May 14th, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: Cough, Cough, Sniff, Sniff

Of course, of course, of course! the minute I go banging on about feeling better I am felled by a ridiculous disgusting cold that has me hacking, spewing and sneezing. Someone walked by me at work today, where I had no business being, just as I sneeze-hacked and remarked that I sounded like a goose. He was not incorrect. Still, I made it through the day. I made it home from work. I lay down for a bit before we made dinner, and if I’m still feeling this awful, I’m actually going to call in sick. What a concept.

We made some vegan chocolate chip muffins the other weekend. The RRBB seemed to enjoy them. His emotions vacillate so easily these days — one minute he’s blessed out on vegan-choc-apple sauced goodness. The next he’s face down on the floor shrieking because, woe to be me, I have taken away something, closed a drawer, locked a cupboard, who knows. The other day he cried the entire way home in the car, then shrieked for another hour after we got home. I almost didn’t survive that day. We had dinner guests and a pile of people coming to the house and it was a day where there was no breathing, only moving, forward, forward, forward until I collapsed in a puddle on top of my bed.

And the small changes are working. At least, I think they are. Each week, I add something new, something teeny tiny, hardly noticeable to anyone other than myself, and it’s helping me come to terms with, well, all of the changes. My attitude is better. I’m not so run-down, so short-tempered, but I still have a long way to go. I haven’t managed to rescue myself entirely from the emotional hurricane of the last eighteen-months. It’s amazing to me how little time I have to actually sit and think — something I took completely for granted before I had the RRBB. Entire afternoons spent in a glorious state of an internet coma, doing “research,” keeping up-to-date with friends, and strangers, and bloggers, and books, and more books. Now, I’m caught thinking in the in-betweens, on the way to work, stolen moments here and there, raw impressions, never full, never tender, crammed all together in an endless loop until my days get ever-busier that anything that resembles a thought gets crashed around and out of my head.

Yesterday, while my RRHB was up at the cottage, thankfully, doing all of the chores so we can be ready for the long weekend, the RRBB opened up one of the cupboards and pulled out his animal crackers. He looked straight at me and said, “Mama, ya?” A question! A full and complete thought where he reasoned he wanted an animal cracker and knew enough to ask. The answer was, unfortunately no, he had already had some at lunch, but at least someone that I love and adore has the presence of mind to actually finish a thought, and that is worth revelling in.

May 7th, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: Sand in My Shoes

Goodness. The week has whizzed by. Work has been busy, life is busy, and in it all, I’ve actually been feeling better than I have in ages. The RRBB has started saying, “Mama.” It sounds like he’s half-Italian, and comes out, “Mumaa,” but it’s the most heart-filling thing in the world. When he started smiling, that was something. When he rolled over, that was something else, when he said, “Mumaa,” the other day as I left for work my heart cracked. And then, when we all went outside to see me off to work, there was a woman across the street with bleached-out short hair, and RRBB pointed to her and said, “Mumaa!” So, maybe he thinks all women with hair like mine are called “Mummy.” Who knows. It was very funny.

Up until last week, when I would say to him, “RRBB, where’s Mummy’s nose?” He would point to his own nose. “Where are Mummy’s eyes?” He would point to his own eyes, and so on. I found it comforting that he, in a sense, could not define himself outside of me. For the longest time, even when he was growing inside me, I wondered how he would know me when he was on the outside. How would he come to realize that I was his mother, how would he feel about me, would I be enough for him in my ever-depleted state. I mean, there are so many definitions of what a mother is — a baby doesn’t have to grow inside of you for someone to be its mother, but until he had some way of talking about it, I was never really convinced that my RRBB knew what I was — who I was sure, but that’s a very different thing.

Philosophically, I’ve been thinking a lot about mothers over the last little while. I’m sure a lot of it has to do with not having mine for the majority of my adult and young adult life. There was an article in the gossips the other day about how Gwyneth wants us all to stop judging each other, and then there’s all the hullabaloo over The Conflict, which I’m going to refrain from talking about only because I haven’t read the book yet (and I’m not sure if I will; I’m quite happy being the feminist I am, the working mother, AND someone who practiced attachment parenting while I was well enough to do so). It’s not enough that I define myself, I read, therefore I am, I write, therefore I am, I watch TV, therefore I am, I love, therefore I am, but now I’m being defined for the rest of my life by this other person — this person I created. So, it’s not enough that all the other moms getting their good shoes stuck in the playground sand are wondering about one another, passively judging how their kids are acting towards mine, and so on, we all have to be worried about how badly we’ll flapjack up our children too.

It’s amazing to me how language develops, how his language is developing, I should say. He’s been saying a version of “Daddy” (“Daddend”) for months, and it was spectacular. But in the last few weeks, since he surpassed that 18-month mark, it’s like a whole new world — not full sentences, but concepts like, “more!” and really recognizing objects like “plane” and then making the sounds that they make. But what of the “concepts” of “Mumaa” and “Daddend” — how do they relate in his giant brain that’s working a mile a minute. That’s the part that I wish I could climb inside his ear and find out, and I’m sure I’ll still be wondering what he thinks of us when he’s a teenager and we’re really flapjacking old.

Anyway, I’m rambling now. All I can say is that I find this whole motherhood thing utterly fascinating. When I’m not exhausted, sick, pulling out my hair, frustrated, exhausted, tired, exhausted, and oh, exhausted.

April 30th, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: How Many Hours in a Day?

These days, our lives are moving so fast, I am honestly shocked when it’s Friday (when this photo was taken), and then the weekend whizzes by, Game of Thrones is over, and we’re back at daycare/work first-thing Monday morning. The weather might not feel spring-like for Ontario, but it sure felt spring-like had we been magically transported to Banff… it snowed last week, teeny tiny little white flakes that melted as soon as they hit the ground, but, still, snow.

That didn’t matter, we got out on Sunday and walked up the West Toronto Rail Path to the Clean Train Rally held by our MP, Andrew Cash. (Who else sings “Time and Place” every single time you hear his name? Exactly.) It’s nice to see the community rally over such an important issue, but it was nicer just to be out and about, regardless of how tired/ill I felt, and the lesson for this week is how consistently surprising your children are…

They were giving away apples and so I gave the RRBB a bite of mine, which he ate, and then another, and then another. And then he took THE WHOLE APPLE AND ATE IT CORE AND ALL. This is a kid who, up until now, has not eaten a sliver of fresh fruit, well, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, it’s very rare that he eats fresh fruit, but he ate that apple, top down, for the majority of the walk home.

The second lesson for this week, no one cares about such stuff as much as you do. “RRBB ate an apple!” I kept saying. Blank stares. “An entire apple!” Patronizing, “that’s good, right?” Yes, yes, it is.

They were talking the other day on Metro Morning about that viral video floating around, Lotte Time Lapse, about the importance of capturing life like this — taking a photo of yourself every day, keeping a diary, finding ways to remember those things where memory itself becomes faulty. We have so many ways of pausing our life, social media, old-school blogging, camera phones, iPhones, iPad (which is what I took the above photo with) that it’s impossible not to be thinking about how to record your life as it’s happening. But it always gets me wondering about how different it’s going to be for my kid to grow up with all of this just the way life is — what kind of expectations around their lives, their images, their person, will change because I’ve been writing about him here since before he was born.

I’m sure I’m not remotely the first mother to be thinking about this kind of stuff. I mean, I keep his name away for a reason, and would have kept my own under wraps for longer if my particular work situation didn’t make it so that I had to drop my pseudonym. It’s a false veil, I know — people who know us, know him, know me — and my blog is small, traffic-wise, but I also want his life to be out there because it gives me pause to examine what it means to be a mother, how my life has evolved, and the different ways the world is now.

This weekend my son ate an apple. That news isn’t going to change the world. That he ate it core and all I find endlessly hilarious because why wouldn’t he, there’s an amazing sense of abandon in his world that we forget completely as we grow more and more knowledgeable. Seeing him chewing away, not caring about the juice dripping down his face, grinning, kicking his feet in his stroller, happy to be out looking at all the people around him, listening to the music, meeting his MP; it’s important that we remember these moments so that he has stories, so that he knows that he comes from somewhere, from two people who adore him, and if this is the way that I have to remember on his behalf, then I’m just going to continue, and worry about it all tomorrow, when, for sure, he probably won’t eat another apple in that very particular way again.

April 23rd, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: Like Waves

Just like the so-called “spring,” my body can’t decide whether it’s coming or going. This month I’m back pumped up on the steroids, have finished another week of the gross Septra, and am trying desperately to maintain a little perspective. Everyone I know seems to be in a bit of dire straights. The ups and downs of life are just barreling downhill and not seeming to climb back up, so I’m spending time hugging, giving advice, hopefully being there, listening, and putting my heart out to be held by those who might need a boost or two.  Friends are important. You know who you are. I wouldn’t be here without you. I only hope that I can give a little bit of that back to you when you need it.

It’s been a relentless twenty months. TWENTY MONTHS. I can barely manage to type that out. I’m chubby and puffy and feeling more than a little prednisone-crazy these last couple weeks. I’m not sleeping, of course, but I’ve finally found my groove again when it comes to reading, and I’m going to get caught up here over the next few days. We’ve been watching some great TV, and I’ve been enjoying some BBC shows on my iPad as I ride the stationary bike in the evenings. A terrific show called The Hour. Luther, which freaked me out, and then Wallander, wherein Kenneth Branagh is perfection. It’s all to say that despite the sheer stress of the last couple weeks of feeling truly horrible yet again, I’ve managed baby steps in the right direction: biking in the basement 3-4 times a week, lots of books read, lots of time spent with the baby. Now if I could only get my body to cooperate with my mind, and make me healthy, we’d be climbing back uphill in a moment.

The other night, lying in bed, I thought that there’s so little that I can control at the moment. Not my health, not my life to an extent, and not my mind from wandering all over the place and back again. I know I put so much pressure on myself to be doing all of the things that I did before I had the RRBB. To try and keep pushing forward, to keep moving at a pace that I recognize, and I’m failing, miserably. Making myself miserable. Making my husband miserable. All the while claiming to be happy, in a sense, because I have everything in life that equals my own personal sense of happiness. The long list that I made all those years ago: a job that I enjoy (for better or for worse), a rewarding career, a family, a nice house, a solid marriage — these are all things that I value. I would be floundering without them. Yet, I’m feeling dragged down and drugged out, moody and dangerous, unable to pause for a moment and just take a deep breath — and that’s the fatigue of dealing with the disease leeching into every aspect of my life. I can get through the days. But I don’t want to, if you know what I mean.

So, my epiphany.

The big things I cannot control. I can’t will the disease away. If anything, worrying about it, being frustrated and sad, only feeds the fire. I have to find a way to just be in it without letting it completely overwhelm me. I need to make my life smaller. Not bigger. I need to change tiny things every day until I’m feeling better, more like myself. That’s the real tease of the disease — for two or three-odd days over the last few weeks, I felt alive, like myself, not dragged down in the mud, not exhausted, happy and ready to take on the challenges of life with a toddler, a job, a household. And then, bam! I’m back to feeling horrible, ill, exhausted, more tired than I’ve ever been in my life, old, old, old.

So, small changes.

Something everyday that makes me, well, me. Small changes. Big thoughts. Right?

March 17th, 2012

Busted On The Bloor Line: Take A Moment

There is a marked uneasiness these days. Something isn’t quite right. I can’t trust the weather — it leaves a pit in my stomach that something is going to go horribly and absolutely wrong. It is not normal to be wearing white short-shorts in March to the sugar bush. And I’m not just talking about the sheer oddity of having no snow for an ENTIRE winter, but the fact that the world might be changing in ways that I won’t recognize as my son grows up. (more…)

March 10th, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: This Sounds Much Worse Than It Is

First, before I dive into the guts, and, well, grumpiness of where this post will necessarily go, I want to post this — a portrait of my son as if we were sending him off to The Wall with Jon Snow and the rest of the Night’s Watch. Can you tell we’re a little excited about the return of Game of Thrones?

Anyway, for members of my family who might read this, please don’t be alarmed, and don’t be upset, please feel free to not read this, it’s okay.

So, I saw the psychiatrist last week. I am freely going to admit that I’ve been in some form of therapy for well over a decade now. If only to cope with the disease, to right some difficult patterns in my head, and to be able to understand how my mind works just that little bit better. And when I was there, rambling as I do, I told her that I feel unhealthy in my body, unhealthy in mind, and unhealthy in my spirit — that not a single part of me feels like myself, and I don’t even know where to begin in terms of getting it back. (more…)

March 3rd, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: The Times, They Are Changing

Things are getting better. I saw the SFDD this week, and while my bloodwork is never entirely good news, there’s hope on the horizon in terms of finally being in a little more sustainable remission for my Wegener’s. My kidney function was severely damaged by the pregnancy and intense flare all those months ago, and I just have to come to terms with the fact that I’ll probably be on some form of medication for my poor, beleaguered organ for the rest of my life. That said, at least I’m alive. I manage to get to work. I’m raising a little boy. I have an outlet here. (more…)

February 23rd, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: Old Meets New

There is nothing that this wee toddler likes more than this old, old, old rotary phone. It’s my grandmother’s from when she worked at the Ontario courts (I think that’s correct; she was a stenographer; I think). I’ve had it since university, and it’s been in every place I’ve lived since, and it still works. We’ve been through three different iPods, the phone still works. We’ve been through three televisions, the phone still works. The zombie apocalypse could happen and that damn phone would still work. That is, until the RRBB drops it on its head for the umpteenth time. And it’s not that he’s just obsessed with this phone — he’s obsessed with all phones. Fussy on the TTC: hand him my blackberry. Grumpy at home: RRHB gives him his phone. He holds them upside down and backwards and says, “Hi!” It’s hilarious.

And the gloriously happy look on his face does nothing to betray the hell we’ve been through over the past few days. I’m coughing like Doc Holliday in Tombstone, running a fever; my RRHB’s got a cold; and the baby has the stomach flu, complete with the, ahem, runs — for FIVE STRAIGHT DAYS now. He’s not dehydrated. He’s actually eating well. It’s just a lot of changing diapers and rinsing kibbles and bits off in the tub. So, it’s been another marathon. Just getting through the days. Worrying incessantly about him, about his health, about whether or not I should call the doctor, checking things online, reading different parenting sites, doing more worrying, and then I cough up a lung, my RRHB feels nauseous, and all three of us collapse into another day defined by whatever daycare plague has descended upon us. (more…)

February 15th, 2012

Busted on the Bloor Line: Breakdown on the Tracks

I’m going to confess right off the bat: I did not take this picture. It’s a great shot and the RRBB looks exceptionally happy in this particular moment when his French Canadian father pumped up his French Canadian blood and dropped him full throttle onto the field by the park to just get out of the house. And, I missed it. I get to live my son’s life through the photographs that my husband takes to show me the moments that pass while I’m away at work. Oh, he’s comforting — consistently telling me I’m not missing all that much, but I am, and it’s overwhelming.

Then, I’m at work and it’s crazy busy and really stimulating these days, and actually kind of exciting. I have a number of giant projects, which means the days fly by, no lunch, no gym, no fresh air, and then on Mondays and Tuesdays, it’s racing to get the RRBB from daycare, racing home, and then dropping on the couch after he’s been fed, bathed, storied and deposited in bed. And, it’s overwhelming.

So, more so than usual, I think because everyone has been endlessly sick, and not the disease-kind of sick that I endure on a daily basis but a runny nose, achy, coughing, stuffed up, miserable, feverish, snotty, daycare-plague that haunts us from one weekend to the next. I don’t think we’ve ever had a Saturday or Sunday since I went back to work that all three of us have felt at our best. I’m sick. The RRBB’s sick. The RRHB’s sick. No one is happy. There’s a lot of whining. There’s not enough fresh air or fresh food because who can cook when their head feels like it’s going to explode. And, it’s overwhelming.

Things that I used to excel at — keeping our budget organized, our money sorted, our bills paid — were falling by the wayside. I paid our gas bill twice and forgot entirely to pay the cable bill (which, TWO DAYS after the bill arrived in my mailbox Rogers started calling me like they were a collection agency and I have never been so mad at a poor telemarketer. This is the ONLY time I have ever forgotten to pay that bill. Shut the flapjack up Rogers, seriously). We’re more broke than we’ve ever been in our lives — but still, we have a beautiful house, food on the table, clothes on our backs, a happy, well-adjusted little baby in private daycare — so I would better classify us as monetarily challenged at the moment, going from one salary to two, and from two people to three. You know, it’s overwhelming.

And my other work, my book, some short stories, things that have been percolating for decades, keep getting pushed aside, and a tiny little part of me, the me who I think I really am inside, gets lost in the shuffle. And that is, well, overwhelming.

So, I’ve started breaking my life down into manageable pieces. I pay the bills on any computer the moment they come into the house. I take the car in on daycare days even though it’s $13.00 to park because the baby is happier when we get home earlier. I run errands on my lunch hour when I’m not working through it. I’ve been doing okay with my New Year’s Revolutions — making soups with the slow cooker on the weekends that are good for lunches and at least one dinner. Making meal plans, fitting in grocery shopping wherever possible to make sure we can make meals at home. Now, we’re only ordering once a week — usually on Mondays because my RRHB has been working, and we’re all out of the house — instead of two to three times a week. That’s a win. We dusted off the bread-maker and my RRHB has been making delicious bread at home, which I think is terrific because we’re saving all that packaging and the RRBB loves his bread. And I’ve taken something to heart — a good friend of mine with two kids used to describe his life as “choosing tired.” In order to squeeze in the parts of himself that got lost in the daily back and forth and up and down that is parenting small children, he stayed up too late, and “choose” to be tired.  So, I’ve skipped the last few naps with the RRBB on the weekends and sat down at the computer and wrote, and it was amazing. I started a new project. Found some new life in an old one, and was glad to have done it. It’s only once, but it’s a start.

That’s the key — to use the skills that I’ve learned in this new life to try and feel less overwhelmed minute-by-minute. And I think it’s working. However, I was up with a seriously cranky RRBB at 4:45AM this morning, trying so very hard not to get angry when he whined and moaned, knowing he was so very tired and just needed to go back to sleep, yet refusing the rest at every turn. We read books. I steamed him up to help with his cough. I cuddled him when he allowed it. I lay down on the floor in his room when he bawled at the thought of being in his crib. And I did all of this because at the end of the day I love him so much it hurts. I barrel through my life during the day so that I can get home and spend a lovely evening with my RRHB, whom I adore, even when I’m fighting with him tooth and nail. Because at the end of the day, I might be overwhelmed, but I am loved at every turn and, in that, I am lucky, so very, very lucky.

December 20th, 2011

Busted on the Bloor Line: Holidays

We are utterly unprepared to have a child during the holidays. Thankfully, he’s too little to really notice the extreme lack of “festive” decorations or, really, a tree. I’ve bought him a stocking and even a few things to stuff it with, and a couple of presents, but we’re finding it hard to strike a balance between what we believe (we’d rather spend the money on a trip than extravagant gifts; the world is filled with crap that has taken precious time, energy and resources to make, do we really need it?) and the need to give our son happy, healthy family memories. There’s a point where you need to make your own traditions — to decide what’s right for your family. In a way, I know these sorts of things will evolve over time. Before we lost my mom, we had a number of things we did around the holidays: we each made a decoration both for the tree and for our homemade stockings, we read a battered, aged copy of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas on Christmas Eve after we were allowed to open one present, and we spent days covered in family from head to toe culminating in a delicious meal or two, or three. (more…)