Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Mommy Panic

Sunday, the 15th of November marked an interesting milestone.
The daycare milestone.
Well, that's not accurate. The childcare at the gym milestone.
The leaving-my-baby-in-the-care-of-a-stranger-for-an-hour milestone.
Yeah.
My gym's childcare center will watch children between the ages of six months and ten years, for up to two hours daily so mom or dad can work out. In my case that's swimming, and now that Snapdragon is six months and ten days old, I decided it was more than necessary for me to be able to get back in shape without counting on daddy's babysitting convenience schedule, and that means the gym's childcare.
To make things even better, my mother in law decided to gift me his "membership" so that I can take him.
Well, I'm sure you can imagine my panic. I'm raising an exclusively breastfed baby who spends more time in a sling than in anything else, well, other than my arms. We co-sleep, I wear him in the shower, we are nearly never apart.
Deep breaths, right?
What if he gets hungry? My teats are in the pool! What if he needs his diaper changed? (like two hours in a fresh diaper is a make or break scenario?) I was worrying about things like his propensity to spit up and the fact that he doesn't sit up well. And that we don't let him sit/lay and cry. What if they did?
Turns out that my sweet Snapdragon isn't suffering from sufficient separation or stranger anxiety for me to have had cause to worry.
Maybe it was a good mood, maybe it was a sign of being well-adjusted, but Snapdragon was fine. There were no tears. He was cheerful.
Maybe there's something to this whole attachment parenting thing after all.
Or maybe the girl who works in the childcare center is simply really good with babies.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's hard to leave your little one with a stranger, I still won't do it. Luckily Peanut has grandparents nearby. An hour every couple of days isn't too bad.

Alicia said...

Aren't those milestones bittersweet! I hope you get to keep enjoying your pool time. It sounds like a wonderful set-up and perhaps you could let them know that you'd like someone to come get you if your little one got upset. That's what I do, just in case (though it doesn't come up often!).

I just discovered your blog and am happily off to explore now. :)
~Alicia

MommyGeek said...

Whatever the reason, I'm glad it wasn't a disaster - that can be SO stressful!