Day in the life- Halloween

I know the internet is divided with love/hate over "Day in the Life" posts, but I enjoyed reading the ones about life with a baby while pregnant. I still like to, I just realize now that not only is every baby completely different, but at this age, every day is pretty different. I mean, they all contain the same elements (eating, sleeping, diapers, "playing", crying, cuteness), but at different times and in different orders.

I'm enjoying them less now because I'm finding it amazing how some bloggers turn something factual into sounding so angry. Like, ZOMG, who knew that a day in the life after having a baby would include so much of the baby? So I'm writing my own (hopefully) non-resentful one. Just be glad I didn't subject you to my monthly letters to Dalton, I'm keeping those private.
 

A few notes:

• It was actually much harder than I thought it would be to keep track of what we did all day.
• I have some really exact times because I use an app (Sprout) to time feedings, the rest are more approximates.
• I didn't include all diaper changes because there's no need, just don't think I change my baby only 3 times a day and just let his bum rot the rest of the time. 
• I think it's gross when people say babies "had dinner" or inexplicably even worse "a snack" so I will just be referring to "feedings".  
• The day we are discussing was Halloween and Dalton is five weeks old.
• After rereading, I feel like I do talk about a lot of fussy times for Dalton, but I'm not trying to make him look bad, we all have our good and not so good days.

 

1:30 am: Wake up and pump - we had this idea that since Eric is a night owl he could do this feeding so I could stay asleep, but the girls weren't on board with that. We're working on revamping things.

4am: Eric gives Dalton a bottle (I stayed asleep) - he's often up earlier, closer to the time I pump, but not that night I guess! Babies do their own thing.

6:03am: I feed Dalton and he goes right back to sleep, which is a major win because that's my plan too.
 

7:27am: Dalton wakes up crying. I move the party out to the living room and feed Dalton briefly and he falls asleep, so I think he was just lonely, not hungry. I'm still learning! I watch the Today show and drink coffee and cuddle while he sleeps.

I've been practically peeing my pants with excitement over the Halloween costume reveal. Every year I miss it because of work and I finally got to watch. It was all I hoped it would be and more. I need to have a fall baby every year from now on. (I usually try to pump at some point after a morning feeding to add to my freezer stash but I got too swept up in the SNLToday excitement and forgot.)
 

9:25am: I reluctantly put Dalton down in his bouncer so I can eat breakfast.
 

9:35am: Dalton wakes up and wants to eat for real (breakfast is long done, I've learned to eat fast!). He's still sleepy so I have to keep him awake to eat by stroking his cheek and jaw. Side note - autocorrect changed "stroking" to "striking" in that sentence so good thing I caught it. I also unswaddle him and change his diaper. And this happens: 

10-11am: - We hang out, sing, "play" (he's a little too young to really play yet so it's more me making a fool of myself and pretending he's participating, mainly through voiceovers), have some tummy time, attempt to read a book (he's not a fan yet).

 

See, I swear he's having fun with me!

 

We are trying to get him used to his crib (so he will eventually sleep there) by doing some tummy time/hangout awake time in it each day. No idea if his memory is long enough to make this effective whatsoever, and google wasn't sure either, but it probably can't hurt. About a hour of happy awake time is his limit, so he's fussy and yawning by 11.

 

11:00: Time to calm things down and get him back to sleep. I'm not terribly successful.

 

11:15: I try to put him in the ergo (baby wearing thing) to cheer him up, realize he's hungry, so I feed him instead. Obviously.

11:50: A diaper change leaves him exhausted but wide awake and quite displeased with those feelings. Those diaper changes always do that. I soothe him with The Happiest Baby on the Block methods.

12:00pm: He's drowsy, so I put him in the Mamaroo to try to put himself to sleep. The pediatrician and the nurse at my mom's group recommended putting him down sleepy but awake to get him used to putting himself to sleep. It's hit or miss, this time is a miss.

 

12:20: I put him back in the Ergo, which usually cheers him up, and we head outside for a walk. On our way out, we run into a neighbor, who asks me when I'm due. I point to Dalton and say "he's right here". Maybe she doesn't understand how pregnancy works?

 

12:30-1:00pm: 30 min walk, Dalton is happy (I assume) and goes right to sleep.

The baby strapped to your body means he's already been born.

1-1:30: I keep Dalton on and make chili in the crockpot for dinner while listening to halloween station on Pandora. It was quite disappointing. I'm not sure what I expected, but it should just be Monster Mash and Thriller on repeat.

 

I had a picture of me browning the ground beef because most people never thought they would see the day, but that's gross and no one wants to see it. The finished product isn't beautiful either but we all know chili is delicious.

1:30: I feed Dalton, change his diaper and give him a water dunk in his bathtub (the pediatrician said to soak his lower half in water twice a day), and try to cheer him up when he gets a little cranky.

 

2:35: I hand Dalton over to Eric to try his luck soothing him and go take a shower. (He's not a deadbeat dad, I was trying my hand at independence to prepare for him going back to work on Thursday.)

 

3:30: I eat lunch while watching Les Mis (surprisingly Eric's choice, I can never not watch it if it's on TV) and Dalton falls asleep on Eric.

4:30: Dalton wakes up to eat and get a diaper change, he falls right back asleep on me around 5 or so. We were going to put him in his costume and take him for a walk, but we missed our window! We should have done that to calm him down earlier. More new parent fails.

6:23: Dalton wakes up again and gets another diaper change and his real bath, and he finally gets his costume on! Is there a way to give an infant a bath without getting soaked yourself? If so, we're doing it wrong. 

6:46: I feed Dalton. Because like his mom, he responds poorly to hanger.

 

Exhibit A:

Before eating

 

 

Exhibit B:

After eating.

 

7:10: Halloween photo shoot while blasting Thriller. It's hilarious and adorable.

 

STOP. I can't handle it.

 

7:40: Dalton gets fussy and doesn't respond to the usual so I feed him again, and he's starved like he's been in prison camp and not just an unwilling pawn for his parents to dress up and photograph. Babies and their super tiny bellies, amiright? He falls asleep in my lap again after he eats, and I put him back in the Mamaroo.

8:30: Chili time. I wanted to make cornbread to go with it but the Halloween photo shoot took precedence. Can't do it all. We watch an episode of New Girl while we eat. 

 

9:10: I get the coffee maker set up for the morning. The most crucial part of any evening.

9:20: I was going to have wine and cookies but instead get in bed because I'm feeling a little sick and achy. I screw around on my phone for ten minutes or so then go to sleep.

10:25: I feed Dalton in bed.

 

11:00: Go back to sleep.

 

Day in the Life posts - love or hate?

How much Halloween candy did you eat and what kind was the best? We didn't buy any because we don't get trick or treaters, but we went over to our friends' house the next night and they begged us to help them out with all their leftover candy. My favorite was the Reese's peanut butter cup (not pieces).

 

 

An unexpected marriage booster

I'm not exactly someone one might refer to as "socially adept".

Please help me, I don't know how to act when doing things with people.

Not because I'm a jerk or I act like Sheldon Cooper or anything, just because I struggle with awkwardness and the more new people I'm around, the more uncomfortable and awkward I get. Which is why for the past few years I've exclusively turned to the internet when I want to add to my social circle. But I did the unthinkable and didn't scare away real life people, and reaped the rewards after the new mothers group last week.

 I ONLY have him programmed in that way in case of emergency (and it has worked in the past).

We went out for the pregnancy forbidden food, sushi.

We rolled in swinging our three babies in their car seats, taking over the largest table in the restaurant as all the business people enjoying their lunch looked up in horror. The kids were really good though! I even nursed Dalton in my lap while still eating sushi (not with chopsticks, I'm too white for that). We've come a long way since the days when it would require all four hands from both his parents for him to eat successfully.

The week's excitement did not end there.

Um, how did this happen?

I was reading something last weekend that referenced October 23 (Dalton's one month birthday) as part of the upcoming week, and I was positive that there was some mistake, either I was reading it wrong (a common problem these days) or the writer was incorrect. I pulled out the calendar and everything. But it was correct, and somehow October passed in a wonderful blur and it's been a month since he arrived. My previous childless self reading this would have rolled my eyes and been like "um, it's a month, he's not off to college, pull yourself together". But those days are done and now I get why moms cry when packing up the outgrown clothes (he already doesn't fit in the outfit he wore home from the hospital!).

We celebrated a month of Dalton successfully surviving inept new parents by going to the happiest place on earth.

Baby's first Wegmans trip

I'm pretty sure he loved it, he slept in the Ergo the whole time but I know he felt happy, because it's impossible not to at Wegmans. It's important to honor his heritage as a half - Rochesterian baby.

Some other stuff happened. We went on a 2-ish mile stroller walk the past three days in a row!

My friend convinced me to get Snapchat - still not convinced it's not just for drunken nudie pic sharing.

None of these walks ended with me in immense pain or with signs that I might hemorrhage and die. I even pushed the stroller for about a third of the time.

Even better, Friday's walk was back to the pumpkin farm.

Everyone knows photo ops like this are the real reason people have babies.

Do not climb the pumpkins.... but it's ok to dress like one and have someone put you on there against your will.

Sometimes mommy brain pities you and throws you a bone. I can't remember what my husband said to me 45 seconds ago, but somehow it occurred to me that I never spent a generous gift card that my dad got me for my 27th birthday. I'm 31. And 4 months. Anyway, I used it for a much needed new bed set.

 

I even took the Boppy and burp cloths off for this picture to show the full effect.

It's so pretty and comfy and fluffy and I love it. I don't care if I'm not getting a solid 8 hours for a while, I'm enjoying whatever I do get even more now.

 

 

I watched a video of a C-section (a real one, not the one in Breaking Dawn). If you've been following this blog, and especially if you know me in real life, this should be shocking. Eric and I went to donate blood when we had been dating like a month. I got denied because I coughed, and I peaced out of there and let my friend stay with him because I hate needles/blood/anything medical so much.

The back story is, at the new mothers group, I brought up my frustration at being a month postpartum, and being able to do significantly less than I could at 9 months pregnant. I thought I was good at the whole "not comparing myself to others" thing. Then I realized that I was only good at not comparing myself to randoms on the internet, because we all know the world is full of crazy. I was comparing myself to friends though, because obviously they are people I respect and know are intelligent and not crazy. And they could all do more than walk across the street 4 weeks out.

The nurse who runs the group (who also taught childbirth class) told me that people who get the same surgery for other reasons are generally not working, driving, or doing anything but resting for 6-8 weeks. Women who get C-sections have the same incision and general procedure, but they are immediately caring for an infant (duh), which is essentially the opposite of resting. She also pointed out I might be extra sore since the doctor was most likely much rougher on the retractors and my organs since mine had to be carried out so fast (so hopefully if I end up having a scheduled one for the next kid recovery will be easier!). And, obviously, everyone is different so my body really doesn't give a crap what my friend or enemy or anyone else was doing after delivery, it will recover whenever it damn well feels like it.

The nurse he referenced the video we saw in class of a c section, and when I told Eric the story he was like "you saw that! You were sitting right next to me looking at the screen!". Yeah, well, I also bounced on the birthing ball and stared lovingly into your eyes while we practiced breathing through pretend contractions but that didn't turn out to be reality either. Clearly I had my eyes closed during the video.

But now it can't scare me anymore because my anxiety stems from when I perseverate on something until it becomes worse and worse in my mind (I'm looking at you, returning to work) but this already happened. The video was disgusting but also interesting. I want to watch another one, actually, because that one was for premature twins, and I want to see one similar to mine. It's actually kind of frightening how many videos of surgery are on YouTube.

 

A huge benefit in Eric's mind to the possibility of a planned c-section in the future is that he won't have to comfort me and can just enjoy watching the whole procedure. Him seeing my organs has really improved our marriage and brought us closer, which is an advantage I hear just isn't there for vaginal deliveries.

 

Are you fascinated or horrified by modern medicine? (Horrified in an "ew gross" way, not like let's bring it back to just biting a bullet while we saw your leg off like that scene in Gone with the Wind that I fast forward through every single time.)

 

 

 

Moms -this is what you need

I sincerely apologize. My kid is four weeks old today (time seriously PLEASE STOP) which makes me about 3 weeks late on my post about all the parenting things you need to be a successful parent like me.

OMG why do my feet sneak in to every picture I'm so sorry. Also Kari made him that sweet baby drool scarf!

Except I'm not planning on recommending baby stuff. When you're pregnant and looking for advice it can be extremely stressful because all your mom friends are willing to help, which is wonderful, but they all recommend different stuff. Probably because they all have different babies. So until someone invents a device to ask your unborn fetus which swaddler or bottle or bed he will prefer once he is a member of the outside world, it's a crapshoot. Sure, people can let you know which items have features that are helpful to parents, but unless it's an item that's exclusively for adult use, like a wipes dispenser or monitor, it doesn't matter how parent friendly it is if your baby hates it.

My baby is four weeks old. I know nothing, like Jon Snow. With that disclaimer, here we go - what new moms need.

1. Ice

With nutso hormonal hot flashes and, if you're breastfeeding, unquenchable thirst, you'll need to drink approximately 95 large glasses of ice water daily.

Because you clearly didn't know what a glass of water looks like.

Every time you reach for your water it will be empty because you just chugged it and then immediately forgot what just happened (this applies to everything, not just drinking). If you were smart enough to get a fridge with an ice dispenser, this won't be an issue, but if, like me, you don't live this life of luxury and have to fill up ice trays like a pauper, you have to stay on top of things. People say being pregnant in the summer is bad, but personally I would much rather spend the hot months pregnant than breastfeeding postpartum.

2. Some sort of sweet bread or muffins for breakfast

Having friends bring you dinner or freezing meals while pregnant is fantastic and quite helpful. But I find sometimes making breakfast is harder than making dinner. For dinner, at least you have several chances throughout the day to make something (although it still might not happen). You'll almost certainly wake up starving after sleeping all night (ha, just kidding), and it's unlikely you'll have time to make something. Bake some banana bread (or healthy whole wheat bran muffins or something if that's your thing), pre-slice it, and then you can grab a slice, eat it one handed, and it doesn't get cold or soggy if it takes you an hour and a half to eat it. The giant box of granola bars from Costco accomplish the same thing, but I'm not in the camp of "now that I'm a mother I don't even care how food tastes I only care about my child". Nope, food should still taste good. Sorry I'm not sorry.

My mom sent me more chocolate chip pumpkin cream cheese bread. She's the absolute best.

3. Friends on the same wild ride as you

It's invaluable to have friends with older babies/kids who can guide you. I also highly recommend finding someone else knocked up due around the same time as you, within a few weeks ideally. It's perfect if a pregnancy pact with existing friends works out, but if not, use the internet. While I do make most of my friends on the internet these days, I was due two weeks before a good friend I've had since before the internet even existed, unless you count the days when you used AOL to ask A/S/L until your mom needed the phone and you had to log off. Its disturbing to me that there are potentially people reading this that don't have a clue what the previous sentence means.

A baby in a hooded towel always cheers me up.

Anyway, pregnancy and it turns out, babies are different practically day to day and you really need someone to commiserate with at each point along the way. No one understands how pregnancy makes you crazy like another prego, and you need that person to talk you down when you are ready to kill your husband because he made you dinner and used the wrong kind of corn (true life over here). That's not even getting in to all the weird stuff post partum and trying to figure out your baby. Bonus points for friends with babies of the same sex as yours, because diaper changes are unique for each sex.

She also gave me the Halo swaddler, which for us is a lifesaver.

4. A kindle and good books

I got so into the last book I read that I would find myself still reading at 3am after putting Dalton back to sleep. Theoretically you could just read archaic paper books but those generally require light and two hands, which are two things that are off the table for middle of the night feedings. I just started rereading Mockingjay to prepare for the big day next month!

5. The ability to throw your expectations out the window

When I was pregnant, I imagined Dalton adorably snoozing in the Rock and Play next to us sleeping in our bed. I would easily grab him and feed him and then put him back, gaze adoringly at him, then drift off myself. Well, that's not exactly how things have played out. I read in a mom Facebook group to do whatever gets everyone the most sleep, and we are following that advice.

After the honeymoon first week, when he was exhausted from being born, he wanted nothing to do with the Rock and Play.

Week 1 and then never again.

In fact, he didn't want to sleep anywhere but on one of us, so we took shifts throughout the night and day for the second week or so (and still do now as needed).

I wish I could nap like this guy, but I'm broken and can't nap.

It also turns out that babies, this one at least, have two sleep modes - frighteningly silent and still, or loud as hell, grunting and groaning like a full grown adult. When I can resist the urge to constantly poke him while he's in deep sleep to make sure he's breathing, I can sleep myself. But the grunting and groaning keeps me wide awake. Right now Dalton and Eric sleep in the living room at night (Eric can sleep through anything and anywhere, although he surprisingly wakes up when he hears crying like 85% of the time) and I sleep in the bedroom with the door open so I can hear actual cries, but not every little tiny sneeze. It's not what you see in the movies but it's working for us at this moment, and we'll switch it up as need be. We can hang out when we're awake.

 

Napping in the swing.

My wonderful friend passed this Mamaroo and I'm afraid to say anything about it for fear of jinxing but let's just say he doesn't hate it so far.

6. A really cute, sweet, loveable baby

Because otherwise all this work would probably suck, but I wouldn't know.

 

Another amazing friend made him this hat. I have some good people in my life.

 

This is really unrelated but I've gotten some really good advice here. C-section moms: I have random numb parts of my belly, is this forever or will it go away?

Any other advice - motherhood or in general?

 

 

 

 

Parenthood - the unexpected (but no poop stories)

So while I do mainly mock and ridicule blog and social media posts, one that I kind of like is what people find is unexpected about life as a parent. So here's some stuff.

1. I'm a billion degrees

Before I was pregnant, I was the freak show shivering in a sweatshirt in August. Being pregnant pretty much caught me up to the temperature of those around me. Today, I went to the grocery store in a tank top and shorts and was totally comfortable. As I looked around in the checkout line, I realized everyone else was in pants, long sleeves, and occasionally jackets. So that's different.

2. I thought I did strength training while pregnant to prepare to constantly carry my baby

I was wrong. What I really needed those bicep curls for was to arm wrestle my baby. I thought the Twilight series was just a guilty pleasure, but it turns out they were right about newborns having superior strength. The other thing about newborns that I've learned is that they fight their own survival. This kid will yank his food source out of his mouth and start sucking his fist instead, and no amount of explanation from us will convince him that no nutrition is available that way. You would think it would be easy for me, as an adult, to just take his fist away, but no. It is not easy.

Looks innocent, but he's secretly a bodybuilder.

3. Babies don't read

Specifically, the baby books and the baby item product reviews. Kara was nice enough to pass down her Rock and Play. It's the Rolls Royce of baby beds. In fact, if you google ways to help a two week old sleep, like 95% of the responses say to buy a Rock and Play. Try it. Dalton isn't so convinced, and really prefers to sleep on one of us. I can't really blame him though, his father is renowned for his hugs.

They are both pretty awesome.

4. The night is dark and filled with (even worse) terrors

I went into pregnancy with a crippling fear of needles, and I got out of it with five tries to put an IV in and a needle in my spine and I didn't completely succumb to panic. I was patting myself on the back for becoming slightly less phobic due to all those blood draws in the past nine months. Well, the joke was on me, because it turns out that things can get much worse than dealing with a fear of needles getting stuck into you. After pregnancy, people want to stick needles into your baby.

I haven't even really dealt with it yet. He got his post-birth tests/blood draws when I was cracked out on morphine and didn't even know what was happening. Then he got his follow up PKU test last week, and I left and hid in the bathroom and ran the water so I couldn't hear anything (Eric stayed). I might do the same for the one month vaccines. I realize this is a prime opportunity for people to say "just wait until ___", and I realize I will have to deal with it someday, but today is not that day.

5. I don't need to know lullabies

One of the weird ass things I got nervous about towards the end of pregnancy was not knowing any songs to sing Dalton to sleep. It turns out babies don't care, and you can sing Katy Perry instead of Rock a Bye baby, and it works just fine.

6. I don't always hate physical contact

I'm renowned for hating hugs, and generally touching of any kind. Two people sent me this article. But I often have to force myself to stop hugging and cuddling this guy. I never want to not be snuggling with him.

He's just so squishy and kissable.

7. Not all infants are boring.

They're all so cute. But let's face it - as great as it is to hold other people's kids, they don't do much. Especially at this age. Adorable, but not interesting. Unless it's your own kid. Then every yawn, sneeze, and blink is fascinating. Really. I have actually watched a video of him hiccupping when I missed him while he was sleeping. This one isn't technically that unexpected, because I'm the same way with my nephew. I'm including it though because it was something that concerned me before I became an aunt.

8. Mommy brain is worse than pregnancy brain

This is also something people warned me about, but I'm including it anyway because if you actually listen to everything people warn you about while pregnant you'll definitely lose your mind. I'm also including it because the actual #8 came to me while I was working on this post, and I grabbed my phone to record it in the notes section with the rest of the items on the list. Literally by the time I unlocked the phone I had lost the thought, and I swear I do not just throw the word "literally" around unless I mean it.

9. I became a caricature of a mom. It happened before I expected.

I got really brave today and we went for our first outing (a walk down our street) just the two of us, mother and son. I got the diaper changed, put Dalton in a fresh, cute outfit, and brought the baby carrier out and started to put it on, announcing "ok, we're all ready to go on our walk!". Yeah, one of us wasn't ready. One of us was in a spit up stained nursing tank, pajama shorts, and had hair sticking up like a cartoon character who just stuck a finger in an outlet. Full disclosure - I put on a headband and pants, but the spit up tank remained.

I had another one about poop but there's enough of that on the internet, and I wouldn't want someone blogging about my bathroom habits, so maybe I should give my kid the same consideration.

Unrelated - if you are interested in reading and reviewing my aunt's book (I posted about it yesterday), or really, if you don't know if you are interested, you can read the first chapter on her blog. It's a fantastic dystopian novel.

What was unexpected about a major life change for you?

 

Four things Thursday

1. I fully admit to being dumb and trying to do too much too early and not letting myself recover. I really appreciate everyone who has had a c-section commenting and sharing their experience and saying nice things. I went to my doctor today for my follow up and asked her about what I could and couldn't do, and I summed up her advice as "don't be dumb". She agreed. I will now work on not being dumb. (For the record, my husband did offer to clean the floors but I felt bad since he's already doing everything and did it myself anyway. Dumb.)

2. I'm now allowed to drive again! Although I don't really want to go anywhere, as I have everything I need at home.

But now I can. Luckily for me I'm not really one prone to cabin fever. I'm perfectly happy to have a week of snow days where I don't see the outside world other than through the window. That mentality works out pretty well while caring for your first brand new baby. We did stop at Trader Joes on the way back from the doctor, and I got a few groceries. It was my first time going to a place that wasn't a doctor's office. It doesn't really count since I went in alone while Eric and Dalton stayed in the car, but still. But it was exciting to be in a grocery store and be like "Now I can eat whatever I want!"

3. I made a pregnancy/baby page with all the posts I wrote about pregnancy. There were more than I thought, so I figured I might as well catalogue them. It's been a project spanning several days. I also saved all my pregnancy posts as word documents during the process so I can look back on them someday when Blogger is but a memory. If I'd been smart, I would have been doing this all along, possibly with all my posts. But I'm not smart.

Shocking, I know.

4. I made lactation cookies. I didn't even know this was a thing.

The ingredients that make the magic happen.

Supposedly it works, so, best case scenario, you help your baby, worst case scenario, you just eat cookies. It's a win win. They are cooling now, so I'll report back on the taste (but there's butter and sugar and chocolate chips, so I feel it's safe to say they will be delicious).

I guess they don't actually look like much. Too bad you can't smell them.

One more thing -We are committed to trying the Little Caesars pretzel crust pizza tonight, so hopefully I can report back on that as well. Who said the romance dies when you become parents? We're still living life in the fast lane, clearly.

 

Would you get cabin fever never leaving your home, or are you more like me and could take or leave the outside world?

Wardrobe after baby

Ok, I've been thinking about how I want this blogging thing to go while my life is nothing but baby. I think I just want to make sure its nothing like the articles I see posted multiple times a day on Facebook, which generally have the tone of "865 reasons having a baby sucks".

This just in... it doesn't.

I mentioned these while I was pregnant, because I had to abstain from them eventually. The one that put me over the edge was really condescending towards the "naïve pregnant woman", basically like "you dumbass, you think your baby will be fun, THINK AGAIN". I'm not saying I'm not still completely naïve, after all, it's only been two weeks. But with articles like that - as the ignorant pregnant lady, being excited like a total dummy, what's the takeaway?. I mean, once the kid is in your belly, you're kind of locked in to taking him or her home. It's not like I can read about how I'll be sleep deprived and covered in spit up and then be like .... nah. I'd like to opt out please. Even now, no matter how hard it gets, guess what? I still have to do it!

Once you wave goodbye to your helpers, you're stuck with the kid.

Anyway, I can only base things on my experience, but it seems to me that any pregnant woman who has a mother, or friend, or sibling, or coworker, or even just seen a stranger with an infant, knows that caring for a baby isn't easy. Even every basic sitcom shows this in at least one episode. I'm not sure who thinks we need all these "eye opening" articles on the internet.

So that's my goal. If anyone wants to read a bunch of complaints, just check out Facebook, or email me, and I can direct you to a number of whiny mommy blogs. And if I get whiny, please call me out.

Ok, with that said, now I'm going to complain.

Not about this fancy little gentleman though.

Just about the method of getting him out. Granted I have no basis for comparison, and I'm sure any sort of birth results in some not so fun after effects. But recovering from a c section is annoying. It was manageable in the first few days, but now it's the same and I'm over it. I'm still in no hurry to exercise, but I'd like to be able to wash my legs in the shower without pain. The tricky part is a lot of things feel fine in the moment, and then I pay later.

We went on a 20-30 minute walk on Sunday, and I'm talking barely a shuffle. Like we probably could have taken Dalton out of the stroller and let him scoot along beside us and he could have kept up. By the end, my incision was killing me. I decided I just need to wait until I see my doctor for my 2 week follow up appointment tomorrow before any more walking.

He is so tiny and barely fits in any newborn clothes, so on his walk we dressed him up in this hilarious mismatched froggy pjs and hoodie.

Tuesday, I thought I could clean the bathroom and kitchen floors (and these rooms in our apartment are the tiniest possible version of a bathroom and kitchen that still fits the basics like a toilet and an oven, it's like a ten minute job), and once again was in a world of hurt afterwards.

One thing that really shocked me is that I don't have any staples or anything that needs to be removed, just these strips that (supposedly) will fall off themselves, and then I wear a binder around my midsection. Essentially I have scotch tape and a girdle keeping my organs inside. I only looked at the incision once in the hospital because it freaks me the hell out that it's a cut down to my insides and I can't handle that thought. The binder is really hot and irritating, but it keeps me together and I don't have to get staples removed.

So beautiful.

On the sunny side, I'm insanely lucky that our school district allows for 6 weeks of paid paternity leave. I finally wised up and laid on the couch while Eric made dinner.

Wardrobe after baby: robes, pajamas... and that's about it.

I have no clue how single mothers or military wives or anyone does this alone. Also, I have no idea how people do this with older children. That right there explains why people want VBACs to me. We've also had amazing family and friends doing everything from cooking/bringing meals for us, unloading the dishwasher, bringing over gifts, and just coming over and calming down the baby since we're still learning how.

Kara and Cordelia gave us a swaddling lesson.

 

Don't let her blog fool you. Cordelia was an adorable perfect angel and stroked Dalton's head in a way that would melt anyone's heart.

 

Just because there are never enough daddy/baby napping pics. Everyone loves those.

So another thing I mocked during my pregnancy was push presents. I thought they were the dumbest idea ever. Well, apparently one time towards the end, Eric went to a work happy hour and everyone was shocked that he hadn't gotten me one. Once he stopped thinking they were just messing with him and was convinced push presents were a real thing, he freaked out and left immediately and went to the mall.

 

He found a gift he thought I would like, and, smart man that he is, ordered it on amazon on his phone from the mall, because that way was cheaper.

The joke gift - I collect coffee mugs.

The real gift ... it's hard to see but it's a mother and baby.

And who doesn't want a baby face in the picture?

 The best part is I didn't even have to push to get it! I haven't really been wearing the necklace yet because newborns have super human strength and could probably lift a car if push came to shove, so I'm not tempting him with a necklace. But someday I'll be forced to go somewhere without him and it will be terrible, so wearing the necklace will be an incentive.

 

What did you mock for being dumb but turned out to be great?

Moms who have had c sections - fill me in on whether I'm just being a wimp or when I'll be able to do basic things without pain.

 

 

The first week - random thoughts

 
I definitely never intended to write a "mommy blog" (and back when I started blogging, kids weren't even remotely on the horizon and I would have never guessed I'd keep it up so long! TWSS). Hopeful it won't stay a mommy blog forever, but right now, that's kind of all that I have. I'm on maternity leave, recovering from surgery, and caring for a newborn. I guess I could blog about current events or something, but let's be honest, the rest of the world is much less interesting to me right now.

Kind of all I care about currently.

We came home from the hospital on Saturday, when Dalton was four days old.

Getting ready for his world début!

 

We were in the hospital an extra hour waiting for a wheelchair. That I had to walk over and get in to. Policy, I guess.

 

The hospital was pretty sweet, but I was weirdly excited to “introduce” him to his home. Because he totally knew the difference.

 

Welcome home! See how psyched he is?

He got to meet 4/5 of his grandparents right away! My dad is coming this weekend to complete things.

 

 

My mom and stepfather stayed with us until Tuesday, and it was amazing. I basically did nothing but cuddle with and feed Dalton, and they cooked us gourmet level meals and cleaned the kitchen. Actually, even after the sad goodbye, we're still on that plan because they left us plenty of extras. 

 
We are now on day 9 of his life, and have spent one full day caring for him all by ourselves (so expert level now, obviously). Here’s a random collection of thoughts about it.

 

1. Anyone who knows me knows that next to needles, there's nothing I hate more than hugs and inspirational, cheesy quotes and clichés. That said, it turns out that all that crap about motherhood being a love like you've never known and being instantly infatuated with your kid is true. Who knew?

 

Home in time to cheer the Ravens to victory.

2. Obviously a week or so is nothing and my feelings can change at any moment (especially on all these hormones), but I would rate the past week as approximately the best of my whole life. I'm excluding the day in labor since he was actually in my life for less than 45 minutes of that day, and the next day of nothing but a drug filled haze.It's up there with our honeymoon. Clearly in a different way, the honeymoon was great in more of a relaxing, fruity tropical drink filled way, but in terms of pure happiness, they're pretty comparable.

3. My stomach is so soft and squishy. I don't know if that's what normal stomachs feel like and I just got used to it being super hard because a baby butt was pressing out, or if that's just part of the healing process. What non-pregnant women feel like letting me feel their bellies to compare?

4. I painted my toenails! It didn't even hurt or cause me to breathe like I was winning the 100 yard dash! It turns out that a lot of the things that you look forward to when not pregnant (rolling over in bed, going from sitting to standing, and picking things up off the floor without all of the above being an ordeal, mainly) aren't in place right away when recovering from a c section. So the toenails were a huge victory. How about instead of a gross foot pic, we enjoy another adorable baby shot?

He's a "first bath by inept new parents" survivor.

5. I finally get why people say it's hard to lose the baby weight. Because people bring you delicious food. Just yesterday we had three sets of visitors. One brought a gift card for takeout, one brought an awesome toy, and the last brought delicious macaroni and cheese for dinner. I have a giant stack of candy on my dining room table that people have brought me, including five large bags of M&Ms (candy corn, peanut butter, and pumpkin spice, in case you were curious). On a scale of 1-10, I'm upset about this -5. My philosophy has always been that many, many things taste better than skinny feels. One of them is macaroni and cheese.

6. Two things that I thought were hyperbolic descriptions.

• That scene on Friends after Rachel has her baby when she's looking at her sleeping and is like "I actually miss her right now".
• People telling me that you will lose so much self consciousness in the hospital that you can be breastfeeding and tell the janitor to come on in.

Turns out neither one of these is an exaggeration. Both 100% accurate.

7. We had our first outing yesterday, to the pediatrician. Dalton has surpassed his birth weight, and gained even more than the recommended amount. I was super excited over this, which means I've officially entered lame mom territory. Even more exciting, that means we don't have to wake him every two hours to eat anymore. Something I didn't realize is that "every two hours" isn't really two hours, because it's start of feeding to start of next feeding. So if he eats at 1am -1:30 am, and goes back to sleep at 1:45am, you need to wake him back up to eat at 3am. Again, I don't mean that as a complaint, because I was honestly just so happy that he was eating well. But it's exciting to let him call the shots now!

8. We were only a slight mess leaving the house. One lesson I learned was that you are supposed to apply deodorant under your sleeve. It doesn't work on top of clothing.

Eric insisted that picture make the blog

Lesson #2: It takes a little longer to prepare to leave the house with a baby. I thought I had enough time to get ready and get both of us fed. No. I barely had time to feed him and incorrectly apply that deodorant.

We got the baby in the car, pulled out, and then I realized "hey, we have a baby now! We're supposed to bring the diaper bag with us!". Luckily we hadn't gone far and could go back and get it and still be on time. Not surprisingly, it turned out to be extremely necessary.

9. We started watching The Strain. Creepy vampire violence. You can't go wrong.

Best week of your life. Go.