Reflection and Mama-time

I find myself doing a lot of reflecting these days. Man, life has changed. Not in the "I used to be so independent and selfish and now I am tied down to a baby" kind of way - in fact - the farthest thing from it. I LOVE with a super-capital L being a mom. It fulfills me just as I always knew it would, and I feel so privileged to have a wonderful, sweet, adorable baby to love and take care of. It is completely wholesome and satisfying and it is just "for me." I am meant to be a mom; this I know without a doubt.

The kind of reflecting I'm talking about has to do with identity. Balance. I grew up with a huge goal of being a successful, independent, working woman. My sister and I were raised by a single mom, and this was stressed (lovingly) in our household all the time. Do not depend on a man for your financial strength. Do well in school. Succeed. I think it was great - because today both my sister and I are highly motivated, hard-working gals. No, we aren't Ivy League grads or Nobel Prize contenders, but we are good at what we do - and hey, we have some personality too. I think we are both unique and gifted and ambitious. That's all you can really ask for, right?

Well, now that I am a mama, you all know I took a shortened schedule at work. Many of you have asked me how it's going. Truth be told, it's going great. Far better than I could have imagined. When I'm at work, I'm "on." There is no Perez Hilton... Facebook... playtime. I am focused, motivated, and on point. I love that feeling. But yet... I still feel like I'm not doing enough. Because I leave at 3pm everyday. Because I don't work on Fridays. Even though I get there at 7:30 am in the mornings. Even though I get up at 5:20 am every morning to make sure I'm up and ready before little Maya wakes up. Even though I'm still out of the house 9 hours a day (with my commute). Even though I am always reachable and check emails and call in when I'm home. Everyone at work seems happy with the situation. I was assigned some new responsibilities at work when I returned - ones that I would not have gotten if they didn't believe in my abilities or if they didn't like my performance. So why am I stressing about this? I don't know. How can I have it all? If I work like mad, I really can't be a mom. I've tried my best to balance it, and it seems as if I have, but yet, I still feel strangely guilty about it. Oh, why do I torture myself so?

OK, I'm blabbering. Now for a cute little Maya story.

I got home from work at about 4ish on Monday. I walked in and Maya was in her jumperoo, looking oh-so-cute. I went over to the nanny log book and saw that she had just eaten not too long before I came home, but it had been almost 2 hrs since her last nap. OK honey, time for a nappie. There was no way she'd make it to 7pm (her bedtime) without a nap.

So I nursed her a little bit and did our "naptime routine". Well my girl knew what was up, and she did not like it. She started to fuss. Then started to cry. This was all in my arms. I didn't even have a chance to set her in her crib. I tried walking around with her, rocking her, she wasn't having it. She was just getting more hysterical. After a while, I just said eff it (in my head of course). I turned on the lights in her room, and said "You don't want to take a nap? Fine, no nap!"

Oh my goodness. She immediately stopped crying, and looked at me, then around the room, in a little bit of shock/surprise. Then she looked back at me, and the BIGGEST grin appeared on her face. I just melted right there. It was so damn cute! She was so happy that I cancelled her nap!

We spent the next hour just playing on the floor in her room. Lots of kisses, and tummy time (my girl loves tummy time), and blowing raspberries, and Eskimo kisses. She was in pure delight. So was I!

I thought about it, and it made sense. I'm gone all day long, and then I get home and I try to put her down for a nap? Poor thing wants some mama-time! That totally makes sense - dummy me.

So Tuesday morning, I told the nanny to stretch the time between her naps a bit longer - so that she'd be waking up around 4ish. That way when I come home, it's play-time!

We've played and shared a million kisses on her pink rug every afternoon this week. Pure freaking delight. :)

Our big adventure

I don't work Fridays, so I really take the opportunity to savor some alone time with little Maya. Yesterday my mom came over in the morning and we hung out; it was really nice. I had arranged to meet another mama at a great kids clothing store in Santa Monica - Life Size at Fred Segal... which is about 10 miles away from my house. A really good friend of mine works there and they are having a huge sale right now. We were going to shop a bit and then walk down to the beach and have lunch. Beautiful idea, right?

We had a really nice time. The weather was infectiously nice... blue skies, calm ocean, sweet warm air. I was walking back to my car and noticed it was 2:45 pm. Crap.... I really needed to get a move-on because Friday traffic is a nightmare and I didn't want to get caught up in it with a baby. Plus, Maya had been snoozing away in her stroller and that meant she probably wouldn't do too much sleeping in the car.

I thought about feeding her before heading out on the road, but she was very content, so I figured I'd just get on my way and not waste any time. We got on the freeway, and about 2 minutes into my drive, I noticed a big electronic saying that there was an accident up ahead (at the exit before mine) and that the 3 right lanes were shut down.

Fukc.

It took 30 minutes to transition to the freeway I needed to get on (the lovely 405). THANK the lord, Maya fell asleep in the car. I was so panicky.... if she woke up and started wailing, I would have no options... Stuck on a freeway that wasn't moving.

As soon as I could get off the freeway, I did. The exit was Santa Monica Blvd, and if anyone is familiar with this area during rush hour/traffic you know what a clusterfukc it can be. I figured I'd take the side streets. I was going to cruise through Brentwood and take Barrington up to Sunset. All was well with that plan until I heard huge sirens and saw helicopters ahead. Traffic on Barrington at a standstill. There was apparently some huge accident/car fire on Sunset Blvd. You had to be kidding me. It was awful. I called my mom and H basically so freaked out about how I was going to get home.

I got off Barrington and jumped on Bundy.

Maya woke up and started to fuss and I knew she must be hungry. I pulled over off of Bundy (famous street where OJ and Nicole Simpson lived) and nursed her. Mind you, she decided to pick this day to start a nursing strike. I think she has gotten used to getting bottles during the day from the nanny, so nursing is just far too much work. She was crying and I felt so at a loss.... all I could offer her was me. Thank god, she eventually did go for it. I could see traffic ahead up at a complete standstill on Sunset. After nursing and changing her, Maya was in the sweetest mood! I had to play along like I was in the sweetest mood too, but I wasn't! I was freaking out!

We got back in the car and I tried to see if there was some alternate street I could take. I looked in my GPS and saw a little road up in the canyon that could be a shortcut. We drove ALL the way up, only to see that it is a private city road that was gated off. Shit!! Down we went, back to the parking lot that was Sunset Blvd.

I told Maya we were just going to have to be strong and get through it. Onto Sunset we went. I sang songs to her, just tried to be as positive as I could. She was such a trooper. After a while she started to fuss (how long can a baby tolerate being in the car!?) so I gave her the paci and thankfully she took it.

There were many more little incidents along the way, but we FINALLY made it home. 2.5 hours later. To go 10 freaking miles. Oh my goodness. I really felt desperate... like I was in a battle that I had no control over. That's what LA traffic can be like.

From now on, we are staying really close to home on Fridays. Never freaking again.

Head is spinning

I'm just thinking about how much has gone on in the last week... and it makes my head spin! It's not just "things" that have happened or are happening, but it's also just where my mind is at.

Let's get to it, shall we?

1. Maya - my dear, sweet love. Oh, how I love this girl! Let me count the ways... She is SUCH a good little baby... her smile makes me melt... she has such good spirits... she sleeps 11-12 hours a night (I know this can change!)... I can just go on and on. I love this girl more than I ever could have imagined, and then some. It's so cliche to say it, but everything I do, I do it for her (cue Bryan Adams). It's true. I get up at 5:30 in the morning to get ready for work before she wakes up... I go to work with high hopes and ambitions... and I get out of there on the dot so I can hurry my little butt home to scoop her up. She is my true love! I just can't get enough of her.

We celebrated her 3 month birthday last Sunday... She wasn't much in the mood for pictures, but she allowed us one behind-the-scenes shot.


The paparazzi kept pestering her while she was on her break, and she did not appreciate one bit.


LOL. Ha! I love her faces.

2. Nanny - So, I was back to work this week (see #3 below). We've had our nanny working two days a week for the past month, as she needed to start earning some money, and it gave us an opportunity to get used to each other. Well, this week it was 100% nanny. I was not around to give her a hand, let her eat lunch, etc. Overall, I think she did well. I think it totally wiped her out though... it's different when you are taking care of a baby 100% on your own. I think Maya did OK too, and for this it was really good that she started working with us a month ago. I have log sheets that she fills out detailing stuff about Maya's day (how much she ate, "bathroom breaks", naps, etc).

So, more about the nanny. She is a great cook! And she cooked the 3 nights that she was here. I got home from work at 4ish, scooped up little Maya, and told the nanny to go rest. So for 2 hours or so, she was upstairs, resting, watching TV, whatever. Then she came down, and cooked! Whee! Monday night it was Chicken Milanese, or Schnitzel, Tuesday night it was lemon garlic Sole, and last night it was some Bolivian chicken dish with onions, green peas, and tomatoes. All were great (though the Bolivian dish wasn't my favorite) and it's SO nice having dinner made for you. It's great that she's a worker bee and really doesn't know how "not" to do something, because it would make me feel really uncomfortable if I had to ask her to cook or something. She just steps right up to the plate. She also cleans too. Pretty sweet deal.

So you may be wondering, do I have any reservations about the nanny? Well.... a few. She calls Maya "Mi bebe." Which means "my baby." Ugh. I hate it. She's not "tu bebe", she's MY BABY! I mentioned this to my mom a few weeks ago when I noticed she did it for the first time, and my mom scoffed at my complaint, telling me it was really silly to worry about it. Well my mom came by the house on Monday to see little Maya (and also check on the nanny), and she did it in front of my mom. And it also really irritated her! So the other day I told her "No es tu bebe... Es mi bebe!" Excuse the poor Spanish. But I basically told her that Maya is my baby, not hers. I don't care if you want to call her "my doodlebug" or "my paycheck", but she is not your baby. I think I took her by surprise when I told her, but she stopped it... until this morning. She said it again, and I told her again. Let's hope it stops.

Another thing that is a bit annoying is that I feel she is trying too hard to prove that Maya likes her. When I get home and I grab little Maya, I want that to be mama baby time... not mama, baby, nanny time. But nanny just hangs out. And is in Maya's face, trying to get her to smile. It's like she's trying to show that Maya prefers her over me or something! H says I'm overreacting, and that she is just new at the job and wants to prove that she is doing a good job. I can appreciate that. I started noticing this on Monday, so when I got home on Tuesday, I took Maya and told her to go upstairs and rest... no chitchat. I didn't let her help with Maya the rest of the night, even though she wanted to help. I feel like when I'm home, it's time for her to step back... clean, cook, whatever. It seems like she's hopefully getting the point.

Overall I like her and I think she's a good lady. It's a transition for all of us. The most important thing is that she is good with Maya, and it seems as if she is.

Oh, and we're getting nanny cams installed tomorrow. Just sayin'....

3. Work - Yes, the dreaded "back to work" week arrived. You all know how much I was dreading this. I think for the last 5 weeks I was seriously stressed about it. Well, maybe all the energy I expelled about it in advance of actual D-Day helped, because it really wasn't bad. Dare I say that it was actually enjoyable?

There was definitely some stress surrounding it. Getting ready for work Monday morning was a whole event Sunday night. I had lunches packed for H and I... bottles for the pump ready to go. My outfit picked out. Everything I'd need neatly arranged by the door. A quasi-schedule of how things were going to go in the morning all established in my head. Going to sleep at 9:30 pm. Waking up at 4:30 am. Unable to go back to sleep. Yes, you heard that right. Out of bed at 5:20 am, thinking I'd just enjoy a leisure cup of coffee in the dark. Decided to get ready in case Maya decided she was going to have an early morning. Good thinking, because Maya did have an early morning. Phew.

It was nice to see everyone at work. I'm currently not in my office as another gal who is pregnant took over my office while I was gone. She goes on maternity leave in March and I'll get it back.

I spent the week getting caught up on my projects, and getting back in the mix. I am a bit irritated, because the guy who took over my accounts while I was gone seems not to understand that I am back now and they're mine again. In our department, historically we have only had account managers... who did everything from customer contact, proposals, teleconferences, to internal planning and project management/scheduling/coordination. A few months before I left on maternity leave, a technically-oriented person from our organization expressed an interest in joining Sales & Marketing. My boss liked the idea of having someone who was well-versed in technical detail and who could manage and get through a lot of the crap Sales and Marketing has to go through in a much swifter fashion. We all agreed - he would function as an "internal" project manager.

Well, when I went on leave, our boss put him in on my projects. I was fine with it, since he's a nice guy and I felt confident he would do a good job. And he did. I bought him a nice bottle of Don Julio to thank him.

So now I'm back and there is a bit of a struggle on his part to let these projects go. I told him that I was back and "thank you very much", and he will still be in on these projects. But he's more of a support function for the account managers. I don't think he gets it. We had a telecon with one of my biggest accounts today and he was trying to run it! Granted, he set it up before I came back to work, but it still really annoyed me.

I mentioned this to my boss today... that I was concerned there was too much of a gray area between the "account manager" function and the "project manager" function, and he basically said he hasn't really worked it out in his head yet. Ummm, he's the department head. THAT'S HIS JOB. He also said that another coworker of mine also expressed some of the same concerns to him. Ugh. So I think I'm going to chat with her on Monday so we can be a cohesive front on this. I do not want to lose my accounts to some guy just because I went on maternity leave. I worked hard to develop the relationship with these people and it's what I like most about my job. And boss had better get to delineating some rules about job function. I mean, you are in a position to manage people only if you know how to manage them.

Sigh... it's a little annoying, but I hope it will be resolved.

Just because I need some cheering up now, here are some recent pics of mi bebe!