When it rains, it pours

WARNING: This blog is more of an angry rant. I call it cheap therapy. Proceed with caution.

I am having a really hard time this week being away from Avelyn and having to confront the childcare issue. I know everything is going fine and she will be okay and that we are blessed that our family is healthy but I just feel like the world's dumpiest mother because nothing is working out like I wanted it to. I am not being the mother I want to be, and nothing is going to change that except quitting school, which I just can't do. I'm feeling very teary today which has turned into downright anger so as I sit here alone, in the "Working Mothers" room at school, pumping my little heart out, here is my therapeutic dump list. I need to get it out.

1. I am so angry that I am in Houston and Kevin works in San Antonio.
2. I'm pissed that Kevin gets to be at home with Avelyn and I can't.
3. I hate that he will be in Chicago for six weeks in less than a month.
4. I hate that it means I will have to place her in daycare with people who will treat her well but who won't love her as much as I do.
5. More than that I hate that I can't afford a daycare worthy of such a teeny tiny precious baby girl. (I don't even think they exist but she sure is too good for where she is probably going.)
6. I hate feeling that twinge of bitterness when friends and family offer to help take care of her. If I can't take care of her I don't want anyone else to do it either. No one knows her better than me. No one can do it the way I want them to do it. It's not fair!
7. I hate that I'm at a school that doesn't allow any time off without taking an entire year off.
8. I HATE that I can't take a year off.
9. I'm angry that the Health Science Center in San Antonio rejected my entire application because ONE transcript from ONE college with ONE French class on it didn't arrive by the due date.
10. I'm livid that I can't be home taking care of my baby who isn't even 6 weeks old yet. Babies need their mommies, period. More than that, this Mommy needs her baby.
11. I hate that I wasn't able to breastfeed her and missed that bonding experience that everyone keeps telling me about. (I just told you I wasn't ABLE to breastfeed, people, not that I didn't want to. Leave my self esteem alone and quit beating a dead horse!)
12. I hate that pumping is so time consuming and inconvenient and (occasionally) painful that I sometimes wish I could give her formula and feel okay about it. I don't feel okay about it, so I refuse to quit no matter how much sleep and classtime I'm losing. I couldn't feed her and I can't be at home with her; the least I can do is sacrifice my own convenience to give her what she wants. Formula is stinky and gross and neither of us enjoy it.
13. I hate that in the middle of the night I have to ask Kevin to feed her while I sit downstairs alone and pump her next feeding so I can try to get a little sleep before she wakes up again.
14. I hate that I know I have to quit pumping soon in order to get any sleep and schoolwork done.
15. I wish I didn't feel the need to defend myself, to myself.
16. I hate feeling resentful of every pregnant woman who complains about being "too pregnant" and wanting the baby to come out. I knew I wouldn't have much alone time with her out here so I loved carrying her with me everywhere I went. I am so disappointed we had to emergency induce her 3 weeks early.
17. Above all I hate feeling like a complete loser mother when I know I'm really not.

I KNOW there is no such thing as an ideal situation. I KNOW that Avelyn will be fine. I KNOW the grass is always greener. I KNOW ALL THESE THINGS, I RECITE THEM TO MYSELF EVERY DAY. I'm just feeling down because... duh duh duhhh... life's not fair! I also know that in the long run I'm doing the right thing for our future. (I hate that too. Stupid future.) Next May I will graduate and be able to get a job and provide for her like I want to. I plan to take the summer off, not work right away, and spend the summer studying for my RN license and spending every other waking minute with her to make up for my lost time.

I know I'll be around, and I know it's not like I'm absent and missing everything but - I will never get her first year back. She's almost/only six weeks old this week and I don't want to miss anything. I swear to God if she walks/talks/laughs/crawls/does anything first with someone else and they tell me about it I will just cry. And then punch them in the face. Only an idiot would try to tell me I missed my daughter's amazing new feat.

Luckily at the end of the day when I go home now, I get to go home to a beautiful baby. Just concentrating on that a few times a day somehow makes everything better. I have a wonderful husband and a gorgeous healthy baby girl that, for the moment, prefers me to all others. I have a feeling she'll be a sucker for her Daddy, but right now I'm her favorite face, her favorite scent and her source of life. As much as I would change about our current situation, I would never change anything about her. She is perfect and wonderful and makes my life worth living.

Rant over. Blog therapy = $0. Getting it all out and looking at Avelyn's grin on my desktop - PRICELESS. Some things in life are just worth the tears.