10/21/25
“you know Granny? You’re a super duper party pooper!” -6:35 pm, Hunter just randomly said this to my mom, who is visiting
tonight, wore sneakers for the first time instead of the wide flat slip-ons I’ve been living in for the past 8 months. I had to because was going to do the laundry and had to walk up two really steep hills to get there, pulling the wagon of laundry behind me, with Hunter in the wagon too. would have slipped out of my shoes if they didn’t have a back to them. chose the widest, loosest ones I had. And it wasn’t bad. I didn’t feel really any pain, hardly any stickiness. when I was going up the hill, it was such a load that my heart started beating fast and the autumn air was crisp and it was refreshing. And a while later, coming back down the hill with the warm clean laundry, it was exhilarating in the darkness and colder air while also managing the weight behind me – to not let it get past me and using my arms to hold it back. And then running down the flat straightaway back to our trailer in the darkness, the only light was from some lit-up Halloween blowup decorations but it was mostly pitch darkness through forest and along the Conestoga river, with Hunter in the wagon, gleefully holding my phone flashlight as he bumped along.
I’ve been thinking about my snapping and think I’ve uncovered a little more about it. I realized it’s not only when multiple urgent things are happening at once that I do it, though those are definite times. It’s also sometimes when no urgent things are happening and it’s just between me and R. Trying to pinpoint it further, I think it mostly has to do with the baby. I get super annoyed when like: I think the environment is cold and R hasn’t put enough layers on him, I think the baby isn’t eating healthy enough because R has not provided enough vegetables or is microwaving too many things instead of heating on the stove top- stuff like that, that has to do with the baby’s health and safety and comfort – if I perceive that R is not doing like the absolute best thing for him, I will get annoyed about that, and get snappy about that. so aside from stressful situations, my snapping is mostly coming from my dissatisfaction that I perceive the baby is not being taken care of well enough. In truth, I think R is a caring, loving, attentive, protective and creative dad who does a really good job. (Maybe made better from my previous snappings?), but he’s the one who is sleeping with baby at night and waking mid-night to squish his large man body into baby’s small twin bed when baby calls out for him, collects all the wet sheets when Baby wets the bed and changes them, he takes care of Baby in the morning, brushes his teeth and gives him breakfast with usually a good variety of foods, dresses him, wipes him clean and changes his diaper, even will feed him when it seems like Baby is getting too involved with some video and is forgetting to feed himself. it’s just…a lot of times, i judge what he’s doing and i see even better ways he could be doing it, for Baby. I realized: when Baby says he’s hungry, it sets off an urgency in me. I feel like I’m always somewhere internally tracking whether he’s hungry or thirsty, and when I realize he’s hungry – whether he’s said it out loud or I just sense it – I start making food and I feel like it is the most important task in the world, to get the baby fed – I get laser focused, and anyone who gets in my way (which is usually R, he’s the only other person around) will be run over. It’s like bubba’s biological needs – being fed and clothed and warm and comfortable all the time – if any of this stuff is messed with, (I’m only consciously realizing now because I’m writing about it) I can get a bit ferocious. I could definitely see how this has a biological origin, because this attitude would help babies survive, and thus help mankind survive. But still, I don’t wanna be this snappy person. I don’t like myself like that.
I guess I could…realize that maybe things are not as urgent as I feel they are? Like I think I had a hypervigilant streak even pre-baby, so because I know that about myself, maybe I can calm down a little about everything, take everything a notch down, and that might help? I don’t know. but I feel a little closer to the solution now. Maybe I judge too much? I could definitely let go of the little things I judge R about, that have to do with him. but when it comes to the baby, I can’t let things slide. I always want the absolute best for him- i just have this urgency in me to give him all I can give, and I can’t…supress this.
tonight, I cut baby’s nail too close and it bled and he cried. It started with him coming to me, holding his finger out, asking for me to cut it (I’ve clipped several hangnails of his before without any issue). I was actually confident going into it, because I’ve been cutting his nails since he was an infant, and have never yet bled him, so it’s been years without a mistake. it kind of made it worse when I thought back on it, how confident I was. I should’ve been more careful. But I got the same clippers I always use, I even knelt down in front of him to get the closest look at it, I gave it what I thought was my full attention – looked at it and sized it up a moment, positioned the clipper where I thought would be the closest best cut without breaking any skin (and I usually even leave a little more space just to be safe), and then I clipped down hard. Immediately after, he started crying that it hurt, and I thought he was just being dramatic, but then I looked down and saw to my horror that it was too short now and was pink and then became red with blood. It wasn’t gushing or anything, but it still was bleeding red. I sprayed iodine water on a water wipe and dabbed it, then smeared some goldenseal myrrh balm on the pad of a baby shark Band-Aid and wrapped it around his finger. I don’t know what happened, but I’m gonna be so much more careful now. I really thought I knew what I was doing, but it was his pointer finger, which I always thought the nail there was shaped funny and not how I think a nail would be shaped, so maybe that had something to do with it. I just really thought I was cutting off dead nail, and not into his live flesh at all. I hugged him close and tight as he cried, I said sorry so many times and that i didn’t mean it and asked if he forgave me two different times, which it melted my heart that both times immediately he said yes. I felt so bad, on par with the bad I felt when he was an infant and I accidentally let him fall from the bed. On par with that. i felt like a failure as a mother. I kind of couldn’t believe that he still wanted me to put him to bed (and not R) – that he didn’t hate me and still wanted me near him. When he was crying, I felt like crying myself, but I didn’t let myself. I held him and answered all the questions he had about Band-Aids and his wounded finger. I think that might be the last baby Band-Aid I had with us, and it occurred to me to buy some more. but then I realized – I’m so angry at myself for making this mistake that i swear it’ll never happen again. and to reinforce this, I don’t need to buy any more Band-Aids, because it will never fucking happen again. I still remember when I was little and my mom cut my nails too close, how it hurt. I had been sailing along, thinking I would never do that to my kid, and now here I am. no different from anyone else.
10/22/25
today, backstepped with the pain. although the area affected has definitely reduced in size on both feet at the same rate, the spots that remain looked bad and weepy. I wore the same wide sneakers today that I did the other day, but today, for some reason, it hurt. The tongues were pressing down and hurting my feet, which felt open, even though I reached in and stretched the tongues up and out and wider. during dinner at a pho place, I had to sit with my feet out of my shoes at the table. I can’t think why except that I guess nothing goes in a straight line towards the goal? Or maybe because I’ve been eating gluten lately? my mom is visiting and brought pecan pie, which I’ve eaten two days in a row, then we went out for regular pizza, other stuff. I don’t know. But my feet did feel better later at night, and still had an easy soothe tonight.
it feels like a lot of “you get what you give” with baby. Like when we love and cuddle and swaddle and give every comfort to him, it somehow does the same to us. Like just lying in bed tonight with R with the baby sandwiched between us, knowing that he must’ve felt so safe nestled there with our bodies pressing him from every side, healed something in me and made me feel safe.
10/24/25
last night, while Baby was sleeping, checked his wounded nail and it looks to be healing okay. I didn’t see any redness or swelling. The nail still has to grow back where I cut it too short, but the exposed part is now a dark brown/dried thin line, and not as bad as I thought. The morning right after I hurt him, he came into my room and onto my bed and showered me with kisses, seeming to forget/not care that I just last night was the source of his terrible pain. I never felt in such a state of grace as being under his kisses that morning.
Marriage Journal 