Thank you for reading this

We celebrated Scout’s two year adoption anniversary yesterday. I’m not sure if it was really the date; I got an email from the vet saying it was her birthday and I assumed it just meant it was her adoption birthday. So we shared a cupcake with her and gave her a little extra love.

Having a dog and a baby in a one-bedroom apartment with no yard is not recommended. Whenever I see another frazzled mother walking around Brooklyn with a dog and a stroller, I want to stop them so we can just deeply sigh together and then go on our way.

Here’s why it’s hard: You cannot open the door to let the dog out to go to the bathroom. Instead, you have to leash them, go in the elevator, take them outside, walk a little bit, have her do her business, then unlock the front door, wait for the elevator and come back in. You do this three times a day. With a baby, that means doing that and getting the baby ready to go outside. It takes an incredible amount of time and energy to do something so incredibly simple. I will not say it sucks as that will make me seem selfish. I will just say it’s not ideal.

But I don’t know what to tell you other than I adore our Scout and when you adopt a dog, you adopt a dog and it is yours forever and you can’t pass off the responsibility just because a baby comes into the picture. She’s a great member of our family. I have no idea what I would have done in the early days of Sam  when he was constantly feeding and I was constantly alone in the apartment. It was such a relief to have her with me. Just having something else living near me was so crucial because 7 hours of tv watching and feeding a newborn does not sanity make. Most of the time, she makes me feel good and loved and fulfilled.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t get highly annoyed with her sometimes or think about how much easier life would be if I didn’t have the extra responsibility of a dog to contend with. And one day, when Scout and Sam were being difficult, I texted Nat something snarky like: “I’m getting rid of the dog.” And he texted back, in all seriousness, “But Dorothy. We love Scout.”

There is no gray area with Nat. Either you love something and you continue to love something forever or you don’t. Isn’t that a great way to be? I love being a witness to this. There is no complaining about the things he loves — his family, my family, our little beings in our apartment. They, and the responsibility that comes with them, are fully accepted as fact.

And I keep that in my head. When she yodels or barks at food or won’t go to the bathroom when it’s raining outside and I am late for work and practically dragging her down the sidewalk, begging her to pee, I think, “We love Scout.” Because we do. She is ours. And she loves us so much. It’s an easy kind of love. Unconditional. We just have to take her out three times a day and feed her. That is so much less complicated than raising a baby. I don’t know why I forget that sometimes.

Happy birthday Scout. We love you.

My body, it is changing.

After being skinnier than I’ve ever been (thank you, breast feeding), it’s now piling back on. And on. And on. It makes me sad and anxious. And in the past, when I would gain weight, I knew what to do: Exercise. But with babies and a full time job and a dog and a husband, it can’t happen.

I don’t feel guilty working and having Sam be with the nanny, surprisingly, refreshingly so. I think she’s a Godsend and I’m much happier professionally and personally than I’ve ever been. But the truth is, I only have a finite time with Sam during the week. I have two hours with him in the morning and two hours at night if I’m lucky. That time is precious. Sacred. Unassailable. I will not interrupt that time with going to the gym. It just won’t happen. And I need to leave work at 5ish so I can’t leave work to work out.

So, I try to run after work, after the baby is asleep so my two main . It is awful. Running is not my thing Spin. Yoga. Weight lifting. Group glasses. Those are my things. Just hitting the dirty pavement with my iphone and sneakers? Not my thing. It hurts my body but my body hurts anyway. I figure one of the hurts is a good hurt? It’s not working. But I hope it does. I need something.

Is this how it happens? How women start to look middle aged after babies because there just isn’t enough time to take care of yourself? I guess, deep down, I’d rather just be ugly than be pretty and a bad mom and a bad employee. I was going to spend $ money today to go to yoga and to take care of myself but life came in to play. Sam took an earlier nap, Scout needed to go out, I had two conference calls. Life. These things make me happy. But not my waistline.

Next week. Next week I will work on it. But probably not.

New trick and mismatching, too-small socks.

Sam is dragging himself around our apartment now and is pretty pleased with himself because of it. He’s also filthy because of it; Sam crawling just means he is essentially a baby Swifter. Yesterday, he had three dog hairs glued to his face with baby snot. I despaired and pointed it out to Nat, ashamed of ourselves and Nat looked up from making dinner, glanced at Sam and said, “It’s a baby mustache!” And then gently wiped Sam’s face for me while I thought about throwing myself down a flight of stairs in recompense for being a terrible mother (I’m very Tolstoy in my mommy-guilt).

But Nat, as always, has the right attitude. Because, come on. There is nothing more we can do. I have a house cleaner come every two weeks to wash the floors. I vacuum and Swift in between that but we aren’t OCD; we have jobs and demands and lives that we want to live. This means we aren’t bleaching our floors every other day. So, Sam gets dirty.

But I can’t let it be. I have to start thinking about how it’s not just any kind of dirt: it’s city dirt. Like, what the hell kind of shit are we bringing in from outside? You do NOT want to see some of the things that are on our sidewalk. But I’ve learned, in the journey of motherhood, that I just cannot let my mind go down that path. I cannot let myself get bent out of shape on things I cannot control. We live in Brooklyn. We bring dirt in. We clean as best we can without killing ourselves. I really, really hope Sam won’t pick up any bacteria. And whenever I despair, I think, “Babies in Calcutta practically use dead rats as pillows and they live; I feed my son organic quinoa and take him to baby Yoga. Things are okay.”

“Babies in Calcutta. Babies in Calcutta. Babies in Calcutta.” That is now my mantra.

That being said, our second baby will be born somewhere where there is grass. I am going to make sure of it.

I’ve found myself doing this thing, where I make these odd, self-deprecating jokes about the baby and my ability as a mother. They aren’t even especially droll or observant jokes. For instance, when someone comments on how cute Sam is, I say things like, “Oh, you want him?” Or when people ask me how we are, I say things like: “We’re tired and covered in poop!” I deflect, deflect, deflect but it’s because I can’t say what I want to really say, which is: This is the happiest I’ve ever been. I sit on the subway on my way home and I actually have butterflies in my stomach from excitement that I’ll get to see him before he goes to bed. Every morning when I bring the baby into bed with us and he tries to figure out how to pet Scout and we all snuggle as a family, my heart hurts knowing how lucky we are. Simply put: The poop, it does not bother me.

Instead I Tweet things like: “Baby is crying. Send help. My 20s are sad for me.”

Dude, my 20s would be so stoked for me. I think. I hope. Right, 25-year-old Dorothy? What is that? You’re hungover and eating your fifth cheese steak of the day? Typical.

I don’t know. It’s like I don’t want people to be jealous of my good fortune. I don’t want to seem bragging or like a Mom that would be seen wearing a ‘No. 1 Mom’ sweatshirt. I think that before I got pregnant and before Nat and I decided to go down this path together, I thought there were only two options to being a Mom: The crazy, I Am Going To Update Facebook Every Second About My Child’s Gluten Allergy and the workaholic Mom who never sees their child (this mother is never on Facebook because she’s working and probably doesn’t really exist besides in movies like Baby Boom and Babel). But I think it’s possible to work and have an identity that is other than “Mommy.” I like to think that I am a writer, editor, friend, and wife who also happens to have a baby.

Correction: I am a very lucky writer, editor, friend, and wife who also happens to have a baby.

And Nat’s rendition of Scout.

This is the photo the dog rescue place posted of Scout when we were looking to adopt or foster a dog. Nat looked at it and was like: “What IS that? I must meet that thing.” And we did. And she is now our dog.

7 a.m.: Baby starts babbling. Bring baby into bed with us. Dog wakes up and wants attention. Baby pets dog. Think how sad it is that many babies don’t have dogs.

7:15 a.m.: Husband gets dressed hastily and dashes off to work (did he brush his teeth? Is he wearing something appropriate?). Left with the baby in bed.

7:30 a.m.: Realize Sybil, the nanny, is coming in an hour. Try to dress baby in something that won’t cause Sybil to chastise me about my parenting skills. Dress baby in long sleeves, warm socks, warm pants, and sweater.

7:45: Feed baby, causing him to mess everything I just put him in.

8: Change baby so Sybil won’t yell at me about my messy baby.Put him in something similar to what he was wearing earlier.

8:15: Sybil comes early! Hooray! She chastises me anyway about not having enough cereal on hand.

8:30: Hastily get dressed. Think about how lucky my friends are who have babies with no dogs.

8:35: Toss the ball for Scout. Feel better about having Scout that it gives me an opportunity to get fresh air.

9: Get back to apartment. Feed Scout. Dress myself so I don’t look like a crazy homeless person.

9:15: Miss train.

9:25: Get on train.

9:45: Starbucks.

10: At my desk.

10:15 - 5 p.m.: Working

5 p.m.: Oh shit! Today was my day to pick up the baby. Text Sybil to apologize; tell her we’ll pay her extra. No response.

5:30: Get home to pick up stroller. Walk in Arctic wind to pick up Sam at the nanny share. Apologize again. Get deathly stare.

6 p.m.: Get home. Apologize to Scout for not taking her out just yet. Nat comes home — hooray! Sam is happy. We feed Sam real food, give him medicine, give him bath.

6:30 p.m.: Nurse Sam, cut his fingernails so I don’t get the wrath of Sybil, put him in pjs, put him in his crib. He falls asleep like a champ.

7 p.m.: Catch up with husband briefly. Have him hug me.

7:15 p.m.: Leave to meet publicity contact in the hood.

7:30 - 9:30: Drink. Talk shop. Have a good time.

9:45: Come home. Take Scout outside.

10 p.m: Clean up apartment.

10:30: Bed. Thank god.

Guess who slept from 6:30 p.m. straight through to 7 a.m.? This knucklehead! Everyone parental and canine-wise are now off the ledge. In other news, happy Inauguration Day Mr. President!

“Doesn’t he know that if he doesn’t stop crying, his parents will be murdered by their upstairs neighbors?”

This is what Nat asked me at 4:30 this morning as our baby wailed in his crib on the other side of our Ikea bookshelf we built as a cheap way to “split” our large one-bedroom into a two bedroom (ah, Brooklyn. The only place in the world where you can have a six-figure income and still live like a tenement dweller from 1912). Sam only cried for 30 minutes which isn’t too long but seemingly endless when you’re nervous about what the neighbors are thinking/if your baby is really okay and not, say, has his arm caught between the railings which will result in him having to have arm amputated and then getting fitted for a baby-sized hook (although very sad, let’s face it, baby hooks are still slightly adorable). He soon fell back asleep but then woke up at 6:12. Nat was desperate and wanted to give him a bottle but I actually had to hold him down as 6:12 is still too early to wake up. Sam then fell back asleep and woke up at 7:20 WHICH IS A PERFECT TIME TO WAKE UP. THANK YOU SAMMY. Now do that straight through without the interruptions.

Do you guys find my son’s sleep habits as fascinating as I do? God, I miss having something else fun to talk about/occupy my mind with. I went shopping in Brooklyn yesterday and I went fucking hog-wild. I usually hate spending money as I’m terribly cheap (see above about a one-bedroom converted into two via Ikea) but I did not give a shit yesterday. I’m kind of depressed about our living situation and the fact it’s January and so I got out and put on new clothing and spent money and it was amazing. I went into a cute Brooklyn store where I actually talked to living people and overheard people talking about things that weren’t poop-sleep related. I just wanted to sit in the dressing room and soak it all in. It’s like it restarted my mind or something. And then I went home and my baby gave me the biggest smile when he saw me and kicked his little feet in his highchair and my husband gave me a kiss and I had a bag full of new clothing and I felt like a million bucks.

Until this morning when I felt like I was going to die and then snapped at Nat for complaining about getting no sleep.