#getsitoffmychest

So I’m throwing up and running a 101.1 (last checked I feel like it’s gone up…) it’s a bug that’s going around. Though how I got it since I’m basically a shut in is beyond me. Anyway this prompted a phone call to my mom to get her to come get my nearly five month old daughter. My little girl has managed to go her whole life without any real illness. Just a stuffy nose from a bad dust storm, and a slightly upset tummy after a formula change. So I sent her with my mom so she wouldn’t catch what I got. However, I still feel like shit. My mom's watched her before. She spends maybe every other Saturday night with my mom to give me some time to catch up on whatever I missed during the week, and since hubby works nights it gives me much needed me time. That makes me feel guilty enough but it’s healthy for the both of us. Gives her some bonding time with Loli and gives me some cool down time. I have some mental issues and I use that time to clean what I neglected and take a long meditative bath. Don’t get me wrong my baby is my highest priority I might forget to feed me, but she gets every bottle on time, never has a dirty diaper, gets plenty of cuddles, and a bath nearly every day. (Some days she falls asleep early before her bath.) I am blessed with a very easy baby, but even if I wasn’t anyone who knows me will tell you maternal instincts run very deep with me. Even with people that aren’t my kids. Which is probably why self care is hard for me. I forget to eat (have for years), I don’t sleep, I often forget to actually shower when I shower, I might wear the same clothes for three days straight normally pjs. Since I got pregnant I have gotten way better about it because I had to take care of me for her, which is why even after I had her I stayed with my mom for a couple of weeks , and now the amazing woman gives me breaks from time to time.

All this said, I still feel like shit. I’m on the petite (short) side and my daughter followed in my foot steps. She only weighed five pounds six ounces at birth, and despite everyone telling me she’s fine I feel like it’s my fault. In the beginning of my pregnancy I got very sick and dropped thirty pounds. I was constantly dehydrated and started having Braxton Hicks at 20 weeks. At 23 weeks I was put in the hospital with a bad bad bladder infection and I was like this until I hit about thirty weeks. At that point they discovered I was carrying a lot of water but after THREE diabetes tests they couldn’t figure out why. Finally at 39 weeks I went into labor. I checked into the hospital at 8:50pm my water broke at about twenty after 9 and my daughter was here just before 11. Two hours. My contractions weren’t even where my doctor said they should be if I had waited I would have had my daughter in a parking lot. So when she was small, and looked like a premie I freaked out. Well in my head. I just knew I had done something wrong, I wasn’t strong enough to keep enough food down, it was my fault. Then three days after she was born her first doctor accused me of smoking while I was pregnant. I was furious, and hurt, and I cried the whole way home. (For the record I did not! Didn't even drink caffeine and suffered medication free through depression and migraines.) We scheduled a new doctor and later found out my daughter was supposed to be on every week observation and the original doctor failed to mention this. At her two month visit she was still wearing newborn clothes and was only the same size as some of my friends week old babies. About that time breast feeding had failed, despite everything my lactation consultant and my doctor told me my milk just flat dried up. I bawled in the store the day I bought her formula. Still her new doctor (who is fabulous and wonderful and such a better fit for my family) assures me she is completely healthy, and she is such a happy baby. Still I look at her terrified and anxious and just know that I have done something wrong by her somewhere. I got water on her face once in the tub and called my mom crying after I got her out and in pjs, my baby hadn’t even noticed. She hit a growth spurt and ate one less bottle a day for almost a week because she was sleeping so much. I almost had a break down. She just had her four month check and I was almost in tears waiting for the doctor because I was afraid she hadn't gained enough weight or wasn’t eating enough. Now I know this is all normal stuff for some babies. Anyone who sees my baby tells me she’s gorgeous and looks so happy and healthy, and I know she’s ok. But my guilt triggered anxiety will not stop that voice in the back of my head that says I’m doing something wrong. I’m a hoverer, she never goes anywhere without me other than my mom’s. I rarely even leave her with my husband. I managed to keep her illness free despite giving birth right in the middle of flu season, while I myself had the flu. Despite my friends kids getting RSV multiple times. (She still hasn’t been around kids that weren’t family, and even then not until she was three months old.) She’s not in daycare. (even if I worked we couldn’t afford the sky high prices here or avoid the over crowding and multiple state violations…) Mind you she still gets plenty of socialization my mom visits often so do my husbands grandparents and a friend of mine I’ve known for twelve years. She occasionally goes to church with my mother, or her office if I have an appointment. She loves people, didn’t get that from me. I AM doing everything right within my power. I know I’m a good mother. But still there’s that voice…