In trying to get back into blogging, I pulled up my old blog post drafts and came across this one from early August 2018:
So in the last 5 months, we’ve moved from Texas to Little Rock, had a baby, then moved from Little Rock to New Mexico. All so we could be together when I had Berend. I didn’t want to be in the delivery room without Andrew. I couldn’t imagine him not being there. It was probably the most complicated way to do this whole thing (moving Gerrit and myself to Little Rock with Andrew for just a few months), but I think it was worth it.
Anyways! Berend was born in the middle of May, in the middle of Andrew’s C130 training. Andrew was basically told to take 2 weeks off after the birth and drop back a class. I was hoping he wouldn’t have to do that (even though I wanted him home to help) because it landed us in this situation: him leaving me and our two kids in a new house at a new base for a month of training out of state because he couldn’t get dates changed.
Had he not dropped back a class, we would have had two extra weeks to get settled here before he left. Thankfully, my mom agreed to drive from Arkansas to New Mexico with us, and she stayed for a week after Andrew left to help out.
But now it’s just me, a 3-1/2 year old, and a 2 month old in a house on an unfamiliar base with a LOT of unpacked boxes.
Day 1: I was ambitious and agreed to go to a play date meet-up at a park on base to get out of the house. We arrived late since Berend was napping, but I made sure we got out of the house. I enjoyed chatting with a few other moms, but Gerrit was being shy and didn’t want to play with the other kids. He told me he missed his old friends. Break my heart! 😦 The day was long because Berend refused to nap longer than 15-30 minutes at a time, so I was constantly trying to get him to sleep, get him back to sleep, or keep him relatively happy before I tried again with the naps. When I put Gerrit to bed, he told me he didn’t want to play outside the next day. When I asked why, he said, “So I don’t get dirty, and I won’t need a bath.” I told him I thought he liked baths, and he said, “But I want Dada to give me a bath.” Seriously, this kid is trying to make me cry! And cry I did. It was dark, and I was rubbing his back while he fell asleep, so he didn’t know I was crying. I just felt alone and overwhelmed. And I wondered how in the world I would ever survive an actual deployment.
Day 2: My only goal for today was to get to the commissary. So I had to write up a menu, write my grocery list, and get us out the door. With basically only myself to feed, it was a pretty short list. I feel like the day went better because Berend actually took some good naps! I didn’t feel so defeated at the end of the day, but I was definitely exhausted.
Days 3 & 4: The weekend! Although the weekend is like every other day when you’re alone with your kids. We went on some walks to the splash pad/playground in our neighborhood to get out of the house. Berend is not a big fan of the car seat/stroller right now. I thought he’d be okay with it since he can see me (vs the car seat in the car), but he’s almost always screaming on our walk back to the house. I can’t imagine what the neighbors think of us…
Day 5: Gerrit continues his binge watching of “Transformers: Rescue Bots” on Netflix. Berend thinks he just needs cat naps until early afternoon. I needed two large cups of coffee today. But I remembered to get the garbage out for trash collection! Accidentally left B screaming in his bassinet while I got Gerrit to bed (white noise machines work very well to cover baby screams) and felt like a crappy mom. Berend continued waking frequently until he had a large blow out poopy diaper at 3am… then finally slept 2 hours straight. He and I snuggled together from 6-8am so I could get some more sleep.
Day 6: More cat naps. More “Rescue Bots.” Trying to get a Crock Pot meal on the table tonight.
I’m so glad I didn’t delete this! It was less than 3 years ago, but it seems so long ago. Last month was Month of the Military Child, and this post illustrates how hard this life can be not only for the adults but also for the little ones. I’m so proud of my resilient boys!
On An Even Kiel 