Sunday, April 7, 2013

Mom update

About 2 weeks ago I talked to my mother for the first time since I told her I was pregnant in December. Last night I had a dream in which I told her off for being a terrible mother. And this afternoon a friend from middle school sent me a facebook message saying "I was over at *mutual friend's house* and admiring his great challah cover, and he told me your mom had made it for him, so it made me think of you, and was just wondering how you are doing."

 So two weeks ago. My dad called me for his traditional "erev pesach" phone call, and I missed the call but I called him back a few minutes later. We talked for about 20 minutes and then he was like "here's mom" and handed her the phone (kind of like when I called him in December to tell him I was pregnant and he handed her the phone.)  We talked for maybe 15 minutes, mostly about being pregnant. She asked how I was feeling, she told me about how when I was a kid she made me handmade baby food in a food processor, and she said "EWWWW" several times loudly and obnoxiously when I told her about my plans to cloth diaper. She first asked if I was going to send them out to a diaper service, which I'm not- one of the big advantages (for me) of cloth diapering is all the money it saves vs. disposables, but sending them out to a diaper service defeats the purpose.

At one point she was like "I never got any acknowledgement that you got the shalach manot I sent you" and I shot back "Well I never got any acknowledgement about the 3 ultrasound emails I sent you."  First off re: the shalach manot- the address was written in my dad's handwriting, and had a card inside also in my dad's handwriting, so I called my dad to thank him for it. Apparently he didn't pass that on. Re: The ultrasound emails- my mom claims she never got them. She at first was like "you must have sent them to the wrong address" and I confirmed with her on the phone that the email address I had was correct (Which I know it was, because that's the same email she sent me her disowning email from, so it's in my address book).  Then she claims it must have gone to her spam folder, which I don't get, since she has emailed me from that email before, so my email should be in her address book and therefore my emails should not go to spam. So I don't know if she's lying, or if it actually went to her spam folder, or what. I suspect she was just lying, but there's no way to confirm that of course. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.

Either way I don't feel much better. I've stopped waking up crying about her, but I still had a dream last night where I told her off for not being there for me, telling her (in my dream) that you don't stop being a parent when your kids turn into adults that make different decisions than you, and that I still haven't forgiven her for disowning me and throwing me away like trash, and how could I forgive her when she wants to pretend like it never happened, has never apologized, and makes it seem like some big concession that she's even talking to me, never contacts me or responds to my emails and will only talk to me when my dad puts her on the phone. And where does she get off criticizing my decision to cloth diaper when she isn't exactly winning any awards for parent of the year, especially since she still has made no effort to get to know her son in law and you know, disowned me, didn't come to my wedding, and then didn't talk to me for 4 years.

It was a satisfying dream and I just wish there was some way to actually tell her that stuff in person. But I don't think it would do any good to do that, and don't see how I would go about bringing it up, especially since we never talk about anything real.

Then that old middle school friend emailed me this afternoon and it just made me kinda bitter again, because I know she made that challah cover for that guy for a wedding present, while for her own daughter she didn't get me a wedding present or even come to my wedding because god forbid she not put her religious beliefs above her own daughter. Argh. Still highly doubt my kid will be getting a baby quilt from her, although my dad said if I send them an invite they will do their best to come to the baby shower. But I know, just like with my phd graduation, that will be all him, while my mom will come along because she will be afraid of what my coworkers will think if my dad shows up without her. Cause she cares so much about appearances and what people will think, even people she doesn't know, so will always do the "public appearances" thing (Except at my wedding of course) even though she can't be bothered to actually try to have a relationship with me unless my dad puts her on the phone every 5 or 6 months.

Yeah, so the whole "accepting that my mother is never going to be the mom I want" thing is still a work in progress.  I've accepted it with the rational part of my brain, but the emotional part of my brain is still upset over it.

Pregnancy wise, I'm around 6 months pregnant (almost 25 weeks). I started wearing some maternity clothes last week but still also fit into most of my "Fat" work clothes- I lost around 25 pounds before I got pregnant and have only regained 10, all in my bellies, so most of my fat pants/shirts still fit, although the pants are starting to get a bit tight. Last week I wore one of my new maternity shirts- the ones that are designed to be super tight and show off all the bellies, and one of my coworkers/friends was commenting on how skinny I look from the back when I wear a shirt that tight (especially since I've been wearing my loose/fat clothes for the past few months). I'm still eating fairly healthily, and exercising mostly by gardening. I'm actually eating probably the healthiest I have in my life, since I'm going out of my way to have veggies and fruits every day, and not drinking soda, only water, juice and kefir, and mostly have been avoiding most processed food and junk food.    Although I have been having some chocolate every once in a while too. My daily breakfast is a whole grain bagel with an egg fresh from my coworker's farm - we have a deal where he delivers eggs to our department fridge for me and a few other profs every other week.  For lunch I usually have a giant serving of some kind of fruit and a big greek yogurt with some granola, and I've been eating a lot of salad for dinner along with whatever else I'm eating.

Gardening wise, I planted a blackberry bush (won't get blackberries until next year) and a new blueberry bush to replace the blueberry bush that didn't make it last year, and the other blueberry bush is flowering so hopefully I'll get some blueberries this year! I need to get some netting so birds don't eat all the blueberries.  One asparagus is poking out of the ground right now, and unlike last year when they were mostly matchstick to pencil size, this one is pretty fat- like edible size fat!  But it's only one right now, so I probably won't pick that one- I'm going to wait until a bunch are coming up all at once (which I bet will be in a few weeks) and pick enough for maybe one side dish, and that's all I'm picking this year.  Next year I will get a full harvest though. I also planted a bunch of leaf lettuce and romaine lettuce, which has all come up and I can probably will have enough leaf lettuce to make a whole salad by the end of this week, and my garlic and sugar snap peas are also growing. I planted some wildflowers flowers in pots on the porch which are turning into seedlings.  Also have some basil seedlings growing inside, 4 very small lemons which have been growing on my meyer lemon tree all winter (hoping they will get bigger before they ripen) and my perennial herbs outside- rosemary, sage, mint, oregano, thyme- are all starting to leaf out again (saffron flowers don't bloom until the Fall) along with the strawberry plant I have in a pot.

This weekend I ordered a bunch of creeping phlox (blue) to plant as groundcover out front- we have a big area under the 3 trees we have out front that the prior owners mulched, and last year I planted wildflowers there, but this year it's growing a bunch of weeds (Even though we mulched it with shredded leaves and grass from the lawnmower last fall and again this weekend), so I want to plant some groundcover so that I don't have to keep mulching/picking all the annoying weeds. Creeping phlox is an evergreen groundcover which blooms in the spring.  Here's a picture of one I found on the internet that's half in bloom so you can see the flowers and the groundcover (when it's completely in bloom it's a solid carpet of flowers)



The place I ordered the phlox from is going to send me some free Dahlia bulbs too which I plan to plant outside- those are not hardy in my growing zone (only zones 8-10- I'm in 7) so they will be an annual, although I hear if you deeply mulch them in our zone they sometimes live through the winter.  But I also heard that about the artichoke plant I planted last year and mulched, and that did not survive the winter - I think because we had an exceptionally cold winter this year

17 comments:

  1. What is the total savings amount between disposable and cloth diaper that it overcomes the gross factor?

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  2. From what I've read online, disposable diapers are approximately $80 a month on average over 2-3 years
    At the low end you will be paying $1920 for diapers if they potty train by 2 years. At the high end if you don't potty train until 3 years you will be paying $2880 for diapers

    Cloth diapers are approximately $20 each for the ones I want (The "high end" ones) which can be used until they are potty trained (they have different "Settings" for when they grow). Plus they can be used for future babies. If I get 30 (Which is probably more than I would need) at full price that's $600. If I spend an extra $20 extra on my water bill/detergent every month (Which is around average) for 2 years that's another $420, for 3 years that's $720 for a total of $1020 (or a savings of $900 in total) if they potty train at 2 years, $1320 (or a savings of $1560 total) if they potty train at 3 years. Plus another $600 in savings if/when I have a second child and reuse the same diapers. Plus cloth diapers are less harsh on a babies skin and they don't sit in a landfill until the end of time.

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    1. Just did a bit more research and most people recommend you get around 24 diapers, plus I found a place that sells the one I want for $400 for 24, not $600, or an additional $200 in savings compared to the numbers I gave up there.

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    2. $80 a month?? We buy 1 box of diapers a month from amazon for about $45 = 540/year. And people who clip coupons/buy sales get them even cheaper. You can't deny the landfill earth/killing thing though.

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    3. well that's what I read online, but i guess the internet was wrong...but still it's $400 for all the cloth diapers I need, so that's $140 less the first year and $540 less the second year.

      plus cloth diapers are so darn cute! :)

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    4. as i said i pay $20 a box in wallmart and that lasts me for a month except for when the baby is very young u change them more often so thats not more then $300 a year but yes cloth will still be cheapier

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  3. wow what an amazing and hard letter to read
    about the diapers i use the dispoiable ones and i cant imagine using the other ones and washing it out they sometimes get so dirty

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  4. you don't have to wash them out until they have more solid poops/are eating solid foods, cause breastmilk poop is completely water soluble. But we have 3 cats and 2 dogs, we are used to poop in this house (my husband is not 100% thrilled about the idea though...)

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  5. true for how loing do uplan on bresatfeeding
    and i just thought of answering that i just reminded about ur dogs
    btw where do u plan pon leaving ur dogs when ur little girls comes into this world

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  6. was that english? :)

    Not sure how long I'm going to breastfeed, but I'm hoping 6 month minimum until we introduce other foods, possibly longer.

    I plan on leaving my dogs in my house...a friend is going to come check on them while I'm actually giving birth.

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  7. From my experience, the main drawbacks of cloth are:

    - stink factor between washes
    - disposable being easier for travel
    - in some cases, better leak protection for disposables

    Of course, you could always try going the Elimination Communication route if you want to avoid diapers altogether. It's considered weird and ultra-granola here, but is quite common in Asia.

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    Replies
    1. really, cause I've heard that the ones I want to get (bum geniuses) have much better leak containment than disposables. At least according to online reviews.

      I think we will get some disposables to use for travel, although you can also get disposable liners for the cloth diapers.

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    2. Those actually look really cute! I remember considering cloth briefly in 1999, going to a cloth diaper retailer, and getting overwhelmed by pre-folds and covers and liners - yours seems better for a tired klutz.

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  8. Sorry about your mom, sucks. As least she stopped being passive aggressive long enough for you to chew her out... doesn't change anything, but gives some emotional respite.

    Never even considered the cloth diapers, and my kids did not potty train early (and the first time around, we ware running out to 24-hour Pharmacies to buy diapers most of the time at 4x the price of a Wal-mart or Warehouse Store)...

    I find the idea of cloth diapers a little gross, OTOH, the thought of another $2-3k in each kid's college fund sounds like a lot less stress...

    Good luck. Just suggesting that you focus your gardening on things that will survive being neglected for 6-12 months... think more trees/shrubs... :)

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    1. i allways buy at wallmart they have the less then $1 shipping on it and its only $20 a case so it easy to spend i but about one box a month

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  9. BTW, it's not necessarily all or nothing. In the first 6-9 months (when you'll be exclusively breastfeeding), is when you chug through diapers. As they get older, it's less common. Also, you might find at age 2 or 3 they are trained through the day, but can't sleep dry through the night. At that point, you might want to switch to the disposable pull-up type varieties.

    But I would guess that you'll save the entire cost of your cloth diaper purchase in the first 3 months, even if you choose to add disposable down the road for convenience.

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  10. Yeah, breastfeeding poop is messy, but not usually smelly. I was always washing it out of clothes anyway, so washing diapers on top of that wouldn't be a huge deal if you have a reliable washing machine.

    Farther down the road, I wasn't a big fan of pull-ups. The problem is that they sometimes work TOO well - the tot simply doesn't feel wet, so they have no reason to get up. Serious toilet training requires some time where you are willing to tolerate accidents.

    [Yes, this is indeed what happens when people get pregnant or have young children. No matter how accomplished they may be, you get into discussions about poop ;)]

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