Parenting

The Key to Being a Happy Mom? Don’t Sugar-Coat It

~ katiebonn ~ 4 Comments

A Gaggle of Babies

Last week my playgroup had a playdate with a discussion about juggling and self-care. I wasn’t able to attend because I was juggling an appointment with my therapist into my schedule so I could do some self-care. The plan was to read an article about balance before the playdate in order to fuel the discussion.

I wanted to participate in the talk despite being unable to attend so I wrote an email with some of my thoughts. Well, it ended up more like a blog post. I share it here with minimal edits: Continue reading →

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Momstinct: The Art of Trusting Yourself

~ katiebonn ~ 1 Comment

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One of the benefits of being a new parent is learning to trust my momstinct. No, I haven’t developed a new smell after becoming a mom (at least, if I have, no one has told me so). That’s what I call my mommy instinct. It’s amazing how dead on it can be.

Back when Siddhartha was almost seven months old, he got sick for the first time. As is often the case, it started in the middle of the night. Continue reading →

Help! My Baby is Growing.

~ katiebonn ~ 4 Comments

Happy Baby!

This week my son will be nine months old. Somehow, nine months became a major milestone to me. Now, Siddhartha is a grown up infant, almost a toddler. Soon he’ll be walking and he’ll say his first word. (If he hasn’t already. We’re still unsure whether he understands that it means something when he says, “hi”.)

In his first few months, the minutes felt like hours, the hours, like days. When people say that they grow up so fast, they fail to mention that you have to get past those first few months first. At that time, we wanted nothing more than for our son to be older. We were insecure, sleep deprived and we felt panicked. Also, he cried. A lot. Continue reading →

Your Baby Learns His Reactions From You

~ katiebonn ~ 3 Comments

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I swear in front of my kid. When I knock something over I say “$h1t!” and the other day I’m pretty sure I even dropped the f-bomb. At this age (4.5 months), I don’t think it’s something to be too concerned about. It will be a long while before he’s repeating what I say and it’s not like those words actually hurt anything.

It’s so easy to view a baby of this age as something like a pet. I know that sounds awful to admit, but they have so much in common at this point. They communicate with you through cries and body language, they depend on you for most of their needs and although they can interpret tone of voice, they don’t know exactly what you’re saying to them.

Well, last week I was delighted to discover that Sidd is picking up on more than I thought he could at this point. Continue reading →

Real Child Support Does Not Have a Cap

~ katiebonn ~ 4 Comments

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I wrote this post a while back and never posted it for some reason. Maybe I wasn’t in the mood to argue with folks who would inevitably disagree with me? Maybe I felt it was incomplete somehow? Or perhaps my perfectionism was getting in the way, as it often does, and I was sure I could improve it somehow.

Re-reading it today I realized that it’s an important opinion to express and I think I already clearly expressed how I feel in what I had previously written. So in the interest, once again, of keeping my perfectionism and subsequent procrastination at bay, I give you my opinion…

May 24
On the light rail today I overheard a man explaining his child support situation to a friend. He started by explaining that he has been paying child support for years. That’s good, I guess. The least he could do, really. But he then continued to complain about how crazy the mother of his child is for expecting him to dish out more after he came into an inheritance. Continue reading →

Microblogging From Birth

~ katiebonn ~ 4 Comments

Listen up, Bear!

The baby buddha was hanging out with my friend, his Auntie Andrea, for a few hours yesterday. She had been there to watch over him since ten in the morning, but I didn’t get out of the house until quarter to one. “I had a lot of stuff to take care of around the house”, I tell myself. “It takes so long to get going.” But really, am I still just a little bit afraid of leaving my little baby? I completely trust Andrea, that’s not the problem. I just can’t shake the feeling that Sidd needs me…always. Continue reading →