Bye Bye Night Night

The night before last I nursed Kate for the last time. At the time I didn’t know it would be the last time, and it’s probably better that way.

Last night Mark was reading Kate her bedtime books. (We’re big fans of Pippo here.) When he was done and gave me the “you’re up” signal to come in and nurse her, I was all engrossed in some work thing. Every other night that I’ve been home when she’s gone to bed–which is roughly every night of her life minus three–I’ve nursed her before she’s gone to sleep. But, kooky kids that we are, we decided on the fly that Mark would give her a bottle. (It’s wild like that around here sometimes.)

Even though the plan had been to wean her around her first birthday, I’ve been nursing her a few times a day up until around Christmastime. The thing was, I went back to work the day after her first birthday–right when I’d been planning to wean her. And when I’d get home at night, she’d see me and start to cry for “night-night,” her way of requesting a suckle. (Since it always happened before sleep she somehow got her vocabulary lines crossed there.)

So I’d give in. Why deny the little angel-puss who I’d abandonned with a nanny all day a little Mama’s milk? After 8 hours at the office I’d missed her too, and it was our way of reconnecting (quite literally). It was just too hard to make the change then.

But the practical side of me knew the transition would have to happen some time. And I’ve prided myself on being able to fairly deftly move Kate through other changes (our bed to co-sleeper to her crib, for instance). And it seems like the older she gets, and more able to express her desires and, sure, even have tantrums, these transitions can be more challenging.

Even though the nursing provides a calm bonding moment in some otherwise hectic days, and I’ve wondered why I should deny her something that’s so easy for me to provide, I’ve gotten really frustrated with it at times, and just wanted my body back. I’d storm around the kitchen while Mark was cooking. “That’s it! I want to stop this now! I don’t want to be nursing her when she’s seven–even if we live near Berkeley!” (This is one of those sudden-onset dramatic moments that understandably make men roll their eyes and say, “Women!”)

Then the next day Kate would want night-night, and I’d give in, and we were back to our old ways.

Last night when Mark emerged from putting her down I asked how it went. “Did she do okay? Would she take any of the bottle?” These all being code for, “Was it obvious that she really missed me?”

Turns out she was totally fine. Mark said she drank a lot of the bottle actually, then he plopped her into her crib, and she started her usual putting-herself-to-sleep moaning. No drama.

Of course, it galled me slightly. But more than that, I realized it was probably an opportunity. Maybe the other night, with neither of us even realizing it, should be the last time I nursed Kate. Otherwise, what happens when I plan the last time? It becomes like the over-hyped last cigarette. I start weeping pathetically and clutching her to my breast while my mind envisions La Leche League volunteers encircling the house chanting, “Don’t stop! Don’t stop!” I just don’t have the fortitude for that.

So, I think we’re just going to go cold turkey. We’ll miss night-night, Kate and I. But I’m sure we’ll find some other things to do together, and we’ll be just fine.

Pop Tart Psychology

A few years ago when we were in Connecticut visiting Mark’s sister and hubby they had Pop Tarts in the house, and in the course of the visit we had them for brekkie. So when we got home Mark got some at the grocery store–two packs since they were a BOGO item, i.e. “Buy One Get One” free. (This is what you learn from having a grocery store client for as long as I have.) I lamented that we shouldn’t eat those. They were a special “when we were at someone else’s house or up in Tahoe” treat. (For some reason when you go to Tahoe you’re allowed to eat like a 12-year-old latch child.) Then I polished off both boxes before I think Mark even got one.

We went for a spell without getting them. I put my (much fatter) foot down and managed to convince Mark that cinnamon toast was just as sugary.

Well I looked in the cupboard a couple days ago and what do I see but two gargantuan boxes of Pop Tarts. Brown sugar–not even my flavor. I prefer blueberry. Though that didn’t stop me from snarfing them up in the past, nor did it this time.

And so I’m sitting here with a cup of Earl Grey decaf and now my second Pop Tart and thinking this gastronomic decline just makes perfect sense right now. Everything else in my world seems to be coming a bit more unglued than I’d like–though I did check in with Mark recently to see if I was just being dramatic and/or hormonal. He kinda didn’t answer….

Yesterday morning we finally had our pitch. A response to an RFP to keep an existing client. Their bean counters (I assume) have all vendors bid or re-bid as it were for the work every several years to make sure they’re getting the most bang for their buck. And while I don’t blame them, bidding to keep work you already have is the worst. Losing hurts more than losing to a client you never had. And winning really just gets you back to where you were before you devoted weeks of stress, extra work, and new gray hairs to it all.

That said, pitching at a publishing company does beat pitching at an agency. I mean, this wasn’t a 25-person roller coaster ride from hell that involved experts pulled in from offices in other time zones and executives who two days before the pitch determine all the work that’s been done is in the totally wrong direction, and ‘y’all should probably execute against this strategy now.’

Weirdly, I was the exec in this pitch. Not that I haven’t been a Big Girl on these things in the past, but at least then I was one in a team. And now it’s just kinda me and other people who don’t seem to have tons of experience pitching who intermittently seem to get it, then suddenly do something leaving me fretting that they don’t get it at all.

Self-imposed stress can be the worst of it all. As long as someone else more senior than you tells you what you’re doing sucks, you’re confident in that assessment. But when it’s you telling you, you can’t help but wonder if maybe what you’ve been slaving over is really okay, or even kinda good, and you’re just being hard on yourself. Then, moments later, you are utterly convinced of its suckingness.

At any rate, there were no endlessly long late nights. Nor excessive weekends of work. But my brain was totally co-opted by thoughts of this so even Kate Time occasionally felt slightly tainted by work thoughts. Which is not The Plan. The Plan is to have the job that I do when I do it and not obsess over it and have it affect my sleep, and make me snap at the people working with me since I wish they had more experience pitching, and decide to go into the office on my work-from-home day, so not be able to drive Kate and the nanny to Gymboree and then feel guilty that my work is seeping into places that are not in The Plan.

For all this I had to be in LA overnight. Kate did a great job of making me feel even worse about it all by getting a cold and being especially sad and Mommy-clingy. And it was all about me just getting home after the pitch and then I’d have the rest of the week and weekend with her, but my bag got lost and I ended up sitting in the airport fuming and waiting for the next plane to land. An hour spent waiting for your bag to turn up sucks in any scenario, but one in which you are desperate to get back to the baby you’ve been fearing you’re been short-shrifting, makes it intolerable.

At one point, with only 20 more minutes to wait, I considered getting in my car and driving home to see Kate, and just getting the bag another day.

Of course, while waiting I had umpteen work calls and several of them indicated I might need to do some work the next day (my day off). This sent me into the stress stratosphere.

Thankfully by Friday morning it became apparent that the meeting I thought I might need to have wasn’t going to happen. I might get my day off after all. And the clouds–like those white fluffy ones in the opening sequence of The Simpsons–seemed to part and some rays of sun made their way down to me and my self pity. I resolved that next week I’d take my work-from-home day from home, and to take my day off off.

And if that wasn’t good enough, when I did check work email later that day (despite my best intentions—clearly I am part of the problem), I discovered that something I’d been working on for weeks that had been caught up in corporate red tape had suddenly slipped past the goalie and my mission was accomplished. It was one of those things that I was resolved to get up my dukes over and suddenly and anti-climactically the problem vanished. Poof!

It’s so weird when you are in a mental groove and then you’re spit out the other end of it. It was like my psyche was still crunched up in a grumpy stress ball and was having trouble shaking it off and going to the light.

I can have work-life balance. I can spend time with Kate and Mark and still have a satisfying career. I’d still be getting this new crop of gray hair even if I was home being fed peeled grapes. If I keep chanting it, it will all be true, right?

Perhaps I’m approaching the recent appearance of Pop Tarts with the totally wrong attitude. Maybe I should behold them as a celebratory indulgence that’s suddenly there for the takin’, not the specter of poor nutrition that’s symptomatic of temporary poor life management.

Either way, they sure do toast up nice.

The Joys of the Season: Packing It All Up

It may make me sound like a holiday curmudgeon. And I’m not. I swear! But this year, one of the highlights of the holidays was packing up all the ornaments, decorations, and Christmas crap.

And not for any reason like we had a bad Christmas, or I that I have any negative associations with the baby Jesus. In fact, we had a lovely time. Christmas Eve we had a fun dinner party with Sacha, Joel and Baby Owen and Joel’s parents who were in from Chicago. I made Aunt Mary’s eggnog, we dressed the babies up in special waiting-for-Santa PJs, and when they were in bed we made our way through some good food and wine while chatting about everything from being deprived of junk food as a kid, to what causes Joel’s mother wants to fight for when she retires. When it was time to go I got Kate from the Pack and Play in their bedroom and her hair was sticking straight up like Phyllis Diller and even though we’d woken her up and dragged her out into a brightly lit room of fairly lit adults she was wincing and all smiley and it was so darn cute you just had to laugh at her and hug her to pieces.

And Christmas day was relaxed and lazy and fun. Peggy was here being Supreme Grandma to Kate. After a 10-minute period of Kate not totally gushing over Peggy when she first arrived, she shook that free and the two of them dove into in a wonderful love fest that was fun to see. You just can’t help but love it when another person is as gaga for your baby as you are.

On Christmas after opening presents and eating cranberry bread that I made (just like my Mom used to) and lounging around, we headed out for a before-it-rains hike with Kristen B and fam. Afterwards we ended up going to their house for an impromptu lunch of leftovers and to check out Milana’s Santa loot. Neither Mark nor I even thought about taking a shower until after 7PM. It was a dirty-haired Christmas, and it suited us just fine.

In the post-holiday shopping blitz (in which we probably spent more money than we did on all our pressies for others), I bought some ornament storage boxes at The Container Store. Then at OSH I got a Rubbermaid wreath storage bag. And at Target I picked up a wrapping paper and ribbon holder that looks like a golf bag, but lacks wheels (which would be a nice feature for their next gen product).

It was all I could do not to rip the ornaments off the tree the moment I entered the house with my storage boxes. But in a maternal act of selflessness I saw how much Kate enjoyed looking at the tree, so I left it intact until yesterday.

Suffice it to say, I’ve never had so much fun taking down a Christmas tree. I let my OCD out of the closet and wore it like a badge of honor. If I could have I would have alphabetized those damn ornaments, but I managed to derive enough pleasure from simply stowing each one carfefully in its own compartment where it will be safely stored and easily retracted next year. Oh simple pleasures!

My grapevine wreath, along with the pinecone ones Mom made and the shell one Aunt Mary made me are all wrapped and sealed in the wreath bag–and labeled neatly with green masking tape. (Do other people own six wreaths? Am I normal?) I covered all the other random decorations in bubble wrap and put the manger pieces in the same old newspapers that my mother stored them in for years. (I didn’t look at the year on the papers but I should have. I bet it’s old!) And Grandma Kohl’s divine Christmas tree skirt and 12 Days of Christmas wall hanging got furled up and packed away in the special cotton bags she made for them.

What, I ask you, could be more fun? In fact, I blew off the neighbor’s New Year’s Day party I was having such a dandy time doing all this.

Mark tossed the tree out front and vacuumed up stray needles and I slapped my hands together gloating with satisfaction while surveying the house. Without the tree and all the fixings it seemed like we suddenly have so much more room.

And just like that we’re back to non-holiday mode. It’s over and packed away perfectly until next year when we do it all over again.