sensitive subject

Am I becoming insensitive? I got an astrological reading as a gift and during the reading I was told that this would be a very pragmatic year. I could be a bit of a steam roller at times but that this was necessary for my life at the moment, for my new life as a mother. It was what I needed to get things done.
It may be what I need but I don’t think it is what the world needs. I just snapped at a friend who had the unfortunate luck of being the 4th caller during my attempted coffee break. I should have lost it at the telemarketer, not her. I would have just let it ring but there isn’t any way to turn the ringer off on our upstairs phone and I didn’t want to wake Lukas. So I barked at her about how I couldn’t talk and was irritated. I sort of assumed that she wouldn’t take it on, that she would understand my plight but that isn’t fair. In fact it is a bit self-centered. She is also a mother with a very full plate and she was only calling to offer me one of her son’s toys. Well I can’t take it back now. I can just try to understand it. I would just chalk it up to one moment of uncontrolled emotional spewing if I hadn’t done a similar thing yesterday. I went on a very insensitive toy rant.

I was at a friend of my mother’s house. This friend is also a grand-mother and we were playing with her 2 and a half year old grandson when my mother asked me if I liked one of the toys in the nursery. It was a little purple caterpillar with blinking lights by its eyes and the alphabet illuminated and pulsing on its body. It sang songs about the alphabet in a high pitched voice. “No”. I said “I don’t really like blinking and singing toys.” This would have been offensive enough to the owner of the toy, who sat at my side, but I continued. Or, my mother continued. I think she was trying to save me but I didn’t realize it. “What about this one?” She said referring to a little toy train with a frog on it that bobbled up and down. The train sang rail road songs in a voice that resembled the chipmunks. “No.” I said, still totally unaware. “I would rather this one.” I pointed down from my high horse to a little wooden train. “Well, yes that is nice but I think Lukas likes this singing one.” She said raising her voice at the end in a desperate attempt to get my agreement. “Lukas will like whatever he is exposed to. And I don’t want to expose him to toys like that. I think they are obnoxious and annoying and I don’t want….”
“Susan, stop.” My mother said. Then I got it. Why did it take me so long to get it?
I looked at my mother’s friend. “I am so sorry. That was so rude of me. I don’t know who I think I am going off like that.” “It’s really fine.” She said with total sincerity. “It’s not a big deal. They are annoying. But Shannon likes them.” She said referring to her grandson. “I know. Lukas likes them too.” I continued for a while trying to dig myself out of the deep hole I had plummeted into.
I don’t know what is happening to me. I used to be a really sensitive person. I used to be overly sensitive of everyone else. Now I seem to only have enough sensitivity for Lukas. Maybe I am running out. Maybe we only have a certain amount of sensitivity in our lifetime and I used all mine up on Lukas. Maybe I am in a tunnel staring only at my son and myself and I don't see anything else. Maybe I need to open up my vision a little wider. Or maybe I just need to unplug the phone. Call a babysitter. Get out.

walking alone

Help! I have a baby attached to me and my husband is gone for 9 days!
Jorg had a chance to go to Germany for work and I couldn’t really deprive him of that…though he was kind enough to offer that option. So now I am with baby for many days without husband. Luckily Granny J and Grandpa are back….friends have stepped in and I feel ever so supported.
Lukas is very needy these days. He has wised up to all my tricks and it is impossible to even get him to sit by himself. He cries when I even approach his play mat where he often is left. I’m not sure what to do. It just doesn’t seem reasonable that I toddle around with him during his every waking moment. Yet this is what I have done for the last two months. Everyone has a suggestion or comment about what I should or could do but honestly I just don’t see any option right now. He won’t bend for me to sit him down. He goes rigid. He screams in the pack and play. The other day I had to go to the bathroom and since he wouldn’t bend, I laid him down on the floor in the kitchen and watched him flail and scream like an upturned beetle on our hard wood floor. I could only imagine the psychological damage that I was causing at that moment. I feel sorry for him. I feel sorry for me. I just keep thinking that he is so close to walking. I can just wait it out….or toddle it out. Yesterday he took about 6 steps totally on his own and then grabbed for me before taking a face plant in the dirt. The other day he fell forward so hard that he was still sneezing out dirt the following morning.

Oh sigh, I do love him so much. I feel a bit attached to him myself. I don’t know how to turn it off. I think of him and worry about him even when he is sleeping or I am away. Yesterday was the beginning of the Jewish New Year and some friends of ours came over to celebrate with Challah, Mead, Apples and Honey. We did some reflecting on the past year. We talked about what we want to come into our lives and what we want to let go of. I realized that what I need to let go of is some of MY attachment to Lukas. He is only 11 months old and I can already, even now, begin to let go of this little boy. He was inside me. He was a part of me. I birthed him and then we bonded for months as he suckled and cuddled at my breast. Now he wants to walk. He wants to explore. He thinks that he needs me and my hands to do this. Somewhere inside me I think he needs me too. Some part of me likes being so needed. It makes me feel special and important. But I need to believe that he can do it without me. I need to let him go a little. I need to let him walk alone. I need to let him fall alone. I need to let him learn that he and I can be with and without each other. Somehow I don't think that anyone else could have given me this advise. Sometimes I just have to sit with the dilemma and feel it out. Then the answer seems so clear. It is not easy but it is clear.