The care and feeding of mommies

I was at a cafe last week with a friend. Me with my 4-month-old and she with her 3-month-old. My friend was already there when I arrived, so I quickly went to the counter and ordered a large cappuccino and a flaky cheese-filled pastry. My friend was drinking regular coffee and when the waiter brought my drink, she asked him whether they had sugar-free or low-fat cookies. 'Yuck!' I thought, but didn't say out loud. In the end, she got a little quiche and didn't eat the crust. Later that day, it dawned on me. Why had we picked such different breakfast fare? It's because she has two children and I have three.

Yes, when you have three children under the age of 3 you can eat anything you want!!!

Let me explain. Every woman gains weight during pregnancy, whether the child she's carrying is her first or her 20th. The rate at which that woman loses that weight depends on many things, the most important one being whether she actually can find a free 5 minutes in the day to eat!

That's my diet secret.... as much as I try to take care of myself, there are so many times in my day when I have no time to eat. So, when I finally get a moment of respite to sit down and eat...well, it doesn't matter what it is. I can eat that flaky cheese-filled pastry because my body needs fuel and who knows when my next chance to re-fuel will be. Pass the jelly donuts!

You might be laughing, but think about the last time you were at the table with a mom of small children. Unless she had some helpful older children, she likely spent the better part of the meal helping the little ones eat....dishing out food for them, cutting it into little pieces, helping them with their forks, spooning food into their mouths. It didn't leave her much time to eat. So yes, she could have taken a portion of the most fattening food on the table and still not eaten as many calories as the other guests. This is kinda my philosophy... if this is all I get to eat for the next few hours, it better be something good!

If both of my hands are occupied with childcare tasks, then eating takes a back seat. At the moment, that's my life. I slurp down at least one cup of coffee in the morning I get the boys fed and dressed and ready for gan. Then I have a nice half-hour walk up and down the hill with a stroller full of kids.

A mom of small children gets daily exercise whether she wants to or not... it's called pushing a stroller! Even the oldest of my three little puffballs still sits in the stroller - and he's heavy! I recently weighed my kids and realized that I push 63+ pounds of yumminess when I have all three of them in my stroller. (yes, 3 kids in a double stroller, I will explain the mechanics of that sometime later) We are peasants without a car, so the only way my boys are getting to their respective nursery schools is if I walk them there and back. When the boys are gone, I usually take the baby with me as I run errands around the neighborhood... more walking! Add to that the daily weight-lifting of lifting children in and out of cribs and strollers and you have yourself a workout... with cardio and weights!

This is actually something that I'm still working on; finding a balance between taking care of everyone else and taking care of myself. My husband always gets a nice hot lunch because I cook massive crockpot meals and portion them out in aluminium pans in the freezer that he heats up daily. My lunch menu is pretty sporadic. I'm hoping that I will have more time once the baby settles into a schedule. Also, I think that I try to do too much... I will go into the city to run errands when the boys are away and I end up returning home with just enough time to put the baby to bed and leave to pick up the boys. Lunch is falafel, eaten standing at the bus stop.

I really like falafel, but I'm slowly learning to channel my activities into a routine and carve out a few minutes, as needed, to sit down and make myself a wholesome meal. I'm sooooo not into the whole 'I'm a mom, so I need to be a martyr' mentality. I might laugh at my current situation, but I wouldn't take such pride in constantly putting my kids before myself. I think the best parenting advice is something the airlines tell you during the crash safety instructions... when the plane loses oxygen, if you are travelling with a child, put on your own safety mask before you assist the child. I think the lesson is pretty obvious, you can't put an oxygen mask on someone else if you yourself are struggling to breathe. So too with parenting.

The power of "I don't want to!"

I love junk food. As a child, I remember thinking how lucky adults were because they got to eat whatever they wanted. When I grew up, I thought to myself, I would eat potato chips and drink Coca Cola whenever I wanted. No bossy parents would tell me what to do! I looked forward to being an adult because adults get to make their own choices and answer to no one. So, what did I have for lunch today? Vegetable soup and bread. But I could have had chips and Coke.... I just didn't want to.

I'm a big believer in free choice. It's hard for me to hear people talk about some drudgery that the endure because "I'm supposed to..." or "I'm not allowed to..." or "I should...". This kind of talk makes me want to hit people over the head (not to actually injure them, but with one of those blow-up hammers that make a squeaky noise) and shout. "Who says that? Why are you listening to them? You get to do what you want... you're a grown-up!" I really don't think people grasp their own power. To me, one of the most powerful phrases in the English language is "I don't want to".

That's right, no one says you have to do anything! You can always say no.

Of course, we live in a world governed by natural laws and consequences. If you don't want to work, find a way to live without a salary. If you don't want to wear a coat, deal with being cold. If you don't want to pay taxes, prepare to serve some jail time. I think most people may complain about their circumstances, but if you press them, they will admit that their so-called obligations are the result of their own choices..... they chose to take that job, they chose to be religious, they chose to have three little children spaced very close together.

Parents especially, need to internalize this idea because everywhere they go, someone will be telling them what they should be doing. Very rarely will a stranger stop you on the street and give you random advice... until you have kids. Some days, you will feel like you're walking around with a huge bumper sticker that says "How is my parenting? Call 1-800-345-7890" You can walk around all day with a bad haircut or unflattering jeans without anyone saying a word, but it seem like once you have a baby,everyone is giving away opinions like those little samples of halva that guy at the shuk is always waving in your face.

Say you decide to take your new baby out for a walk to the store in her nice new stroller. You see one of your neighbors in the hallway who comments about how materialistic some people are because they buy such fancy things for their children. Ouch! You dart back into your apartment and grab the hand-me-down stroller your sister-in-law gave you.... and run into another neighbor who chastises you for jeopardizing your baby's safety by using such a cheaply-made stroller. If you're still holding onto a few pounds of baby weight, you'll run into a friend who will regale you with stories of her cousin who gave birth to triplets and left the hospital wearing skinny jeans. If you've lost all the baby weight, then you'll run into a friend who will tell you "You don't have to starve yourself to look like a model.. your milk is going to dry up if you don't eat" You can't win!

If your baby is crying while you're waiting in line at the supermarket, the lady in front of you will tell you to give her a pacifier. Once you give the pacifier, the lady in line behind you will tell you how pacifiers will ruin a child's teeth. If you take out a bottle for the baby to feed your baby, the mom in the line to your right will glare at you and mutter "breast is best" under her breath. If you try to nurse your baby, the mom in the line to your left will tell you that it's immodest and besides, "Your baby looks pretty skinny... are you sure you're making enough milk? You really should supplement with formula" What's the solution? Stay inside. Find a way to order your groceries online and never leave the house.

What's a parent to do? You can smile and nod and hope the person goes away soon - sometimes this works. If you really want to make the advice-giver happy, pull out a small notepad and start asking them details ... yes, she should be wearing a hat...what kind of hat should I get? What fabric? Where's the best place to buy one? Should she wear it all the time?..etc. Unless you're planning to follow through, this approach is a little disingenuous... and you had better hope you don't run into that same person when your baby is hat-less on a chilly day.

What if it's a person you will see repeatedly... like a co-worker or (even worse!) a relative? You have to use your powers of "I don't want to". Remind yourself that you're an adult who can make their own choices. It shouldn't matter that "Everyone is doing....." or "You really should..." or even "There's a study that shows that...". You smile, thank them for their suggestions and tell them that you've carefully considered it and decided on another course of action.

That's the polite way to say "I don't want to!"

I can't talk to you, I'm allergic to pessimism.

OK, I get it. You have more kids than I do, your kids are older, you've been a parent longer than I have, but the last thing I want to hear (from you, from anybody!) is the phrase "Just you wait.. " followed by a smug look that tells me how certain you are that my life will be more difficult once my children become toddlers, or start school, or reach their teenage years. I don't want to hear it, and furthermore, I may have to leave the room because I'm highly allergic to negativity.

I'll tell you my mantra... for the moments when I have three little people crying at me. I think "The best is yet to come - this is only getting easier - right now, right this moment, is the hardest point and onward, it will be downhill"

I have reliable evidence that my situation is due to improve. My older boy will soon be out of diapers. He is also becoming more helpful. My middle boy's teething will soon be finished. He plays very well with my older boy, without my constant supervision. Every day, my older two grow in their vocabulary and abilities to express what they need, instead of simply standing there and crying. Every day, my baby gets bigger and more independent and can sit by herself and be amused by the toys hanging from a mobile in front of her chair. At this point, however, none of my three little puffballs has mastered the cappuccino machine and figured out how to make mommy a nice coffee drink.

Whenever I meet moms with big families, I always ask "when does it get easier?". I also posted this question on a mommy internet message board that I frequent. Some moms say 'Oy! It never gets easier!' but the general consensus is that it gets easier after Four children. Four isn't a magic number, but I'm guessing that by the time you have four little ones, the oldest few are more independent and more helpful and that friendships have developed amongst the children so they play with one another and don't need mom to entertain them. Or maybe things are easier because you have a wealth of experience to draw on and have weathered every crisis and survived. I'm not saying that everyone needs to have four children just to test out my hypothesis, but I think it's worthwhile to realize that at some point (maybe at four kids, maybe at a different point) things *have* gotten easier for others.

So yeah, I don't want to hear about how difficult things will be... what are you basing that on? Your experience?. I'm not you. And besides... *MY* kids aren't like *YOUR* kids.

I'm choosing to remain optimistic, so I see every challenge in my life as the top of some awful steep hill that I've had to shlep up. Walking up the hill is hard, but once I'm at the top, everything is downhill from there. I'm not going to lie... taking care of three little children under the age of three is hard. They have a lot of needs. They get frustrated easily. They make a lot of poopy diapers. They cry a lot. They puke on me.

I can deal with things because I know there is an end in sight. This too shall pass. And after it passes, I will have my three little puffballs, big and grown-up and (hopefully) appreciative of everything I did for them that they walk into the kitchen on their own, grab a jug of milk and reach for the coffee grinder and think "I love my mommy, I think I'll surprise her with a cappuccino"

If the earth were a mother, she would understand.

Why is my house so dirty? Because I grew up in a clean home! The floors were always swept, the clothes were always put away, there were never any piles of dirty dishes in the sink.... my mom did a great job, but never taught me. Now, I am trying to maintain my home and I have realized how much of a cleaning impairment I really have. Since we don't have a cleaning lady - and since my mother is halfway across the world from me - I am learning how to keep our apartment clean while taking care of my three little puffballs. What's my secret? Cutting corners!

I'm sure there is a landfill somewhere with my name on it.. there is a layer of diapers from my three little puffballs and another layer filled with the various plastic plates, cups and utensils that our household goes through. If the earth were a mother, she would understand. The most important thing is to love my children and nurture them and she wouldn't be so bothered by how many disposable plates, pans and utensils we go through.

I truly dislike doing dishes and am awful at it. So I decided that the best way to minimize my kitchen mess is to use disposables. It took me a little while to arrive at this conclusion and more than a few conversations with my husband along these lines...

(him) "I need a fork, where are all the forks?"

(me) "They're in the sink, pick one up and wash it off"

(him) "I can't see a fork, the sink is filled with dishes"

(me) "Sorry, I need to do dishes"

(him) "Are you going to do them now?"

(me) "No, I'm feeding he baby"

(him) "So, how am I supposed to eat without a fork?"

The answer was simple. I can buy two bags of 100 plastic forks for 10nis ($2.70 usd)... which saves me from having the above conversation the next 200 times it would normally occur.

Also, I never have to clean up shattered glasses or shards of broken china from my floor. Plastic plates barely make noise when they're banged on a table by a playful toddler and plastic cutlery is less likely to cause an injury than the real thing.

The simple truth is that I don't have so much 'cleaning time' in my life right now. Furthermore, I have more important cleaning tasks... like mopping the floors on a regular basis, since we know that toddlers have an '86,400-second-rule'.. a food item remains edible a full day after it has been dropped on the floor. There are other priority tasks, so dish-washing is the place where my shortcuts are taken. Your weakest cleaning task may be something else and it's up to you to find a way to conquer that area quickly and easily.

There's nothing wrong with shortcuts. There are some things that are essential to running a household. Obviously, you can't raise kids if they have nothing to eat or nothing to wear or if you plunk a big pot of soup in the middle of the table and hand everyone a spoon.... but if I had to choose between an hour at the park and an hour doing dishes with restless kids underfoot, then I would choose the park. In an ideal world, someone else would do my dishes and I wouldn't be feeding the landfills with my garbage. I'm sorry if this offends any of my ecologically-inclined friends, but this is my solution and it's a solution I will continue to advocate to any of my harried-mother friends.

Don't worry, I won't be inviting Al Gore over for Shabbos lunch anytime soon.

Top 10 reasons why having closely-spaced kids is good

1. Your maternity clothes won't go out of style. Imagine that you're pregnant (yay!) and your regular clothes are fitting a bit tight, so you reach into the closet for the box of maternity clothes you put away and find..... Juicy Couture maternity tracksuits, poofy maternity skirts and a bunch of tops where the shoulders have cut-outs on them. Welcome back to the 90's!

2. Your older kids' hand-me downs won't embarrass the younger ones. Imagine that you're fetching a box of our older child's outgrown clothes for your younger one to wear. You open the box... and everything is purple and adorned with Barney the Dinosaur! You remember how the older one had a Barney obsession as a toddler, but now Barney is passe... and you don't have spare cash for a new wardrobe and the clothes still have lots of wear left. Your younger child will be too young to adequately protest, but one day, they will make a bonfire of any family photos where they are wearing Barney.

3. Two kids can share clothes. Simplify your clothes-shopping and your laundry by having two children of the same gender 16-months (or so) apart. There will come a point around ages 3 or 4 where they will wear the same size clothes. Each child will need their own coat and shoes, but you'll only have one 'set' of clothes for both. Even if you have a boy and a girl, there are lots of gender-neutral clothes they can share (and stuff like pajamas).

4. Your healthcare providers won't forget you. It's very likely that your favorite doctor will still be practicing at the clinic you go to.... and that the really helpful nurse you know will be there and remember you. All the more if you live in a socialistic country where healthcare is impersonal and bureaucratic. Yes, the OB's office will be your 'Cheers'... that place where everybody knows your name.

5. It's easy to find a nursery school for the younger one. No need to hunt around.... next time you're dropping off the older one at nursery, ask the teacher when she's starting registration for the next year.... done! Maybe ask for a family discount if you have more than one child attending the same program at the same time.

6. It's easy to plan activities. Does your 3-year-old like the gymboree at the mall??? I bet your 2-year-old would like it too. A small toddler will enjoy almost everything a big toddler likes to do. They will play at the same park, watch the same movies and enjoy the same snacks.

7. You'll raise good little socialists. Sharing will be second nature if you start them off early. This is especially true if you only have a 2-bedroom apartment like we do. I'm amazed at how well my older one sleeps with a little scream-y (teething!) toddler 4 feet away. He's used to it already. He's used to taking a bath with his brother and going to the park with his brother and sharing a big bag of Bamba with his brother... it's almost like a mini-kibbutz in our house. (only we don't force the kids to work in the fields or drain swamps)

8. You never leave 'baby mode'. As any mom can tell you, 'baby mode' is a stage in life where you become accustomed to being woken up at night, where you never leave the house without diapers and wipes, where you learn how to do almost anything while simultaneously holding a baby. You are always wiping spit-up or dribbled yogurt (or boogers!) off your purse. You always plan your shopping trips around what can fit under your stroller. Your kitchen is always stocked with cheese sticks, little yogurts and teething crackers. Once you leave 'baby mode' and realize that the night has 8 uninterrupted hours in it, well.... things just aren't the same and it's hard to go back to 'baby mode' again.

9. It's an excuse for a party. There are four magic words that will get your family and friends to drop everything and come to visit you... "We're making a bris". With every new baby, you get an opportunity to invite everyone you know for bagels. People bring you presents. People make you meals. Your mom will come visit and clean your house from top-to-bottom and take your older children to the park and feed them junk food. If it's not a bris (or simchat bat) then it's a birthday party that gives you an excuse to see friends and eat cake. If it's possible, have each child in a different month and your year will be filled with parties, parties and parties.

10. It's almost like having twins. OK, I admit it. I would love to have multiples. I realize that it's a tremendous amount of work (even for twins, let alone more) but multiples are sooooo ridiculously cute to me. The odds are against me for spontaneously conceiving octuplets (or even twins) and that's ok-ish with me. You can *almost* get the same effect by dressing your closely-spaced kids in matching outfits.

My 19 little puffballs???

Before we were married, my husband and I had a talk about family. I grew up with only one brother and always wished for more siblings, so I said that I would like to have 8 kids. My husband grew up as one of 8 siblings and thought it was craziness, so he said that he wanted to have 2 kids. Marriage, as we all know, is all about compromise. So, this is what we decided. I am having 8 kids (like I want) and he is having 2 kids (like he wants).

So, yes, we will have 10 kids!

All joking aside, when you have 3 children under the age of 3, it's a question people ask.... 'How may kids are you having???' People pry. People poke fun. People even throw out well-meaning hints about getting me contact info for rabbis who would approve of using birth control or reminding me 'you know how this happens, right?" Yes, I know how babies are made and maybe it will surprise you to know that I intended to make all three of mine.

And I guess we were "asking for it" when we gave or 3 little puffballs names that begin with the same letter, but I've gotten quite a few Duggar Family jokes. I like the Duggars.. they seem like good wholesome people who are happy with their lives. IMO, we should all make choices that enable us to be happy with our lives.

Should I reserve "my 19puffballs.blogspot.com" before anyone else snatches it up?

Here is the truth, I really don't know how many kids we are having. I don't think it's something that's know-able, or even guess-able until you are there. Most people have an idea in their mind about their ideal family, usually based on the family they grew up in and the other families in their community. To me, these kind of ideas are no better than a wild guess. You are not your mom. You are not your neighbor. You are not your rebbetzin. You are not Michelle Duggar. So, why decide that you want 'X' number of kids because that's what your mom or neighbor or rebbetzin had? Or even worse, because you read some lame article in a parenting magazine written by so-called parenting experts. I don't think there's ever a one-size-fits-all answer to the 'how many kids should I have?' question or even the 'how far apart should my kids be?' question. What is fine by one mom will send another mom to the looney-bin.

Also, I really like the old saying about making God laugh by telling Him your plans. My husband is a planner, I fly by the seat of my pants. He obsesses about his decisions, I know that some of my best decisions were made quickly and with intuition instead of facts, figures and pie-charts. So, no, I haven't decided how many kids is the ideal number for us. I dunno, I'll tell you when I get there. I have a number (and from that number, I can tell you how many boys and how many girls) but that's not based on any science, it's just something that I heard in my head as I was walking outside one day. Really really.

Don't we all know people who planned for 'x' number of children and got a surprise when baby x+1 was born despite their best efforts at contraception? Or people who wanted 'x' number of children, but stopped at x-2 because the last one was a little ball of craziness? I think it's better to make no plans, than to make plans and have life and fate and karma prove you wrong. IMO, the more someone thinks they can control their life, the more that God is going to throw a cosmic curveball. I would like to think that the Allmighty protects and helps those of us who have no idea what they're doing.... not because clueless people are on a higher spiritual level, but because we readily acknowledge that the good things in our lives don't come from our own proper prior planning and preparation. This is my own idea. If you've heard some high and holy rabbi say the same thing, please tell me.

Sometimes, I look at my 3 little puffballs and I am in awe. I am the first to say "I didn't cause that" when they do something amazing. I see my oldest being sooooo smart and figuring things out on his own. I see my middle child being soooo loving and sweet towards his siblings. I watch my two boys playing with eachother and having conversations in some jumbled mix of baby-talk and English/Hebrew/Yiddish. I see my little baby being soooo happy and smiley and content and beautiful. Did I mention how beautiful she is? She is the prettiest of the 3.

I really couldn't have imagined how my kids would have turned out, so I am not going to pretend that I know that I will be able to handle another child in some specific amount of time or that I will be able to adequately take care of a certain number of children. We'll see when we get there.

You know what's ironic? I recently bought the Duggar Family's new book and also a DVD of their show (because I've never seen it, since we don't have tv in our house)... but I've been too busy to watch the DVD and only read a few chapters of the book. I've been too busy with my kids. I think the Duggars would understand.