our birth story

It only took me six months, but I've finally finished writing my birth story. Starts here, and I dated the posts so they're physically in order on the page if you're on the main blog page.

she's my sweet potato

The sweet potatoes were a huge hit. She did really well with opening her mouth and swallowing; I was impressed. My contributions turned out pretty well, I suppose. The made-from-scratch and jello-free cranberry sauce was very tart and offended my 9 year old nephew's palate, but the grown-ups liked it. My glazed carrots could have had more glaziness, but were okay. The broccoli casserole was great. I could have eaten a ton of it, but Molly would have been pissed because broccoli-mom-milk gives her terrible gas.

After dinner with Shane's family we went to my Grandma's. She's doing really well now that she's back home. Her dementia is much better in a familiar environment. I think it's very mild, but Shane says she's more wacky than I think. Mostly she just repeats herself over and over. She had the best time playing with the baby- Molly was in the giggliest mood I've ever seen. She was just adorable.

I missed my mom so much, but it gets better and better. Molly is the best healing wonder. Being a mom makes me feel closer to my mom. I am still so close to her, it's weird maybe. I don't get into the guardian angel thing or any of that specific, religious stuff- it seems so literal and cheesy to me- I just feel closeness I guess. Like I still have a familiarity with her and a comfort about her memory that feels like the very mundane normal closeness we had when she was alive. Of course, there are times when all I feel is her absense, and it's like a fresh, wounded screaming pain that will never, ever heal. An orphaned, angry, lost feeling filled with confused denial. It just may never seem acceptable to my heart that she is gone. I think those moments are coming less often. They used to be so awful. I wince remembering the way Shane would hold me and I'd sob and shake. Now usually I have a little warm melancholy feeling, like a lingering ache but the baby will smile and I'll know her motherness is in me now as I sing and rock Molly.

(edited for a new better collage and longer entry-hre)

happy moon day

Molly's new trick, in celebration of her sixth lunar month, is sitting:) She sits, supporting herself with her hands, when we position her. It's awesome. She looks like a tiny little girl. She had her first sanctioned taste of food yesterday- two little fingerfulls of mashed potato off her Mawmaw's plate. She seemed to dig it, so sweet potatoes may be our first real feeding. I want to wait until her little gut recovers from the onslaught of the antibiotics and then try yummies!

pregnancy inspired artwork, a note about Grandma

"Motherline:" Untitled Variations on sketch for Motherline:

A dear friend, talented artist, and former professor just let me know she's expecting a baby girl this spring. Congratulations, Sabina! (Check out her page- she does really strong work about identity and culture) To celebrate, I'm posting some of the art I made while I was pregnant. I remember a conversation with Sabina a couple of years ago, when she told me that she thought maybe becoming a mom would be great for me and it would "pull me out of myself." She was, as usual, so right.

I took Molly to the hospital to see my Grandma, who fell and hurt her knee and aggrivated her two mended hips. I had the baby cloistered in a stroller under several layers to keep the germs at bay. I almost didn't take her but I had strong intuition that we needed to go. Grandma was overjoyed to see her "Holly." (She gets the name right a good 50% of the time, so we don't complain:) She's in the very early stages of Alzheimer's as best the doctors can guess. She's just dotty and it's still sort of cute to me, although I dread the real confusion that will come later. Right now she just repeats herself alot, and mixes up names. Today she was telling her roommate about Molly and me, and about how mom had died. She turned to me and asked "Did they ever figure out why your mother died?" and I had to remind her about the cancer. It was surreal, sitting down the hall from where Mom died and reminding Grandma about it. This visit didn't upset me like it usually has to be in the building. I guess I'm finally desensitizing a little bit. I hate most the smell of the disinfectant soap there- scent is so connected to memory.

I love talking to her so much. Every second I'm with her I'm so present and in the moment. Losing Mom made me so focused on savoring the time I have with Grandma, and so thankful she is with us and well enough to remember the baby.

marriage

I don't write alot about my marriage outside of our role as co-parents, and in that respect I'm usually worrying about clashing ideologies. It's easy to avoid examining a marriage because it's an existence that's so easily taken for granted. It's like breathing, eating, sleeping. We have lived as if married for five years although our wedding was two years ago. I'm really instrospective the past few days about our marriage. I've just finished reading The Mermaid Chair, by Sue Monk Kidd and it brought up the issue of taking a marriage for granted. It also deals with an artist wife who feels tamed by her marriage. She falls passionately in love with another man and reconnects with her home and her mother and herself. It's heartbreakingly beautiful. At the time I've been reading this, our situation is a tense, all-but-sexless marriage of struggling new parents with barely enough money to survive. Shane is so stressed about finances he snaps at me, at telemarketers, at the dogs. Little bursts of severe asshole behavior have shot through like bullets that shatter my relative contentment. Meanwhile, we aren't making love because I have no desire for it, and we've barely spent any time together alone between all the part-time jobs it takes to make our household run.

We were out yesterday and Shane spouted some rage about something trivial and it just lodged in my head that he can be such a shit. His temper unsettles me so much. Then I was reading the book, and this cold fear settled into me and I saw myself in several years leaving him. I saw his temper flares just building and frustrating me and then I thought of how different we are and thought how devastating it would be to meet someone I connected with like the heroine of my book. Seeing this possible future made me feel 1,000 miles away from my husband. It ripped me open to be feeling our marriage as a thing that could be broken someday, a vulnerable entity that either one of us could tear apart. I have always felt if something did happen to us, it would be my breaking the vows. I sometimes worry that the wildness in me isn't meant to be married. I fret about not making art anymore. I wonder if I've lost anything to this union.

I examine those thoughts and I think that it's normal for me to wonder about those things. The truth is, I am a much better version of all possible me's because of Shane. The thing I've lost, the drive to create, it is a sleeping thing like a fire I've let dwindle, and neither my wifeness nor my husband has anything to do with that. I've struggled with that all my life. Shane has been my best advocate for channeling my energies into art. But I was reading my book, all these doubts worrying around in my head. I realized they were going to fester and grow into some resentment or anger if they weren't voiced. I went to him and it took me a long time to frame the vague ideas into a conversation, but he listened patiently and we talked about the stresses and the shape of our life and our lives. We were actually feeling similar anxieties but expressing them differently I think. I felt waves of relief giving vent to my doubts about us, and the relief washed them away as I realized how amazing it is I can talk with him about this, how strong we are. I needed to mend the disconnected feeling I'd had, and he held me close. Then the comfort turned to a fierce need to physically connect and we made love very beautifully. It was a wonderful, necessary ritual binding us tighter and the mood of the house is much lighter and cleaner now.

In unrelated news, there was another trip to the pediatrician's office today. I'd been waiting it out- just a cold, but her cough was getting worse and I didn't want to wait the weekend out with her feeling increasingly bad. The nurse said she had an ear infection too, but I hadn't seen any signs of it. I was loathe to put her back on antibiotics again since she's still on poopalot mode from the last one.

I brought her home and talked it over with Shane, and we decided ear infections are serious enough that we didn't feel like it was overreacting to use the antibiotics so we went to the pharmacy for them and to get some decongestant the nurse recommmended. It had pseudoephidrine in it, and they no longer carry anything with that at our pharmacy. The pharmacist was great, though. She went through all the possibilities with us and told us how the substitute for pseudoephidrine hasn't been tested in kids under 2. She was very knowledgeable. We bought some cough medicine & decided to stick with breastmilk dribbled into her nose and the nasal suction bulb for her nasal congestion.

After we got home, she spewed everywhere, so I gave her a bath and clean comfy pajamas. Then she pooped all over herself, so she got another bath and the last clean pj's, forcing me to wash a load of baby clothes as well as the bedsheets she'd thrown up on. Her cough has been gone since the medicine. Since the visit to the doctor's office I noticed her pulling on her ear, and then she wouldn't nurse with that side of her head lying down, so I had to wrestle her into a football hold. It is not fun to try to get a five month old baby into a new strange nursing position. She was very "whatthefuck?" Tonight may suck as our side-lying, semi-comatose-mommy position won't work if her ear still hurts.

showers & wings

This is a piece of art I created for my friend's baby's nursery. (Yes, that's a sleeping Molly.) We went to her shower Saturday. I obsessed about giving her this, worrying that she'd see it as a photo of Molly and a self-centered gift rather than as a collage using a photo of Molly. Shane told me it was fine but I'm still not sure. Anyway, it's cute. She is decorating with fairies and winged creatures.

The shower was great. I met a sweet woman who has two-year-old twins and conceived by artificial insemination. She and her girlfriend live next door to the mom-to-be. She offered me several nursing tops for cheap when she heard I'm planning on extended nursing. I don't have any nursing shirts, so that's a very cool thing. Extended nursing... so weird a term. Like there's an invisible line at age 1 when it suddenly becomes an extra, strange thing to do. 'Round here most folks think it's gross to nurse after a year. Well, alot of them think nursing's gross, period. Weirdest thing how that came to be the mindset amongst a poor bunch of people. They'd rather spend money on formula- it blows my mind.

The baby's back to normal... her itchy red bottom is almost healed, and she slept 7 or 8 hours last night without any nummins (nursing.) Of course, as Murphy's Law would dictate, I had insomnia. Probably because she's nursed non-stop during the week of evil diarrhea.

this post is NOT titled "got milk?" because i am NOT a dork

I had the neatest observation today. When my milk lets down (oh sorry Dr. Sears, I mean when I experience my 'milk ejection reflex'....heh) I have this tiny ache in the opposite breast. I could never describe it, but this morning Shane and I had a little tiff and tears welled up in my eyes. The burning ache right before the tears spill? That's my let-down ache, only right behind my nipple. It made so much sense and seemed so poetic. It's like the other boobie is crying because it's jealous. That breast wants an adorable baby cuddled up to it, too. Only thanks, Goddess that it doesn't for that would mean twins and a total spazzer mommy.

***

Jennifer at The Lactivist requests that we help publicize the efforts of HMBANA, a non-profit milk bank which distributes breast milk from donor moms. This link to her entry tells how a large drug company is trying to elbow HMBANA out of the way as it scrambles for profit. I am appropriately infuriated, and thought I'd repost in case any of you can donate cash or milk or know someone who could. http://thelactivist.blogspot.com/2006/10/donating-milk-know-who-you-are-sending.html I'm disappointed I can't donate milk, because I was pumping at least a few ounces more per day than Molly can drink. Turns out my milk gets wonky after a few days in the freezer unless I scald it which would make me ineligible to donate.

as promised gothiness, with bonus turtle

See all the halloweeny fun at our flickr page.
This was after the tiring medical drama of the day, which is all moot now anyway. (Briefly: there was a wicked fever, there was a urine test, blood test, threat of scary dye-imaging testing, then antibiotics, then diaper rash and diarrhea. Then all the tests were clear and the drama evaporated. Now all we have to worry about is Molly's poor gut getting normalized after the medical invasion. There have been 456,992,344 poo diapers. My ass would be red & itchy too.)

omygoddess i love these boots

OK, I seriously can’t wait to show you guys pictures of my outfit. After deciding not to fuck with creating costumes for the party, I was suddenly struck by a case of free mama when the grandparents picked up Molly. So I goth’d myself up beautifully, if I do say so my own sexy self. It’s so cute; it’s like I’m channeling myself at 19 on a random weekend. Did not go for the black hair dye (I hear Type O Negative in my head now…lol) but the black cat’s eye makeup, hoop in the nostril, and shitkicker boots are vintage Heidi. Woohoo~ I love Halloween! Giddy me. And I haven’t even started drinking yet. (We had a good stash of milk in the fridge so I’m planning on being a somewhat liberal partier and pumping and dumping.

After debating that plan for days Shane begged me to chill and take a “night off.” Um, yeah. I’ll just press the pause button on my maternal instincts for the evening. I have decided, actually, that since the baby’s securely elsewhere I have permission to relax a notch or two down from my usual state of anxiety- comparable to terrorist-alert-orange I think. So there. Shane’ll be home in a few minutes and he can help me fasten my fishnets to my garter belt and ask me “where did this come from?” I’m sure I will have a pleasantly surprised husband. Poor guy perpetually sees me in an unbuttoned nightgown with milk stains. Not the most seductive of looks.

of tea and snow and apples*

It snowed yesterday, more than flurries. Enough to create that gorgeous lacy texture in the sky for a few minutes. Shane and I looked and said, "Wow. Our first snow this year," then we both looked at the baby and exclaimed, "Molly's first snow ever!" I walked out into the snow with her but she was unimpressed. Nothing exciting like, say, a ceiling fan. Now that's a good time.

We met with our job coach yesterday at a local coffee shop. I always get a chai tea, because I love, love, love chai tea. That evening Molly fought sleep more than usual. I've noticed this a few times and thought vaguely that it might be related to my little caffeine indulgences. Probably not enough to worry about, but at least in the evenings I should probably eschew the tea. We have a client meeting there this afternoon, so I'll stick with a vanilla steamed milk or a cocoa.

I'm dying to feed the baby real, tasty food. She's nearly five months, old enough in some peoples' book to have purees and cereals, but all the gurus of baby that I trust most suggest delaying food until six months. I'm with this in theory. It'll give her wee tummy more time to mature, and help prevent (possibly) food allergies. But it's so much fun to see a baby learn about the yummy texture-filled world of food. So, I broke down and offered her a spoonful of apple juice (I know- I really live on the edge.) She made the cutest scrunchy lemon face ever. Not a fan of the juice. She did open up wide for the spoon just like she knew what to do. I am a wicked mother and gave her a couple more sips just to see the adorable yuck face.

Leave me a comment with your green vegetable suggestion for her first real food. Peas? Avacado? What else can babies have that's green? Her pediatrician suggests green before yellow or orange veggies so they don't get hooked on the sweetness. Is she crazy? What do you veteran mamas think? She also said that it makes sense on the other hand to start them on something sweet like banana because breastmilk's sweet so they're familiar with sweetness.

*Well, apple juice. But I wanted to echo the title of Neil Gaiman's short story "Snow, Glass, Apples" because Neil rocks.

happy moon day

(Damn. Forgot to post Molly's moonday celebration. Am terrible blogger. Had insomnia last night even, coulda been bloggin'.)

frustration

If we didn't have this little goofy face keeping us company, we'd explode. We're on a deadline designing a website- well, building it. As usual, my design was very pretty and a terrible pain in the ass to execute.

Also have done .001% of the housework that needs done.

How am I supposed to be a mama, an administrative assistant, a graphic designer, and still have time for sleeping and eating- much less luxuries like clean house and clothing and time to spend with my husband?

toddler love and tea

My friend hosted a Tastefully Simple party last night. It was much more formal than I thought. I hadn’t been to a captive-consumer party in ages, and told V that among my friends, we’d never dream of hosting parties like that- except for the sex toys parties. But, V had given me a sample of their Chai tea mix, and it blew my mind- it was actually really good. I am a major Chai junkie, so I saved for two weeks to buy a can of the mix. (That’s a testament to how broke we are, not how expensive the tea is.)

I brought the Souster, Megan, (think soul/sister, it’s a story for another day…) along with her 3 ½ year old Alexander, and, of course, the Mollybird. The kids were amazing- barely a peep, until the ride home. The food was much, much better than I’d thought it would be- I assume that prepackaged, just-add-water stuff is crappy, but everything was tasty. I’d buy some of the spices and stuff probably. The portions were teeeeeensy, though, so we left hungry.

As soon as we tried to get the kids in the car, Alexander wigged out. “I’m ‘stared,’ Mommy!” and had to be all but forced into his seat. The commotion got Molly started, so they wailed in unison almost the whole car ride home. When it would get quiet, if Molly would so much as whimper, the little guy would start that funky toddler whiny crying. He told her to be quiet, which I found amusing but Megan didn’t appreciate. I’m starting to think he’s afraid of me. The last time she had him at the house he said “I don’t like this place,” and he was scared of my car. Hmm. He’s so much more timid and sensitive than his older brother, Viktor. Alexander’s a Pisces, and Viktor’s an Aries, and they are both very typical of their signs.

Back at Meg’s I went inside to nurse the boo, and Viktor (age 4 ½) was so cute with her! He said “Nice to meet you, baby!” And “Her fingers are so tiny! Her feet are so tiny! Her head is so tiny! etc…” Then when she popped off the breast to look around he said “I think she wants to eat some more.” I was floored by the cuteness. Oh, and Alexander disagreed with me- “Her name isn’t Molly. No.” But he was kind enough to let his Mommy pass along an adorable pea-pod costume for the baby.

After her belly was full we went to pick up Shane at our friends’ house. Molly crashed in the car on the way home and was so cute bundled up in her coat and hat with Ducky on her lap. I should have snapped a photo in the car, but I waited until we got her inside then took some. (Blogger being a pain in the ass, you can see them at our Flickr page.) After that I changed her into her pajamas and she was hysterically giggling. She does that a lot- she thinks being naked is the funniest thing in the world. I adore her.

babydoll

Sad: I googled "babydoll" to find an image to post, thinking of an old-fashioned porcelain angel faced toy. All I found was porn.

My daughter's beautiful. I'm biased, and she's more beautiful to me than she is to you even if her hugebluemooneyes beguile you, too. But she's damn pretty. I get pissed off at myself when words like "princess" and "babydoll" slip out, though. Everyone's praising her right now for her looks, and assuming this continues, how does this affect a child, especially a girl? I want her to be praised for being strong and intelligent and to know her true value to me has nothing to do with her attractiveness. At the same time, I want her to have a good self-image and celebrate her girlness and beauty.

My parents piled on the pretty praise, and I have a great self-esteem. That's a fairly wonderful thing, for me to feel beautiful when I'm also quite aware of my deformity. There's a whole complex whorl of thoughts & emotions there- I am self conscious about my body, but on the whole I'm very comfortable in my strange bones. But Molly doesn't have a birth defect that needs balanced like that. Is it teaching her the wrong thing if I keep cooing over her cuteness as she ages? Should I dole out two "you're so smart"s for every "you're so pretty?" How do I teach her to love herself but also that appearances aren't the true measure of worth? It's a funny thing- as an artist I do very much appreciate physical beauty, but I feel like I have a broad, healthy spectrum of what I find beautiful.

Oh, and again with dolls- what do you moms-of-daughters do when your little girl wants to play with a doll who represents unhealthy beauty standards or is sexualized? No Barbies/Bratz/etc? Do you let her play but explain to her, like my aunt did to a six year old me in one of my fondest memories, that no one really looks like that?

Oh, how do I raise a grrl?

new project

I've started a new project over at LiveJournal, if you're ever inclined to check out the communities there. The community "breastfeeding" has been my favorite support and information group on the web.

I hope this will be a good place to share experiences, dreams, visions, and ideas.

october 1, goth holiday extraordinaire

I worked at a family planning and abortion clinic years ago, and the Wicca was the majority religion of my co-workers. (That was so cool because there aren't too many in my area. Plus the religious right would have a heart palpitation about a bunch of witches running a clinic.) We declared October 1 a minor holiday and made it a rule that we'd all wear black, bonus points for pentagrams & gothy attire. I just cleaned, hung out with my aunt & grandma today, but I wore black because I always still do. It's like the countdown to Halloween begins. Whee!

I'm having religious conflict a little. I felt some weirdness at the group the other night, and I just don't know about my feelings. I used to be a devout little priestess in training, but it seems a little over-the-top now. At the same time I missed it terribly and feel like I need to reconnect with Persephone and Demeter, my patron Goddesses. I think part of it is I don't eat, sleep, and breathe Wicca like I used to. I devoured books, researched everything to death. I'm just not as interested in a scholarly way anymore.

My aunt brought a tiny, tiny sick kitten she found newborn & abandoned in her basement. It died on the way here. Too weak to suckle its little bottle of kitty-formula. I guess mama cat abandoned her? So my aunt was sad and then Molly was really gassy (bad broccoli eating mommy) and cried alot and I thought Pam was going to break down in tears with her. It is so pitiful to see those big eyes glass over with tears and then spill them all over her little cheeks. She was fighting sleep too. She passed out as soon as they left. And now she wakes.

blogging on blogging

I never visit MySpace, because it's the most constipated website I've ever tried to load. I find the layout annoying and cluttered, and I want to dig my eardrums out of my head when I find a user page that has music embedded on it. But, many of my art school friends have pages, and from time to time I think of someone I'm curious to track down and I look them up. I found a couple I met through my ex who I was very fond of (both the ex and the couple.) They have a 10 month old baby, so I giddily added them both as friends and eagerly awaited a reply, hoping the fact that I was friends through the ex wasn't awkward for them. In the meantime I read their pages more carefully, and I found out they've lost a child who would have been a little over a year and a half old now. This shocked me and broke my heart. I'm not sure what happened to their son, but I'm amazed by their resilience. The father has a very sweet mention of the baby on his page, and I read a little about the mother's healing process. She did reply to my blog entry there and hopefully we'll have a playdate in the near future. Hearing things like that is 1,000 times more painful now that I'm a mother. I want to hold this friend close to me and tell her I love her because I really do. She's a precious, beautiful woman.

*****

A LiveJournal friend updated recently and was venting about her really high-needs baby. She wrote about how sick it makes her to read glowing mothers' tales of adorable, easy babies. It made me feel something like guilt for being that Mom- my cousin's troubles make me feel that way too, as if I won the easy baby lottery at their expense.

However:

The past couple of weeks, Molly has graduated from adorable, easy-going newborn baby to clingy attention-starved infant. She must be held (but Oh , No- not in a sling!) and entertained at all times, eat every hour and a half, and sleep right on top of mommy. She has to cry from 6:30-8:00 and then crash. We've had some stretches finally this week of long sleep in the night, aided by the admittedly excessive use of the baby swing. I'm not complaining- when I'd think I was approaching really cranky strung-out mommyness, she'd give me a little break. I just wanted to let the blogosphere know I'm not that mommy anymore with the unfairly easy life. Molly is, in fact, human. (Although I have on several occasions lately wondered if she was replaced recently with a screaming goblin changeling.)

two years yesterday

Happy Anniversary, Bu.
(& thanks for all the fish.)

I think I'm going to go cry now for the 20+ inches of hair I've cut off in 2 years.

mabon

I celebrated Mabon, the autumnal equinox, by returning to Earthways, the little group of pagans within my UU congregation. I called on the element of water, which was wonderful for me. I feel watery after literally carrying so much of it around in my body and then releasing it with my baby. Now, nursing is like I'm a fountain of liquid mooniness. It's so cool to make sweet milk in my own body that nourishes the baby. I can't get over the magic of that.

We had what would have been a quiet, contemplative meditation on balance, BUT... Molly decided to balance the reflective mood with loud pouty screaming until she fell into an immediate and deep sleep after we were all finished. I did manage to feel open enough to grok a couple of vague impressions. Something said "listen" and then I had the vision that we were bees, because we were humming spontaneously. (I think the listen suggestion meant listen to Molly, to trust the intuition that comes from both her and me. I had focused on the question of balancing my crazy fears with the "good" fear that makes me a good parent.)

I love the equinoxes- the scent of huge changes in the air and feeling how quickly the seasons change, and then settle in. Summer is long and lazy and easily taken for granted, and winter is just this seemingly unending nap. I have to force myself to love winter, and I fail.

But autumn- it is quick and powerful and the moment you try to revel in its beautiful colors, they fall away leaving stillness and a kind of sadness. The smell is my favorite. All these mixes of scents- the earthy, sexy smell of smoke and drying leaves set against the crisp cleansing breezes. Beautiful contrasts- like the brilliant oranges in the hills against a bright blue sky. (West Virginia is amazing in the fall.) It's no wonder I returned to my circle in the autumn. I wrote before how this time draws out my witchiness. October- I just float through October. My old friends and I declared October first an unofficial holiday- the day of wearing all black to work, and maybe a subtle pentacle if we felt brave. The whole month is like a festival to me, ending with Samhain (Halloween) which is the best day ever. The fact that I hate winter so much adds to the drama of the season- it's like the last wild party before buckling down for the slow, cold darkness.

tragedies and anxieties

A little girl whose family lives down the road from here was killed in a terrible accident this week. Her mother hit her with the car backing out of their driveway. She lived nearly 24 hours but died on Tuesday. She was two years old. I didn't know the family except from noticing them as we would drive past their house. They have a big yard full of plastic toddler toys and there are always several kids running around and several cars visiting. The family seems chaotic and wild and I've made bitchy comments daily about the kids playing too close to the road.

I can't imagine what that mother is dealing with right now. It makes me sick to imagine, but I keep imagining- over and over. Since I lost my mom I have this ugly manifestation of my anxiety that makes me obsessively imagine terrible things happenning. When Shane was travelling at his old job, I would have visions of his being killed in a car crash. I had visions of being widowed immediately after the wedding. Dark, frightening things seem to insinuate themselves into my thoughts the moment I feel happy and lightened. It's like I got programmed to expect a tragedy when things are good. The baby, of course, is working my scary imagination overtime... I have times when I'm filled with dread that I won't get to keep her, that she'll have an accident and I'll lose her, that she's too good to be true. It's almost like I think I don't deserve her. That's such a sad thing- why would I feel like this? It's tense writing about this feeling- I feel superstitiously like admitting the worries will call the universe's attention to them and create them. Do all new moms feel these unfounded terrors?

The accident amplified these worries for me. I couldn't stop crying when I read in the paper that she had died. I just grieve for the family. In the same edition of the newspaper I saw a reference to a local man who murdered and raped his girlfriend's son. I think his mother is going to prison too, for some kind of neglect or responsibility for his death. We know the girl's cousin, and she has been very active in trying to get legislation passed in Logan's name to ensure longer sentences in such cases. It didn't pass in the last session of the state legislature, but I'm sure they plan to keep working.

How do we raise children in this world without losing our minds worrying? I want to take her and Shane and run away to a commune somewhere where there is no TV, food additives, pollution... I could go on but no such Utopia exists. I can tell from the first four months as a parent that this is my great challenge: I have to look out for her the best way I know how without letting my fears turn both of us into neurotic, timid crazy people. This is why the Wonderful Taoist Nature of Fate has brought me my husband. He anchors me, he is my counter balance. If we can find a blend of our parenting styles, this will be one well-adjusted happy kid. I'm learning to pick my battles, as it were. Allowing organic meats in the future, for example. But only when Daddy feeds her. I still refuse to prepare meat, and if my vegetarian example influences her eating habits, so be it.