#3 day yontiff

[reachingrachnius]

[haorev]

Whether or not I was actually gonna end up going to services today was kind of a toss up (I don’t wake up early and it’s like an hour drive to the synagogue I go to for HHD), but basically I woke up this morning, took my meds, got some water, and pretty much promptly went back to bed and slept for like 3 more hours

Gut yontiff, g’mar chatima tova, Shana tova, Shabbat Shalom

If you’re fasting: may your fast be easy and meaningful. If you aren’t: may this day be holy and meaningful. May all of us be inscribed in the Book of Life, and may we all have a peaceful 5785.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

Hahaha I’m so stressed about Pesach

[jewishconvertthings]

So remembering that I can turn on lights again in my house is A Thing

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

I really hate nursing anywhere that is not the comfort of my own home with only family around. I don’t like to use a nursing cover, I don’t feel comfortable nursing in front of non-family without a cover, and I have my very particular setup at home with the couch and the footstool and the nursing pillow. But, such is life, if we want to take advantage of our ability to go out for meals on yontiff it’s most likely I’ll have to nurse while there (especially with this baby, who tends to nap shorter during the day vs. my first who would regularly nap 2-3 hours during the day at this age [but woke up more often at night so it’s a trade off…]).

First day went totally fine (thanks @ the hostess if you see this lol), I had a private room I was able to use and a chair that worked out pretty well. Today, though, was another story. The hostess told me that I could nurse in their living room because “nobody” would be coming in there; anyone who came inside would only be going to the kitchen to get the next course, and they didn’t need to go through the living room to get there.

So I go inside and first of all their DIL is already in there just sitting on the couch. Ok, “nobody,” but maybe the hostess didn’t realize DIL was inside, fine. I start getting set up which is tricky because their couch has a weird angle that makes it difficult for me to have my feet on the floor at all whatsoever without holding my back in an extremely uncomfortable position. As I’m setting up the hostess herself comes in, parks herself on a chair, and starts talking to me. “Nobody”! Omgsh. And she’s asking all kinds of questions like “what is that thing?” (the nursing pillow) “why are you putting the nursing cover over your head?” (So I can SEE WHAT I’M DOING to get him to latch) “oh, does he have trouble latching?” (Not so much when I’m not on a couch with a bizarre angle and he doesn’t have a nursing cover obscuring his vision, but I need to place a nipple shield, which I am not going to get into with you) I’M JUST TRYING TO FEED THIS CHILD SO I CAN GO ENJOY THE FOOD YOU JUST TOLD MY HUSBAND IS GETTING COLD OMGsh. I mention something about the baby not being used to a nursing cover in passing and she says, “Oh you don’t need to use that, nobody is here.” I admire your humility, ma’am, but you are not nobody.

And to top it all off, throughout the time I was nursing, not only was the DIL in and out a bunch of times, but not just one but TWO adult sons came in and out of the room. “NOBODY”???

I did have the cover BH. But. NOBODY?!

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

My husband brought my urine jugs back to the lab this morning and was told we’ll get results in 3-5 days. Ugh. I hope they were just underpromising, because the lab company’s website says turnaround time for this type of test is typically within 1 day. I really don’t want to have to wait until after this upcoming 3-day yontiff to have any idea what’s going on. If they send the results by tomorrow, I could hopefully be in touch with my medical team before Shabbos.

I’ve had the headaches at least once a day on 10 out of the past 13 days. One of the midwives had told me that even though the headaches are mild enough that I don’t really feel a need to take Tylenol, I should take it anyway because if they respond to it that means they’re significantly less likely to be caused by preeclampsia. The problem with that is that they typically only last a few minutes, so if I were to take Tylenol and they went away, that wouldn’t actually tell me whether they responded to the Tylenol or not.

I’m thinking maybe we should get a blood pressure monitor so we can get some more data on that front. My blood pressure has been totally fine until now, but it’s only being checked every so often at appointments. My husband probably wouldn’t mind having one anyway for his own professional purposes (and I’d be confident we would get accurate at-home readings because he’s literally been tested on how to correctly take someone’s blood pressure, lol).

I just want to know what’s going on with my body. 🥺

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

Every time my family visits over yontiff, my mom and sister waffle about which meals they’re going to be around for, and it’s really frustrating. Like do you not understand that cooking for 3 adults and a toddler and cooking for 5 adults and a toddler are significantly different? Plus there’s the fact that neither of them will eat dark meat or gefilte fish and my sister won’t eat salmon, so whether or not they’re present makes a huge impact on the menu. Also, was considering trying to eat out during the day, but again, seeking an invite for 3 adults and a toddler and seeking an invite for 5 adults and a toddler are not the same thing. 🤦🏻‍♀️

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

My son was in a great, energetic mood all day. He finished dinner, asked for a bottle, drank like half of it, went and got a book….I noticed he seemed a little hot…….and boom, he was out on my lap. He’s in bed now sound asleep, an hour before bedtime, when lately he’s been really fighting bedtime every night. I know it’s expected for him to come down with a lot of things this year and, after 5 days in daycare since Sukkos break ended, he was about due, but still. 🥺 I really hope this isn’t a) covid b) that bad or c) something he’s going to give to my husband. My husband can’t afford to miss on campus class again after missing a 9-5 day 3 weeks in a row due to having a fever he caught from my son and then 2 weeks of yontiff.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

My son has had some kind of bug since Motzei Shabbos. He had a fever (based on forehead feel - he didn’t want his temperature taken and I wasn’t interested in fighting for it) from Saturday night through Sunday night. He hasn’t had one since, but his appetite has been barely there - yesterday all he ate the whole day was 1.75 applesauce cups, a couple saltines, a couple chickpeas, and a slice of challah. Yesterday he had diarrhea twice, once when he first woke up and once about 11 hours later. This morning he had 3 diarrhea diapers within less than an hour and a half of waking up.

He’s overall in a pretty good mood though so at least there’s that. I took him to outdoor shofar about a 20 minute walk away both days of yontiff which he enjoyed. Bummed I wasn’t able to send him to daycare today though what with the fast.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

This week was supposed to be pretty relaxing. No yontiff, my husband is on break, he’d be able to help a lot more with childcare so I wouldn’t have as much to do, etc. But instead it’s been crazy stressful. My son has been constipated and miserable for a week (finally started making progress with that today), crying on and off constantly from discomfort, being super clingy to me because of that. My husband needed to take the car in because the check engine light was on, which should have been a 1-day thing on Monday, but he ended up having to take it farther away than we wanted in order to get an appointment during his break, he was told it would take 3-4 hours but then at the 3 hour mark of waiting (because it wasn’t worthwhile to come back home in the middle) was told that the person working on it had to leave for an emergency, he then drove home because he needed the car to get to an appointment Tuesday, he took it back yesterday and left it overnight, and then today he has to go back and get it. So he’s been gone a ton when I expected him to be around to help, and my soon as needed way more attention than normal. My son refused to take his nap multiple times today before literally just passing out from exhaustion in my bed cuddling with me 3 hours after his normal naptime.

I mean I’ve hardly had any work to do this week really, but I also haven’t been able to do much on the job hunting front because it’s hard to write good cover letters with a screaming toddler in the background and your own anxiety through the roof as a result of the crying.

And now it feels like my husband’s break is basically practically over already. Friday always goes quick getting ready for Shabbos, then Shabbos, Sunday, Monday, and he’s back in class full time on Tuesday. My (fully vaccinated) parents are coming to visit for a week and a half on Sunday which should be helpful in some ways and a bit stressful in others, but of course davka the day they leave is the first day of the semester that my husband has to be on campus all day.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

One of the professors responded to my husband’s apology email with a lecture about how he’s going to learn cultural sensitivity as part of this program and it will serve him well blablabla

This entire situation began when she and her colleagues opted to schedule 2 exams over Pesach including 1 the day after a 3-day yontiff despite having multiple Jewish students in the cohort including 2 Orthodox Jews, one of whom had talked to her ahead of time about the difficulties that having exams that week would pose, and they also opted NOT to schedule any exams the weeks before or after that

But please, ma’am, tell us some more about freaking cultural sensitivity.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

I can’t wait til my husband doesn’t have studying to do anymore. Every Sunday is just like I take care of our son al day while he studies all day (necessarily), and it’s really boring. I mean I suppose if not for covid it would also be more fun because I could take my son more places (right now it’s really just the nearby playground and that’s it), but still.

My parents are coming next week Monday-Friday, which is the last week of my husband’s semester as long as he doesn’t have to retake any exams, and then my in-laws are coming for the first time since my son’s bris on the 18th-25th while my husband is on break. Which should be…interesting. Despite having met and gotten engaged to my husband over 3 years ago now, between covid and everyone’s schedules before that I’ve only met them in person 5 times up til now: when they came for our 2nd l’chaim, our wedding, when we visited their area our first Pesach together (but we only saw them 1st days of yontiff and before we flew out after 2nd days), my husband’s semicha graduation, and my son’s bris. All of these previous visits have been brief and with a very specific purpose, so this is the longest visit so far AND the first that’s just more casual and not planned out. My MIL is a nice but incredibly anxious person whose anxiety tends to trigger my own, and my FIL seemed to have forgotten what to do with babies when they visited when my son was just born despite having successfully and hands-on raised my husband, so I’m just kind of nervous about how they’ll be with my son. We’ll see. At least my husband won’t be in class so it won’t be up to me to play hostess all day on my own.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

My husband just got his schedule for the semester and even though at least 20% of his cohort is Jewish (half of those Orthodox), the head of the program is Jewish, and their (now cancelled) spring break was supposed to be davka over Pesach, they have 2 exams during Pesach including one the day after a 3-day yontiff. Meanwhile they still have Good Friday off because heaven forfend Xians ever have to do anything on their holidays that don’t actually prohibit any activities. 😠 They cancelled spring break AND added an extra week of class at the end of the semester, meaning they have 2 extra weeks to work with compared to usual, and they couldn’t find another way to schedule this stuff? Really?

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

How's your chag going?

It’s ok. I wish we could have eaten out over yontiff but not there yet with our covid situation. 3 day yontiff without the social aspect can feel really long. Our sedarim were pretty quick and low-key even for just the 2 of us because the baby sleeps in the living room so we had them on a tiny table in the kitchen while only speaking in a whisper. And then my husband has 2 exams this week including a practical today and I’m working every day except Friday, so chol hamoed honestly just feels kind of stressful because I have the normal stress of simultaneously working and taking care of my son while also having most food for both of us be more labor-intensive than normal and a lot of his normal go-to options not a thing for Pesach. I just want a normal yontiff with people and maybe even traveling to see people we haven’t seen in a while.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

Yontiff was really nice, and kind of wishing we hadn’t had to come out of it. We’re within walking distance of home but it’s mamash felt like we’re on vacation. The apartment we’re staying in (whose owners, our friends, are out of town) is a gorgeous 2.5 bedroom with a living room probably 2.5-3 times the size of ours, kitchen 3-4 times the size of ours, and a porch large enough for a sukkah that feels like a treehouse because we’re a floor up. The baby has his own room for once, which means we can actually do stuff after he’s asleep. He’s loving all the space to crawl around and greatly enjoying their daughter’s toys - we brought a whole bag of his, but he’s hardly touched them since we arrived. For the first time since early March, I was almost able to forget about the pandemic for a couple days and just pretend that my husband wasn’t going to shul and we weren’t seeing anyone because we were in the middle of nowhere somewhere. I really wish we could stay here through 2nd days, but unfortunately our friends get back into town Wednesday afternoon. 😭 It’s been so nice though, I don’t know how to thank them properly for letting us stay here.

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

A little off topic but, are they not obligated to accomodate him? In my country our schools are legally obligated to accomodate religious conflicts with school to a reasonable extent. We definitely still have the "everything is planned around Xtians" issue and that's stressful, but I never have to worry I won't be able to do something.

Yes, they have to accommodate him (and that’s how it will work with the fall chagim that they don’t have off - ie Sukkos - but it’s just they were supposed to be off for Pesach so this semester wasn’t supposed to have this issue, and like, it’s nice to have 1 semester a year where you aren’t playing catchup at some point). But this is a really intense program so the accommodation is “we’ll record the classes and you can watch them later” but in a single day he is missing 7 full hours of class. And he typically has classes the entire day, so it’s not like he has ample free time to make things up. It’s Shabbos or yontiff Friday night through Monday night. He comes out Monday night having missed 3 classes totaling 7 hours. The next day, Tuesday, he has an exam that he won’t have been able to study for the past 3 days, so he is going to study Monday night rather than catching up. Wednesday morning he has a class he will have missed 3 hours of on Monday, so he’ll basically HAVE to do those 3 hours Tuesday night I guess. But then Wednesday evening he’s not going to catch up on the other 4 hours he missed, because he has another exam first thing Thursday morning he’ll have to study for. And then he has Friday off but it’s erev Shabbos/yontiff so it’s not exactly a great day to play catchup, and he won’t be able to catch up Sunday because it’s still yontiff. And then Monday he has the same classes as the previous Monday in this instance so he’ll need to be caught up by then basically. Also, the exam that’s right after yontiff is a practical exam (ie one where they are physically tested on skills rather than answering questions on paper) and in the past his classmates have gone into school on a Sunday to practice with each other which has been very helpful. He will not be able to join if they do.

So are they technically accommodating him? Yes. He is being permitted to miss class and to make up the material later, and they didn’t put the exam on yontiff. BUT it’s going to be extraordinarily stressful (especially given how labor-intensive Chabad Pesach food is) and it didn’t have to be because they had complete freedom to not schedule things this way. The week BEFORE Pesach there are no exams and there is a study day with no class. None of the material from that week will be on the exams that are being given over Pesach so it’s not like “oh we couldn’t have given the exams that week because we need enough time to cover everything.” The week AFTER Pesach also has no exams and a study day. The week after THAT has only 1 exam and a study day. So it was entirely possible for them to not put 2 exams during Pesach and even to not schedule class on yontiff but they chose not to do that even after my husband had had a conversation with the program head about his concerns (which was before the calendar was made). And of course there was never any possibility whatsoever that they would schedule anything on Good Friday or put an exam the Monday after Easter.

And I wouldn’t expect them to take this stuff into account if we were in some random area with no Jews. But the school as a whole has so many Jews that it schedules its spring break around Pesach when break isn’t cancelled, and his cohort in particular is at least 20% Jewish (there may be more who are flying under the radar, but those are the ones who are either obviously frum or have told my husband they’re Jewish).