Got Junk in my... eye.. sigh

The other night I was making my weekly Target rounds (really, we need TP AGAIN?!) when my right eye started to itch. GAH. Did I get something in there? Was my contact dry? I get home and peel my contact from my eye. The next morning I wake up to this:

Okay, thats not me (my eyes are more greenish)

But all the same I wake up to a throbbing red eye. Convinced that it was a corneal abrasion from my contacts, I didn't worry too much about it, but made an appt with the after hours Dr "just to make sure".. apparently just to make sure it was, indeed, my friend conjunctivitis back for a visit.

The Dr assumed I got it from Lucas and the den of diseases that we like to call "preschool". But no, the kid's eyes are fine (for now, knocking on wood.. crap! Does Ikea particle board count?!), just mommy got the junk.

The Dr, the same one who treated me for mastitis 2 weeks ago (haha, Aetna! Look who's laughing now!) prescribes an antibiotic drop and tells me to wash my hands frequently and sterilize my house and throw out my make-up and don't touch my kids. So after buying all the Lysol (yea, screw you METHOD. I try go all "green" and immediately get bacteria growing in my eyes. Back to the earth damaging, but bacteria killing chemicals over here) products that they have at Rite-Aid during the 15 minutes it took them to put a label on a bottle of eye drops, I head home to flush my eyes out. But before doing so, I read the instruction packet.. which comments something about "nursing moms may not want to nurse while using.." WTF?! So what do I do? Consult Dr. Google of course!

And Dr. Google and Kellymom.com both tell me, no, these eyedrops are just fine while nursing. Whew.

But Dr. Google also tells me that one of the best remedies for eye problems in nursing moms is, well, breastmilk. Like, in your eye. Like squirting milk in your eye.

The best part about this is that I actually bent my head over and tried to figure out how to squirt my own milk in my eye. Then, because I'm TOTALLY sick like that. thought "Crap, I should have Jason film this and become an instant YouTube sensation!"

OLD smacked me in the face

How do you envision yourself? In your head, when you "see" yourself talking to other people, or at a party, how do you "look"? And does that differ from reality?

I guess that I still envision myself younger than I appear or am. I'm the youngest in my group of friends, I know about trends and what's hip, I have a flippin' MySpace page. When I walk through the mall, I think that I look like a young mom. When I'm without my kids I think that people would be "surprised" to hear that I have not one, but TWO kids! I still feel like other people see me as "just starting out"..

Yesterday the reality of this caught up to me.

I worked an event in Pasadena and over the course of the 4 hours I was there, I had about 5 different women tell me I look familiar and do I have kids at soandso school. At first I was laughing that my alter-ego twin lives in Pasadena.. then it hit me. All the women that were saying this, looked old to me. Not super old, but older.. like Moms..like the type of women that with or without their kids, one could tell they were Moms. They were in that stage of their life. And it honestly never occurred to me before yesterday that I fit that category.

Maybe I should stop shopping in the Jr's department?

She works hard for the money

I technically "went back to work" this week. I say "technically" and use the handy dandy "" because I'm still working from home, and not really full-time, but about 100 hours a month. Which is nice. VERY nice. I picked up a new agency to freelance for plus my old friends came back for more. So, after my "maternity leave" and months of desperately trying to figure out what the hell I want to do with my life, I'm revving up and consulting again.

And let me tell you how nice it feels to use my brain to figure out something other than what to make for dinner.

So Friday I actually had to go to an all day meeting and planning session for a new account. The meeting was actually a hotel down by the airport and I knew that I was going to be gone the majority of the day. Barely thinking straight, the night before it donged on me that I should probably pack up my pump to bring.

When I get to the hotel in the morning, I explain my "situation" to a woman at the front desk and ask if they happened to have a place where I could go and pump. Maybe a private bathroom I could use? Of course they didn't, but she suggested that I use the bathroom on the first floor because "No one ever really goes in there".

3 hours later I excuse myself from the meeting and head down to the first floor. When I walk in I notice that the only electrical outlets are right by the sink in the middle of the room. They do have a little seating area, but no outlets on that side of the room. I walk back outside and go into the sales and catering office and ask again if there is someplace private I may go. Once again I'm told that "No one ever goes into the bathroom across the hall." Whatever. Fine. I'll make due.

Anticipating that I may not have my own private lactation station, I brought along my "hooter hider". Realizing at this point that any milk leakage onto my pretty lavender silk shirt would be quite embarrassing, I decided to take off my shirt (I had a tank top on underneath) and fold it nicely on the counter. I start to pump and within the first 5 minutes had 3 different people walk in.

Hurrying the process. I'm finishing up and drop one of the pumps on the floor. As I bend down to pick it up, I knock my shirt off onto the floor, and onto a big glob of liquid soap, which, you know it, was right over the boob area of my shirt.

Swweeett.

The things we do for love...