Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Has It Really Been Three Weeks?

So, I am a really bad blogger lately. Currently, my days look something like this:
•wake up around six; hit snooze until 7.
•Rush around like lunatic trying to get ready and out the door for 8 am bus to work
•Work until around 4:30 (which is SO TOTALLY EARLY compared to my old job. Why don't I have any free time?!)
•Run around all day at work. Spend every spare minute pumping and/or frantically trying to arrange details of our upcoming move that are technically work-related, but somehow don't really fit into my workday.
•Run for the bus home; just barely make it-arrive home just before 5
•Play with Miss M. until she seems tired/feed her/talk to her/play with her some more/do SOMETHING about dinner (takeout, anyone??!)
•Nurse baby to sleep when she gets fussy (bad sleep habit, I know!)
•After baby is in bed, run around apartment like lunatic/surf internet, ordering things, going over to-do lists, researching, cleaning apartment, doing laundry, etc, until I fall into bed around 11
•Wake to sound of crying baby 56 times in middle of night; comfort her briefly until she falls asleep (yes, another bad sleep habit-but it's all about survival right now, and she goes back to sleep in seconds when comforted and not at all if ignored)
•Rinse, lather, repeat...


Weekends involve more time with baby, but also more time running around. So, blogging has fallen off my radar. Things are going well overall, though, other than the utter insanity of dealing with a second major move in a three months. Things are inexplicably better with T. Part of it, I think, is that I've stopped needing the fenugreek, and I've noticed that I am a LOT less irritable. I was INSANELY irritable while taking it. I haven't seen that as a side effect, but that was my experience. It will be good to finally get settled and find a good babysitter. We haven't had a date without the baby in months, and we really need it.

We leave next week for our new city, where we will spend the next few years. It is crazy to be moving again. We've made some great friends here, and it makes me sad to leave them so soon, but since they were only here for training, they are leaving soon too. I guess that just gives us one more place to want to visit on vacation!

I've just seen the pictures of our new townhouse, and it is pretty fabulous. I could have never afforded such a great place in a large city on my own, but it's one of the perks of the job. I'm pretty excited about it.

And now, must race off again! I scheduled a meeting for tonight, because I just couldn't fit it in anywhere else. Sigh. I'd rather be playing with Miss M.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Transitions

When we decided to have a baby, I knew that there were things about my relationship with my husband that would change. I also knew that there would be things that would be hard. We'd been together for fifteen years before we had the baby. As our union became a true family, the dynamic between us would be different.

Similarly, I knew that there were a pile of things that would be hard about taking this new job. After all, we moved 500 miles so that I could get training, knowing that we would move internationally when I finished training. We didn't know at the outset exactly how much training I would get, or exactly how long we would be here. We moved to a place that neither of us was familiar with. I changed fields, so I am learning entirely new skills every day. I have new coworkers now, and will have new ones again in another month or so when we move again. T gave up his career to become M's full time caregiver, so there is the loss of how he has defined himself professionally, as well as the transition from professional with his own business to staying at home full time with a baby, which we all known can be wonderful, intense and isolating all in the same day. We've left our familiar support network of friends and family.

Much of this has been joyful and easy. Some of it, though, has been hard.

Our relationship continues to evolve, both in relation to having a baby and with regard to all of the other changes going on around us. The evolution is not always for the better. I am short-tempered sometimes. I am tired, particularly when I've had a number of long days in a row, and Miss M hasn't been sleeping. I am quick to become irritable with the fact that T can't be bothered to rinse out the bottles after he feeds them to her, or take out the trash when he has been home all day, or leaves wet towels from the pool on the living room furniture. It makes me crazy. He will become sullen and quiet when I tell him Miss M needs to be strapped into her carseat all of the way when we go out for a walk with her, that it's not safe otherwise. He'll tell me bitterly that I suck the fun out of everything when he proposes going out for burgers, and I point out that will only make him feel poorly and ruin his sleep. Some days, it feels like we either bicker, or there is a gulf of silence between us.

I know this is just a transition phase. We have a strong relationship and a long history together, and there has been a lot of change for us over the last nine months. I adore him, and he makes me laugh. I know that we can work past all of the stupid stuff, and that our lives are in a really good place right now overall. There are plenty of nice moments among the irritating and difficult ones.

But lately, our marriage feels--for the first time in a decade--like it really takes effort to make it work. I am used to speeding along on autopilot and having everything slide along smoothly. I'm not used to this. I'm not used to it being hard.

I underestimated how much of an impact transition upon transition upon transition would have on us. It's one thing to have a baby, or move, or take a new job, or go from running a business to taking care of a baby. But doing all at once is infinitely more challenging.