Tonight is the second time we've left the Tiny Overlord with someone other than family. Our good friends, Mark and Tracy, have agreed to watch TO while Dave and I attend another friend's wedding. And I'm spending my time until 2:30, when Tracy and Mark arrive, convincing myself that they are not going to encounter anything cataclysmic. Because I'm pretty sure the chances of a forest fire or earthquake are small, right???
I used to roll my eyes at our Friends With Kids (FWK) who confided to me that they had hangups about leaving their little ones with babysitters/family. I just couldn't understand the problem: what's so hard about escaping your bonds for a few hours to get stuff done, or just have some selfish time? Well, I get it now.
It's many seconds of worry, all in flashes while doing routine tasks.
Cleaning the kitchen: what if they have problems with the bottle? What if she chokes on the milk the way they feed her, and they have to administer CPR and they don't remember how? What if she runs out of cold teethers, and starts screaming uncontrollably?
Doing the laundry: what if she's grown out of all the clean onesies she has, and needs a bigger one, but the bigger ones are dirty? Will they know how to control the thermostat so she doesn't freeze?
Showering: What if she misses us and won't be consoled? What if she's tired? She doesn't go down to sleep for anyone but us. What if she needs us and we're not here? I'll have failed, right? I'll be a horrible mother for leaving her. I left her.
And then I take a breath and talk to myself, trying to restore my sanity and push down my inner-Nana. (My mother, of rabid squirrel logic. The ironic thing is, I no longer think my mother was out of line that time. More on this story later. . .)
To self: Mark and Tracy are responsible, rational, intelligent adults. If TO runs out of clean clothes that fit (unlikely anyway), they could wrap her in a blanket and/or turn up the thermostat. Our thermostat doesn't require an engineering degree in the first place; in the second place, Tracy knows how to work it.
TO has never choked on milk before, and it's pretty much impossible to do that anyway. Worst case, it'll go down the wrong way, and she'll cough. She's done that before, while I've been breastfeeding her, so she'll be okay with a bottle, too.
She has ungodly amounts of teethers. I'll just have to ask them to wash them and put them back in the fridge if it looks like she's running low. Again, they're intelligent, responsible adults, not morons.
As for the sleeping issues, they're real. Readers of this blog know TO has some serious sleep issues that Dave and I can't even tame. So, I'm hoping that Tracy and Mark can just hang in there if TO gets too cranky.
Have I mentioned that we'll be putting her down for a nap before we leave? And that we'll only be gone for 3 1/2 hours? And that I'm being completely irrational? I need to tell myself, continuously if necessary, that I'm not a bad mother for leaving my child. And it's not even "leaving her". It's taking a break from her, which I know will be good for both of us. After all, she's growing up; I need to start learning to let go a little now.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment