Mandajuice

Spring Break

We are supposed to be on our way to Maui today, but instead I have this exciting to do list:

Clean downstairs bathroom (done)

Bring in the trash bins (done)

Feed baby green beans (I forgot yesterday!)

Do elliptical (doing as I type)

Make cookies with Genoa (she’s still asleep)

Cut baby’s nails (done!)

 

Super exciting! I might even shower and wash my hair today! The rest of my time I’ll be taking care of sweet baby girl and trying not to think about the rising death toll.

 

Because it was Sean’s first day off in two weeks and he could stay home with the baby, yesterday was my once weekly trip outside the house to forage for groceries. It made me very nervous, but I have a system now so I touch as little as possible. I wear gloves, bring my own bags, and completely wipe down the cart before touching it (even though the store is sanitizing the carts as well). Then I use two more wipes to clean off a scanner and I scan my own groceries as I go, putting every item directly into one of my own bags. I take my credit card out of my purse and put it in my pocket at home so I don’t have to touch my purse with the dirty gloves when checking out. After unloading everything at home, I put my clothes directly in the washing machine. I do not, however, wipe down every box and bag that I buy. I don’t think that’s where the risks are. I just wash my hands a million times while putting everything away. 

 

We now have a mountain of food at home, which is good because we’re all eating A LOT. It’s weird making three meals a day for everyone (except Sean who is only home for dinner). I’m kind of enjoying it. I haven’t eaten takeout (except pizza once) in over two weeks. I’m sure I’m still managing to gain weight, but I’m trying not to let that add to my stress. There are more important things to worry about right now. 

 

Oh! Miss Ever rolled over for the first time from back to front! I missed it because I was cooking Sean’s lunch, but when I looked up there she was on her belly! I’m desperately trying to get it on camera next time she does it.

Being home is strange

I’m normally such a workaholic, but I have to admit I’m enjoying being Suzy homemaker again. I’ve been cooking a lot more and catching up on laundry. I even worked out on the elliptical yesterday for the first time in something like two years. 

 

Things are good within our little family bubble. Nobody is sick (yet). Contact with extended family has increased dramatically. Big kids are doing fine, if following completely nocturnal schedules. I barely saw Alex at all yesterday, but he woke me up at 3am when his video game chat got rowdy. 

 

Baby girl is doing great. She’s still sleeping through the night and instead of keeping us up until 2am, she’s routinely down at 11:00. The only difficulty is that we’re having zero luck with nursing. My milk is just... gone. 

 

About two weeks ago, and only during the day, baby girl started thinking it was HILARIOUS to bite my nipple and tug on it over and over again while grinning up at me and smiling. This coincided with me only being able to pump maybe an ounce while I was at work anyway. So I quit pumping and let her have formula during the day to save my nipples and my sanity. Since then my milk supply has decreased significantly and I’m only able to nurse her first thing in the morning or on the off chance she wakes up in the middle of the night. 

 

Much to the chagrin of the hardcore lactivist I was with my big kids, I’m not as sad about this as you’d think. Breast might be best, but formula feeding is 100% stress free, and there’s definitely something to be said for that. And as for finding formula during this time of empty shelves, were on a monthly subscription from the manufacturer, and they’ve given us no reason to worry. I’m just trying to be grateful for all the breast milk she did get instead of focusing on how little is left. She’s an incredibly healthy baby girl and I’m enjoying her so much during this time off. I’m sure I’ll look back someday and know that getting to be home with her was the best part of the quarantine. 

Worries

We got word from the governor that all salons are shut down for two weeks. 

So we’re pretty screwed. I’ve sent out an announcement email and now I’m furiously texting clients to cancel their appointments. The truth is I was already worried about how slow business was getting. This is the time of year we usually start picking up again and instead now we’re closed entirely. 

 

I have several worries, obviously. On a micro level, I’m the main breadwinner for my family and if I can’t work, I can’t provide. This will be painful, especially for Sean, who plans to take up the slack by working as much overtime as he possibly can. I guess we’re lucky that one of us is an entrepreneur and the other is a government employee. It helps us weather crises exactly like this one. I just hate that it falls entirely on his back. (And our savings account!) I guess I get to be a stay at home mom for the next two weeks. 

 

On a macro level, this suuuuuucks for small businesses, not just ours. We’ll be okay because our overhead is mostly commissions/payroll and we only have one employee. But all those bars and restaurants?! The entire service industry is going to suffer and it makes me terrified that we’re heading into a very deep recession. 

 

Then there’s my fear of the virus itself, a fear I’m sure we all share. (Except for the teenagers who are all, like, MOM, WE’RE FINE, and who are pissed I won’t let them contaminate the house by having friends over). Part of me is glad we’re closed because one of my business partners has MS and is immunocompromised. I was terrified one of us or a client was going to give it to her. I’m glad that decision was made for us so we didn’t have to constantly struggle with it.

 

Needless to say, our Maui trip is cancelled. It just didn’t seem like the right thing to do. The kids (and my parents) are righteously bummed. I’m sad, but resolved at this point. Hopefully we’ll get our money back and be able to reschedule when we can afford it again.