Baby Life in The Day To Day Ramblings

When it rains, it pours. Two entries in one day!

So far one of the biggest surprises to me has been how much mommyhood has felt like one big competition. It’s not even with other people openly competing with me…it’s a lot of constantly comparing myself to others. How other preemie moms do it. How other people with full term babies do it. How anyone ever finds time to shower. How anyone ever feels attractive enough to have sex again. How other people get their kids on schedules. How people get their kids to sleep at night. How anyone every leaves their house without three tries, lots of tears, going back twice for something you forgot and eventually giving up and staying home. It is so damn much harder than I expected and I’m one stubborn woman. I’m still continually feeling like I come up short.

I think the biggest source of this is that my niece was born 2 days before Leah. She was full term, she has no trouble sleeping, she takes to a schedule like no baby I’ve ever known and she’s formula fed. My sister and I may have had babies moments apart but our experiences are so different.

My sister get 9-10 hours of sleep every night. Her baby sleeps 11-12 hours in a row. My sister has no physical obligation to her baby and is able to get to the gym, do work out classes, go for runs, eat and drink anything and everything…she has her body back entirely to herself. While I am incredibly proud to be able to breastfeed and it’s something I worked really damn hard for, I still sometimes peek over that little fence and look at my sister’s green grass. Now, if you’ll recall, my sister physically cannot make milk and she’s stated more than once that she will forever be sad she can’t provide for her daughter how I can provide for Leah. That being said, we are both doing little fence peeks and have little waves of lust for the life the other has. Oh the freedom she has being just like a dad. She gets to do so many things!

My niece is also 6 weeks more functional and mature than Leah. She is laughing already and starting to think about rolling over and she’s so much more alert and intentional with her movements. I know not to compare them. I know it. I am the preemie ambassador to my family and friends, constantly chiding them for comparing Leah and Joyanna…but oof. Still. It’s hard. Just because I know it doesn’t mean I completely accept it. My sister and I have been mothers for the same amount of time but we have entirely different babies. I’m still just now figuring out how to help my baby go down for naps and still just now trying to start tiny bits of a routine…something my sister has been doing for a long time. Six weeks, as she gently reminds me. “You’re right on track, Kels. You’re doing everything I did, just six weeks later.” I get that…but I’ve been a mom for 13 weeks. You’d think I’d have figured something out a bit ahead of the curve. But no, just like Leah, everything takes me 6 weeks longer.

I try to put it all into perspective though, on these days when I’m feeling sorry for myself. I get to rock my sweet baby to sleep at night without a bottle. I always have just what she needs, warmed up and the right amount and at the ready, whenever she wants it. When she’s scared or overwhelmed or tired or sleepy…she wants me and she wants to suckle and she wants to be held. Not by my husband or my mom but by me. I get to bond with her at 3 in the morning by simply crawling out of bed, curling up in the glider in her room and nursing her little belly full of milk and cuddling her back to sleep. I did the bottle thing for 10 weeks and while I definitely still bonded with her that way and absolutely know it’s a wonderful way to feed and care for your child…it’s been different while breastfeeding.

I also get to have a snuggly little newborn for six more weeks. Sometimes I wish I could fast forward and start having a 13 week old who acts like a 13 week old but I know I’ll miss this time when it’s over. When I return to work in a month and I go entire days without seeing her when I work 13 hour shifts, I will long for these days upon days of nothing but snuggling and breastfeeding and soothing and shushing and loving on her. She won’t be this pliable, snuggly, floppy, soft and cozy baby for very long, and I know that, but when you’re in it and it’s been twice as long as most other babies…you really feel it. I do appreciate that she’s been a very good baby, if a light sleeper, and that I’ve been able to put the entire rest of my life on hold to be here with her and help her grow. I’m not ready for it to be done…but I’m ready for it to be…different? I’m not sure how to explain that.

I’ve so deeply fallen into being a mom that I can’t remember the last time I was in a photo. I used to shower and put on makeup and be a functional person who went places and wore real pants (ha!) and wanted to document it. Yeah…that person is hibernating right now. I was feeling a little sad that I don’t have more photos (any?) of me and Leah in the last few months. I have photos of her delivery and a few, maybe five or six, of her and me over the last three months…but I’ve spent so much of my time at home, in pajamas, exhausted and not showered, with dark circles under my eyes, hair in a huge messy pile…that I don’t take photos with her. That makes me kinda sad. While I don’t see that changing much any time soon, perhaps I should just start taking them. Even if I don’t share them, it would be nice to have for her to see that that is what mom looked like then. That raising a baby isn’t easy or beautiful or glamorous or Instagram-able…it’s real. Not every photo needs to be shared and critiqued and analyzed, sometimes you just need to take a photo to snapshot life right now, it’s all of its messy glory. I’ll work on this.

Okay, my little love bug is awake so I’m off to snuggle her up. I’m writing all of this down so I can look back in a month or six months or two years and remember exactly where I am. Even if I’m not taking pictures, I’m creating word snapshots. Thanks for letting me put it all out there with you guys :)