DotMoms

Little-Sister-Itis

By Sarah Rachel Egelman

My baby, who turns one this month and is hardly a baby anymore, has a bad case of little-sister-itis. That is what we call her permanent and incurable condition and it seems to be getting more acute. Symptoms include:

• frustration at being unable to walk/run/jump/climb like her big sister
• boundless joy at being the object of her big sister's attention
• arching of back and howling at the word "no"
• fits of giggling and hand clapping upon hearing her big sister sing or seeing her dance
• possible neck strain at constantly looking around for her big sister
• rejection of all age-appropriate toys
• attempting and often succeeding in playing with big kid toys like Legos and puzzles
• disinterest in board books
• extreme interest in big sister's favorite books
• super baby strength demonstrated by attempting to climb bunk bed ladder after big sister and getting farther up there than you would imagine; note: this is directly related to the condition found in parents called "heart palpitations"

I am a big sister myself. And the age difference between myself and my younger sister is only a few months less than between my girls. So I can empathize with Lilith when she is upset at finding Adina chewing up her books, messing up the puzzles she worked so hard at, or just getting the kind of hawk-eye attention a 1-year-old gets. But, I am starting to understand the younger sibling's point of view, too.

An early memory of mine is sitting on my bed, quietly playing while my little sister toddled into my room and swept all the books and toys off my shelf. She seemed to leave a trail of destruction wherever she went. But, as a mother, witnessing this same scene several times daily, I have come to rethink the scenario. Could it be that what I took as deliberate mischief was really my sister just wanting to play? Was she just trying to get my attention? Was she trying to keep up with me and play with the things I liked to play with?

Adina adores her big sister. Lilith is by far her favorite person, beating out me and her father easily. It seems my job these days is, however, to keep her little-sister-itis in check, encouraging the sweet behaviors and rechanneling the less endearing ones. I know that a bad case of big-sister-itis (jealousy and feelings of isolation, confusingly coupled with abundant love and an innate desire to protect) can get out of hand, too.

I am learning a lot about being a sister from being a mother, and thankfully the difficult side effects (sleep deprivation, frustration, heaps of laundry, inability to answer 700 "why" questions in a two-hour span) are always outweighed by the benefits of mother-itis (pure unconditional love, pride, creativity, humility and laughter).

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her family. 

From de rigeur to dangerous

By Sarah Rachel Egelman

"Can you believe parents aren't supposed to give their kids cold medicine anymore?" asked the woman scanning my groceries. It was early in the morning and I had my 9-month-old in a carrier strapped to my chest. There was no one behind me in line and so the woman and I had been chatting about teething and other baby concerns.

I have distinct memories of driving around in my parents Volare in the 1970's. My sister and I, unencumbered by seat belts, would be scrambling around the backseat (often, truth be told, mooning the cars behind us) while my mom smoked cigarettes in the front seat. Not the picture of safety by 2008 standards, but not a whole lot different than most families we knew at the time.

So, we are not supposed to give our kids cold medicine anymore; it wasn't something we did a lot around here anyway but it did get me thinking about all the things that are either now out of vogue in parenting or we have come to learn are simply dangerous. Nowadays, kids are firmly strapped in while driving in cars and even parents who smoke often do so only away from their children.

Here are some other examples from now and then:

Bike helmets: When I was a kid it was weird to see someone wearing a helmet to cycle or skate. Now my young daughter reminds her dad every morning, as he prepares to ride his bike to work, to put on his helmet. She has a nice green one she is proud to wear while cycling.

Sleeping on tummies: At least one generation, mine, was put down to sleep as newborns on our tummies. Now we know it is far safer for babies to sleep on their backs.

Early solid foods: In my husband's baby book is a sheet of instructions from his pediatrician. It advised his parents to start solid foods at less than a month old. I have read this sheet several times with disbelief -- how do you get a newborn to ingest solids? It seems like torture for all involved. Now we are told to wait at least five months. Six months seems to be the average but even 10 months isn't unusual.

Walkers: Until the last decade, walkers were a de rigeur baby item. Before babies could walk they were put in walkers and allowed to drag themselves around the house. Most doctors recommend against walkers these days as they can be dangerous and can even delay walking instead of encouraging it.

I can only imagine how strange or even hazardous our parenting methods will someday seem to our grandchildren.

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her family.

My not-so-little Little One

By Sarah

My oldest daughter was 6 pounds, 6 ounces when she was born. My second daughter was 7 pounds, 4 ounces. Despite being almost a pound heavier than her sister had been, we called Adina "Little One."

She was little. While newborns are quite tough actually, it is their smallness and vulnerability that we notice most readily -- and for important biological reasons! Compared to her big sister (not even 30 pounds at three years old), she was tiny and helpless and so Little One was nicknamed.

But she got big quickly. At six months she was about 18 pounds, all thigh and tush and delicious apple cheeks. The babies in my family tend to be small while those in my husband's family tend to be big, so to us she seemed a perfect combination. According to the growth charts she is heavier and taller than most babies her age but nothing to fret about (not even the 90th percentile). I love all her dimples and heft.

Still, I have to admit, it can be bothersome, day in and day out, to have her size commented on. "What are they feeding you, baby?" "Oh, she is such a big, big girl." "What a fat baby!" "Hi, thunder-thighs!" "Looks like she gets enough to eat."

I have heard all these comments and more. Where I see lovely, full, strong legs others see fat. Whereas she was exclusively breast-fed until her 6-month birthday (and now mostly wears the food we feed her instead of swallowing it) others reference how much she must be eating. Perhaps if she were boy she would be "healthy" and "strong" but she is a girl, and people call her fat.

She is not fat. In fact, she is just as tall for her age as she is heavy, her little ribs are apparent when she is in the tub and her arms are getting thinner by the day as she has begun to crawl and is in constant motion. Even those big thighs are growing leaner. The big bottom people comment on is really just a tiny behind masked by bulky cloth diapers. And here I have to stop myself, and ask: Why do I have to defend her size and why does it bother me at all if I know she is healthy and happy?

Perhaps my own body images are unresolved. I spent a year in high school eating nothing but diet pills and saltine crackers even though I wasn't overweight. I hate shopping for clothes, dread the difficulty of dressing my pear-shaped body. My mother is constantly dieting, calling herself fat (she is actually tiny) and I remind her not to talk like that in front of my daughters. But in my family, fat and skinny are important terms.

Adina and her sister are clean slates. They have not been corrupted by unrealistic images of beauty and womanhood, have not been hurt by playground jabs about how they look. These are my issues, my mother's issues, many women's issues.

What I need to do is learn, like my girls are, to be comfortable in my own skin, no matter what frame it is stretched over. What I need to do is admire my own dimpled thighs as much as I admire Adina's. We have so much to teach each other. Then, perhaps I can help everyone else see that Little One's baby fat is really baby beauty.

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her family.

Done but not finished: A complete family

By Sarah Rachel Egelman

I sit here in my home office typing and my seven-month-old daughter is capering behind me. She is covered in dust and dirt from sweeping the hardwood floors with her body as she crawls around and I have had to pry several cords from her strong little hands already. She is supposed to be napping. But, after nursing her over half an hour and laying in the quiet, dark room with her only to have her start crawling all over the bed, pulling off my glasses and laughing, I got us up and got myself to work. I turn to look at her now, to make sure she is not in danger of choking or pulling something down on her head (this room being the least baby proofed) and she grins up at me, giddy with her illicit freedom.

In this room also are a baby seat and a swing. I could strap her into either one of those, but these days she is too big and too mobile to be strapped into anything but her car seat and the Ergo carrier when we are outside the house. No, now is the time for her to explore, to get dirty, to learn boundaries, to find out the those dust bunnies are not very tasty at all. Maybe I should get out the broom...

Soon the swing and the seat will be gone and she will have more room to play in here while I work. Barring a very big surprise, my husband and I will not be having any more children. After my oldest daughter (not quite 3 and a half) was born we were not sure we wanted more children. We were so happy and it was so much work and why mess with a good thing? But, I had saved all her baby clothes and baby toys and board books and finally I had to admit I wanted another child.

Our two girls are very different, in looks and in temperament. And now our family feels totally complete. We're done. And now I am able to start getting rid of all the baby stuff that has, honestly, cluttered our house for over three years. We had a garage sale this summer, I have sold stuff on our local Craigslist. I have traded clothes in for store credit, donated some and passed other items on to new moms. My baby is growing fast; she no longer needs anything smaller than nine months and so all of it can go. So can the infant tub which she has outgrown already, and the plastic infant toys I no longer want to keep.

With the money from the things I am choosing to sell we have started a bunk bed fund. My oldest wants bunk beds and they are the best solution for when we move the baby from our room into her sister's. I am getting rid of a lot of stuff, but need to acquire the things for the next stage:

We are done having babies but far from done raising our family.

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her family. 

Perspective: Mornings

By Sarah Rachel Egelman

It is 6:48 a.m. My husband is trying to be quiet as he gets ready for work, but I cringe at every small sound and know I will not get any more sleep today.

The baby, curled up next to me, is restless, beginning to wake. Next, I hear my daughter crying for me from her room. She wants me to come get her and carry her back to my bed, but I don't want to get up. I yell back that she should come on in, but this only upsets her. I go get her, and she is mad at her father for some reason and starts yelling at him and grumpily settles herself into our bed, demanding a cup of milk. It is now 7 a.m. and I already know this will be an exhausting day.

* * *

Another day. It is 7:10 a.m., and I hear her footsteps in the hall. It is a Saturday so my husband is still home and asleep. My daughter climbs into our bed, and I scoot the baby safely over. She nestles down between her father and I and tells us she loves us and had good dreams about golden dragons. The baby wakes at the sound of her voice and starts smiling and cooing. I go to the kitchen and get her a cup of milk and crawl back into bed with my family. We are snuggly and sleepy and we will have a busy day.

* * *

Days later. It is 7:19 a.m. and I cannot believe that she choose this day, the first day of preschool, to sleep late.

I get up to brush my teeth and get dressed and it wakes her. She is mad I am not waiting for her in my room so I get back into bed with her and she calms down. She tells me she doesn't want to start school but then is distracted by a "cuddle party" with her little sister who is finally awake, too. She eventually picks out her favorite clothes and fills her purse with treasures and we head to school. I have promised her we will bake cookies when she comes home.

At the school, she holds my hand for a moment, shy of her teacher and the classroom. But before I know it she has joined a group of girls to hear a story and I say goodbye. The baby and I head out into the 9 a.m. sun.

The day is getting hot already, but there is a nice breeze. We drive to the store for baking ingredients. I picture her in her classroom, cautious but curious, brave and interested and I know this will be a wonderful day.

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her family.

Post-pregnancy re-entry

By Sarah Rachel Engelman

You have probably seen me: hobbling down the street with a newborn tied to my chest, a ratty ponytail holding the unwashed hair from my face, spit-up on both shoulders and a frustrated, needy toddler at the end of one arm. I am a newly postpartum woman just venturing into the outside world.

When my first daughter was born, although the labor and delivery were easy enough, the physical and emotional recovery turned me into a shut-in for almost two months. Then, when I did leave the house I brought along my trusty donut to sit on (stitches, ouch!). I leaked milk, had mastitis and was generally freaking out all the time (but, oddly enough, people remarked what a calm, serene mom I was already; I think I was catatonic). This time around has been very different.

The labor and delivery were even easier and though I had breastfeeding issues again, they resolved themselves quickly. My baby daughter is either much mellower or my husband and I are. Either way, the baby aspect is going quite well. BUT. Now there is an almost 3-year-old to contend with.

Of course, my oldest daughter, Lilith, is even needier and more sensitive now that her little sister, Adina, is on the scene. She has begun climbing into bed with me in the middle of the night. Sometimes she says she is having nightmares and sometimes she just says she needs me. Whenever I nurse the baby she tells me she needs to be held, too. All of this is to be expected, and I did expect it. Still, living it is difficult. It adds to my exhaustion and many days are spent in frustration.

A colder than usual winter has kept us inside lately. It has been hard for Lilith to expend her seemingly boundless physical energy. That plus the fact that, I will be honest, taking the two of them out together, just the three of us, makes me nervous. So, my first couple of trips to the grocery store have been either alone or with just one of them. We three girls have managed many nice walks around the block and a couple trips to the park without incident. There, at the park, Lilith is occupied with swings and slides and sand and is content. I can hover nearby with the baby safely tied to my chest, sitting on a bench to nurse as needed. But, the grocery store, or any such place, fills me with a teeny bit of dread.

What if Lilith takes off? She has been less obedient in public lately, testing her limits, seeing how responsive we are to her. Will I be able to be on top of her and the baby and the groceries and get us home in one piece? I know it is inevitable that I will have to make this trip but I am not ready yet for the final stages of re-entry!

Adina's turning two months old (by the time I finish writing this, she will probably be graduating from high school, you know how it goes) and she has a pediatrician appointment. I will be taking Lilith. It will be just the three of us. I have images of Lilith running away from me, heading down the hospital corridors as I helplessly watch and am stuck holding a squirming naked infant on the paper-covered surface of the examining table.

Maybe I am not giving either of us enough credit. After all, she is a good kid, and I think I am a good mom. I am sure the doctor's appointment will go well, with Lilith quietly coloring in a chair while we tend to Adina. Who knows, maybe it will go so well we'll hit the grocery store on the way home.

And, if you see me there (you'll recognize me; blurry eyed, nervous, yet blissfully happy), please say hello or smile my way. It is not easy for a postpartum mom upon re-entry.

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her family. 

The new baby

By Sarah Rachel Egelman

When I was newly pregnant, a friend told me that throughout much of her second pregnancy and especially during her labor and delivery, she mourned the loss of the relationship with her toddler at home. As she talked about her feelings, how she even cried, missing her son, as her baby was born, I paid close attention. I knew this was one of those things that parents rarely talk about but many feel deeply. And, now here I am, about to deliver my second baby and I understand why she shared her story with me. 

I admit I am conflicted. I wanted to get pregnant and have another baby and that has not changed.  But, my feelings this time around are so very different. My feelings this time around are not centered on the growing baby but centered on my daughter, Lilith.

She is so perfect and wonderful and everything is just so good right now, and I can't help but feel I am about to mess things up completely. 

She is not quite 3, but will tell you she is four and a half years old. She is strong willed, sometimes quite serious. She is always affectionate ("Mimi, you are my mother and I love you and I love my daddy too!"), and she is admirably silly ("The dog gave me a slippery, sloppery kiss! I said 'slippery sloppery,' that is funny!"). She has her moments: she slams the door to her room and tells us to go away. She asks me, "Because why?" like she is 14. But she is smart and imaginative and cuddly and lovely all the same. And, soon, her world will be quite altered and there is not much I can do to prepare her. 

During my prenatal yoga classes when we are asked to visualize delivering the baby, I visualize delivering Lilith. When I try to imagine who this new baby is I imagine another little Lilith. It is hard to, at this point, think of the baby as its own person because my life, my heart, have been filled with Lilith for so long.   

My mother says that after I was born she wanted more children. My father was anxious and hesitant.  Would he have enough love for another child? Things were fine the way they were. He didn't want to lose his relationship with me. But after my sister was born he realized that love expands and our capacity to love is infinite. He loved my sister just as much as he loved me; she was her own unique and awesome person and he couldn't imagine life without her.

I know intellectually that, while the transition for our family may be rough (Lilith already says she wants to sleep in a crib again despite the fact that I have explained numerous times that she never did sleep in a crib when she was a baby and in fact screamed bloody murder at the sight of one) it will be a challenge that will make our family better. I know that my capacity to love is infinite, and I know this baby will be loved as much as my daughter is (by me, my husband, by all our family and friends). 

But, I have to be honest. There is part of me that is mourning the loss of what I have now. There is part of me that is nervous, wondering why have I chosen to make things more difficult? Was I being selfish? Why did I want to have another baby anyway? 

I have to be honest because there is not much time left and I need to be allowed to feel these things so I can move on to celebrating this new little person who is going to expand my heart and my understanding of the world, who is going to challenge me and make my Lilith a big sister.

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her family.     

The Big Bad Wolf

Courtesy: Disney

By Sarah

I don't know about other adults, because it isn't something that usually comes up in conversation, but I have scary dreams on a regular basis. I am not terrorized by sleep, but occasionally I wake up from a real doozy. Perhaps I am just an anxious person and sleep is when I work things out, or maybe it is normal to have nightmares, I'm not sure. But, until last week I didn't really give it much thought.

Last week, my two and a half-year-old had the first nightmare that she could articulate for us, and we are all still talking about it.

That day had been a rough one -- lots of dull errands to run with me and then a disastrous and upsetting play date, and, of course, no nap. At some point during the day we were stopped at a parking lot driveway waiting to turn into busy traffic and across the street was a huge sculpture of a wolf. Or, a lobo to be precise: the mascot of our state university here in town. 

Lilith thought at first that the wolf was real and asked me when it was going to move. "Just watch," I said, "it won't move, it's only a sculpture, not real." She seemed to accept that just fine.

Cut to 2 a.m. She started screaming for me. As soon as I realized she was fully awake I dashed to her room to see what's going on. "There are wolves in the house! There are wolves in the house!" she sobbed.

I climbed into her bed and cuddled her and told her, "No, it was just Mimi and Daddy and the dog and cat and no wolves are in our house."

It took her a while to calm down and I stayed with her until she fell back asleep. She was awake and afraid 30 minutes later and then I heard a huge thunk, the sound we all recognize as a toddler's head hitting the floor, and again I ran to her room.

We bumped into each other in the hallway. She assured me she was OK as she ran past me and jumped into my bed. She clung to me the rest of the night. And the scary dream was the first thing on her mind in the morning.

She was able to tell us that she dreamed there were two wolves in the bathroom. And that was the topic of conversation all that day (and into the next). We tried our best to both assure her it was just a dream (no wolves can get into our house, they live far far away, etc.) and respect the fact that it was very real to her. 

As adults we take our dreams and nightmares for granted. We may believe they have something to tell or teach us or we may ignore them altogether. But, we know they exist only in our own minds. For Lilith, this dream was really inseparable from waking reality.

She had all kinds of interesting ways of trying to deal with this nightmare, from talking about it at great length to wanting to paint and draw it.  She also wanted to take a picture of it with the camera but we had to explain we just didn't know how to do that! Still, we were happy she was willing and able to confront so creatively something that had frightened her so.

Many days and nights have passed and our sleep is back to usual here. But, every morning when she comes into my room to wake me she tells me, "No bad dreams last night!"

I was prepared for the first steps, first words, first hugs and kisses, even the first time she told me to go away, but this nightmare incident feels like a milestone too -- one perhaps more subtle but no less important or intriguing. 

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her husband and daughter.

The hunt for maternity clothes

By Sarah

Being pregnant the second time around brings some practical joy: it is nice to know you have all the stuff you need for the baby. With a few exceptions, I don't need to spend a lot of money, time or energy getting everything ready. Our only challenges are gender and weather.

My daughter was born in May and this baby is due in January. If we have another girl we are all set with clothes and even if it is a boy, we're OK because we have plenty of gender-neutral clothing for the first few weeks, if not longer. Of course, we have had to invest in a few long-sleeve onesies, a couple sleep sacks and some warm newborn socks, but acquiring all this has been easy and relatively cheap. (I have learned, in the past few years what to buy used and what to buy new, as well as where to get reliable quality things that fit in our budget).

Like I said, we're basically set.

Wait, let me rephrase that: the baby is all set. 

The baby has nice warm clothes waiting for it, a place to sleep, a car seat, a stroller, slings and wraps and all kinds of other necessary and unnecessary baby accoutrements just waiting for his or her arrival. It is me who needs some help.

I was happy that this time around I wouldn't need to comparison shop for co-sleepers and car seats, I wouldn't have to research cloth versus disposable diapers. And, I thought, I would be spared the humiliation of shopping for maternity clothes because I kept all mine neatly stored away. But, here I am in my seventh month, hunting all around for just a simple pair of maternity pants that will get me through the next 11 or so weeks. Who would've thought this search could be so involved and so frustrating?

I do have a few strikes against me. First, though I did save all my maternity clothes, the last time I was pregnant I started to show in the middle of the winter and delivered in the spring. So, all my pants from my early pregnancy, which would be weather appropriate now, are just a teensy bit (OK, quite a bit) too tight. Second, I started this pregnancy heavier than the last, so the clothes that did fit this time around fit for a significantly shorter period of time. Third, by this point last time I was on maternity leave so I could really get by with one pair of pants and a few shirts since I would just wear sweats or big pajamas around the house. And, fourth, I have to admit I am very cheap. I really don't want to pay much for clothes I will wear for a few months at best, and maybe for just a few weeks. Four strikes and I am, in baseball parlance, very much out.    

I find myself with about seven weeks of work left before I go on leave and while I have plenty of appropriate shirts, I am down to two pairs of pants, both brown, both a little too tight for comfort.  I have been hitting the most reliable used clothing stores with no luck; it's easy to find shirts, but to find decent pants that fit is proving impossible. So, I decided to buy a new pair of pants.

I had two places in mind but only 40 minutes to accomplish my task. I headed to (gasp) the mall. I decided on jeans because you can wear them longer without washing them and because they are warm and luckily I can wear jeans to work. I tried on three pairs. The second and third pairs actually fit.  One pair actually fit well, but, they cost just over $40. Forty dollars for a pair of pants I will wear for the next three or four months if I wear them post-partum. The final pair were less than flattering, but they did fit and were on sale for $16, and so they came home with me. 

It is hard enough for most women to shop for everyday clothes but hunting for maternity clothes seems often to be a futile sport as well. I am short, a bit overweight, but I think my body is not unlike many American women's bodies. Yet when shopping for maternity pants, as in shopping for regular pants, I often find everything is just way too small. Despite the fact that I am only maybe 15 pounds overweight at the most (not something I am proud of, but not at all unusual) the pants I bought today were XL. How on earth do pregnant women who are more overweight than me find anything to fit them?  What about women who put on a lot of pregnancy weight, even though they are otherwise small? 

The cost is another issue. Maternity clothes are very expensive. I planned to have some talented seamstresses I know help me make some skirts or pants but never got around to it and now that I need pants for tomorrow I am faced with having to spend what is, to me, a lot of money. 

Perhaps it is the hormones talking, but it seems there are not that many affordable, functional, and still at least slightly stylish maternity clothing options available. Perhaps I am just picky and pessimistic. 

How does everyone else go about shopping for maternity clothes? Is anyone else frustrated or do some women look upon the hunt as an exhilarating sport?

Sarah Rachel Egelman is a community college instructor and freelance book reviewer who lives in New Mexico with her husband and daughter.

Library treasures

By Sarah Rachel Egelman

Every week my 2 and a half-year-old daughter, along with the woman who cares for her while I am at work, goes to the library for storytime. Afterward, she is allowed to browse and read and pick books off the shelf, selecting some to take home. When I come home on those afternoons I am always excited to see what she has selected. Excited and, I admit, nervous. (Read more)