A therapeutic phone chat with a KT BFF earlier this week is prompting today’s post. I don’t know if misery loves company or if I always feel better just knowing that I’m not totally failing nor am I alone in my doubts, but it was just the sort of conversation I needed.
The thing is, I am typically a very confident person. I don’t really waiver on things or get all insecure. And we know I certainly loathe mommy guilt. I think it’s BS.
Don’t worry, I have gone all rogue George Bush on you, I’m not above an apology or admitting when I’m wrong. And I know how to pronounce simple words, like “nuclear.” Though it seems I yell these days more than I’d like too.
Anyhow, the continued growth and development of DD2 is a fabulous thing. She is 100% goofball, all smiles, and she is very active, crawling, cruising and working very hard to walk in an effort to keep up with her busy older sister. What this means, however, is that each day she becomes more time consuming.
And seeing as how there is only one of me and two of them for 10 hours a day, I am spread real thin. This is a phenomenon that is taking a lot of time for me to adjust too. It’s huge.
The thing about adjusting to life with two, is that it’s a long slow process, thank god. In those beginning months, the baby doesn’t do anything but sleep eat and poop, as we know. While those things are more time consuming than I had remembered them to be, they are basic and simple tasks, and generally we felt that DD1 had no real change in her life with the addition of a new baby sister. At first.
But then DD2 kept growing and getting more active and seeking more attention. And this is what leaves me riddled with doubt most of the time.
Before I quit working and spent my days at home, I imagined how my time would be spent. In reality, my time is split between shepherding between the needs of both girls, intercepting the breaking of fingers of the baby, cleaning up messes from art projects and cooking projects with DD1, tearing through the playrooom like a crazed maniac as DD2 heads for the very dangerous and small parts toys from DD1 things that I was just sorta hoping she wouldn’t notice even though I knew she would, and changing diapers and giving bottle feeds and other meals.
Etc etc.
My point – the amount of “quality” time where one of them is getting my attention is very limited. Like barely any of it. This is hard for me to get my head around. It leaves me wondering, could I be spending my extremely limited “down time” differently to give them more attention, especially DD2. It seems that she’s always just sort of hanging out. When she is playing, I figure she’s happy and she can play without my full attention (unlike DD1), so I leave her be. If I hear crying, I actually ignore it until it reaches some kind of fever pitch because I figure they are working it out.
Yes. An 8 month old is working it out. You’ve heard of that before, haven’t you?
Anyhow – I find myself stuck in a place that is new to me – this place of constantly second guessing myself and worrying that there isn’t enough of me to go around. Again, no guilt, just some difficulties in adjusting to life with two. A life that is never dull for one moment, that is for sure.
