Happy Halloween from the Little Dragon

Even More Fierce

Hello. I have updated my blog header to signify my new, fiercer persona. Since going off the happy drugs, I feel different but in a good way. I haven't discussed this with a therapist or anything, but to me it feels like I was using the drugs to jam down my feelings and not deal with stuff that was making me angry. I've definitely had some big anger as the fluoxetine has drained from my system but it feels like GOOD anger to me. I am starting to stand up for myself again and I like it. The gloves have come off. Everything in me says I needed to do this.

Besides that, my life has gotten measurably better since Anna has been sleeping in bed with me (or with US if Uri is home). I think the extra contact and time together is grounding her somehow. We both face the day with more confidence and leave each other feeling a bit more connected. She is such a cuddle bug, we share the same pillow all night and are always touching. I really like it actually. Also she sleeps in! Like past 6:00 am! Today we slept until 6:45 which is pretty much the perfect wake up time in my book.

The other thing that's making a big difference is having Fridays off. That extra day is well worth the 20% pay cut. If any of you working moms out there have any chance to do this - jump at it. And if you don't have the chance, see about making it for yourself. A day to get things done has been so amazing.

God Bless America. That is all.

Girls' Weekend

Howdy y'all. I am back from The Blathering in Austin. I don't roll with a camera so at this point I have only one picture:

Don't you love my jaunty chapeau?

Thanks to Elizabeth for taking it (with much better resolution than is shown here in my crappy screen grab). If you are interested in seeing more pictures from the event, peops are putting their pictures in this Flickr pool.

This year was much larger than last year and I didn't get a chance to talk to everyone there. I did enjoy each woman I did get to talk to and laugh with about various things such as kids (of course), husbands, work, life, mothers, in-laws, vibrators, jail, bitches, books, hard times, medication, college days and certain pieces of yonic art.

Trip highlights for me:

• Finally meeting Hillary and Michelle - who were kind enough to pick us up from the airport. No one does this in LA. so I was really blown away by it. They also shuttled our moochy asses all around town.
• Seeing the funky end of Congress Street in Austin - totally redeemed my thoughts about the city after our last trip there. Also helpful to have a local guide showing us around and shooting the shit with us (who was a total trooper because she's 8 mos preggers!)
• South Congress Cafe
• Watching The Help with ma roomie (who has a better weekend wrap up), in our hotel beds while eating chocolate and drinking wine. (The movie is BETTER than the book - rent it!)
• Sharing life stories with other fabulous women. Feeling like we're all in this together.
• And to top it all off? Having Sunday all to myself. Sleeping in until 10:30 on Sunday, followed by a leisurely lunch downtown and a massage at the airport. Not to say that the high point of this weekend was alone time but just hey, that's living the dream right? The weekend was the perfect mix of awesome camaraderie and blissful zen time.

Thank you to the Organizers for putting all of this together. I love the idea of the event - just a place where bloggers can get together and chat, have a chance to put a face to the writing. Most of my IRL friends don't blog so there is just something special about getting together with women who do.

Thank you Uri for allowing this to happen for me and ALSO for making dinner and changing Anna's poopy diaper once I was home. (He doesn't usually read this blog but just in case.)

It was so nice to recharge. I feel like I've been slogging through lately and it was just the thing I needed. I was so happy to see my family when I got home, being away helped me to appreciate the day to day that much more. Girls' Weekends are the BEST.

Blathering Here I Come

So I noticed a few people have been posting 13 things to know before the Blathering, which I think is neat. I  punted on the accent vlog so I think I should make an effort here on the 13 things. Okay. 13 things... and go!

1. I find it really difficult to think of witty and hilarious things to say on the blog that will make people want to meet me. Sometimes I have no idea why people even read my blog at all but I feel like my best blog asset is my honesty. My whole thing is trying to put it out there so other people can feel like someone is in this mess with them.
2. I got a scathingly horrible blog review this year. I am not linking to it here because f those guys, but if you search, you can probably find the link somewhere in the archives. At the end of the day, I'm not sure how it affected my blogging but it did really piss me off.
3. I loooove girls nights. I am still close with a big group of my college sorority friends and we try to meet up at least one a month (although sometimes it goes like 5 months) just to drink wine and eat tidbits. I am looking forward to a weekend long girls night at the Blathering. Bring it!!!!
4. I went to the Blathering last year. I really enjoyed the first night where we all hung out in the Blathering Living Room (also the condo I stayed in because I was lucky). I have extremely fond memories of the next afternoon, watching many episodes of LA Ink while drinking leftover wine and eating leftover cheese with this girl and I'm super bummed she's not coming this time.  I'll admit the wine was pretty much all me and I may have cried at some of the more touching episodes. Was it the wine? Was it the extreme emotional release of having a weekend away from my young child? Was it the fantastic writing? We'll never know.
5. Like this Erica, I am loud and often things just fly out of my mouth. This tends to get worse in group situations and worse still when I have had a drink. Sorry about that. In high school we had a retreat (small Catholic school) where they put up a picture of each girl as a slideshow and said one word that described her. Lots of words like "kind", "creative",  "understanding", etc. I got "frank". Well then.
6. My husband travels a lot so I'm often "lone wolf" as K likes to call it. (PS K, it hurts my soul that I don't get to meet you this weekend!)
7. Besides the lone wolf thing, I also work. It's not currently popular to say what I do until the whole OWS thing blows over but I'll tell you that I'm not diverting money from the people to fund my lavish lifestyle. I am a cog. My title is "Director of Investor Relations" but it's more like "Everybody's Bitch" (see it explained better here at iheartchocolatecake).
8. My sister came out (as in being gay) in the last couple of years. This is the first time I've mentioned here as it's her story but I feel like the process is far enough along that I can just go ahead and say it. I've learned that it's not just a one time statement, it takes time and you basically reinvent your whole life. She's also taught me a lot about the "heterosexual paradigm". She is so super awesome and sometimes blogs and I wish she would do it more.
9. It's been hard for me to keep up with all the "meet the attendees" and blogs of ALL the people going to the Blathering this year. This Erica has a spreadsheet about it - maybe I should just borrow that. However, my "meet people plan" is just to go with the flow. I am really excited to meet some of my bloggy friends in person and just shoot the shit with peops. And drink. Sorry, I really have to mention this because I am so Eddie and Patsy sometimes. Probably more Eddie. "Like a bird, on a wire. ... Like a drunk in a midnight choir. I have tried in my way to be free."
10. I am wearing this on Saturday night. Yes it is vintage 80's and not a perfect fit. But I don't know, I am just FEELING it. Notice it says right in the description: Great for parties, dinner dates or any fun evening event. 
11.  I love the Internet so hard.
12. I am really liberal in many ways but I don't discuss politics with people except my sister mainly because we agree on most things. It's small of me I know but I really dislike arguing. 
13. I can't wait to meet all of you. LET'S DO THIS THING Y'ALL!

It's Always the One Time

Most of the time, I put on makeup and try to look presentable when leaving the house. Partially because you never know who you are going to run in to, but more because I just feel better about myself when I do. Sunday was different. Anna had been up coughing much of the night and I was tired. She woke up at 6:00 cranky and we hung out for a bit in the house, in a funk, and then I decided we'd just get out and go to breakfast. Breakfast cheered us up a bit and then I swung by the pharmacy to get Anna's prescription.

As I was walking into the pharmacy with Anna on my hip, I run into my first boyfriend. With his new wife. They looked great, walking their dogs without a care in the world, the relaxed easy weekend morning that only people without small kids seem to have. When I say first boyfriend, I mean seriously old school growing up neighborhood. What is he doing at my strip mall after all these years? Arg. I am pretty flustered and the whole time I'm doing the awkward hellos I'm just thinking about how terrible I look. I know, vanity. But really, it was a bad scene. Under eye circles, hat, frumpy outfit. At least my brow was beautifully smooth and Anna looked cute. As I drove away in my mini-mini van, I thought wow - I am SUCH a MOM. Usually I am pleased about this role and enjoy it but ugh, when you run into old boyfriends you always want to look HOT. I was definitely NOT.

Damn it.

Breaking Free

For a while, my anger was just too raw. I found myself seeing red in all sorts of situations that really didn't warrant much attention. I was drowning and I couldn't see a way out. That's when my OB recommended Prozac. So nice! So helpful. It was like a warm fuzzy cocoon wrapped around me and the sharp edges of life could no longer pierce into my skin. I bumped slowly along with glorious detachment. I needed it.

But then, I was considering a second child. I knew I had to ditch the drugs and I was having trouble doing it. My regular doctor prescribed going down from 20 to 10 mg before trying to quit. So I did it. Then I started going every other day and things were fine. At some point during the process I decided that another child wasn't in the cards right now. I thought about just staying on the drugs because they are cheap and they help. But the cocoon was starting to feel stifling. As much as I love being protected from the lows, my bubble was also dampening the highs. I missed that part of me - the slightly manic being who just FEELS so strongly. I missed my passion, my conviction. I started skipping the pills more often and then I stopped taking them altogether. I am not out of the woods yet, folks. It takes about 45 days for the drugs to completely leave my system. So we'll see.

I'm not going to feel like I failed if I have to go back on them - but I just want to try, I want to see. I lived 33 years without the help so I'm going to try flying solo again. It seems like my life has been getting easier incrementally and the Prozac was a bridge through a particularly difficult time. I hope.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not turning all natural and against every drug. I still love my daily Zyrtec as the life changing substance that it is, and I love me some retinoids and botox for my mug. And of course, my good old friend wine - the 25th letter of the alphabet. But I wouldn't mind getting some of my sex drive back (sorry but it's true) and just feeling more like the old me.

Here goes nothing.

Bedtime Battles

Sleeping isn't easy for any new parents but I feel like we've had more than our share of challenges. When I was pregnant with Anna, I was very big into reading the Dr. Sears Attachment Parenting books so I planned to co-sleep. We did it for a while when she was a newborn because it made night time breast feeding easier. However, it was stressful to me because I was always afraid Anna would get strangled in the blankets or I'd roll onto her or the cats would come and smother her or something awful like that. So I didn't sleep that well. Then we had her crib in our room until she was about 2 months old. I just couldn't take it anymore after that because I would wake up at every tiny sound she made. Then it was the accursed monitor for what seems like forever. I hate that thing.

Since Anna was very small, she has fought bedtime with a passion. There were times when I would rock her in the rocking chair for 40 minutes while she screamed and tried to push herself out of my arms. Not exactly what you envision when you think about rocking peacefully with your baby. Once we outgrew the rocking chair routine, we had the book routine - which often took over 5 books to get her calmed down enough to get in bed. Then I would sit by the crib and rub her back forever, and still sometimes she would completely flip out when I left the room. There were stretches of months where she would only go to bed after violently crying herself to sleep for anywhere from a few minutes to half an hour. I know there are a lot of strong feelings about the "cry it out" method but man, I couldn't see a way around it. I had to eat some dinner and get to bed myself!

Once we had the toddler bed up and running, the routine got longer. I would often lie in bed with her and rub her back, getting her to sleep. Sometimes I thought she was asleep and would leave the room, only to have a baby running amok around the house shortly after. We would go through this in and out of the bedroom routine up to five times. Bedtime was a tough time for everyone and it left me completely exhausted and out of sorts. Two years of this and it just kind of gets to you.

Lately, we've been doing things completely differently. As she's gotten older, Anna's bedtime has slowly pushed back. We started at the terribly early hour of 6:00 am because she was just exhausted (from fighting naps!), then moved back to 7:00, then 8:00, then 8:30. Last night she didn't go to bed until 9:40 pm. I know it sounds crazy but she is fine staying up that late. No signs of super crankiness (except the usual battle over wearing pjs after her bath) and she happily plays games on her iPad while Uri and I read and get stuff done on ours. (Yes, everyone in our family has an iPad and I think it's great.) I no longer fight to get her to fall asleep in her own bed. We just have lights out all together and then everyone (including the two cats) hits the hay in the family bed. Our bed is kind of full but it's cozy and it works. For a while, Uri would carry Anna to her bed after she fell asleep. This just resulted in a crying girl running into our room around 2:00 am. So we just decided to leave her in our bed.

The upside is that I don't have to fight with her about going to sleep every single night. She is perfectly content to fall asleep when we do. (Luckily I go to sleep before 10:00.) Another good thing is that she tends to sleep in longer when we're all sleeping together. Sometimes even until 7:30 which is some kind of record. She does kick us sometimes or head bonk me but all in all it's comfortable and actually I really enjoy snuggling with her in the night and smelling her little head. Sometimes we sleep face to face with our arms wrapped around each other and it's so precious.

Uri turned to me last night and said, "is she going to sleep in our bed forever?" I just don't know. I am guessing that at some point she'll eventually want privacy and enjoy her own room. Until then, we're just winging it. And it's kind of working.

Oktoberfest

My good friend and event planner extraordinaire had an Octoberfest party last weekend. It was amazing. Uri's dad came with us and they had a little photo area set up. Cute stuff:

Baby Clothes

Baby Clothes. Definitely the item in my home that causes the most worry and gnashing of teeth. The thing is, I have a LOT of them waiting around. I saved all of Anna's stuff, and my friend gave me her baby girl stuff as well. I loaned it all to another friend who had a girl and just got a huge shipment of it back. The problem is, if I give it away - it's pushing me further towards the "one and done" thing. If I store them, they are a pain in my arse and also in the small chance that I did have another kid, there is another small chance that I would have a boy. So all this storing would have been in vain.

But until now, I've avoided the decision because most of the baby clothes were not at my house. Now that they are back, arg. It's time to decide. But just like that, an answer came to me. I got an email that my neighborhood is having a joint yard sale on Saturday. PERFECT. Baby clothes are popular at yard sales so I'll price my stuff to move. Also Uri just hit up his favorite annual sale to stock his wardrobe up and so I've got some really nice man duds to sell as well.

Any suggestions on how to price things? I have a ton of onesies, cute outfits, separates, sweaters, receiving blankets, hats, shoes, etc. Also, man duds? Designer jeans, long sleeve collar shirts? Thoughts?

Anna Sings the ABC's

Everyone has been doing these cute accent vlogs. I don't think I have an accent so well, I thought that might be boring. Instead, a video of Anna singing the ABC's.





And yes, "wine" is the 25th letter.