I’ve been trying to keep to writing every other day, but today was exceptionally tough and I’m staggering over words in my head. So above is a pic to remind myself one of the major reasons why I take on difficult situations like today’s and why I need to keep fighting (and stop chastising myself over not reconstructing everything immediately), and of coure, the pic is for your enjoyment as well. As my friend told me earlier, “Give yourself a break, Lorne!”

A couple of appointments ago, Sienna’s pediatrician told me to never just say, “No!”, and instead to try to reason with her which set off an insane amount of anxiety and future guilt when I did just say “No!” out of frustration. I think our pediatrician is great. He’s caring, funny, competent, has listened to my fears and feelings of isolation, and even set me up on a sort of “date” w/ another stay-at-home dad who was struggling w/ similar issues, but sometimes, when he’s rushed, he can generalize sparking my inner turmoil (“No more bottle!” instead of “Ease her off the bottle”) and causing Elaine, my parents, my friends, and my therapist, to have to calm me down so that I understand not to take his words literally.

This was not the first time I’ve heard of this parenting strategy. When Elaine was pregnant, we both read Bringing Up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting by Pamela Druckerman, an American journalist who had a baby while living in Paris, and within, Druckerman discusses how French parents tend not to say, “No!” and instead reason with their children even at a very young age. We both thought it was a great idea and had planned to incorporate that and other Parisian childrearing trends that Druckerman suggests leads to better child behavior into our own parenting styles, but now, 15+ months later, it seems near impossible – at least on a continual basis.

The Parisian style is one held by nearly an entire culture and is reinforced by government-subsidized neighborhood daycare centers in which children learn manners, have 3 or 4 course meals in which they get to taste all different things, and generally experience things simultaneously. Therefore, children immediately become part of the lifestyle. Here in America, parents face an uphill battle. Not everyone can afford daycare. Those that can sometimes find that their rambunctious kids wind up with inadequate caretakers which can lead to even worse behavior.

We’re of the “can’t afford daycare” clan; I’m with Sienna the majority of the time and thus am currently her primary teacher, and there are only so many times I can follow a “No!” with reasoning. For example, in trying to teach Sienna not to throw things on the floor, I’ll say, “No floor, Sienna. Dropping food on the floor is a dirty and rude habit and makes things difficult for Daddy. If you don’t like something, please give it to Daddy.” Then I’ll shorten it to “No floor, Sienna.” And then, “No floor!” and finally, after saying all of those things multiple times, I’ll become exasperated and simply say, “No!” That’s when I tend to get her attention.

My anxiety and guilt about saying, “No!” have decreased greatly since that appointment with Sienna’s pediatrician. There are so many things Sienna does and touches that she needs to learn not to do or touch that it’s overwhelming, and each day, the lessons need to be re-taught. I’ll continue to explain to Sienna the reasons why she shouldn’t do or touch certain things and hope that she’ll one day understand and change her behavior, but in my opinion, taking “No!” out of the equation just doesn’t work in American culture. And I shouldn’t feel guilty about that.

Two nights ago, Blog Anxiety attacked me while I was trying to fall asleep. For hours, my head was ravaged by possible topics, accusations, what ifs, are my blogs too long? too short? and the Field of Dreams-type disembodied voice of one of my former writing professors: “If you blog it, you cannot publish it.” So as I tossed and turned and I thought of topics, I pulled back thinking that if I wrote about the media and children or the desensitization of violence in children and its relationship to Sienna or really anything, then I couldn’t be published and if I couldn’t be published, then I wasn’t a real writer…I doomed myself to failure.

There are so many things I want to say, but I’m afraid to because of this desire to be published…REALLY published; to succeed as a writer. Then there are the self-barbs that my blog isn’t any good. I’m not witty. I’m not insightful. No one outside of my closest friends and family are reading it. How many visiters have I had? I have no clue. Are people stumbling upon it and reading it? I doubt it. So immediately I rush towards the end game. I can’t attract readers. My blog will never be recognized as important as one of the “top blogs about blah blah blah” out there. I won’t be cited in magazines or newspapers or other blogs. I’ll just be floating in cyberspace…alone. I’ll have failed.

Hours of this garbage causing deep chest pains. This is what anxiety is: irrational attacks from the mind that you feel defenseless against and that quickly manifest into physical trauma, thus causing your defenses to weaken until you eventually submit. Luckily I didn’t have a panic attack. Instead I took a melatonin and eventually fell asleep, though the aftermath was grogginess the following day and a dull throb of anxiety coursing through my body.

Last night, similar thing. I didn’t write yesterday so I flagellated myself for not writing. I’m supposed to write each day, right? Isn’t that the rule? Despite everyone including my therapist telling me that it’s my blog and that I can do whatever I wish, I still feel these unwritten pressures and rules. I tell myself to breathe. I tell myself I’m being irrational, that this is where I go. It doesn’t work…yet (my therapist tells me to always add “yet”). I’ve been advised to try yoga or meditation classes, but I’m scared as hell because I can’t remember a time when my I wasn’t present – when I truly let myself go, and deep down, I don’t believe it’ll ever happen. Yoga. Even the word frightens me. The thought of me being in a class with all of these people (in my head) looking at and judging me. Knowing without knowing that I can’t master breathing techniques. But I need to try, for my sake and for Sienna’s. She cannot have a father figure who’s tormented by his own thoughts and therefore terrified of the world. It’s not fair to her. It’s not fair to me. I guess yoga or meditation is in my future. I have to try.

I’ve felt such a rush of love for Sienna the last few days that I felt it was important to revisit a blog I’d written for the NYC Dads Group about falling in love with your child. The blog was about how much trouble I had loving Sienna during her first 6 months and how I set myself up for failure. I still face that problem in therapy…setting myself up for failure. So this blog re-post is also a reminder that I need to patient when it comes to  therapy. This is a blog for myself, mainly, but also for all those new parents out there who are inundated with insane expectations forced upon them by society. You can find the original post here and I thank the NYC Dads Group for allowing me to share content I’d written for them on my own blog:

Here is what I wrote:

One of the most ubiquitous and most dangerous clichés around is “love at first sight.” In respect to having a child, it’s supposedly that moment when you hold your son or daughter for the first time, when you feel your heart “melt” and you know, truly know, that you’re in love. I use the word “dangerous” for a reason; for someone, such as myself, who suffers from depression and anxiety, the cliché can act as a catalyst for the mind to create an unrealistic anticipation, an engraved in stone expectation. But what happens if that moment doesn’t occur? What happens if you hold your child for the first time and love is the furthest thing from your mind? For me, my anxiety and depression ratcheted up about a zillion percent, and my mind became even more of a brutal enemy than usual. While depression and anxiety can exacerbate just about every aspect of having a baby, perhaps the worst thing it intensified in me was that concept of love or more specifically, the question: When will I fall in love with my child?

Further, I finally realized I had set myself up by believing in the clichéd “moment,” the Good Will Hunting breakthrough. As with therapy, there is no sudden burst of lucidity when it comes to falling in love with your child, and by expecting it, you’re only setting yourself up for disaster, guilt, and agony. It’s a different experience for each dad, for each parent, and comparing yourself to others will only end in mental anguish. This is true with most people, but for those with depression and anxiety, it is especially pertinent, for we always go to the extreme and then blame ourselves when it doesn’t come to fruition. So while the clichéd moment might be false, the clichéd “falling” in love just might be true as it implies something continuous and gradual, something that happens without you even realizing it. I carry the picture (see below) my wife captured of Sienna and I with me at all times…not as a reminder that I love my nearly one-year-old daughter (for that I feel it in my gut), but I will always need to remember not to succumb to the minefield inside my mind. Things will happen when they happen, so long as I let them.

Turns out that sometimes staying home can be just as adventurous and exciting for Sienna as going out. Yesterday Elaine and I had planned to take Sienna into the city, but the weather report was foreboding (and eventually wrong), so we wound up staying in our apartment.

We spent the day playing with Sienna, trying to appease her insatiable curiosity by naming everything she pointed to: door, wall, wall, Phil Rizzuto (an autographed pic hanging on the wall), ball, duck, wall, etc. We took turns reading to her from books we’d read so many times they were engraved on our brains: “A cow says moo. A sheep says baa. 3 singing pigs say la la la!” We gave her a bath. We watched “Spongebob” and giggled as Sienna tried to sing along to theme song.

The day wasn’t without its literal bumps. Sienna slipped in the tub and cried. She banged her head in the bathroom and cried. She caught her finger in something and cried. A collage fell off her door about an hour into her nap waking her up and leaving her hysterical. And dinner was saucy and not in a good way.

We had gone out for Italian the night before and Sienna enjoyed pasta and tomato sauce, so we figured we’d replicate it. It didn’t happen. Sienna barely ate the pasta and instead stuck her hands in the sauce and smeared it all over everything. This is something that normally would bring on massive anxiety for me and it started to for Elaine, but something happened. We tag-teamed it. We didn’t let Sienna’s toddlerness get to us. Elaine cleaned her and we switched to a bowl of cereal and milk and a cut up banana which our daughter gobbled up. We joked about the mess. We said Sienna was trying out for the part as the Red Skull in the next Captain America film

And then we danced. The three of us danced to “OPP” and “Rock Around the Clock” over and over, Sienna emanating pure joy. We played monkey in the middle using, what else, stuffed monkeys. Sienna ran between the two us laughing and clapping as each monkey soared over her head. We asked Sienna to point out her mouth, her cheek, her neck, Gleeb, Minky, a blanket. We clapped and cheered each time Sienna got it right and our daughter clapped and cheered too…she clapped so hard and with so much pride that it looked like she’d fall over (something she did later each time I spun her causing glorious dizziness).

But the highlight of the day was when Elaine had left the room for a bit, came back, and Sienna looked at her and said, “Mama!” Everything stopped. Elaine and I looked at each other and I watched as Elaine nearly burst from happiness, my own heart warm and proud. We were a family. We spent the day inside having fun as a family. Elaine, Sienna, Minky, Gleeb and myself. No trip, no outdoor experience could ever replicate those shared feelings of familial closeness, fun, and love.