Today* has happened 26 times in my life...

*I started writing this post on the 20th, but it took me FOREVER to finish it.

Well, technically it's happened 27 times to include the day I was born. I'm not really big into my birthday. It just doesn't have the same magic as when I was a kid. So, we usually don't do a whole lot. We'll probably go out to eat (Tucano's sent me a buy one get one free entree, so how can I not?) at some point when Chris has some time.

When I had a c-section to birth my son, my brother joked that my mom and I are like Russian nesting dolls. I was born by c-section also. That image is so hilarious to me. To think of me bursting out of my mom's stomach doing a crazy Russian dance and then Ben doing the same from mine. It's just really really funny.

On a side note, as Chris read what I've written so far over my shoulder, he suggested that perhaps he should have made my birthday magical. I asked him how he might do that, to which he responded that he could wear a magical fairy suit. That, my friends, is an even better image than the Russian nesting dolls.

I continue to be exhausted, but I'm discovering that I'll just need to cope. I bought the Baby Whisperer book on the recommendation of another blogger. I read most of it, and I really agree with so much of the philosophy in it. However, I tried the sleep method in the book, and while I really do feel that it would work for Ben, it's just not working for me for a variety of reasons. So I'm back to square one. We'll figure it out, though. I'm not really stressed about it at this moment; I'm just going to give it a rest for a bit.

Right now Ben is playing with a couple of pacifiers I bought for him because I'm hoping I can get him to take them again. He spontaneously stopped taking them around five months or so. It may be a long shot, but I'm going to try it. I'd rather him need the pacifier to sleep than my boob.

PPD is still plaguing me. It's really frustrating to me because I feel like I really have nothing to complain about. Life is really good. Sure, Ben isn't a great sleeper, but he is such a happy kid. He's a great little companion. We have a lot of fun together. But my depression has been worse lately, and I don't have a reason for it. So I'm going to go to a therapist. I really don't want this to affect Ben.

Making a motorboat sound

Ben is a climber.  He climbs everything, and he's gotten pretty good at it.  Before I knew this, I had him down in the playroom one day, so he could play and I could nap.  I woke up to find him sitting on top of his play table swinging one of his toys around.  This was also before he figured out how to get down from high places without breaking his neck (a skill he acquired just this weekend- YES!).  It's only a matter of time until he realizes he can move other objects to use as steps to help him climb instead of only utilizing the immediately adjacent materials.  And we are in such trouble when that happens.  I actually worry about that more than him learning to walk.

It's not necessarily common knowledge, but when I was a junior in high school, I attended a program at West Georgia that allowed me to enter college two years early.  I left early because I hardly ever went to class, and after the first semester I knew I needed to either go to class or leave.  So I left (which was SO dumb).  Anyway, my best friend, Kristen, at the Academy (I haven't seen her in 7 or 8 years) came through Boise on a cross country road trip, and she stayed with me a night last weekend.  It was really cool seeing her and reminiscing.  Usually when I think of my peers from back then, I feel so totally inadequate.  I haven't even finished my undergrad, you know?  And I guess I just have this image of all of them riding into the sunset with doctorates streaming behind them infusing life and flowers into the earth in their wake.  I also realize that's just a mechanism I've held onto for so many years out of guilt for wasting my chance.  Of course it's not like that.  They're people, I'm a person. There are countless paths each of us could have taken.  I didn't waste anything.  I can still finish school.  What I was trying to get to is that I didn't feel any of that inadequacy when Kristen gave me the low down on what's been happening in other Academy members' lives.  When I was given the reality of what has happened in the years since then, I am totally satisfied with where I am now (which is also why the PPD is so frustrating.  How do I know what to fix if I don't know what's broken in my life?).  I was relieved to feel that way.

I don't really have a good way to end this post.  That seems to be a theme of mine.  But if you'll excuse me, I have to tend to a very loud climbing hairy creature that sprang out of my stomach doing a crazy Russian dance.