Dear post-baby self

Dear post-baby self,

You need to accept that your body is the way it is, and it is never going to be the way it was.

Love,
Self


Everyone tells you that having a baby ruins your body.  You watch your belly grow as your feet disappear.  You rub on mounds of cocoa butter, but the stretch marks still appear.  Your belly button pops out and goes back in and pops out again.  And your boobs...!  Let's just not even go there.

During this time, you know your body has been taken over by a wiggly alien who likes to kick your ribs and head butt your bladder, but you feel it is temporary.  You just have to make it 40 weeks, and then you get your body back.

Nope.

If you choose to breast feed, as I did, your body is still a captive audience.  Sure, after 6 weeks or so, your body heals, the swelling goes down, ("Hey!  Feet!  Ankles!") and you can sleep gloriously flat on your back or on your stomach if you so choose.  However, you have an infant going to town on your nipples and your caloric and water intake must rival that of an elephant. 

But you still think, in the back of your mind, that your body will be yours again some day, and you will return to normal.  No matter what people tell you, you think that "you" is hiding somewhere inside of those ginormous breasts, and when your hair starts to fall out a few months post-partum, you think it is just a sign of molting and that your old you will reveal itself, albeit now riddled with track marks.

I stopped breast feeding my son in August.  As he slowed down over the summer, the number on the scale started going back up and back up until I had gained 15 lbs.  My ravenous hunger that accompanied making boobie juice only calmed down in December, and, to be truthful, I am still pretty freaking hungry.  No matter what I do, however, I hover around 132 lbs. 

This is the new me.  I have to accept it.

I recently took my measurements to try to figure out why nothing feels right on me anymore.  My hourglass figure pre-Tuck (36-24-38) has turned into more of a cylinder (36-33-38).  And some days, it feels more like a very unglamorous, unattractive, spent toilet paper roll.  I have a belly that basically lines right up with my chest.  I have never in my life looked like this.  I have spent 31 years on this planet, and from age 14 and on, it was with curves.  And, oh, I still have curves, but they are now love handles and cottage cheese thighs. 

Go ahead, tell me diet and exercise. 
Do I exercise?  No. 
This is my day...
6:30 ~ wake up, shower, dress, and at some point during this time, Tuck wakes up.
7:00 ~ help the hubs get Tuck ready for school and feed him breakfast
7:30 ~ drive to work
8:15-4 ~ work
4:45 ~ get home, throw on dinner
5 ~ get Tuck
5:15-6 ~ dinner
6 - 7 ~ entertain the toddler
7 - 8 ~ bath, bedtime routine
8 - 10 ~ clean up the kitchen, start laundry, pay bills, and flop on the couch exhausted, go to bed

Note:  there is not a whole lot of time in there to, say, go to the gym.
I am not complaining.  I am saying this really to help myself accept that this is who I am, this is what my body is, and that is totally okay.

I do believe that the way you view yourself goes pretty far, and I have to get over this notion that my true physical self is how I was before having a child.  It has changed.  It will change again.  And I am still me, and still lovely, even though I have to buy size 8 now, even though when I sit down, there is a pooch, and even though my belly looks like a small road map in some places.  I should tell you that I am not exactly unhappy with my body...  it just feels strange, like I am in the wrong skin.  The physical me I knew for so long is now in a different shape, and it is taking some getting used to.



It often takes sacrifice to produce great things...  And I am proud to say that I made an amazing little boy.  In retrospect, there is nothing more precious to me than that little boy, and nothing I wouldn't have given up.  A belly is a small price to pay for such beauty.

And maybe that is it.  Maybe I have not given up my physical beauty, but just passed it on to someone else.  Instead of withholding beauty, I was blessed enough to help make something beautiful and let it leave me, like a piece of art.  Tucker is gorgeous, and if he had to suck it out of me, so be it.  Ahh, perhaps there is the revelation I was hoping for...

Dear mamma,
Your body is a temporary vessel that will change over time.  It has the ability to nourish life, and that will come with a price.  However, it is a price you are more than willing to pay.  At the end of the day, the most important beauty is in the true soul, and that cannot be measured in pant sizes.
Love,
Self

Challenging the Gifted

I have to write about this because I just have to.

Here is the scenario:
I have an 8th grade student in my Honors Biology course.  She is in the gifted program of our school, and has been getting 100's for basically ever.  This year, she had the choice of going into an advanced life sciences course or taking Honors Biology.  Unbeknownst to her, I have unleashed the smackdown on my Honors kids this year.  Not only do they not have a textbook (I mean, they have one, it is just not the one I am teaching out of), but they also have timed tests.

In cyber school, everything is open book.  There really is not much to be done about it because proctoring systems are costly in time and money.  We are beginning the process of looking into such software and hardware, but we are years away (in my estimation) from actually implementing it in our courses.  So, all of our students can look things up...  textbook, google, notes, whatever.

Yet I have learned a valuable lesson from attending Mississippi State - timed tests suck.  They really make you work.  Even if you have access to the materials, you still need to study and know your information, otherwise you will never get to finish the test in time.  I learned this the hard way when taking a test this past spring semester.  Ouch.

Anyway, back to mom.

Her daughter has been doing very well all year so far, getting 100's.  She would take her time on lessons and, as you can imagine, made sure to look back and check to make sure all of her answers were correct.   She got a C on the unit exam. 

Unleash the torrent of tears.

On one hand, I really feel for her.  She is used to excelling in everything.  She is used to it being easy.  She is used to things just coming to her and making sense.  She said herself that she did not really study.  Hello me in 1999 entering college.

Suddenly, she hits a wall.  It is not easy.  She has to study...  what?!  She has to try.  Hello me when I got a 32% on my first Calculus exam at Penn State.  I cried.  Oh did I cry! 

But you know what?  I also got Bs and As on every single test for the rest of the semester because I learned my lesson.

So while I do feel for her, I really sort of feel like...  suck it up and deal.  Mom asked me if I was going to curve the test or were they (imagine incredulity) "going to get what they get?!"  I responded yes, they are getting what they get.  However, I did ofter a bone: students who contact me can re-do their incorrect responses and turn in correct ones for half credit.  I am only doing this because it was the first test and they have largely never taken a timed test before.  That offer is going to go out the window after the first marking period ends.

Mom grilled me for a good 25 minutes...
What did the other students get?  (The average is a C...  which, statistically, is good news!  Not all students should be getting As all the time.  It should be challenging, and I am proud that my hard work this year has paid off and made it a challenge.)
What will this do to her grade in the long run?  (Probably not much, daily lessons add up to more points than tests)
What if a college sees a B on her transcript?!?!  (Uh, nothing...  though I did not have the heart to break it to mom that one B is not going to ruin her entire post-high school life)
Are all teachers going to be using timed tests?  (I don't know what anyone else does)
How many students passed the Keystones?  (about 40%)
What about Honors students?  (about 85%)
What about state-wide?  (I don't freaking know!)

Mom then proceeded to tell me it was sort of her fault for not being there last week to help her.  I quickly pointed out that I am available for questions and help all day, and I do kinda know the material somewhat (sarcasm), so it would be prudent for her daughter to start coming to office hours and asking me questions.

"But she never had to do that before."

High school is different, honey.

I told mom that a lot of studies have come out showing how gifted students get used to things being easy.  Traditional school is designed around them:  listen to me, take it in, spit it back out at me.  Gifted kids can be really good at that.  However, how much are they really learning?  And when challenged, gifted kids readily will go back to the old familiar things they know how to do for fear of admitting that they are being challenged.  Kids who are told they are "smart" never ever want to look less than the title, so they will not even try, or they freak out when they are "called out" on their lack of knowledge.

When I got that big fat F in calculus, I could not drop the course.  I just had to work harder.  And yeah, I ended up with a D for the semester...  it is really hard to come back from that kind of grade when there are only 4 tests total.  Trust me though, I did kartwheels when I found out I passed the class and I was really proud of how well I did the rest of the semester.

So what to say to this mom?  If my son came home in tears with a poor grade on a test, I would like to think I would talk to the teacher and see what happened.  Every parent's gut reaction is that their child is amazing and perfect and they want to alleviate any source of anxiety.  But I don't think I would let him drop the course.  I don't think I would let him give up.  That is disservicing him in the long run!  I want him to learn grit.  I want him to learn determination.  I want him to learn that yes, some things in life will come easy for you...  and some things in life are hard, but if you want them enough, you can work at it and probably make it happen. 

I guess I will find out some time this week what mom decided to do....

On having a 1 year old and the things I "should" be doing

My son turned 1 at the end of July.  
It sort of snuck up on me, much like he did, much like my adoration and absolute obsession with him did.  Suddenly, I have a toddler, when I am not sure I have even processed having a baby!

He has changed so much in one year, and even week to week, we see advances in his language and abilities.  It is amazing to watch him grow and know that he came from me, yet was also a gift to me.

Tuck does things in his time.  We anticipate him doing certain things, and it seems as if he will never do it, and then he just decides one day that he is going to do it.  I try to remind myself to calm down...  he will drink fully from cups one day.  He will just eat table food.  He will sleep!  He will look at me and say, "Mama" and know that he is calling my name.

But that is not today.

So I find it difficult when someone suggests that maybe I need to push him more to do these things.  Doesn't every parent bristle when someone hints that you are not doing "The Right Thing"?

At daycare, Tuck is sort of stuck in the infant room because he does not:
a) drink milk from a cup (which everyone refers to as a "sippy", which irritates me...  sippy cup fine, but just sippy?!)
b) feed himself

I mean, sheesh.  He is a year old.  He walks and crawls up stairs.  He makes his desires known.  He points.  He turns on and off the lights, he closes and opens doors.  He loves to page through books and animals make him laugh with delight.  He dances.  He does a lot of freaking things...  but he also has 2 and 3/4 teeth and prefers pureed food.  What do you want me to do?

It is not like we are coddling him.  Every day we offer him different foods to eat with his own fingers.  He is great with crackers and cereal.  He will eat most diced fruit.  He likes to try raw veggies, but ends up stuffing the whole thing in his mouth, and without teeth, we are always scooping it back out again.  He eats pieces of meat and bread.  He likes pizza.  Give him an ear of corn and watch out!!!  I mean, that is a lot of stuff he shoves into his mouth on his own.

Sorry if he cannot eat the sloppy joe you want to offer him for lunch. 

Today, one of the administrative women said that she had to keep him on the infant pricing (the most expensive) because he is not feeding himself completely yet.  Fine, I have no issue with that.  We talked a bit and I told her we do offer plenty of things for him to feed himself.  

Then she said, "Well, if you stopped offering him the other stuff, he would have to eat the table food..."  It was not said in a snippy tone, but one that implied that I was essentially babying him.  She then told me, "I am sorry to say, but with the first kid, we make all the mistakes because we do not know what we are doing."

Excuse me while I bend over so that you can kiss my derriere! 

Yes, I whole-heartedly agree that we really have no clue what we are doing as parents, so the first one gets the brunt of trying things that go down in glorious flames.  However, I don't like the insinuation that I am being lax or not doing enough.

Another example involves his teeth.  My mom asked me if I was giving him things to chew on.  (Sorry mom, I know you read this, and I know you meant no disrespect by it, and it was a friendly suggestion!)  Yes, of COURSE I give him stuff to chew on, but I cannot FORCE him to chew...  no more than I can force him to pick something off of his try and put it in his mouth, no more that I can force him to drink from a cup when he does not want to drink from a cup.

Tuck will do things in his time, when he feel likes it.  In the meantime, I can just offer him what is available.  I cannot, in good conscious, allow him to go hungry.  It feels wrong to me.  I have a good eater, I really do, and he likes slurping up those pouches.  He does that on his own too!  

So give him some time, and give me a break.  My pediatrician told me his goals for the next three months are table foods, milk, and cups.  That means I still have 2.5 more months to work on that, and a kid can be really really different in 10 weeks.   He will get there, and it is very likely that it will be before I take him back for his next check up.  No, I have no idea what I am doing or how to raise a child....  but he is a happy, loving child, and that makes me think that my instincts are not terrible.  If he wants to eat mushed up sweet potato, so be it!!!