Reinventing
Motherhood
Being a mother, in the modern age, means redefining and reinventing what that word means. Being a strong, weak, independent, dependent, hard, soft, loving, stern, icon for your children to look up to and model themselves after. This is what the word mother should mean. Instead, society deems our role as insignificant and lesser than a corporate CEO or even the local store clerk. To add insult to injury, if you are a working mother and happen to be either a local store clerk or a CEO, you are considered lesser than, because your kids are in day care and someone else is raising them. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.
Modern motherhood means being as strong as you can be, so that you can lead, rolemodel and demand the same from others.
All of these articles are also published on www.typeamom.com
| First Time Mom’s Biggest Challenge |
 Advice is everywhere when you're pregnant or caring for a newborn. It’s under the couch, in the kitchen cupboards and at the bottom of your sock drawer. It permeates every fiber of your being. Everybody from family, friends and neighbors to the bookstore shelves. They're overflowing with experts of advice and those "been there, done that" kind of authors. Yet, not one of them prepared me for what was about to happen to me.Now don’t get me wrong, I knew how to play with a baby and keep it safe, but that’s about the extent of my knowledge on the subject. Useful advice was slim pickings in my network of available support. My husband worked two full time jobs. So, short of propping up a baby next to his sleeping body on the couch, he was useless. I didn’t have any friends with kids and, despite my baby being planned, it was as if I had caught a disease. I have never seen people scatter so fast. You might think I yelled “Fire!” Every one of my friends acted as if they would catch the baby disease if they visited too long. What was I thinking? Who was going to tell me what was wrong when the baby cried? My mother? Sad to say, but that would be like asking Mommy Dearest for advice on child care. Maybe the baby fairy? Well, like Santa, I was hoping all the traps I had set would produce their wonderful, magical selves, but the last time I checked they were still empty. The baby would cry and I didn’t know why. He would cry right out of a sound sleep. I didn’t know what was wrong, so I didn’t know how to stop it. If I was lucky enough to have somebody around when this happened, I would just pass them the baby and claim “the baby is broken, fix it.” Sometimes he stopped and sometimes he didn’t. Most of the time I just cried right along with him. Why not? It seemed to work for him. After a few minutes he’d fall fast asleep. Oh, how I longed to sleep. Those experts of advice told me I could get some sleep if I slept when the baby slept. In the same world where the baby fairy exists this sounds like a feasible plan, but in the real world, who’s going to cook and clean my house and, most importantly, when? When the baby naps, that’s when. Sterilizing bottles to prep them for the next feeding, doing the dishes so you can eat off of them, cooking and packaging food for the week, restocking the changing station, washing and folding laundry, brushing my teeth and showering before the baby wakes again. The list goes on. These are the things that go on when the baby naps. I can’t tell you how many times I fell over holding the baby in the middle of the night waiting for the bottle warmer to buzz that it was ready. Or how many times the crying wouldn’t stop for both of us and I frantically thumbed through the experts of advice trying to find an answer. "What To Expect When You're Expecting" is the only book I can honestly say gave realistic, useful answers to my questions regarding development and age appropriate activities, yet the baby wouldn’t stop crying. Who was going to tell me how to stop it? But wait, there’s the baby. So I’m not alone, but he wasn’t going to tell me what was wrong with him. He wasn’t going to give me advice or help me to understand. Or was he? Was the answer in front of me the whole time? It took me a few weeks to study my baby to find out he was the answer. I quickly learned that the baby had one cry for hunger, one for when he was tired, one for when he was uncomfortable and one for when he was bored. I also learned that he preferred one bottle nipple over another (I was unable to breastfeed). He preferred one pacifier over another, as well. I also learned that he slept better, as did I, when he slept with me. He was up and down all night if I put him in his crib or bassinet. He slept peacefully when he was in my arms. We finally got some sleep, just by doing what seemed natural, listening to the baby. Now that my baby is three years old, I still listen to him and as a result, he listens to me. Does that mean he isn’t trying to assert his independence and does as he’s told? No. However, I can get him to calm down in a tantrum and he stops and listens to me and apologizes, then follows directions. We have a mutual respect for each other, I feel, because I took the time to respect his needs as a baby. Being a mother is natural. And granted, not everybody has a natural, maternal instinct. But most of us aspire to assist our children in growing up to be safe, secure, well adjusted, productive adults. The experts say it all starts in the womb. I say it all starts when you start listening to them and respect their individuality and application of what you teach them on a daily basis. Children don’t expect us to know everything and have all theanswers, but they do expect to be listened to. Becoming a mom for the first time was easy, it was learning to listen that was the challenge. Photo of My Newborn Sage. Copyright by Angel Rodrigues, from iphoto. |
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Twins: “Why Not Get Two Out At One Whack?”
published July 15, 2008
I was only six weeks pregnant and I knew something was unusual. I had my first child two years prior to this and even though I wrote down every minute detail, my mind was certain. This one was definitely different. Like so many women in modern society, infertility was the mysterious white elephant in the room when it came to the question of motherhood. I took Clomid (a common infertility drug) and I was off and running. Blood test after blood test, I learned that the HcG (pregnancy hormone) levels were doubling by the day and was well over the levels of my first pregnancy. I became suspicious. My husband became excited. He so wanted twins. As he claimed “why not get two out at one whack?” Then there they were. My sonogram showed what I had suspected. Two jumping grains of rice. I wanted to name one Uncle Ben and the other Long Grain.
At each check point in my pregnancy I became riddled with anxiety until it was confirmed in some medical manner that I was still pregnant with twins. Fear of a miscarriage, one baby squishing the other or the lining of my uterus “absorbing” the baby as the baby books called it. Every rational, probable, irrational andhighly unlikely outcome of my pregnancy plagued me the night before every pending check point.
Then 8 months into my pregnancy I hit the wall. My body was done. Stick a fork in my behind, because this turkey was ready to carve. I wanted to scream into my vagina, okay, guys you can get out now. Well, if I could even see that part of me at that point. I would have been happy just to see my swollen, sausage toes while standing. At this check point the doctor said that even though I had been experiencing contractions, my body had no other signs of labor. What was I to do now? The babies didn’t want to leave and my body had called it quits.
I couldn’t stand for too long. I couldn’t sit for too long. Laying down was murder on my back. Sleep was non existent and I couldn’t remember the last time I ate without my esophagus burning like I was the latest fire eating attraction at a circus. When I saw the sonogram at week 32, I gasped in horror. One baby was standing on the other one’s face and smooshing it into my cervix! There was absolutely no room left. I’m pretty sure my organs packed their bags and headed for the nearest exit. I was miserable. My reflection in the mirror was screaming at me to shed all the weight, water, acne, dark circles and mood swings that had been plaguing it for the past 8 months. I’m pretty sure I heard the mirror say “check please”! So during week 36’s check point, I expressed to my doctor how I was done and was unable to carry on. She agreed and sent me to the hospital.
There I was, the night before my birthday. My legs spread wide open, they broke my water. Now it was on like Donkey Kong. My contractions were unrelenting. Unlike my first pregnancy, there was an ebb and flow to them. This time, there was no ebb, just flow. On the monitor I could see them go off the chart and never really go back down to a point of relaxing. I wanted an epidural. What I didn’t ask for was the reaction to the epidural that almost sent me packing. My blood pressure crashed, I became very cold, shaken and the room went dark. I heard someone say “get the adrenaline,” but not much else. I looked around and saw only nurses. My husband was across the room, to stay out of the way. I was alone and dying. Then like a cannonball making its exit, I was up and out of the darkness. I was warm and scared. I started to cry. The nurse explained everything to me and reassured me the babies weren’t harmed. I had no choice but to believe her. I wanted to hold them, on the outside.
Being determined to deliver vaginally, for fear of caring for my twins, my two year old and myself after a cesarean, I kept telling my belly to “get into position boys, were ready for lift off.” Eight hours later, baby number one, as he was so lovingly referred to by everybody made his way out. Then an hour and two minutes later, baby number two, also lovingly called by everybody came. He was significantly bigger than the first. That’s not supposed to happen. All the baby books and medical staff told me that the bigger one comes out first and that way baby number two is an easier delivery. Oh no, not me. Of course not. I always manage to do things the hard way. But then I saw them and it was all good.
Weighing in at 5.75 lbs and 6.02 lbs, my two grains of rice were larger than most twins, separated in delivery time longer than most twins and not delivered in a cesarean as most twins. I knew it was an unusual pregnancy from the start. Being born on my birthday, giving me the biggest and best birthday present ever. I was running off of an adrenalin high. I was up and walking around right after the delivery and caring for myself and them for the remainder of my stay and up until now. Without blinking an eye. Now don’t get me wrong. I have shed many tears and screamed on the top of my lungs in frustration, but caring for them and seeing their developmental rewards has been the most rewarding experience of my life. Seeing them play with each other and hold each other is the best. Each one so different from each other, but with their own special bond that no one can ever take away from them or me.
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I hate to hear myself talk, think and complain. I try not to bother my husband with my mental ramblings, because he’s busy. He’s working three jobs and then finding ways to be with me and the kids, with very little sleep and without complaining. I wish I could do that. I hear myself and I sound so ungrateful, but really I’m not. I’m just so depressed that I want to run and hide, but because I can’t, I complain. I know he wants me to be superwoman. I know because he says it. He calls me superwoman. He tells others I’m superwoman and yet all I hear is “be strong, because I can’t afford to have you fall apart.” I try. I really do. I end up arguing with him about going back to work all the time. I want to go back to work, because I feel like such a looser. There isn’t any glory in being a SAHM. I know feminists everywhere, including my pre-mom self, would shriek at this statement, but I feel the whole movement of women who wanted the right to go back to work after children and the development of day care centers, was because women wanted to get a break from being a mom all day. Diaper after drool, after cartoon, after bottle number 422. I need a day off. Motherhood is the only job in that doesn’t come with a day off. I can’t call in sick. I can’t lie and say I have the flu and go to the beach instead. Okay, so I can go to work in my pajama’s. Okay, so I can sing the theme to all of the Noggin programming and scream about the letter of the day on Sesame Street with my three-year-old and tickle my twins until they pee in their glorious Pampers, but what I really want is to have my cake and eat it too. What I want is to have a job that I can brag about and a fancy degree to go along with it. I want the pictures on my desk of all of my kids, while I rave a bout being a mom of twins and a three year old, while they go to learning centers all day and can read Chaucer by the time they enroll in Kindergarten. I want to go away on vacation with my husband and kids to Hawaii and Europe. I want to have a dinner date, every now and again with my husband and remember what it was like to love him from across the table, instead of being so preoccupied with the kids that I hardly notice him at the table, except to watch my purse while I do a diaper change, or I watch his plate while he does a diaper change. Damn it, I want it all. I know I’m lucky. I know I’m blessed as some would say. But that doesn’t change how I feel as a woman. A woman who wanted so badly to have children that by the time the fifth doctor told me I would never have children, I felt an ache in my womb that cannot be described by words. A loss so deep I felt it would never stop. Now that I have all that I wanted, I want more. Isn’t this part of being a woman? Or am I so needy, selfish and greedy that I don’t deserve to even speak or write these words. I mean, come on, who am I? I feel like a fish out of water, a woman without an identity. Am I alone? Am I the only SAHM who wants more and feels guilty for it? I don’t think so. Feeling like I want more than I have, on top of taking care of three children all day, can really stress me out. When I become too overwhelmed I try to find ways to relax and have fun. Here is a list of five coping skills/mood changing/uplifting things that I use to help me relax. 1. Give my toddler a Capri Sun and put on the soundtrack to Grease. Put the volume up and sing and dance until we can’t anymore. It’s a natural high. 2. Put on a CD of silly songs that I have that also have the same effect as number one, but just to have on in the background, while we play games or do art projects. 3. Get on the computer and talk to other mom’s, friends or family to feel more connected to the outside world. 4. Make my favorite coffee charged drink and eat a chocolate covered donut and get myself moving off the floor or couch, which ever I landed on that morning. 5. Make a list with my toddler of positive affirmations and we sit in front of the mirror and repeat them to ourselves. He laughs and makes silly faces too, which makes me laugh and it’s all good. Being a SAHM is more than just sitting in your pajamas, watching Spongebob and eating Cheerios, it’s a 24-hour period of reminders that we are no longer a part of the work force, contributors to society the way that we had become accustomed to. It means experiencing jealousy that your husband, your equal partner, is out socializing at work and earning a paycheck, a monetary validation that he is doing a good job. As a SAHM, you have to create your own validations. More than the fact that the children grow and learn. You love your children and you feed and teach them things daily, even if you don’t realize it. Getting up every day by the sound of your baby (or babies in my case) babbling and cooing in their crib is a sound that may wake you up at the most ungodliest of hours, but it also wakes up your soul and puts a smile on your face. The warmth it brings to your heart and the drive it gives your body to get up, brush your teeth, wipe the tears from yesterday off your face and pick up the baby that you spent hours upon hours in labor to deliver is what drives you. The baby that taught you just how strong and weak you are as a woman, all in the same moment. The baby that was created by you and the person you love with all good intention to make the circle of life go on, with your addition to that circle. It’s not important if you brushed your teeth, or your hair for that matter, its only important that you lead by example. To relax and find joy in the little things that make up the relationship that will grow everyday. Whether your stressed out, relaxed or trying to get everybody to the doctor for a check up and realize half way there that your still wearing your pajama’s, relax, because what good is getting upset? Work those pajamas. Photo of Spa/Beauty. Copyrightjadey919. From Stock Xchng.com SAHM Learns To Relax 
Did I brush my teeth today? When was the last time I showered? God my foot is killing me, but just the thought of lugging all of these kids with me so I can see a doctor after being to the doctor twice this week for immunizations, the flu and teething in all three kids, I don’t think so. I’ll put it off another week - or two. OK, I’m pretty sure it’s broken or sprained or something, but that’s what Ace Bandages are for, right?
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I knew that countless, brave woman had endured what I was about to embark on and lived to tell about it. However, there are also countless, brave women who died in child birth. Even as recent as the week before my deliver, in the same hospital. How was I to be any different? However, the one fear that crept over me like someone walking on a grave, was the thought that the baby was going to have to come out. More importantly, come out of there! During the last week of my pregnancy I was diagnosed with Pre-Eclampsia and Toxemia. My blood pressure readings were around 201/199. I was swollen and my skin had a layer of water underneath it, giving me the appearance of a walking waterbed. It was great for my pregnancy self esteem. Pregnancy is beautiful! Right? After I was admitted to the hospital 6 days before my due date, the doctor’s wanted to induce. I went through rounds of medications, on a constant drip. Pitocin, Magnesium, Cervical Monitors, the whole kit and kaboodle. My blood pressure was so high that I had very little sight left and my eyes were black all the way around them. I was miserable. I was ready for an epidural. Once all of the contractions were bearable and I could lay still and rest, it came back. The thought. The thought that my baby was coming and he was coming out of there. Three days had gone by and all the medical efforts weren’t making my baby stand and deliver. I firmly believed it was because he could hear my thoughts. The fear of the inevitable. He knew I was terrified of him coming out and splitting me in two, leaving him alone with his equally as terrified father, with his own paternal fears. So he kicked back and relaxed. What else was there to do? Then just as everybody decided to let my body relax and I could finally eat real food, my water broke. I started to cut into my eggplant parmesan, when I thought I peed myself. The nurse tested my waters and confirmed that I was indeed labor and not incontinent. I was so upset that I couldn’t eat, I wanted to cry, but I think I used them all up during the contractions. So I just lie there and sulked until they hit. They! The all encompassing, body quaking, earth shattering contractions. The natural way your body gets you prepared for the event about to take place. It’s kind of like the alarm that sounds when there’s a fire and all the fire people come running out and rush to the fire. Yeah, that’s the type of enthusiasm that goes into each contraction. Your not sure if their ever going to end or if they will be the death of you. I was inclined to think they were going to be the death of me. In other words, I was pretty much of the mind set that either me or the baby wasn’t going to make it out alive and instead of my husband standing by my side looking at me lovingly, he should be out planning a funeral. Morbid? Yes, but this is what fear does to a person. It robs you of the enjoyment of some of the most wonderful things in life. Until that wonderful conclusion comes and you sit there, looking into the babies eyes. Him/her looking back at you. Checking to see if he or she was issued all of the standard equipment and you want to just sigh in relief. So you do. Then you realize, you were just afraid of becoming a mother. Then you are one and your grateful, scared, relieved, petrified and elated all in one joyous moment. The baby came out of there and guess what? You both made it. Both in tact, hopefully and without even thinking about it, you will do it again. Photo copyright by Angel Rodrigues. iphoto photograph.Fear of Delivery 
Fear. This is the one thing that has been a common thread throughout my whole first pregnancy. Fear that I would loose the baby after so much time nurturing him in my womb. Fear that he would be born without all of the standard baby equipment, i.e. arms, legs, eyes, feet. I feared one thing above and beyond all of these very realistic, but improbably outcomes of my 9 month journey. I feared the final departure. The exit. How in the world was an expected 6 pound baby going to come out of the womb that carried him so lovingly for the past 9 months?
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Another soothing foot relaxer is to put your feet in the tub when you bathe your toddler. They get to play, sing and do whatever other bath time activities with you and you get to soak your tired, aching tootsies. Before you take them out, dry off and apply some nice scented lotions and comfy socks. If you can, after the little one’s are in bed, go ahead and paint your toes and fingers with some crazy, vibrant color that will make you smile when you see them and your kids want to giggle too. Herbs and aromatherapy’s can play an important role in your mood, as well as the mood of your kids. Providing allergies have already been taken into account, an activity that can be fun and relaxing for both you and your kids is to paint plant pots and plant herbs. When your done and as they grow its an on going enjoyable tasty and scented treat. Grow mint and have an ice cream party with your kids. Chop the fresh mint and put it in a refreshing lemonade. You both will be glad you did. While your baking some cookies or some baked goods you can set aside some oatmeal, honey and applesauce. Give them all a good mix, until they form a thick paste. Then put it on as a facial and wear it while you bake. Your kids may want one too and its safe and easy to wash off (allergy check here too). The oatmeal will rub off dead skin cells when you wash it off. The honey is a good binder and natural thickener and the applesauce has acidity to deep clean and exfoliate. Your skin will look great when your eating that double chocolate walnut cookie. Before you know it you will look like you spent the day at the spa, instead of wiping baby food off your face and not noticing that spot on your ear before your loved one kisses you. You can appear well rested, with a cucumber and yogurt facial while you eat breakfast. No one will know that you got up four times from 3-4 am, because your baby lost his/her pacifier - again. No one has to know that your life isn’t one big Herbal Essence commercial, because you can make it look like you just appeared in one. Have fun, I know I do. Photo Spa1. Copyright kikashi. From Stock xchng.com. Home Spa Treatments for Stay at Home Moms 
Now we all know that going to a spa for a day and being doted upon is every woman’s idea of the perfect day. Yet, unless we are the kind of woman that can afford such a luxury, it happens so infrequently, or not at all. Some of us have to just live with the occasional foot rub from our loved ones. I however, have found ways to create luxury in my daily life as a SAHM. Things that I can do that not only give me some relaxation and joy, but eases the discomfort that comes from baby vomit being splattered all over my fourth shirt of the day. Things that will even make you giggle while you do them, as you might feel like your sneaking around and being a kid again. Sounds like fun, right?
A little fun that can brighten up your day and make you and your baby or toddler smile is to grab your child and sit in a chair or couch and either read or play games with them, while you put a baby bouncy seat at your feet (make sure the batteries are fresh) and vibrate your tired calves, ankles and feet for as long as your kids will be entertained. They think your playing, but you know the truth. If you can, rub your feet with lavender lotion or oil first and it will alleviate swelling and heat from your feet too. Oh the ecstacy.
Movie Reviews that are written by real people, not stuff shirts in journalism. Read my movie reviews.| Am I Prepared for Pre-School? |
| Written by Angel Rodrigues | |||||||||||||||||||
| Tuesday, 05 August 2008 | |||||||||||||||||||
 As a mother, you always know that day is going to come. The day your baby, goes into the care of some other person for eight hours out of the day. Maybe more, when if their bused. However, I was not prepared for that day coming so soon. He’s only three years old. Children are expected to start learning in a social situation, such as pre-school by three years old. He just started to use the potty on a regular basis and using full sentences when talking. Now, I’m sending him off with strangers, with an apple in his hand and a number two pencil in his Blue’s Clue’s backpack. I made all of the appropriate phone calls and filled out all of the necessary paperwork. I even bought him a lunch box. Yet, I was still not prepared or even comfortable with the whole idea. I could not even believe I was about to give my baby over to a stranger. My son just a face in the crowd. What was I thinking? Could I really be this careless? Yet, everyone and their grandmother was doing it. Does that make my decision any less heart wrenching or I am just a sheep in the crowd heading to pre-schools across America?Now my parenting skills were going to be judged by the outside world. My behavior that is thrown back in my face when my son throws a tantrum, on display for the board of education, the other children in the class and all of their parents. This I was not prepared for. A mother’s biggest anxiety driven panic attach, to be judged on her skills as a parent. I was never one to care about what other people thought of me, my behavior, my fashion or lack there of it. Then I became a mom. I suddenly cared. Then I relaxed, when I looked at my son and realized, I have been doing a damn good job. If I do say so myself. I started to think of all the fun things that came with the first day of school. Putting myself in his place, I thought of all the new clothes I used to get on the first day of every school year. The new backpack, lunch box, and school supplies. I am one of those people who gets high off of the idea of shopping for school supplies. Oh how I love the back to school section in Target. My son was getting excited and so was I. Daddy took him shopping for clothes and I took him for school supplies. My baby was ready for school. My toddler has shown me that he is smart, strong, independent and eager to learn, in the three short years of his life. Not being prepared myself to let him go, is my problem. Not his. So why shouldn’t I bite the bullet and let him go? He will be gone only part of the day and I can get stuff done and spend some much needed quality time with my twin’s, who will be heading off to pre-school in 2 1/2 years. I will be prepared when their time comes. I think. I have so many more milestones to look forward to. Pre-school is the first milestone of separation that is essential for not only the toddler, but myself. The parent. The one who has to accept the inevitability that your baby will be an adult someday. Prepared? You bet I am. Photo - Coloured Crayon . Copyrighted by woodsy on Stock Xchng.com ____________________________________________________________________________________ Postpartum Depression - You're Not Alone! August 29, 2008
When exactly does postpartum depression go away? When I was pregnant with my first, it took about 6 months. However, with twins, does that mean it takes twice as long? Their just over 5 months now and I love them dearly, but I am so depressed that I’m pretty sure my absent mindedness of my own personal care is a symptom of the depression and not sleep deprivation. How do I over come it? How do I find the special things that gets every mom through the day? How do I find that special something that makes a mom snap out of her postpartum and say to herself “Oh, wow! Look at this perfect little angel that has come from my husband and myself. I so love being a mom.” When does that come? Because right now, I’m so not feeling it. Photo from www.stockxchng.com - Sadness Girl crying in the beach. Uploaded by dnabil |
Other Recommended Sites: 10. http://astore.amazon.com/tyamo08-20 Raising Twins- Advice, support, help and information for parents who are expecting twins, or who already have them and love them!  | Publishing, painting, cooking, blogging, sculpting, filming, or any other form of expression is essential to anybodies life. Even the simple act of reading a book is a form of expression. As women, born of women, we know what it means to be the matriarch of a household. Whether your household was a single parent household or not, the woman was and is always the manager of her domain. The mother is responsible for everything. Even if the relationship is 50/50 we always hold ourselves responsible for everything. The old days of a mother cooking, cleaning and ready to procreate with our mates, with a smile on all day long, are no longer. The third wave of feminism that has left us all as individuals and free to express ourselves as we wish, to live our lives as we wish, is here to stay. It is up to us as a gender and a nation of mothers, how we choose to take a stand and showcase our talents, to lead our children into a future that will be economically uncertain and clouded with maybes, but full of potential and expectations. It is up to us to teach ourselves and learn from each other, so we are strong role models for our future leaders of the free world.
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