Because Babies Don't Keep

* This post is sponsored by Smart Mom Jewelry. All opinions are are entirely mine. 

The cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow,

But children grow up, as I've learned to my sorrow.

So quiet down cobwebs; Dust go to sleep!

I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep.

~ Ruth Hulbert Hamilton

Mac had three teeth pop through last week. That makes a grand total of six (only fourteen left to go). 

The poor kid had a tough week. For several days he clung to me like my body was his life raft in the middle of a choppy ocean storm. I am happy to be his safe place. After his traumatic birth, and the deafening silence that followed, I am always grateful for the sound of his cries. And there were plenty of them last week. He has his Auntie Tata by the heart and she was desperate to help him. 

Mac and his Auntie Tata

She brought home a Teething Bling necklace for me to try. So we rocked and he chewed on the teether-turned-pendant around my neck.

 

And that’s what I wanted to write about today. My gratitude and the way my heart swells with every noise he makes. But the truth is that I also wanted to sit down and write this post so that I could pass off the (now less miserable) baby to my wife and take a bit of a break. I love that holding him close while the tiny, razor sharp, teeth wreak havoc in his mouth can ease his pain. But I’m also glad when the little buggers finally break through so that I can catch-up on laundry and take a bath.  Which is where I am right now. So the post I planned to write felt a little inauthentic. 

Mama I don't want all these toys. I just want you to pick me up.

As I sat down to let y’all see the inside of my heart the poem above was running through my head. It’s a sweet sentiment isn’t it? Ignore the mopping and the laundry. Let the dishes sit dirty in the sink. Rock your baby because babies don’t keep. It gives moms permission to let all that “other stuff” go because nothing.is.ever.as.important.as.time.with.your.child.

Reading that is likely to make you feel one of two ways: relief that the state of your floors is indicative of your good parenting or guilt that the state of your floors is indicative of your neglectful parenting. Or maybe you are that special parent who doesn’t feel guilt. In which case, congratulations – you are rocking this whole parenting thing! Unfortunately, the rest of us are often left drowning in guilt as the image of a perfect parent feels increasingly out of reach.

As a new mom I am constantly reminded that these days will fly by faster than I can imagine. I listen to these pieces of advice and offer my thanks to the wise women and men who have come before me. I can see the nostalgia in their eyes and often the regret. Oh what I would give for one more day with my not-yet-grown-child their half-smiles seem to whisper. I tuck their reminders into my heart and promise to enjoy the day they wish they could relive. I know my baby won’t keep and I do what I can to not take that for granted. I rock him gently and stroke his head as he chomps away at the teether around my neck. The day fades away and I know I’ve accomplished something important.

But the truth is that sometimes other things are more important. [Shock! Gasp!] Sometimes that email needs responding to, those dishes need washing or that one more chapter of the Hunger Games needs reading. And here’s the real shocker – THAT DOESN’T MAKE YOU A BAD PARENT. Rocking a baby can be pure bliss (and it can sometimes be boring and uncomfortable if it’s the end of a cry-filled day) but that laundry won’t fold itself and you can’t pay your mortgage with cuddles. Try not cleaning your house for the first year of your child’s life and see how many Parent-of-the-Year awards end up on your doorstep.

Sometimes the TV can actually make a decent babysitter when dinner needs to be made. Sometimes it’s OK to pretend the line-up at the grocery store was unusually long because you wanted to play a few more minutes of Settlers of Catan on your iphone in the parking lot (I mean, hypothetically of course. Tracy, that was a seriously long line yesterday!) And sometimes Mama needs a decent bubble bath. Or, at least, I think all of those things are OK. You might disagree. That's OK too.

I’m starting to let go of the need to be constantly present in each and every moment of my son’s life. Of course, I could easily spend an hour memorizing the way the tops of his cheeks dimple when that infectious smile spreads across his face. And I’m the mom who regularly wears and rocks her baby during naptime. But I’m also the mom who takes bubble baths, occasionally drinks her coffee hot while the Jumperoo and Baby Einstein babysit her child and does her best to keep the sink clear of dirty dishes.

I’m starting to realize that it’s not an all or nothing proposition. I can ignore blog writing and focus on my baby’s first swing one day and head out of the house to just be away from all the sweet cuddling the next day. And I don't think that I am a bad parent on either of those days. 

I’m fortunate enough to be able to spend my days with my young son. And on the teething days I cherish the fact that he needs me because I know a day will come when I will want nothing more. I let the laundry sit in a pile and I ignore the dust bunny in the corner. And then as dusk turns to dawn you can find me in the kitchen washing the dishes while Mac entertains himself. Because babies don’t keep but sometimes they are fine to just chill out.

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Always Grateful for the Sound

It was cold in Ottawa yesterday. The weather channel was warning of a severe snow storm that didn't actually materialize but it was still very windy with a combination of snow and rain for much of the day. Mac and I stayed indoors and had a great day. He got to do many of his favorite things including lying around naked, smiling at the cat, smiling at himself in the mirror, playing with applesauce and bath time. 

 

He was as happy as can be. And then today I woke up to a blood curdling scream. As I tried to soothe him he grabbed for my fingers and shoved them into his mouth. Not able to talk he was showing me. Inside his mouth I felt a razor sharp little tooth poking through his gums and knew we were in for a rough day today.

The poor little guy was in agony and couldn't quite figure out what in the world was happening inside his mouth. And my heart broke a little as his eyes pleaded with me to fix it Mama. So I scooped him up in my arms and spent much of the day rocking him and stroking his head. I gave him some Tylenol, a cloth dipped in breast milk and then frozen to suck on, and no less than one thousand kisses. And when it was finally time to get dinner on the table I strapped him into the Ergo and let him rest against my chest as I prepared it.

But every once in awhile the pain was too much for his Mama to soothe and he cried out. Muffled sobs and loud shrieks - baby was hurting. And as I rocked him I thought back to the day he was born. It was the greatest and scariest day of my life. In the middle of pushing him out into the world the doctor stood up abruptly and consulted the monitor. Before I knew it she was grabbing a vacuum and telling me that his heart rate was dropping and that they needed to get him out NOW. She disappeared between my legs with the contraption and after a few more pushes Mac arrived. His skin was a pale blue/gray except for the purple welt on his cone shaped head. And he was silent and still. Instead of having him put on my chest as I had planned, he was whisked away to a table across the room and a team of specialists quickly entered. They marched in single file as I lay there feeling more vulnerable and helpless than I ever imagined possible. I pleaded with Tracy to please, please go check on him, go see if he is OK, GO! But she was too petrified to move. Scared for my health and the trouble the doctors seemed to be having delivering my placenta, and terrified for Maclean, she stood transfixed with her steel cold hand wrapped around mine as stiff as cement. I loved her and hated her for that. When he was born he had an APGAR score of one. Medical staff use an APGAR test to determine the health of a newborn. Babies are given a score of zero, one or two in five areas (skin colour, heart rate, grimace response, muscle tone and breathing) for a possibility of 10 points. To put his score of one in perspective - zero is dead.

Each second that passed felt like an eternity. I couldn't tell you if it took 30 seconds or 10 minutes but eventually he cried. HE CRIED! His little lungs worked overtime as he screamed out scared, alone, confused and cold. He cried and cried as the NICU team continued to shuffle around him sucking stuff out of orifices and monitoring stats. He cried for his moms and we cried too - tears of joy because the sound of his cry was the best noise our ears had ever heard. It was music and love and the sound of angels singing. 

It wasn't long after that (or maybe it was, time was so hard to understand) before his skin turned pink and he was wrapped up and handed to my wife. Safe in her warm arms the tears stopped. Well his did anyway, I was crying enough for all of us.

In the days and weeks that followed I felt bad for him when he cried. I did my best to soothe him but I secretly enjoyed the sounds as I remembered the deafening silence when the cries weren't coming. 

So on days like today when tears and sobs and shrieks are plentiful I hold my child close to comfort him but I revel in his cries - always grateful for the sound.