Salt is Not the Spice of Life’s Blog

For some odd reason my neighborhood has been targeted lately for a crazy influx of solicitors. You name it and that product has been pitched to us. We have probably the second largest (if not the biggest) fig tree in Georgia in our front yard. So, like any good salesperson, they will use that as the opener… “I’m admiring your fig tree”, “That is the biggest fig tree I have ever seen”, “What a beautiful fig tree”….. And since the figs are starting to come in let me go ahead and put this disclaimer out there – don’t touch my fig tree unless you have mine or my husband’s permission. The figs are for our family and friends first. You would be surprised how many random people stop to ask if they can pick figs.

Sorry, I digress….. Back to these solicitors. It doesn’t matter if I tell them we are not interested or to please not come back; I will get another knock a week or two later. Do these companies not track the homes they know won’t buy anything as to not waste their time with them? I guess we never noticed it before with both of us being out of the house at work, and now I’m home with Jack. What part of “NO” do these people not understand? I get that everyone needs to make a living, and I will give you a chance, but enough is enough. And I have to throw out there how annoying it is to answer the door with a five month old to someone you don’t know. What is really funny to watch with these guys is when they hear my two dogs growling and the look on their face when I open the door to two large (and not very happy because they don’t know you) labs telling them they will bite their head off if any attempts are made to come into this house and get anywhere near me or Jack. I really love how protective my dogs are.

My husband and I have talked through calling the various companies to complain, putting up a sign, building a fence around the yard, any ideas to keep these unwanted solicitors out…. Basically, unless you are selling thin mints or popcorn (isn’t that what boy scouts sell?) then don’t come knocking on my door.

These solicitors got me thinking about how evasive everyday people are in our lives with their opinions, soliciting their opinions. This gets particularly bad when you have a baby. Everyone in the world seems to know the right way to raise your baby. The first couple of weeks after we got home from the hospital, I just wanted to try to figure things out for myself. I think any new mom can relate to that desire. I would get phone calls, text messages, emails – everything on what I needed to do, how I needed to do it and when it needed to get done. At times I would wonder how these people even knew I was dealing with said particular issue. With a newborn, the last thing you have time to do is facebook or call someone to tell them you don’t know what’s going on with your child. As Jack gets a little older (I know five months seems like he has been on this earth an eternity!), the advice then turns to how you should be losing weight, how you should be spending your time and money, cleaning your house, activities you should be doing, even on relationships in your life. Now before I go any further let me interject a very important piece of advice (which is going against the point of this blog) but may actually save your life one day – NEVER, and I truly mean NEVER talk to a woman who has just had a baby about her weight. And that “just had” extends to at least a year, if not longer….

Ok, now back to our regularly scheduled program – unwanted solicitation… Does having a baby put this invisible to you sign on your head that says “I no longer know how to live everyday life????” At times I have to wonder if people think I am capable of living everyday life and making competent decisions. Please understand this does not include where I ask for advice or am talking one-on-one with someone about a situation and they voice their opinion. I’m talking about where out of the blue people start telling you their opinion on your life without any prompting. What really gets me is when I am being told I need to do something.

I feel overall I’m a pretty decent person. By no means am I this two-headed, immature monster that would warrant needing directives. I have a good heart (well, not medically speaking), I’ve made good decision for the majority of my life (hey, who doesn’t make a mistake or two down the road) and I try to surround myself with solid people. When left to my own accord, I do the right thing for myself and my family. So, bottom line is, in more areas than one, unless you’re selling thin mints, no solicitation!!

My last blog on “Things I Don’t Understand” received a lot of positive feedback, so I thought I would go at it again. Just as a reminder, this idea came from watching Golden Girls where Rose keeps saying things she doesn’t understand… “And you know what else I don’t understand…” It’s a funny episode for me, and often times I find myself questioning why certain things happen or are the way they are.

Without further a due, here is the latest instalment on things I just don’t understand:

– Why my son’s sleep schedule keeps changing. Just when I get my sleep schedule adjusted to his, he changes his. I think this is really a little game for him to see how quickly he can train me….

– Why I think the “I’m Sexy and I Know It” M&M commercial is the funniest thing on tv right now.

– So on that subject, I don’t understand why so many commercials suck right now. Are there not any advertising majors out there??? There really aren’t many funny commercials. Or ones that make any sense for that matter.

– Continuing on with dumb commercials – why Morningstar’s tag line is the burger flavor you want? Um… you are a veggie burger. Mostly targeted to vegetarians (while I know that meat eaters still eat these too), how would they know what burger flavor is. Furthermore, why would they want burger flavor if the point of the burger is to be veggie, and they don’t eat meat?

– Why does the A/C in your car wait to go out in the heat of summer?

– Why more guys don’t buy their women flowers. My husband does it all the time, even if he just went to the store to get us milk. And I think it’s the sweetest thing. I love having a vase with flowers he picked out for me.

– Why our dog Mookie has a tag fetish on his toys. If we don’t cut any tags that may be on the toy he will destroy them trying to rip the tags off. Tag fetish!! I’ve never seen this with a dog…..

– Why oh Why will my husband NOT shut the cabinet doors in the kitchen??? He knows this drives me up the wall!!! Maybe that’s why he does it…..

– Why do the best writing ideas come to me at 3am when I’m just laying in bed? I don’t want to turn the light on to write these ideas down. And I can never remember them in the morning when I wake up, like I always think I will.

– I still don’t understand how my household goes through SOOOOOO much laundry. Let’s face it ladies, with a newborn there are days I don’t even get out of my pj’s. So how has my laundry tripled (and I’m not including my son’s laundry)?

– Speaking of things that have tripled, how in the world has our dishes tripled? I run the dishwasher every night….. my son is eating veggies now, but that’s not enough to warrant the amount of dishes that pile up in the sink.

– Why everyone doesn’t get on pinterest. It’s my newest addiction and I love it. So many great ideas! And yes, most everyone’s Christmas presents will be some DIY project idea I got from there. You are now forewarned!! haha

– Why I can never sleep when my husband goes out of town for work….

– Why in the world I like to watch stupid, pointless, reality TV shows when I can get a break.

– So on that subject… why do they call it The Real Housewives of… The majority of them are not even wives, so how can they be a housewife?  This one may have been on my last “Things I Don’t Understand”, even so – I still don’t understand it.

– How can one dog shed sooooooooooo much hair? I could vacuum twice a day, every day and still not get all of it.

– Why people get a dog if all you are going to do is put the poor thing in the back yard. Dogs want love and affection too. I have a few neighbors that have done this and it really makes my blood boil.

– Why we have so many magazine subscriptions. The only one I read is People. The others are sitting in a stack just waiting for me to have some free time to read them.

– Why don’t they size baby clothes better? My child is 5 months and wearing 12 month clothes. Doesn’t make any sense to me…..

– Why don’t all diapers have the wetness indicator????? It’s the best thing since sliced bread, no guessing on if you need to change the diaper. Why wouldn’t they put this on all diapers?

– This one I don’t understand, but I completely love – how the simplest things will totally crack my son up. Sometimes I can have him rolling in laughter just by saying ‘Momma’.

So, for now, these are just a few things I don’t understand that have been on my mind…

Right now I feel like I need to be in some swanky New York apartment, sitting at a cute desk typing on my Mac with my Carrie Bradshaw-like voice talking in the background….. When having a baby, does size really matter? 

This seemed to all really start when I was pregnant. Women would talk about how much weight they gained during their pregnancy. No offense ladies, but I really didn’t care. And for those who only gained 10 pounds, I wanted to shove a Big Mac down your throat!!! Each woman is different in her pregnancy, has a different set of health issues or “things” going on with her baby and body that determine how much one gains. And yes I do realize that we can control what food we put in our mouths. But unless you have been pregnant, give me a break and don’t judge! And then as you got closer to your due date and the doctors would give you an estimated weight of your baby, I would be told all about every Guiness Book of World Record baby every born. Why do you want to scare a hormonal pregnant woman with heart issues??? And what on earth makes you think I want to hear about the 15 pound baby born??

Where this epiphany really slapped me in the face was after my son was born; once we had a definitive weight for him. My son was 9 pounds, 8 ounces. Not the hugest baby every born by any stretch, but not a tiny little thing either. This is when all the stories would hit – “Well, my baby was 10 pounds” or “Mine was 9 pounds 7 ounces! So mine was bigger!” or “I had three 9 pound babies, you only had one”. I think my favorite being “You had a c-section, I delivered my 9 pound baby naturally”. So for the rest of the world who hasn’t had a baby, let me clue you in on a few important points:

1 – Labor is NOT a competition. It doesn’t matter how many hours/days you were in labor versus the other person, how much your baby weighed or the manner in which you delivered (c-section/natural, epideral or not…). If you want to compete then I’ll kick your butt on the baseketball court. The most miraculous event in my life is not a competition (although it feels like an Olympic event just having a baby…) So get your priorities straight.

2 – Labor is painful no matter which way you cut it. Labor hurts whether you deliver naturally or have a c-section. Whether you have drugs to help or not. And it really is not fair for people to say their’s was more painful than yours because of how they delivered, whether or not they had drugs to help or because of how much their baby weighed. I’m going to state what I feel is the obvious right now – why in the h*ll would you want to be #1 in this category? Really? Now, having said that – for those who may be currently pregnant, please don’t let this scare you. There are drugs that can make things a lot less painful. And I never believed it until I had my son, but right now I don’t remember what the pain felt like. I just remember being in pain. I promise you every second of it is worth it when you get to hold your baby for the first time.

3 – Don’t listen to people right after you deliver. This is when it seems to be the worst. You are tired, exhausted, sore, not getting any sleep, may not be able to eat very much. This is when you are at your weakest and the vultures want to attack. Just don’t give them the chance.

The one bond that women share is motherhood. Even if you never have a child yourself, we all share that bond. I bet at some point you had a pet, right? Or maybe one day you would like to have a child. Or you’ve given a child the greatest gift they could recieve and adopted them. It’s all motherhood in some shape or form. One would think this would be the time women would band together as a cement strong support for each other. Instead it becomes a petty competition of who did it better, whose is bigger – it’s all about the battle scars.

My son is not a battle scar. He is a precious life that is a miracle with every breath he takes. And he would still be this beautiful miracle whether he was 4 pounds, 9 pounds or 15 pounds at his birth. Cherish your own unique labor experience, be grateful for what you have or for what you did not have to experience instead of constantly comparing yours to everyone elses. Because the bottom line is, you truly don’t know what all someone went through just to have that baby. The actual delivery of a baby is such a beautiful thing, I wouldn’t want mine to be exactly like someone else’s.

So in my best Sex in the City impersonation – Does size really matter, or can we not just celebrate the new life that has come to this world?

You’ve probably heard the song at every wedding reception in the last couple of years. It is inevitably a status update for many around Valentine’s Day. And I personally think the song has been way overplayed. But that line, “God bless the broken road that led me straight to you” is the best way to describe where I am in my life. For those of you that follow me on facebook know that my absence from my blog has been due to the new wonderful addition to my life – my son. He keeps me busy, on my toes, running around like a chicken with my head cut off, sleepless and extremely tired. And I LOVE every minute of it!!! 

So, what’s the broken road, huh? Most women at some point in their lives settle down, get married and start a family. Well, the settling down and getting married part was always something I had hoped would find its way into my life, but the ‘starting a family’ piece of the puzzle was a door that was closed on me years ago. There were medical tests run to show I could not get pregnant (due to three years on chemo). You can only imagine the flood of emotions that rushed through my veins when the doctor confirmed that we were in fact, pregnant.

There are no words to describe what it’s like to be a mother, and I mean that in a very positive way. My son renders me speechless at times. I look at him, and I look at my job as a mother and I can see how every experience in my life led me to this point, to this moment I thought I would never have. And I would gladly go through all of it again, the good and the bad, the happy and the sad, the highs and the lows, and even all of the pain. Every bit of it has shaped how I am as a mother and how we want to raise our son.

“I think about the years I’ve spent, just passing through….
But you just smile and take my hand,
you’ve been, there you understand….”

Okay, so my son hasn’t exactly ‘been there’ yet, though this child understands so much at such a young age. He knows the battle I went through just to have him. He remembers the fight we fought to keep both him and I alive. And at times I feel down, he takes my hand and reminds me of the fighter that is buried somewhere inside me.

There is no one to praise except for God for this miracle that is my son. So God, thank you. Thank you for the broken road that led me to my son. Thank you for Jack.

And now, this blog will start to take a little different twist. We will still focus on my heart and the battles around that. But now I have a new heart to celebrate. My heart that is walking outside of my chest, the best part of me – Jack. So stay tuned…. as I write and can get a minute here or there I will slowly update the functioning of this blog.