Hurry, hurry -- Thoughts, you are summoned to surface!
I am scared to even try to write one or two sentences on this thing right now, since I need sleep like a whale needs a blow hole. Wait a minute, that's not how it goes. Let's try this: I need sleep like a sleep-deprived breastfeeding mother needs sleep. Breastfeeding is one hell of a journey. It's freaking hard work. It's rewarding, ultimately, but it's not easy. It cannot be simulated, either. Sometimes we try to give kids a taste of what parenthood is like so they will run for the hills from it for a while (and use protection and be smart about sex). Sometimes we try to give those who aren't bearing a child an idea of what it is like by strapping a weighted pillow around their middle for say 24-48 hours. See how heavy it is? How does your back feel? Now just imagine that for months on end. Add kicking and twisting and elbowing to that. Throw in possible 24/hour nausea, heartburn, acid reflux that you may or may not wake up choking on, sore breasts, tingling appendages, numbness, faintness, rapid heartbeats, nasty burps that taste like prenatal vitamins. Are you experiencing the suffering enough yet? Now just imagine after the baby opens your vagina with its head that you will have to endure fluctuating hormones and sleep deprivation. And that's not counting the challenges involved in each phase of your child's life.
Sometimes we give teens a baby doll for a week that cries, pseudo-soils and needs burping to show them they are not prepared for the constant and unpredictable demands of a child. Sometimes we put middle schoolers in front of a television screen and show them a baby's head ripping through a woman's vagina to shock and gross them out of any hanky panky. These attempts are just small, small glimpses at reality. They are valuable to a point. But for the one who experienced it, sometimes simulations and words just don't adequately encapsulate or get to the root of the "situation." It's like watching documentaries about the various horrors of genocide. The simulated experience brings us closer, but it's so far from the actuality that it's a world away. What did you do after you watched a reenactment of a horror at Hiroshima? You went and grabbed a Big Mac and a Diet Coke, and you started to do something else. You moved on. It's what we do when we are not powerlessly struggling through some "situation (shituation)." I do this all the time. It's natural. It's a survival mechanism. After watching a show about some serial killer, like BTK or Jeffrey Dahmer, I get freaked out and feel sick and want to hide from the night; but by the morning I move out of my fearful state and into a much easier, more pleasant state. Most of the time, I forget all about the feelings of the night before...that is how I NEED to be in order to be a productive, functioning member of society.
Right now I am going through a shituation with BREASTfeeding. The shituation involves Elanah waking up throughout the night to suck on my boob. She wants to be soothed, over and over, by my boobifier. I am starting to grow on edge over this. I am sleep-deprived, and sleep deprivation is very hard on moms who don't get a break...don't get a nap...have to just keep going, going, going until they hit the hay and fall asleep for the night. And then they sometimes have to wake up all throughout the night FOR MONTHS (and, for some, YEARS). It's insane. Why aren't mommas revolting - going out into the streets like the zombies they are and singing strange, strange songs?
The whole breastfeeding mini-rant was all to say that I don't have time to write what I'm writing. I don't have time to write about any of this. But, since I am already a wandering loon, I'll just tell you this. I'm so stressed. I think I better start paying more attention to my mind/body and trying to get the stress in check. Yoga, anyone? Back to the mat?
Since I wrote a blog post that includes breastfeeding, serial killers and human persuasions, let's also raise a bloody glass to Lady Macbeth (but please note that Elanah no longer has boneless gums nor do I fancy dashing brains out of anything):
I have given suck, and know(60)
How tender ’tis to love the babe that milks me:
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums,
And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you
Have done to this.(65)
I am scared to even try to write one or two sentences on this thing right now, since I need sleep like a whale needs a blow hole. Wait a minute, that's not how it goes. Let's try this: I need sleep like a sleep-deprived breastfeeding mother needs sleep. Breastfeeding is one hell of a journey. It's freaking hard work. It's rewarding, ultimately, but it's not easy. It cannot be simulated, either. Sometimes we try to give kids a taste of what parenthood is like so they will run for the hills from it for a while (and use protection and be smart about sex). Sometimes we try to give those who aren't bearing a child an idea of what it is like by strapping a weighted pillow around their middle for say 24-48 hours. See how heavy it is? How does your back feel? Now just imagine that for months on end. Add kicking and twisting and elbowing to that. Throw in possible 24/hour nausea, heartburn, acid reflux that you may or may not wake up choking on, sore breasts, tingling appendages, numbness, faintness, rapid heartbeats, nasty burps that taste like prenatal vitamins. Are you experiencing the suffering enough yet? Now just imagine after the baby opens your vagina with its head that you will have to endure fluctuating hormones and sleep deprivation. And that's not counting the challenges involved in each phase of your child's life.
Sometimes we give teens a baby doll for a week that cries, pseudo-soils and needs burping to show them they are not prepared for the constant and unpredictable demands of a child. Sometimes we put middle schoolers in front of a television screen and show them a baby's head ripping through a woman's vagina to shock and gross them out of any hanky panky. These attempts are just small, small glimpses at reality. They are valuable to a point. But for the one who experienced it, sometimes simulations and words just don't adequately encapsulate or get to the root of the "situation." It's like watching documentaries about the various horrors of genocide. The simulated experience brings us closer, but it's so far from the actuality that it's a world away. What did you do after you watched a reenactment of a horror at Hiroshima? You went and grabbed a Big Mac and a Diet Coke, and you started to do something else. You moved on. It's what we do when we are not powerlessly struggling through some "situation (shituation)." I do this all the time. It's natural. It's a survival mechanism. After watching a show about some serial killer, like BTK or Jeffrey Dahmer, I get freaked out and feel sick and want to hide from the night; but by the morning I move out of my fearful state and into a much easier, more pleasant state. Most of the time, I forget all about the feelings of the night before...that is how I NEED to be in order to be a productive, functioning member of society.
Right now I am going through a shituation with BREASTfeeding. The shituation involves Elanah waking up throughout the night to suck on my boob. She wants to be soothed, over and over, by my boobifier. I am starting to grow on edge over this. I am sleep-deprived, and sleep deprivation is very hard on moms who don't get a break...don't get a nap...have to just keep going, going, going until they hit the hay and fall asleep for the night. And then they sometimes have to wake up all throughout the night FOR MONTHS (and, for some, YEARS). It's insane. Why aren't mommas revolting - going out into the streets like the zombies they are and singing strange, strange songs?
The whole breastfeeding mini-rant was all to say that I don't have time to write what I'm writing. I don't have time to write about any of this. But, since I am already a wandering loon, I'll just tell you this. I'm so stressed. I think I better start paying more attention to my mind/body and trying to get the stress in check. Yoga, anyone? Back to the mat?
Since I wrote a blog post that includes breastfeeding, serial killers and human persuasions, let's also raise a bloody glass to Lady Macbeth (but please note that Elanah no longer has boneless gums nor do I fancy dashing brains out of anything):
I have given suck, and know(60)
How tender ’tis to love the babe that milks me:
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums,
And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you
Have done to this.(65)
