Author: Katie

I’m So Thankful for This Life

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I have the worst baby fever. Having a baby only seemed to fuel it. I have to keep reminding myself that I need to live in the moment, because my daughter’s going to grow up before my eyes; it’s sad to think that in just two months, she’ll be a year old. I can’t believe how quickly this year has gone.

To our families, if you’re reading this, don’t worry; we will not be having anymore children anytime in the near future.

Being a mother has shown me a love I have never experienced before. My daughter is my world, and I’ve never loved someone so deeply, and so completely, as I love her. It’s strange how your world view seems to change when you start a family. Before I got pregnant, all I was concerned about was myself, really. Of course, there were people I cared about, but at the end of the day, it was always about what was good for me. Then, I became a mom, and all I want to do is make sure that I do everything right for her. I don’t care about myself anymore. It’s like a switch got flipped the moment I gave birth and held her in my arms for the first time.

This time of year is about being thankful for what we have. This is not the life I envisioned myself having, but I couldn’t imagine it being any other way. I’m so thankful to have my little family – my boyfriend and my daughter – and to have a job that allows me to stay home with her and still bring in an income. I’m thankful for the support I had during my pregnancy and after. I’m thankful for my mom, my boyfriend’s family, my grandparents, who have all helped me along the way in figuring out what kind of a mom I want to be. I’m thankful for the internet, which has helped me connect with so many wonderful moms whose opinions and friendship I value. I’m thankful for Thanksgiving, when I will get to reunite with all of the people I care about most.

I’m thankful for my life. It’s not always easy, but it’s so worth it.

The Ten Things I Wish I Knew Before I Had a Baby

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When I found out I was pregnant, a friend of mine was kind enough to loan me a few books on pregnancy and parenthood and I read through a lot of it to try to prepare myself for what was ahead. They were books that told me all about my child’s development, all about how to begin breastfeeding, what to expect those first few nights – but nothing in those books prepared me for what parenthood was really about.

  1. Your body will change… and it will never be the same again. I’m not talking about stretch marks and belly flab (which pretty much will never go away), I mean everything changes. Your metabolism, your skin, your joints – no part of you is safe.
  2. Breastfeeding is natural, but it also hurts like hell. Everyone told me it would just take a few days for the pain to go away and a few weeks for me to get fully used to it – they were wrong, wrong, wrong. I’m ten months in and even now, it’s not always a pleasant experience, and the first couple of months were complete torture. (Side note: if you’re not breastfeeding, someone will inevitably think it’s wrong that you didn’t try, or that you didn’t want to, or that you couldn’t and you didn’t try hard enough to do it. Screw them. You’re feeding your baby, and that automatically makes you a good mom. It’s no one’s business whether you breastfeed or formula-feed anyway.)
  3. Your relationship will completely change, either for better or for worse. The first couple of months, there were times I hated my boyfriend. (Thankfully, once I was no longer so sleep-deprived and my hormones had finally leveled out, this feeling went away, but it still made things hard.)
  4. Speaking of relationships, remember the sex life you had before the baby? It’s pretty much gone. When you’re in the mood, your child will be awake and wanting to play with you. When your child is finally down for a few hours, one of you will be too tired. When you finally do have some time (and energy!) to spend together, you’ll be interrupted by screaming from the other room.
  5. You cannot train a child. They are not dogs, they are human beings and each one of them is precious and unique in their own way. Embrace the chaos, it’s the only way you’ll survive.
  6. “Sleeping through the night” doesn’t actually mean “sleeping through the night.” For a baby, “sleeping through the night” is a good four or five hour stretch and most babies don’t ever do that until they’re much, much older. For a while, I thought there was something I was doing wrong, because my child wouldn’t sleep more than an hour or two at night. Even now, she wakes up at least two or three times a night.
  7. Baby poop smells – worse than you can even imagine, especially once your baby starts solids. Learn to hold your breath during diaper changes and make sure you’ve invested in a good diaper genie.
  8. Don’t stress out about the housework you didn’t get to today. If you have the choice between finishing up that last load of dishes or playing with your child, do the latter. Housework can always wait until tomorrow, but your child will grow up before you know it.
  9. There will always be someone there to tell you that you’re doing it wrong. Every mom who’s been there and done that will give you advice whether you want it or not. Just smile and nod. In the end, simply trust your instincts, as they’re the most valuable tool you can use when it comes to being a parent. Sure, they’ve been there, done that, but at the end of the day, every child is different and you know your child better than anyone else. (And those people who try to give you advice and have never even had children? Laugh at them. And tell them that they have no business giving you advice.)
  10. You will experience love in a way that you’ve never experienced before. Nothing will ever be the same.

At the end of the day, though, I wouldn’t change a thing.

Spending Time with My Little Family

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During my pregnancy, I was told that the key to a healthy relationship after having a baby was spending at least a couple nights a month together as a couple. Unfortunately, that’s a lot easier said than done. At the beginning, I had a high needs baby who needed to be held, comforted, and loved every second that she was awake. She became upset if I was out of her sight for too long and finding a reliable babysitter was difficult. I found a job working from home in order to keep us both happy, between her separation anxiety and my postpartum depression and anxiety.

I long for a night out with my boyfriend without the baby, but without a babysitter we can count on and trust, and without her being able to be away from me for more than five minutes at a time, it’s pretty much impossible for us to spend any time together without her. I’m hoping that over the course of the next few months, she’ll begin to grow a bit less dependent on needing her mommy around all the time. Don’t get me wrong: I love my daughter, I love being a mom, and I love that I have the option of staying home with her, but I believe my relationship is important, too. Especially now that we have a child together.

Since we don’t really get one-on-one time anymore, except maybe a bit before bed, we still manage to find time to go out as a family. Money is tight, but we’ve been finding things to do once a week that cost little or nothing. It’s nice to get out of the apartment for a little while and put everything else on the back burner for a couple of hours and just focus on the three of us as a family. I think it’s good for her, too, because she becomes a little more comfortable with new people each time too.

At the very last minute, we decided last Sunday, August 18, that we’d take the little miss out to some botanical gardens that aren’t too far away from where we live. Admission is free and they claim to be open until sunset; we arrived with only a couple of hours of daylight left. The only problem with these weekly outings is that it’s becoming increasingly more difficult to find something we haven’t done before or something that doesn’t cost money. Parks are usually a good option, but those get pretty dull after a while, you know?

We packed up the baby and the stroller, grabbed a couple of sodas from Speedway, and made our way there. I was excited. It was a place that I’d never been, nor had I even heard of, and while I hoped that Boo would have a good time, I have to admit, this outing was probably a lot more for me and her father than it was for her. She seemed to have a good time, though, and she was a happy camper when we left. She slept just about the entire way home, which is a good thing. I remember babysitting a friend’s daughter once and when I brought her back to her parents, exhausted from our day at the mall and having spent a significant amount of time napping in my car, her mother told me, “You wore her out. That means you did something right! You’ll make a good mom someday.” Those words stuck with me.

The place is amazing, and for the very low price of free, I couldn’t have been happier with the experience. We didn’t get to see it all, as the grounds are huge, but we did get to explore a big chunk of it, both inside and out. Outside, they have various trails that you can walk and all kinds of cool plants that line the walkways. There’s a little river that runs through and I got really excited when I saw a sign for a “labyrinth” hidden back down one of the trails. Imagine my disappointment when we didn’t come across a maze, but patches of grass made to go in this sort of loop with three large rocks in the center of it. As you can see from the photo, it’s not really what I expected. Apparently, it’s supposed to be a calming exercise; there’s a beginning and you walk the little path in between the grass until you get to the middle, which is the end. I don’t really understand it, but it was kind of cool. A maze would have been cooler though.

After walking down one of the trails for a while, we stopped at the building near the entrance, where they have a greenhouse. They have three different sections: one for tropical plants, one for desert plants, and one for a mixed variety of plants. The tropical section was, by far, the coolest. It had a neat little pond at the beginning and it stayed relatively cool, despite the warm weather outside and the fact that it was a greenhouse. There was even a little waterfall. In the “mixed” area, there was a pond with some fish in it that Boo seemed to enjoy watching. There’s a plethora of plants in the building, and I honestly didn’t learn a single thing from the trip, but it was fun anyway.

We’re probably going back there tomorrow to catch some of the stuff we missed.

I love my little family. Our “family time” is the thing I look forward to most during the week, and it’s some of the most important time we can all spend together, away from the distractions of work and technology and the housework we have to do. The time together reminds me how lucky and grateful I am to have these two people in my life, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.