Squidbits

Between posting last month's Squidbits late and the Squid's trip to Chicago with his Daddy this month, I've only got about two weeks' worth of Squid reports. And not a lot to add, honestly - all the same stuff as last month, only more of it. More words. More repeating. More activity. More more more. Himself called from Chicago this morning and said that he can now count to 19...not with all the right numbers and sequencing, of course, but his vocabulary has expanded beyond the 1-10. He has more sophisticated spatial and temporal concepts,too. I talked to him on the phone yesterday while I was driving back from meetings and he informed me that Lolo was working, and that he wanted him to come home. Um, not in so many words. It was more like, "Lolo coming!" (hopeful), "Carseat!" (the carseat is in Lolo's car), and then "Lolo working," (sad). Still, that's a whole conceptual set of ideas about other people's location and actions that he didn't have when he left.

He's fascinated with Baby [Squid] - pictures and movies - but the moment a few months back where he said "That's me!" must have been a fluke, because he identifies the little kid in the pictures as "Da [Squid]!" He also doesn't respond to his name, though that could be the standard toddler self-absorption rather than a lack of recognition. He looked at a picture of himself making "ooo" pursed lips and said, "MOOOOO!" which totally blew my mind - I thought, that's crazy that he has a concept of what his face looks like when he makes that noise! It took me another few days to realize that he's not translating the feel of the expression on his own face into the sound, he's recognizing it because he sees it on other people's faces when they make that noise.

So quick to believe that my child has sophisticated thought processes going on! In a recent survey of almost a hundred mothers of children aged 2-5, 70% rated their own children as above average, across the board. Hello, Lake Wobegon. My reaction on reading the story: But my kid really IS above average! *koff* I know that's not true, actually. He crawled, talked and walked a little later than many of his peers, and there are younger kids doing things he still hasn't explored; which is fine, I'm just saying, kids move at varying paces on a whole spectrum of activities and abilities. I do think, however, that when it comes to friendliness, mellowness, and general good nature that he is exceptionally wonderful. He's such a happy, cheerful little guy! I miss him.



Of course, he was happy and cheerful...until I spoke to him on video chat one day. And even then, he had a good time, playing and chatting away...until I said "bye bye." His poor little face just crumpled and he started sobbing "Mommy, Mommy" and reaching for the screen. Way to break my heart. I don't think we'll be doing video chat any more when we're apart - he's fine on the phone, but apparently video chat is traumatic. The fact that he had skipped a nap probably wasn't helping, but regardless. Poor bug. He's had a great time with his Lola and Lolo for the most part, going to the park and the children's garden and the zoo, but reminding him visually that I wasn't there turned out to be a bad move.

It's been good for me to have the time off, though. I've caught up on sleep. Caught up on my piled-high inbox. Completed a craft project or two. Gone to a concert. Visited friends and family. Done some long-neglected housework. Read some books. I watched some movies in which shit blows up and sewed the projects that had been sitting unfinished on my counter for the last month and a half. I desperately needed this re-set. Even working full-time is not enough to cast a pall over it.

And Saturday I went to my pre-school reunion. That's right, you heard me. Pre-school reunion. It was awesome. My preschool was a very special liberal preschool run by some friends of my parents - I attended from the time I was three through the second grade, at which point I transitioned to public school, so I had known some of these kids for seven years, and some for more, if they ended up at the same grade school or high school as I did. It was crazy to see them all as adults - crazy good. Our teachers came, and all the parents, and a lot of us brought the next generation, too. I recognized at least three-quarters of the attendees, even after all these years, and I still like them.

It's interesting, though the difference between solo socializing and socializing avec Squid. When Himself is gone for business for two weeks, and it's just me and the Squid, I'm lonely and tired by the end of it. I never used to get lonely when he traveled, before we had a kid. I enjoyed my time alone. I'm good company for myself. But being a parent is a different way of being in the world. I can't just turn inward, replenish my energy and center by thinking my me thoughts and doing my me stuff - I have to be outwardly focused almost all the time. It's really exhausting, and it's lonely because even though I'm focused on someone else, nobody is focused on me in a reciprocal way. All the energy and attention flows one way. Which is not to complain - that's parenting, that's how it's supposed to be - just to observe. Conversely, I haven't been lonely at all the past few weeks - I mean, I've done some socializing, but it didn't feel necessary, just pleasant. Solitude and loneliness are very different beasties.

A colleague of mine is big into personality typing, and for kicks I took a bunch of Myers-Briggs analogues online a while back, so I could talk about it with her. I ended up pretty much the opposite of what I'd expected - as a kid I was an...oh, hang on...ENTP, I think. As an adult, I came out with a whole hodgepodge of ratings, but skewed heavily introverted and always judging rather than perception-oriented. Er, it is possible that time has not improved me. In any case, my colleague explained the introversion/extroversion thing to me - it's not whether or not you like to socialize, it's where you get the core of your energy - do you need time alone to recharge, or does social interaction energize you? When you put it that way, it's pretty clear where I lie. This actually has helped me feel better about my parenting in a weird way, like my need for time to myself is more justified or something. I don't know.

This is also central, while I'm in full navel-lint analysis mode, to something that's been preying on my mind for a few years now, namely, the question of a second kidlet. We had always planned on two...until I got pregnant. And my resulting depression and anxiety tipped me all the way over into "oh hell no" until November, when I finally got the right medication and stabilized. Now I'm living in a weird limbo in which I'm terrified of the concept but not entirely ruling it out. I can't stop thinking about it. I checked with the ~iatrist, and I could stay on at least half of my meds with minimal risk through pregnancy and breastfeeding. The next door neighbor sent a picture of their three-year-old son holding their newborn, and my heart melted. The Squid would be such an awesome older brother! I want him to have a sibling! My best friend just had her baby, and I am so happy for her I could burst, and making tiny onesies and thinking thoughts about tiny wee persons, and I think, Babies are so awesome! I want one!

On the other hand, it took me more than a year and a half to fully recover from the first one. I already max out my sick leave each year with one kid's germs. I've already maxed out my budget with one kid's daycare. The Squid is (and his other caretakers confirm this) a remarkably even-keel, low-maintenance, low-anxiety guy, and I'm still afraid that I've maxed out my ability to parent successfully. Particularly as anyone else who came along, while no doubt wonderful in their own ways, would probably not be quite as independently okay as the Squid is - he's unusual that way. My social life is built around my ability to travel solo with him and wrangle him on my own while spending time with friends; I'm not sure how possible that would be with two. I hated being pregnant. And solo parenting 15-20% of the year with more than one, well. On the bad days, it would be really, really hard. I'm not sure I'm strong enough. I'm afraid I'm too selfish. I'm afraid I'll make a decision and it will turn out to be the wrong decision and it will be too late to change my mind.

So I think about it all the time. And as an awful side effect of my indecision, I've realized that I've sort of cut off contact with all my friends who have more than one kid. Not because I don't love them or because I have any kind of judgment about their choices, but because when I talk to them, it's all I can think about. I want to ask them about it endlessly. My anxiety ratchets up to a peak. This isn't fair to my friends, and I only recently realized that I was doing it, but now that I've twigged to it, it's clear. It's like being friends with someone who lives at the top of a cliff when you're terrified of heights or something. If they seem happy, I envy them for being better people than I am, and if they are having trouble, it is all my fears confirmed. I need to get over it, but I'm not sure how, until and unless I can some to some sort of decision or closure of my own. Dear friends with more than one, I'm sorry; it's not you, it's me.

On that vaguely negative and bizarre note, I should wrap this up - the Squid and Himself will be home in a few more days, and I have loads of half-finished projects to tie up before then. ("Relax!" Himself said, when I mentioned possibly hand-scrubbing the grout and re-sealing it while they were gone. "Get a massage!" I forgot to schedule the massage, but at least I didn't hand-scrub the grout. Much.) I am not really very good at relaxing, but I squeezed a little in in the past few weeks. I gave up on finishing Ulysses before Bloomsday, which means I will have to put off my planned tattoo for another year, but that's okay. I needed to read genre fiction and watch episodes of Dr. Who more than I needed to meet yet another arbitrary self-imposed deadline.

I'm not sure where I was going with that tangent. I always was bad at conclusions. Shutting up now.

Squidbits

Nine months old...yesterday. Wow.

This was a long month. In some ways, it was the best month yet - as each successive month has been, because he just gets more fun and more interesting and more himself as he gets older. In some ways, it was the worst since the early colicky days, as the family unit as a whole struggled with travel, with illness, and with exhaustion. I wish I'd written this post off and on throughout, as I usually do with the Squidbits, but there hasn't been time; Himself and I saw one another for a total of six days in the entire month of November, and both of us are tired, recovering from sickness, and a little off our usual game.

The Squid, I am glad to report, bounced back from his disgusting snotty cold in style, and has been practicing his crawling (!!!) and endeavoring to maul everything within reach with his usual glee for at least two weeks now. He still can't crawl properly - it's more like a flail-with-paws, flail-with-knees, and a flop forward, and on our slippery hardwood floors he goes backward, even - but he's getting there shockingly fast, and on carpet he's quite mobile indeed. Our completely un-childproofed deathtrap home is on the cusp of something the likes of which it has never seen. He moves from lying to sitting to crawling to rolling and back on his own, and is just beginning to pull himself up on people and things, which is a precursor to independent "cruising," which is a precursor to walking, which is a precursor to disaster, as all toddler parents can attest.



I let the Squid watch baby telly for the first time when we were both sick - I always thought I'd reserve it for illness, and it truly did help when I was too ill to be properly engaged without breaking down. I have to say, though, that these Baby Einstein DVDs are the biggest scam I have seen in ages. I thought they'd be research-based, carefully calibrated to developmental stages, and strongly edutaining. Instead, they are stock video clips of cute animals, some sequences of smiling children, and simple puppet dumbshows set to public domain music. It's got to cost them less than a hundred bucks to produce each DVD, and they retail for around $16 per. They also include at least three minutes of "Baby Einstein," "Disney," and "Little Einstein" branding at the beginning. A scam, I tell you. I'd love to see some RCT evaluations of the actual learning effects of those things; I hypothesize no significant gains. I "read" them to him, as I discussed a few posts ago, like I would a book, but still. As soon as I felt better, off went the baby telly.

Things he can do now that he couldn't last month: Eat toast and other breadstuffs that soften in his mouth, hold two different things with two different hands, move across a room (flail-roll-crawl-flop-wiggle), play peek-a-boo, search out specific toys and get upset when they are taken away, brush his own teeth (hee), and differential calculus. Except for that last one. I lied about that.



On the parental front, between us we logged nineteen days of solo parenting this month (not counting the three days that I was in meetings and Grandpa took the Squid), two states, at least ten all-day meetings, four cities, two separate cold viruses, one professional conference, and two countries. Upside of all this was that each of us got at least one "day off" and the Squid got to spend some real quality time with Grandpa, Uncle F, and Grammy while we were in LA. Downside of all of this should be apparent without further whinging on my part.

On the grandparental front, his Lola sent us boxes and boxes of Squidstuff, ensuring that he is warm and fed and entertained from now until the end of time February at least, and his Grandpa did some excellent babysitting. The Squid naps so well for Grandpa that I live in envy. This could be because we found out after the fact that Grandpa hadn't been reading the dilution instructions on the formula cans and had been stuffing the baby with extra-rich milkshakes! Or it could be because they play together so hard; there are few things more wonderful than watching my father with my son, tickling the baby with his beard and lifting him giggling overhead. They are great together, though there are certainly moments of weird:

"Come here, Snakebreath," I heard Grandpa coo to the baby, scooping him up and carrying him off toward the kitchen.

"Snakebreath?" I said.

"Oh, yes," said my mother, unruffled. "You and your brother were both 'Snakebreath.' I don't know where he got that."

Snakebreath. Huh.



December will bring a father/son adventure in Chicago, while I try desperately to recover some lost equilibrium at home, and our first Christmas as a family - our first tree, the traditional cinnamon rolls, holiday music on the stereo, sparkling lights, and cards from friends all over the world. Also, no doubt, a highly mobile Squid and the next stage of parenting challenges. Wish us luck!