Pity Party- Table for One

Today is the first day where I truly felt the single, working mother guilt. I have had twinges here and there but today I felt it from the soles of my feet to the top of my head. In many ways, it's probably a ridiculous over reaction on my part but I am a strong believer than if you need to cry or sulk or fume over something you get 24 hours and then you figure out how to move on. So since I'm still within my 24 hours here I go.

Today I took Grace for a weight check at her pediatricians. As I have mentioned eight bajillion times before, Grace is on the small side and I am a crazy woman about it. She has been eating better of late so I stupidly put a number in my head that I expected her to be. The number I set was 14 pounds. She was 13 pounds 3 oz about 7 weeks ago so I thought 14 pounds was a reasonable guess. In actuality, I was hoping for more but would have settled for 14. Today she weighed in at a whopping 13 pounds 10 oz. Now, I know any gain is positive, but I would be a liar if I said I wasn't worried that she had only a seven oz weight gain in almost two months. So here's where the guilt comes into play. As soon as I heard the weight I thought, this is your fault because you work. If you stayed home with her you could feed her every hour and a half. You could make sure she drank every ounce of every bottle and every drop of baby food. But because you decided to be a single mother, now your baby is suffering. Now, let me say two things here. 1. Grace could not be in better care and my sister Kate could not be more in tune with her needs or more dedicated to making sure she eats, even if she were her mother. She is super on top of the eating and she sits with Grace until she's eaten but lets face it, some days she just won't eat enough no matter how you try. So in no way am I attributing her lack of weight gain to my sister. If it wasn't for her dilligence, we would have had a smaller gain (can you imagine what a whack-a-doodle I would be if that happened? Not a pretty image I imagine). 2. I realize my line of thinking is CRAZY. I know that I am doing everything possible to make sure she's as healthy and loved and well cared for as possible. And the rational side of my head knows that if I tried to feed her every hour that child and I would be ready for the looney bin. I know I add a lot of stress to the eating situation and I have been really good about backing off. If I were home with her all day I could likely cause a big set back. But the bottom line is that you feel like she's missing something because I only have limited time with her. I give her everything I have when I'm home and I know that it's a lot. I also know that I have unrealistic expectations of what enough is and I need to let go of it. Overall, she's a healthy girl who is developing well, is pretty well adjusted and happy. I need to focus on that. And I will........in 11 more hours when the pity party is over. While the nurse Practioner was not alarmed at the weight gain she did say that if she doesn't have a good increase by her one year appointment at the end of April, we'll need to go see a feeding specialist. The important thing here is that we get her issues worked out.

On a more positive note she crawled forward last night!! She only did four crawls and then I got so excited that I called my sister and the kids down and sure enough, she refused to perform. My daughter is super stubborn and she likes to play with her mama. I kept saying Gracie, crawl for Auntie Kate, please crawl for Auntie Kate! And at one point she looked at me, said Mama and then shook her head no wildly and then gave me a wicked grin. Like she was saying I know you want me to crawl but uh-uh. She kept teasing us though. She would move one knee forward and then move it back. Then she would giggle. She's something.

I'll report back soon with a new attitude. Well, not so new that you wouldn't recognize me.