Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Lest you think I have it all together

I've been feeling very out of sorts lately due to a number of reasons:
  1. The babies' one-year birthday next week reminds me of my birthday coming up (our goal of 36 weeks was a day before mine) and I'll be 36. 36! I can't believe it. I still feel so young :)
  2. It's the last day of June today so half the year is gone... which leads me to look at my goals and see where I'm at.
  3. And just a general feeling of uncertainty.
I'm the type of person who can deal with things once they're clear and out there. I just don't deal well with uncertainty and lack of focus/ vision/ clarity.

It's my J :)

Turning 36

This is like my turning 35 because last year was a blur of getting pregnant, staying pregnant, NICU, and the newborn stage.

When I turned 30, I really felt like I was on the brink of something big. Little did I know it was infertility!

I'd done so well work-wise and when I got to this company, I was also earmarked as a top performer, had a chat with CEO, etc, etc.

What on earth happened?

I don't know. But my salary is not benchmarked and that tells me they don't value me.

I stay because I'm in a comfort zone and I love my boss. I know that I'll not find his awesomeness again soon and I have such FREEDOM here.

Interestingly enough, I'm enjoying my actual work so much more these days because I told him I have no problem making decisions and taking control, he just needs to let me free. And he has, so I'm doing my thing, making deals where I'm comfortable, doing more presentations, etc, etc.

The only thing is the money. And like I told my friend Roz last night, it's not about the money as I live quite comfortably on my (low) salary. As you know, I'm frugal :)

It's about what the money represents - the fact that I'm obviously not valued. Which leads to a self-confidence issue.

I don't even have the answers to this. I'm praying for guidance and I bought The Workplace today so will have a good look later.

My business

I need to change some things but I don't know what.

There are some obvious things... I realised when I did my last organising project with a client that I don't want to be away from my babies (I felt sort of resentful being in the client's house thinking, "I want to be home with the babies") so that's it - the last home project.

I've also delegated all the stuff I hate doing - loading my newsletters, website stuff, etc. and thank God I now have a fabulous new VA - and am already enjoying working with her so much.

Then there are some not-so-obvious things.

I want to zero in more and only do work I'm REALLY passionate about (I know that involves time management and speaking!). I've booked a laser coaching session (3 hours!) with a business and marketing coach for mid-July so we can hone in on my unique brilliance and cut out all the rest of the stuff I do, one of which will definitely be the in-home professional organising.

By the way, some of you may think I should just stop the business. To be honest, I was tempted earlier this year but I LOVE helping people in this way. And I'm good at it. And I've been doing it for nearly 8 years. It's part of what makes me "me". I've also realised that a happier me is a better parent.

And then parenting

I still don't know how everyone knows what to do with their babies. I am clueless!

Examples...

In chatting to a friend, I realised that I needed to drop a bottle during the day and start sippy cups. So we worked on that and now they only have 3 bottles during the day.

I asked Deanna about the transition to sippy cups, she wrote a lovely blog post and I followed it to the T. They now take that lunch-time bottle in the sippy cup as well as any water.

The nurse said they shouldn't be having a bottle at night, and now they (mostly) aren't. She had to tell me how to do it though.

If I didn't have Annabel Karmel, I wouldn't have a clue about the food either.

But this stuff is not instinctive for me.

I need instructions and a how-to and then I do. What did people do before Google?

That's why I'm so regimented when something works. Because it works! I'm all about results.

The crying it out didn't work for us so I stopped. The very slow watering down of bottles did, so that's what we do.

Apparently my kids don't like very quick changes (Connor), just like their daddy.

But seriously, how do you know all these things?

8 comments:

  1. Ok, I have a nursing sister that I trust 100% - I follow her advice. For the rest - read Babysense and Toddlersense - most sensible.

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  2. Trial and error? Figure our first born is five now, so we must be doing OK. It's different for everyone, I'm sure you are doing just fine!

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  3. I knew some about parenting from watching my sister grow up. I relied heavily on my pediatrician and my mother-in-law for experience, and Lucas for instincts. I did a lot of reading (LOVED "What to Expect the First Year") and made note of everything that made sense. I talked to my daughters' teachers regularly; they'd seen hundreds of children the same age and seen what worked and didn't work for various parents. I talked to parents with kids the same age and older. I talked to the moms in my mothers of multiples group.

    A lot of parenting, for me, has been taking a step back, analyzing what I'm doing and why, and really thinking about what works for Melody vs. Jessica.

    Our goal is to raise healthy, happy, whole, independent adults, and I try not to let that ultimate goal get away from me.

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  4. I'm trying to wean Josiah off of his bottles too. My biggest problem is that I've always used a bottle to soothe him and get him to sleep. So, now, any time he wakes up in the middle of the night or is ready for sleep, he needs a bottle to do so. I've tried watering them down. I can get down to 1 scoop of formula and 6 oz of water, but if it's anymore water than that, he cries and won't drink it. Crying it out doesn't work for us either. Can you tell me how you did it?

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  5. Sadia, thank you! I need the reminder that at the end of the day all this stuff doesn't really matter as long as they turn out well.

    Mandy, I still don't know what the "right" thing is but I read in Babysense (Cat mentioned it and is a famous South African book) that the lunch bottle must go. We just gave less and less bottle and more and more food :) and within days he was off the lunch bottle.

    That's it!

    At night he used to get 150 ml water plus 6 scoops (that's the correct measurement). So we did 5 scoops for 3 weeks, 4 scoops for the next 3 weeks, and so on. VERY slowly - Connor freaked when I watered down too quickly before. I've never gone less than 2 scoops. Up until about a month ago I was doing 2 scoops and measuring water up to 150 ml.

    I then reduced to whatever he left in his evening bottle X 3. So if 40 ml left then I added water to 120.

    He's basically found it not worth the effort to wake up because even when he was waking he'd have at most 90 ml (3 oz) of the watered down bottle and then go back to sleep.

    So we're kind of there but I'm not mentioning it because I don't want to get too excited.

    With Kendra I just went straight to a water bottle and after a few nights she didn't wake.

    :)

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  6. I'm glad the sippy cup post helped! I'm glad I wrote it down...it gets hard to remember what we did after awhile. I think I learned a lot of the things I "know" from reading other parents' experiences, etc. I also trust our pediatrician and find that he gives great advice. Have you used babycenter.com? It was great for information during pregnancy, and for the newborn stage as well. I haven't been on there lately, but there are lots of articles and resources.

    I like what Sadia said too...it's largely about keeping your long-term goals in mind. For example, related to Mandy's comment, I knew from the beginning that a goal for us was to put them down to sleep awake and not let them use a bottle to get to sleep. We structured our schedule and routine around that, and it worked. Whether it's "right" or not doesn't matter...it's the way we wanted to do it. Same thing with the sippy cups. Like Sadia said, I want to have independent girls, so we do a lot to work toward that.

    I think you need to have a little more confidence in your parenting instincts...you have them, I know you do! : )

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  7. This is definitely a big question for me...how to know what to do, and when. I'm very happy staying home with my girls, but I sometimes worry that I might be doing them a disservice in some ways. I don't exactly have a "curriculum" to follow, as if they were in a day care program.

    I try to read - I like the Babywise series (not sure if that's the same as what Cat mentioned). And honestly, I learn so much from reading blogs. The majority of blogs I read are about multiples who are relatively close in age to our girls. I get lots of ideas about what other people are doing with their children. Some of those I make note of to try, and other times I think, I definitely don't want to do that! :)

    When I ask my pediatrician about the girls' development, he always says, just read to them. He can't mean that literally...but I think it's his way of saying, take time with them, gauge their interests, and go with it.

    As for the bigger milestones, I try to think about where I'd like to be in six months. I had a goal of the girls eating in a restaurant by the time they were 18 months, for example. I thought that was reasonable, and it helped keep me on track with introducing new foods, weaning to a sippy cup, etc.

    And if all else fails, I post something on FB and get responses from my friends. My aunt teases me that I'm "raising my babies by FB". HA!

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  8. I'm like you - Google and a LOT of books. My friends all laugh at me because my sentences all seem to statr "Well I read that......"

    My baby is only 4 months, but so far so good.

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