The Other Side of Tired

Here's the Cliffs Notes version of the blog post I want to write today:

Remember how I briefly mentioned the Australian Open final yesterday?  Did you watch it?  What can anyone say about it, except that it was literally unbelievable?  That it made me proud to be a tennis fan?  That it made me marvel, yet again, at what the human mind and human body are capable of accomplishing?  Here's what Andy Roddick said about it:

Last week, I mentioned that one of the mantras I repeat in my head is That's where you are going to know yourself.  On the other side of tired.  As I wrote a couple years ago, it comes from Andre Agassi's autobiography, Open.  He told his trainer, Gil Reyes, that chasing dreams is so tiring, and that was Gil's response.  Yesterday, we got a new tennis image of what that kind of self-knowing tiredness looks like:

image via

I was cheering for Djokovic to win.  I used to like him because he was the underdog compared to Nadal and Federer, and I'm amazed by how he has managed to completely usurp them in the past year+.  I was also cheering for him to win because he had to serve second in the fifth set, which is a huge disadvantage.  If Nadal had broken Djokovic, the match would have been over.  When Djokovic broke Nadal, he still had to win his service game to win the match, which meant Nadal had a chance to even the score.  You might recall that when Federer beat Roddick in the 2009 Wimbledon final, Federer got to serve first, which meant that when he broke Roddick for the first time in the entire match, it was game-set-match-championship to Federer.  No chance for Roddick to break back.

Anyway, I'm getting sidetracked, and Nora is going to wake up soon.  And if she doesn't, I should spend the next 30 minutes reading.  So what I really want to say is this: when Rafa and Nole were standing there during the trophy presentation, you couldn't tell who had won and who had lost.  All you could tell was that both players had given everything they had.  Even though they had just been executing unbelievable athleticism a few minutes ago, and someone was about to hand them each a huge check and a trophy or a dish, they were so exhausted that they could not even stand.  I watched that whole trophy presentation, waiting for Djokovic to raise the trophy above his head, as is customary.  He couldn't do it.  In other sports, they talk about "leaving it all out on the field."  I've never seen a better demonstration of that cliche.  Djokovic used to have a bad reputation on the tour for being unfit, for calling the trainer to give himself a break, and for retiring from matches when he should have played them out.  I think he found himself on the other side of tired.

So I'm going to try to imagine this image every time I start to feel tired or exhausted over the next few weeks.  We'll see how that works out.

Back in the Saddle

My first week back to work went better than I could have imagined.

On Monday, Nora and I tried our best to savor our last day at home together before things began to change.  She just seems to get more curious all the time, and it is unbelievable to me to see how much comprehension she seems to develop in just a single day.  I have to be careful with her in her Bumbo seat because her head control is still developing, but here she is sitting in it and inspecting her toys from a new angle.

On Tuesday, I had to attend an orientation for new teaching assistants, so I took Nora to campus with me to meet my colleagues.  She took a nice long nap in the morning, so she was in rather pleasant spirits all day.  It was nice to have a reason to get properly dressed and leave the house.  We were met with so much enthusiasm when I showed up with Nora, and it was a delight to introduce her to many of the people I've been working with for the past several years.  

Billy began working from home on Wednesdays this week so he can watch Nora while I'm on campus.  I enjoy his work from home days because he gets to be there for Nora's golden hour.  In the first hour after Nora wakes up, she is often at her most curious, inquisitive, and happy.  I always put her in her play gym during that time, and each day we can see that she is getting closer and closer to rolling over.  She was getting such good rotation on Wednesday morning that we joked she is already much smarter after one day at college!

I had a really hard time leaving Nora that morning, and the car ride to College Park has never seemed so long.  Nora seemed un-phased, though, and she behaved well for Billy.  Once I got to campus, I was distracted enough that being apart from Nora for the longest period yet did not feel so bad.  In lecture on Wednesday, I realized that in all my anxiety about being separated from Nora, I managed to overlook how fortunate I am to have this teaching assignment.  Twice a week, my "job" is to attend an interesting lecture about my own subject area taught by a professor I like and respect.  Once a week, my "job" is to meet with undergrads to talk about books.  Aside from all the grading this entails, it is a job I would gladly do for free.  I felt better after making this realization, and Nora smiled and giggled for me when I got home, so that first day of the semester felt like a success.

Since the class had not yet begun in earnest, my professor cancelled the Friday discussion sections, giving me an extra week to prepare to teach.  On Thursday, I savored the chance to be home again with Nora for a "normal" day.  Evidently, she did too; she took a three hour nap!  She normally naps for around 30 minutes, she sometimes naps for an hour, and on a few rare occasions she has napped for up to two hours.  So a three hour nap is unprecedented... but it was also reassuring.  I think Nora must have been worn out after Tuesday and Wednesday, so it was nice to see that she is finally able to sleep longer when she is tired.

The cancellation of Friday's discussion sections also allowed me a chance to do a "practice run" of having Patti watch Nora for the full day.  Being away from Nora is hard enough; I can't imagine what it would be like if I was also worried about the type of care she receives in my absence. On Friday, the thing that comforted me enough to get some work done was knowing that Patti was taking great care of Nora.  Chuck and Brian were home when I went to pick her up, and it was fun to see how excited they were that they got to see her that day.  I was also relieved to find that Nora hadn't given Patti trouble with eating or napping, and that the two of them had fun playing during Nora's waking periods.

After all that, it was great to be home with Billy and Nora yesterday.  There were several signs that things are finally falling into place, which meant it was the first day I really felt like we are doing a good job as parents.  Nora has started reaching for and holding her toys, she is beginning to tolerate tummy time, she holds her head up much higher these days, and she is getting closer to rolling over.  She is learning so much now that it's easy to see how getting enough sleep is fueling her brain.  She's getting better at self-soothing and she's continuing to nap for longer periods.  Now that she barely puts up a fight before relaxing and falling asleep, it's hard to believe that only a few weeks ago she was screaming and writhing every time we started the nap routine, or that a month ago, it was literally impossible to get her to sleep without holding her for the entire nap.

An added bonus from yesterday was getting a visit from Aunt Vickie and Tres, who leave for their Bahamian cruise today.  After bringing us lunch and patiently waiting for the little sleepy head to wake up, they were treated to a fairly pleasant mood and a few hours of playing.  A while back, I finally found a onesie that said "aunt," which I had to buy immediately because Vickie does not want to be called "auntie."  Nora was also decked out in her little Gap skinny jeans, so naturally I had to take a photo of my two favorite girls.

Tres was last here right before Thanksgiving, before Nora got sick with RSV. For us, that time has really flown by, but having him visit again really drew attention to how much Nora has grown and how much she has developed in the past couple of months. It was great to see him and hear about their plans for the cruise... even before we opened the gift he brought, which could not have been more adorable.  These Tiny TOMS are still a little big for Nora, but that's perfect, since she isn't really wearing shoes yet.

In fact, I loved them so much I had to buy myself the matching pair!  So you can be sure that photo will be forthcoming. : )

Besides a considerable amount of peace of mind, the main lesson I took away from all this is what a difference a week can make.  When you're in your 20s, the weeks all blur together, and it's easy to turn around and realize a whole month has passed unnoticed.  But when you're approaching 4 months old, one week is long enough for an amazing amount of growth and development.  In addition to trying to take things day by day, I hope that next time I start to feel frustrated or clueless, I can say to myself: Give it a week and things will be different.  Surely we will have some weeks ahead where things are as bad as they were good this week, but now that I know just how quickly Nora can change, I hope I have an easier time getting through them.

Today, after we watched the last two hours of the Australian Open final, we took Nora to the mall to make some returns.  She was a little skeptical about having her photo taken. : )

Posts are likely to be shorter and more sporadic from here on out, since I really need to be doing academic work, but I'll try to share pictures and a few thoughts once in a while. : )

On Confidence

I have been an extremely decisive person my entire adult life.  I research, I talk to people, I observe, and then I sit down and think about which things will work for me and which things will not.  I do the work to figure out what I want, and then I make up my mind.  I rest easy knowing I made the best decision I was capable of making at that moment.  I don't worry about what might have happened if I'd made a different decision.  If things don't go as I planned, I direct my energy toward adjusting my behavior or my expectations rather than toward wishing I'd made a different decision in the first place.  My attitude about living and about myself could easily be summed up with this phrase:

Life: I can sort it out.  

Plenty of people have told me that they envy this attitude I have.  Now I see why.

As a mother, I find it exceptionally difficult to make a decision.  Even when I think I know what I want, I find it very hard to figure out how to arrive there.  I have difficulty sorting through which advice to heed and which advice to ignore.  After making a decision, I question it constantly.  I waver.  I get irritated when other people question my decisions.  When something I've chosen to do is successful, I worry that I'm helping Nora to establish a bad habit.  I seem to be incapable of giving myself credit for things I have done well for more than one or two days.  When something I've chosen to do is unsuccessful, I get upset with myself for not knowing ahead of time that it would fail.  My husband must be wondering what happened to the woman he has been living with for the past 7+ years.  I am wondering what happened to the woman I have been becoming for the past 29+ years.

At least I know what the problem is: I have a complete and utter lack of confidence in my abilities as a mother.  I know there is no good reason for this.  My baby is healthy, she is growing, she is learning, and most of the time she's even fairly content.  She is comforted by my presence.  Plenty of people have told me I am doing a good job, which is encouraging.  But the thing I know about confidence is this: nobody can gift it to you.  You have to generate it within yourself.  You have to learn to be able to identify your own successes.  You have to be able to forgive yourself for the ways in which you fall short by committing to improving upon them.  When you make a decision that doesn't turn out the way you'd expected, you have to learn to stop focusing on the bad results long enough to identify the good that came from the decision, even if it is minimal.

I'm not there yet.  I think all new mothers must feel this way, at least initially.  I keep feeling like there is so much pressure on me all the time, but I realize that it comes from within.  It's pressure I'm putting on myself because I've never wanted so badly to succeed at something.  The stakes are high because there is another person's life involved.  I think it has been particularly difficult for me to feel so helpless because it is such a vast departure from my normal state of being.  This makes it easy to feel like I am worse off than a new mom who was never confident in her abilities in the first place.  But I'm not.  I know what confidence feels like, so I should theoretically know how to get back there.  I did not make a new year's resolution, so perhaps a back-to-work resolution is in order:

I will work harder at cultivating confidence in my ability to mother my daughter.

Almost Back to School

Since Nora turned three months old, I have been working on savoring my last week at home with her while also getting ready for my return to work.  This means we've continued working on helping her learn to nap, and she has even been successful at self-soothing several times.  She is making good progress, but I wouldn't call it steady-- she'll sleep well for several days in a row before having a setback of a day or two.  I'm hoping that as we keep with it, and as she grows older, she'll get better and better at falling asleep and staying asleep.

We've also managed to watch a little bit of the Australian Open, though not nearly as much as I normally manage to see.  I was disappointed for Andy Roddick when an injury forced him to retire from his match against Lleyton Hewitt, and I'm also disappointed that for the first time in a long time, there are no American men around for week two of a Grand Slam tournament.

We have also been preparing to leave Nora under others' care.  Vickie babysat her last week so I could go in for a check-up with my doctor, and Patti, Chuck, and Brian watched her on Monday so Billy and I could have a few hours to ourselves.  We had a good time getting lunch together, and then we had no idea what to do with ourselves!  I finally decided to make the leap to a smartphone, though, so we ended up doing some phone shopping.  My phone has an app that puts cool "artsy" looking filters on photos, so here are a few pictures I've taken since I got it.

As you can see, Nora is getting very good at bringing her hands to her mouth! : )  She was relatively well behaved during her time away from us, both with Vickie and with her grandparents, so I am hoping my transition back to work will not be too difficult.  It is a big comfort to know she will be in such good hands while I am away-- Patti will be watching her for a few hours on Mondays and Fridays, and Billy will have her for a few hours on Wednesdays.  It makes me nervous to leave her because I worry about leaving other people to deal with her more difficult moods.  I know that in the long run, she will probably have an easier time with the transition than I will, it will be good for both of us to have some time apart, and I will enjoy getting back to my own work.  But if I think too much about how much is going to change in the next few weeks, I start to feel very overwhelmed, so I am trying to promise myself I will just try to take it one day at a time.

Though I wish I had a few more weeks at home, I am looking forward to getting back to campus.  I get to return under pretty ideal circumstances, so I think that will help me make the transition.  As I continue preparing for my comprehensive exams, I'll get to work as a teaching assistant for the professor who co-directed my Master's project and is directing my exam committee.  I am looking forward to the course, which is in my research area, and I've been working with this professor for a long time, so I am really excited to be back in the classroom.  He has two young children, he's been very encouraging about my decision to have a baby, and he can't wait to meet Nora, so I am very appreciative for that support, too.

There are a few mantras that have kept me going as I've worked my way through particularly difficult semesters and long runs in the past.  I hope these phrases will continue to serve me well in the next few weeks...

Nothing to it but to do it.

Just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming, swimming, swimming...

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...

The only way out is through.


That's where you are going to know yourself.  On the other side of tired.

Just Keep Playing.

Nora's 3rd Monthday

Happy Third Monthday, Nora!  You've officially become an infant!

Nora's three month photo shoot was so cute, I couldn't choose just one picture.

Nora's mood today continues to absolute blissful in comparison to her mood when she turned two months old.  She is so smiley and happy!  For several days, she has been cooing while giving big, open mouthed smiles, so we were hoping a laugh would not be far behind.  Today, while I was getting her dressed and Billy was smiling and talking to her, Nora gave him a big smile and a giggle!  We were thrilled that we were both there to hear it, and we can't wait for her to laugh again!

Everyone we see keeps commenting on how small she is, but the comparison below helps illustrate why, for us, it seems like she is getting big!  She is still a little chunky, but she just keeps getting longer!

Thank You

I just wanted to say a quick but sincere thank you to everyone who reached out to me yesterday, and over the past couple of weeks, to let me know that you were thinking about me.  Your emails, phone calls, texts, facebook posts, blog comments, and more have meant so much to me.  I know it is difficult to know what to say on a day like yesterday, but those of you who made the effort to say anything at all touched my heart.  We think Nora is hitting her three month growth spurt because she is nursing almost continuously throughout the day, so I haven't had a chance to thank you all as I would have liked, but your kind words have served as a buoy to help keep me afloat during this difficult time.

I also wanted to encourage you to read Vickie's blog post from yesterday if you haven't had a chance to read it yet.  You can find that here.

On Dad's birthday, Vickie took the card I made for Dad up to his niche and sent me this picture, which helped me feel included even though Nora and I weren't able to visit the niche with Nate and Vickie.

And yesterday, Shaye sent me this photo she took when she and the boys visited Dad's niche on Christmas Eve.  I'd posted a video of Nora to facebook that day, and she played it while they were up there.

In the letter he wrote me to open after he passed away, Dad emphasized the importance of sharing your life with others and allowing them to help you along.  So as my friend Catherine wrote yesterday, it is "amazing to be human," and I know I am fortunate to have the chance to share that humanity with such special people.

One Year

She shaved his face.

Billy, Vickie, and I had been sitting with Dad when his breathing changed and we knew he was about to go.  Billy went to get Aunt Carrie and Judy, and we were all there when he took his last breath.  And then Vickie shaved his face.  Then we noticed that there was barely a trace of yellow left in his skin.  Then we realized that his face had relaxed into a sort of grin.

Every day from January 1 to January 12, 2011 was the worst day of my life.  Every day it got harder to see my dad get worse.  Every day I woke up feeling less prepared to take on the unknown challenges I waited to endure.  I don't know how Vickie brought herself to shave his face, or how she knew what a difference it would make, but that was the sign that healing could begin.

I wish I could make this easier on you guys, he had told me.
That's not your job, Dad, I had responded.  You're the one who is dying, I had thought.  And anyway, the only way this would be any easier is if we weren't going to miss you so much, I'd said aloud.
Thank you for saying that, he'd whispered.

It's not easy.  It's very, very hard.  But I have now seen what it is like to die a difficult death before your time.  And I have now felt what it is like to endure the loss of your father before his time.  There is no question, in my mind, about which one is more difficult.  And I know that any sadness I feel about being unable to tell Dad about what has happened over the past year, or heartbreak I feel that he didn't get to meet Nora, is far outweighed by the sadness and heartbreak Dad felt in the days, weeks, and months leading up to January 12.  He may have put on a brave face and made us laugh, but he knew what he was going to be missing.  And still he managed to be concerned about us.

We're okay, Dad-- Nate, Vickie, Nora, and me.  We have good days and we have bad days.  We have each other.  We have Billy, Ashley, and Tres.  We have plenty of other people around us who love and support us.  And we miss you terribly.  But we have known that you wanted us to heal, and we've been working on it since she shaved your face.  We know because you taught us.  You refused to allow cancer to define your life while you were fighting it, so we know we can refuse to allow it to define our lives now that we've lost you.

I love you, Dad.  I didn't know it then, but you did make it "easier" to live without you by teaching me how and when to stand tall on my own and how and when to lean on others.

Approaching the End of the "Fourth Trimester"

Now that Nora is right between 12 weeks and her third monthday, it is easy to see why all the books I've read and moms I've talked to suggest that something special happens around the end of the "fourth trimester."  Not only is Nora napping better now, but she's also more social and she can keep herself entertained.  She is now beginning to do the things I have always thought babies could do from the start, I guess because I haven't really spent any time around newborns.  I have been compiling short video clips to try to document this stage and share it with those of you who haven't seen her yet or haven't seen her since she was very small.

Posting this video also reminds me that I never shared the video Nate made with footage he shot during his visit to meet Nora.  At the time, she was around three weeks old.  I don't know if anyone will have the attention span to watch them back to back, but doing so provides an interesting comparison of how far Nora has already come!

P.S. I played Nate's video again after posting this, and as I was singing the "ooh ooh!"s to Nora, she started ooohing herself.  Maybe she has been paying attention while Mat Kearney plays on repeat in the car? : )  In any case, the day might come when I get through this video without tearing up, but it hasn't come yet.  I'm so thankful to have it because I didn't take any video of Nora at this age and because Nate included so many thoughtful touches that will help me remember those early days that are otherwise a total blur.

New Year, New Baby?

Nora is 12 weeks old today, and the past week has been the best week of being a parent yet!  Our attempts to turn Nora into a better napper have found a new level of success since we rang in the new year.  Only recently, Nora has resumed taking a pacifier, she sometimes calms down while being rocked rather than being jiggled or bounced, and she has much less trouble staying asleep when I set her down.  I began reading Dr. Weissbluth's Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, and I wish I'd read it before Nora was born!  He suggests that sleep is fuel for the brain in the same way that food is fuel for the body, and he advocates limiting waking periods to one or two hours for babies Nora's age.  His ideas make a lot of sense to me, they're well supported by research, and most importantly, they seem to be working!  Now that she is getting more regular sleep in the daytime, Nora is like a totally different baby.  She smiles and vocalizes more, she enjoys being placed on her back to play, and she rarely gets agitated unless she is tired, hungry, or wants a diaper change.  I wonder how much fussiness we could have avoided during the month of December if we'd been able to get her to nap more regularly... but there's no sense crying over spilled milk, I suppose.

My mood has continued to improve since I first began to figure out how to limit and cope with Nora's fussiness, but this week I feel more like myself than I have since Nora was born.  I finally made it to my childbirth instructor's New Moms Group, where it was fun to talk with other moms, see their babies, and be reminded of how much more capable and engaging Nora will be in only a few months.  Nora has been cheerful and playful in the evenings, which means I get to look on as Billy smiles and plays with her instead of feeling guilty that he came home to a crying baby after a long day at work.  I've also enjoyed having a goal each day, even though that goal is as simple as getting Nora down for three decent naps.  When I'm successful, the positive benefits are manifold: I get to have a break, I can get a few things accomplished around the house, I can continue reading more of Dr. Weissbluth's book, and I get to interact with a happy baby when she wakes back up.  These payoffs make the unsuccessful moments, like when I know Nora is tired but continues to fight falling asleep, or she wakes up as soon as I set her down, much less frustrating.  Working toward establishing a somewhat regular schedule for Nora also gives me hope that I'll be able to get some work done when I return to my academic responsibilities at the end of this month.

According to the book, she's only now entering the stage where her brain begins regulating her sleeping patterns.  I hope that by teaching her to sleep during the day and establishing good sleep habits now, we can avoid a lot of problems down the road.  I know I'm at my best when I'm well rested, so if there's anything I can do to help make sure Nora, Billy, and I all get enough sleep, I'm up for the challenge!

Hello, 2012!

In A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens writes "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times."  I can't think of any better way to sum up my 2011, which included both the best and the worst moments of my entire life.

Happy New Year, from our family to yours!  Personally, I'm hoping for a little more stability this year.  I've had more than enough "excitement" to last me for quite a while.  I hope the new year finds you in good spirits and brings you what you need most.

Pattern mixing and on-trend footwear before she's even 3 months old... look out, world. :)