Oscar gained another pound in this last week. That’s two pounds in as many weeks. He really looks like a regular ol’ baby now and is certainly acting like one. He no longer just drifts off to sleep after a feed. He has his likes and dislikes and seriously uses his voice to let you know which one it is. As I bathed him last night it occurred to me that he has a real tushy now, and little creases in his leggies. So cute. And so hard earned.
Life is about to get more interesting here. With Vannette’s departure, I will not be able to leave the house except for when she comes back to help a couple of times each week. It is impossible to manage things without help right now, even if I could split myself in three pieces. I think anyone with their third child can relate, but only preemie moms during cold and flu season know the pressure of keeping that baby as germ free as possible. He just can’t get sick. He is doing so well. Any illness could land him back in the ICU, and must be avoided at all costs. So if it means that I am here most of this winter with him, and the big boys run around with Emma, then that’s what we will do. I think about how life would be with my mom here. None of this would be going on. No outside help because she would have moved in by now and made it all better. Forget that. I may have gone to term if she were here, because I would have stayed in the hospital and known my kids were with their mormor and all was well. It would still be hectic of course, but it would be family. And people would be accepting of that model in a way they aren’t always of the one we have now. Its our only solution, and I’m fine with it. But fairly often I get the backhanded remarks about how lucky I am and how much ‘help’ I have. And its often from someone who’s mom or other family member is close by and super involved. So that hurts, and makes me defensive. Which is so besides the point. We all do the best we can as mothers. And to judge one another before walking in someone’s shoes is an awful exercise in divisiveness. I have two little kids with different schedules and a newborn that can’t leave the house. So I am not sure what these people propose I do. We have great help and are so grateful for it. But I would trade my left arm to have it be my mom instead.
Whatever it is we are doing, however it is we do it, its working. That’s all that matters in the end. Oscar is growing and thriving, I am not in the loony bin (yet), and Colt and Lucca are happy, fulfilled boys. Oh, and I’m still married 😉 Minor miracles all of them.