I’m doing better but am still challenged.<\/p>\n
A new wrinkle developed a week ago that adds to my challenge somewhat. I pulled a muscle in my mid-back (at bra strap level) that has been made worse by lifting and holding Bean. At first it was a cautionary ache. I moved somehow a few days ago that exacerbated it. Now when I move certain ways a shooting stabbing pain can make me gasp or even cry out. I saw a doctor for it last week and was told to stretch. Not helpful. I\u2019m using heat and Ben-gay.<\/p>\n
Of course this means I still can’t drive or lift the stroller or carrier. First it was the C-section, now my back. Husband is off work two more weeks and can extend another two if needed; beyond that I don\u2019t know, and I\u2019m trying to stay present.<\/p>\n
Husband and I are exhausted. He was up all night with her and went to sleep at 7 a.m. Bean is in my right arm now asleep. Put her down anywhere (crib, bouncer) and she wakes up and soon fusses herself into a state of Great Upset. We know she needs holding; she’s not aware that she’s even a separate entity. Even if we hold her 12 hours a day that’s still a 50% reduction from what she had before in my cozy womb.<\/p>\n
So life is reduced to basics and I’m still fighting this (which isn’t helpful). I want to power through the day, taking walks, getting to the grocery store, keeping the dishwasher emptied and loaded properly, doing laundry, vacuuming. But I cannot do all this. There is no time or energy to think about anything that does not directly affect immediate needs: is Bean hungry, needing a clean diaper? Do we need to mix a new batch of formula, is there a clean bottle? Did we mail the rent? Dinner? There’s a frozen pizza in the freezer; never mind we’ve eaten pizza for the last four days for lunch and dinner. Remembering to get and send birthday cards (hell, even remembering<\/em> birthdays), opening savings accounts for Pixie’s future, writing thank-you notes, knitting Bean a Christmas stocking, getting the annoying squeak in the Honda checked out — all not<\/strong> priorities. And if you ask us when we’ll get to them, the answer is we haven’t a clue, and that will remain our answer until it changes.<\/p>\n They say the first six weeks are toughest and it gets better and I’m holding Them to that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m doing better but am still challenged. A new wrinkle developed a week ago that adds to my challenge somewhat. I pulled a muscle in my mid-back (at bra strap level) that has been made worse by lifting and holding Bean. At first it was a cautionary ache. I moved somehow a few days ago […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-motherhood","category-nature"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2061"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2061\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13647,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2061\/revisions\/13647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}