Tomorrow, The King will be 7 weeks old.

I’m slated to go back to work part time after 8 weeks of leave. So I’m trying to get ready.

There are things I’m looking forward to, like having several hours at a stretch of not hearing a baby cry, not even being listening for the baby to start crying.

And there are things I’m dreading, like not being able to go just look at him and smell his wonderful baby smell at the drop of a hat. I’m going to miss him so much!

Our original plan was for me to be out full-time for 8 weeks, and then back half-time for another 8 weeks. During the second 8 weeks, we’d juggle care for The King, and then right after Memorial Day, his slot would be available at Montessori School.

Although that looked good on paper, it is just not realistic, for several reasons:

• Jill can’t work half her hours "after hours" and she can really only do ’spot care’ while she’s working. I can go to the bathroom, or she can change a diaper, but when her phone rings or she’s typing up an interview, she can’t also be managing The King.
• Me working only half-time for 8 weeks, while we are covering rent on the new place and mortgage on the old, is a huge drain on our finances. It borders on the irresponsible.
• The Montessori School slot might not even be available the first week of June. They still think "June" but they’ve clarified that they don’t know yet when that means. It all depends on the current baby’s developmental milestones.

On the plus side, we found a sitter who we think is going to be great. His "real" job is theater directing, particularly children’s theater, but he has a couple of months between shows.

I called my boss, and proposed coming back half time beginning on 4/10, and ratcheting up to 4 days/week a week or two later, through June. He said that if HR will approve it, he will too. I’m going to try to set up a meeting with HR early next week.

I have this horrible, bizarre, and completely irrational fear that The King won’t get enough to eat when I go back to work.

I know it’s totally irrational. I’ve been pumping, partly to practice it, partly to build up a little stash, and partly because when The King goes more than 3 hours between meals, they swell up ridiculously. This morning, after he slept for 7 hours AND THEN ATE, I pumped 4 oz. The times I’ve pumped when he hasn’t eaten, I’ve gotten close to 6 oz.

And if that weren’t proof enough of how irrational I’m being about this, I also bought one of those mondo size cans of soy based formula.

Unless Jill and the babysitter both forget to look in the freezer and how to read, and are too embarassed to call and let me know, there is no chance that The King will go hungry.

But even writing that doesn’t make me feel better. Or less worried.