Dang my good job with benefits!

I always knew I'd probably want to be a stay at home mom. When we were first talking about having a baby I knew I wouldn't be able to stay at home right away, and I was ok with it. Flash forward several months later I was standing in my kitchen with my 7 day old newborn and it hit me...I don't want to leave my baby!! I can't remember why I had my baby in the kitchen, but that's beside the point. I knew this would probably happen, and I told myself to give it some time. I still had another 7 weeks at home with him. Well, the dreaded day came when I had to return to work. It was as awful as I had imagined. It wasn't that I worried about his safety or well-being, I just didn't want to be away from him. I thought it would get easier. Just when I thought "I can do this", something would happen. First, Remy got a cold (Why, Lord, Why?!). Then he had to take some formula because I wasn't getting enough milk pumping at work (How will he survive?!), and then after a month I had to find him a new daycare. Everytime one of these occurrences happened, a new meltdown would occur. My mom would talk me off the cliff. My husband would tell me of research that he's read that kids in daycare are smart and have good social skills. I told him I didn't care, I'd rather have a stupid child at home with me. I'd look up scriptures that justified why I should stay at home. I prayed every second of the day. I've been back at work for 2 months now. It has gotten a little easier. The other day, I left out 2 bags of breastmilk all night and, I am happy to say, nobody was hospitalized because of it. I still want to be a stay at home mom. My husband knows that, God certainly knows that. So, I feel I can stop having to vocalize it every second of the day. It's not good for me or my family. It doesn't help that Remy is such a good baby. Sure, he gets cranky if he's tired or hungry, but who doesn't? He wakes up smiling and he's content just rolling around on the floor trying to eat his foot. Who wouldn't want to spend all day with that?

Unrealistic Fear

I am a worrier. I come from a long line of worriers, so I blame my family heritage...namely, my mother. She would call my me and my sister into the living room to watch Oprah anytime she had a show about a kidnapper, child molester or stalker. I'm 27 and she still says to me "be aware of your surroundings" and "call me when you get there." She can't help it, my grandpa still does the same to her and she's 50 something. My dad doesn't help either, he's constantly sending me articles about how vaccines cause Autism, cell phones cause cancer and non-stick pans are the worst thing you could ever use. Vaccines are a double whammy because not only do I worry about the vaccines, if I don't give Remy them all I just know all the kids in his daycare are going to give him Polio and the Whooping cough. I hate it when I have really unrealistic fears...like when that serial killer was in North Carolina, I worried for a week that a serial killer was going to get me. And, I admit for a brief moment, I actually thought "What if Obama is the Antichrist?" But what the absolute worst is when I get a silly fear that I can't stop dwelling on. For example, when I forgot to turn off a co-workers computer at the end of the day after she reminded to. I actually worried about it all week-end. Why, who cares? What is the worse that could happen, seriously? Or, my most recent work worry...the annual Managers Excellence Conference..aka torture. I was the only one there from my department, which meant I was basically a new kid at a new school. I had to mix and mingle with other managers that I didn't know. We had to do all these "team building" exercises. By the end of the day, I was literally standing on a 4 by 4 wood platform with 9 other managers (including my Vice President!) singing Mary had a Little Lamb. But, you know what...I survived. I don't know why I worry. My sister has been telling me I need to do a blog...but I haven't because I worry. What if I'm not interesting, what if I offend someone, what is someone stalks me and comes and gets me (thanks mom)? Well, here's to conquering my fears.