• Self-feeding finger foods
• Signing “milk” in ASL
• Clapping
• Waving
• Pulling up to standing
• Sitting up
• Hands-and-knees crawling
• Attempted cruising

Damn, so that’s why we’re tired.

Seamus has been sick for the last couple of days, burning with fever and generating some of the funkiest diapers known to humanity. He spent most of the last two days sleeping on me and nursing heavily, which made me feel a little wistful for that eensy newborn I brought home. That eensy newborn with, apparently, the ability to iron sheets with his hot little belly.

His temperature dropped to 101.6 this morning and he was in pretty good spirits all day, but he also managed to puke on me shortly after his morning nap, so I canceled a playdate and did housework with him on my back, hoping that would be enough stimulation. He ate four TJ O’s for lunch, nursed down….and popped up, nursed down, fell asleep… and popped up. Rinse, repeat for half an hour until I laid him down to cry it out.

So now he’s crying, falling asleep….and bursting into sobs.

Part of me thinks I should have put him down sooner to not confuse him, the other part thinks I could have gotten him to sleep on the boob if I weren’t selfish enough to need to eat.

Darling Boy,

Even while I struggle, you keep thriving. What an awesome and humbling thing to witness.

You turned eight months old last Monday and suddenly your nighttime sleep evened out to two fairly reliable wake-ups at midnight and at four. You’ve also begun wiggling away from me at night when we bring you to bed, which makes me think that you’re ready to spend the whole night in your crib and that I’m cramping your style by snuggling you after you nurse. Your naps have degraded some and may be in flux again, but until I know that for certain I plan to keep working through the 2-3-4 sleep routine as best I can.

None of your teeth have deigned to make an appearance, despite the drooling and the gum-gnashing and the frequent insertions of Tylenol or Motrin. You seem most uncomfortable in the mornings and evenings, poor bug. I dreamed that all twelve of your first-year teeth cut through in one day like stop-motion photography of a flower opening. I shudder remembering the visual on that one. We’ve stocked up on teething toys and biscuits, and I try to let you gum at least one of your foods every day, so you can let them pop out any day now, love. really.

In the days it takes me to write these letters to you, and in particular this letter, you evolve into a smarter, faster, more skilled baby, often a completely different baby than the one to whom I began the letter. I started writing this one to a baby who had just managed to sit himself up, and now I’m writing to a baby who sits up and pulls up to standing easily and has begun clapping and waving whenever it amuses him. As always when you tackle a new motor skill, your language and signing went away for a couple of days, but you said “mama” this afternoon, so you’ll re-integrate in the next few days, and soon I’ll have a new lexicon of your wants and needs to interpret.

I need to talk about last week, if you’ll put up with me for a moment.

I wasn’t angry at you. You were doing your job of wanting to be as mobile as possible in order to keep racking up those new and exciting milestones that will let you wander the house at will and get into everything, and part of that job is accomplished by trying to throw yourself off of the changing table as many times as I am able to reposition you, at every diaper change. I get that. I also get that part of my job is to get you to the age of eighteen in one piece and with a few hang-ups as possible, and that the best way to do that is to keep saying “no” in a calm voice, reposition you again, and get the damn diaper snapped on.

But I’ve been in a bit of a funk. I applied to a few jobs a while ago that I thought I’d be good at, and have never heard back, so I can only assume that they aren’t interested. This bums me out, as does the thought that as much as I love being with you, I really miss working. I took a long time figuring out what I wanted to do job-wise, and it took a long time for me to finally do it, so to not do it anymore makes me sad sometimes. I love being your mama, but being a mama is much, much harder than having a job. Most of the work I do is invisible except in your healthy happy baby self, and it will remain invisible if I continue to do it well. I had had a couple of harder days with you because of the teeth and you busting out with the pulling up and some new willfulness, and the people to whom I expressed that shared the opinion that because I chose to parent, chose you, that perhaps I did not deserve to express tiredness or frustration. Also your Auntie J is getting married very soon, and I don’t think she’s going to be your Auntie anymore. Despite the fact she insisted on seeing you be born, I think she’s seen you twice since then, and just doesn’t seem all that interested in having a babymama as a friend. I also don’t know the man she’s marrying very well, so I’m guessing that she has a whole new life in front of her that’s trimming back the old one.

I wasn’t angry at you, I was angry at me for failing. Failing at my non-mama job, at keeping my friend, and at raising you to not fling yourself off of the changing table. I am so, so sorry for yelling at you. I can only tell you that I’m trying to do better and feel better, so that by the time you start remembering these things I won’t be doing them.

Love,

Mama

I always wanted to see him perform, and I will miss his voice in the coming election cycle. Kevin Smith’s next movie won’t be the same, either. Damn.