Friday, October 28, 2005

Lack of Nest

So much for my "nesting." Last week I just chalked my lack of instinct up to the stink-nasty round of health issues that have been spinning around the house, but today I have simply concluded that my nesting is just not going to happen. Not that it has been all that impressive in the past. At least with the Bird I had an actual nursery prepared, complete with crib, dresser, and darling little layette all ready to welcome the sweet fledgling home. With LaLa I had a brand new suitie to bring her home from the hospital and a quilt I had made just for her. Right now I'm not even sure where I'm gonna put this new little girl... and any clothes that she has that are new is not due to any effort on my part. I certainly don't have a designated take home outfit. The crib is in pieces and actually needs some replacement parts before we put it back together... Birdie darned near rocked that sucker to pieces and LaLa, with her far more modest rockage finished the job. That's why she sleeps in a big girl bed at the tender age of 19 months. That and we didn't want her to feel like the baby was stealing her bed when it came down to the time to actually inhabit the crib. Although we have till the kid is almost three months old before she is likely to use it.

Y'see we have the "designated chair" that our babies spend the first three months of their lives in. The poor thing is UUUUUUUUUUgly, and the guts are crumbling out. But throw a thick tapestry cloth over the top and it is the most comfortable seat in existence. We nurse, I stand and place comatose baby on seat of chair wedged up against arm or back and walk away. This was more the scene with LaLa than Birdie, but I pretty much plan to do the same with upcoming Pearl. I'm just not a 100% on where the chair will live. Right now the chair resides in the bay window space in my bedroom... on MY SIDE of the bed no less.

Let me tell you why it is not likely to stay there. In our house we DO NOT CO-SLEEP and there is NO SUCH THING as a family bed. This is not because I am morally against it or whatever... I've read in forums where folks can get into some pretty nasty name calling and judgements on each other about what is best. Naw, the fact of the matter is that I get post-partum freakout. Not the baby blues, and it can't really be characterized as depression, what I go through is just plain old freakish freakdom. My brand of freakishness may have alot to do with the doubling of my dose of thyroid medication over the course of each pregnancy followed by an immediate drop in my need of the higher level meds after the baby is born. Maybe it's tied to whatever delays my milk production till almost 7 days after the baby comes. Whatever it is, I cannot sleep within two rooms of a baby. They snuffle. They peep. They groan and squeak and every sound they make sends adrenaline searing through my veins. The nights I have spent laying with my teeth clenched together, hands balled in sweaty fists as I try to control my breathing, the "fight or flight" instinct causing my whole body to shake...it ain't pretty.

Maybe this time it''ll be different. My doc.... we'll call him Dr.J here, has me using Progesterone Cream in the hopes of evening things out, and oh yeah, getting my milk to come in before the Pearly girlie starves to death. Maybe.
Meantime I'm just trying to catch up on the laundry. Hmmmmmmmm but I probably COULD make a quilt in time....

3 comments:

Kathryn Thompson said...

Post partum freakout? That's a good way of putting it. I had something that sounds very similar (still do when I forget to take my little friends). It gives me pause when thinking about having all the kids we had originally planned on. I have no idea how I'll react next time, knowing what I may face (not being able to keep food down, being freaked out by my kids, not sleeping for 72 hours at a stretch, anxiety attacks, you know, the usual). I really want to hear how things go for you.

The Absent Minded Housewife said...

I didn't nest with #2. I was just too dern tired. We came back home from the hospital and I had to do all this housecleaning. My house was a literal pigsty without a clean dish anywhere. Don't get upset about me having to do it. With #2 childbirth cured me of the tiredness I had been feeling for months. I was tired of feeling tired and I was ready to get up and go.

Heather said...

I never nested either. What are these women talking about cleaning everything in site. I just got in bed ans slept whenever I could. :)