Ben has started playing with the baby doll we bought him a few months ago when we learned we were having a girl. He loves babies in general, and he's very sweet about greeting babies we meet. So it's interesting to see what he does with the doll.
Forty percent of the time, he plays "mommy" or "daddy." He cuddles and nuzzles the baby, feeds the baby from his sippy cup, takes the baby for motorcycle rides around the house with the baby draped over the handlebars. It's freaking adorable.
Considering that before, his only play with the baby doll included shoving her head first down his potty chair, I feel he's showing real progress. The other sixty percent of the time still involves stuff like that. He tosses her across the room to see how far she'll fly. I'm just waiting for him to realize what a thrill it would be to throw her through the basketball hoop.
We've realized he's just too young to understand what we're talking about when we discuss a baby in mommy's belly or bringing a baby home or living with a baby. He doesn't get it. That's okay. We've taught him the trick of rubbing my belly and saying "baby." Of course he rubs Chris's belly and says the same, also his own.
I think once the reality is here (reality, thy name is Anna), he'll have a few weeks of rough transition, and then he'll be fine. I think he'll love her a lot. And I think I'll spend a lot of my time encouraging him not to crawl all over her like a jungle gym.
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A note about depression:
Last night I realized there's probably not enough Zoloft in the whole world. Living with depression is odd. I find lots of moments of pure joy during the day. I enjoy Ben and my husband. But I have these moments and hours where I just crash into wallows of ick and despondency.
I've convinced myself that all this awful cramping and contractions and "wrongness" that my body is feeling is totally normal and I'm just a whiner. Who the hell cares if I can't walk around my house for more than five minutes without doubling over in pain and almost collapsing from the strain. I doubt my OB will even check my cervix. I'm just going to be a prisoner here until I finally get to go to the hospital to deliver this baby.
Poor Ben is stuck here with me. I can't take him outside because I can't walk without having terrible contractions. I give him free rein in the house, more or less, and he gets to climb on things and run, but he gets most of his activity when Daddy comes home at night.
These "blues" are debilitating at times. I totally get the whole thing about one of the major problems with pregnant women being depressed is that they don't take care of themselves. I find myself skipping meals because "I just don't care anymore" about eating. My OB appointment was rescheduled to this morning, and I wasn't that upset. As a matter of fact, I don't even want to go today. What's the point? I don't feel the need to go somewhere to have someone tell me that everything I'm feeling is totally normal and nothing to worry about. Anna's still jumping around in me like crazy, so she's probably doing just fine. So why bother going?
I have a husband who cares about me, and he's making me go anyway.
