This Is Still Not a Mommy Blog (Even Though That’s All I Do All Day)

Before I spawned my urchin, I was adamant about keeping the metalepsical church and state firmly separated.

I read all of those books about the importance of  keeping your grown up self intact and building a life where the baby mostly fits into your rhythms and routines rather than the other way around. I was pretty certain that I had enough going on in my life, both intellectually and socially, that I would never be that person who posts regular photos of her progeny both on the blog and on social media.

It would be like my pregnancy, I swore- very low key and private, with only a few well thought out and focused discussion pieces published every few months.

It wouldn’t take over.

Ha.

Hahahahahaha.

They’re everywhere…

Holy crap, these days I am just waiting for someone to screen shot one of my posts as an example of tedious over-sharing and sending it off to STFU Parents for shaming.

The thing is, I’ve tried really hard to keep my core adult self intact. It’s harder than it might look, even at my advanced age with all the cumulative brain-detritus I have from decades of travel, reading, experimentation and wild discussions with odd people in bars at midnight. I thought it would be enough to see me through at least the first few years of child rearing, with adult creds and dignity intact.

But it’s a lot harder than just saying, yo, look, I’ve still got it: we’re moving back to Asia soon and I’m learning another language and I’m doing experimental carne asada in the slow cooker and churning out channa flour spicy crepes and I’m doing various online university courses through Coursera.org and reading lots and lots of intense long-form journalism articles and a few actual novels and complicated non-fiction books. Last night, I did my fencing course’s grade 1 foil exam and got 100% in both theory and practice. I’m busy, y’all.

Yes, I’m ticking a ton of grown up boxes.

Look- a very brief girl’s night out at Sichuan place! (Photo courtesy of Jeannie Mark)

Yeah, no.

The thing is, these days, 98% of my day is generally spent wrangling the urchin. Some days are more challenging than others.

Yesterday, for example,  was a solid, pure hell. He was in one of those moods where if he wasn’t glued to my hip or latched to my bosom, he was howling like the world was about to end. Plunk him in his chair and his face would immediately crumple and a tearful air raid siren would issue forth. Plunk him on the carpet to play with his odd German toys and he would immediately roll onto his front and get stuck and howl. Put him in the jolly jumper in the doorway to keep him occupied while I did something that needed two hands (the washing up, the laundry, chopping veggies, brining chicken bits, whatever) and he’d be fine until he suddenly wasn’t and, again, his face would crumple and turn red and distraught and a banshee wail would emerge just when I was inconveniently up to my elbows in, say, raw chicken juice or sticky bread dough.

So when I said I was doing all of those things above, all of those grown up things that I’m adamantly holding onto, I’m not lying but I’m also not strictly doing those things with a clear focus and dedication and any degree of success.

And so I write about it.

I note my small successes online, happy when comments trickle in and remind me that it’s all normal and part of a process that will evolve and grow and that this exhausting bit is temporary and, generally and universally, pretty all-encompassing and intense.

This set up lasted all of 8 minutes before his eyes popped open and he announced his wakefulness.

The funny thing is, the hard bits aren’t what I expected.

Everyone said to me before he was born, get your sleep now because you’ll never sleep again and you’ll never know exhaustion like that which comes with a newborn.

Bullshit- 12 hour night shift gigs at the nursing home with Alzheimers patients were harder. My first university gig in Shanghai with that mad 2 hour commute (each way) out to Beyond Pudong was harder. Being broke and cold and stranded in Romania in winter was harder. Being 7, 8, 9 months pregnant with horribly arthritic hands and feet and a very active unborn creature kicking me day and night from within was harder.

I get better sleep now than I did during any of those times.

I was told that the general mundane upkeep of a baby would be endless and tedious and exhausting.

Again, no, not really. Not yet, anyway. Keeping him clean and fed and rested is pretty straightforward and part of daily rhythms, tacked onto my own routines. I cooked and cleaned before he was born. I still do. Maybe my ridiculous history of taking on similar jobs (but involving live in care for debilitated grown ups) helps for perspective. Dunno.

But what I’ve found hardest is what I noted above: how can I keep the grown up part of me alive and well when I am tending to someone else’s wholly undeveloped emotional and physical well-being all day and all night?

It’s trickier than I had anticipated.

No one told me that sometimes babies simply won’t accept the notion of sleeping in their own cot, much less their own room. We’ve been trying to get Oscar into Moses baskets, carry cots and cribs since birth and he howled for hours with each one, even with it positioned next to our bed, even with our hand dangling down for midnight baby back rubs. He currently sleeps in a 3 sided crib flush against my side of the bed. It’s quieter that way. Quieter, but he’s definitely still there and makes his presence and needs known. Grown up space is much trickier to fortify than I’d imagined.

Or during the day, when I have to choose between carrying him in one arm while I try to get things done or trying to focus through the cacophony of howls, trying to not feel like the cruelest person who ever lived whilst brining that chicken or kneading that bread dough.

Or just needing to pop out to buy something and realizing I’ll need to get him dressed and ready and strapped into the sling before I can even leave the house. Or wanting to sit for a while in a cafe to enjoy a coffee and book in the sunshine but knowing there is a 75% chance that he’ll have a meltdown before I finish half of the coffee, much less a few pages of my book.

For some reason, the 24-hour support aspect of things never really sank in before I had him. It’s really tricky trying to study, say, Vietnamese when you have to feed, change, play with, calm this small person, this cuddly little limpet, who is suctioned to your body.

It’s the same with writing.

This post, for example, was typed one handed with a napping Thwack passed out across my lap. Yes, that’s Kevin the Panda’s ass you see on the right.

And as for this blog, I’m struggling to keep my adult self alive and well- the one who does stuff, reads stuff, makes stuff, goes places- but I will have to admit that all of these grown up things I am able to pull off are done hurriedly or in many instalments or with only partial attention paid to them.

This is still not a mommy blog, I swear.

It is, however, my blog and, like me, it is permeated with drool and barf and resonating with echoes of howls and baby farts. I can’t quite erase those traces.

Sorry about that.

I hear it does get easier.

And much of the time, the kids are alright.