Dear readers, I am heartened by your votes. It was an honest question, mostly along the lines of 'is anyone still out there?'. The answer, apparently, is yes.
Now let me commence to whine.
Let me preface this with: I love my baby, and I realize exactly how fortunate I am, don't get me wrong.
But you know, that doesn't make some things any easier.
I moved to Sausage City from Dante's Eighth Circle*, about 1100 miles away. I know practically no-one here, and you know what? I suck at making new friends. Also we'll be leaving in 1-3 years, and it's hard leaving people behind.
I have a couple of work-friends I have lunch with. They're lovely people. I might ever go out with them except... I can't be away longer than my 9-hours-at-work-and-10-if-I-bike, because Pumpkin wails his head off when presented with a bottle.** And the kid, unless he's really hungry he'll only nurse laying down, plus he wants to be played with all the time so why bother leaving the house, and nobody holds playgroups on Sundays here because they're all at church. If I were staying home I'd go to storytime and moms' group and actually hang out with other humans, but as it is, forget it.
I didn't even make it to my LLL meeting last week because- irony!- I had to come home and feed the Pumpkin.
I feel isolated. I'm starting to feel depressed. Working is hard, and the only time I get to myself, unless I stay up too late, is on the max-speed bike ride home. I may lose my mind.
What did you do to avoid going OFF YOUR ROCKERS? (With small children or any other kind of isolation. Gaaah.)
End whine.
*A distressingly accurate summary of all that was wrong with the place. Except maybe for sorcerers.
** Yes, we tried several different bottles. And three kinds of cups. And a spoon. And a dropper. He hates plastic and he wants BOOOOOB. He'll take a bottle after several hours of crabbiness, but there's a lot of gnashing of toothless gums.
