Take your daughter to work day!

Yesterday Marissa and I paid a visit to my office. It was weird being in there after being out for so long...there are some new faces and some people were gone; a lot changes in three months. The ladies enjoyed seeing Marissa and playing with her. Of course, just as a crowd had gathered, she fired off a poop that sounded very farty. Everyone laughed and then she smiled...it was classic. I changed her in one of our conference rooms. I was trying to think of a person whose desk I could change her on...but then I realized that there isn't really anyone there that I dislike that much. Now, I could've found plenty of desks at Home Depot to use, but that's why I left that place!!

It's going to take me a few weeks to get my head back into work. Not too much has changed...but there's a lot of planning and new initiatives on the horizon. Hopefully I'll be busy so that I won't cry all day long. Although I might at first; Amanda told me that she cried her entire first day back at work but that it got better day by day. I don't know if I will or not, but hopefully I won't be "mommy-tracked." I do want flexibility but I intend to work my butt off while I'm there; if something is going to take me away from my daughter, it better be worth it (paycheck and benefits are great and necessary, but I hope I get some sort of personal satisfaction, too).

In preparation for daycare, I've started giving Marissa more bottles. She'll probably have to take 2-3 while I'm at work; so today I gave her 2, at the times when she would have them at daycare. I plan to continue breastfeeding when I return to work at least at first. I'll probably pump once per day while I'm at work. So she can have 1 bottle of breast milk and 1 bottle of formula while at daycare, and I can breastfeed her before and after work. I haven't introduced formula yet...I will do that in the next week or two. I'm sure she'll be fine but I don't think I'm ready! After I got past the first few weeks, I've really enjoyed the closeness that breastfeeding has given us and of course the benefits for her. The only drawback is the lack of "freedom" (can't be away for too long because no one else can feed her unless I pump...which I have been doing for a while now) but it hasn't really affected me too much. I'm totally fine moving to formula eventually...it's practically just as good as breastfeeding (and I think I turned out OK and I was formula-fed...ha!!)...but I'm just not ready yet. I didn't think I would feel this way...weird what you discover once you're in a situation!! The other benefit of breastfeeding is that it's free. Formula is crazy-expensive!!

One day I'm going to print out this blog and let Marissa read it. I'm not sure how old she'll need to be to appreciate it (or if she'll ever appreciate it...perhaps she will just roll her eyes and tell me I'm a nerd)...maybe I'll give it to her if she decides to have children of her own one day. At any rate, I'm sure she's not going to appreciate the amount of entries that mention her pooping issues. But she won't be surprised...after all, she does have Matt and me as her parents.