babyfruit: the miscarriage blog and motherhood diaries

Breasts

I've been thinking a lot about breasts lately, namely my own. I've come to half-jokingly refer to these newly-modified-by-motherhood parts of my anatomy as "National Geographic Boobs." Gone are the perky breasts of pre-pregnancy & pumping life. I used to look in the mirror and think "Wow, nice set of ta-tas," but now, I look in the mirror and feel like I'm watching a strange circus performance of flesh.

When it comes to physical appearance, G. always has the right things to say. I just got my hair cut (over 6 inches off) and colored (back to my "natural" dark brown), and he has told me numerous times how beautiful it looks and how great I look. He is also perfectly satisfied, he says, with my morphed breasts. He always has a nice thing to say about my post-baby body, too.

He asked this morning if I'm happy with my breasts. I told him I'm just getting used to them because they are so different. I'm certainly not unhappy with them. I just feel like they are foreign objects at the moment. But I've learned over the years to be comfortable in my own skin, even though it isn't as supple and shiny as it used to be.

A girlfriend of mine had a boob job after a number of babies. She was really happy with the results - nothing ostentatious and Pamela Anderson-like, just reviving the perkiness with a touch more fullness for fun. I've never thought of having one done, and even now, as I lift my arms and watch my boobs sink into my body like deflated balloons, I'm not thinking surgery. I just need a good bra. Or maybe boob suspenders?

I do feel it is warranted to go to Nordstroms for a bra fitting. That's a store where I don't usually shop - I'm more of an Old Navy & Gap kind of gal. But it is the one place where they carefully measure your body and boobs and make careful recommendations for the perfect-fitting bra. My mom treated me to a very expensive nursing bra at Nordstroms after I learned that my normally 34Bs were suddenly 38 Double Ds. Today, that lovely, pricey bra hangs like silky drapes over my deflated breasts. I wonder if I can sell it on Craigslist?

Another girlfriend of mine just took her stepdaughter shopping for new bras. They went to Nordstroms for a fitting and discovered this tall, lovely 15 year old had 32F breasts. Wow. Now that's impressive. They couldn't find a bra that fit in any of the usual lingerie departments or stores so my friend finally suggested a "stripper" store, and sure enough, they walked out with several perfect bras.

Back when I was 15, I could have never survived large breasts. I was so painfully shy that I tended to hide my tiny breast buds by slouching and wearing loose clothing. Even then, I remember thinking that I wanted guys to like me for my brains and not my boobs, and I carried that theory with me throughout my 20s.

In my 30s, I was simply proud of my breasts. I thought they were absolutely perfect, proportionate to my body and well suited to my personality. I didn't flaunt them or bare them indiscriminantly. I just pampered them in Victoria Secret and improved my posture to show off their perkiness.

Now, I just want a couple of nice bras that will hold them up to their former glory so they look nice under clothes. Then once undressed, I'll let them do their thing as my husband ogles them. It is so great being married to a man who likes my breasts. I think I'll keep him. And the flappy boobs.

Travels without Baby

I am about to embark on a business trip without G. and without NG.

I'm excited about it because I haven't attended a new media conference in a long time, and I'm going to BlogHer which I've wanted to attend for ages. The first year of BlogHer, I was pregnant with NG, the second year I had just given birth. So this is the year.

This is the first time I'm leaving NG for an extended period of time. This is way more than a day-long business trip. This is Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights away (coming back midnight on Sunday night). 3 nights of not waking up in the middle of the night because baby wants a bottle. Imagine that.

I also feel like a grown up again. I can travel solo. I can attend a conference. I can network. I can be like the me I was before having a baby - only 2 sizes larger and with less hair (post partum hair loss has been very very bad to me).

I'm a little worried. Will baby be okay all day and night without me around? Or worse yet, what if she doesn't even notice that I'm gone?

What was it like on your first trip away from baby? How did everyone survive?

Baby and the Bottle

I was just starting to wonder when I should wean baby off her bottle. For some reason, I was thinking 13 months was too old for a bottle. I have been planning this blog post all week.

NG especially loves it in the mornings when she wakes up and when she is readying for bed.

She is great with a sippy cup of water and will drink from it throughout the day. If I put formula or milk in it, however, she'll take a couple of sips and abandon it. I attempted to switch out her bottle for a cup of formula, and she had a fit until I poured it from the cup into her bottle and gave her the bottle.

Well, at the end of this week, I received a Babycenter.com newsletter that had an article addressing this very issue. The mom featured in the piece has a son who is 22 months old, and she is asking about weaning him off the bottle. 22 months! And here I was thinking 13 months was too old for a bottle. What was I thinking?

So I'm no longer worried about weaning her off the bottle. It is definitely a comfort thing for her, like her blue fleece blanket with the moon and stars.

When did you wean your baby from the bottle? Or have you yet? Just curious...

Baby Fashion Faux Pas

Dear Advice Giving Mommies,

My baby grabbed a pair of my underwear from the clean clothes pile and decided she wanted to wear them. But not as underwear, of course. After much contorting, a few tantrums out of frustration and a session looking at her reflection as she tried different "styles," she settled on a "vest" look with her arms through each leg hole and the bulk of the undies on her back.

Now she won't give them back. She screams and screams every time I try to remove them.

What is a mommy to do? We have to go to the store, but do I let baby wear my underwear as outerwear out in public? I'm excited she is interested in dressing herself, but how do I convince her that my underwear are a Fashion Don't for baby?

Signed,
Fashion-Challenged Mama

The Case of the Missing Babysitter

I've been using Craigslist to find babysitters for NG. In general, it has worked out well, and I've ended up with students from the university or 18 year olds who are taking a semester off to work before going to university. So I think anything that happens with the babysitters may be more due to their age than the fact that I found them on Craigslist.

Right now, our regular babysitter is missing. By missing I mean that after we returned from our trip, she didn't show up the next day. At first, I thought she forgot, but when I called her cell phone, there was no longer a personalized message from her. Instead, there was a computerized menu from the cell phone company. I text messaged her hoping to get through.

Since she had seemed ultra responsible and hadn't flaked on us once, I finally called her folks (she lives at home) to see if she was okay. The response was that this was "par for the course" for her and that she was "just being a teenager."

Later that evening, I received a cryptic text message from the babysitter saying she had left me a message while we were away (she hadn't or at least I didn't receive it) to say she had to go out of state for a family emergency and didn't know when she'd be back. I thought it odd that her own parents didn't know about this "family emergency" and chalked it up to her being irresponsible and not owning up to it. We haven't heard from her since.

I immediately turned to Craigslist again and found another babysitter. This one is only 16, but she posted her full resume online, and I recognized a classic overachiever. Ultra responsible, active in her community, excelled in school, lots of extra curricular activities. Her references checked out just fine, and she met with NG and me at a bookstore in town.

After going through the due diligence checklist that one goes through for babysitters, I used my final gauge - how she interacted with NG at the first meeting. Right away, she was chatting with NG and comfortable taking her from me. NG smiled and seemed comfortable. Babysitter passed The Baby Test.

I'm half expecting our former babysitter to show up one day like nothing happened. It will be awkward, I'm sure, but I just can't see trusting her again with NG after disappearing and probably even lying about it. Am I being too harsh?

Daze of Poo

I feel like my days are filled with Tales of Poo, not to be mistaken with Tales of Pooh. If it isn't poop in the tub, it's the latest poo incident.

NG made her usual signs of pooping - red faced, watery eyes, intense concentration - and I proceeded to change her diaper when she was done. Then, when moving the used diaper aside, I lost my grip and a huge mushy turd fell to the carpet. Ewwww....we're talking a big one, the kind you wonder how it fit into your baby's bowels in the first place.

Not one to panic over poo anymore, I scooped it up with a diaper wipe, shoved it back in the old diaper, then returned to the diapering at hand. I did scrub the carpet and will spray it with Lysol for good measure, and luckily, no poo stains.

We never did invest in a changing table so I guess this is par for the course when changing baby on the carpet. We are, however, investing in a Diaper Champ which has been recommended to us over the Diaper Genie because it takes any size bags instead of the more expensive special inserts. The poo smell has been so overpowering in her room that we've moved her current diaper pail to the front balcony. So far the neighbors haven't complained.

So I guess I've opened the floor to more poo stories. Oh please share!