Fightin' For that Five & a Parental Promotion

Hello, everyone!

I want to start by saying thank you so much to all of you who were so encouraging about my latest endeavor.  Whether you commented or just hit that "like" button, I was touched by your feedback.  It was like an extra boost to keep going.

My client that started last week, Ms. J,  has already lost five pounds and she made it seem effortless.  She was like a star pupil!  Her positive attitude had a lot to do with it, but she also fought for it as well.  She followed the program and VOILA!  It's working.  I'm really proud of her and inspired by her too!

Speaking of "Five", I've been fighting to see that second digit become a five for a few days now.  It's my first big weight goal in Operation Fattypants.  Today I got on the scale and you know what I saw?

160.0.  POINT ZERO?   Really?  The effing thing just can't give me a break.

Worse yet, I have one of those scales that does not allow you to cheat in any fashion.  You get on, it scans, and then BAM!  The number pops up and the scale immediately sends it to your computer.   There's no chance to lean a little to the left and maybe get the scale to take off .1 of a pound.  It pisses me off.  But I suppose I need the honesty.

In case you're wondering, I have the FitBit Aria scale.  It works with the FitBit Force and is compatible with the My Fitness Pal app/website.  It's like all of my devices gang up on me.  There's no cheating.  Mutter fluckers.

I will be doing the Forbidden Dance of Joy when I hit that 159, so prepare yourself, peeps.  Wherever you live, I'm sure you'll hear me carrying on.

On other fronts, viral germs have infiltrated my home again.  This time it appears that they do not wish to invade MY body.  They've organized an attack against Justin and Allie.

Last Tuesday, Justin got the stomach virus.  Three days of gastrointestinal fun!  Whoopeee!  Around the 2nd day, he got the respiratory virus.  Double the fun!  Around Friday, he passed it on to Allie, which was a kick in the pants.  I mean, look at this poor baby.....

She usually operates on Fast Forward so for her to be passed out like this in the middle of the day was quite surprising.

Times like this are when I see the real value of Facebook.  Immediately I jumped on Facebook and started asking questions.  So many awesome people responded right away with input.   Of course they are only opinions, but to me it's like gold.  Those opinions have value to me.  Who knows this stuff better than Moms?

I know that sounds really sexist, and I know that there are plenty of dads who are the Go To Parent when illness takes over, so please forgive me for singling out the maternal side.  But when I complained about how I felt like the Optional Parent, everyone said, "Wait until she gets sick or injured.  You'll see."

When Allie wants to play or rough house or do something extra fun, Justin is the Go To guy.  She hears him come home and gets super excited.  Me....not so much.  That's why I say that I feel like the Optional Parent.  He's the super fun playmate.

HOWEVER there is an exception to this rule.  The second that Allie falls down or feels sick, it's all about Mama!  She wont even let Justin touch her.  "NOOOOO!  I WANT MAMA!!"  And of course this is very confusing to him, since he's the center of her world at every other moment.

The immature side of me relishes in this.  Why?  Because he finally gets to see what it feels like to have your child run past you to get to the other parent.  And it's really nice to be able to have something to give that no one else can.  I'm the Comfort Parent.  I'm viewing it as a promotion from Optional Parent. I'll take it.  No extra pay necessary.

Before I go, I had something occur that I'm wondering if any other parents have experienced.  It was a bit freaky and unexpected.....

I took Allie's temperature on Sunday and it was 102.7.  I had to do some things around the house so I moved her from my lap to Justin's.  When I finished with the chores, I came back to the couch and sat down next to him.  For about an hour I felt very emotional and disturbed.

Don't make fun, but I felt exactly like my dog does when a storm is coming.  She gets all freaked out and worried looking.  We always know that a climate change is about to occur just by Sadie's behavior.

During that hour, I kept saying to Justin that I felt like something wasn't right with Allie.   I called the doctor and he told me that her symptoms were normal for the virus that was going around.  But I still felt freaky.  I took her temperature again.

"It says.......104.9."

Wait.  WHAT???

I took it again.  Still 104.9.    I started crying.  I don't know why.  After that, I called my mom and asked her to bring all of her thermometers over.  ("All of my glasses and all of my shoes" for you Jerky Boys fans)  I took Allie's temperature again and it said the same thing.

We called the doctor AGAIN and followed his advice.  About 2 hours later she was back to 102.7 and I was feeling like myself again.  The next morning she was 99.3.  All was fine.  All was good.

So, who is going to explain this to me????  Does someone want to explain that floofy, kafuffle thing that I had going on internally the night before?  Do all moms get this?  Are these more maternal connections to create more things for me to worry about?  No one warned me about this!

Is this how my mom has always known to call me when I'm having distress?  Immediately after an argument with someone, the phone would ring and my mother would say, "It's me.  Are you okay?"  I know that I'm just a rookie.  I'm in the same room and I have this internal thing going on.  My mom gets it while she's in another zip code!  I lived in an entirely different state during many of those crappy moments.  She's intuitive on a professional level.

So, to wrap this up, here's my little princess this morning, feeling all fabulous.....

She's still sickly, but she is happy to be almost back to full speed.

And since I mentioned the dog earlier, here's a photo from this evening.  Sadie has insisted on sleeping by Allie's feet since she got sick.  I looked down tonight and saw this and it warmed my heart....

My two favorite girls intertwined

Wishing you all good health and fluffy, protective paws  :-)

If you clickity click on the banner below, it will seem like nothing happened, but it did!  You can close the window as soon as it opens if you like.  T'anks peeps!

Identifying With Dads

Let me begin by wishing all of you wonderful Dads out there a very happy belated Father's Day.  I hope you all enjoyed the day in whatever way you wanted to.  It was your day, so you should get to pick the way.  I saw a lot of dads at the Bergen County Zoo this weekend, doing the dad thing.  However, if peace and quiet was the way to go, I hope you got it!

Excitement at the zoo.....whatever could they be looking at????

I've been thinking about our (Justin's and mine) parenting roles since Mother's Day and how the ways  we chose to celebrate Mother's and Father's Day was in line with that.  On Mother's Day I just wanted to be with Allie.  All day, all about her.  On Father's Day Justin wanted to take a nap.  He took two.  He wanted to spend time with Allie, but since he spends all day with her every day, a nap was a luxury. 

When I had to pick a theme for this blog earlier this year, I thought 'what is a strong factor in MY momness?'  What came to me was that I have a very different role than I had expected I would as a mother.  I always said that I was going to wait to have kids until I could raise them myself for the most part.  If I was going to have to work, my job was going to interfere as little as possible.

I hear the gods of fate snickering already.  Buncha wiseasses!

Needless to say, I didn't get exactly what I had planned.  Most of us don't, so I'm working on accepting that.  My little business has been a brat since Allie was born.  It was like a first-born child, determined to get my attention in any way it could, trying to divert my focus from Aliie.  I am still working on it, but I'm becoming a better business parent.  It gets proper attention and when it acts out, I take disciplinary action.  

Not long ago, the parallels between my life and that of the traditional dad started to reveal themselves to me.  In the morning, I wake up and immediately begin getting ready for work.  Justin is left to change Allie, find her breakfast, and get her started on her day.  In the afternoon, I'm calling in to report when I think I'll be done with work and Justin is filling me in on what he and Allie have been doing all day.  At night, I make getting her ready for bed my job so I can have that time alone with her.  Justin is sitting in another room decompressing after playing with a 2 year old all day.

Neither of us thought that things would work out this way, but considering that we have no choice in the matter, we've accepted the roles and hope that one day they will reverse.  In the meantime I try to focus on all of the benefits of Allie spending so much time with her father.  I know first hand how the father daughter relationship determines so much of how a girl will handle the rest of her relationships in life....along with the type of man she will be drawn to.

Side note....if there are any men reading this who have little girls, I don't want to put pressure on you with that last little ditty.  Try to view it as both a compliment and a future reflection of your Dad Skills.  It is no joke that you will play a  huge part in who your daughter chooses as a mate.  It's SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN.  People have devoted their lives to proving this.  

So, on behalf of daughters (and their potential mates later) I implore you to keep this in mind when you make decisions about how you live your family life.  You are what will be familiar.  Do you want your daughter dating someone like you?  Are your ethics and morals good enough for your little princess?  Do you want someone treating your daughter like you treat her mother?  I am rooting for you....let it be a YES!  And those things you don't want your daughter subjected to are maybe something you can work on.  If you change, her choice of mate will change too!  

Back to my original point.....

There are many days when I walk through the door and think, 'So this is what a lot of working dads with SAHM wives feel like.'   I feel like I'm walking into a show already in progress.  Life has been going on here with the rest of my family and I'm just joining in.  Actually, it seems like I have two separate movies going on and I jump from one to the other.  Neither one totally "defines" me and they are extremely different.

I have a newfound respect for Dads.  I get it.  Well, I don't totally understand because, let's face it, I'm a girl so I was raised on the flip side of the traditional parent roles.  Plus I'm overly sensitive sometimes, wear a bra and girly underwear, and get a little bitchy every 28 days.  Those things also tend to set us apart.

I think we all should try things out on the other side.  I'm not going to preach about how tough it is to be a mother.  After all this post is about dads.  But I know that if fate hadn't forced me to be a mom who works full time while my husband is a full time parent, I wouldn't know what it was like to be on this end of things.

I feel honored to have this Traditional Dad Insight.  Hats off to all of the men who do it and make it look so appealing that women have been trying to do what you do for half a century.  It's not as easy as I always thought it would be.

Personally, I'd prefer to be June Cleaver staying at home with Wally and the Beav.  I'll let Ward be the dad, thank you very much.

Just in case you were wondering, this is what was exciting at the zoo.....there were 30 prairie dogs running around and I think these three were in charge.  That one on the left seems to give off a body guard vibe.  He looked like he was going to lunge at me and eat my nose off at any moment.  I'm sure he likes to rough up the paparazzi.