at 4 or something at the same time as us; we all sit down and cry together.
@ home – wash and prep bottles for the next day

wednesday march 30
i pack the milk i pumped, plus a coupla bottles. drop lucy off by 830 or so and tell them i will feed lucy for her ~ 11a meal.
i call or they call me? or i show up at 11a, using the parking pass or a meter? lucy dines after hopefully having napped, and i race to work to be able to pump again at 1:30 for an afternoon of meetings.
you pick lucy up ~ 4? 5? and i come back to ?otivo? by 5? to meet you and lucy and for a snack before we take her home and feed solids.

whew; maybe we should just make it up instead of trying to plan.

“they say it gets better”

lucy is six weeks old today. they say it gets better at six weeks. yesterday she smiled, it seemed, non gassy – so it seemed like a good morning but the afternoon and evening were screaming. her screaming is so loud it gives me a headache which hurts. we might have overstimulated her.

i’ve been mourning myself – thinking today that i didn’t feel through inventing myself – and now inventing myself feels like past tense. now, the important person to invent herself is lucy. but i still want to study ___ or explore ___. i tried to explore it with leanne this morning but we just wound up talking about finding temporary daycare or leanne staying at home taking care of lucy or lucy in the office at otivo — somehow not about me. leanne feels bad when i say i didn’t get to explore as i needed.
or is the ‘reinvention’ or ‘invention’ now to invent myself as a ‘mother’? is that the only important role going forward?