Day five

Amy is sleeping in her swing.

Erin, today’s volunteer, is reading a book.

I am getting nervous about my therapy appointment; I am to call Joe at 3:40. I’ve been a little nervous about it all day.

Amy has been having a good day. She slept a stretch of seven and a half hours last night, which was a great mercy after all the fussiness last evening that had all three of us in tears. The good thing about Amy’s fussiness is that it’s not constant — she’ll settle for a while then randomly burst out crying, then settle again, then cry, and so on. (It was probably not the best night to try to watch Syriana.)

By the time Erin arrived, I was finishing up a feeding. Erin and Amy played on the mat while I reviewed my journal to prepare for my appointment. I think Amy might have dozed a bit, then we changed and fed her again and put her in the swing, and we ate lunch. I also got a page done in the scrapbook — the pictures of her first tub bath.

Soon Amy will wake up, and Erin will get her all to herself to change and feed while I do therapy. Soon after that, Mark will be home, we’ll eat the dinner Bev is kindly bringing, and then I’ll go off to the new moms support group. After that, there’ll be the last new episode of House M. D. until American Idol calms down.

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Edited to add:

My therapy appointment was good. I was nervous because I’d felt that last time he was trying to push me away, keep his distance, make me feel I didn’t need him or he couldn’t help me. We were able to talk through that and of course that wasn’t his intention at all, but he said my reaction made sense given things like my fear of abandonment or betrayal, fear of being dismissed or rewritten (being defined by someone else instead of myself), fear of not getting help, attention, or compassion unless I’m in crisis.

The moms support group was not so great. They were talking about putting together a fund-raiser to support the family of a local boy who had been badly assaulted by the neighbor, who was hired by the parents to babysit for a weekend; a known felon, but the parents didn’t know that. They were also talking about other cases, like a baby who is now blind and paralyzed from the waist down, because a staff person at a LICENSED day care center shook her. I’m glad they’re doing this fund-raiser, but I wasn’t quite up for hearing about so much violence against babies and kids.

Oh, and I got a flat on the way home. Had no flashlight, didn’t want to try to change it myself there in the dark. Fortunately a police officer was passing by shortly after I pulled over, and he drove me to a gas station to fill the donut, which was also flat, and then drove me back and helped me change the tire. I got to hold the flashlight. Mark checked the flat this morning, found no holes; it looks fine — we just need to keep it filled.

The House episode was strange… and disappointing… anyone else watch it? What did you think?

Day four

Once again, this week I have volunteers from church and the dulcimer circle coming over to help me with Amy. I do not yet trust myself to be alone with her for a whole day, not when I still can’t predict when I’ll get hit with a wave of depression, anxiety, aversion, or all three.

Today has been mixed. Amy has enjoyed herself on her play mat, in her swing, and in her bouncy seat. She’s been cuddled (awake and asleep), changed and fed, laid to sleep in her basket. She’s stared and smiled and almost laughed and cried and yelled and burped and other things. Lunch (which Sherj brought) has been eaten. Dishes have been done. A harp has been played. A book’s being read. A cardigan’s being knitted.

Some of it has been me, and some of it has been Sherj.

My earlier post was hard to write, and has left me somewhat depleted and low today. I’m managing, but am not very motivated. I feel like I am just passing time. Yesterday was like that, too.

Sherj will be here until about 5:30, which allows Mark a fuller day of work.

Have I mentioned that folks have been bringing us dinners? Thanks to all of them. It is wonderful to be taken care of in all these ways.

Playing with Daddy

Amy likes her play mat. Sometimes, though, she looked instead at Daddy’s face or the TV or the window or…

Getting a grip

Notice the little fist with its handful of blanket:

After an unusual few nights with five-, six-, and even one seven-hour stretch of sleep, Amy went back to her more normal every two or three hours waking up schedule. Hopefully Mark will get to catch a good nap before the playoffs.

She’s still sniffly, but it hasn’t gotten worse. We continue to follow the doctor’s suggestion of a humidifier in her room.

Edited to add this one of a full lap (and edited again to add a better one):

And to mention that now that the Christmas tree is out of the way, we set up her play mat, and she just had a nice time with Mark looking at and talking to the various things hanging from the arches. I should have gotten a picture… maybe next time.

Day three

Today I have been slow and somewhat depressed. I gave myself permission to crash a little — to just rest and be. After all:

• I got through those first two days really well, but at the same time it took a lot of energy, and to an anxious person, success is often almost as scary and costly and exhausting as failure.
• I had a dream last night that was upsetting. It had to do with feelings and beliefs about how I function in social relationships.
• Mark and I have been talking about a particular job opening. I’m not sure I want to live in that place, but then again the other places that have openings right now might not be any better. This particular one wants to make their hiring decision in early February, so it’s a bit of a rush to consider it. We are sure other offers will come up, so if this one turns out to be a bad fit for one or both of us, that’s probably okay. We are just not very good at making decisions, together or individually, big or little.

So, I let Ann take care of Amy the whole time she was here, about 9:45 to 12:30. She’s been well-nurtured — changed and fed and cuddled — and she’s been quite content. Oh — and I should mention that she slept SEVEN hours last night, from 10 to 5.

She fell asleep again just before Ann left, and is still sleeping now at about 2:00. She will probably wake up within a half hour or so. Mark will be home about 3:45, so I don’t have much longer to go alone, and I will be able to take care of Amy when she wakes up.

I don’t think anyone needs to view today as a failure, or reason for increased concern; I think it’s just part of the wavy nature of depression.

Day two

Day two:

Amy stayed asleep from the time I got up until just before my first volunteers, Ann and Heidi, showed up. Gave me a chance to tidy a bit and take down the Christmas tree. Soon after that she woke up, and I had changed her and was in the middle of feeding her when Ann and Heidi arrived. When she fell asleep, we cleaned house. I dusted and vacuumed the living room and hallway, and Ann did the bathrooms — what a gift! They brought lunch, too.

Amy woke up again just in time for the first volunteers to leave and the next one, Erin, to arrive. We changed her, fed her, and then gave her a bath. She had a nice awake time in her bouncy seat, fascinated by my feet — I was lying down to ease my back and had my feet up in the air, and she watched them as I waved them around a bit.

She was content enough that I got up to do laundry, and then she fell asleep. She had another changing and feeding — a bit fussy, that feeding — and dozed again for a little. Not long after Mark got home she woke up, and now he’s reading to her.

Heidi held Amy for me for a while, Erin helped me give the bath and watched her when she was contentedly awake. I had a short break when I wasn’t ready for her to be awake yet. Otherwise it’s been another good day. And this time it didn’t start with me anxious and crying about Mark leaving.

I am always reluctant to say anything too positive. This day went well, but I did have help and I wasn’t alone… I feel fairly good about things, but I don’t think I’m ready to go it alone yet.

Amy’s afternoon nap

This afternoon Amy took a nap all cuddled up on her belly. (Not to worry; she’s got the head control thing going pretty well, and the Boppy is a nice support.)

While I was at my appointment, Tamara took this picture, including her six-month-old Sophie in the background. Sophie enjoyed Amy’s toy basket and the Christmas tree.

Day one

This is day one of the “Mark goes back to work” experiment.

He did some days at work before the holidays, when his mom was here to help me with Amy.

This time, Tamara has arranged for some church people to come here for a few hours morning and / or afternoon, for two weeks. Today, Scotty is coming at 10 (any minute now) and staying until 1. After that, either I’ll be dropping Amy off at Bev’s while I go to my appointment with the psychiatric nurse practitioner, or else Tamara herself will come here to watch Amy while I’m out.

Mark left a few minutes after 9. So far Amy is dozing pretty well, and I’ve taken a half Ativan, so I’m okay. I sure cried a lot between waking up at 5:45 and Mark leaving, though.

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I made a little schedule spreadsheet for myself, to keep track of Amy’s doings; just because.

• 08:00 am: Ate about 5 oz
• 09:00 am: Dozing
• 10:00 am: Awake
• 10:30 am: Changed a wet diaper; ate about 6 oz
• 11:00 am: Dozed and fussed off and on; Scotty changed a wet diaper and a poopy one, then Amy fell asleep again
• 11:30 am: Changed a poopy diaper, ate about 2 oz
• 12:30 pm: Belly nap
• 03:30 pm: Changed yet another poopy diaper, ate about 5 oz
• 04:30 pm: Enjoyed Daddy coming home
• 05:00 pm: Dozing

For whatever reason, I was okay most of the day. Sometimes the fear of the scary thing is worse than the scary thing. Maybe someday I’ll live with less fear.

I had about two hours alone with Amy; one before Scotty arrived, and one between Scotty leaving and Tamara arriving. And Mark got home just ten minutes or so after Tamara left. I took a break while Scotty was here, and had an appointment with the psychiatric nurse practitioner while Tamara was here. Tamara also did part of a feeding for me. Otherwise I did just about everything. And survived. And even enjoyed a lot of it.

Doesn’t mean I’m all cured or anything… it just plain and simple means it was a good day. Now I’m taking a little time out to recover from it… then I’ll fetch dinner, and later I’ll watch, believe it or not, This Old House.

Today’s appointments

Today Mark stayed home so we could go together (with Amy, too, of course) to my final midwife visit, the six weeks post partum checkup. I also had my second phone session with my therapist, Joe.

We changed and fed Amy just before leaving for the midwives office.

She was rather fussy during the feeding, and it was hard to tell if she was still hungry or not. Sometimes she’s so upset she won’t accept the bottle even though she is hungry, and we just have to wait a bit and try again. Finally she seemed to be calm and not hungry, only to yell vehemently when we put her in the car seat. Were we wrong — was she still hungry after all? Or just annoyed to be handled and buckled up in the car seat?

She did okay in the car. She was even okay in the waiting room — but just as she started crying again, Graham was ready for me and Mark got a phone call from one of the jobs he’s thinking of applying for. He was able to arrange a time to talk to the guy tomorrow instead, and took care of Amy while I went in alone for my appointment.

Meanwhile today was the day I decided to try taking a half Ativan at midday instead of morning AND afternoon, and I hadn’t taken it yet. I’d been fine all morning, but that crying in the waiting room set me off.

Still, I had a nice talk with Graham about how things have been going, what I think of how the birth went now, and some other stuff plus the exam.

My second phone session with Joe was fine.

The gist of it is that I need to feel the feelings, whatever they are, whether reasonable or unreasonable, whether I like them or not. It’s one thing to recognize that a feeling is irrational; it’s another to try to not have it, or to judge it, because of its irrationality. Feelings can’t be controlled, transcended, repressed, denied, judged, etc, without negative consequences; they can only be felt. And feeling them is the only way to diminish their power and influence.

Six and a half hours

Mark tells me Amy slept from 12:30 to 7 last night. That counts as a whole night! Again, this is just one night, so no guarantee it’ll happen again soon, but she’s on her way.