Hello and welcome to the world, little Mr. Howard Thomas! He is so so cute, but I will let my sister do the posting of pictures and so forth when she is good and ready. He weighed in at 8lbs15oz, and a stunning 22.5" long. He is BEAUTIFUL and Mateo got to meet is cousin today. Mama and Papa are soooo cute and happy and it's just a good, good day.
Hellllooooo Howie!!!!
So tomorrow is a small, insignificant day. I will get Teo to day care as usual at quarter to eight. I will be in the office by quarter after. Somewhere in there, my sister is most likely going to give birth to a baby boy.
Whatever.
After that, there's going to be text messaging and some jittery behavior on my end for the rest of the day. I am taking the afternoon off, as I have made a doctor's visit for Mateo at the same hospital where Teo's cousin will be born. So I will pick him up early, go to the doctor's, and see what happens.
I am hoping to get to stop by, to meet my nephew in his early hours. Kari may be drugged up and crazy, but Andoo will let me know the haps as they develop.
The one issue? It's eight pm the night before this day care-work-day care-doctor-hospital driving extravaganza, and I just noticed I have a flat tire. I heard a suspicious hissing sound in my garage this evening as I unloaded the groceries, but I just shrugged it off as nothing. But um... well, the tire is completely flat.
Good timing there, God. Niiiiiiice.
Update: Catastrophe averted. I am borrowing my sister's car because, well, she won't be using it for awhile. I will drive around town in that car and then eventually get my tire fixed. Andoo is going to replace my tire at some point with the spare I didn't even know I had. Yes, I am a girl. I have never fixed a flat. My only excuse is that I haven't owned a car since I was 19, and I honestly never though it was something I needed to learn at any point in the last decade.
We did point out the positive in this, however. Miracle had it that I even noticed the flat this evening, as the guy who was supposed to deliver something to my house yesterday ended up flaking and coming tonight instead. I happened to have left my wallet in my car, so I had to go back out to the garage to get it. And that's when I noticed the flat. At 8 pm, instead of 7 am. When they would have already have been at the hospital and otherwise occupied.
So, I repeat: CATASTROPHE AVERTED.
Two positive things after my last depressing post:
1) I have befriended the girl who works the deli at the grocery store near me. She is just sweetness, all the time, and she loves Mateo. We go through a little routine where he waves at her and smiles and of course she doesn't like that at all. This last time when we went, though, she said, "Can I also just say something? You look great. I would have never known you had a baby -- let alone such a young one."
2) These are my calming evenings after work nowadays. Yes, I have a hole in my sock.
A relaxing evening from odessa on Vimeo.
Today I went to pick up Mateo from his day care and was overwhelmed with sadness. Teo's day care is great, he was ecstatic to see me, all was well on that front. He is, for the record, feeling like dynamite. I realized just how rotten he must have been feeling the last 5 weeks or so because he is suddenly the smiley, enthusiastic dude he has always been. He has done nothing but smile and giggle for two straight days. It is wonderful.
And greatly needed. I have been going through a bit of a dip. I know these will come and go, and it isn't anything for people to start calling me or sending me concerned emails. But I did have a moment today while picking up the babe. There were all these fathers around. Good God, the place was crawling with them. They were so cute, with their bottles in their hands and their obvious excitement to pick up their children. Their eyes danced when they saw their babies squirm with happiness upon arrival. Some parents came to get their kids together. And it just mad me so, so sad. I can't even put into words how tough it is for me to see how awesome some dads are, and how both Mateo and I are missing out on having that huge - HUGE - presence in both of our lives.
I am happy for everybody I know who is in a deep and fulfilling relationship, and especially happy for those with children in such a situation. But damn if it's not hard to be the only one -- really, the only one -- I know who is doing this on her own. I honestly do not believe that anyone can even come close to understanding what it is like without living it. The daily part of it is difficult but manageable. I don't let myself think about The Big Picture too much or I will fully flip out. But even more challenging is dealing with the constant feeling of... disdain? Concern? Judgement?... I get from others when they find out I am on my own. I know that most of you who read the blog don't feel that way -- most of you are super supportive and well, downright awesome. But for each person who is saying, "Oh, you're so badass!" (and thank you for your emails, by the way), there is somebody who gives an overly sympathetic sigh or someone else who says too much with a cutting look and no more. Getting questioned at the doctor's office, at work, at the FREAKIN car dealership about my marital status and having to say, in as few words as possible, that it's just Mateo and me. A single woman without a child does not have to go around talking about her single-dom, but a single mom has to regularly discuss it with people. It is odd. And annoying.
Now I know that everybody goes down their own path, and that we all have our demons to struggle with. I get that. My current demon is just accepting that this is our situation and that Mateo is not at some crazy disadvantage - dad or no dad. But right now Mateo just woke up after falling asleep at 8:30. It is 10:45 and I am in my pajamas, ready to go to bed. He is crying in his room. I spent all night trying to figure out with the morons on Comcast how to get my other computer hooked up to the internet. I finally gave up and opted to take a shower and get a good night's sleep. I cleaned everything, put away the dishes to my admittedly rather forlon meal, prepped Teo's bottles for tomorrow, placed his toys where they belong, packed up my work bag, and took a shower. As I was hanging up my towel and dreaming of sweet, sweet slumber, his loud cry came from the bedroom. Just when I thought I could finally cash in for the night.
I am struggling with the question of when to go to him. He needs to learn to get himself to go back to sleep some time. Occasionally, he does, but most of the time he just gets himself into a tizzy. I have nobody here to help me with this decision, and I am exhausted after a day of work, a trip to the grocery, an evening of trying to get some work done (without any success) and now a crying baby. Sometimes, you don't even so much want the relief of dealing with things, you want the comfort of going through it with someone else.
While I was at work today, we went through these sales training courses that the VP had bought. They were pretty good, and one of the guys on the discs said "When you go home from the course today, what are you going to say about it when you walk in the door?" I was struck by the sad thought that I wasn't going to say anything at all. I have nobody to say it to. Yes, Mateo is here. And yes, he helps enormously. But I can't exactly tell him how my day went. I miss having someone to do that with.
I also miss my friends. I miss them so, so much. I talk to my good friends regularly, and am in email contact with those that I can't call. But it's not the particulars that bother me so much as the big picture. In Paris, I had a nice little circle of friends and was honestly never lonely. It never really occurred to me to be so. Occasionally, I would get bored, but never, ever lonely. I saw my friends regularly, kept a busy lifestyle, and had The Boy. It might just now be hitting me what a big, enormous hole I have in my life when both my friends and my significant other are no longer a part of it. I spend all day with people I hardly know, and that is pretty tiring by the time Friday rolls around.
Anyway, like I said, I know life has ups and downs and that this is all a part of that. I am not worried, but I did want to document this feeling so that in six months, a year, whatever, I can look back and remember how much ADJUSTING I do on a daily basis and how exhausting and lonely it can be sometimes. I also wanted to add that Teo keeps me smiling 95% of the time, so my sadness is usually fleeting. But it is there, and should be recognized. Especially so that one day I can look back and see how far I have come.
Mateo was very sick. He woke up on Sunday with a terrible fever, shaking so much that I took him to the emergency room. I would have just taken him to his regular doctor had it not been Sunday, but oh well, ER it was. They were prompt and didn't make me feel crazy for bringing him in. It turns out his ear infection had only gotten worse in the past few weeks, and I guess his body just freaked out on him, causing him to spike a crazy fever.
I took him to the pediatrician today and she looked into his ears. "Mom," she said, "We gotta talk." I guess it had gotten pretty ugly in there, and so she gave me the line-up of options. I appreciated that she said one wasn't any better than another, and let me make my own decision: shots. He is getting three rounds of shots in his little legs and we are just bombarding his little veins with antibiotics. I am against the overuse of antibiotics in general, but this infection is just not. going. away. His ears have not been clear in over a month, and she said that letting the trend continue could lead to some hearing loss. Generally, that is to be avoided.
My sister was an angel and she came to watch him this afternoon once we came back from the doctor's. She is a million weeks pregnant and she still did that for us, I am so grateful. I needed to go to work -- the job is new and I don't feel comfortable just skipping out like that on my third week. My boss is gone as of Wednesday, too, so these two days are super important. I went in, made my appearance, did my work. But honestly, I am just exhausted. Saturday night we hardly slept at all. Sunday drained me further. And then today was crazy. Tomorrow and Wednesday are likely to be similar.
Additionally, I just have so much work to do. I was worried about how I would get it all done even before all of this went down.
I am sort of amazed at how life just sort of exploded in my face. Goodness.
We'll make it through, and this weekend will probably be the best in my life because of it. I hope to
1) sit
2) shop for furniture
3) do laundry
4) go to the baby sale
5) sit some more
Teo seemed difficult and grumpy until about six-thirty this evening. But for the last two hours, he has been all smiles and sunshine, and I pray pray pray that the medicine is working. I want my baby back -- seeing him so happy again made me realize just how miserable he has been these last few days.
I am going to shower now. I don't even remember the last time I did that.
