Operation Smile

At the end of last summer while leaving our favorite park on a warm and fire-fly light night, I felt inspired by the beauty of the night and our high spirits to make my kids' childhoods perfect. Idyllic. It was all up to me; I could completely control it by simply being a perfect and idyllic mother. It was just a matter of taking it day by day. So exciting!

Well, a year later, that hasn't quite worked out as I hoped. My kids and I have been a little bit grumpy over this summer. There has been too much yelling, crying, threatening, writhing on the ground and even mild cursing around this house. The boys have been a bit grouchy, too. After watching Andrew melt down and throw an absolute fit over basically nothing, and just before I threw my own retaliatory tantrum (you know, to fix the situation, obviously), I decided it was time to turn things around and thought that maybe, just maybe, there might be a more effective response. I knew it sounded crazy, but I thought it just might work.

I decided to just plaster a huge smile on my face. Never mind that it was fake. My kids aren't that perceptive yet. I forced them into the car, we raced off to a park to blow off steam, and, after I was able to coax-threaten Andrew from the car, I put my plan into action.
As a short aside, Operation Smile has been floating around in the back of my consciousness for some time. I have come to realize that my face is not one of those that gives me away; worse, it is one of those that disseminates misinformation about me. I have had women apologize to me for expressing their love for the Savior or their goals to hold weekly family nights because somehow my face acted like it was offended by their admirable feelings and ambitions. I knew in the midst of one such humiliating apology that my face needed to shape up. I had another occassion to see that O.S. was necessary when reflecting upon some childhood memories of adults who always seemed, from the set of their expressions, tense or unhappy. I don't want my meaness of my natural slack expression to indicate to my kids that I am not having a wonderful time being their mom.

Anyway, O.S. worked immediately. Andrew turned to see if I was watching him on the jungle gym and I gave him my biggest grin. His face transformed into a huge smile. The same with Will (who was happy already anyway, cute thing). Within 5 minutes, Andrew went from out of control to happy and joyful. By the time we got back in the car, we were all genuinely in fabulous moods.
My kids are just tiny little human mood rings of me, reflecting back at me whatever mood I exude at them. Looks like it is in my power to be a completely perfect mother after all! (Does ignoring them while blogging count as an imperfection? Didn't think so, either.)

The Fastest Summer of My Life (and also the most stressful, unless you count my mission which I often don't)

I have a lot of reasons for having abandoned my blog for the last several months, but none of them are really worthy. For example, one of those reasons is that there are too many things that I want to remember. Sometimes an approximation is the best one can do, and it is certainly better than doing nothing. Looking through my photos also somewhat depresses me because I realize that I didn't capture quite enough. Those first few weeks when the baby is the tiniest thing, almost unrecognizable to what he will soon enough become, I have too few of those. Like many other things in my life, though, I must confront that failure and move on. That is what blogging is all about.

So here is our summer, in photos.
It was the summer of a tiger striped baby who slept in a side car next to our bed.He also came to the pool with us and slept. It was the summer that Andrew really legitimately swam. He even invented the Thumbs Up stroke.He also learned the dead man's float. It would represent a heart attack moment for the lifeguards (he stays under for an alarmingly long period of time) but for the fact that they pay attention only to one another.
(Awkward Family Photo suitable?)I also like this photo quite a bit. The only way to include Andrew's face was to await his surfacing for air and be quick to press the shutter.
It was the summer I really liked my bathing suit. It was also the summer that Will became frighteningly ill. I was horrified when I saw this photo. He reached a point where he could not keep anything down at all. It is one thing to lament that your child can only be fed by a machine through a tube; it is another to wish that such a treatment worked. Despair might be the best word to describe how Brigham and I felt during the most acute phase. But Will pulled through and we are ending this summer as the first time since he was a few months old that he is solidly on the growth chart.It is the summer that I got serious about doing Family Home Evening (this photo of Will is from FHE's water fight activity from last week.)

I also instituted another policy: Brigham Must Be Home By 7:30pm. This policy was born in one horrible moment of clarity during which I was rocking a wailing newborn whose reflux made it too painful for him to nurse while watching my grievously ill and sobbing 2 year old vomit up all over the rug the small amount of food I had Jillian Michaeled him into eating set against the acoustic backdrop of my 4 year old raising hell in some nearby corner of our filthy disheveled shameful home, knowing that Brigham would only be home in a few hours (it was 6pm) as a special favor to me so that I could attend a Relief Society function I proved too depressed to rally myself to attend.Brigham initially failed to comply with the policy but eventually got with the program that enabled a few of these types of moments, not to mention a sane(r) wife.



It was also the first time any of my kids arrived at the 70th percentile for weight. He has dropped back down to 50th, but I savored the chub for the month it lasted.

I am going to have to stop here because it is late, but here is one from just this morning. Stay tuned for the next installment featuring our beach vacation, crafting activities and Will's soccer skills.

Porter at 2 months

Porter, today you are two months old. You started smiling like crazy a few weeks ago, just after I uncertainly reported to the pediatrician that of course you were smiling and interacting with us. You waited a week before really confirming that you were capable of that. Now we talk to each other every day, though you still show almost equal interest in the people in the paintings over my bed. Never fear, I know that in no time at all you will be b-slapping us on that same bed right alongside your brothers. Below are photos from your first month. Look how much you have changed!


You have been our easiest baby so far. Everyone remarks upon what a quiet and content little baby you are. When you do cry, you do it properly, with tears and loud yellings. I pointed out to Daddy that you are our earliest tear-producer and he pointed out that you are probably our longest left ignored while crying. Don't worry; that does not mean that you are not my current favorite because you totally are. You are growing really well, too, so that counts for a lot right off the bat. You weighed 12.4 lbs this morning with your diaper and onesie on. Andrew also grew well but you have him beat in that you do not require that we hold you all night to keep you asleep. It is true that you don't really enjoy driving, but other than that, you put up with your brothers getting right up in your face and exclaiming at top volume things like, "AWWW! HE'S SUCH A CUTIE!" (Will) or
"BOO!" (Andrew); you will tolerate your baby chair in the kitchen long enough for me to generally get breakfast moving; you even enjoy taking showers. (I hope that the way Andrew is blocking your face from view in this photo does not come to represent how you feel about your place in the family! Just remember, it builds character!)

It is hard to believe that two months ago today at this moment the least confident anasthesiologist on the planet, face contorted in a mask of fear and bewilderment, was placing my epidural for the second time and you were just a few hours away from arrival. Porter, you are adorable and perfect and from the moment I held you, I knew I would never trade you for any daughter in the world. I knew when I was first pregnant with you that you specifically were supposed to be in our family. We are so blessed that you are. Please don't b-slap me later, but even if you do, I won't forget that feeling.

Love,
Mom
ps, we will take some higher quality shots of you today and better capture that cute half smile that you've got that melts my heart. Love you forever.

Gifts

"If ye being evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Father in Heaven give good things to them that ask him?"

Someone mentioned this scripture in a lovely talk in church today and I have been thinking of it ever since, though in a slightly different context. We have recently had some set-backs with Will and our hopes for his eating. We removed the ng tube in an effort to get him to develop normal biorythms with regard to food and to learn appropriate self-feeding techniques, two things he has been deprived of since tube placement at 14 months of age. For about a month, he did really well and I thought we had proved all the doctors wrong about Will. He was able to take in more calories by mouth than he had tolerated with the tube (he would vomit up the tube feeding sometimes as much as two or three times a day and always at least once a week) and some days he would even exceed his caloric intake requirements. But in the last few weeks his eating broke down, he began vomiting again, we were told that he is allergic to a broad spectrum of basic foods and his weight simply plateaued where it had been when we began our experiment. I realized, when I found myself fighting my poor little two year old every day (I reminded myself of Jillian Michaels at mealtimes, which, incidentally, lasted easily 90 minutes), that our experiment needed to end for all our emotional and physical health. Will needed help to gain enough weight/inches to catch up and at least be at the bottom of the charts.

Will's health has been a long-standing source of stress and anxiety for our family and I have often envied those around me who seemed have it so much easier than I do. (I know, of course, that so many people have far worse health concerns with their children and I must sound like such a complainer to go on the way that I do.)Once another mother commented on the fact that her 14 month old was the same height as my 2 and four month old and I felt a resentment against her for weeks thereafter. Who, after all, makes that kind of comment about a little child whose ng tube taped to his face makes obvious that there is a health issue present? I suppose I am still irritated about it.

It has only been recently that I have realized that Will's health problems will most likely be long-standing and that they will require a lot of effort and money to even just ameliorate, and that our family needs to adjust accordingly. This trial that we had convinced ourselves, after we were told it was not Cystic Fibrosis, would be grown out of soon enough, is going to be much longer and more difficult than expected.

Often when we talk about trials, we take comfort in believing that they are blessings in disguise, sent to us from a loving Heavenly Father and perfectly taylored by him to help us in whatever way He sees we stand in need. I am not sure that is true, and fairly sure that it is not always true, but I think the best arbiter of whether a given trial was sent from God is the person bearing the burden.

What I do know is true is that with every hardship that befall us, He is there to bless us and help us through, and that these trials really always are opportunities for us to grow as people. That growth can take many forms, but I suspect that it always includes an expanded charitable instinct. After all, what He offers us in these dark times is his perfect love. It seems natural that, when properly endured, our trials help us to develop some love of our own.

It does not matter to me whether God plagued us with Will's health issues in order to bless us and I tend to believe that He did not. But I have seen how it all has created some positive attributes in our home. Andrew is a more protective older brother, Will is the bravest, toughest kid I have ever seen, Brigham and I feel closer as a couple as we struggle to find answers and solutions, our attitudes about eating and exercise have changed and I have experienced a new sense of responsibility and accountability as a mother and a determination to take charge of all things and get them done correctly rather than let the details slip through and fall where they may. I have been learning to prioritize the most important things and let go of those little concerns that eat away so much of our time and energy but that really don't matter at all. My prayers have taken on a new fervor and all of this increased looking towards God has awakened me to the other aspects of our home life that have been neglected (FHE, for example). Brigham has eaten dinner with us during the week only twice since we have lived here and all of this exhaustion that has come with Will's needs has made us realize that we cannot maintain this lifestyle. Our lifestyle, which is best characterized by "single mother with a government-level income in a really expensive area," is far from ideal. Brigham is missing out on these early years with our kids, and I am, too, to a degree because I allow the stress of it all to interfere with my appreciation for its beauty. We would probably continue on in this way indefinitely, as this is how most people out here live, but for Will's health and our dawning realization that a lot of things need to change to help get him better.

Will's health has been a hardship of origin unknown, but it has been surrounded by gifts that I can feel are from God.

Hello, I love you won't you tell me your name

Most of the events in my life that I expected to feel surreal--stepping off the plane as a missionary, stepping off again as a returned missionary, getting married etc--never really did. Having a baby, on the other hand, did feel surreal, every single time.

I woke up in the middle of the night on Sunday (it was actually 4:00 am or so) when my water broke. It was a slow but unmistakable leak. I can't remember seeing Brigham so nervous. He was tearing around the house rather incoherantly while I sat and waited for my mom to arrive to stay with the boys. The timing was a little bit bad since the kids were leaving Monday with my parents, sisters and kids for Florida and this would mean that I would not be able to spend the morning with them, but I was also glad to not have to be induced later in the week.

I usually describe having a baby as simply going to the hospital and watching tv while eating popsicles for a few hours. Not so this time. Despite getting an epidural in fairly short order, I continued to experience a lot of pain. Even the epidural placement did not go smoothly and easily as in the past. The woman possessed none of that confidence bordering on supreme indifference that I find so attractive in a doctor. She had to try a couple of times before it was all in place, and even then I had to keep rolling from side to side to evenly distribute the feeling of numb paralysis. The paralysis affect was even more pronounced, too, than I had remembered. I truly could not move my legs and my irrational fears of permanent paralysis only intensified when the nurses and doctors informed me with furrowed brows that they supposed it was not utterly unheard of to be so numb.

My contractions slowed in frequency, though not in intensity, and Brigham thought he had a now or never moment to grab something to eat. In the 15 minutes he was gone, the nurses gave me pitocin and I began experiencing contractions so unrelentinga nd painful that I cried. Suddenly a few nurses came rushing into my room and starting adjusting things while one of them plunged a syringe into my thigh. The doctor called out, in a back-fired attempt to reassure me: "Don't worry, the baby has recovered!" Recovered from what, lady? The doctor checked to see how far I had progressed and remarked in surprise, "Wow, he has a lot of hair!" Apparently, I went from 4 cm to ready to push a baby that was already visible in about 15 minutes. The nurses paged Brigham and two pushes later, I was holding my newest little boy.

He looked so much like Will and Andrew that it was startling. He even sounded like them. He has long eyelashes just like Andrew did. He has a loud, strong cry. I felt so worried when they first handed him to me because he was wheezing and purple, but he quickly pinkened up and began really yelling. He is so sweet and cuddly and I feel already that he belongs with us forever. Now we just need to figure out what to call him.

the one where i review the baltimore aquarium

and give it a B. It is cool, but for the $$$, I did expect a bit more. Caveat: I am rather demanding.
The jellyfish were one of the best things at the aquarium, in Brigham's and my opinion. They are a not a permanent exhibit, though, so if you do want to go, I suggest you do it while your dollar buys the jellyfish, too.
If I were to ever again trust myself with caring for living things besides kids, I would want an aquarium of jellyfish that we kept in a darkly lit room. It was that cool.
We also saw the Dolphin Show, which was an extra $15 or so for the three oldest of us, and while it left something to be desired, I do feel that it is a necessary part of the Aquarium package considering the price of the GA ticket.
The "Australia Room" exhibit reminded me a lot of the National Zoo's Amazonia house, but it was still fun.

I think that the next time we visit Baltimore, we will do it when the weather is warmer and we can ride on the water taxis and take tours of the submarine and ship we saw (and which you can see in some of the photos of us in the cafeteria) docked outside.

I would like to remember that Brigham and I laughed all the way home listening to Jim Gaffigan on our ipod. The boys watched Scooby in the back. We even got home in time to attend a friend's turkey mole party and let the boys run crazy in their house.

It was a great first day to the new year.

Ringing in 2010

I read that the way you spend your New Year's Eve is the way you will spend your year. So I suppose I can look foward to eating in unnaturally and unbearably freezing cold restaurants (that is Brigham's coat wrapped around Will, not a napkin) where waiters throw food at our faces. And Andrew will deal with quite a bit of frustration at not catching it.
On the other, less literal, hand, perhaps it means that we will go to a bit of expense and trouble
to try to get out of the house
and do memorable things
which we will not capture well with our camera.

I am hoping that my self-help books will have some influence this year, too.

Broken dish, broken heart

When I was showing Andrew these photos of Christmas Eve the other day, his little eye immediately fixated upon that small Christmas-themed candy dish on the coffee table. And he got really really sad.

One night shortly after Christmas, before we had put any of the accoutrements away, Andrew (who takes after me in the crazy gene) became so enraged about something (I wish I could remember what) that he picked up that dish and slammed it back down on the table, breaking it. I like to handle such things by massaging their guilt muscle a bit. A child's guilty conscience is a mother's best asset. So I acted really sad. I quietly picked up the pieces and spoke softly about how special that candy dish had been. (This was actually sort of true. After all, how often do you find a really cute Crate & Barrel dish for $1 at a second-hand store? Even if you don't live the sort of life in which the dish would ever contain something besides tiny plastic star wars guns.)

Andrew wanted to see if we could glue it back together, but I honestly replied that we could not. He suggested that we could just buy a new one, and I honestly told him that it had been made several years ago and we would probably never see the same one for sale at a thrift store again. That was when he totally fell apart. He sobbed as if something living and beloved had just died. I decided he had faced the consequence of his actions enough, and now was time for a little measured perspective. But despite all my reassurances that it was only a dish, Andrew would not be comforted. "I loved that candy dish so much! It was my favorite! I am so so so sorry, Mom! So sorry!" More sobbing.

He seemed to calm down a bit after I got him in the tub and I thought the whole thing was behind us. Our nightly ritual is to put the boys in my bed in their little towels where they, after feeling sufficiently warmed up, jump around naked while I get their pjs and books ready. Then the boys get dressed and we settle in and read for a while. I left Andrew in my room while I went back to get Will out of the tub. I heard a sudden cry from my bedroom followed by loud sobbing. I rushed back in, sure that Andrew had suffered some sort of physical injury. But, of course, he was crying again because he had remembered that candy dish and was mourning it. His tiny heart was broken and he apologized continually. I think it might be the biggest regret of Andrew's little life.

And it makes me think of a quote I associate with General Conference:
"For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: 'It might have been!'"

Andrew, may all your regrets be as unreasonable and exaggerated as the one you still suffer for that broken candy dish.

Christmas Day