there's one good thing about being a young parent in montreal: you can maintain a bit of edge. if i was feeling domestic life a bit heavy i could go out alone, wander mile end or downtown and feel like i was a part of something big, some orbital culture. not true for the sunshine coast. i'm not complaining, obviously when seeking a more rural life here i was aware and appreciative that these two worlds are almost opposites. but today i am feeling a little nostalgic for montreal, for some stimulus, friends, an excellent coffee and the industrial landscape of saint henri. it's a quiet, grey, homey day here and the baby is asleep. alex is working now (right now he's ripping a roof off an hexagonal cabin on gambier island), so i've resumed full-time housewife and mother role. finding some harmony in this a little more challenging since i'm not i'm my own home, but what can you do.
i've been thinking a lot about going back to university in september. i'm really looking forward to it, but i'm curious and a little anxious to see how i can balance these different roles and selves when the time comes. i wonder about where my inspiration will come from without a bit of edge in my life. i'm not worried about keeping up with fiction, but i'm inexperienced with creative non-fiction and suspect i have way less exciting things to write about now than i did when i was younger. this blog was supposed to be an exercises of non-fictional writing, a source of challenge, a place to be episodic and focused, or just to practice when all else fails. i've lost sight of that and am feeling uninspired by the gradual tilt this space has taken into the intimate going-ons of the days.

home free

after much humming and hawwing over decision-making, alex and i have decided to stay on the sunshine coast for the next year at least, and see where that takes us. we found a home and it kind of seduced us into sticking around. not-so-brief description: a 1942 house on a grassy hill across the street from the ocean; it's in a little area called grantham's landing where my best friend emma grew up, an ideal location because it's about a five minute walk to lower gibsons and a long but doable walk to the ferry and my parents' house; two bedrooms with a view of the beach, ocean and coastal mountains; meticulously well kept; wrap-around veranda with views; south and west facing so lots of light; a big cherry tree in the yard; an outdoor fireplace; and gardening space. we're pretty excited about it.
we really wanted a place where our friends from out of town would feel comfortable visiting, and this is definitely the place. we're also excited about not being able to move about three more times in one year, which, left to our own devices, we could otherwise talk ourselves into. we're staying at my parents' for the month of april. let's just say that i'm looking forward to having our own space very soon.

yesterday i finally got out in the garden. i haven't played around in the dirt for way too long, my steadfast ambitions to have a community plot in montreal unfulfilled. it felt pretty good to be out there. it was so quiet and still. the garden borders the forest and i kept catch little creatures out of the corner of my eye and could here the rattle of a raven somewhere above me. we're getting ready to put in peas, and we transplanted our sixty tomato seedlings into sterilized pots this afternoon, then we'll start tackling the explosion of landscaping. the garden is intended to triple in size; there is talk of trucking in extra soil. the main goal for me this summer is to plant and harvest enough food to almost live off it. we even have some wheat and quinoa seeds as an experiment. i have the daily challenge of entertaining the little picano, who is more than eager to put everything in his mouth from dirt to electrical cables, especially now that alex is working pretty much full time. yesterday i strapped sebastian to my back while i potted seedlings and he spent the hour or so head-butting my shoulder blades and giving my shirt raspberries. i'm happy to know that as he starts eating more and more food that a lot of it will soon come straight from the garden. he seems to be quite at home out in nature.

i’ve had a hard day today. in the past i have felt like my mother-in-law hasn’t respected alex and i as parents, and today i’m having the same issue with my own mother and the result is much more volatile and counter-productive. she seems to have taken it upon herself to “protect” sebastian from household dangers which i have deemed non stress-worthy. this morning she hovered over him as he played around a brick ledge on the fireplace and after about, oh, three seconds of polite discussion on the level of neuroticism i wanted to approach parenting with, we were in a yelling fight, a throw-back to our dysfunctional, unproductive, emotional-train-wreck selves before i hastily left home at seventeen. i had shared my grief over strangers and in-laws with her so many times and she always seemed mutually offended or ready to balk at their nosiness, so i didn’t think twice about staying here for a while, but by the end of our fight she was basically pulling the most insulting power trip she’s ever managed, yelling, “this is my house and while you’re here you have to watch sebastian in this way.”
there is an obvious pattern developing in my life surrounding motherhood. when that happens i usually have the sense to take a step back and ask if it’s me perpetuating the problem or if the people around me are actually ridiculous. i keep feeling trampled on as a mother by the women who i thought would be the most important support figures at this time in my life. being a mother for me has been a long, deeply personal experience of preparation, beginning long before birthing or even conceiving sebastian. it’s something i take more seriously than anything else; that is, it’s a role i don’t want to take for granted. it’s a gift, a privilege. so i guess it’s no wonder that i’m a bit of a volcano when my actions as a mother are questioned or overlooked or misinterpreted. for the sake of everyone, i’m going to try to be more receptive and less defensive. but i’m also going to keep setting my boundaries as kindly as possible.
it must be hard being a grandmother for the first time. it’s a whole new role to adjust to and it’s a communal one, a delicate one. i don’t know for sure, but i suspect that alex and i’s mothers are having a hard time especially because we’re young parents. we haven’t been out of the nest for that long. neither of them have had much opportunity to witness us as adults; we haven’t been at home for long periods that often over the last eight or so year, returning only for boughts of recuperation, or in between aimless wanderings. i think it’s hard for them to comprehend that there is a sacred portion of our lives now, something that can’t and shouldn’t be touched by their need to parent.
i’m not sure what to do in regards to my mother. it’s awkward because she can be a powerfully negativity force, crashing throughout the house, aggressive, embarrassing, childish. and she is powerful. i cower the same way i always have when she’s in these moods. i still don’t know how to deal with them. tonight she came home and tried to tell me about her day as though nothing had happened, and i calmly told her i wasn’t interested in having a casual conversation. i said i didn’t want us to storm around the house ignoring each other, but that i expected an apology for over-stepping her boundaries. she replied we could talk about it if i liked, but she has nothing to apologize for.
oh the endless challenges of relationships, of humility, of communication, of parenting and being parented. normally i would flee from her; that has always been my instinct when i’m afraid of her. not productive but a feeble attempt to cope. now, i can’t do those things. i have to think about what’s best for my own family. alex and i live here; we can’t leave and it benefits us to stay. we’ve traveled across the country and landed here with a pocket of time reserved entirely for my parents to be grandparents. my mother and i need to learn to communicate better and we need to learn how to exist peacefully as mother and mother, mother and grandmother, child and mother. i don’t want underlying tension between us regarding sebastian. he is the purest thing in our lives and i’m not interested in seeing that corrupted by petty behaviour.

Sour Milk

Breastfeeding has been on my mind a lot these days. Actually, what is usually a mindless task has become something I have to prepare mentally and physically for, one which I grimace through. I have had an on-going thrush infection for the last month. I am familiar with thrush infections as Sebastian and I had one in the first couple months of his life. Because I wasn’t privy to the sensation, it became out of control and caused a lot of pain, tears, dread etc… This is what I learned about combating thrush infections from that experience:

1. Regularly change and wash nursing pads or bras, preferably after EACH feeding.

2. Don’t use breast milk to soothe or attempt healing. Although breast milk is a great lubricant and healer for many ailments, particularly because of the presence of white blood cells, the warmth and sugar content of milk creates the ultimate breeding ground for yeast infections.

3. Wash the nipples and baby’s mouth after each feeding.

4. Keep nipples aired out as much as possible by not wearing a tight shirt or bra to bed, and going braless as much as possible around the house.

5. Over-the-counter and general pharmaceutical creams won’t necessarily help. Nystatin is apparently the gentlest cream available; it’s what is used on the baby’s mouth if the infection is visually present there and is available in cream form for nipples. This is what I used the first time I had thrush and although it was a great soother for the first or second use, after that it became irritating and had a counter-affect. Gentian violet is messy (it turns nipples and baby’s mouth purple), stains and slightly toxic. Most doctors and pharmacist that I’ve talked to recommend a common yeast infection cream, mainly Canestan.  I have talked to several mothers who have battled thrush infections and I don’t know of anyone who was successful with creams. One mother I talked to was successful with gentian violet. Two other mums I talked to swore by anti-fungal foot cream as the only thing that worked. I haven’t ventured there, having sensitive skin and a reluctance to get too creative with pharmaceuticals especially while breastfeeding.

6. Avoid excessive sugar and yeast in diet, mainly sweets and alcohol.

Aside from indulging in excessive amounts of chocolate, I have followed these rules pretty diligently during the last couple weeks. The infection has come and gone, but always lingered slightly even at the best of times. I’ve been using Nystain off and on, but am finding it too irritating. The last couple days have really worsened to the point where I’m in a lot of pain while breastfeeding and avoiding feedings. This morning I decided to try gentian violet. It’s a stubborn and strange thrush infection. For one thing, it hasn’t cultivated in Sebastian’s mouth in any visual way, whereas they typically do.

I’ve been thinking a lot of milk sharing, particularly nursing other babies. This thrush infection came from a friend of mine who graciously breastfed Sebastian one night while babysitting. We had talked about milk sharing and nursing each other babies a lot before this, and were both open to nursing each other’s babies should they need it. We both agreed that we would always rather do that than give our babes formula. I knew she would probably have to nurse Sebastian back to sleep the night she baby sat if he woke up, so that was cool.

I still think milk sharing and nursing other mama’s babies is great, but I’ve definitely learned something from this experience. I should have taken the risks a little more seriously. I didn’t know my friend had a thrush infection when she nursed Seb, and she definitely didn’t either. But I should have asked if she had ANY signs of ANY problem surrounding breastfeeding. She thought she had a dry skin or just irritation from the winter, and had some scabs. If I knew she had scabs, looking back on it, I would have been wary to let her nurse Seb. I know that now. While I really trust her, and wouldn’t let Seb be nursed by anyone who I didn’t completely trust, there are just some standard precautions I will definitely take in the future, regardless of who the perspective L.N is. Open wounds or scabs is one. Any signs at all of infection or irritation is another. Necessity is another thing I’m going to really factor in the next time the opportunity to nurse someone else’s baby or let Sebastian be nursed, because sometimes we’re carry something and don’t know it. Was this on-going thrush infection worth a couple of hours out at night? Not really. But I’m not dwelling on it, and there’s no point in regretting it. I’m fine to take this as a learning opportunity.

Now, I’m just trying to heal this thing. It’s getting a little out of hand, and I’m not sure what else to do about it. I have a tiny open wound now which is so irritated and is getting infected by nursing. Last week, on the other breast, I developed a clogged duct in the middle of night and woke with chills and a fever. It took a day or two of tender breasts and achy muscles and grimaced feedings to get through it.

I’ve also been thinking more and more about weaning Sebastian. Not thinking about actually weaning him, but about the future experience of weaning him. I know these infections are definitely factors in thinking about this, but not the root. He’s seven months old and is eating more and more meals. A couple weeks ago, infection aside, I went through a short but intense phase of hating breastfeeding. I felt like a wanted to stop, that everytime I fed Sebastian he was sucking some kind of life out of me. Maybe I was tired, having been sole-provider for him while Alex was still in Ottawa for a week. Sometimes I resent using my breasts as a tool to get him to do things, such as go to sleep. It’s hard to lull him to sleep without breastfeeding for me because that’s how we’ve often done it. I know from my past experience with thrush that the pain and irritation and emotion is sometimes enough to make you want to throw your baby out the window (ha…erg.)

As he gets older I’ve been thinking a bit more about how long I will nurse him. A few people have casually brought it up, like asking me what I’m going to do once I’m away from him a couple days a week in Vancouver. I didn’t really see it as an obstacle, and I still don’t (I foresee a greater bond with my breast pump in bathroom stalls), but I wonder if I will actually want to keep breastfeeding past his first birthday. As with just about everything, I know I will just see how we’ve both feeling when that time comes. I know I want to breastfeed him at least one year, and am open to going beyond that. I don’t think he’ll be eager to break that bond, and I know getting him to break the bond would be much harder on me than somewhat begrudgingly continuing to breastfeed.

Deep down, I have a conflicting assumption that I want to be the kind of mother who lets him nurse for years if that’s what he wants. I like the idea of an utterly gentle, drawn-out wean. I’m trying to decide if it’s the process or the idea of this approach that I value. A big part of me is looking forward to having my body completely my own again, though, or at least being needed a lot less in that way. Nursing him before bed, for example, would seem sublime if it meant not having to nursing ten other times a day. I guess I think a lot about a second or third child and wonder how I’m going to reach a point of generosity to welcome pregnancy again. I think a large gap between breastfeed and the next conception will be very helpful. The thought of pregnancy again is still overwhelming, although for some reason I catch myself often thinking of the next babies to join the family with warmness and eagerness.

The Great Upheaval

I haven’t written here in a long time because it’s of The Great Upheaval, ie moving across the country. It’s not as though I’ve been particularly busy, but more about having lost a certain rhythm that lends itself to such things as blogging. I’ve also had to share computers with entire households of equally computer-needy people so when the moody strikes to write the means isn’t often available.

Anyhow, here I am on the Sunshine Coast. What can I say about the last month? The move from Montreal, mainly shipping all six hundred pounds of boxes to a small-town bus depot and still being on the other side of the country when they arrived, went off without a hitch. And arriving here, at my parents old seventies-style house in the woods, has been joyful, relaxing, and therapeutic. It’s also been strange, for Alex as much as I. Coming from Saint Henri and landing in the boonies on the West Coast, the lifestyle is about as different as you could imagine. No more Metro, just rural buses that come every hour and a half and are usually predicable only in their lateness, or earliness… The snow has turned to GREEN, dark, wet forests, moss, grass, cedars, firs, alders and so much water. Non-stop rain, high creeks and ditches, and the ocean. We have taken many walks along various beaches. One of the best beaches on the Coast is a ten minute walk from my parents house and I’ve spent some afternoons lounging at the end of wharf with a book in the rare hours of sunshine.

Life is so slow, and sometimes that’s a good thing and sometimes it’s stressful. It’s hard some days not to be productive. Our main project has been house-hunting. This is what seems to be the situation on the Sunshine Coast: many one bedroom suites in great places for reasonable rent, a few one-bedroom or loft-style cabins here and there for reasonable rent, the odd two-bedroom suite or house for reasonable rent but hard to snatch or else not the right location or else just not our style, and finally, many entire large houses for too much than we can spend. We’re holding out for a great two bedroom place, so we haven’t found a house yet. We’ve only been here for about two and half weeks, which is funny to think because it seems like an eternity.

But the house we’re in right now is somewhat ideal, despite it not being our own. My parents are easy going and happy to have us here, so for now this is where we are, boxes stacked in the basement and no plans to move them. We figure it won’t be so bad if we end up staying here for the summer. We’re happy to be saving money, especially with this move to Vancouver on the horizon and a Masters degree to fund.

So that’s the situation so far.

What else can I say? Today the family is all a little anxious because Simon is still out sailing in the middle of the South Pacific, and possibly in the path of the tsunami after the huge earthquake in Japan. In fact we’ve been under tsunami warnings all day ourselves, and have been warned against going to the beach. My dad is in Port Alice, at the Northern tip of Vancouver Island for a business, and that area and Haida Gwaii are on serious tsunami watch. It’s hard to imagine an earthquake on the other side of the world could possible devastate our region. I think we’ll be fine though. For now, we’ll just wait for Simon to get in touch with us. He’s expected to reach Samoa by the weekend.

Sebastian turned seven months old a week or two ago and has been charming the locals everywhere we go. People already “know” him as “the happy baby.” Today we went into a bakery and some people were like, “oh there’s that baby…”  The other day I was walked around the docks and as I passed a woman she leaned in and said, “Hi Sebastian.” Hahaha. On his seven-month birthday he fully learned how to crawl! Just suddenly he could do it, and now he’s ripping it around the house (well, maybe that’s being generous). He’s a trouble maker now. I wish he could see his old pal Olive now that he’s more capable of actually interacting and moving! I’ll have to find him some baby friends here soon.

Alex seems to be adjusting to the Coast fine. He got a short research contract with the federal government on remote-access communities in the North, which is so ideal for us because he can work from home and is making about three times the amount than he was at his last job. I received a decent sized entrance scholarship to UBC so that was pretty cool! Now the work begins of actually applying for scholarships and milking the institution for all its worth…