Sick, miserable, and tired, but still pretty awesome

This week has been hard. It started off pretty normal. normal baby, normal job, normal health. And then Wednesday came and my baby was sick. Fever, throwing up *that might have been self induced though from crying so hard,* teething, a cold...the whole bit. But as is the life of a parent you take care of them, stay up at night for them, and go on with your routine. In the back of my head, or should I say throat, I could feel the twinge of something coming for me. I ignored it though in true parent fashion hoping it would just go away if I ignored it. It didn't go away. I woke up that next morning more exhausted than I had been since the last time I got sick. so I spent the next day trying to get myself some rest, while taking care of a still very sick baby. in other words I didn't get any rest. by Friday I was still spent. I sent a text to my supervisor at work and let her know I wouldn't be in. after waking up two hours after I usually wake up I was feeling a bit more rested took a Dayquil and decided that maybe I could just go to work late that way I wouldn't have to spend my entire Saturday at work trying to do catch up. right now i am so thankful that i did go.

it was one of the hardest days I have had at work in a long time. and that says something. not in the fact that anyone was particularly mean or rude that I talked to (which is a miracle by itself because my job is known for having to talk to really rude people at times) but it was so long and I felt like I was going to die from still being sick.  but  it put things in perspective for me. as I was working I chatted with one of my coworkers and complained that it was the first time that I had been at work past 2 pm in over a year (besides a short training period but i don't count that for some reason.)  then i thought about it and it just seemed crazy to say because before becoming a mom I would stay at work making up my time for sometimes 11+ hours in one day, and for some reason this 8 hour day felt harder to me. that was when I realized how good I have it. Yeah, I have always known how blessed I am with my job situation but it really hit me then. since emery was born I have been given the opportunity to work for only 6.5 hours per day which allows me to work less and still get the benefits of a completely full time worker, AND i get off work at 12:30 almost daily. I was given the chance to see what it is like to be a " normal" working mom and not to be able to see my daughter until after 5 pm which killed me. it is well known that emery is sort of an obsession of mine, not in a creepy way just in a normal I'm her mother way. I feel that i have just been taking for granted the fact that i get to spend an ample amount of time with my daughter that most women really don't get to do and I hope that I don't forget it.

thankfully i was able to be home in time to enjoy one of my proudest mommy moments so far. emery said her first sentence. so here's the back story. she was in her high chair eating some gold fish and sipping some water as my father in law went in to the pantry and got himself a gummy snack. as he passed by she blurted out as clear as day "BAPA!," which she has never really even tried to address him with a verbal word, and it was pretty darn close to grandpa. she then pointed to the gummies in his hand signed for eat, signed for please, and then nodded. so if you put that all together in a sentence she said "Grandpa! I want your gummy to eat please....yes" OK, well she didn't really use more than one word, 2 esl signs, and one obvious gesture but i swear to you anyone watching her would have understood what she wanted. we started teaching her some basic signs when she was about 6 months. mostly because i think it is adorable when kids sign/say please, and because the baby Einstein signing video that we got as a gift is the only thing she will sit still and watch for more than negative two seconds. (PS thank you LeComte girls for the awesome gift!!!!!) we haven't been too consistent at it but apparently she has been understanding it because for the last few months she has been very good at saying please, food, milk, all done, and more....like i said its not a lot, but its more than I thought she would have picked up on since we haven't been too avid at trying to teach her. kids really do pay more attention to what is going on around them than we give them credit to. she has also been saying more words. so far she says dada, mamma (when she's sad mostly,) thank you, please, nana aka banana and probably some more but I'm having a brain fart right now. giddy doesn't even come close to explain how I had felt in that moment when she used gestures, ESL, and a fairly real word all at the same time. at the same time a part of me wants to discredit what she did because in all reality it could have just been an accident and she doesn't realize what an awesome thing it is that she did, but I'm not going to. for now i am just going to toot my child's little tiny horn because i think she is awesome.
That being said I wore myself out so hard from working yesterday, and i didn't even mention my almost complete lack of sleep that I didn't go in to work today as i had promised myself i would do. but it was good for me to actually be able to take the time to relax and start to feel better.