Time

Time

Today Tess is exactly 6 weeks old!  This is probably an odd milestone to be celebrating but it seems to be pretty significant for a few reasons.  There are some things that I can start doing again 6 weeks after my C-section (like exercise) and some of my books suggest things start to “get easier” with Tess at 6 weeks.  Hmm… Maybe that starts tomorrow? 

Sticking her tongue out at the idea anything should be "easy" at this point

Not sure… but one thing that is significant for me at 6 weeks is that today officially marks the halfway point of my maternity leave. I can’t believe this is possible since I feel like we just got home from the hospital and I still feel clueless about everything.  I can’t imagine leaving her to go back to work at all, so I can barely face thinking about it.  I love being with her so much, and she just feels so needy… I can’t imagine letting someone else take care of her!  I even get antsy when Andy’s been holding her for a while instead of me.  On top of that, I feel like she and I are still getting to know each other… I just haven’t had enough time with her yet and don’t think another 6 weeks will be enough either.

This idea of “time” is kind of dominating my thoughts and life right now, and all the different reasons why are connected.  For example, not having any time… I am grateful for the few minutes I currently have to devote to updating this blog!  And know that its short-lived so I better type fast!

The idea of time is also on my mind right now because the importance of Tess’ schedule has been made astonishingly clear to me this past week.  (Keeping a schedule is also what buys me some time to do things like update this blog).  

My friend Eva from Smith came out to visit us for a few days, and because I was excited to spend time and catch up with my old friend – who I haven’t seen in years – I did a bad job of keeping up with Tess’ sleep schedule.  After a couple of days of her not getting much daytime sleep Tess was pretty unhappy.  On Eva’s last day, Tess basically cried from 2:30pm until 1am.  It was awful! She was so overtired, I couldn’t get her to sleep. She would doze off for 5 minutes here, 10 minutes there, but I could not get her to lie down to sleep for a good nap or even go down for the night for the life of me.  I felt so awful!  Like I deprived her of what she needed for my own desire to hang out with my friend.  It was a tough day/night, but she slept a ton after that and we are getting back to her old routine with some good daytime napping.  It was a hard but important lesson that I need to maintain her schedule no matter what – minor changes here or there is one thing… but 3 or 4 days of everything being upside down is not an option. 

Two Smithies... and 1 future Smithie?

Which brings me back to what I was writing about earlier – how I still feel so clueless and new at this, I can’t believe my time at home to figure this out and learn about Tess and what she needs - is half over!

Tess figuring things out... like how to find her fist.

 A lot of people remark on how lucky I am that I have 12 weeks off (8 weeks unpaid FMLA time and 4 weeks of paid vacation/sick time – HA!  What a laugh… “vacation”) The sad fact is, I AM lucky because A: I can afford to not get paid for 8 weeks and B: some people don’t even get that much time (companies with fewer than 50 employees are not mandated to offer FMLA).  But that makes me sick, that we should feel grateful for 12 weeks of unpaid leave or the opportunity to use our vacation time to stay home. And I HAVE to use my vacation time by the way, I couldn’t, for example, take 12 weeks of unpaid leave and save my vacation/sick leave for later in the year.  Because, you know, mothers of babies in daycare NEVER get sick and won’t need sick leave.  

The US is 1 of 3 countries in the world to not mandate paid maternity leave – we are in the good company of Swaziland and Papua New Guinea for that statistic.  Danish mothers apparently even get 4 weeks of paid leave BEFORE giving birth.  Many European countries even offer paternity leave.  In Sweden, fathers can get up to 480 days of paternity leave.  480!!!  Because Andy and I both work at Emory, if he wanted to take any paternity leave that time would have come out of my maternity leave. In other words, if he wanted to stay home for a week, I would have only had 11 weeks rather than 12 to stay home.  Despite the fact that studies show that paid maternity leave improves breastfeeding, general health of mom and baby, lowers healthcare costs and is associated with increased economic security and independence… the truth is, I’m not even expecting paid leave – I just would like the opportunity to stay with Tess longer than 12 weeks if that’s what we need.  If I don’t go back to work the day my FMLA ends, I can get fired.  When you look and see that so many other developed nations gives somewhere around 6 months of maternity leave – often paid leave - you really realize how shitty our policy is here.  No wonder so few mothers are breastfeeding their babies for the suggested 1 year in the US.  I’m having a hard time keeping up with breastfeeding now! I just think its odd that our politicians like to harp on “family values” but don’t think its worth writing legislation to ensure maternity leave rights.  Maybe they just think I shouldn’t want to continue to work at all after having children and quit my job – oh, and be married to someone who is rich enough so I can afford to do that. 

Anyway, I will get off my soap box now.  I guess I could have moved to one of these fabulous places that offers all this maternity time, although my mom would have killed me and kidnapped Tess if I so much as suggested that. I only am depressed that this precious time I have with Tess is so short.  How can I leave this precious face???