Strange Machines

After one of the roughest and exhausting nights in my nursing history when Jack nursed almost every hour on my completely sore and exhausted nipples (and howling as if the world was ending if he didn’t receive any – “I really really want NAN!”), Jack cheered me with a lovely conversation about me not going back to work.

His Dad asked him, “How about Mom goes back to work and then we have more money to buy you more toys?”

He looked at me and said, “No, I want Mom to look after me. I have enough toys. See,” gesturing to his stuffed animals on the cot. “I have so many friends.”

Then he hugged me. :`)

The whole of this last month, almost as if he suspects his throne will be usurped, Jack has been nursing feverishly every night and every morning almost like a newborn. It has been undoubtedly exhausting and excruciating and I get up every day parched and absolutely beat.

I try to encourage him to stop, hugging and praising him when he unlatches, and I find that the times I am calm, he will be too, but the times I am angry and frustrated, he will pick up on my mood and cry for milk more. Still it is hard to be calm every morning when one is sore, in pain, having Braxton-Hicks, and the sorts.

As mothers we do the best we can with the knowledge we have, and I remind myself constantly that to a child, it is almost akin to us wives having to accept a second wife. It is that painful and traumatising. So I must be patient.

Well, it is almost that time now. 4 days more to the due date. Braxton-Hicks are frequent (although strangely enough none today) and I can almost feel my ligaments shift to prepare for the birth. I worry most that Jack will cry for me at night when I am at the hospital, not so much the pain or discomforts of childbirth, and I hope that I have prepared him enough for the changes to come.

I just read in one of my pregnancy books that around the 35th week (and that’s when it began) the hormones will turn expectant mothers into aliens. Yes, this post is proof of that. Unnecessary worrying, strange cravings (for sugary food – yuck!), preoccupation with unnecessary things (finishing the courtyard! and maybe sewing some stuffed animals), excessive purchasing of baby things. Heck, I even started Jack on cloth diapers (bumGenius – not bad at all but for the PUL), and have ordered some wool diapers after I read that PUL could be an endocrine disruptor. Dang.

Meanwhile I am still figuring out this cloth diapering thing. Prefolds, doublers… heck, I just bought an all-in-one. Then I found out that they take a while to dry if I don’t wring them out properly and air every bit of it. They’re expensive too. $30 a pop (or poop) and we’ll need a lot when the little one is born. Currently Jack just uses it once a day and we change it whenever he is wet during this feeble attempt to toilet train. I haven’t had to wash out poop yet so maybe that’s why I am still chipper about the whole thing.

Even bought the Seventh Generation size 3 diapers which looked so small and thin I haven’t dared to put them on Jack yet. They are supposed to fit a child of weight up to 13kg but they look small enough to fit only Kaku! I better try them soon though. Jack’s growing like a weed. Or maybe I can save them for the baby. Hmm…

The courtyard project is almost complete. The glass roof is leaking in 2 places so that’s gonna be fixed soon – clothes can’t hang there yet but I have populated the place with some sun-loving plants, including a sweet basil that freshens up the place a bit. I’ve given up on Boston Ferns which have all but died on me. Ivies too. They hate the heat. Only 2 survive and I am giving them as much TLC as I can before I pop.

Ornery after 8 months of changing cat poo, DH banished Boy to the back with the other cats after he peed and pooed indiscriminately outside his pan after the workmen traipsed all over the area. Surprisingly he’s doing quite well and only Tux seems upset about this new arrangement (maybe cos he is now half Boy’s size and the change in hierarchy since Sam and he broke off and Sam grew bigger than he has affected him somehow). Boy nabbed a nice spot on a chair with a soft towel and seems happy there. I do miss petting him in the kitchen.

Jack has been clingier than normal, especially at night. And that has been so hard cos it hurts ever more now to nurse. Thankfully it is mostly the first minute then the pain abates. There’s still tons of milk, although it looks more like water to me. Jack swears it tastes the same. “Nan is the sweetest”, he chirps. And then sings me a song he made up about the joys of nan nan. How can I not give him any?

Back to the feeling alien thing. I think it is the girl hormones. There’s been weeping. Lots. Especially during sad Buffy moments. When Angel left. When Joyce died. All very sad. Even when Riley left! The only other time I cried during a movie or TV show was when the guy Lou Diamond Philips played died in La Bamba. Anyway. Hope I’ll feel more myself after baby is born. And that the labour is short, painless, and safe…