Not about not posting (I guess I've had a few spare moments where I might have put in an update, but if I did, I can't really say when they were ...), but about work and baby-tending' duties.
On the work side, I've had deadline after deadline after deadline since coming back from my all-too-short two weeks of paternity leave. I'm keeping up with the editorial director paperwork, but there is no time to look around the department to try to address long-simmering issues: It's more a matter of keeping flare-ups to a minimum. Plus, before Celeste, I typically worked at least a nine-hour day; I'm trying to limit myself to eight hours now, but it's nigh impossible to get everything I need to done.
Which leads to the home-front guilt.
I'm still getting home later than I'd like (and when I'm home, I'm sometimes trying to edit things or to proof pages or something), which limits what I can get done to help Evelin.
I do some baby-minding in the evening, and I get the dirty diapers out to the trash and the trash bins to the curb each garbage-pickup cycle, but beyond trying to get one load of laundry done each evening, I don't feel like I'm helping as much as I should.
Part of it is that I can't do the one big thing in Celeste's life — feed her. (I had been giving her one bottle a night, but since the doctor said she's clear of the jaundice, we're trying to go back to 100% breastmilk.) During the night, I wake up sometimes to help change her or to hold her while Evelin gets positioned for a feeding; and I try to forestall her waking in the morning to give Evelin a little more sleep as I'm getting ready to go to work. Evelin says I'm holding up my end of things, but it feels like I should be doing more.
Tuesday was Celeste's one-month check up. She declared jaundice-free without having to have a blood test and got her second Hepatitis B vaccine shot. But the exciting news was the measuring: 6 pounds, 8 ounces (almost a full pound above her birth weight and up nearly 1.75 pounds from her lowest weight).
Last night, while Evelin got a post-9 p.m. feeding nap, Celeste and I hung out downstairs, listening to the end of the New York–Twins game on the radio while watching the start of the Beloved BoSox–Angles game on MLB Gameday.
Celeste also had a good play bout on the playmate. She was swatting her monkey and elephant toys and pushing the hanging Taggie around, too.
We were both a little upset by the way the Twins game ended, but (after checking the score during an early morning feeding) we were very happy to have the Sox up 2–0 as we head back to Fenway.
2 comments:
Dude--
You're doing everything the dad of a bfing mom can do. At least, it's as much as I have seen, heard about, and can imagine. there's no way the partner who isn't bfing can "even out" those 5 to 6 hours per day spent feeding.
As karen from gone to carolina says, it all evens out eventually.
Congrats on the GREAT weight gain!!! That's amazing for a girl to gain that much!!!! And don't worry, you'll get plenty of times over the next couple of monhts to feed celeste a pumped bottle.
Yay for you all and good luck with the working dad guilt.
I was a tiny bit upset by how the Twins game ended Thursday, but not terribly. I really don't think the Yanks are going to have a good weekend in Minneapolis. I heard on NPR today that the BoSox wish the Yanks would win...
Yes, you will feel guilty. But you are doing whatever you can and Evelin will let you know if you can do more. My husband still feels a bit guilty at times, and our boys are 10 and 14. But he's got a good rep as an involved Dad and that makes up for the times (like now) that he's gone for 10 days, or working deadlines until the wee hours. The times he seems most heroic to me are when he comes home at 2 am after putting the magazine to bed, and still gets up at 6 am to get our elementary guy off to school.
Karen
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