mother lode

As I mentioned in a previous update, Edie will go to daycare full time from March 2014 (or nearly full time if we decide to try and work it so that she can spend 3 or 4 days at daycare with 1 or 2 at home).

Then something will happen, like she’ll have a sore tummy and one of us will need to hold her, comforting her and stroking her head until she is feeling better.

The dark thoughts start to creep in.

Who will hold my darling angel when she cries? Who will shush her and rock her and stroke her head? Who will sing Do-Re-Mi to her until she smiles again?

I love her more than I ever thought possible and I know how important it is to spend this time with her. Edie is absolutely too small to go to daycare now! However, I struggle with the “Groundhog Day” of nappies, naps, bottles, activity gym time, tummy time and walks. When plans get cancelled or I don’t have people to catch up with, I start to feel a bit crazy.

From 6 months old she’ll be fine there, right? With professionals who know how to extend her, help with her development and watch over her while I go and be an adult for a bit so I can be a better mum?

First there is the hospital and that passes in a blur.

Then there is the second week and we hit the first weirdness about not working – there are of course the hormones, and the new schedule to adjust to, but the rules of the game have changed. The goal has changed.

What does success mean now? What’s a good day at the office – a marker to show how well we’re performing?

How do you tell what you’ve achieved in a day? Whether it’s been good or bad now depends on such a different set of parameters. You look for patterns of behaviour; try to rationalise inputs and outputs. You muse over tactics and strategies and then of course the midwife blows your list of questions apart with the sage answer: she’s a baby. Doing baby things. On a baby schedule – and this point, not even at her due date yet.

“She’s being a baby.” In other words, go with it. She’s too small for us to do anything else at this stage. We have to try and go with it. Relax…