The Daddy Factor

19Jun

Categories: Family, Husbands, Marriage, Marriage Confessions, parenting

If I haven’t made it clear enough already, Chris is a fantastic dad.  He’s so natural at it that it seems like he’s been one his entire life.  And the Bean is definitely a daddy’s boy.  I mean, he seems to like me and all seeing as to how I FEED HIM AND CHANGE HIS NASTY DIAPERS ALL DAY (are ya getting this, Beaner?).  But when his daddy is around, I haven’t got a chance.

And that’s where the problem starts.

After two full weeks with me and Beanie, Chris went back to work this week.  He’s such a trooper that he still gets up to do a 2:00 AM feeding every night and then he gets up a few hours later at 5:00 AM to head to work in New York.  He gets home every night around 6:30 and does the dinner feeding for the Bean, and then before we know it, I’ve gone to bed, the Beaner is sleeping, and Chris is left downstairs watching TV.

All week, I thought this was a great routine.  It gave Chris time with the Bean.  It gave me a break in the morning and late at night.  And yet he still was getting his down time in the evenings to watch TV or play his video games.

But last night, Chris told me he was feeling the strain of our schedule.  And it wasn’t the kind of strain that I thought it would be.  He said it was really hard to leave me and the Bean every day.  That he was tired from having to carry the weight at work and at home.  And that he felt like he didn’t get to see me at all.  It was like we were just passing the baby between us and then going separate ways.  He said he was sure he just had to get used to the new routine, but that this first week had been really hard.

To be honest, I had never thought about it from Chris’ perspective.  I bet that is really hard to have to leave every day and then wonder what you are missing at home.  I bet it is really hard to have to give 100% at home and then 100% at work, too.  While I get some down time during my day while the Bean sleeps, Chris is working a full day and then working a full night at our house, too.

And I miss him, too.  The one thing we always said about having a baby was that we would still put our marriage first.  When Chris and I are happy in our marriage, we make better parents.  I’ve seen this through my own parents and its something I’m happy we are making an effort to bring into our own marriage.

So, last night putting my marriage first meant staying up with Chris.  It meant losing an hour or two of sleep in exchange for sitting on the couch with him.  Not because he needed it.  But because we needed it.  I expected to be zapped this morning.  But, you know, I’m not really.  I’m sure I’ll need an afternoon nap, but that’s a small price to pay for Chris.

As far as I can tell, this will be one of the parts of parenting that will take the most effort.  But its an effort that needs to be made.  Because good husbands are hard to find.  And good fathers are even harder.  So, a good husband AND good father in one?  Well, that’s the Holy Grail.

11  comments   |   posted in Family, Husbands, Marriage, Marriage Confessions, parenting   |   tags: humor, life, love, Marriage, parenting

2:30 AM.

18Jun

Categories: Marriage Confessions, parenting

Chris:  How do we turn it off?

Katie:  I don’t know.  What does the manual say?

Chris:  He didn’t come with a manual.

Katie:  Aw, crap.

28  comments   |   posted in Marriage Confessions, parenting   |   tags: babies, humor, life, Marriage, parenting

Mommy Brain

15Jun

Categories: Changes, Marriage Confessions, parenting, The Bean

I have been trying to blog for two weeks now.  I have more unusable drafts written than ever before.  They just sit there.  Unpublished.  Mocking me.

And why do I have these unpublished blog posts piling up?  BECAUSE THEY ALL SUCK.

And why do they all suck?  BECAUSE I HAVE MOMMY BRAIN.

I had heard of Mommy Brain before.  It was supposedly this phantom disease that creeps into new mom’s brains and robs them of clear thoughts, any ability to be funny whatsoever, and replaces acceptable vocabulary with words like “poopy diapers” and “pooter headed Beanie.”  I always thought this disease was just a new mom’s excuse to babble like an idiot to random strangers about their baby’s bowel movements.  But now, I understand.  I completely understand.

Mommy Brain is very real.  It it is killing new mom’s brain cells every day.  From the limited coherent thoughts that I am able to put together, I think Mommy Brain is caused by lack of sleep for an extended period of time coupled with the need to be incredibly focused on your new baby in order to understand mysterious things like sleep patterns and bowel movements.  This results in a brain that is fried and, therefore, incapable of talking about anything other than the gastrointestinal workings of the new baby.

I’m trying to fight it.  I’m trying to stay active and keep my brain alert and focused on important things, like celebrity gossip and the romance novels that My Friend Sarah sent me.  I’m trying to blog.  I’m trying to keep my brain sharp enough to make even one small joke a day.  But I’ve got nothin’.  Every blog post I write sounds cranky.  Or, worse, it doesn’t make any sense when I reread it.  Let me give you an example of my poor sense of humor right now.  I recently posted an photo album of baby pictures to my personal Facebook page.  The album was a bunch of pictures of the the Bean sleeping everywhere.  He was sleeping on my bed.  Sleeping in his crib.  Sleeping while his dad was holding him.  Sleeping while he ate.  He was sleeping everywhere.  So, I named the album, “The Baby That Never Woke Up.”

It wasn’t until My Friend Sarah pointed it out to me, but “The Baby That Never Woke Up?”  What the hell kind of morbid title is that?!?!  That’s not funny!  So not funny!

Another example of Mommy Brain?  I went to Target today to return something.  I got all the way to Target and was standing in line at the Customer Service counter before I realized…I forgot to bring the item I was going to return.  I left it sitting in my kitchen.

So, my dear internet friends.  I apologize for my lack of blog posts.  I just can’t seem to get my head working right.  But – good news!  I hear new moms hit the wall during Week Three and then rebound from there.  So in another week, I should be good to go.

For now, I have to go figure out where I left the Beaner.  I’m sure he’s in the house somewhere…

21  comments   |   posted in Changes, Marriage Confessions, parenting, The Bean   |   tags: babies, humor, life, new moms, parenting

Between the Bottles

09Jun

Categories: Marriage, Marriage Confessions, parenting

We seem to have been blessed with a baby that is easy to schedule.  He must have gotten my overly-scheduled genes.  From day one the Bean has been really consistent with his feeding and sleeping routine.  His night time eating schedule is pretty awesome, I have to say.  We feed him at 11:00 PM right before Chris and I go to bed.  Then he wakes up around 3:30 or 4:00 for another bottle and then he goes back to bed until around 7:00 or 8:00 in the morning.  All things considered, its a pretty easy night for us.

Well, most nights anyway.

Two nights ago we hit a little snag.  Michael woke up for his 4:00 bottle, which I gave him as usual, and then Chris took him to rock him back to sleep so that I could get some extra shut eye.  When I woke up an hour later, Chris was still rocking Michael who was wide awake.  When I woke up an hour after that, I found Chris standing in the middle of the nursery wearing just his boxers and socks, rocking the Bean back and forth.  And the Bean’s eyes were wide open.  It wasn’t that he was cranky.  He just wasn’t sleepy.

The problem though wasn’t that the Bean wouldn’t go back to sleep.  It was how Chris and I reacted to the Bean not wanting to go back to sleep.  My first instinct, my knee-jerk reaction, was that Chris was doing something wrong and that if he would just hand the baby over to me then I could fix the problem myself.  This, I should clarify, is total crap.  There was nothing Chris was doing that morning that I could have or would have done any differently.  You can’t force a newborn to sleep when he’s not tired no matter how many different things you try, and I should have just kept my mouth shut and let Chris do his thing.

But I didn’t.  I walked into the room making suggestions.  Which is a nice way of saying that I walked into the room giving orders.  He was holding him wrong.  The lights should be off.  He should be rocking back and forth instead of swaying side to side.  He should be humming or singing.  I had a list of things that should be done differently.  And at 5:00 in the morning after a hour and half of trying to get the baby to go to sleep, the last thing Chris needed was to be told how to do things.

On the flip side, Chris at this point was really frustrated.  He was irritable.  He was tired.  And, like anyone would be, he was out of the energy to make the Bean feel relaxed enough for sleep.  He was on autopilot.  What he should have done was ask for help.  He should have come and gotten me after the first hour – even if it was just to have someone to sit with him.  He shouldn’t have tried to push himself to do it alone.  Because at 5:00 in the morning, EVERYONE needs help with a baby.

Eventually, after I quit giving orders, I ended up standing behind Chris with my arms around him, rocking back and forth with him and Michael.  I learned that sometimes the best thing I can do for my baby is to be there for my husband.

Before the baby, Chris and I were used to taking care of things for each other.  If I wasn’t feeling well, Chris picked up the slack for me.  And if Chris wasn’t 100% for whatever reason, I took over and did it for him.  We love each other and we did whatever we could to make things easier for the other person.  What I am learning about parenting is that we have to now be able to work together to fix things.  We can’t fix them for the other person all by ourselves anymore.  We have to recognize that neither of us is able to give 100% right now and so we both have to work together to take care of this baby at the same time.  I have to be able to say to Chris that I need help – not that I need him to do it all for me.  And he has to be able to do the same for me.

Parenthood has come easily to both me and Chris.  I was surprised by how quickly we both just knew what to do.  But we knew what to do independent of each other.  What takes more effort is adapting to parenting as a couple.  And that process starts with learning to ask for help from each other.  Especially at 5:00 AM.

Week One of Parenthood

Week One of Parenthood

13  comments   |   posted in Marriage, Marriage Confessions, parenting   |   tags: life, love, Marriage, parenting

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