In the interest of complete candor, I have to say that we have been pretty lucky with our sons in that they are both happy and easy babies. (G-d knows, not every parent, even parents of singletons, can say the same.) They have slept through the night fairly consistently since the first week of June, and even with teething and colds, they seldom get so fussy that they cannot be comforted.
When I say they have "slept through the night," I don't mean to say that they've both slept all night without waking up a single time (although that has happened on occasion). To me, sleeping through the night means that they are able to go from last bottle of the night (sometime between 7 and 9 pm, depending on your baby) to first morning bottle without having to wake for a feeding. Even if you woke up 2-4 times and needed to be resettled (back rub, help repositioning of finding a lost pacifier), I would still count that as sleeping through the night.
AJ is an excellent sleeper and has been since he came home from the hospital. He only wakes up during the night once a week on average, and that is usually just a quick wake-up and needed to be resettled. MJ, on the other hand, I would describe as just a good sleeper. Usually he wakes up anywhere from 2-4 times a night and needs his pacifier and a rub on the back to settle back down. He generally would go back to sleep fairly quickly and easily after being resettled and seldom would full-on cry and need to actually be taken out of the crib.
For the past two weeks, though, MJ had started a troubling habit. In addition to his 2-4 wake-ups, he would wake sometime between 3:00 and 5:00 a.m. and refuse to go back to sleep unless I held him in my arms. Even after I got him back to sleep, if I set him down in his crib, or in his Pack n Play in the living room, he would wake up abruptly.
In the interest of getting him to sleep until a reasonable wake-up time for the day--and yes, I will admit, also in the interest of getting more sleep myself--I started taking him into bed with me. (I don't sleep with MM; that is a topic for another post.) Bad, I know. I was very careful to do all the things you should do for safe co-sleeping, and it worked: he would go back to sleep until at least 5:45 (my wake-up time) or later each morning.
But I was concerned that I was setting a dangerous precedent. I've never wanted to let my kids sleep in my bed, and I didn't want MJ getting in the habit of doing so. Plus, I didn't sleep very soundly once he was in bed with me. (Still better than not sleeping at all, but not nearly as good as sleeping alone.)
Last night, for the first time in about two weeks, MJ woke briefly only twice and was still sleeping in his crib when I left for work at 6:40 a.m. Hallelujah!
Some days it really is the little things.
(But can someone please explain to me why I'm more tired today than usual? LOL)
Friday, October 5, 2012
Thursday, October 4, 2012
What Do You Say?
(This post is completely off the topics of infertility and parenting.)
I am hoping that some of my readers can give me some advice.
I pride myself on being a good friend. For many years, I have been the "go to" person for advice for many of my friends. (I often think I chose poorly in both my careers and should have become a psychologist/counselor instead.) I like listening to friends' problems and giving an objective, logical view of a situation.
Of course, I am careful to only give advice to friends who ask for it--if you just want to vent, I'm willing to listen, too, and won't advise unless asked--and I am well aware that oftentimes when I give friends advice, they don't take it. I am fine with that, as I learned long ago that the only way to remain objective was to have no investment in the outcome, except to the extent that the friend feels heard and empowered to solve his/her (more typically her) problems.
I never say "I told you so" later if my friends acts contrary to my advice and doesn't get the outcome she'd hoped for (though I will admit, it's been hard to hold my tongue in some situations), and I don't generally judge my friends' choices. (As one example, I've given advice to friend dating a married man, even though I did not think her doing so was "right.")
I have been in a situation for several months in which I'm not quite sure how to be most helpful to a friend. "C" is one of my oldest friends; she is the only friend from high school with whom I have remained friends continuously since that time in my life. Our lives have taken quite different paths: C met a (separated-but-still-married-with-children) man when she was 19 (and I was 17), and she married him when she was 21 (after his divorce was final).
He was in the military, so they lived overseas for a few years and then lived in the L.A. area for several years. During those years, I was finishing college, starting my first job, moving around a lot, and we saw one another only sporadically, though we always kept in touch by phone and by cards/letters. She and I only saw one another a few times, apart from a three-month period when I was living and working within driving distance of her.
As far as I knew during those years, C was happily married. I saw her and her husband almost weekly during the three months I lived nearby, and I sensed no problems.
He retired from the military after 20 years of service, and they relocated back to his hometown, where C's mother also lived (and where C spent a portion of her childhood). At least, I thought she was happy until she called me in 2006 to say that her husband was cheating on her and that they were divorcing. Their divorce was final in April 2007, and he married his mistress not long after that.
C gave up a lot in marrying her ex-husband. She had always wanted to work in film, either in front of or behind the camera, and, for various reasons, she had give that up during the time that she was living abroad. And by the time she returned to the states, many of her possible connections to that industry had dissolved. . . and in any event, she was too busy working to make ends meet to have time to devote to pursuing her career dreams.
Additionally, her ex-husband had fathered three children during his first marriage, and after the third (unplanned) child, he had a vasectomy. Yes, C was aware of this when she married him, but at 21, it wasn't something she dwelt on. At that tender age, she wasn't even sure whether she would eventually want children, and she naively thought that if she did, her ex-husband could have his vasectomy reversed. Perhaps he could've done so, but he didn't want to: he didn't want more children, and they were both heavily burdened financially by his child support payments to his first wife and by attorneys' fees related to that. (Long story short, his ex-wife took him back to court on numerous occasions, trying to get more money; there is even a published court of appeals decision in California about their dispute.)
So C spent a lot of the money she earned at her various jobs paying to support the children from her ex-husband's first marriage--children they rarely saw because their mother had poisoned them against him--and paying legal fees. Which was hard on her and delayed her completing her education.
And she never had children of her own. When she raised the subject of a vasectomy reversal with her ex-husband not long after she turned 30, he told her he didn't want more children and that they couldn't afford them. He refused to consider adoption, or even fostering, as options.
C turned 37 not long before her divorce was final, and the divorce wreaked financial havoc for her. Her ex-husband just simply did not pay the debts assigned to him in their divorce, including tax payments. Many of his creditors hounded C because the debts were originally joint debts, and the taxing authority in the state where they'd lived took money from her bank accounts to settle those obligations (over $3,000). He allowed the house he was awarded in the decree to go into foreclosure, and because her name was still on the mortgage, the bank pursued her to pay that debt as well.
All of this resulted in her having to first take a number of temporary jobs out of state to attempt to earn more money to pay these debts and eventually, after that failed, having to file for bankruptcy protection. All while trying to get her life as a newly-single-after-seventeen-years-of-marriage woman together, venturing back out onto the dating scene after nearly twenty years, and dealing with various drama in her extended family (too long to go into here).
Oh, and then two-and-a-half-years ago, her dad's cancer that had been in remission for twenty years returned. And she moved to the state where he lived in the hope of renewing a relationship with him while he was still alive. (They had grown distant over the years for reasons too long to go into here.) He died about a month ago. And although he was in hospice just minutes from her, C wasn't able to be with him at the end because her stepmother called her too late.
All this background to say this: I get that C's life has not gone the way she'd hoped. I know that she did not see herself alone and childless at 43, and she has had a lot of stressful things to deal with over the past few years.
By way of additional background, I should also add that while I am primarily a logic-driven person, C is primarily an emotion-driven person. I make decisions by writing out lists of pros and cons; she "goes with her gut." I make even most of the emotional decisions in my life logically (ex: marrying MM), while she makes most of her decisions emotionally (ex: buying a car more expensive than she can really afford because "I love it and have always dreamed of having one")
Finally, to my dilemma: what do you say to a friend in these circumstances who says things like "I have the worst luck" or "I'm cursed" or "If something bad can happen, it will happen to me"? Some of the bad/stressful things in C's life have been things over which she had no control, like the return of her father's cancer. But some of the other bad/stressful things have contained at least an element of choice, at least way, way back.
I don't think anyone can be an instrument of positive change in her own life unless she realizes that her choices shape her life, for good or bad, and takes responsibility for the consequences of her choices. While bad things do happen to good people, and sometimes for reasons that are unclear or for no reason at all, accepting the role of victim for yourself is unlikely to lead to happiness and fulfillment in your life.
Also, I somewhat think that I am not the best person to offer C advice. To her, my life is everything hers is not: I am happily married, I work in a relatively well-paying job, and I have two children.
Of course, never mind the fact that I was single until I was 37, and worked for several years in jobs I didn't enjoy and that did not pay well, and that it took me over three years and $30K in fertility treatments to become a mother. I've had my own struggles, but I've never viewed them as "bad luck" or a "curse." (I've filed my own struggles under the headings of "That's Life" and "Shit Happens" and "It Could Always Be Worse.") Obviously C just sees my life as it is now and doesn't focus on what led me to this point.
So, oh wise women of internet. . . .how should I respond the next time C asks me for advice and says she is cursed/unlucky/bad things always happen to her?
I am hoping that some of my readers can give me some advice.
I pride myself on being a good friend. For many years, I have been the "go to" person for advice for many of my friends. (I often think I chose poorly in both my careers and should have become a psychologist/counselor instead.) I like listening to friends' problems and giving an objective, logical view of a situation.
Of course, I am careful to only give advice to friends who ask for it--if you just want to vent, I'm willing to listen, too, and won't advise unless asked--and I am well aware that oftentimes when I give friends advice, they don't take it. I am fine with that, as I learned long ago that the only way to remain objective was to have no investment in the outcome, except to the extent that the friend feels heard and empowered to solve his/her (more typically her) problems.
I never say "I told you so" later if my friends acts contrary to my advice and doesn't get the outcome she'd hoped for (though I will admit, it's been hard to hold my tongue in some situations), and I don't generally judge my friends' choices. (As one example, I've given advice to friend dating a married man, even though I did not think her doing so was "right.")
I have been in a situation for several months in which I'm not quite sure how to be most helpful to a friend. "C" is one of my oldest friends; she is the only friend from high school with whom I have remained friends continuously since that time in my life. Our lives have taken quite different paths: C met a (separated-but-still-married-with-children) man when she was 19 (and I was 17), and she married him when she was 21 (after his divorce was final).
He was in the military, so they lived overseas for a few years and then lived in the L.A. area for several years. During those years, I was finishing college, starting my first job, moving around a lot, and we saw one another only sporadically, though we always kept in touch by phone and by cards/letters. She and I only saw one another a few times, apart from a three-month period when I was living and working within driving distance of her.
As far as I knew during those years, C was happily married. I saw her and her husband almost weekly during the three months I lived nearby, and I sensed no problems.
He retired from the military after 20 years of service, and they relocated back to his hometown, where C's mother also lived (and where C spent a portion of her childhood). At least, I thought she was happy until she called me in 2006 to say that her husband was cheating on her and that they were divorcing. Their divorce was final in April 2007, and he married his mistress not long after that.
C gave up a lot in marrying her ex-husband. She had always wanted to work in film, either in front of or behind the camera, and, for various reasons, she had give that up during the time that she was living abroad. And by the time she returned to the states, many of her possible connections to that industry had dissolved. . . and in any event, she was too busy working to make ends meet to have time to devote to pursuing her career dreams.
Additionally, her ex-husband had fathered three children during his first marriage, and after the third (unplanned) child, he had a vasectomy. Yes, C was aware of this when she married him, but at 21, it wasn't something she dwelt on. At that tender age, she wasn't even sure whether she would eventually want children, and she naively thought that if she did, her ex-husband could have his vasectomy reversed. Perhaps he could've done so, but he didn't want to: he didn't want more children, and they were both heavily burdened financially by his child support payments to his first wife and by attorneys' fees related to that. (Long story short, his ex-wife took him back to court on numerous occasions, trying to get more money; there is even a published court of appeals decision in California about their dispute.)
So C spent a lot of the money she earned at her various jobs paying to support the children from her ex-husband's first marriage--children they rarely saw because their mother had poisoned them against him--and paying legal fees. Which was hard on her and delayed her completing her education.
And she never had children of her own. When she raised the subject of a vasectomy reversal with her ex-husband not long after she turned 30, he told her he didn't want more children and that they couldn't afford them. He refused to consider adoption, or even fostering, as options.
C turned 37 not long before her divorce was final, and the divorce wreaked financial havoc for her. Her ex-husband just simply did not pay the debts assigned to him in their divorce, including tax payments. Many of his creditors hounded C because the debts were originally joint debts, and the taxing authority in the state where they'd lived took money from her bank accounts to settle those obligations (over $3,000). He allowed the house he was awarded in the decree to go into foreclosure, and because her name was still on the mortgage, the bank pursued her to pay that debt as well.
All of this resulted in her having to first take a number of temporary jobs out of state to attempt to earn more money to pay these debts and eventually, after that failed, having to file for bankruptcy protection. All while trying to get her life as a newly-single-after-seventeen-years-of-marriage woman together, venturing back out onto the dating scene after nearly twenty years, and dealing with various drama in her extended family (too long to go into here).
Oh, and then two-and-a-half-years ago, her dad's cancer that had been in remission for twenty years returned. And she moved to the state where he lived in the hope of renewing a relationship with him while he was still alive. (They had grown distant over the years for reasons too long to go into here.) He died about a month ago. And although he was in hospice just minutes from her, C wasn't able to be with him at the end because her stepmother called her too late.
All this background to say this: I get that C's life has not gone the way she'd hoped. I know that she did not see herself alone and childless at 43, and she has had a lot of stressful things to deal with over the past few years.
By way of additional background, I should also add that while I am primarily a logic-driven person, C is primarily an emotion-driven person. I make decisions by writing out lists of pros and cons; she "goes with her gut." I make even most of the emotional decisions in my life logically (ex: marrying MM), while she makes most of her decisions emotionally (ex: buying a car more expensive than she can really afford because "I love it and have always dreamed of having one")
Finally, to my dilemma: what do you say to a friend in these circumstances who says things like "I have the worst luck" or "I'm cursed" or "If something bad can happen, it will happen to me"? Some of the bad/stressful things in C's life have been things over which she had no control, like the return of her father's cancer. But some of the other bad/stressful things have contained at least an element of choice, at least way, way back.
I don't think anyone can be an instrument of positive change in her own life unless she realizes that her choices shape her life, for good or bad, and takes responsibility for the consequences of her choices. While bad things do happen to good people, and sometimes for reasons that are unclear or for no reason at all, accepting the role of victim for yourself is unlikely to lead to happiness and fulfillment in your life.
Also, I somewhat think that I am not the best person to offer C advice. To her, my life is everything hers is not: I am happily married, I work in a relatively well-paying job, and I have two children.
Of course, never mind the fact that I was single until I was 37, and worked for several years in jobs I didn't enjoy and that did not pay well, and that it took me over three years and $30K in fertility treatments to become a mother. I've had my own struggles, but I've never viewed them as "bad luck" or a "curse." (I've filed my own struggles under the headings of "That's Life" and "Shit Happens" and "It Could Always Be Worse.") Obviously C just sees my life as it is now and doesn't focus on what led me to this point.
So, oh wise women of internet. . . .how should I respond the next time C asks me for advice and says she is cursed/unlucky/bad things always happen to her?
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
.JPG)
Friday, September 21, 2012
5 years ago today
Five years ago today, I went on my last first date ever. (I wrote about meeting MM for drinks that evening here, on my long-abandoned first blog.) At the time, I was just looking to get back out on the dating scene and have some fun after ending a two-year relationship (and engagement) less than six months before. Little did I know that I was meeting my future husband and the father of my children.
Five years ago today, I never would've envisioned that I would be where I am today: wife to MM, mother to two sons.
Life is strange. And unexpected. But wonderful.
Five years ago today, I never would've envisioned that I would be where I am today: wife to MM, mother to two sons.
Life is strange. And unexpected. But wonderful.
Thursday, September 20, 2012
8 months
I can hardly believe that our sons turned 8 months old yesterday! I had planned to include some of their 8-month photos with this post but forgot to upload them to the computer. Oops. Maybe next post I'll remember. I share with you some photos from the past month instead.
(If you're checking this post on or after 9/30/12, the photos have been removed from this post. If you're a regular reader, email me, and I'll be happy to share them.)
Here is AJ. He is sitting very well without assistance these days and crawling all over the place! He started with a few hitching "steps" at the end of August and has progressed daily ever since. It's hard to get a decent photo of him with my point-and-shoot camera because he is constantly in motion. He has also become a very good little eater, eating more than his (heavier) brother at many feedings.
Here is MJ. He is not yet actually crawling but is able to get around very well by rolling, pulling himself and scooting. He is also able to get in and out of a seated position on his own, and he has two teeth on the bottom! The first broke through a few weeks ago, and the second joined it yesterday.
AJ and MJ playing on the big bed (smiles courtesy of Daddy's antics).
It is so fun watching them learn and grow and progress, and I love their smiles and laughs. We are really enjoying them!
(If you're checking this post on or after 9/30/12, the photos have been removed from this post. If you're a regular reader, email me, and I'll be happy to share them.)
AJ and MJ playing on the big bed (smiles courtesy of Daddy's antics).
It is so fun watching them learn and grow and progress, and I love their smiles and laughs. We are really enjoying them!
Friday, September 14, 2012
Insurance & Health Care--my perspective
Without getting into the politics of it, I just want to say that there is something seriously wrong with the way we pay for health care in America.
My husband and I pay for health insurance coverage which is available to him through his job. . . "good" (though not "Cadillac level") coverage. And yet, nearly eight months after my sons were born, I am still paying for "our" share of the hospital bills related to their birth. I just made the last payment on MJ's bill this morning. (His was the least expensive of the three--mine, his and AJ's--because his stay was shorter than AJ's and he didn't need many interventions.) I will still be making payments on my bill and on AJ's bill for another few months.
I didn't even receive the first bill for any of our care from the hospital until they were a few months old. I guess the hospital doesn't bill patients until/unless the insurance company has processed and paid its portion first.
And I occasionally still get a random bill for the boys. . . either for a doctor visit during their hospital stay (billed separately from the hospital) or for a special vaccine I forgot they received (and didn't realize I'd paying $250+ for "our" portion of the charge).
When you have a health insurance plan that says there is an annual family out-of-pocket maximum of $2,000, you might reasonably expect that you'd never have to pay more than $2,000 for your health care. In our case, you would be wrong. There are all sorts of exclusions and exceptions that no one tells you about up front, so that the amount we ended up paying out of pocket has exceeded $4,000 so far this year. (I stopped keeping track after that.) It's only September.
[And don't even get me started on the fact that the MFM group that followed me in the hospital was deemed to be an "out of network" provider by our insurance. This despite the fact that (1) they are the only MFM group that sees inpatients at that hospital, which is "in network," and (2) they are the main MFM group to which my OB group (deemed "in network") refers its patients. Yeah. Messed up!]
In the past few months that I've been receiving and paying all these bills, I've often remarked to MM that we are the fortunate ones: our sons' hospital stays were relatively short (7 and 11 days, respectively); despite arriving at 34 weeks, they never spent time in the NICU and just needed to "feed and grow"; our sons have only had to go to the doctor once since discharge from the hospital for a visit that wasn't a "well check"; and I have a well-paid job that allows me to handle the occasional unexpected $200-300 bill without panic or insolvency. So many other people in our situation would not be so fortunate.
I'm not even talking about the fact that our insurance paid not one red cent toward the fertility treatment which produced our sons in the first place. That is whole other topic for another post. I'm talking about the (in my opinion) crappy insurance coverage of the delivery-related and post-delivery care we received.
In terms of quality of care, I couldn't be happier with the care my sons and I received. (And, as a former nurse myself, I think I'm in a better position to judge this than the average layperson patient.) But the way we pay for that care leaves a lot to be desired.
My husband and I pay for health insurance coverage which is available to him through his job. . . "good" (though not "Cadillac level") coverage. And yet, nearly eight months after my sons were born, I am still paying for "our" share of the hospital bills related to their birth. I just made the last payment on MJ's bill this morning. (His was the least expensive of the three--mine, his and AJ's--because his stay was shorter than AJ's and he didn't need many interventions.) I will still be making payments on my bill and on AJ's bill for another few months.
I didn't even receive the first bill for any of our care from the hospital until they were a few months old. I guess the hospital doesn't bill patients until/unless the insurance company has processed and paid its portion first.
And I occasionally still get a random bill for the boys. . . either for a doctor visit during their hospital stay (billed separately from the hospital) or for a special vaccine I forgot they received (and didn't realize I'd paying $250+ for "our" portion of the charge).
When you have a health insurance plan that says there is an annual family out-of-pocket maximum of $2,000, you might reasonably expect that you'd never have to pay more than $2,000 for your health care. In our case, you would be wrong. There are all sorts of exclusions and exceptions that no one tells you about up front, so that the amount we ended up paying out of pocket has exceeded $4,000 so far this year. (I stopped keeping track after that.) It's only September.
[And don't even get me started on the fact that the MFM group that followed me in the hospital was deemed to be an "out of network" provider by our insurance. This despite the fact that (1) they are the only MFM group that sees inpatients at that hospital, which is "in network," and (2) they are the main MFM group to which my OB group (deemed "in network") refers its patients. Yeah. Messed up!]
In the past few months that I've been receiving and paying all these bills, I've often remarked to MM that we are the fortunate ones: our sons' hospital stays were relatively short (7 and 11 days, respectively); despite arriving at 34 weeks, they never spent time in the NICU and just needed to "feed and grow"; our sons have only had to go to the doctor once since discharge from the hospital for a visit that wasn't a "well check"; and I have a well-paid job that allows me to handle the occasional unexpected $200-300 bill without panic or insolvency. So many other people in our situation would not be so fortunate.
I'm not even talking about the fact that our insurance paid not one red cent toward the fertility treatment which produced our sons in the first place. That is whole other topic for another post. I'm talking about the (in my opinion) crappy insurance coverage of the delivery-related and post-delivery care we received.
In terms of quality of care, I couldn't be happier with the care my sons and I received. (And, as a former nurse myself, I think I'm in a better position to judge this than the average layperson patient.) But the way we pay for that care leaves a lot to be desired.
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Random things I've realized
- There are not enough hours in the day to do everything I need/want to do.
- Friends really do understand when I don't have time to call or send them cards these days.
- "Billable hours" are one of the reasons people hate lawyers, even if they don't realize it.
- "Billable hours" are one of the reasons lawyers (in private practice) hate their jobs and have higher-than-average rates of depression.
- Wearing comfortable underwear can make a big difference in your mood.
- So can free barbecue for lunch.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)