Halfway thru First Year

I'm not counting down the days anymore like I was at Week 1 when the days and nights were one big blur with sporadic unrestful bouts of sleep. At almost 8 months, I'm asking time to slow down. Let me memorize his face, his chubby feet, and baby fat that Rob and I would (fake) chomp on to make him laugh. Even his cries. As much as they make my teeth clench and stir my stress, I try to appreciate this all. I've grown used to having a little bit of sleepiness constant throughout my days. Operating, nonetheless. And skipping the naps.

The longest fastest year ever.

Hands down, 2014 was the year that picked me up, threw me against the wall, forced me to get up and run as fast as I can. Does everyone have this year? The one that challenges you to operate under extreme sleep deprived, unshowered, unsettled conditions right after your dog just died and you don't have a proper place to put all your clothes? The year where you find yourself cramming as much into 4:30 PM - 5:18 PM (sometimes 5:26 PM) so you can push off picking up the baby from daycare. It's the baby you love so much but are terrified about spending two bewitching hours with? Add to that, your husband is operating on fumes because his work and work people suck every ounce of patience, hard work, and diligence out of him with no appreciation in the end. Not to mention, he has a nasty, anxiety-filled, pre-dawn to sundown commute each day to that nasty workplace.

But then there are those moments.

When he finally slept thru the night and you are thinking your wildest dreams have come true.
When we are scared to death of stopping the dreamfeed. But we do. And it is ok.
When he finally smiles. 
When he rolls over.
When he grabs the milk bottle off the counter and shoves it in his mouth.
When you realize the monkey with the pacifier is, like, gold. 
When he crawls.
When you think he actually said "bye dad." (But he really didn't).
When he starts to take on a personality and is truly interested in dogs and lights and photo holiday cards.
When he's onto you with which remote controls actually control the tv.
When he eats the food you make.
Taking those first few steps are incredible.
When he lays down with you.
When Baby Einstein DVDs do their job.
When it's silent in the house.
When you walk into his room while he sleeps because you've already missed. 

Birthday time!

Milo turned the big 0-1 on Feb 7. We celebrated his dol last weekend with close friends and family at the Foster City Rec Center. It was a beautiful, sunny, droughtlike winter day. 70 ish degrees. Aside from a few minor stresses, like no nap for Milo, me not bringing my cell phone, Tina showing up at the wrong rec center, Mom super snappy, Patty picking up Ravioli House food slightly late and in-communicado...all went pretty well.

Few odd things I'll remember...
- poster sized baby fotos for pin the mustache on the Milo game
- audio mishap with the video projector. A little disappointed that the youtube video I put together wasn't presented exactly the way I wanted. Especially because it took me forever to learn iMovie
- not knowing how to explain to my family that Ali has no hair now
- Ryan winning the dol game
- Milo choosing a hockey stick (WHAT?!?!?!)
- Meeting QM and DM (Hao's kids)
- Elijah doing, gimme five, down low, into space, IN YOUR FACE!!!
- Eimo, enjoying strolling Milo around
- Rob Gavin Newsom-ing Milo's hair
- Daisy looking like she just stepped out of a salon
- Greg's blessing to Milo
- Eva and Ella in matching peach spring dresses
- Bowie missing his nap to come to the party!
- Christine coming down kids-free to a one year old birthday party (WHAT?!?!?!)
- Jeanne not being able to make it cuz she's stuck in newborn purgatory
- Dad laying back, taking it in.

It was a great day! We are now getting used to walking into a room and finding Baby Milo walking and "numchucking" two remote controls, like he's been ninja-ing for years!

I bonded with my smartphone on maternity leave and I feel gross about it

This is my last week of maternity leave and I'm afraid I bonded more with my phone than my baby. I mean, my baby is cute, but my phone interacts with me more.

It began with the fact that I spent the majority of my leave at my parents' home. They don't have cable tv and set up a nursery in their living room. Which meant every time I nursed or pumped, I stared into space. Thank God for my phone though. I could have my baby suck away at my boobs as I caught up on my Scramble with Friends or got sucked away on Facebook. This means about 8-12 times a days, I'd be interacting with my phone…err…I mean baby…but what really happened was I couldn't live without my phone!

My first two weeks post birth was especially bonding since my Mom mandated the Asian post birth recovery rules of ancient Asia lands of Confucian blah blah blah. Those rules that really work she says since they've been around for thousands of years. Things like, dress like an eskimo even though it's 75 degrees outside. Wait, actually don't go outside -- mom or baby. Eat seaweed soup a couple times a day. And pigs feet soup since pig's feet is readily available at the Korean supermarket. Wow, what a depressing time for me. I am literally walking around in a green fleece robe all day, my c-section incision still fresh (meaning every time I cough, my guts seem to move), my nipples are raw, and my hemorrhoids (well, need I say more…TMI there). So my only friend(s) is (are) my phone (and my husband who snuck me out of the house in the evening).

As I sat in the glider chair nursing my flesh and blood, I got of a glimpse of the outside world via Facebook. Ah, so-and-so photographed an attractive meal at a trendy restaurant -- exciting stuff! I don't see a trendy restaurant in my immediate future. Oh, and single lady friend is on her third beach vacation. Now, that will never happen again. And a funny animal video, random rants of anger or not so funny humor…ahhh so entertaining and meaningless. I love it! Oh, the baby is finally asleep on my lap. Give me a few more mins here with my phone.

Now that my baby is 4 months and almost 20 lbs., laughing, smiling and *almost* sleeping thru the night, I am feeling much more whole again but find myself with an unhealthy attachment to my phone. Example: I lay the baby down to play with him but place my phone next to his head so when I get bored with him, I can check email. I'd take a picture of this, but can't because I'd need my phone to take a photo of my phone. What's worse is the baby already hates the phone. When the baby starts laughing or smiling, I'll pick up my phone to capture a photo or video. Once it's flashed in front of him, his smile disappears. He already feels like a second child. Case in point:

I swear, he was smiling and laughing before I flashed the phone in front of him. Or this example of his physical reaction toward the phone:

So alas. It's possible my phone soothe me more over maternity than my baby did. Well, I know that that is true. In fact, I know it's true for many moms, given the sheer volume of photos and commentary on Facebook. With the end of unstructured days of pumping and nursing, tt's time for me to also cut the cord with the unhealthy relationship I secured with my phone over maternity. So long friend. Til we meet again…oh wait, Half Off Foot Massage on Living Social?

Remembering Tommie

Last Monday, Tommie, my dog for the past 16 years, passed away lying next to me while I slept. It wasn’t a complete surprise since he was so old, but it was still heartwrenching none the less.

My husband, Rob, and I realized Tommie wasn’t acting like himself after the two of us had a long discussion about all the different things we had to do in the coming week to quickly move on the rebuild of our house which had been our obsession for the past 5 months, second to our baby.  See, Rob, Tommie, and I had been staying with my parents down in Sunnyvale since the new year, as our new home is being put together. Since here, we had our first child, Milo, which has forced us to focus most of our energy on the care of the baby. We took over my parents’ living room and turned it into a nursery with a twin bed for whomever took care of Milo during the night. Tommie spent his days nested on a fleece blanket behind a glider chair in the nursery where I breastfed, and he spent the nights upstairs with either Rob or me – whoever didn’t have night duty.

As you can imagine, this past month has been incredibly trying. Rob and I have been physically and emotionally spent as new parents not quite living at home. Rob has taken on all the stress of the remodel. I’ve taken on stress of having a baby rely on my body for all his nourishment, as I recover from the birth. In addition, I've taken on most of the nighttime care as Rob had returned to work since the birth of the baby. Tommie was not immune to all the things that have been going on either – whether it was moving out of our place in San Francisco back Dec or adopting new daily routines. He saw a lot of attention diverted away from him to the new baby. 

Knowing this, Rob and I made it a point to walk Tommie each evening so he got some bonding time and exercise each day. Rob actually had been doing pack walks every night for more than 6 months – a ritual started back on Guerrero St in SF. The last couple of nights, however, Tommie showed some reluctance with participating in what used to be the highlight of his day. He would pause at the front door, halfway down the driveway, pause, and pause again a few times at the very beginning of the walks. However, Rob and I pulled Tommie along since we knew the exercise was good for him and his arthritic legs.

The night before he died, we noticed Tommie was especially slow moving, his breathing impaired, his heart racing and neck craned. Based on Rob’s experience with the death of his cat, Fuzz, years back, Rob's gut told him this could be our last night with Tommie even though we had a relatively normal pack walk to Starbucks earlier in the day. 

I, however, had hope. Although a dog, Tommie had nine lives resiliency. But I also knew we had so much going on with the care of the newborn, the house stuff, and the stress of living with parents, we couldn’t possibly fit a sick dog or the decision to put Tommie down on our list of things to worry about.  It really sounds stupid, but that’s how I felt. It was simply bad timing - I couldn't take on any more. Rob suggested we take him into emergency care, either he, or I, or the whole crew including Milo could pile into the car at midnight.  I felt we couldn’t possibly do that either as I pictured us all in a depressing pet emergency room all night with the baby crying and me having to pump or nurse. Plus, I dreaded spending exorbitant amounts of money towards heroics that would be needed in order to prolong Tommie’s life for what…a few more days or months? So I said I'd take Tommie to the vet in the morning.

So Rob suggested I either take the night off from Milo duty or have Tommie sleep with me downstairs. Since Rob had to be up at 5:45 AM the next day, I thought having Tommie sleep in bed with me would be most prudent.

That night, Tommie and I cared for Milo. Surprisingly, it was one of the most smoothest nights I had with the newborn. Tommie would watch me feed the baby from bed, his breaths now a staccato and his neck craned even more. During the last feeding which was around 5:30 AM, I looked at Tommie, then down at Milo with my eyes welling up, dripping tears. Milo stared up at me with that wrinkle of concern between his eyes, an expression he got from Rob. Tommie rested his head on the bed and watched. Once Milo went back to sleep, I held Tommie in my arms. Tight. Then I got us both comfortably positioned for the next round of sleep on the small twin bed. I laid on my side and he was at my legs, the way we slept hundreds of times before.

I woke up, probably only an hour later when Rob said goodbye to me before he left for work. As I lay there, I asked Rob, how is he? Tommie had since moved himself right by my chest. I felt the warmth of his body and no more wheezing. It felt peaceful.

Rob checked on Tommie and I knew from the expression on his face and the words that didn’t come from his mouth that Tommie was gone. Rob carried his body to his fleece blanket and back to the corner of the bed. By then, Milo woke up. We all gathered around Tommie.

Rob hugged Tommie and put his ear close to Tommie’s chest. He was convinced he felt a faint heartbeat. Between tears, he told me to continue to touch him and say my goodbye in case Tommie was still there. He told me you don't want to abandon him at that moment. I hugged Tommie and told him how much I loved him. I rocked Milo in my other arm. We cried and said our goodbyes to him. Even though he was deaf, I hope he heard us and felt us there. He likely passed away then, surrounded by his family.

I’m not sure how to mourn the death of my companion who I met when I was 26 (I will turn 42 this year). He's the dog I came home to everyday after work, greeting me with profuse dog wags. He'd run "Figure Eights" around me when I returned from long trips or most recently, meeting me at the front door when I returned from the hospital after birthing the baby. He was there when Rob asked me to marry him at Land's End. And during sad, lonely or just plain sucky times, I could count on hugging on his white fluffiness who knew to love me for no reason. Through all the life changes or when life didn't move fast enough for me, he was my constant.

But now my constant companion is gone.  I can only believe the way he left me was purposeful. He passed on during the hour the whole house slept (even Milo!) and he managed to walk over to my side so I was with him but didn’t have to go through the agony of seeing him take his last breath. 

As I go through my days, all I see is him and think about how he left me: with the start of a new life with Rob, new Baby Milo, and the soon-to-be-finished new home that we were looking forward to sharing with him. 

It's hard to grasp that my buddy is gone, but I find some comfort in knowing he’s taken care of me in the most selfless and loyal way I could ever imagine. I told Rob, I want to make sure Tommie didn't just slip away from our lives and that we don't recognize how he left us. He asked me, do you want to recognize how he lived or how he died? I responded, both. I won't ever forget all the memories I have of him. They are all around me. How he died and how I remember his death maybe a coping mechanism for me as I go through this sad time. Maybe I've romanticized it to make me feel better. But I'd like to remember him as my companion all these years and when he passed away he didn't abandon me but left me with my new life companions, you and Milo, I told Rob. To me, that is the greatest gesture of love I've ever experienced.

What are you hoping to achieve in 2009?

Hard to believe we are down to the homestretch with W. Good riddens. Also hard to believe that 20 years ago, it was 1989. Yikes.

Well, with the new year, and namely the first month of the new year, it's time to take a look at the world and our individual lives and think of little ways we can improve upon both through the non-committal resolution making process. Have you come up with yours? I'm looking for some good ideas, here's what I have so far starting with me, extending out:

1) Year of yoga. Try to get real bendy and zen-like.

2) Do things led by interest first! In other words, do what I love to do vs. things just because they are there. Off the top of my head, I'll start with yoga (#1), baking/cooking (see later), watercolor class (if I get around to it...this has been on my list for like 5 years), swimming, and travel. I know, very broad and sweeping, but the point is, interest-led.

3) Once a month, cook a meal for a different person. No repeats, so if you make the Top 12 don't try to mooch from me by trying to swing an add'l homecooked meal.

4) Extend the Obama-Inspired Campaign. I would like to do what I can to help make this term(s) a success and continue that momentum that was harnessed during the campaign. My thinking is we're all in this world together, regardless of how we vote. I would like to do what I can to stay informed and execute on some of the agenda at a community level. I'm shooting for either education driven or environmental causes.

Ok, that's 4...all semi-achieveable. I'm really pumped about what's forthcoming! It's the end of an era, albeit not without tremendous challenges, but I feel there is a greater sense of hope and empowerment now than there has been in a loooong time. Happy New Year, everyone!

Reflections on Barack Obama's Victory Last Night

Last night was my proudest and most profound moment of being an American. In my lifetime, I was able to see Barack Obama, an African-American man, elevated to the highest position in the free world with the overwhelming support of our great nation (yes, our nation became great again!). There are no recounts, no lawsuits, no hanging chads this time. He is there because nearly 65 million individuals believed in the change he could bring, the "content of his character", his intellect, discipline, focus and leadership.

The night began in Arizona with John McCain's most sincere concession speech - the best of his entire campaign which is bittersweet. Then, I watched Barack Obama in Grant Park come out with his family - so appreciative of the honor, in front of an endless sea of people of all shapes, sizes, and colors, reflective of the America I know. Then, he gave his victory speech which was so incredibly unifying and poignant. It motivated me to take action and want to serve a nation that now believes in itself again. In a time where so much is wrong with our families, our country, the world, listening to his words gave me hope that things will only get better. I think he will mobilize the best and brightest to now want to serve the people vs. serve themselves.

It's hard to put into words a night like last night, much less the journey that brought us to that particular moment in time. Think about this ideal of equality we hold so sacred. Then think about how after over 200 years, we are not there yet. Our story is chapter after chapter of racial and gender oppression and struggle. So words to describe last night? Elation, disbelief, awe, pride.

For me, Barack Obama's journey embodies my dreams of what is possible. And, what is now probable. Our children will live in an America where leadership positions transcend race and gender (and someday sexual orientation - hopefully soon). They will grow up with more doors open, wider, with more opportunities and dreams that are within reach.

So, candidates aside, campaigns aside. Palin, Bill Ayers, POW, "present votes", Rick Davis, aside, aside, aside...history was made and what's great is that no one can take away or undo what has happened. Even some McCain voters have seen passed the campaign divide and to their credit, they have seen much more beyond Barack Obama, the man himself. They see this moment in time and understand its historical significance and impact. To the few that are still angry or confused, healing will come, but I am hopeful that they will also look back and see how a mountain was moved by the collective power of millions of normal people and a dream of one African-American man. This is exactly what our nation needs and what makes our nation so great. As cheesy as it sounds, it is a new dawn.