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Because I used to devote most to all of every single day solely to my children, I am constantly feeling mother-guilt for the past few months.

Alright, I started constantly feeling mother guilt in mid-2007. I was mostly emotionally unavailable and somewhat physically unavailable for 3 1/2 weeks after Elise was born, and then extremely distracted and preoccupied with her therapies, medicine dosing, doctor visits, my research about her, etc, for the next couple of months. I did pretty well; I continued to give the other four a lot. I was actually being some sort of martyr as I was DYING two Falls ago; the day before I was checked into the hospital for emergency surgery I drove Annie to ballet and read to everyone before bed and nursed Jake like usual right along with Elise and cooked a good dinner.

But then I was yanked out of my house completely for 10 days. Sat around in a hospital bed watching TLC and wondering if I would live with only adults coming and going for TEN. DAYS. And went back unable to lift my own baby for over a month, or be jumped/climbed on, and it's just never gotten back to where it was before. I've been "self-centered" in a way I never was before...I put it in quotes because a lot of it is involuntary or even horrible, not the sort of vanity self-centeredness typically implies to me...but either way, I'm more centered on ME than I used to be, and less so on the tiny people around me.

In some ways, it's actually a positive shift for us as a family. I really value taking time to go swim, or to write, I've been drawing and obviously counseling is tremendously helpful. All these things really only add up to a few hours a week. But then Grant and I are also increasingly feeling justified in locking ourselves in a room together or ordering everyone else out of the room we're in, for sex but just as often for simple talking without interruptions. We get at least 30 minutes per day, these days, of time sequestered from the children just the two of us behind a closed door - as well as a 5 hour block on Sundays when the nanny comes and we go out and eat and see a movie or whatever we feel like (this is the only time she's still coming, now, aside from being booked in advance for our solo anniversary trip). It's been GREAT for our marriage on soooo many levels. I feel like we really HAVE a relationship separate from the kids. An actual adult relationship that is just about us being in love and wanting to be together that has nothing to do with family responsibilities. <3

Happy as heck in my marriage, getting better all the time personally, social life in general improving...but the ghost of my former self dissaproves and I can't ever quite get used to motherhood not being...everything. I have a lot of kids, after all. They're still quite young. They'll only be that way once. Right?

I just have a totally different paradigm than I used to. Which makes sense in reference to Ananda and Aaron, because they're 8.5 and 7.5 and far more independant. It's perfectly fine for them to spend half the day reading chapter books and playing musical instruments on their own. I'm not sure if it's fair to Isaac, Jake and Elise. Who knows, you know?

I was tallying it up today, though, and I really kind of sell myself short. I was wrapping up the evening feeling very guilty, as per usual, that I don't do nearly as much with them as I used to and am so oriented on grown up things. I've been back in touch with an old high school friend who I still care about a lot this week - there've been several phone calls, I got a letter and am writing her back. No arts and crafts, though, no '3 and up' board games. But the tally, for today:

-I drove Ananda to counseling and back, talking with her all the while both ways, much of it educational about bacteria, hospitals, mosquito-born diseases, tropical climates and safe water, all kinds of stuff.
-got everyone a good lunch and sat with them to eat
-read Jake a book
-endless amounts of nursing, cuddling, diaper changing, snuggling and playing with Elise, who is clingtastic and endlessly affection-hungry throughout the day
-put a movie on for Jake
-stood Jake in the corner once and had a talk with him at least 5 times, mostly for violence towards other kids or cats
-guided everyone through getting their shoes, finding warmer clothes, etc, and (with Grant) took them all out to the everglades for dinner Outside, including me taking the older three on a short little hike down to some water
-on the way, drew A and A a map of Florida with all of "our" points of interest and familiar towns and landmarks on it, and we talked about it
-planned a whole-family 3 day 2 night camping trip for Grant's next block of 4 days off (week after next)
-went in the pet store with only Aaron to find his cat a leash, while we picked up litter and more hay for the bunnies
-read half an HP chapter to A and A after making them and Isaac brush their teeth
-made Jake and Isaac go back to bed a million times
-got Elise to sleep

So that is actually a lot of parenting. It is not as sucky as I feel like it is. I feel the void, though. The void wherein:

-I slept in and everyone scrounged around for bagels or cereal for breakfast on their own, which is all too common lately
-I talked to G on the phone and then drew in my sketchbook, by myself, while Annie was in counseling
-Grant and I escaped to the bedroom alone for half an hour in the afternoon, with Bee Movie on for the kids, while Elise was napping
-I spent about 40 minutes ignoring everyone and researching overnight trips we could take (just the two of us) for Valentine's Day, and contacted my sister about whether she'd like to have that childcare endeavor. I'm all hyped up about Grant and I traveling by ourselves ever since I got the idea for our anniversary. Not for long periods of time, but...for little periods of time ;) A couple of times a year.

Nobody, like, got a bath. The littlest two didn't brush their teeth before bed. There wasn't any formal sit down schoolwork even though it was a schoolday. I somehow missed Isaac completely at almost every turn, though he was with me for the mini-hike and Grant took him out to the store alone for dinner supplies. I don't know what I really think about any of this sort of thing anymore. My thought process goes;

I want my bed back.
I already miss Jake not sleeping with us!
I have to get more rest, and I want privacy with Grant.
Once Elise is out of the bed, that's the LAST CO-SLEEPING BABY out of the bed forever :/
I'm sick of getting woken up over and over.
G and I have never once went anywhere just the two of us, it's high time after 8 years.
But to Jake and Elise it hasn't been 8 years, they might not be ready to be without us for more than 24 hours.
Yet, they'll have their siblings to help in a way the older ones would not have.

Etc.

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I have the hardest parts of my c-section book done. That is;

-There is a title
-I've organized my ideas and plans into chapter headings and know what I'm putting in, and in what order
-The forward is written, which establishes the tone

It may not sound like much, but it is the fruition of TONS of thought and frustration, and will make it so that the rest will fly by almost on autopilot. This is how I used to write papers for school - 3 times as long for the outline as for the actual filling in of the outline and then some edits and I'd be done.

There is a lot of research to be able to cite sources still in my future, but I can deal with that. Especially since research is something I can do with interruptions, unlike the writing itself.

Also...my collection of short stories is more than half done! And. I really think it's good. That also has a title ;)

And I have a couple of things to submit to magazines after one more edit and an idea for another book that I'm almost having to sit on my hands to not start writing before I finish some other things.

I wish I had more time to write. But I'm not really willing to take it from our family. It's hard...I'm SO hoping the littlest kids' bedtime scheduling transition is done soon, which will free up some nighttime hours for me in a way I can live with. Until then, I'm basically writing on Monday afternoons after therapy and in fits and starts when people seem occupied, or if I'm not too bone tired, once they're in bed.

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Speaking of once they're in bed. Geez Louise, tonight is a perfect example of "Why I can't lose weight". I've been doing great - eating small frequent meals throughout the early and mid part of the day, and slowing down a lot as it gets later. I did 40 solid minutes of swimming on Monday. I'm drinking a ton of water.

Today had been a good day. A long day, but good. And I had a much earlier dinner than usual, which helped make up for it being a less than stellar meal. I was so tired and we'd been out running around in the Everglades so we had all the kids in bed by like 9:15 (early for them). TWO HOURS later, all five were still awake - Grant had the power cut to our room and A and A's room since he was installing a new ceiling fan, and they claim they can't sleep without their music. Isaac didn't have his blanket, and when I tossed it to him from the doorway after retrieving it, it hit the light fixture on THEIR ceiling fan in a way that made the thing drop like a bomb and shatter on the tile. Grant thinks he didn't tighten it properly after changing the bulb last time. Under Jake and Isaac's beds, in the bunny pen, out to the hallway, there was just glass everywhere. A and A had to take their bunnies out and the light had to be on for me to sweep, sweep again, shake things out, vaccum, vaccum more, sweep again. There was glass DUST in the grout all over the room.

Finally Grant was going to bed. He'd gotten the new fan in, everyone but Jake and Elise were sleeping, he has to get up early tomorrow. I was trying to lay down with Elise with him, and was sooooo sleeeepy, which is rare and precious for me...I have horrible insomnia since this ptsd shit started. So it is really especially irritating to actually feel sleep is possible, and have to get up. But I did. This is over 3.5 hours after bedtime routines were begun.

So I am out here in the big empty main part of the house, with Elise, who is hyper and clingy at the same time - basically, wanting to be actively engaged constantly. Which was fine for the first hour and a half she'd done it before G went to bed and before I was sick of it.

Exhausted. Frustrated. No energy, no end in sight. I always head for the fridge.

I ate a handful of olives. A baby carrot. A leftover hot dog from earlier this evening that we brought back home with us, on the (whole wheat) bun. Quite a lot of chips and dip, which we don't even usually have in the house. One of Grant's carbonated juice pseudo-sodas. Then I got inspired and found the probably-too-old vanilla ice cream in the back of the freezer, filled a bowl with it, and topped it with crumbled graham crackers and sliced strawberries. Which I highly reccomend, btw. All this was in, like, 30 minutes tops. After midnight.

Then Elise went to sleep and I got to stay up with my regret and wish I knew how to make myself puke. Blah. Far too tired to even dream of excercising (it's almost 2 am now).

I know that it's my fault and my problem that I try to cope with tiredness and frustration this way. AND YET, if I had it my way, I would have just went to sleep and been fine. It's so hard this way, the staying up late with one or two stragglers is a HUGE part of my problem (and the resultant sleep deprivation plays hell with my metabolism).

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Movie Reviews:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was SO imaginative, creative, original, thought-provoking...so well done in terms of acting and makeup. I cried a little once and laughed several times. AND YET...because the love story was not one I could relate to, the peripheral relationships were kind of eyebrow-raising for me, and the main plot is not really something any of us can relate to - and it was a period film from another time...I don't know, it was just sort of forgettable after all was said and done. I have all this intellectual praise for it but emotionally it didn't really connect. I think it was worth seeing, and better than some other things I've seen lately, just not quite all I expected.

The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is something I've seen before, once, years ago, and I was blown away by it then, and again last night. I mean damn, GENIUS. It's just...it blows my mind. And now that I've had a lot more experience being under varying degrees of anesthesia with people talking around me, that aspect was a lot more intense for me. And now that I know a lot more about neurology, that aspect was a lot more engrossing for me. And...yeah. Anyone who has not seen this just MUST. Anyone who has, watch it again!

Cats and rabbits/would have very extra special houses/they would sit and talk to me for hours...

I responded to a voicemail this afternoon, to call back someone who wanted a reference for our nanny. We've slashed her hours pretty intensely (she comes on Sundays for a 5 hour block so G and I can go out together, and is open to other things that come up rarely on an as needed basis) so she needed some supplemental stuff.

I ended up talking on the phone with the referral woman for over an hour, about personal stuff, once we got the referral part out of the way. She is in counseling, too, for ptsd - she and her children watched her husband be brutally murdered several months back. She wants to homeschool but doesn't know how, but her 7 year old is one of those rare autistic kids with a genius IQ that is floundering in public school, and by the end of the conversation - she's calling me back for homeschool resources, we're getting Aaron and her son together, we've compared notes on trying to find an attorney and on helping kids who are having a hard time with therapy...she referenced things like Dateline NBC doing a special on their family and after we hung up I found the whole story with some quick googling. She'd never heard of emdr for reprocessing but was very interested. She lost an infant way back in the day, too.

She was completely weirded out three quarters of the way through our conversation, by how much she was telling me. I tried to reassure her I'm used to it and people always just sort of walk up to me and start telling me things.

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Grant wants to travel, by himself. He's always had a passion to see things he's never seen before, to be in nature...it's how he relates to God best and, well, it's been the biggest thing between us for a few days in a row.

Because I don't want him to go off on his own for days and nights at a time. We've always done things together, I can't even imagine suggesting going off on my own without him. I can't even sleep at night without him in the bed...especially now. We have five young kids that we attachment parent and homeschool, and to me it seems sort of ludicrous to even think that could be an option. I've always valued, SO MUCH, that he is not a man that is going to accept a position with business trips or deployments because family comes first.

He's brought up how as much as we go on trips as a family, it's very limiting to have all the kids with us, and it costs so much more to do it as a group of 7 that it's just not possible to do very often. To that I was thinking, yeah, and feeding us all is a pain in the ass, too - dinner would be so much easier if I just went out and got myself something and then came back when it was bedtime. I mean, really.

And yet...

Grant hasn't gone to counseling, or been swimming at the Y, over the past year. He doesn't have nearly as many real life friends as me, or the online support network that I do. He doesn't write or draw to get things out. He did get a shed and a lot of equipment to do woodworking, with the settlement, and that is good for him, but like my outlets, it's very hit or miss with when we actually have the opportunities to get our creative energy out...

He had to take care of the kids as I recovered and has had to be there for me as I fall apart.

So I'm starting to try to consider this as, maybe this is what HE needs.

Because, honestly, up until now I've just been very hurt, thinking how I can't imagine wanting to go hundreds of miles away from him for days at a time. When I fantasize about getting published, I imagine all of us getting on a plane, or signing things by fax. Yeah, I'm clingy - whatever. He knew I couldn't trust anything or take anything for granted when we fell in love ;) He claims to love me as damaged goods, so it's not like it's any surprise now.

Anyway...I'm working my mental way around to being able to accept him traveling and tell him I'm cool with it. But I have to keep working, or else I'll tell him that and then resent the hell out of him excitedly counting down the days, feel jealous of whatever locale he picks, and then listen bitterly as he tells me what a great time he had, feeling all defensive and overly vulnerable about how much I missed him.

Great mother, sure, Christian keeping the faith through good times and bad, I can do that - but Grant gets one seriously high maintenance mess for a wife. I like to think the lavish meals and fabulous sex offset the long hours he listens and rubs my back as I cry and rant about the jumbled crap in my head.

Honestly I think he has it pretty good and we're both really happy...I'm just emotionally exhausted from going round and round about this - both mentally and out loud with him. We don't fight or yell, we sit and talk calmly and cry and make jokes and break the tension and lay there holding each other talking about why it's hard and have sex and then think of something new to start the cycle over.

For reference: he wants to go set up a tent at the base of some mountains and hike through them and push his body, and rock climb and explore wilderness and take pictures with the fancy camera he's never really gotten to use. He's not at all interested in, like, dining or man made attractions or whatever. Basically, he wants to do things I'm not really physically capable of at the moment, anyway. Which is mostly cool in that it reassures my EXTREMELY jealous and possessive nature that he's aching for solitude, but also sort of awful in that I hate feeling left out or left behind because I "can't" do anything... Like when we went to Bush Gardens and even though I would've been all about the roller coasters a few years ago, now I'm just getting used to life without constant adrenaline from worry and panic again and like things calm. Like how we always wanted to sky dive, and now he's getting impatient to do it right as I'm feeling like I'm not ready yet. He tells me, "it's not like I can only do it once, we can still do it together someday, too", and then I'm torn in half between something like that is NOT the same the SECOND time around, I hate this crap and my desire to not hold him back and have him resenting me.

...This is a long while later. But I'm sitting here now, thinking, and. Come on. The man didn't want cats, or bunnies, but now he's stopping by a pet store after a long work day to pick up a nesting box for baby rabbits. He's building me a chicken coop in our suburban backyard. He's designated Mondays as mine and from now on I get a six hour block during each one to go out by myself...this past one was devoted to swimming, 2 hours of counseling and writing at Atlanta Bread.

The more I think about everything over the years, the more I genuinely want to make a sacrifice for his happiness. Like just thinking of making him happy, makes me happy.

I swear one day he'll have taught me how to love.

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Ananda, Aaron and I have devoted a lot of time today to learning all about rabbit pregnancies, baby bunny care, etc. Some of it is really interesting - for instance, countless humans have "rescued" totally healthy newborn rabbits from their "neglectful" mothers out of sheer ignorance. Because it is apparently normal for the mom to only nurse them once or twice a day, when people aren't watching (i.e., late at night and at the crack of dawn). And, they don't hang out in the nest with them - they sit on top of the nesting box or outside of it all day, because in the wild they've got to guard the babies from predators, not entertain them. Likewise unknowing people often sell babies at 4-5 weeks old because they're at peak cuteness then, being ultra tiny yet fully fluffy. BUT, that is the age they're starting solids and are very prone to intestinal disease if not getting the protective elements in mother's milk, too. It's common for commercial breeders to lose half of every litter to this sort of flim flam, whereas if they just left the babies with mom for a full 8 weeks while they made a slow transition to all solid food, it could be almost totally avoided.

We've also had to have a lot of "bucking up" to deal with how one or more is often born dead in a litter, or dies in the first few days of life. I need them to be prepared for that; especially Aaron. And a lot of instruction about scent and keeping our hands off her kits so she keeps caring for them. We put a bunch of nesting materials (strips of old towels, cotton balls, extra hay, etc) in her pen today, for her to drag to the nesting box at her leisure and whim. And moved Shadow to the kids' room with a small litter box and nighttime pen, where he can move freely throughout the day.

I was really surprised to learn, many months back, that rabbits can be litter trained. But it's really effective. Our bunnies are in one of those tall fence style portable playpens with no bottom, on an area rug. We fill a box with hay, then two days later the hay is gone and it's full of poop, and we dump it and add hay again. The rug's been in there for 6 months or more and still vaccums clean and has only a smell of hay about it, that febreezes out pretty well.

Our nanny has a "house rabbit", meaning it roams the house freely like a dog with a litter box, food and water set out. Shadow will be a "room bunny", but shut up at night when A and A's door is open, because I don't think a house bunny would be safe for long with Jake and Elise.

Watching them interact with the cats is awesome: Peter, Aaron's terrified and mostly grown cat, is of course terrified of the rabbits. Chrysanthemum gets along great with Shadow, but chases and pounces on and hunts Hoppy because Hoppy is afraid of her and will run. The best is when Shadow and Chrysanthemum are both curious about the same thing - it's a tiger striped, fluffy kitten with her paws up on something and her head cocked to one side, and a sleak black bunny the same size as her standing on back feet with front paws in the air, sniffing the air and craning forward to see.

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I have so much cleaning to do in the morning. Then my friend Kristin is coming over in the afternoon, to measure my kitchen and talk about this mosaic tile I've commissioned her for. It keeps getting so late. I don't want to get up before noon lately if I can help it, but that is rarely an option.