Grateful for modern medicine

So about a month ago I started trying to cut back on my daily dose of Zoloft--not because I felt ready to do so, but because my midwife wouldn't prescribe any more.

It was a horrible horrible month. I cried buckets and I think I made dinner maybe ten times if that. I didn't even want to bake bread. I slept way too much and then stayed up until 4 am thinking about everything that I could possibly put on a to-do list, which would of course go undone because I was too overwhelmed to do it (re: making dinner). I did a lot of painting because it was the only thing I wanted to do. I missed church 3 weeks in a row and the 4th week I only went because I was teaching and then I spent the last hour crying and was in full-blown hysterics by the time we got home. I cried whenever I changed Nathan's diaper or undressed him or fed him--anything that reminded me that he was not a giant fat baby. One night I even told Neil that I was done being married to him because marriage took energy that I didn't have and everything was just too hard, and he shouldn't take it personally (he responded by letting me cry on his shoulder for two hours and making sure that I got in to see a doctor that week).

So I went to see a new doctor on Thursday, and I started taking the full dosage again. I kid you not, I woke up on Friday morning feeling bouncy and happy and full of life. I washed all the sheets on all of our beds and remade the beds to surprise Neil (he does not love changing the sheets on the bunk beds every week and I usually wait for him to help with those, since they're hard to do on my own). The kids and I had an awesome day and then on Saturday Abigail was like, hey, how about we get some baby chicks and I was like, yes, that is a wonderful idea--if you can convince Daddy we will go today! So now we have 7 chicks and I am so thrilled because I have wanted chickens for sooooo long and Neil finally gave it the green light. (I am so so so so excited by this I can't even tell you!!! I have been reading up on chickens for about 4 years and longing for a little backyard flock of my own.)

Today I spent most of the afternoon working outside with the boys.  All of the tasks that have seemed insurmountable and terrifying to me for the past month--digging compost into the garden beds, planting the lettuces, cleaning up the inevitable windblown debris of the winter, pruning the raspberry canes, backfilling postholes, planting grass seed, etc...all of those things I did today. And it felt AMAZING to have them done and to be out in the sun and the wind with my boys. (And I was even able to laugh when Luke sprayed me with the hose--it's warmer, but not that warm!) We went to the playground after we picked up the girls and I just felt this huge giant swell of love in my heart as I watched all my children run around playing with each other and eating the banana bread that Lukey and I had baked earlier that day. And I realized that for me, depression not only makes me miserable and sad and lonely, but it blocks those love-swells where I look at my family and I feel like my heart is going to explode out of my chest because I love them so much. I felt the same way yesterday at church as I looked down the row at all of the people I love best. And I am so, so, so grateful that antidepressants not only return me to the incarnation of me that is energetic and fun and spontaneous and going a million miles a minute, but the incarnation of me that is so full of love and joy and gratitude that I feel like I can't contain it all.

I love cakes and Lukes

I feel like I have a lot that I want to write about, but it's more private journal type of stuff than blog stuff. But I do want to write a little bit here too...just random things.

1) I have been reading a lot lately about mothers that I admire. Right now I am reading up on Maria von Trapp and Lillian Moller Gilbreth. I have a big stack of biographies & autobiographies about the two of them on my nightstand right now (and of course I do love The Story of the von Trapp Family Singers and Cheaper by the Dozen and Belles on Their Toes, all of which I have read and reread dozens of times, but I am loving reading much more in depth about the mothers who headed these families). My favorite out of all the ones I've read so far is this.

2) Kind of on that same note, I have been revamping my feed reader lately to include some new-to-me blogs that focus on mothering. My new favorite is this one. Any good ones you'd suggest?

3) Last Saturday I ran 20 miles. Just in case you hadn't realized it, that is a lot of miles. It was kind of crazy but also awesome in a crazy kind of way. I am running my marathon in 2 weeks and 2 days and I can't believe it!

4) I've been working on our house again a lot lately. I have been doing the 40 bags in 40 days clear-things-out-thing (yes, I do realize I'm not Catholic, but I have always loved the idea of Lent as a time to clear my mind and my heart). Along the way I have been selling off things, donating a ton of things, and freshening up our spaces (thanks to the cash influx!). My very very very favorite thing about this is that I finally found some beautiful wingback chairs to replace the papasan chairs that I have passionately loathed for years. This would be a good place to put a picture but guess what, if I put off this post until I remember to take a good picture the post will never get published.

On the other hand, I have (mostly) finished the boys' room as well, and I did take a picture of half of it. Finishing this room entailed finding new curtains (I was planning to sew these but couldn't find any fabric that I liked in the right price range--I randomly saw these curtains on clearance at Hobby Lobby which I still need to hem and rehang but oh well), painting over the lavender walls and brown molding, painting the bookcase, sewing all of the reading floor pillows, finally hanging the rhino head (Isaac and I made it of paper mache earlier this summer and I then Mod Podged scrapbook paper all over it), painting that little photo frame, and then turning a piece of scrap wood into that reading sign (I painted the words on and it is definitely kind of wonky-looking but it was really fun to paint). Anyway, the rest of the room is done and decorated too but I just didn't bother to take a picture yet. And the lighting is really yellow-green...in person it is much brighter. Oh! And I almost forgot--Neil spray-painted the rhino head with glow-in-the-dark paint, so that is kind of weird but also sort of awesome (I just hope none of my kids end up in therapy because they're convinced a Baskerville-esque rhino is after them).

5) Spring is almost here! Our crocus (croci?) are up and blooming in the back, and the tulips are poking through in the front. Take that, pellets of icy rain/snow that were falling all morning! It has been a loooong winter and in some ways I am SO ready for it to be over and in some ways I am dreading the summer (please don't be wretchedly hot!). I must admit that this kind of winter definitely has its perks in terms of feeling like it is way too cold to do anything other than lounge in front of the fire in our pajamas. My favorite kind of days.

6) Speaking of which, I am starting to think about summer plans with the kiddos. This is (hopefully) our last summer here, which means there is SO much that I want to pack in, and Neil will be working like crazy so I want to just do lots of adventures with the kids. I have really been debating and struggling lately about what I should do with the antidepressants--it has been an awful rocky month--but ultimately I ended up getting a renewal of my prescription because I want to be 100% present this summer, and I have not been able to do that this past month with a lowered dosage. I want to be full of energy and fun and excitement and perseverance rather than feeling defeated by the simple question of what's for lunch (okay, sometimes that is not all that simple. Have I mentioned lately that while I used to LOVE cooking I have decided that I do not always love cooking for my kids?).

Anyway, that's all.

Nathan is eleven months old

Eleven months old! (And never fear, I did trim that wild mad scientist mop of hair a few days after these pictures were taken. I probably would have let it go fluffy and darling forever but Neil gently told me that it was time to cut the baby mop and let him look more like a little boy.)

At eleven months old, Nathan is pulling up, beginning to cruise along furniture, army-crawling all over the place to get what he wants (he is super fast at going from his tummy to sitting up and back again; he will take a few "crawls" forward on his hands and knees but quickly drops back down to his tummy), claps whenever he is happy, says "Mama" and "Dada" discriminately (especially when he has gotten himself stuck somewhere!) and is generally the sunshine of our lives.

We all adore him and I especially love to watch Abigail with him--she is so sweet with him and he gets super excited when she comes home from school! 

We are still dealing with the same difficulties in getting Nathan to eat/drink enough. He has quit nursing except for once in the morning and occasionally once at night, and he has dropped down to about the 10th percentile for weight (still at 75th for height). Last week we met with his pediatrician, a dietician, a speech pathologist, and an occupational therapist to try to figure out what's going on with him. The diagnosis was that he has great muscle tone everywhere and just seems to have kind of a control complex about allowing things into his mouth, likely because of the severity of his reflux and our subsequent attempts to get him to take in enough calories. We have spent the last couple of weeks trying all sorts of different cups, bottles, sippies, etc. with different combinations of formula, milk, cream, half-and-half, juice, etc. in an attempt to keep him sufficiently hydrated, and today we finally had the most success we've had yet with chocolate milk (thank heavens my mom was grocery shopping with me and suggested it!). Right now he is on a high-calorie diet so we are basically adding butter and cream to everything he eats. I was trying to coax him to eat some ice cream after lunch today...he is on the diet we all wish we were eating!

Anyway, all of that is still incredibly stressful but I am starting to feel cautiously optimistic. I am also meeting with a new doctor myself tomorrow and I am hoping that I can get some of my anxiety under control, since I am sure Nathan is picking up on that.

Tonight Nathan woke up and was howling--I tried all the usual tricks and couldn't get him to calm down (he also quit taking his pacifier about three weeks ago so that's been pretty rough). Finally I tried nursing him and wonder of wonders that calmed him down! He fell asleep in my arms and it was so lovely to sit there with my beautiful little boy listening to the sound of his breathing and watching his long lashes fluttering against his cheeks. 

Lukey my Lukey

One of my favorite photos of Luke--July 2012

Tonight Luke and I were biking together and he was chatting away as he perched behind my bike seat and I thought that there is so much that I don't write about this little love of mine simply because he is fourth in line, and I really should jot down a few things.

Our children are split on whether they prefer Neil or me--sometimes it just depends on the day--but Luke is always devoted to me, which is a nice little self-esteem boost. On Saturday I wasn't feeling very well and I was lying on my bed when Luke woke up from his nap. I could hear him sobbing and realized that he was calling out for me, despite the fact that there were three friends visiting and lots of exciting things going on. He came in, climbed up on my bed, and snuggled down next to me and stayed there looking into my eyes for a solid hour--so content to just be with me. I was feeling all weepy and sad and it was such a blessing to realize that my son needed nothing more than my presence to feel safe and secure.

Luke has an incredibly active imagination and a ridiculously sophisticated vocabulary for a child his age--the other day he said something like, "Shall we go read some stories?" and I was just tickled pink by his cuteness. I also chuckled today when he asked a grumpy Nathan, "What is wrong, my little tiny flufferkinhead?" He always has very elaborate games going on--today he was a fearful pirate at lunch eating the tiny little fishes (peanut butter and honey sandwich wedges), and later at dinner he was a giant eating huge boulders (chickpeas). He usually has a number of small toys that he carries around to act out his games and they all have names (like Gennulmun Lightsaber). Yesterday he spent a long time running around in cowboy chaps and a Yoda hat and told me he was "Cowboy Captain Yoda." He has a very long attention span for books, stories, games, crafts, etc. He has also been incredibly good-natured about his health issues and has been so good about all the exams, medication, and unpleasantness that he's been through.

I don't think I even blogged about Luke switching over to a big-boy bed, which he did before his second birthday, and potty-training, which he did just after his second birthday. Both barely registered as blips on the radar because he was so easy-going about each...hey cool, this is my new bed? I think I'll stay in it without any problem. Oh look! A potty! I know what to do with that one too. He's just an incredibly low-key, happy-go-lucky little guy, and he totally rocks my world--he is also the only one of my kids who has ever actually enjoyed the shower. Random, I know, but so nice to have someone who will consent to have yogurt sluiced out of his hair without going crazy!!

The mornings I spend one-on-one with him are easily the most calming parts of my day and help me to gear up for the rest of the goings-on around here.

just updating

The last couple of days the boys and I have been working on painting their room. It is the only room in the house we've never painted (it was a really gorgeous lavender when we moved in and absolutely perfect for the girls). So basically this means that my boys have been sleeping in what used to be a beautiful lavender room and is now a lavender room covered in chipped paint and nail holes. It was probably only noticeable to me but the color was really bothering me because it clashed so much with their bedding, plus neither of them really like purple that much (if it was pink it would be a different story!).

So yesterday we primed all the molding and today we painted the walls. I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll be able to caulk and paint the molding and then we can move the furniture back and THEN I have some additional fun things I want to try with paint to do an accent wall. Truth be told, if we were going to be living here longer than a year I would paint one entire wall with this scene from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, a book that I loved as a kid and my kids all adore as well.  We all have it memorized and we usually read it at least once a day. Anyway, one day Isaac and I spent a looong time editing out all the text on the page and recreating Parisian buildings where the text & the center of the page were (seriously, I was really impressed with my editing since I was just using Paint and I had to create all of the sky below the moon in the left corner and all of the buildings in the lower right half of the page below the River Seine, plus erase the crack that runs through the center. You can probably tell where I made alterations if you look closely). So we have that framed on their wall but I would love to do the ENTIRE wall (I did consider just painting this onto the lavender wall, but I thought that prospective buyers might not love it as much as I do).

Anyway, it's always entertaining doing a project with them because they keep up a running monologue commenting on the project's progress or something their friend said or something they want to do...anything they think of, and Isaac in particular is a nonstop talker. My very favorite thing that he said today (out of the blue) was this: "I'm glad I'm not a girl, because I don't want to have babies. But I need to help after my babies are born when I am a daddy."

How lucky my boys are to have such a good daddy as a role model! And how lucky my girls are to have such a good daddy as a model of the kind of men that make good husbands and daddies.

on my mind

For some reason these days I can't stop thinking about whether or not we are done having children. I worry so much about whether all of my children are getting enough from me, especially as Nathan has been so difficult lately in terms of getting him to eat or drink (his cold has been absolutely awful) and the vast majority of my time is going to coaxing a few drops of liquid down his throat.

Last night Nathan was really upset--more upset than I have ever seen him. He was exhausted and rubbing his eyes, which were reddened from his cold. Tears were streaming down his face and mixing with the snot that was freely flowing from his nose. I tried everything I could think of to get him to eat or drink--I could tell from his diapers that he was starting to get dehydrated. I was worrying about whether I should take him in to the ER to get a fluids line started or something like that. Neil left to go buy (yet another! we seem to go through those so fast!) new humidifier in hopes that it would help. I finally laid Nathan in his crib and was standing outside the door listening to him howl in hopes that he would just conk out after a few minutes of crying and go to sleep--he NEVER cries at night but he was so stuffed up that he couldn't take his pacifier. After two or three minutes I couldn't stand to listen to my poor baby any more and so I picked him up and cuddled him and calmed him down. I finally managed to get him to eat a few mandarin oranges, drink some milk, and then I undressed him and gave him a bath (since he was covered in oranges and juice). He was so darling splashing there in the sink--he kept turning to make sure I was looking at him and then he would giggle and splash again.

After his bath I wrapped him up in a towel and we went and sat in front of the fireplace. I kissed his little hands and toes and blew raspberries on his neck. He laughed and wiggled and pointed at the fire. I closed my eyes and inhaled that freshly-bathed baby scent...there's nothing quite like it. And then I sang to him and we cuddled a bit more and then I bundled him up in clean jammies and put him to bed.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this. Some days I feel like this is so, so, so hard and I don't know how I can possibly keep going because I know I really have no clue what I'm doing. I've never done this before and as soon as I get one kid figured out, they hit a new phase and I'm back at square one. But I just keep going every day, and I take a deep breath when I want to scream and I fake a nice loving voice when really I want to whack somebody and I do the same things day after day after day--usually many times a day. And some days I sit down on the kitchen floor and cry and we have scrambled eggs for dinner, and some days I dance around the kitchen singing very loudly while I cook an elaborate spread of everyone's favorites. I feel so far from perfect but I know that I am learning and I'm getting better at this, and in the process of being a mother to these delightful, infuriating, intelligent little people of mine I am being refined.

And this has absolutely nothing to do with anything I've written, but St. Patrick's Day is coming up and this bread is AMAZING and you really should make it. I have made it probably a dozen times in the last few months and it's always gone super fast and my kids clamor for more (and I hate regular soda bread. This is awesome and not blah like so many of them are). The recipe is originally from one of the Barefoot Contessa books.


Irish Soda Bread
4 c. all-purpose flour (I do 2 cups whole wheat--I tried it 100% WW and it did not work)

4 T. sugar

1 t. baking soda
1.5 t. kosher salt

4 T. cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch dice (I have substituted an equal amount of oil with great success)

1 3/4 cold buttermilk, shaken (I use milk plus 4.5 or 5 T. vinegar--just let it sit for a few minutes)

1 extra-large egg, lightly beaten

1 t. grated orange zest (I zest a big orange--or two--and dump it all in without measuring)

1 c. dried currants (I use raisins. Tried Craisins and they don't work as well)

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper (I use a Sil-pat) and preheat the oven to 375.

Combine flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in electric mixer with paddle attachment.  Mix in butter on low speed until butter is mixed into flour.  Lightly beat buttermilk, egg, and orange zest together in measuring cup; add the buttermilk mixture slowly to the flour mixture on low speed.  Combine the currants with 1 T. flour and mix into dough (I break the raisin clumps up with my fingers so they were all separate).  It will be very wet (I have to scrape it out with a rubber scraper).  Dump the dough onto a well-floured surface and knead a few times into a round loaf (I add probably 1/4 c. of flour throughout this process).  Place the loaf onto the prepared sheet pan and lightly cut an X into the top of the bread with a serrated knife.  Bake for 45-55 minutes or until a knife comes out clean (I bake it for 50 minutes).

Go make it right now. You're welcome.

Windy City

 This is my new favorite picture of our family (even with Luke's finger in his nose! Neil wishes that he hadn't been buttoning his shirt after Isaac unbuttoned it, but oh well...we can't have everything).

We spent part of the weekend in Chicago. I love that city. Blustery and cold and crowded, but I always love it. It’s packed full of unexpected beauty (one of my favorite things about Chicago is that every building budget must include a specific percentage that goes to a public art fund—and there are beautiful murals and sculptures and installations all over the city) and beautiful parks and it all curves along the beautiful shores of Lake Michigan. Truly my favorite city.

We’ve been feeling pretty burnt-out lately so we decided to take Friday as well—we pulled the girls out of school and Neil took the day off of work. We stopped at the candy factory on our way—always a HUGE hit and really entertaining—and then we met my parents at the temple. They had very kindly offered to watch our children so that we could do a session together. It was so, so, so nice to be able to be with Neil in the temple—I honestly can’t remember the last time we were able to do that. Really wonderful and I was so grateful to my parents for watching our kids!

Afterwards we checked into our hotel and then grabbed some Chinese for dinner. While we waited for the food we played our family “name that literary quote” game. We usually stick to children’s books but my parents brought it to a whole new level with lots of poetry and classic literature. I had forgotten how much poetry both of my parents (and especially my mom) have memorized, and it was fun to revisit that part of my childhood. I’m going to start incorporating more poetry into our evenings around the fireplace.

After dinner Neil took the older kids swimming while I chatted with my parents in our hotel room (Luke fell asleep cuddled up to my mom, which was really cute). It was so nice to have that time with my parents. I have really missed them lately and I feel so blessed to have parents who I adore and with whom I love to spend my time. I am just so grateful for them in my life.

We spent Saturday at the Field Museum. My parents had planned to go with us, but wisely chose to drive home before the crazy storms hit (the weather this year is nothing to mess around with!).


I was a little worried about how our museum trip would go, since Neil and I were up the majority of the night with the boys (somehow they perfectly time it so they all come down with simultaneous colds whenever we’re staying in a hotel!).  It was a really long night but I was glad we had stayed in Chicago because we had a wonderful time with the kids at the museum.


I really truly love taking them places like this—it’s so fun to see their excitement and to watch them putting all of the pieces together from things we’ve read about and then actually seeing them (and I must confess that it also makes me feel like I’m doing good things as a mom! 


And it is always so neat to realize how much they are learning and growing and filing away in their memories. I smiled every time I overheard one of them explaining something to another one—everything from Abigail explaining to Isaac how to tell the difference between a mammoth and a mastodon tooth to Juliet telling Luke that mummies have their brains pulled out through their noses. Good times, right? 

One of my favorite things about Chicago is the Art Institute, which happens to house some of my very favorite paintings, among them Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. I love playing with the pointillism and standing super super close and then backing up (once I visited the Art Institute in high school when I had just smashed in my ankle, so I was in a wheelchair, and the docent let me go behind the rope so that I was literally face-to-face with the painting. Yeah, I'm cool like that).

So check this out: LEGO pointillism!

Pretty cool, right? The kids were totally fascinated and I started mentally calculating how much it would cost to replicate this.

Last but not least, I was flipping through our photos and found this one that Abigail took of me when I was pretending to harvest corn and complaining about how hard it was and how I was hot and weren't we done yet? (Sometimes my kids think I'm really funny when I do things like that...and then sometimes they say things like Isaac said today when I was dancing and he looked at me and said, "Mommy, stop dancing like that. It is so weird.)

Anyway, I was being super critical of my dorky face in this photo, and then I realized it is the first photo since one that I took in 8th grade on a field trip to Philadelphia where I actually liked the way my lower body looked. Over the last decade, I've grown to love my body and all the things it can do, but I am still often shocked when I look in a mirror and realize that my self-conception doesn't actually mirror my reflection. So I am posting this photo because I am happy with the half that I usually dislike the most.
 

we'll try again later

I was going to blog tonight but then I ran 18 miles and guess what...I'm too tired. Hopefully tomorrow.