Chaotic Cupcakes
I volunteered to make cupcakes for Big I’s Halloween party at school. (It’s the Mom guilt. I can’t go to the party with Lil C and I don’t have a sitter.) Because I’m a perfectionist over-achiever, I had to do something super cool. No ordinary cupcakes would do. So, I found an idea for jack-o-lantern cupcakes and went to town.
Lil C is quite content playing in her port-a-crib, so she hung out in there while I put orange icing on the cupcakes. Then I heard Big I cracking up laughing. "What’s so funny?" I called to her. "Lil C is undressing herself," she laughed. She could barely talk she was laughing so hard. I walked over to the crib and there’s Lil C without her little jeans, with her zip up sweatshirt off, and her tank top pulled up and over her head, bunched behind her neck holding her in a full nelson. She spent the entire afternoon wearing only a diaper and protesting loudly if I tried to redress her.
When she was sick of her crib, I brought her into the kitchen while Big I and I cut green leaves candies into pumpkin stems and arranged chocolate chips into jack-o-lantern faces. In the time it took to finish the cupcakes for school, Lil C:
- pulled all of my Tupperware out of the cabinet
- pulled all of the snacks out of the cabinet including a bag of pretzels that she emptied completely onto the floor
- removed every single school paper that Big I has ever brought home from school from Big I’s folder and spread them out around her in the kitchen
- removed each and every letter magnet that she has and threw those on the floor as well
- tried to remove my cleaning products from another cabinet
- pulled out pots and pans and threw those on the floor as well
When she went towards the pantry closet, I decided that decorating the extra cupcakes for us was going to have to wait until later. I sort of attempted to tidy up the kitchen before acting class, but gave up because dressing the squirming naked baby took quite a bit of time.
When we all arrived home tonight, Mr. BBM was greeted with the kitchen from hell and leftovers. After dinner, I finished decorating our cupcakes and was directed by Big I to make them "creepy." I did my best. I know my skeletons look like they have some irritable bowel issues, but I only had one kind of icing and Big I was still thrilled despite the poopy-pants skeletons.
I think I have to change my blog name to "Black Belt Betty Crocker".
Be sure to check back for costume pictures tomorrow!
If you are interested in fantasy football, you can check out my latest post at Save the Soldiers. It’s all about making lousy decisions which is what fantasy football is all about right? The post is called Serving and Devouring Crow 24/7 and can be found here.
I’m also participating in the Carnival of Family Life this week and those entries, along with a link to my sad little chipmunk story can be found here. Check them out!
And to all the new visitors and commenter’s, a big BBM "Welcome" to you!
Not Me
I don’t want to be that person. Sometimes I wonder if I am. Starting out in the martial arts at 29 seems to be ancient. I wonder if the parents who watch their children from the comfort of the waiting area are thinking I should give it up; karate is for kids, not their parents. I wonder what other people think about how I do my kata, how I spar. Do they think I’m a joke? Do they think I’m good? Do they think I’m silly for starting so late?
It’s easy to doubt yourself when it took a good ten years to start on the path that you wanted to all along but were too afraid to try. It’s easy to wonder, when you see your reflection at the dojo, wearing that brown belt, if you’ve really earned it, if you really know your stuff as well as you should.
After studying karate for a few years, I can look at others and know which ones are really nailing their kata, and which ones are sort of going through the motions. Am I going through the motions or do I look like I know what I’m doing?
If you ask my Mom about me and my karate she will tell you how great I am at it. She will say about my karate skills, "She’s a natural. It just comes so easily for her. She’s really great at it." She brags about me to her friends, and although I’m flattered and happy that she thinks I’m so great, I know that she is, after all, my Mom. That’s what Mom’s do. They praise and brag. It’s in the Mom wiring.
Recently several students at our dojo competed in a tournament. I didn’t go. I wouldn’t have been able to anyway, seeing as how sick I was; but even if well, I doubt I would have gone. I haven’t ever really considered going to tournaments. The martial arts journey has been personal for me. The idea of putting it out there in a public arena is a little unsettling. Trophies are nice and all, but who knows if I’d even get one. Wouldn’t that be embarrassing? The 31-year old brown belt who is there and is a complete joke. Who let her in here anyway?
In the safety and comfort of the dojo, where the environment is so supportive, you can start to let yourself believe that what you’re doing is right, that others see what you’re doing and think that you know what you’re doing. At a tournament? You might become one of people that everyone sort of laughs at, the joke.
When it all boils down, it shouldn’t really matter what other people think about me, my kata, my karate. It should really only matter what I think of myself. But getting to that point is going to be the hard part.
Just my Luck Or RIP Little Chipmunk
Filed under: Favorite Posts, Mental Strain for Mama
I drove Big I to school this morning and there was nothing extraordinary that separated today from any other day. Upon arriving home, I normally walk around the front of my car to get Lil C out. I don’t know what made me go around the back today, but I did and that’s when I saw it. . . a squished dead chipmunk. It lay there, three feet behind my back wheel, dead as a doornail and so obviously my doing.
I stopped in my tracks and let out a horrified sigh. And then I realized something even worse than the dead chipmunk. Before Big I gets off the bus today, I’m going to have to clean up my mess.
I am the person who can’t pick up a cat hairball without throwing up a little in my mouth or at least heaving to the point that I have to run to the bathroom, just in case. I scanned my neighbor’s houses and cars to see if anyone suitable for doing this sort of thing was home, and the answer was sadly, no.
I took Lil C in the house and did what any rational wife who just killed a chipmunk would do. I called my husband whose office is 45 minutes away and demanded that he come home and now. He laughed while I cursed him for not working from home today of all days DAMN IT. "Just put on a glove. . . " he started. "NO! I can’t do THAT!" I said completely horrified. "I’ll throw up!" I said. "Well, then your other option is to get the snow shovel. . . ". "Oh GOD NO. . . Can’t you just come home?" I begged. "Do you think my Dad would come out and take care of it for me?" I asked my husband. "No, well, maybe. You could call him and tell him that you hit a deer, and that you need help. Then, when he shows up, you could tell him ‘Oops! Sorry, I meant a deer MOUSE’" my husband said while relishing in the fact that he was a good hour away.
"How bad is it?" he asked. "It’s bad," I said "he’s a pancake, squished in the middle and what’s coming out the ends isn’t pretty." "Oh Man," he said and laughed some more.
So I hung up and did what any rational woman would do. . . I called my Mom.
"I have a problem," I said. "WHAT?" she asked thinking there was something seriously wrong. I told her my dilemma and she recommended that I first cover the poor little guy with some leaves and then scoop him up with a snow shovel and put him in some bushes or trees where he wouldn’t be disturbed. This from the woman who had a chipmunk trapped in her fireplace, so my Dad put a trap in there, caught him, and then released him into the woods. "I don’t know if I can do this," I said. "Well, you’re going to have to. Imagine Big I’s face when she gets off the bus." "I know," I said, resigned to my fate.
I got Lil C occupied in her port-a-crib and retrieved the snow shovel. As I opened the front door, a squirrel sat on my step just staring me down. You think I’m kidding? Because I’m not! Then the birds started making all kinds of noise and swooping around in a threatening fashion. I was waiting for a mountain lion to come charging down from the woods and eat me or something. I felt like the friendly forest folk were declaring war on me. I needed to do this quickly.
I threw some leaves on top and I’ll only say that dead chipmunks don’t just nicely move themselves onto snow shovels. There was some scooping and some squirming (that was me) and then I finally got him on the shovel and put him in a ground covering bush away from the house. Then, I had to hose off the shovel, and hose down the crime scene. I also had to hose down my back wheel. Can I tell you how relieved I was that it was my BACK wheel and not the front? I never saw him because he ran out after my front wheel had already passed. Stupid chipmunk running under a car.
And so considering how this day started, I think I’m ready to call it a day. The things we’ll do for our kids. . .
On the mend but still annoyed
It is no secret that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends nursing until your baby is at least 12 months old. An article came out recently in diabetes literature, citing that breast milk is really the best thing for your baby and that cows milk should be avoided until the age of two. Breastfeeding helps reduce the incidence of diabetes in both Mom’s and babies. With the strong history of diabetes in my family, and considering the fact that I had gestational diabetes while pregnant this last time, I felt that it was my duty to nurse this baby as long as I could. Although I started the weaning process at 10 months, I nursed Big I until she was 14.5 months old and when she stopped nursing it was so gradual that she never even missed it. It was the best thing for both of us.
Lil C recently turned a year old and I am still nursing her. I am in the process of weaning her, but weaning to me, is not something you do cold turkey. That is not beneficial for either of us. It’s a very gradual process in this household and I appreciate it greatly when people mind their own business about it. A popular chant for abortion rights activists is "My Mind, My Body, My Choice" and I feel that saying applies even more so to breastfeeding a baby. I never imagined in a million years, that a doctor or physician’s assistant of all people would be so unsupportive of my decision about nursing and how long to continue nursing.
After toughing it out all last week with body aches and a fever on and off, I finally made an appointment with my doctor’s office and of course could only get an appointment with a Physician’s Assistant. I’ve seen her before and it always felt like she was rushing me out the door. Friday was no exception. We ran through the gamut of my symptoms and she determined that I had strep throat. I told her I would need a medication compatible with nursing. She asked how old my baby was, and I told her that she is 12 months old. I saw the reaction, subtle but definitely there and judgmental. She left the room to go consult on what she should prescribe.
She came back a few minutes later with a prescription for Levaquin. Levaquin is what they put my husband on after he had abdominal surgery. It is a strong antibiotic and a bit of an overkill for a strep throat. "Here you go" she said handing me the prescription. "Oh, and you’ll have to pump and dump for seven days." Lil C has not ever taken a bottle. She refuses, and pumping is not exactly easy for me either. It’s not like I have a freezer full of back-ups.
"That’s not going to work," I told her. "I need something safe for nursing. I’m in the process of weaning her and I’m not going to do it like this." She responded with "Well, I nursed my daughter for eight months. I know it’s hard, but there’s nothing else we can give you." "There has to be something," I retorted. "Nope, sorry. Pump and dump for seven days or just wean her now." I told her I would just not take the drug. She said, "Well, then it will go to your heart and kidneys." I was finding it very hard to believe that a mother who also nursed her child wouldn’t be more sympathetic.
I left the doctor’s office and was a mess. What was I going to do? I got home and consulted the internet. I found resources from The Breastfeeding Network that listed at least ten antibiotics safe for nursing. I called the office and left a voice mail saying that I wanted my prescription changed to one of the drugs I found on the list that I had success with before. The nurse called me back and said, "I talked to (the PA) and she said she already discussed this with you. She prescribed the one drug that is safe." "Levaquin is not safe," I said, "and she told me so." "Oh," said the nurse. It was obvious that they were not taking my request seriously. Can you imagine if I had taken the nurse at her word and taken an unsafe drug while nursing?
I repeated my request for the different drug and told them to call it in for me. They said they would call it in but that it was still not compatible with nursing. She threw out a "Well, WE’RE trying to do what’s best for your child". "Really?" I said. "Well if that were the case, then you would know that breast milk is what’s best for my child, and weaning her cold turkey is not."
I called my daughter’s pediatrician and left a message telling them my dilemma. Within a half hour, the nurse from the doctor’s office called me back and left me a message (I was at the pharmacy). The medication I requested, along with the other nine or so I had found, were completely safe with nursing. She told me things to watch for in Lil C in case of a bad reaction, but stressed that the drug I had requested was safe.
While at the pharmacy, I asked the pharmacist his opinion. He told me the drug was safe as well and said it was fine to take it and continue nursing as usual. I am nursing her so infrequently now that I could time the drug so that there would be many hours before I had to nurse Lil C again.
So, my question is this: If I could go on the internet and find reliable information including the package insert for the drug that says it is safe for nursing; if my pediatrician could tell me it was safe; if the pharmacist could tell me it was safe. . . then why couldn’t my doctor’s office?
I have decided to switch primary care physicians because if they are incapable of helping a nursing mother out, then I am incapable of giving them $25 every time I need to see a physician’s assistant who has less schooling than I have. Although she didn’t come right out and say it, there was an obvious judgment being made about my decision to wean my 12-month old daughter gradually, and that is just one of the problems that nursing mothers face every day. Until now, I had never really experienced this, and I hope to never experience it again.
Out of the Office
Black Belt Mama is currently out of the blog world suffering from a case of strep throat. She will return to the blog world when she’s feeling up to it. She has a wonderful story to pass on about nursing mothers, medication, and big time jerk doctors (actually physicans assistants AND doctors) that is sure to get you all riled up. She can’t wait to share it with you. Now go pray that your child doesn’t bring home strep throat too!
Copyright
© Copyright 2006-2019 blackbeltmama dot com ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Follow Me
Blog Designed By
My Creations
Things You Could Care Less About
