I've now been a mother of two for two whole weeks now and it's been an amazing transformation. James was born with some unidentified inflammation in his body so to be safe, his pediatrician recommended we keep him at the hospital for a three-day course of baby-appropriate antibiotics. That pushed our release date back from the next morning to five whole days later thanks to some complications. It was a difficult week for me because I wanted to nurse my baby, so I needed to stay in the hospital for that same week as well. Perhaps the biggest thing I regretted, aside from having my family split in half for a week, was not being able to take care of my daughter. Poor Scarlet was exclusively in Daddy's care for the week and it really showed in her daily visits to the hospital.
She was dressed in clothes but not necessarily matching ones, and her hair was always left down and unruly. She chose her own shoes each day, so they never matched her clothes and almost always had red glitter on them. She was also happy and cheerful and well fed. She let me hug and kiss her when she played in the hospital room, but Daddy was her obvious preference. It was hard for me to sit by and watch her develop a stronger relationship with her father at the expense of losing her relationship with her mother. Now maybe I'm being a little bit dramatic about the whole thing and maybe my week away didn't permanently affect anyone except for myself, but I reserve the right to be a bit dramatic because I still have a lot of hormones raging around inside me as I recover from this most recent childbirth.
In any case, I was determined to spend some one-on-one time with Scarlet once I got home. The thing I didn't consider was my own recovery. I took Scarlet to the library one day, and had to sit the entire time while she raced around and played with toys. It was difficult for me to even sit on those silly wooden chairs thanks to this labor being more difficult than the last one, so I was grateful to be going home after Scarlet had had her fill of the library. A couple of days later I felt stronger, so I took her to the zoo with Josh and James. Turns out I'm not quite recovered enough to go walking around for an hour. It was exhausting agony and I looked for every opportunity to sit down. A few days later I ventured forth again with Scarlet to the park, where I helped her down the slide and played with her on all the jungle gym toys and pushed her on the swing. Enough time had finally passed that I was able to play with her without it being a physical accomplishment by then. Thank goodness.
Josh already spends each morning with her, which used to be my personal Scarlet time before James kept me up all night and I needed the morning to catch a few hours of sleep. So even that time is lost to me. And I nurse James so often that it commonly falls to Josh to feed Scarlet lunch and put her down for her nap and make her brush her teeth before bed. I'm still struggling to get in my one-on-ones with her.
Tonight I gave Scarlet a bath while Josh fed James from a bottle. Scarlet stomped around in the water without ever sitting down, per her usual. I poured water from a cup all over her to get her clean, and she endured the shampoo and rinsing I gave her afterward. Then she played with her bath toys and showed them to me one at a time. I watched her play and I responded to her when she showed things to me, and we generally enjoyed our one-on-one time together. I dried her off and combed her hair, then lotioned up her arms and legs and dressed her in clean pajamas. She smiled and chattered the entire time. She was happy and sweet and wonderful as I prepared her for bed. We said a prayer together, with her folding her arms and I holding her in my arms. Then we sang a silly song and she kissed her dad and her baby brother good night. I gave her her polar bear toy and tucked her in bed and kissed her cheek while she she looked at me with her sparkling eyes. I just love that little girl.
Now maybe there won't be a lot of one-on-one opportunities with Scarlet as James continues to need a lot of my time, but I'm not so concerned as I was a week ago. What time I have, I can share with the two of them. Bath time and bed time aren't as much fun as a trip to the library or a walk around the zoo, but those chores present an opportunity to give my undivided attention to my child and I have learned that by taking advantage of those activities, I have time enough for both my babies.
