3 weeks in and ...

I remember going to Sky Acres Girl Scout camp for a week when I was 7 or 8, and on day 3, hating every minute. It was night time, I was supposed to be sleeping and couldn't, and found myself crying in the counselor's tent, begging them to let me call my parents. "They're night owls, I promise they're awake until 11." Needless to say, they didn't let me call, so I finally went back to my tent and cried myself to sleep.

I also remember getting home after having the BEST time ever. So day 3 sucked, but from then on it was all fun and games and was well worth the one night of being homesick.

Three weeks into this part-time job, I keep waiting for the day 3 feeling to end, and for Piper to move onto the next stage of transition - acceptance and happiness! Starting the first night of my job, and thus, day care, she stopped sleeping through the night. Every night since 20 nights ago, except for two days on a weekend (and one was at my parents' house when we weren't there), she has been up multiple times, screaming her head off, absolutely pissed off at the world. We're all exhausted and could use a good night's sleep. I had forgotten how debilitating sleep deprivation is ... there's a reason why this is used as torture because it makes everything else about the rest of the day more difficult. UGH.

My first day was a Friday, and that whole weekend she was so mad at us that she would crawl away from us and try to hide. That Sunday, I picked her up from a way to short nap and she tried to wiggle out of my arms, so I put her down and she crawled into her closet and started banging her head into the wall. All I wanted to do was cry. I couldn't soothe her, she was clearly emotionally distressed, and why was I doing this again? Luckily, she's stopped the head banging. She's still super clingy, which got worse with her being away from me three days a week, and now she cries at soon as we pull into the day care parking lot, but they tell me that she has a good day once I leave. Well, except yesterday, when her report said that she "Had a hard day and was mean to her friends." Specifically, she was hitting and pulling hair. I think it's because she had a 101.6 fever when I picked her up and was sick ... which brings me to my next subject.

As expected, Piper has been working on her immune system as a result of being in day care. I missed my third day of work because she had literally fountains of snot running down her face. And today we went to the doctor's where she was diagnosed with coxsackievirus.The poor little thing has sores on the inside of her mouth ... plus her molars are still wreaking havoc on our lives. Awesome.

So how's the job going? Fine, but like I said, I'm waiting for "day 3" to be over. And if it's not over by the end of this (November 2!), and we all aren't feeling well rested and happy again, then the odds of me going back to work again until Piper and her potential future sibling are in school are pretty much zero. It's simply not worth it!

One fun update is that Piper is walking all over the place. I'm trying to think of when this started ... I think it was a couple of weeks ago. That may be a positive development from day care - the peer pressure finally pushed her into the land of the walkers with crawling now a thing of the past!

And just so I always remember, the pic above is from the balloon festival last weekend and is one of my new favorites. I love how happy they both look :-) We had to be up at 4:50 to get there in time to see the 90+ balloons take off with the sun, but it was well worth it!

Working mama - day 1 update

First, here's a super cute pic of Piper from the track when we were on vaca. That smile is at a horse, of course.


Moving on, I've been asked by numerous people how yesterday went so here's a quick update ...

Yesterday went well. Reid and I dropped off Piper at day care and she seemed totally at ease. She sat down with her new friends and had snack while we got her stuff taken care of and said goodbye. No drama, no tears, no problem. We walked out and of course I was an emotional mess, but managed to hold it together for the 10 minute drive downtown. Then I had a few minutes to kill so went to Reid's office and cried. But after that, it was off to work - be smart, learn quickly, and rock and roll.

The morning flew by, and then Reid came to ask me to lunch. So we went out, and while waiting for our food, called to check in on Piper. We heard from one of her teachers that she was doing super well, and had only cried when she had a poopie diaper change. Even more than that, she had buddied up with a boy named Finn (the two must have found their hippie names something to bond over) and they hadn't left each others' sides. So cute. We both felt better, of course, and after lunch, I went back to a crazy afternoon of feeling overwhelmed and exhilarated. Excellent.

Then I went to pick her up ... and this is where the guilt returns. Piper heard my voice before she saw me because the Director had engaged me in conversation when I walked in, so by the time I got to her room, she was sitting there, huge crocodile tears running down her face, sobbing her little heart out. The teachers said that she had a great day, but had been watching like a hawk as kids had started leaving over the past hour. With every parent that came and wasn't me, she was disappointed. Ugh ... so she was the second to last to leave (Finn was still there!), and clung to me like a stronger piece of velcro than we'd previously experienced. I knew she was tired, hadn't napped well, but she had produced a cute coloring project, a positive daily report, and was still in the same outfit. I think it probably was a good day for her, but I still felt guilty.

And then we come to today - a TERRIBLE day. Piper clung to me and cried nearly the entire day. She didn't really nap - maybe she was afraid she would miss something? - which didn't help matters either, but her mood was awful, and at so many moments of the day, she was completely inconsolable. ARGH .......... it made me feel terrible and question my decision to take this on. Was it fair to Piper? I thought working would make me feel good, but today it just made me feel like crap. I know there's an adjustment period, and I am hopeful all of this will get better, but I'm definitely dreading Monday's drop-off as much as Friday's, if not more, because I know Piper's going to realize what she's getting into as soon as we pull in the parking lot. Let's hope for a quick transition! Otherwise this guilt is going to eat me alive.

A new adventure

I look back at the last 6 or so weeks and can say that it was filled to the brim with activities that are cherished during a northeast (read that as too short) summer: swimming, boating, playing outside, getting tan and lighter hair (Piper too!), and eating delicious summer food. We went to Burlington, I had a girls' weekend in the Hamptons. We took vacation and went to Essex, Lake Placid, Middlebury, and a Sugarland concert in NH. There are literally hundreds of pictures from the last part of this summer (one of my favorites being the one above) and we're going to love looking through them for years to come. Here are a few more ... (and if blogger wasn't such a pain to upload to, there would be WAY more, but I digress ...)



So now summer has pretty much come to an end ... what better time to start a new adventure? I wasn't looking for a job, but one was offered to me last week. At first, my reaction was no way. I love staying home with Piper - and what if I miss when she finally turns into a full time walker? That transition, by the way, has taken forever! She will walk for literally an hour (and did so at the Hyde Musuem last week) with one finger, but still maxes out on 10 or so steps on her own. Anyway, I also have learned in life that even if the initial reaction is no, you should always learn more. If we hadn't, we wouldn't have moved back to NY almost four years ago! So I learned more, and once I did, I got really excited about the position. And almost immediately after that, really guilty. I felt terrible for wanting to do something else other than care for Piper, which may seem rational or irrational, depending on the reader. That was almost a week ago, and today I accepted the position. It's great because it's three days a week and ends with the upcoming election so I can dip my toe into the water of being a working mom and see how it goes. It was a really hard decision to make because of the back and forth feelings, but in the end, I think it'll be fun for me to see if my brain still works and I do think day care will be a great experience for Piper. We checked out where she'll be going today and it was an overwhelmingly positive experience. She cried when we left! To me, that cleared the guilt away. So starting Friday, I'll be the new communications director for our congressman, Scott Murphy. I'm really excited about the opportunity and curious about how the next eight or so weeks will go. So please wish me, and more importantly Piper, lots of luck!