Hello dear Boobjuicers and Friends!
First and most importantly I hope every one of you had a lovely Mother's Day, or caused one to be had by your favorite moms. If not, I say fair to declare a do-over!
Secondly allow me to provide the recent Time magazine cover all the attention that it is due. Okay, done now.
And thirdly, help me out folks. I have a business trip in June, which I am planning to take by myself, just me and Sukie the Breastpump, so being away from nursling Jackie for about 30 hours. I'm totally wigged. I mean, I have had dreams about it, I've woken suddenly from half naps worrying about it, it's chasing me around. This seems ridiculous. The mamas at my work who serve in the client-facing capacity all had to travel right when they got back from leave. (And so far most of them have told me some horror story where the pump breaks overseas and they're miserable. Can we get a holla for hand expression? At which I am still totally incompetent, by the way?) There's currently plenty of milk on the freezer (more on that later but no I have not found the miracle to increasing supply although I did get a marginal bump for a couple hours out of asparagus.) Matt can take care of two kiddos at once. It's 30 hours. It should be fine.
I totally want to take her with me. I'm ready to chuck my "always buy them a ticket and strap them into the seat" rule out the emergency exit, carry her in my lap, drop a couple hundred on local child care through an agency, and give up on the idea that as the breadwinning boobjuicing blogger I should really set an example of how doable this is and do it myself. I don't want to. What if my pump breaks? What if pumping on the plane is totally miserable, the other passengers harass me, the flight attendants try to prevent it, or the battery runs out? What if a tornado strands me in Kansas (yes I'm going to Kansas and yes I've covered the Dorothy and Toto comments quite thoroughly thanks though) for an extra day? What if my heart crumbles from missing her too much? What if I'm too dramatic and my business acquaintances have me committed? I could lose my supply in the length of time it takes me to explain to the mental health workers that I'm really not crazy and just need to be put on the next flight to Portland please. What if I do take her with me and the child care person shows up drunk, and I can't go to the meeting? What if the child care person steals her and I never see her again?
Can we all just take a moment and marvel at how patient and sweet my husband is now that you have a clearer idea what he is dealing with? Although come to think of it all you people know is that he's still around. Well, I can hear him now, saying "COME BACK TO US! You have gone to The Bad Place! You must chill! I have hidden! your Firebird! keys!!!"
Anyway back to the trip. Anyone who wants to give Matt a hand talking me off this ledge please proceed. I'm at a bit of a loss.
Much love,
Suzi
Oh man, I've got a business trip coming up at the end of June and this is exactly what I'm going through. (Except I hadn't considered that my pump might break! Yikes!) I'm going to be gone for three full days, which seemed so short when I said I'd go back in March, and now seems like forever. What if this kills my supply? What if my baby forgets how to nurse? My husband's had to talk me off a ledge quite a few times.
ReplyDeleteI'm trying to figure out how to ship milk home too. I'll be dependent on the hotel to help me ship anything... big hotels can get FedEx pickup, right...? Do you know if I can actually freeze milk in those itty mini hotel fridges? So many questions...