1/10/22
tonight hunter had his 4 mo dr checkup. I asked about some rashes on his body, if they were eczema, bc I have it too. after inspecting, the dr said yes it was. my heart dropped; it was one of the things actually all my life preventing me from really wanting to have kids, for fear I’d pass on this painful…condition. r knew and sensed my sense of…sadness, despair, I think. he reassured me and made me feel a lot better. he said he thinks hunter is really half him and half me, so maybe the half of him (he has great skin) will let him grow out of it, like the doctor said he might. he said if it gets bad, we could move to Brazil or FL, and that comforted me, that he was so willing to just pick up and leave for the sake of our son. I would do it too, for hunter. I feel like I would do anything to prevent him feeling pain or suffering. and R, when we got home, in the flurry of settling back in and unpacking all the baby shit we have to lug around every time we go out, we happened to meet as I was coming out of my room and he had just come downstairs, and he wordlessly took me in his arms, and hugged me for an extra long time. No words, but I knew what he meant. he was telling me it would be ok, that we’d get through anything, no matter what, together. I knelt down by the couch and cried hard for a few minutes after we got home, then felt better.
the last two nights, for some reason, baby was waking up every hour/two hours to eat. it made me so tired and almost crazy, wanting so bad to be asleep and getting woken up again and again. by the time I needed to wake up for work, I was exhausted. I had a few minutes of quiet in bed before i got up and didn’t know what to do, how I would find the energy for the day. I started praying in the early morning light, laying there. I prayed for strength and grace and beauty. I felt ok after i prayed, not as bad as I expected, not exhausted, really. on the zoom mtg this morning, it was the only time this ever happened – the sunlight came through the blinds so that it streaked down my hair in a curiously beautiful pattern, so that when i looked at myself on screen, it kind of amazed me.
1/11/22
I feel like I’m learning a lot from this time with baby growing up, so many things that it’s like I haven’t fully processed/learned them yet – it feels like I’m only at the beginning of the lessons. But I feel they are: loving someone unconditionally, no matter how they’re acting/what they’re doing (screaming, kicking, crying, biting at your nipples…). This feeling like I will change myself- my habits, my acts, my life- whatever it took- to protect him and give him the best. This great lurching ache in my heart like nothing else when he’s hurt (got some vaccine injections at the doc last night). It’s also made me really appreciate how good a person I married is. I couldn’t do this myself – R helps me a lot.
Also had this thought today that I think kids grow up to be so…critical of their parents. Like—once he can—I think he will hold each of us – me and R- up to this like ethical or moral magnifying glass in his mind, somewhere, and decide if we measure up, or measure us up and judge us. it’s for this reason why I feel that I should not totally lose myself in caring for him – like lose myself so much that I lose my personality, who I am, because I feel like this is a kind of failing, and that my son in the future will count this against me (not to mention, myself will count this against me).
1/12/22
some things im really going to miss when i stop breastfeeding in bed w hunter: his little contented sighs in and out while he nurses that he only does when he’s starting to fall asleep. and his little warm feet against my stomach as we face each other while he’s nursing.
1/13/22
tonight a kind of monumentous night for me – after about 3 months of sleeping w baby in the same bed, i started, tonight, putting him in the crib beside me to sleep (and stopped using it as a dump for the clean laundry lol). i feel like he’s big enough now to sleep a little apart from me, though i plan to room share w him for his whole first year, until he stops breastfeeding. it kind of broke my heart a little to do this; i’ll really miss his legs touching me under the blankets (gotta keep him in a sleep sack now, since he’s too young to sleep w blankets in the crib).
thought i had tonight as i was going through all the emotions of having baby out of my bed: i want to be wanted for my body. it’s kind of all i can offer you right now, and since the beginning. i love that you only want me for my body. that’s ok with me.
1/15/22
this idea of filling someone up to the point where they want nothing more. I think this is what breast-feeding is to me- i’m so happy I can do this for someone. and why I love his contented sighs he sighs near the end, that certain satiated face he makes right after he’s pulled away after a long session.
Marriage Journal 