Time is running down...

I have not worked since October 15, 2011.  This is the longest stretch I've ever gone in my adult life without working.  I have such mixed feelings about going back to work.

I have to admit that in the middle of winter--even though this was the mildest winter I think I've ever experienced in Boston--I was really missing work.  I felt stir crazy being home every day, especially when it was too cold to go out for a walk in the afternoon with the boys.  I missed adult company, my work friends, and my NICU and 8th floor nurses, and I was trying to get my head around how to handle 2 infants.  But slowly I got the hang of the boys, we settled into a routine, and I started to really enjoy being home every day with them.  There was never a doubt in my mind I'd go back to work after my maternity leave was over, but I didn't expect it would be this hard on me to have to go back.

Part of it, of course, is having to leave the boys at daycare, essentially with strangers.  I like the center as much as I could possibly like a daycare, but it's still daycare.  I have feelings of guilt about it like any mom would.  They will do things their way, not necessarily mine, and that worries me.  Already, I have to train the boys to sleep unswaddled before I'd like to because they won't swaddle them for naps.  I'm in the middle of that right now.  There's an overwhelming list of things and supplies I need to bring to the daycare on a daily and weekly basis.  And there's the logistics of drop off and pick up.  But we'll figure it all out.

Another huge part of my anxiety and sadness, quite honestly, is just that it's sort of an end of an era or stage in my life that I quite liked!  I was pregnant and then BOOM!  BEDREST!  Bedrest was a rude awakening and the start of my maternity leave essentially.  But it ended up being a really GOOD experience.  Then there were the 2 months going back and forth to the NICU.  Those were also 2 really incredible months.  Weird to say that bedrest and NICU visits were positive experiences, but they were.  And then finally both boys were home with me, and it was amazing, scary, and stressful all at the same time.  But we got through each of these periods and we'll get through my return to work.  I just feel sad that this period of life that was 100% about the boys all day every day is nearly over.

Adrian and Sebastian (and Carlos and I, too) have come a long way since November 25, 2011.  They are so much bigger, stronger, and healthier than I could have imagined 32-weekers would be.  I feel incredibly blessed that things turned out they way they did.  And I was also blessed to have such a nice, long maternity leave to spend with them.