Strike!

Myra and I are both on strike.  Who do you think is more distressed? . . . The crying baby or the mom behind the camera?

As hungry as she was, she still wouldn't take any bites of her food.  Poor girl.

Motherhood comes whether or not the mom to be is prepared.  I've thought about this, and I really think that after someone becomes pregnant, part of the OB/GYN visits ought to include classes on motherhood.  And before the parents-to-be leave the hospital, the doctors really ought to have the parents test out before they can take their new baby home.  At least, sometimes I wish I had such classes in my background.

I took Myra to the pediatrician for a second visit, because last time they took her blood and she was a little anemic, so they instructed me to give her the Polyvisol vitamin with iron for a month and then come back.  So we did that, came back and she was worse.  I don't know exactly what the numbers mean but her hemoglobin was down.  The aim is to be between 11-15 and she went from a 10 to a 9, which apparently is bad.

I really like our new pediatrician, but talking with her made me feel like a terrible mother.  First I wasn't completely vigilant with the vitamin, though I tried to remember.  Do I take a vitamin?  Not consistently, I ran out of my prenatal vitamins a long time ago.  Then she asked about her meals "What does she have for breakfast?"
"uh, ... sometimes she has some of my oatmeal" I tell her.
"What does she have for a morning snack?"... "What does she have for lunch?"... "What does she have for a snack?" ... "What does she have for dinner?"...

The thing about Myra, actually both my kids, is they have very little interest in food.  I am not quite sure why.  I think part of it is just how they come, but I might unwittingly condition it too.  Anyway, I couldn't answer any of her questions right and I left feeling like an unqualified mother.  I walked out with a prescription for iron supplements and the order for five blood work labs to be done on Myra.

Thinking on it, when I got home, I realized that I am most likely anemic too.  I've been low in the past and since I'm not taking my prenatal vitamin anymore I am probably really low.  So now I have to make up and be a better mom.  Now I am taking my vitamins, I'm faithfully giving Myra her supplement twice a day.  And I'm trying to focus on her meals, though it feels like a tug of war that I am losing.

Myra really doesn't want to give nursing up!  I just wanted to make it through one year.  Now I'm ready to be done with it, but she's not making it easy.  I started trying to wean her last month, but then she got sick and I figured it was mean of me when she wasn't feeling good.  So I'm trying it again now and its not pretty.  Myra and I are both on strike.  I won't nurse her during the day and she refuses to eat most of what I give her.  By the end of the day she is cranky because she is hungry, but she still throws all the food I give her on the floor.  She won't take a bottle either.

Oh the joys. Maybe I'll be the next mom on the cover of a magazine, nursing my five year old...