Tag Archive | new mom

Kinship

Dec8

Well I did it again! My beautiful son, Elliot, was born on Sunday, December 2nd and it just amazing already. Thank God he is healthy and happy. All the anxiety that I had throughout my 9 months was terrifying but apparently unnecessary. I delivered him in 44 minutes from when I started pushing, a huge change from my daughter, as I pushed for 2 hours and 45 minutes with her. The staff was absolutely amazing!

After delivery when I was finally taken to my room, a room I would not see the outside of for the next roughly 3 days. I asked my husband to stay in the hospital with me this time. When my daughter was born I told him he could home and I think that was my first mistake. With her I spent 3 days mostly alone in the hospital room. During the day it wasn’t so bad, I had some visitors, hospital staff in and out checking on me and Fiona, but at night when no one came in to check on us it got hard. I think that is part of the reason I had such bad postpartum depression. I pretty much started off as a mom all alone. 

This time I voiced what I needed. I asked for help. I am so lucky to have my mom so close by. She took Fiona the whole time I was in the hospital so that Harrison could stay by my side. Though I was nursing, and he couldn’t actually feed our new bundle of joy, at least I had someone to talk to. Even though I was up at night nursing Elliot, I could look over at the pull out cot and see my loving husband there, though asleep, to support me. 

That first day/night in the hospital with my new son, after the first round of hospital staff was in and out, after the first round of visitors had come and gone, I thought to myself, “I am so blessed. I have a beautiful new son, a beautiful daughter, a loving husband and an incredibly supportive family!” That is when I heard it! The screeching cry from the room next door! The screeching cry of an inconsolable baby. The constant wail from those tiny lungs. And I didn’t hear it just once. It was pretty consistent throughout our stay. All I could think was, “That poor mom! I do not know your story, but I have been there! I have been in your shoes! I know what you are going through and you can do this! I don’t know your precious baby’s story but he will be alright!” At that moment I said a prayer for her. A prayer for that mom with screeching baby and for every mom that is having a tough time of it. Sometimes all a mom or even dad needs to hear is, “You got this!’ One kind word, or even a prayer, goes a long way! If you see a parent struggling, give them a kind word. If you see a child throwing a tantrum in the middle of the mall, don’t stare. Give the parent a little acknowledgement that you understand what they are going through. Every family, every parent, every child has a story different from our own and what us parents need is kinship to make it through the day sometimes. 

Full on Exorcist Twist

Jan2

Welcome to 2018! It is only the 2nd day of the new year and I have already had it! My personal inner resolution WAS to be calmer this year! Lower my cholesterol, try not to scream so much, eat healthier and not lose my cool! Welp…3 of the 4 those things are out the door already (and who knows my cholesterol could be up and I just don’t know it!)

We were having a nice dinner that I made in the InstantPot and AirFryer, Fiona was watching her show after eating her dinner, we were relaxed and eating healthy. Things were looking good! Then it was time for a Fi to brush her teeth! She refused! I stayed calm and nice and tried to negotiate, because all parenting a pre-schooler really consists of is honing your negotiation skills to the point of perfection!

Turns out I still need a little more practice. After making her cry and throwing her book across the room (I did the throwing because she tried to take it from me) I brushed her teeth and put her pjs on her. I chose princess pjs but she wanted Elsa. Too bad kid, you should have done what I asked. She screamed in her bed for a good 5 minutes. That’s when I heard her run across the room! We don’t get out of bed when we are in trouble in my house. When I told her to get back into bed she responded with “NO!!!!!!” Well… that sent me into a tailspin! I grabbed every single one of her dolls (she sleeps with quite a few) and took them all out of her room!

Enter the best impression of Linda Blair, minus the pea soup vomit, I have ever seen from a child! We were full on possessed! I am talking speaking in tongues, head twitching side to side, high pitched wales, body contortions that would make Cirque Du Soleil look like amateur hour, rolling, kicking, grabbing, biting, throwing, and finally exhaustion!

When the demon had left her body we were able to talk so she could understand why she was in trouble and why I took her dolls away. She told me it was because she didn’t listen! Whew, that was close! She got it right! I let her pick 2 dolls to take to bed with her but I told her she had to earn the rest back by listening and doing what she is told! She seemed to understand. But we will see how long it lasts!

When I finally put her to bed, with no story, no song, pjs she didn’t want to wear and only 2 dolls she still said she loved me! Once she was in bed I walked into the living room and sobbed! Right on my couch into my husband’s chest! I sobbed because she was so sad and upset when I yelled at her. I sobbed because I was exhausted. I sobbed because I felt like a terrible mother for upsetting her. I sobbed because I have no idea what I am doing. I sobbed because I didn’t cave and stuck to my guns! I sobbed because the weight of the responsibility of raising a human is sometimes too much to take. And I sobbed because after all that she still loved me!

After all those emotions running so high, I ended the night with a huge piece of my Aunt’s pudding pie because sometime you just have to! Being a mother is hands down the hardest job in the world. There are no instructions, no one telling you that you are making the right decisions, you could be completely screwing up and ruining your kid’s life! You are constantly tired, stressed, messy and lost but I wouldn’t give it up for anything in the world.

Return to Normal?

Jan25

I have now officially returned to work. My daughter is now 12 weeks old and I spent those 12 weeks out on maternity leave, some paid and some unpaid. I was able to be home with my daughter for her first Halloween (althoughwe were still in the hospital since she was born on 10/30), her first Thanksgiving, her first Christmas and her first New Year’s  Eve. I was home to cuddle with my little one, kiss her toes and snuggle her cheeks. I nursed her in the beginning and then moved her to formula (breastfeeding was not right for us), I changed all of her diapers and gave her baths. I would love to say that I loved every minute of it, but then I would lying. I love MOST of it. I was happy to have that time with her but when my 12 weeks was up I was ready to go back to work. I am a very social person and I am not the type that can be a stay at home. I give so much credit to those that can but I could never do it. I need to be out and about with other adults, dealing with things not related to my children. Don’t get me wrong, I love my daughter more than anything but I also believe that parents need to have lives that don’t revolve around their children 24/7. Yes, 90% of the time your life should be about your children but you need that 10% to keep you from going crazy.  Going back to work, joining the gym and returning to church are just that for me. They have become the 10% of my time that I get for me. Work allows me to focus on things other than my daughter, to challenge my brain and use it so I don’t become stupid. The gym allows me to decompress after work or after my daughter has been screaming for an hour and won’t nap. Church allows me to reconnect with myself, my faith, my center after the craziness of a week of work, the gym and Fiona.

At first I felt guilty for being ready to go back to work (after only 6 weeks of maternity leave.) People would ask me, “How can you want to leave your baby?” But the thing is, it was not a desire to LEAVE my child, but a desire to return to myself. A desire to return to and finish the things I began before my daughter was born. I want to be able to give my daughter the world but to do that I need to work hard to provide for her and I need to remain calm and sane. I still have my dream of going to grad school and to further my career. Having a daughter has not changed any of those dreams. She has just added to my love and desire for great things. Call me a terrible mother if you want to but I think I am doing just fine.

Double Edged

Dec17

I have been home with my beautiful daughter for just about 7 weeks now. Is it wrong that I am so unbelievably bored?? I went into my office yesterday for our team Christmas lunch and I brought her with me. Everyone was so excited to see her and it made me feel so great. Every single person asked me the exact same two questions: How are you enjoying being a mom? and Are you ready to come back to work yet?

The answer to the former is not really a simple one. I mean I love my daughter to the moon and back. She is my little girl. But that is a loaded question. There are so many aspects to being a mom that you can not just yes (because you have to say yes or people will think that you are a terrible person.) Do I enjoy all the little smiles that she gives me throughout the day? Do I enjoy it when she holds me finger as she eats? Do I enjoy it when she stares into my eyes? Do I enjoy taking 500 pictures a day? Yes to all of these questions. But that is just one part of it. Do I enjoy it when she screams for no reason? Do I enjoy getting up in the middle of night? Do I enjoy the constant worry that I am doing something wrong or that I am going to screw her up royally? No to all of these questions. But the fact that I don’t enjoy EVERY aspect of being a mom makes me feel TERRIBLE. What kind of mother does enjoy all of it? I feel like I am letting my daughter down in some way that will come back to bite me in the ass in the future.

The answer to the latter question is also not so simple. There is a part of me that is ready to go back to work, to be around adults again. To engage in adult conversation. I mean there is really only so much TV a person can watch. I feel terrible feeling that way. I don’t want to miss all the amazing things that she does as she is learning about the world around her at such a young age. I want to be there for everything little noise, every little movement she makes. But I am just so incredibly bored right now. I understand the stigma of “sitting around eating bon-bons” because all I do all day is eat. I feed my daughter, change her diaper, have a little play time, try like hell to get her to fall asleep and then, if she falls asleep for a nap, I watch some TV and eat a snack. This is not healthy. I now know that I could never be a stay at home mom. I couldn’t do it! I need to be around people all day. I need adult conversation. In addition to the boredom, there is also a lot of stress. Should I be doing this differently? Will doing this hinder her in the future? How long should she sleep? How often? How much should I play with her? How long should I let her cry? and so on and so on! The questions just never end! I look so much stuff up on the internet that Google should pay me for using it! A part of me feels that if I was back at work and she was in daycare I wouldn’t have so much stress. But then I realize that there would a whole new group of things to worry about.

Being a parent really is like a double edged sword. You love your children so so much! You want to them to be perfect and you want all the things that are best for them but then there is that tiny part of you that doesn’t know if they can do it! Does this make me a terrible person? Am I a bad parent? No, I am not! I am just new mom that is trying to figure out what the hell I am doing and hoping to not screw my family up along the way!