GIFTS…
I’ve gotten a gift delivered to me every week for the past 3 weeks from Mr. W. Once it was beautiful sunny yellow roses in a white pitcher with a card that said it was from Allie and Mr. W, and that they love me, and that I’m the best mother and wife ever. That came in the really bad week I had when I cried constantly, not being able to get Allie to nap, so I joked that Allie felt bad and wanted to apologize for her difficulty. The next week it was a box of big frosted shortbread cookies in the shapes of red hearts, white hearts, and green frogs wearing yellow crowns. The gift message said it was from Allie, for daddy’s sweet tooth and for her sweet tooth, too. I joked that I think Allie has got her hands on Mr. W’s credit card. Last week, I got a giant bouquet of something like 3 dozen large red roses in a beautiful teardrop glass vase. Mr. W said it was for Valentine’s Day, and didn’t give Allie credit this time. The card said it was from him, and “I love you! You are such a wonderful mom and terrific wife.”

So here’s how sick I am in the head… instead of it making me feel happy and appreciated, which is clearly the goal, I feel like crap because I don’t think I deserve it. Now I feel guilty that he’s having to waste his money on me to keep reassuring me that I’m doing a fine job on maternity leave, when the baby’s sick and I can’t do anything about it, and she’s not eating well, napping well, breathing well. I emailed the pediatrician earlier to tell him her current symptoms now that she’s on day 10 of this cold, to ask him if there’s anything else I can do, such as use a decongestant. I’m concerned all the mucus sitting in there for the past 10 days is going to cause a secondary infection in her sinuses or ears. I keep seeing other kids walk around with their parents and I think, “I can’t wait till Allie gets to that age so I don’t have to worry about this baby stuff anymore, I can just talk to her and she’ll understand and it’ll be easier.” But I’m sure it’s NOT easier because at that age, the kids probably have public tantrums and say hurtful things to their parents and refuse to do things like sleep or eat or get dressed. And I feel guilty for wishing away these precious baby times when I’ll probably look back in the future and think, “I should’ve appreciated those days more; they were so much easier than these days.”

…SHRINKS…
I have my first psych session with whomever the 2nd therapist/counselor/psychiatrist is at 2pm today. My parents are coming over to watch the baby while I go. I’m afraid they’re going to catch what we all have and for that reason I didn’t have them visit this past weekend. Today, however, I have no choice. My dad took the day off because he’s loathe to miss too many consecutive days of Allie; as it is, he talks about how much she’s grown and changed in between the week since he’d last seen her. My mom may have switched her normal day off (she’s on a 4-longer-days workweek schedule instead of 5 regular days) to today. I’m nervous about a recurrence of what happened the last time my mom came over and wouldn’t respect Allie’s need to sleep and kept picking her up, claiming Allie was up. Right now Allie is doing her morning nap, and she wouldn’t nap more than 10-20 minutes each segment yesterday, so she really needs to nap well today. She’s been down a little over an hour so far, but woke up 3 times already crying and I had to run up and put the pacifier in her mouth to soothe her back down. I’ll have to insist that my parents do this instead of what my mom really wants to do, which is go, “Oh, she’s crying, she needs to be comforted and she’s clearly awake, so I’m going to pick her up,” and that’s the end of that nap even though Allie’s exhausted and still wants to sleep. My mom also complained last time that Allie’s room’s too stuffy. Well, the humidifier makes it that way for a reason, and she needs to not air it out.

…AND NANNIES…
This is also the nanny concern. I need someone whom I feel will take care of Allie by doing what’s best for Allie, not someone who just wants to play with or hold a baby all day. It’s clear to me now that Allie doesn’t sleep well or deeply when she’s in motion, such as when she’s held or when she’s in the car. Whomever naps Allie must put her down for restful sleep, and let her get enough of it. I would love it if, when I leave for work each day, I feel like the person with Allie has more experience than I do and can do a better job than I can, which really shouldn’t be hard cuz I have a whole 2.5 months of infant experience so far. And I need someone who can teach me about progressing the baby, such as “Now is a good time to start introducing her to sippy cups.” Cuz I don’t know any of that stuff. The overqualified CNCS (certified newborn care specialist) who’s the reason I joined this nanny site finally checked the email, told me to call her last nite, and eliminated herself. She said the start time of 6:30a is really too early for her as it makes for a long day to go till 5:30p. It was nice of her to do that, and I was having the impression that she’s the type who’s busy doing something else and will likely ditch us for a better job anyway, which seems like what she’s doing now. She said she currently has a job starting at 8am and she’s already having trouble getting there at that hour. So if she’s present employed, and she’s looking for something else, I wonder if the other job knows that. I’d freak if she did that to us and we’re left out in the cold. But at least she brought me to join the website, where I hopefully will find the right fit.
I had an interview scheduled with Mr. W’s 2nd choice (1st being the CNCS), a person named Sara, for Wednesday. She’s one who’d contacted me through the site and we’d exchanged some emails and she seemed very experienced in infant routines and such. After we confirmed Wednesday’s interview, she wrote me back immediately and said that someone she’d interviewed with the weekend before I joined the site just called her and asked her to do a trial run, so she was letting me know she’d be unavailable. I wrote back and wished her luck, thanking her for promptly letting me know. My impression of Sara was that she’s competent, but was more formal with us so there’s less of a friendly relationship, which I’m not sure matters because her job is taking care of Allie, not being our friend, right?
Mr. W’s 3rd choice is the 31 yr old German lady, Susanne. We scheduled her interview in Sara’s former time slot, Wednesday evening. She’s enthusiastic and friendly, and has au pair and experience with infants and kids, but because she’s a German national, Mr. W is curious what her connections are here. I’m interested in whether there would be a cultural difference in parenting philosophies. She doesn’t seem to have extensive nannying experience with infants, and she was a teacher in Germany as her last formal occupation. I feel like I’d get along with her more on a peer level, but I don’t want Allie to suffer in getting competent care.
And then there’s a 59 yr old who lives 40 miles away who emailed me over the weekend, wanting to interview for the position. Her credentials look great on paper, saying she’s registered with Trustline, is CPR and 1st Aid certified, has certification for TB and flu shots. I emailed back pointing out that she’d have to drive 40 miles by 6:30 in the morning, and she wrote back that it’s not a problem, that a prior job required her to be there at 5am “over several months” and she was never late (why such a short job?). Her baby experience seems to be with child protective service departments’ infant units, and I’d written back asking if she’d had specific *nanny* experience with infants, and she replied about her experience with infants in a general way. She was eager for an interview and I scheduled it for Thursday evening, and figured I could ask her specific experience questions in person. I wonder why she’d be willing to drive so far, and what ended her child protective services jobs.
I don’t think I’m going to interview the 22 year old who’s transferring to UC Irvine to be a full-time student and wants to nanny full-time for us in the day. She may be able to juggle it, but I don’t want Allie to be the experiment. Plus, what about changing class schedules every semester? Finals weeks? Her wanting to do college student stuff like hang with friends?
Best location is a woman the next city over (minutes away) who emailed me. She has experience teaching preschool to elementary school, but when I wrote back asking if she’s had specifically nanny experience with infants, she hadn’t written back (altho the site tells me she read the email).
Why’s it so hard to find credentialed, experienced, knowledgable people who live nearby and could give us reliable nanny service as a live-out? =/ Too bad the woman who sounds PERFECT who’s moving here from out-of-state wants a live-in situation, only. That was Mr. W’s true #1 choice except that she’s not really in the running because she wants to be a live-in. She did tell me to keep her contact information so she could maybe sit for us on weekends or times when the regular nanny isn’t available.

In all this nanny-hunting angst when I’m desperate to find a great person for Allie, there’s also a growing concern that Allie will bond with the nanny, spending so much more time with her than with us, and will want the nanny on weekends or evenings instead of us. I can already see that Allie seeks me for comfort instead of Mr. W, and I’ll soon be spending the same little time with her as Mr. W does once I return to work.