Oddments

With a daily routine that circles around feeding, diapering and bouncing, I've collected quite a mish-mash of thoughts quickly jotted down in stolen moments.


Humbled (April 29, 2012)
 
Mothering is very physical work, challenging but not very thrilling. Breastfeeding can be enjoyable, but most of time it's not been like the pictures in the baby books - one doesn't look like a smiling, tranquil nurturer. On hot days, your clothes are stained from milk and sweat(from two warm bellies pressed against each other!). Unless you've had time to clean yourself up in the bathroom in the morning, your hair is matted and you can taste your own stale breath (breastfeeding makes one very terribly thirsty).

In this age of Facebook and blogging and Pinterest, it's still very possible for motherhood to be projected much like food, crafts, wedding and the like are on these platforms - far more interesting, aesthetically pleasing and jealousy-inducing than they are in real life. Yet intrinsically motherhood is humbling, straining against such selective portrayals of chic-ness, ease, and picture-perfect moments. Your audience of one (well, apart from God) is a mushy little (albeit incredibly cute) creature who doesn't quite understand what you're doing and what it costs you. And the sacrifice doesn't come completely naturally with hormones, though that helps a lot. I am surviving and sometimes even fully functioning on 2-hour blocks of sleep, but of course sometimes I still feel resentful when Zeke wakes me up yet again.

With our clothes and sheets spotted with milk (and sometimes other things), I'm learning the un-glamorous reality of motherhood. Perhaps for our generation, the equivalent of Pharisaical standing in the crossroads is posting or tweeting something, and the realization of the humility of parenthood comes with the fact that a picture of yourself with tousled hair and stained shirt is utterly not Facebook-worthy.


Sentimentality (May 1, 2012)
 
Zeke is taking one of his many naps of the day, this one in our bed. I'm in bed with him, oscillating between wanting to be practical and getting some rest with him, and watching him and taking note of his cute sleeping faces and noises and arm movements, knowing that each day brings change and this time will last only such a short while.

Strange how motherhood is so intensely practical - physical work requiring common sense and down-to-earth decision-making, and yet so intensely sentimental at the same time. And I feel that I am a paradoxical mix of both - sometimes I feel just fine walking away while someone holds him so I can do a few things, and sometimes I just want to hold him and look at him and kiss him.

It's not all romantic, but it's not all sleepless torture either.


A priceless gift not asked for
 
I will forever remember that moment when I met Zeke for the first time... he didn't have a name yet... I had only touched the soft patch of hair as he came out of me... and there he was - a face that made me cry. His eyes were barely open, staring into mine, and all I could say was "hi, hi," stroking his soft, malleable little head. Oh, my son, my son! A sight that stirred my innards. Ryan leaned down and kissed me and we were both in tears.

Zeke was not planned, and there's no mincing words about it. Now I think about how his arrival 10 days before his due date means 10 more precious days with him... so what would that mean about his conception as an "accident," occurring when we were trying to avoid conceiving? If 10 extra days with him is such a treasure, how much more the sheer reality of his life! A God-given chance to love him and mother and father him when we didn't know to ask for this gift - oh what grace.


Transience
 
The pregnant body passes so quickly. Of course I still have jiggly bits here and there from the nine months, but ten days after giving birth, the bump was not noticeable anymore. My hip pain was gone. I no longer had heartburn at night. My aversion to various foods vanished. I could sleep on my back and breathe just fine. The waddle, the hand resting on the swell, the immense pressure, the fluttering in the tummy - all gone.

Nine months felt like a long time to be pregnant, and a few months into that state, I had forgotten what it felt like to not be pregnant. Towards the last few weeks (as can be told from some of these blog entries), I had grown quite sentimental towards my bump. And yet after that dramatic day of giving birth, all the bodily changes subside quite quickly and without ceremony, in the haze and frenzy that is newborn care. During pregnancy you scrutinize your body, making notes and demanding attention. In parenthood, the scrutiny shifts to another.