Aunt A-Lo to the Rescue

Around 7 this morning, Susannah started making her squeaking noises. Ben was getting ready for work and went to get her. I rolled over in bed to get ready to feed her and realized I could not move my neck. I must have slept weird because I could move it (carefully) side to side but more than a few inches up or down was not doable without an incredible amount of pain. Those of you who know about nursing know that it basically requires you to look down so you can see your baby. This was suddenly very difficult. And super painful. It felt like someone had dumped a ton of concrete on my head. It was not good.

So I am not a happy camper. Ben's like, what's wrong, and I'm like, I can't move my neck. I have to move my neck to feed her and I can't move my neck and she has to eat. He shrugs and offers me some Advil. Oh wait, we don't have any Advil. It's all gone. Meanwhile I am nursing Susannah and I start to cry a little bit. It really really hurts. Someone had taken my neck muscles and replaced them with rebar. Ben goes, are you okay. I'm like, no I'm not okay. I can't move my neck but I have to move my neck because she has to eat and I have to repeat this very painful act 10 more times today. So no I am definitely not okay. He says it's going to get better, this is the worst it is going to feel all day. I say it is killing me now and I don't care about later and I start to cry a little more. He gives me the heating pad and says why are you acting like you just found out you have cancer? I hand him the baby and tell him it would be best if he Left The Room. NOW. And then I really start to boohoo because my neck is cement rebar and motherhood is a 24-hour job and no one can help me because we live in a crappy rental apartment in Brooklyn hundreds of miles away from all our family who would stampede our door if I called at 7 am to say that I needed help because my neck was not moving.

Eventually Susannah goes back to sleep and Ben leaves for work and the thing that makes me stop crying is I remember that my sister Anne Louise now lives in Yonkers, and she said she'd come over. When I call her she's magically already on her way to our place. She rubs Arnica gel into my skin and digs her fingers into the knots that used to be my neck and left shoulder. She changes Susannah's diaper and burps her between feedings and watches her while I take a hot shower and then go to a drugstore and buy 200 tablets of Advil.

For someone who couldn't move her neck very much it turned out to be a pretty good day. We took S out in the stroller and went to say hi to Anna and her babies, who just happen to be being looked after by her sister Ashley, who is in town from North Carolina. When Ben got home from work, much was the same. Susannah was asleep and I was in bed with the heating pad. But I was no longer crying and Anne Louise was chilling on the couch.

Long story short, Anne Louise saved our marriage. And I need a new pillow.