Day 31 - I don't feel great

Hmmm... based on everything yesterday I could probably have guessed this is coming. I feel tired and my head hurts.

With a slower digestion - we stopped having carrot salad and milky cacao... I think this influenced it. Plus, I've brought in more bread (but I think it is the lack of things mostly influencing this). And then feeling dehydrated... I've hit that point where it feels like I need to constantly be consuming something to drink, but also the cold means our furnace is blowing hot air drying out everything (we have humidifiers). And then not enough rest... I was bound to feel depleted and for me the first symptom of anything is a headache.

Bath & supporting getting things out

Bathing is my go to. I feel so much better when I bath.

Being post-partum, I am aware of the importance of my body getting things out - through my digestion and through sweat. My digestion isn't wonderful at the moment, so I need to get back to supporting it, but I still have a bath daily (often not long, but still).

My bath contains:

Epsom Salt (Magnesium sulfate) - Relaxing for my whole body and generally supportive.

Bicarb (Bicarbonate of soda) - An underrated health product in my opinion. I have been adding some to the bath, but also I have been washing with it (a very fine one that doesn't hurt my skin). It helps to clear up the skin and sweat pores to allow things to flow out, but it is also neutralizing. So a time like postpartum where you may find you have a stronger odour because expelling through sweat - bicarb is great.

Jojoba oil - Technically not an oil. It's a wax. I have been adding some to the bath water with it being so dry (furnace pumping all day long) to help with the additional drying of the skin from the water.

I am also considering adding bentonite clay to the bath, but I want to look into this a bit more.

Projects - it's a struggle

I am having a hard time with this crochet project for Elba's birthday (tomorrow). Maybe it was too ambitious of a project for my skill level plus doing it while holding a baby and talking to a toddler...

The colour changes is making it a lot slower than my other crocheting projects...

I am also really wanting to make another bra, because 3 means it comes out the wash when I need it to. 2 means it is hanging on the line downstairs when I need it.

But this is also not moving forward...

I am also nearing the final pieces of organic ribbed cotton fabric I have... so I feel some pressure with making sure I use it well and consider if I want to order more and make more bras.

Right now, it seems, (but my mind isn't math orientated) that each bra is costing $15 to $20 in fabric (with left over fabric, but not enough for another bra). So even with making them they aren't "cheap"... but I think compared to buying them maybe. I don't know, but I didn't really see ones for sale that I wanted.

Ian pointed out some errors on previous blogs and I just want to say out loud - my brain right now is focused on baby. So there are for sure bound to be errors in these blogs. And in a world of AI content, I am wanting to just write these and not use AI. Which maybe seems silly not to use AI to correct errors, but I just don't want to (I do use it to write the meta description though - because I don't want to do SEO stuff).

I share this as a reminder that PP do not expect a woman to be the same as "usual" and women - do not expect your brain to function or perform on some tasks that it is not primed to do right now. Probably best to explain it to your partner or other people if they expect you to be able to do certain things or hold a certain type of conversation. Your brain is focused on baby.

Getting to bed earlier

So there is some progress with getting to bed earlier.

One of the helpful things is Ian is folding laundry downstairs before we come up and we just pack it away upstairs instead of the additional task of sorting and folding.

In general our night time will need refining to happen earlier or faster or more efficient, but also we are in a unique season and there are some things we just aren't going to compromise on...

Like we will cloth diaper... So more washing. We want to all share a room... so the challenge of waiting for everyone (we might change this in future but not now). We don't leave M lying in a bassinet or crib by himself. He lies by or on one of us. We do this out of choice, but also realistically I think he wants to be held too. Healthy food and cooking from scratch - we will continue to do this, but can refine it. And other things...

Convenience doesn't always make life more wonderful. Disposable diapers as an example - I know they are more convenient, but I often think they add more effort in other ways (bum cream, rashes, needing to buy them the whole time, throwing them out, generally longer times for kids in diapers, etc). I say this as someone who has not used disposable diapers so I do have a giggle when people tell me (with love because we can all have different experiences and thoughts and that is awesome) that they definitely don't think cloth diapering is as easy as I find it. BUT for me I don't think the convenience of disposable diapers would add value to my life.

I think I read it in a book - about how email was supposed to make life easier free up time because you aren't writing letters. But then because it is so easy we started getting loads of them and to our phones, so it creates an illusion of being less time consuming than letters, but it became more time consuming in other ways...

I think about that with things in our home and our choice to do things in a way that is not convenient. I am okay with it, as long as the value it adds to our life is worth it, and that we aren't being inefficient for marginal value. Also... I think some tasks are good to do. I like the prep of diapers. It feels good to make food from scratch and just be still or watch my kid play. Life shouldn't be about convenience all the time and go go go mindsets. Slow and intentional is also wonderful.

hmkay I dumped a bunch of thoughts there and I hope they make sense. I would like to say this again - my brain is a little mush in the formulation of coherent sentences. But it is sharp in the baby department and in contemplating things and realizations department.

That is day 31 - tomorrow is Elba's birthday and I did not manage to finish her crochet cow.