When my son was born, two new beings emerged at once: my little baby, along with a revamped version of myself. Here are some truths I learned in a single day after becoming a mother for the first time.
Motherhood is an instant clarifying agent. Within hours of pushing our son into the world, my brain reordered every single thing in my life by priority, with baby/family at the very top of the list. Work worries, socializing, what to cook for dinner…nearly everything faded into background noise as I focused almost entirely on the new little person in my life. There’s nothing like becoming a parent to get your priorities in order, pronto.
I should trust myself more. Like many first time moms-to-be, I had no clue what I was in for. Family, friends and strangers dumped metric tons of advice onto me. It was a lot of work separating the nuggets of wisdom (“No one will know and love your baby like you do, so never apologize for decisions you make in his best interest.”) from half thought out snippets based on old wives tales and labor horror stories (“Your husband will probably faint in the delivery room…he’s not used to seeing your lady bits in that light.” Or, “I had a 3rd-degree tear with my first, which led to the bowel incontinence…be smart and request a C-section early.”) In the end, my body knew what to do during labor and my mind clicked into mommy mode automatically after the baby was here. My husband and I agree that our birth experience was awesome because we listened to ourselves and trusted our guts. And no, he didn’t faint in the delivery room and my bowels are still intact, thankyouverymuch.
I’ll never compare having pets to having kids again. Ever. We have two adorable Chihuahuas, Bella and DJ. They’re even-tempered, friendly little pooches with tons of personality and they’ve brought us a great deal of joy over the years. Up until the birth of our son, we referred to the pups as our kids and lavished a wealth of attention and affection on them. But we fell into a depthless well of love the moment David came into the world; what we feel for our pets is absolutely minute by comparison. Now I get why my friends who were already parents would sometimes roll their eyes when pre-baby me talked about our “dogs kids” with the fondness usually reserved for human kids.
Time and the outside world melt away when you have a newborn. As if I were living in some strange altered dimension, time vanished as soon as we brought our son home. What I thought was an hour spent trying to accomplish a few very simple tasks (feed the baby, change his diaper, fold a basket of laundry, load the dishwasher) would suddenly stretch into a marathon of busy-ness. When I’d glance at my phone, two or three hours would have slipped by. I saw pretty quickly that I needed to focus on one task at a time, instead of trying to do 4 different things at once. At least until I earned my champion multitasking mama badge.
Boundaries are really important. I can’t overstate this one, and it’s important to establish them early. We weren’t as clear as we thought we were about some of boundaries (who could and couldn’t come to the hospital to visit immediately after our son was born, how often we could handle guests dropping by after we came home, reasons we wouldn’t let smokers hold our newborn, how often we’d post about our baby on social media, etc.) The lack of clear boundaries led to some frustration and hurt feelings–the last thing we needed to deal with as we transitioned into life with a new baby. I also wasn’t prepared for the fierce, mama bear protectiveness that bloomed inside me once our little guy got here.
Here are a few extras, little bits of “Aha!” that I’ve picked up early into parenthood.
-Wait…don’t pack up those maternity clothes just yet. I felt (and probably looked) most comfortable in my maternity duds for several weeks after delivering our baby. It took 9 or 10 months to grow your belly (and butt and hips, et cetera); it won’t magically melt away the moment you walk out of the hospital.
-Once baby is home, you’ve bonded and you’re feeling ready to venture out into the world, know this: it will take you longer than your ever thought possible to leave the house. I started adding an extra hour onto the timeframe of my pre-baby get out of the house routine.
-ALWAYS keep a wipe over your son’s privates during diaper changes. The few times I tried to skip this step, that’s when my precious baby boy sprayed me like a hose.
-In the first few weeks, I’d forgo precious hours of sleep in the dead of night so I could stay awake and watch my son breathe. I called the pediatrician countless times with any number of questions after confusing myself by reading dozens of baby health articles online. I pumped breast milk every 3 hours nearly around the clock for weeks, to build up a supply for David to drink after I returned to work. On one busy, sleep-deprived day I realized: I was doing everything I possibly could to make sure he was safe, warm, fed and loved. Once I gave myself credit for being the best mom I could each day for my son, I was able to relax into motherhood and enjoy our new life together.
What did you learn soon after becoming a parent for the first time? Is there anything you’d do differently or things you’d wish you’d known ahead of time?
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