If you follow me on Facebook or Twitter, you are likely aware that the baby has begun crawling and pulling her self up, and straight up standing within the last week or so. It has opened up an entire new world to her, for obvious reasons, but has also opened the dialogue between Hub and me as to whether she truly will be our final baby. (short answer—yes)
When you think of babies, you think of the snuggly little newborn who is on a sleep/eat/poop continuum. Teeny babies in footie pajamas, content to sleep on your shoulder or in the crook of your arm, content to be left in one spot for any period of time. You don’t think about the baby who refuses to sleep in her own bed, or finds rocks and rubber bands and pieces of random crap to shove in her mouth regardless of how vigilant you are about vacuuming and keeping your floors clean. You don’t think about baby proofing, or strategically closing off a part of your living room, or making sure the toilet is closed. You don’t remember worrying about whether she will stand up in her crib (should she choose to sleep there) and figure out a way to catapult herself out, because that is just the kind of baby she is.
We are in hell with Liv right now, a kind of hell that we never experienced with Bud and Lucy. She’s in to EVERYTHING and is constantly getting her fingers stuck in things and going after the cats and she wants what she wants when she wants it and you better comply or deal with her wrath. When you tell her no, she laughs and shakes her head no right back at you…and then blows you a kiss and moves on her merry way. She doesn’t know she is a tyrant; she thinks she is funny. And really, she is a perfectly happy baby. She is loud and exuberant a 22lb jolly sweetheart—unless you try and get in her way.
I know this is normal, I do. But I wasn’t prepared!! You don’t think about this stuff when you decide to have a baby! You think –it will be all snuggly fun!! It is not all snuggly fun.
Remind me of this when I get all swoony for one last baby, ok? Remind me that it is hard. And that eventually they’ll turn in to weirdo 5-year-olds, which is a whole new ball game.
11 comments:
She sounds like my twins, who are making my hair grayer by the minute and making me wish I had stopped at 2. :)
Hee! Having a baby is the most exhausting thing in the world and we DO completely forget how hard it was!
Hang in there. She sounds hilarious!
There's just something about the third child. So much personality... so feisty.
I know it is hellish right now but it sounds to me like these tyrannical and hellish behaviors will turn into ambition and persistence when she is older. And that is a good thing.
I agree with LoriD. Helen has already perfected her straight arm "get out of my way" move.
Yes, my third is also the feisty one. So spoiled and yet so FUN.
But whenever I've had a battle of wills with her, it does help to check the "baby impulse" in my brain.
Oh, I miss the snuggly days. Aidan is always on the go. He started crawling in January-ish and that was pretty much the end of snuggles!
Can you believe they are already 10 month olds??
Aww, but she's still so sweet! Zachariah was an into everything child too. Not now, but once he was mobile up until he was about 18 months old I had to keep everything and I mean EVERYTHING out of his reach. Plus baby gates were my friends then. But it did pass! My mom raised 3 kids and said she'd never had any of us into things like that.
This is making me scared to have a third... So far we've been pretty lucky with that getting into everything phase. Addy just plain didn't do it, and Eli WOULD do it, but is content enough to be contained in the giant play yard that whenever I can't be watching him, I just plop him in there, still. (DON'T JUDGE ME!)
But if it's the third one that does it... Can I skip right to fourth? Do you think that'll work?
Anyways, hugs. Also, my favorite phase for both my kids has been between one and two years old. (Sniff. Eli is soon to be exiting it.) So just hang in there and maybe in a few months, the novelty of the cat and the toilet will have worn off and Liv will be a totally adorable baby-toddler that you just want to kiss all day long again.
I hope things get better soon. :) Sometimes I ask myself, "Why did I want kids again?" on particularly difficult toddler days, but then she wraps her arms around my neck and I remember.
Liv and Jelly sound like twins. And he walked at 10 months and therefore has been into everything SINCE. Oh, hon. It is hard. So so hard.
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