Sunday After Sandy

Copied from fellow SMC blog http://chasingthegerberdragon.blogspot.com/

The end of a very strange week.

The week started with Hurricane Sandy -- I can't remember when we started to even be worried about it. I know that on Friday, I had no idea that I wouldn't be coming to work on Monday.

Anyway, this resulted in my being home every day except Friday. I went into work that day without a problem, but there were no children there, and thus, no patients. And I was having computer problems so I couldn't do any "work work." So I did a little personal "work" instead, mostly cleared out my inbox. My medical assistant finally arrived... she left the very most northern tip of Manhattan (214th St.) at 6 am and arrived at our clinic in Brooklyn at, wait for it, 10:30 am!

I really hope she has a better commute tomorrow.

Tomorrow students return to school. I have no idea how many of our students have been displaced by Sandy, and what kind of shape they will be in. I really have no idea what to expect. It could be very quiet, with lots of children absent, or it could be a total sh*t show, with tons of patients because everyone's gotten sick and been without health care during the week away. Who knows?

As for my personal life, well, it was awesome being home with Calliope. I loved it. I feel guilty when I see the hundreds of emails in my inbox about volunteering... but I can't do much with a baby. There was a "child friendly sandwich making party" email... but for some reason, the contact info was cut off, and the poster didn't reply back to me until long after the "party" was over.

I have a bag of baby clothes gathered up, and will add some packages of baby wipes as well, and hope that someone will take them. It seems the response thus far has been overwhelmingly generous.

I went for a run on Thursday with Calliope, my first in probably three months, as I've been suffering from a bad case of plantar fasciitis. It seemed to go well, though it definitely showed me that "supportive" running shoes with custom orthotics may be great for walking, but are all wrong for running. I had shin splints the very next day! And as the former owner of three, yes, three stress fractures from shin splints (I completed my first marathon on them... and couldn't walk for two weeks afterwards), I take shin splints very seriously.

Two days later, I spontaneously decided to participate in a 5 km fun run to raise money for Prospect Park, which was brutalized by the storm. I wore my Vibram Five Fingers ("barefoot" running shoes) and had no shin problems this time, though my calves are amazingly tight and sore today!

I didn't feel that slow, but the sparse smattering of finishers around me were mostly alternating running and walking, so I guess I was slower than I felt! No matter. I ran the whole thing, indeed, ran it while pushing Calliope... who was none too thrilled by the morning's events.

I'm still doing the Rip 60 Program, still on Week 3. I recently cut back from five days a week to three days a week. It was just too hard to maintain the mental focus for five days per week. Keeping up the grueling pace and not slacking off during each workout takes discipline. I also felt like I had lost muscle tone in my hips from not using the elliptical or running. So now I alternate elliptical (or running) with Rip 60. It's a lot easier to feel like I'm giving 100% now when I do do the Rip 60 workout.

Of course, today I was just too sore and exhausted to do either workout. I started the warm up for Rip 60 and just the beginning stage, gently rotating limbs around joints, made me sore and tired. So I took a rare Sunday off. I hate starting the week off like this but I am a faithful believer in the edict "listen to your body." I've made the mistake of not doing so many, many times... and paid the price.

Although I don't weigh myself, I suspect I've lost somewhere around 20 pounds since last spring. I feel like I've been stagnating for a while around my current weight, up a couple, down a couple. I have a very, very hard time losing weight, so this is a huge victory. Maintaining this will take vigilance, I'm sure. I'd love to lose a bit more, but I also try hard to practice peaceful acceptance of wherever, whatever, my body is. Hating my appearance never created positive change!

A few weeks back, I started pumping twice a day at work, to help out a friend who needed milk for her newborn. And suddenly I was ravenous! And gaining weight!

I tried cutting out the extra pumping... and lo and behold... the ravenous appetite went away.

What's especially strange is that my total pumping output barely shifted by increasing to two pumping sessions a day. Still, I'm curious to see what, if anything, happens when I stop pumping entirely. Which will be... any day now. Maybe tomorrow, even! I've only pumped once in the last ten days, since I only went to work once. The milk is all going to baby Olive, whose mom seems to slowly be producing more milk.

Although twice in the last couple of weeks, Calliope has been taking swigs off of Eleanor's bottles of cow's milk! I had asked the nanny to offer Calliope one of Eleanor's bottles, but she hadn't had success. But seeing it again more recently, I think Calliope is only interested if she can casually grab a few sips while she's playing, and the nanny only feeds the girls in their highchairs. So I'm going to ask her to try giving a bottle on the floor in Calliope's room.

It would be reassuring to me to have Calliope able to take cow's milk. In a cup would be fine, too. Maybe I will ask her to offer both.

My friend has a baby scale at her house, so we all weighed our girls. According to the scale, Calliope was twenty pounds, one ounce! Finally breaking the twenty pound mark (at 14.5 months)! We will see how she measures up at the pediatricians but she looks great to me. This past Saturday, she barely ate, but then yesterday she seemed to have a hollow leg. So I think she's doing just fine.

In other news, I just bought Calliope her first pair of real shoes! A real milestone.

Naturally, she refuses to actually walk in them.

What, did you need this toilet paper for something?