Adventures in Parenting

A parent’s perspective – baby comes first

Published on June 26, 2014 by a.simple.mamaLeave a comment

Ever since we’ve become parents, the Hubs and I have spent less time away from home, less time away from each other, and as little time as possible away from J. As soon as that little one enters your world, they become your #1 priority. Besides that, you WANT them to be your #1 priority. You will find yourself choosing spending time at home with you little one and you family over spending time away. The things that you enjoy doing and find yourself missing doing, you will find yourself choosing your little one over those things. It’s a choice that you start to make automatically. It’s barely registers as a “decision” actually. It became so automatic to us that we don’t even question it anymore.

A close friend asked the Hubs to go on a long weekend camping trip the other day. In the pre-baby days, the Hubs would have jumped at the opportunity – backpacking and camping with the guys for a few nights in a row would have been close to heaven for him. Fast-forward to post-baby days…total change of mind. The Hubs didn’t even ask me if it would be OK for him to go away for a few nights. Instead he already knows and already has decided that he doesn’t like to be away from J (and maybe me too) for more than a night. A baby changes everything.

What was particularly interesting about this specific situation was that this friend got pretty upset about the Hubs not wanting to spend more than one night away. It wasn’t that Hubs couldn’t spend more than one night…although it wouldn’t make me very happy…but that he did not want to. Funny how it changes, huh? It has very little to do with the Hubs not wanting to spend time with his friends doing something he enjoys, and has everything to do with spending as much time with your little one as you possibly can.

I remember how the Hubs and I used to be in the pre-baby days. Knowing us we probably would have been a little annoyed at a friend who would turn down what seemed like an awesome opportunity to get away for the sake of having a family or something similar. I get it, I’ve been there. But now it’s almost comical when someone uses your choice to stay home with the kiddo as a means to be upset over your decision. Your whole perspective changes the minute that little one comes into the world.

A little Torticollis, a little Flat Head Syndrome

Published on June 10, 2014February 6, 2020 by a.simple.mama1 Comment

As new parents there are and will be many many things that you’ll do wrong. Or that you’ll be totally unaware of. Or that you’ll have no idea even exists as a potential problem, until you do that thing and it affects your child.

As new parents ourselves, we had no idea how hard surfaces and a tendency to turn his head one direction would cause not only a giant flat spot on the back side of J’s head but that it would also affect the muscles in his neck. When he was really tiny I’d lay him on my desk at my office (which was the best place to keep an eye and a hand on him)…this is way before he started rolling, don’t worry. Who knew that this hard surface would lead to such a flat area on the right-back side of J’s head?! And who knew that you had to pay close attention to the side of the head your little one likes to lay on?! Well, these are all things that you learn ONLY if these things happen to your kid!

We’d only just noticed that J’s head was a little flat right before we headed to his 3 month appointment. Of course the Doc noticed as soon as he walked in the door. Dead giveaway is when the baby isn’t looking straight up at the ceiling…for further reference. Apparently what happens is that when they tend to turn their head only to one side (J preferred the right) that the neck muscles tighten on that side, and stretch on the other side. So to resolve this you have to stretch the neck the other direction to loosen that side and even up the lengths and strengths of the muscles. So began the many weeks of neck stretches. BTW babies don’t particularly like this. You have to hold them down and gently tilt their head the opposite direction of whichever way they normally tend to tilt it. Then you also rotate their neck from side to side. Yeah…so much fun to do this while they are screaming at you. Makes you feel like you’re torturing them.

The flat spot on his head the Doc described to us as when you push on one corner of a cardboard box and the opposite corner also tilts out-of-place. J had “plagiocephaly” as shown in the pic below.

To correct this and avoid needing a helmet, we had to very closely watch which side of his head he laid on at all times. For the first few weeks we had to do everything in our power to keep him from laying on the right side of his head. Not so easy, let me tell ya. It involved tilting his body to one side when he was laying or sleeping, and using extra padding around the head support in his car seat. We also used the Tortle – a hat or sorts that was created specifically to help with torticollis and Flat Head Syndrome in infants. It worked pretty well when J was still little enough not to squirm too much, but we had to stop using it once he could wiggle his head enough to get the “tail” of the hat moved around. Another product I learned about much later was the Baby Elephant Ears – this product would really help towards prevention of torticollis and FHS, and is super cute too!

Luckily for us it only took a few weeks of doing the exercises and making sure to even out which side J laid on to get the flat spot to mostly go away and for the neck muscles to even out. By his 6 month appointment he was as back to “normal” as we would be able to get him.

Such a silly little oversight, but something that I warn all my new parent friends about. J will always have a slightly flat spot and misshapen head to go with it, but luckily we caught it early enough to correct it enough that you can’t tell unless you know what you’re looking for. Even after years of childcare for infants, I’d never seen either Torticollis or FHS…but hopefully now you can share this information with your fellow first-time parents and avoid a little headache 🙂

Other Kids Parents

Published on June 2, 2014 by a.simple.mamaLeave a comment

Every parent is guilty of judgement of other parents. Whether it be their parenting style, their discipline methods, their hygiene or dietary prerogative, etc. We are also all guilty of judging other people’s kids – but that’s a whole other blog… We all find ourselves at one point or another saying “I love how they did that _____, I want to remember to do that with my kids”, or “eesh I’ll never treat my kids like that.” Guilty as charged. We all do it. But what happens when the words of a parent appear just plain mean? Not when spoken to the child necessarily, but when spoken about that child to another adult or other children.

I was a teacher in childcare for 5 years or so, and now being a parent there have been several “habits” of other adults – not always other parents – that have really started to hit a sore spot for me. Mainly I am finding it very hard to accept anyone speaking ill of a child. Especially when this person should be the one that is supporting and standing up for the child. To be very specific I have two examples that I’ve come across – both recently and as part of my teaching experience.

When I was a teacher there were always those “problem children”. Unfortunately these kiddos seem to struggle in a number of tasks and are forever deemed as “problems” or “pain-in-the-asses”. Even as teachers we fall into the trap of not being able to like every kid that crosses our path. It’s the unwritten rule though that teachers of all people should love all of their students. And we do, each in their own way, but as Kate Hudson puts it in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days – “I love you…but I don’t have to like you right now.” Same goes for teachers. And really for parents too… Anyway, it’s silly to think that every person will get along with everyone right? So why would you expect every child to get along with every adult and visa-versa? Sometimes people just clash. Yet in the teaching profession it is not acceptable to mock, speak ill of, or degrade a child in any way. Not acceptable. Now it obviously happens, but I’ve found it increasingly annoying to hear any of these types of disrespect towards a child coming from an adult who should be someone in a supportive role for that kid. You may not agree with the way that child has been brought up, you may think that child needs to learn how to sit still or how to listen better, and that child may get on your very last nerve. I’ve been there – I know that some kids just drive you crazy, and I’m sure that I’ve been one of the guilty ones who’s talked badly about this child or that child. But there is just something about listening to another adult speak ill of a child that gets to me.

The most specific example I have of this occurred recently and is really probably a better way of explaining why this particular type of talk gets to me. In this instance the parent is a step-parent. Now I know nothing about the relationship between a child and a step-parent. So excuse me if I am totally off base here and over-judging. But as a parent on any level, how can you complain about a child? How can you complain about a child that you are caring for? The role of a parent in this case differs from the role of a teacher, so in my mind it is completely wrong to place judgement on your own child. In most cases, children are doing the best with what they have been given in life. Yet somehow the blame for the child’s actions go punishable onto the child themselves. So why does this parent feel the need to speak ill of this child to me? Or why does any adult/parent/teacher feel that it is OK to speak ill of any child to anyone else?

This is something that I’m really struggling with today. How do you react to a comment made about a child that you know nothing about, but whom probably doesn’t deserve to be degraded in this way? And worse is knowing that I’ve done this myself as a teacher and been fed up with certain children. Do we think that we will get support for feeling this way? I feel like that is really the only explanation for needing to air such dirty laundry to other people. But how do you not almost take it personally when someone speaks badly to you about a child you know nothing about?

Do other parents struggle with this? How do you react without placing further judgement onto the child or the adult themselves? How do you mind your own business while supporting your friend or fellow parent with their struggles?

Religion as a Family

Published on May 26, 2014May 26, 2014 by a.simple.mamaLeave a comment

I grew up Catholic. Every Sunday was church, and I went though First Communion and Confirmation too. We weren’t over-the-top religious, but God was something/someone who was known in my house growing up. Once I went off to college I pretty much stopped going to church. With the exception of a few times when I was home for the summer, or for Christmas mass. The Hubby grew up Jehovah’s Witness. His family however did celebrate Christmas and Birthdays unlike other JW’s I’d known as a kid. He chose to stop going to church when he was 13.

When we started seriously dating, we had a general talk about what our religion was and if we were to practice where we would go etc. At the time neither of us was particularly interested in practicing by going to church. We are both believers in a God, but neither of us feel that we need to go to a certain place at a certain time to show our belief.

Now that we have J, we probably should have the conversation again. I want to be able to teach J about God. In whatever form we choose to do though, is a little up in the air. Do we teach him ourselves but leave out some of the pieces and parts that neither of us choose to focus our beliefs on? Or do we introduce him to a church of some kind once he’s old enough to understand what he’s being told and let him learn a specific story?

I do want to teach him how to pray. No matter what religion you are, or even if you aren’t religious at all I think that Praying is something that is essential to a happy and healthy life. That’s my own personal opinion. I feel that through prayer you can be thankful and go through the process of asking for forgiveness from God (or whatever or whomever you believe is out there) or it can just be a way to speak your mind and come to some inner peace.

Then there’s the question of baptism. I was baptized, but I came from a family that practiced a specific religion. Same with the Hubby. I have nothing against baptism, nor do I feel strongly that J must be baptized. I like the idea and the principle of baptism. But I also don’t want to baptize J because I feel like I should, nor do I want to pick some random church to have him baptized when I feel like that is something that should be practiced in a much more comfortable and known environment.

My feeling at this point is at some point the Hubs and I may decide that we are wanting more of an organized or practiced religion as part of our lives. Or once J is school aged, we could introduce him to a Sunday School type program where he can learn the story behind a generic Christian religion. Or maybe we’ll teach him that there is something greater out there, something bigger than us, someone who we can talk to no matter what. Then when he’s old enough to make his own decisions he’ll be free to choose to practice or not practice whatever he wants.

For now, we will teach him acceptance, love, humility, how to be thankful, family values and to be proud of all his accomplishments – big or small.

“Mama knows best” syndrome

Published on May 21, 2014 by a.simple.mamaLeave a comment

As a new parent, you’ll find that you generally aren’t all that open to trying other people’s suggestions and opinions on how to raise your child. Generally. However we are much more willing to take advice from so-called experts through books on online postings. Whether it has to do with sleep schedules, potty training, vaccinations etc. etc., I’ve found it increasingly hard to take other parents advice unless I specifically ask for it. That being said I am also guilty of this when it comes to my own hubby and his ideas about J.

As you know, J still doesn’t sleep through the night. The hubby has basically refused to get up with him anytime during the night unless I make him take a turn (which I generally don’t). On a good night J wakes up about every 4 hours, which is pretty decent…albeit not ideal. Tonight Hubby suggested that we should try putting J to bed later than his usual 7pm bedtime to see if that makes a difference. Maybe if we wear him out more, he’ll sleep longer – was his rational. My immediate answer? NO.

Aaaaand that’s where my “mama knows best” syndrome reared its ugly head. My reasoning? Well everything that I’ve read from said so-called experts, is that when kiddos wake up early that means that you need to put them to bed earlier. Doesn’t really make sense…but in our previous trials with bedtime, it did seem to help to put J to bed earlier. And I don’t want to screw with his bedtime schedule. Turns out I do this a lot. Almost always actually. Whenever Daddy makes a suggestion I tell him why he’s wrong and we end up continuing with whatever we were doing before.

At this point I feel like it’s reflex. After all, I should know my little one best right? I can’t say that I like being “that mama” though. I don’t think I realized how anti-suggestion I was until the Hubbs pointed it out. I’m probably more polite about it with other people. And actually I think I’m much better at swapping ideas with other mama’s. Why I feel the need to say NO to all the Hubby’s ideas is a little confusing.

Oh, the things you discover about yourself as you are also discovering the many twists and turns of parenthood! Thankfully I have a wonderful Hubby who doesn’t take my Crazy Mama moments too seriously 🙂