Was being a parent how I thought it would be or not?
It's hard to know what being a parent is going to be like. I knew I'd love being a mom but you can't imagine how big that love for your child will be!
I was definitely wrong about some things. The biggest thing I was wrong about was thinking I would get bored on maternity leave. I loved my time at home with Paul and never really felt bored (I rarely feel bored in general, though). I was lucky to get 19 weeks with him (my company gives 16 weeks and I took 3 extra weeks) but I would have loved more time at home with him - I think ideally 6-9 months. That's not realistic in this country or my industry, though.
Parenting has definitely had it challenges, especially related to sleep, but overall it pretty much met my expectations. I watched a lot of friends and family members have babies so I think I had a pretty realistic expectation of how having a baby would change our lives. We had many years to travel and do whatever we wanted so I think I was ready to be a bit more 'tied down.' Having a baby has also taught me how to say no. I was a chronic over-committer before Paul was born. Now I say yes to much less and I only say yes to things I truly want to do (or have to do). I like our quieter life, though. I get so little time with Paul during the week so I am very good about protecting my time with him on week nights/weekends.
What was one thing you thought you knew but ended up having to research more?
Pumping! I thought pumping would be something I'd do once I got back to work. Little did I know I would end up exclusively pumping. I belonged to a facebook group for exclusively pumping moms which was very helpful, though. I learned a lot from that group of women!
What would you tell your pre/early pregnant self that you know now?
I'd tell her not to ignore extreme pain. I had pain from my blood clot for about a week before it was properly addressed. I should have known that pain that made it difficult to walk was not normal. Luckily the blood clot was detected at my prenatal appointment but I probably should have gone in sooner. But I didn't want to be that woman who was over reacting to something. Lesson learned.
I'd also tell her that all the pain and challenges of the pregnancy are worth it in the end. I had a pretty brutal pregnancy between RA flares, managing gestational diabetes and my blood clot. But our beautiful, healthy baby boy were worth all those challenges. My difficult pregnancy was an early lesson in the sacrificial love of a parent.
Do you want another baby?
Yes, although the thought of going through another pregnancy isn't super appealing as I'll need to start daily blood thinner injections the day after I get a positive pregnancy test. Ay yi yi. I'm more anxious about the pregnancy than having another C-section, honestly. But we really want to give Paul a sibling. And I want to go through the experience of having a baby with the perspective of how fast it goes. Everyone tells you it goes fast but until you experience it yourself, you can't understand how quickly a baby goes from being super cuddly to being too busy to cuddle with mom!! We will DEFINITELY be done after 2, though.
How does your body feel postpartum now at one year out?
Honestly, not awesome. It's been harder to bounce back and feel like myself than I thought it would. I thought the baby weight would come off much more easily, but it hasn't. I don't really like how I look and feel but I'm working on losing a little bit more weight before we start trying for another baby. I am trying to be kind to myself as my body has been through a lot in the past two years but I miss feeling fit and thin.
It has felt great to get back into exercise, though. I'm just so ready for warmer weather to arrive so I can go for daily walks/runs outside! We have sooo much snow and it's so dang cold that after-work walks/runs are just not possible.
What do you wish you had known in the early days?
That Paul would grow at his own pace. It was really hard to have a baby that struggled to gain weight. He still struggles to gain weight but he's been on his 4th percentile growth curve for quite awhile now so his weight gain (or lack thereof) hasn't been concerning since around 4 months. But in those early days, we had so many doctor appointments and weight checks. It was so stressful.
What are you plans for weaning from breast milk/transitioning to milk?
We are still working our way through the tail end of my frozen breast milk. Daycare is going to start to mix organic whole milk with my breast milk to ease the transition to whole milk. Hopefully he'll transition well to whole milk! It's going to be interesting/tricky to wean him off bottles, though. Right now I give him a bottle of breast milk while I am getting ready in the morning. It's really nice to be able to just hand him a bottle while I finish getting ready. He lays on his boppy and that's the only time of day that we let him watch tv (he watches whatever is on PBS kids). That's going to change when bottles are a thing of the past! That said I can't wait to be done washing bottles!
How is being back at work?
I thought I'd give an update on being back at work now that I've been back for a little over 7 months. I'm much happier back at work than I was in the early months. Honestly, July through December were pretty rough. I knew I had to give myself time to adjust to being back to work but I didn't think it would take THAT long to find my groove. It didn't help that I came back to a new boss and a reorganization at work. All through that difficult stretch I told myself that I needed to give it more time and that hopefully by the time Paul turned 1, I would feel much better about being a working mom. It's still hard to be a working mom but it's way less hard than it was in those early months, especially when Paul was waking 3-5 times a night thanks to those pesky, painful ear infections.
I still think a 6 month maternity leave would be optimal but I kind of doubt I can swing that. So if/when we have another child, I'll try to tack on some PTO to extend my maternity leave to 20 weeks or something like that. And at least if I struggle when I return to work after having a 2nd baby, I'll know that it's probably a temporary feeling.
How has having a baby impacted your marriage?
Having a baby definitely adds some stress to a relationship as you are both so tired, but Phil has been a trooper and has done as much as he can to bring the balance of work to 50/50 (for example we took turns getting up during the night with Paul when I returned to work, he's picked up chores like grocery shopping, and he sprays almost all of the poopy diapers). One lesson I had to learn early on is that we don't need to compete over who does more or who is more tired. That's a lesson I had to learn over and over again.
We haven't been on many dates since Paul was born. It's expensive to hire a babysitter and Paul sleeps for most of the time that the babysitter is there so it doesn't feel like the best use of money. But I don't want to miss out on time with him during the day since we see so little of him during the week. I do see a lot of Phil as Paul goes to bed around 6:30 so we get lots of couch time from 6:30-9pm. But we definitely need to work on going on dates more regularly, which is why I added the goal of quarterly dates to my 19 in 2019 list.
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So there you have it! There have been challenges in the first year but overall I'd say it's been a wonderful year. Let me know if you have any other questions about being a new parent!
