mommy meltdowns

                                                       Source: etsy.com via Lisa Bartek on Pinterest

as a mom, a wife, a woman....hell, as a person, we all experience an occasional meltdown. And today just happen to be that day for me.....

it all started off at 3am this morning. as Ive mentioned a couple times in my most recent posts, Matthews been sick. ALOT. Its hard as a mom to see you baby get sick. Especially how often as matthew has been getting sick. it puts that little question in the back of my mind, "Is it something Im doing? Something im exposing him too? Feeding him? Not feeding him?" The list goes on and on. I try to tell myself that all babies get sick. But its hard to convince myself thats truly the case. Especially when you have friends whos babies have never been sick, let alone this often, and are only a month or two younger than matthew.

I think ive been to the pediatricians office more in the past 3 weeks than Ive been to my own doctor in the past year. Partially due to an overprotective new father, who constantly thinks we should take the baby to the doctor. I think I bring him in more often just to ease hubs mind than to actually get answers. Sometimes its justifiable, like the recent virus/rash situation, but other times Ive been given the side-eye from the nurses too, "He's teething, hes a baby, hes ok, dont worry." All things I know. But, still, i manage to take the time off from work, spend the extra $30 copay to "see" the dr for 5 mins, and then go on our merry way with the advice to give him some motrin or tylenol if you see hes really uncomfortable.

Then i go back to the over-thinking side of me. I feel like were constantly giving him medicine. I dont like the idea of pumping medicine into his little body. We already give him zantac every morning and afternoon so he can keep his food down. But now, also the cold medicine (Azithromycin i think?), mortin/tylenol for teething, and breathing treatments when necessary. Again, this just sounds like a lot to me. Couldnt I be doing something better for him? Keeping him healthier so he doesnt get sick as often?

But back to my mommy meltdown. So this morning, 3am remember? Matthew wakes up. Basically right at the 7 hour mark of when I last gave him Motrin. I try to calm him down. Try to get him to go back to sleep. Change his diaper. Rock him. Basically anything to not give him more medicine. I even resort to bringing him back into our bed to fall asleep. Which I accomplish in a matter of 10mins, only for Matthew to be woken up by our barking dog.

Then theres more crying. And hubs is finally awake (yes, somehow hes been sleeping through this whole thing), and starts yelling. Im not quite sure if its at me or matthew. But somewhere in the mist of all the yelling i catch a "stop babying him!" EXCUSE.ME?!?!?!? Hes 9 months old. Ironic I know, but HE.IS.STILL.A.BABY!!! Now im mad, exhausted, irritated, and on the verge of tears (i seriously cry at everything these days) but if he thinks that Im babying him and that his solution will work better, Im all for trying it.

So I put Matthew back in his crib, give him his pacifier, blankie, and turn on the noise machine. I hop back in bed myself and feel absolutely terrible as all I can hear is his little cries over the monitor. (please know, I would never let me son cry more than absolutely necessary, and it took every ounce of willpower not to just go right in there and pick him up) But I wanted hubs to realize that his "not babying" solution, just wasnt going to cut it. Finally after about 7 mins (yes a whole 7 mins it took him) hubs got up himself and tried to calm him down. 

Now, a lil background on hubs, he gets frustrated really easily when he doesnt have a "quick solution" to something. So when Matthew starts crying he thinks we should be able to do something immediately to soothe him. Yes, in a perfect world this would be awesome, but guess what? HE'S.A.BABY! it doesnt really work like that. Needless to say hubs gets frustrated alot when it comes to matthew and not being able to calm him down. Especially when it interrupts his own sleep. (HA! welcome to a mothers world!)

Basically, the night morning ended with me back in the nursery, rocking matthew to sleep, waiting for the 2nd dose of motrin to kick in. Finally around 4:30am I was able to peacefully lay him back down and sneek back into our room. Hubs was now watching TV due to not being able to get back to bed. I knew immediately, that the rest of this day was just going to go down hill.

And sure enough, i was right. No need to go into detail, as I think you got enough of that above, but basically from the lack of sleep, exhaustion, frustration, and stress everything has gone into a butterfly effect. Its hard, especially for me--a person who likes to please everyone--to be able to control my emotions on a trying day like this. Things are said (by both parties) in the heat of the moment that arent necessarily truthful, but more to go for the juggler.  And its hard to forgive, even after apologies are said, because words still hurt.

After almost 12 years together, you would think we would know how to communicate with each other. Know how to hold back those hurtful words. Know how to calm each other down before either gets too heated. Instead, we go for the low blow? Instead, we spend another day angry? Instead, i feel absolutely helpless? To the point I suggested we see a counselor. Someone to help us communicate without ripping each other heads off, cuz at this point thats what Im ready to do. I may be balling my eyes out while I do it, but  it may just happen.

please tell me im not the only one with these mommy/wife meltdowns. please tell me, this too shall pass.......

fridays letters

omg, is it already 2013? guess that means its the first official fridays letters of the new year!

dear matt, Im glad you are somewhat back to feeling your normal self, because for the life of me I cant understand why you are such a strong brave man, yet when you get the tiniest of colds you become the biggest wimp Ive ever met. and i mean that in the nicest way possible ;) (for those of you wondering, I even goggled "why are men such wimps when they are sick" and its a proven fact, its something called "the man flu" lol)

dear matthew, i cant believe you are 7 months old today. where did my tiny baby boy go? You are growing before my eyes and I wish I could freeze every second of it. i wont lie, its starting to make me a little baby crazy, i already miss those newborn days, but dont worry I am even more excited to watch how you discover every little tiny thing that is new to you.

dear 2012, this past year has been absolutely amazing. so many wonderful memories, the highlight being matthews birthday this past june. but you were also filled with so many first; first day as a family of three, first family vacation, babys first pumpkin patch and halloween, babys first thanksgiving, first time meeting santa, first christmas (oh yeah slacker me hasnt even posted about that yet), and so many more. Im not sure how 2013 will ever beat this past year, but boy I know our lil family of three is going to have fun trying!

dear holidays, im sad you are over now. ill admit I was a lil depressed taking down the christmas tree this year. i wish the joy that you bring could last the whole year through. the amount of family fun, laughter, and wine you brought with you sure made for some wonderful memories and great times.

dear self, youre another year older (yes i missed a post back on my birthday on Dec 17th when I turned the big 2-7.) its a new year now. that means you cant technically use the ol' "i just had a baby" excuse anymore. time to get back into shape. im not going to call it a new years resolution. I hate those words. i feel like I always fail at my resolutions. so im just going to call you my next goal. that sounds more attainable. and Im even going to start off smaller than that. my next goal is just to lose 5lbs. im not going to worry about the other 30lbs i eventually want to loose ;) just start small... oh and adding to those goals, time to get myself more organized, specifically my office!

dear matt, its your birthday in just 8 days and you still have yet to come up with something you want. i swear you are the hardest person to get gifts for (although I do admit I did awesome on your xmas gift) maybe you could drop a few hints as to what you might like? pls,thx

dear matthew, i am so behind on your monthly updates. im actually having trouble remembering all the wonderful things that have happened each month, and I know you may not care now, but I cant wait to one day look back on those memories to share with you.

And because Ive always promised to leave you with a picture, heres me and some of my girls my birthday weekend tailgating at the Eric Church concert (btw-best concert ever!)

mommy & baby not feeling well

So we've been lucky enough that Matthew hasnt gotten sick at all in the first 3 months. Which means that except for the usual occurrence of getting into a routine, once he goes to sleep he normally only wakes up once during the middle of the night. Usually its just to pop his pacifier back into his mouth, but sometimes a diaper change is necessary. Well Sunday night was different. He woke up about 4 different times, but I seemed to be able to get him back to sleep fairly quickly. Still, I could tell something was up. Over the weekend my sis and I noticed he would occasionally pull on his left ear (sign of an earache?) But I swear, I know most kids arent completely in the teething stage this early, but my lil boy has been drooling like no-tomorrow for a couple of weeks now. So needless to say, I kinda just chalked it up to teething.
All day yesterday my sis (who takes care of him during the day) said she could tell he was out of whack. His morning nap was like 2.5-3 hours long. Normally she can only  get him to sleep for 45mins maybe 1hr. And on top of that, Ive started feeling sick. My eyes are itchy and I cant stop sneezing. Great. So I knew it was going to be an eventful evening last night.
We actually all went out to dinner for my parents anniversary, and surprisingly Matthew did pretty well throughout dinner, but I could tell he was extremely tired. So by time we got home he was crying way more than normal. He feel asleep on my chest for a little while and I decided even though it was earlier than his normal bedtime I should probably just put him to sleep anyway. So we put him in his pj's and off to bed he went.........only he woke up around 1am and decided he didnt want to go back to sleep. Plusalso, now mommy is dragging because I feel like crap.
baby + mommy + not feeling well = no beuno
After 1.5 hour and a bottle, some Tylenol, and lots of rocking I was able to get him to fall back asleep. When hubby got up for work this morning he asked if I wanted to bring him in the room with me and I figured I would just let him sleep. Which lasted only about 20mins and then I brought him into my room with me. Needless to say, all he needed was mommy & daddys bed ;)