#MiniMilah @naimafreedom-blog - Tumblr Blog

Parted down the middle, 90s video realness. #minimilah

Illmatic is turning 20, I had to show my respect.

REJOICE AND BE GLAD, FOR I AM ONE!

Yesterday, we saw an 11-month-old who was a smooth 3 inches shorter and 5 pounds lighter than #MiniMilah and she was walking, as I pushed the Princess of Bed Stuy around in this big huge thing. This must be how my mother felt when I stopped making the honor roll.

Get up, get out and get something, Naima.

#MiniMilah is so sweet. She likes to share her baby cereal with me. Unfortunately, it's only on loan. She'll put a piece in my mouth, then attempt to snatch it out and eat it. Babies are gross sometimes.

I chose this picture because I felt it represented the shame one would feel after eating food from her mother's mouth. And, also, because she knows how to clap now and she was doing that here. If you see us walking down the street, say "Patty cake," she'll do it on command. It's great. I'm still trying to teach her the "Iwokeuplikedis" hands from "Flawless.

Mama said, "If you're gonna read it, read it all."

For the second time in as many days, #MiniMilah woke up having peed through the "great" discount diapers I found. My reaction was "This is gross, where do I make a return?" But I've gotten quite fond of her over the past nearly-10 months and decided against that. Alas, it's time to go back to Pampers. She costs a lot of money. I should really save myself the trouble and just put my paycheck in a blender and mix it with her milk, so she can just consume it faster.

Also, though I am not the tidiest person in the world, I abhor sticky, wet and dirty messes. So this whole feeding thing is really a thing. I sometimes just take her shirt off so that I can just dip her in a pail of water after. Please look at the photo above. That is juice (and water) that she has gleefully poured all over her high chair because no reason. And there's food sitting on her lip, I suppose she was saving it for later. Maybe this is why my mom breastfed exclusively for nearly (okay, exactly) two years, because there's no mess involved. My child has graduated on to fish and grits already, so please pray for all of us.

#minimilah #babies #cute babies

The return.

shady f. baby

*sorry for the hiatus. i had a 'do i really want to do this blog?' moment but yes, i do. who am i to deny the world NAIMA stories????*

#MiniMilah had her two-month checkup and shots this week. we were waiting in the lobby of the doctor's office and another mom/baby pair came from the back. the mom accidentally bumped into us—into #MiniMilah perched in her bjorn on my chest, to be specific. she offered a curt "sorry," and while i know how hard it is to maintain spatial awareness or focus on anyone but your own baby...DONT YOU BUMP INTO MY FUCKING BABY, EVER EVER EVER! I DONT CARE IF SHE IS 30, DONT DO THAT SHIT, I WILL KILL YOU. TIGER MOM AND I DONT MEAN NOTHING ABOUT NO VIOLIN LESSONS, SON. WU TANG! WU WANG!

ahem.

anyway, i quietly seethed. #MiniMilah seemed unbothered, so i chilled. soon thereafter, the assailant's baby began to cry. first softly, then on full volume. and with each cry he let out...#MiniMilah giggled. the harder he cried, the more she laughed.

that's my child, y'all.

#minimilah

that's a little baby (edited)

i used to be one of those folks who talked bad about people who walked around with super small babies. like "oh, you left the maternity ward and came straight to target? what good mothering that is."

and then i was stuck in the house with a baby. WELP.

our pediatrician assured me that it's safe to take even a wee baby out for some air and our walks/mini-adventures have pretty much saved my life. plus they are good for #MiniMilah. for reasons. alas, i have felt bad on a few occasions. the first being when an older woman turned to her friend and said "now, that's a little baby." i speak fluent older black lady, i knew what she meant: "look at this stupid hoodrat with that little ass baby walking around, mmm hmm. we woulda never did this in my day, we stayed in the house for the first 5 years. kept the germs off the baby, sho' you right."

or, perhaps i was just a little insecure. or both. the worst shame so far, however, came when #MiniMilah got fussy on a walk and i knew i wouldn't be able to get her to an appropriate place to feed. we had no choice but to stop in the ATM lobby of a chase bank. i had a bottle of breast milk with me, so i didn't have to pull my boobs out for once. but after feeding, i realized that she had another issue: she had a soaking wet diaper. which is surely less comfortable than normal while wearing a teddy bear suit and riding in a baby bjorn. so...this happened:

people judged the shit out of us. teenagers were scared. it was a thing, a whole thing. but we made it. we survived ATMgate 2013. and i'm sure the chase people who watch the security tapes from the weekend were entertained. they owe me for the overdraft fees i racked up in college.

do you know what today is?

it's #MiniMilah's 1-month-birthday!

i sorta accidentally celebrated this on friday, because she was born on a friday and so four fridays, in my mind, equalled a month. but someone corrected me. math is hard, her dad will have to teach her that, i am not even going to try to do that shit.

anyway, TODAY is the one month mark and she is so perfect and wonderful and omg i hate breastfeeding so much please make it stop and why is it that everytime i even THINK about pumping or going to the bathroom or eating or doing anything that is remotely outside of "putting my breast in #MiniMilah's mouth or changing her diaper," she begins to cry. unless she's sleep, during which times i miss her. why is it so hard? why can't i go braless in my own house without becoming a leaky, funky-ass mess? why can't i go swimming in a pool of sangria?

because look at those perfect little brown eyes, that's why. all worth it. happy birtherversary, little babycake.

the night i went on breastfeeding strike

i am breastfeeding, which is something I decided to do for many reasons. actually, just for two: it's best for the baby and it helps you lose the baby weight.

sn: it doesn't even feel right calling it "baby weight." it should really be "cookie weight" or "au bon pain weight" or "kraft macaroni and cheese weight"—i had a major case of the blue box blues when i was preggo and hadn't eaten that stuff since i was like, 7. i just was eating. i don't half eat now. i am subsisting off of handfuls of carrot sticks, granola bars and pirates booty. help, help me please.

i can't say that i knew what to expect from breastfeeding. i didn't expect it to be fun. i didn't expect horrible. it's neither of those things, though it does skew closer to the latter more often than the former.

alas, it is important work and i would encourage all moms to give it a serious try if they are able (legit info on that here). and i'm saying that not as a mom, but as a child of a mom who breastfed and reaped the benefits. i don't think i'll be able to do it as long as my mom did, meaning i won't be curling up into #MiniMilah's lunchbox next to her string cheese and whatever the kids are eating these days, idk, gluten-free paste. but i'm in it for a year.

however...the flesh is weak. especially the sore, knawed-on flesh that mommy forget to put lanolin on because OMG baby and why would i have time to take care of myself? so one night at 3 am, i looked over at that free can of formula i got in the mail. staring down at me from the top of the fridge promising relief. and i lost my religion. i grabbed one of the many fancy, epa-free, ergonomic bottles we were gifted and i mixed up some of that crap.

nervously, i presented the bottle to #MiniMilah—half-afraid she wouldn't like it, half-afraid she'd like it more than my milk. so many emotions. i put the bottle in her mouth and tilted it and...she opened her lips and just let the milk run down her face.

she wouldn't taste it. she wouldn't clasp her lips around the bottle. she didn't even try. instead, she stared at me blankly, as if to say "you done bumped your MFing head. put the titty in my mouth now or else."

i sobbed quietly and did was i was asked.

#breastfeeding #babies #minimilah #fourthtrimester

i can't believe it's been a whole month! #MiniMilah, you have brought so much joy into the lives of your parents and your village. thank you, we love you so!

look, ma! no neck muscles!

cry it out.

today, i tried the "cry it out" sleep training method, in which you ignore the impassioned cries of your beloved child and confirm her belief that you stopped caring about her the moment you cruelly evicted her from her comfortable womb home.

after 10 minutes, MOMMY could no longer take it. i picked #MiniMilah up out of her bassinet and cuddled her. she promptly threw up all over me and informed me that she doesn't love me any more. shortly thereafter, our cat strutted past and meowed "how's the family?" a la morris day in "purple rain." you know, after the kid's dad had just shot himself.

lessons learned:

1)"cry it out" is terrible

2) cats are terrible

3)morris day is terrible

ETA: this post got me in trouble with my mom because i let the baby cry. :-/

fighting the power, even in her sleep.

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