The Mom I Want To Be

As we prepared our entrance in matching outfits, Hubby wisely told our son: "You're Captain America, and your mom and I will always be your shield." Aww. It's only Wednesday (Baby's 7-week birthday!) and already this week has been filled with more excitement and challenges than we've had in quite a few days. After posting about how things get a little easier with time, Baby blessed us in the wee hours of July 21 and 22 with two nights of about two hours total sleep (right when I was getting used to six...). He wasn't in pain or sick. He cried, but not that much more so than usual. Mostly he just couldn't fall asleep after hours of trying the things that usually worked. New things didn't work either--we attempted to introduce a pacifier (our third attempt) to no avail. And he'd wake up the moment we tried to move him to a bassinet. I kept thinking of the phrase "one step forward and two steps back" as I rocked my nearly 10 pound...

This Wednesday is my six-week post-delivery checkup at the OB-GYN. It's been six weeks since the c-section and six weeks since the birth of my baby. My baby is six weeks old. That's over a month now, and halfway through my 12 weeks of maternity leave. The days have definitely blurred together and gone by as fast as any mom will tell you about her children growing up. "Don't blink." "The days are long but the years are short." "Treasure every moment." Yes, "it goes by so fast." The good news is that in this time, things have actually gotten easier, little by little. Sometimes in small, imperceptible ways, until you realize how much has changed and you have more moments of feeling like something was accomplished. Progress toward a goal of "getting the hang of this." I remember at my two-week post-delivery checkup sitting in the waiting room next to my husband. Baby was in his car seat after fighting to be strapped in an...

A friend of mine asked me today if I've been super emotional since the birth of my child, because she knows about how women's hormones can be after birth. I told her my husband thinks I've been super emotional-- I think I've been a normal amount of emotional. After all, I've been operating on evening sleep of anywhere between 2 and 6 hours (at the most, on a good day). Each week is a new challenge, from round the clock feeding, to breastfeeding pain, to colic, to Baby not wanting to sleep in his bassinet. Plus being cooped up and unable to sneak out to grab even just coffee (I. Miss. Coffee.). Then add the balancing of emotions: you want to sneak out but you also miss your baby and want him back the second you hand him off to someone else, even your husband. And, of course, there's the anxiety that comes with already thinking about going back to work at the end of maternity leave (not to mention the tears that come with recovering from surgery ). Wouldn...

So I've been at this whole "mom" gig for a total of four weeks, but already I find myself giving advice based on my experience (as all moms end up doing, which is how I've ended up with so much awesome--and occasionally conflicting--advice on this journey so far). My friend whose baby was due in July ended up having a c-section one month early, and I quickly advised her to rest up since c-section recovery can be rough (after I congratulated her on the new baby, of course). All my blog post ideas postpartum have been about real talk for new moms--advice on what it's really like to have a new baby. And now I want to put together a post about the items you'll  actually  need after having a baby. Cute onesies, sensory toys, and bottle sanitizers are definitely nice, but in the first few weeks they may not be all that necessary (depending on your situation, of course). Here is my personal survival guide that got me through the first month with Baby: What B...

Greetings all, and welcome to my first post as a new mom (aside from my labor and delivery story  that began while I was still pregnant). Life after birth and with a newborn can be rough. Life after c-section birth with a newborn can be especially rough. You can get through it if you have a great support system, lots of opportunities to cry freely, and photos of when your baby is an angel to remind you that his own periods of crying freely will end eventually. Plus he will be an absolute adorable doll while he's asleep, and when he's awake will (sometimes) stare up at you with enormous eyes filled with wonder. But I'm here for some real talk--what to expect those first days and weeks after surgery and with a new, helpless baby in tow. The things no one tells you (aside from, "You will not get any sleep," which everyone tells you, and is absolutely true, for the record). #1. You will not get any sleep Don't think your situation might be different, th...

I wrote the majority of this post from my hospital bed two days after my son was born. Even though they say sleep when the baby sleeps, I was wide awake in the late night/early morning with the sounds of medical equipment passing through my ears, and thoughts of the big day running through my head: So this is what motherhood looks like. Holding a sleeping baby at 1:40am after nursing because he is finally full, balancing his body above an incision wound and learning as I go that he is the least fussy when he's warm. Yes, I had a scheduled induction for Thursday, June 6 to bring my baby into the world. And then my water broke on Wednesday, June 5 at 8:36 in the morning. Luckily, I had just finished breakfast. I was sitting at the end of the breakfast table about to share updates with my writing group on Facebook to let them know what my doctor said at Tuesday's appointment. I was excited to let them know that I was going to be induced, because at least then I knew for sur...

Graph of baby's heartbeat and my contractions! I can't feel them yet, but something is progressing! Well, unless something changes last minute, this might be my last post before I officially become the mom I've always wanted to be. At my appointment this morning (now two days past my due date), my doctor recommended inducing before I go too far. He gave me a choice of course--we could continue to wait for Baby to come naturally, but if he takes too long to arrive there are risks that could go up. Luckily, according to the doctor, my cervix is "favorable" and so my risk of c-section during an induction at this stage is about the same as if I went into labor naturally. I'm already either slightly less or right around 3 centimeters dilated and 70% effaced, which is good news for induction because they're not trying to start labor from scratch (inducing while you're closed up and thick is a lot harder than when you're already opening up and thinni...