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Would you understand completely and feel very very sorry for me?

At two days shy of 21 months Steven came to me this morning clutching his hiney and saying, "Potty." Sure enough his morning constitutional had taken place. This surprised me but also told me that it has finally clicked in his head that his urge is related to the potty.

This afternoon he came to the hall door and in a whiney voice kept saying, 'potty, potty, potty.' I opened the door and he led me to the bathroom and went straight to the potty. He raised the lid and tried to take off his pants.

I helped him off with his pants, took off his diaper and set him on the potty.

Steven pee pee'd in the potty!

Yayyyyyyy for children who try to potty train themselves!

This is a very sensitive issue this morning.

Yesterday I had to take Steven to the pediatrician as an emergency sick patient. Let me tell you why.

Around 10am he had a normal little boy erection.

It lasted for over two hours. It made him miserable. He pulled at his diaper, he whined, he even did a little foot stomping and crying. I did everything I could for him. I even called Steve and asked what to do. He told me to see if I could get it to either lay up or down in his diaper and maybe it won't irritate him so much. No success. I gave him a cup of ice to crunch on to try to distract him. Eventually the erection went away.

It wasn't long after that it came back again. This time the reaction to it was more intense. I ended up putting him in a lukewarm bath and let him play to help distract from it.

When I took him out of the tub I went to put a diaper on him and he just cried. The end was irritated and red. So I left the diaper off. He seemed to be fine with the diaper off. I kept watching to see if he was going to urinate so that he didn't do it on my floor or furniture. When he did finally go he cried.

I looked at his penis and it was no longer erect but it was very red and on the side of it there was a knot or lump the size of a marble. This scared me. I was afraid with the erections lasting so long that maybe he had torn those little muscle tissues that run the length of his penis.

I called the pediatrician but she couldn't see me. The office wanted me to see the nurse practitioner but I steadfastly refused. She is the one who thinks catheterizing is the first step for anything you can't put a finger on. No way was seeing Steven. Instead I took an appointment with the other doctor in the practice. A man. Exactly what I needed. Someone with hands on experience in that plumbing department.

I called Steve and he came home from work to go with us. I got Gracie from school and as soon as Steve got home we took Steven in.

The doctor was really nice and professional but he was sincere and funny, too. You know penis jokes can be funny.

Anyway - Steven's problem is that his adhesions (where the skin is still attached at the sides of the head of the penis) are beginning to tear away. This is perfectly normal in uncircumsized baby boys. It has to happen at some point. Sometimes it happens very early in infancy. At 19 months Steven is just at the prime erection/adhesion breaking age.

The doctor said we could treat his pain with Motrin and let nature take its course or he could lance the remaining skin and get it over with quickly but it would still have to heal. I asked if we let him lance it would he be able to use a numbing agent. He said no. There was nothing he could use on the penis. We said no to lancing. It takes the body much longer to heal from a cut than from a natural tear  and besides that? there is no way in hell I am going to hold Steven down on a table while anyone pulled back the skin on his penis and lanced around the head leaving him  bloody and in pain and in hysterics. We asked about the blood. He was very honest with us and said it would be a very bloody job. No! Final answer is No!

They gave Steven 10ml of 100mg/5ml of Motrin and within 10 minutes he was pain free and very nearly his old self again. He went to sleep for the first time all day. Ate his supper and played until bedtime. We went to bed at 8:30. I was exhausted.

At 10:30 last night he was so irritated he couldn't stand to keep a diaper on. We padded the bed with towels and managed to make it through the night with no wet sheets. I took a tea towel and draped it over him after he went to sleep just incase it let loose and went straight up like a fount. He woke once and we gave him another dosage of Motrin. Then he slept fitfully through the night.

He woke at 6am this morning in a rather good mood. I had the Motrin and a drink by the bed especially for when he woke. He took the meds and drank from his cup. He also had another erection. The tears in the skin have a dicharge so I have to watch and bath him frequently to prevent infection.

You don't want to go through this stage. Seriously. You don't. This is hurting me beyond anything I can even express to you. It is normal. It is nature doing its thing. Not every uncrircumsized boy goes through this but many do. It is sort of a male rite of passge at this age.

I could just cry. He is red and bruised and raw. The minute he urinates the diaper has to come off because it sets him on fire. He is walking a bit stiff legged and at times bow legged.

I am now wondering if 15 minutes at two days old and being circumsized vs. what is happening now it had been known by me fully would I have chosen the same path? I know it is stupid to second guess myself but honestly no one told me this would happen like this. Initially the pediatrician made it sound like pin prick breaks in skin over time is the norm. Obviously it is not. His penis is swollen to twice its normal size. It is red with streaks of blue in the skin. The torn wound is beginning to have that whitish oozy discharge that is the start of a scab forming but you know this wet skin won't scab so I have to ease back the skin a little and rinse it with water. It makes me shake to have to do it.

My son is in pain. His penis is torn and healing. My heart is hurting. No one told me about this part and it has made me very angry that I wasn't prepared for this part of being a mother to an uncircumsized little boy.

 

UPDATE

I wrote this last night when I was tired and still upset. I need to add a few more things here.

Most little boys are born with adhesions - that means the foreskin is stuck to the head of their penis (on the tip end not behind the glans on the shaft). Because so many little boys are circumsized most mothers don't even know their son had adhesions. It was cut away when the doctor did the circumcision.

About 50% of little boys who are uncircumsized do have adhesions. They begin to break away in infancy and often it is no more noticable than a few pin pricks over a year or more period of time.

Steven happens to be one of the little boys who never had much breakage in infancy and his physical development and current recurring erections have cause the adhesions to break all at once. Talk to English/European mothers and doctors, in places where boys do not normally get circumsized you find this common. It is fairly routine. The idea is to treat the pain, keep it clean and in about a week all is fine.

Let me say again - Not every uncircumsized boy goes through this but many do.

Hearing from several of you that have gone through this has made me relax and has eased my stress. Steven is swollen and a little bruised. He vwalks a little straddle legged and going diaper less is an option for me. I don't mind mopping the floor if he urinates before I can catch it.

I am still having a problem with having to ease back the foreskin and rinse it off when he does go potty. It is swollen and bruised (that's the bluish streak around it). My poor little fella.

But he is fine. I have given him Motrin. He has splashed in a bath for over an hour this morning. I have put neosporin cream all in the tip area and coated the outside with A&D ointment to keep the sting at bay should a drop of urine get on that delicate skin. He will occassionally hold that area and tell you ouchy but I think the Motrin has done alot for him compared to yesterday afternoon before we saw the doctor.

At this moment he is standing at the back door looking out of the screen and talking to the cat.

What can I say? Kids are resilient. Little boys are hardy.

Being ill last week and answering your email and comments has left me with the cream of the crop of commentary. Thank you all! Today is the first day that I feel like I am back and got my stuff together. Today is also the day I climb back on the wagon with my dieting. You must know through all of this I have only been able to eat and keep down white foods, milk, bread, yogurt, potatoes, rice. It has been nice while it lasted but I know I have gained back a pound or two. :-( Today I have to start taking it off again. Back to salads and lean meats. You have no idea how unappealing salad has been the last week. So anyway - One of the subjects of the comments and emails has been a comment Steve made just this past week. When discussing how no one is ever as sick or as tired as he is when he is sick I made a comment about my body physically supporting the process of making our baby and the trials I suffered while carrying him for nine months. The whole flesh of my flesh conversation. Now if you are a female and have experienced pregnancy and childbirth you have a perfect understanding of -

morning sickness, phantom aches and pains, headaches, killer heartburn, pressure on your bladder, kicks and punches to your ribs and organs, unbelivable pressure on the floor of your pelvis, the urgency to urinate frequently, a sneeze or cough that causes the bladder to leak, heemoroids, constipation, swollen feet, face and hands, weight gain/loss, hair falling out, dark spots on your skin (the mask of childbirth), not to mention the poking and proding by doctors, nurses, lab techs, the whole lack of descency and the degrading need to have half a dozen people looking and proding your nether regions, the actual force of labor, the pain, oh, the pain, the needles, the broken blood vessels, the passing of a seven to eight body through an opening at best 10 cm, the swollen tenderness of your body afterward, the abdmminal cramps, the 4 to 6 weeks of birthing aftermath, sore, blistered nipples from the first week of breastfeeding, -

Do I need to go on with the basics? I think you all know what I am talking about and can add a dozen or more complaints to the list of the physical suffering to bring a bundle of blessed joy into this world. We women know child birth. We have looked it in the face and for the most part come out the victors. Our beautiful, wonderful babies are our trophies. All this leading to this - He said to me - "I was there and went through all of it with you. I suffered the same as you did every day." "Oh, you did? You were so sick every day you couldn't hold your head up? You went through the aches and pains and the hives and the constant pressure on your bladder -?" "I was right there, I did it all." WTF???!!?? "You did it all? You physically carried this baby and supported his life with your own? You have also spent the last year of his life supporting his body with your own by breastfeeding him every two hours for months and months?" "I have done it all, except the breastfeeding." A side note here that while Steven was sick and the only time he kept anything on his stomach was when he breastfed, Steve questioned my ability to care for the baby, to sustain his diet, he attacked my ability on so many levels by insinuating that breastfeeding was not enough to sustain the baby. WTF have I been doing his entire life? Secretly feeding him protein shakes in a bottle and not actually breastfeeding him? My boobs have supported that baby from the day he was born! "And you laughed at me while I suffered!" "No, I did not, " a shit eating grin on his face, head down trying to hide it. "You laughed at me when Steven kicked me so hard my bladder leaked and I wet my clothes. You laughed at me on many occassions!" "I never laughed at you," while he tried his best to hide and stiffle his laughter, making a quick exit to bring in firewood and end the conversation. All the while he was grinning and chuckling. Why is it a man thinks he knows every thing about birthing babies and he has NEVER had one labor pain yet he refuses to give a woman her due when it comes to earning her stripes of motherhood. Standing in a labor room watching your child come forth is NOT the same experience as the sheer physical will to get him there. Watching a baby being born is not standing at the cusp of life and death. Watching a baby being born is no way compensates for the physical act of labor. Steve's constant insistance that he knows all and has experienced all when it comes to the nine months and the birthing of a baby makes me take back a tiny bit of respect I have for him. He knows nothing, you can't even begin to explain it to him, yet he insists he knows it all and has experienced it all. He also doesn't realize (or refuses, not sure which) that he makes himself look like the biggest ass mankind has ever created when he makes those comments. He also makes me very angry at him deep down on some primal level. The one thing we women have that men don't have is the ability to bring life into this world. Men are physically incapable of bearing a child the way we women have been blessed to do so. Why must men always try to take the very last shred of what makes us a woman away from us? I am not male bashing here. Nor am I trying to make Steve look like an ass. He already did that by his comments. I am just blowing off steam. It bites my ass that he and many other men think they know so much when they don't know sh!t about certain things other than the mechanics of it all. Please tell me if your husband/significangt other has said equally as assinine remarks concerning childbirth.

Steven is sleeping -finally! I am trying to be very very quiet. Do you know how rare a nap is? My boy doesn't sleep or rest well. He is constantly on the go. I am enjoying these quiet minutes like you wouldn't believe. I am so very grateful for them. Thank you all for the birthday wishes. He has had a very busy week (which means I have had an even busier week). I need to boost my protein intake. Eggs seem to be the easiest solution. I buy eggs in a 5 dozen flat. Now if I can just figure out how to get this latest box down my throat. I have fried eggs. I have boiled eggs and added them to salads and pasta. I hate scrambled eggs. I have even done omelettes. None of which are appealing. I can only do so much with eggs. The way my brain is fried at the moment I can't even come up with anything appetizing for the incredible edible egg. Please won't you share with me your favorite recipe for eggs?

All of the previous posts are things I have started writing at some time or another in the recent past. They are rambling and icky in some places and not quite what I was trying to say when they were started. When I began writing ages ago I made an agreement with myself that whatever I wrote was for myself and I wouldn't not publish it. So today I have clicked publish on all the posts I have written over the past months with thoughts of Mother's Day in mind. I have chosen and sent my mother a card. Chose a card for Steven's mother. Chose cards for the kids to send to both. I find many of the cards to be too sugar sweet and over the top and therefore it takes ages to find the right card. I have looked through the jumble of past Mother's Day cards from my kids. I have smiled at the struggling spelling, the crayola illustrations, the cutout paper teapots with tea bags stapled in the little pockets, the pressed flowers, the notes and letters. Each one says the same thing. Happy Mother's Day. That is my wish for you. A happy Mother's Day. Updated to add -- The answer to the game show quiz? 3 days. Actually 3 hours shy of 3 days old. Jennifer and Jak are the winners! In all fairness CCAP and Donna are winners too, guessing 2 days because he didn't turn 3 days old until 3 hours later. Send me your snail mail address and I'll send you your prizes, Ladies! :-)

I don't know if I should laugh or be frightened.

When you are standing in front of those long racks of greeting cards designed for Mother's day what are you thinking? Do yo feel obligated to purchase a card? When is a phone call not acceptable in place of a card? Do you find the cards to be too sugary sweet? Do you buy cards only for your mother or do you choose the card(s) for your Mother-In-Law as well? Do you purchase one card and put everyone's name on it or do you buy the grandmother's cards, etc. and send those separate from your own? Do you look forward to receiving cards from your family? Do you feel your husband should give you a card? You are the mother of his children not his mother. How should that work?

When Colby was little there were times when I had no choice but to work. It meant the difference in eating or not. It wasn't until the summer before she started grade school that I was forced to find 'daycare'. My husband at the time was faced with accepting a pay cut or lose his job completely. The difference in pay put us inbetween a rock and a hard place. There was no way I could not work for the summer. It literally meant spending all of the tiny savings we had and still the possibility of not having electricity or going without groceries. For the two and a half months prior to entering grade school I dropped her off at a home daycare. She hated it. She hated the woman providing the care, too. So there I was. My child crying every morning. Me off at work unable to meet her needs. A dwindling checking account. A very depressing time in my life. I did not complain, piss or moan about the situation. I put my butt in gear worked harder, saved more and got us through that tough time. I could have used a few good stiff drinks back then but that meant spending money and spending it on booze would have gotten us nowhere fast. I vowed then that it wasn't worth it at all to live that way. I searched out other ways and never had to depend on a childcare service. I am very traditional. I believe the role of the mother is to raise the children when the father is working to provide. I also believe that role can be reversed at any time. Fathers are as equally important. I am very much in the Dr. Laura Schlessinger school of thought. Having children is a major responsibility. When you choose to have a baby you should realize you are choosing to set aside alot of things for yourself and focusing on the best for your child. Those first few years are so very important to their development. How can an outsider teach your child your morals, ethics, rights from wrongs? Why should the daycare provider be allowed to receive the rewards of the first words and first steps and a million other firsts? Those first years of marriage and parenting were such a struggle. We got through them but honestly I look back and don't know how we did it other than sheer willpower and determination. I am grateful in part to the struggle. There were alot of life lessons learned in those few short years. When Gracie came along I was able to stay at home with her. Those days were the most incredible. Double the pleasure actually. That is also the year I began homeschooling Colby. I was able to devote much more of myself to both of my girls than ever before. When money was tight I took a job substitute teaching and later took a job with the school system that allowed me to bring Gracie with me. As I sit back now I do know at times I toot my horn. I have struggled and sacrificed alot to be a hands on mom. I have managed to raise two exceptional children and it is just as much because of who they are as it is my influence on them. With so many years of growth and experience behind me I see motherhood in an entirely different light with the birth of my son. I know not to take one minute for granted. I dare not forget the total responsibility required of me. Somehow with his birth it seems to be an ever greater sense of responsibility than ever before. I can only reason that with his birth there has come age and maturity and a bit more wisdom. Being a mother is so much more than just being a parent. While it is nice to think that having a father is as good as having a mother I can tell you it is not. A mother is far different than a father the same as mothering is so completely different from parenting. If you have yet so see those difference you need to give yourself more time in the role of both. There are huge differences. It is similar to being a first time mom and the light going on and seeing how silly it is to think pets can be like children. Oh, I love to see that light go on and it isn't anything that can be explained except by the experience. My parents divorced when I was a small child. A few years later my father died. I have no idea what it is like to be the daughter of a father. It is an experience I crave. Seeing women like my grandmother and my mother-in-law crave the experience of being a daughter of a mother is heartbreaking. Both of these strong wonderful women and mothers lost their own mother in early childhood. The loss is one that is painful beyond anything I can being to explain nor fully comprehend. With Mother's Day coming up it is really hitting me in the softest spots of my heart of all the mother's and mothering that is being missed out on. I think of the children I know (and don't know) who have lost their mother and wonder what they think and feel in the midst of days like this Sunday? I ache for the women who have lost their children and wonder if the day is a day of celebration or one they blot out. While we are celebrating how many of us stop and give a moment of comfort to those who might be longing/hurting/suffering on Mother's Day?

This is probably going to cost me alot of readers. And that is okay. This is my journal. This is where I write what I think and feel. Alot of this is past due to be said. So I am saying it. Sometimes the truth hurts. In August of 1986 I got pregnant for the very first time. I was excited yet somewhat afraid. I anticipated the birth of this baby inside me wondering how on earth I was going to raise another human being. Through those months of preparing for the birth, decorating the nursery, choosing a name, I found the answer to the question. When the time came I let the baby lead me. I let her show me what she needed and wanted for first few days and weeks. As I learned my natural instincts took over. Maybe it is because I was exposed to babies throughout my growing up years. Maybe it is because all I ever wanted to be was a momma with lots of little babies. Maybe it is because this is who I am supposed to be. Maybe it is because I am stubborn and don't like to be told what to do. Those could be the answer. The question is: Why do so many woman seem to need books, magazines, articles and websites to be able to raise their children? And with that question I want to know why is that women who seem to want to write the books, magazines, articles and websites also give off an aire that they don't raise their children well and often seem to neglect their child while they perfect their craft of writing about parenting? I also want to know what in the hell gives some of these women with babies and no experience whatsoever in the toddler, young childhood, tween, teen and early adulthood stages the idea that they have advice we all need? They know shit about shit and just blow their own horn in some attempt to draw attention in the "look at me, look at me" toddler fashion. It pisses me off, heh, truthfully it makes me fucking angry, that these women think they have something to tell me (and many of you) when I (we) have been there, done that, bought the t-shirt and watched the damn thing become riddled with holes from old age. There seems to be some huge intellectual cult of women out there who are mothers and need a book to figure out how to parent their child. Let me tell you something if you need a book to tell you how to parent how do you expect to mother your child? Mothering and parenting are two different things. I am not saying I know everything. If I did I would be qualified to write the book. I am not saying my way is the perfect way. Believe me perfection is not mainstream here. The way I was raised was that when you had a baby you bucked up, buckled down and did right by your child. You set limits and bounderies and you had some common sense about what to expect and how to handle the pit falls. You grew up and took full responsibility for yourself and the child. Putting the child's needs far above your own. We women can have it all. But at some point there is an expense to be paid in some area. No one has declared that to be whole and fulfilled you must have it all. Some mothers have to work and that is a situation where I do not consider it as 'having it all'. For those who choose to work and let others raise their children simply because they need to be 'fulfilled' you make me hang my head in shame. Going to work and leaving your baby with a daycare or a sitter or a nanny is the easy way out. Staying home and taking responsiblity for the life that has been given for your care is the tougher, harder, more challenging road. When you have the choice to stay home and you choose to leave home and to work and then write about the anxiety of leaving your child all day, to put it simply, you are nothing but a selfish bitch and you don't deserve to have that child waiting for you to return. My heart breaks for all the women who have no choice and have to go to a job everyday to be able to provide for their family. If this were a perfect world and I was the billionaire I wished I were this is where being the quiet benefactor would be so rewarding. People qualified to give advice are women like Bonnie (12 babies), my ex mother-in-law (God rest her soul) (9 babies), my grandmother (6 Babies) and so many more. So suddenly what makes pill popping, nervous breakdown waiting to happen, first time mothers, mothers to small children with no experience with older children, dysfunctional, whining, never satisfified, complainers, etc, etc, etc, the icon of knowledge that the upcoming generation of young mothers is supposed to hold up as an example? This internet thing is a strange yet fascinating place. (It is no secret I met my husband through this media.) The women who should be garnering fame and glory (not to mention $$) go ignored and overlooked by all of the powers that be. If the current 'icons' are the only example my daughters had to follow I would hang my head in shame. I am thinking I must be the oddity in this here life. I have a daughter who will be 19 next week. She has never been in trouble. She has never done anything to make me ashamed of her. She has both feet planted firmly on solid ground. Her head is filled with dreams and plans for a sweet life. She doesn't want to conquer the world but she has the skills and the intelligence to do so if she wanted to. Being a mother is important to her. I know she will be an awesome momma. I have an 8 year old daughter who even now is determined to conquer the world. I have to keep a slightly tighter reign on her. She is strong and smart and funny. She knows the limits and bounds and has never crossed them. She has a guilt streak a mile wide and it will eat her alive if she doesn't do right by those with less than she has. I have an 11 year old step-daughter. I have set the bar and the example in a life where there was no example for mothering and being allowed to enjoy being female. I have had to reteach alot of thinking and very bad child rearing that put a tabu palor on being a girl. She is a child who is learning to celebrate being female and enjoying all of the possibilties that being a woman means. I was a surrogate mother. I carried an embryo to full term. I gave birth to a baby boy who is absolutly amazing. I love him dearly but I am not his mother. I have never had the instinct to mother him. Never. His mother is my best friend. She has never tried to withhold him from me. I have never tried to take him from her. It was the most incredible experience of my life. One which I think has had major influence on my ability to love unconditionally. 3 months shy of 20 years of being a parent I have a 3 month old son. A beautiful boy who is so sweet and so good. Having a baby I the house hasn't stopped all normal functioning. Life goes on and he comes with the flow - meals are cooked, laundry is washed, floors are swept, grass is cut, internet is surfed, websites are launched, among a million other things and he has learned to cope with them all. I am hoping and praying and planning for another pregnancy this summer. I want to do it all again. I am battling with the knowledge that having one more baby will not satisfy this urge in me. One more will never be enough. I know if I have another I will still always want one more. I don't need advice. I don't need someone to pat me on the back. I don't need a pat on the head either that is for dogs. I understand many woman do need advice and want advice. Those that do I sincerely beg them to look to older woman who have had much experience and loads of common sense. The rockstar bloggers who are now the icons for modern motherhood and parenting are setting up a lot of young women for major pitfalls and emotional troubles in this life. Motherhood is to be revered. It is the hardest job and the biggest responsiblity a woman will ever undertake. Doing it well takes a lot of effort. We each have to find our on way down the path but it is not a path we take alone. It is not a path that has never been traveled before we take our trip down it. It is a path that can be lined with sweet scented flowers and a lots of thorny branches. To set an example, to do this thing every day with grace requires respect. Respect for yourself and your child. Protecting their dignity and setting a moral example. To all the young woman who may run across this peice please take a tiny bit of advice before leaving here. Show respect for your children. Show respect for yourself. Leave your footprints each day knowing you have done so with dignity. You must protect the dignity of your children. Don't use a blog to gain some sense of the 15 minutes of fame by selling your children's dignity for a few laughs and full comments box. I am just rambling here. Hitting and missing many targets along the way of these thoughts and emotions that are swirling in my head. There are several points that probably need clarification. Leave your thoughts in the comments area and I'll reply to them. ******* The answer to the game show quiz? 3 days. Actually 3 hours shy of 3 days old. Jennifer and Jak are the winners! In all fairness since Donna is a winner too. She guessed 2 days. She is correct because he didn't turn 3 days until 3 hours later. Send me your snail mail address and I'll send you your prizes, Ladies! :-)