Parenthood has been every single emotion ever. It's crazy how I can feel so many things at one time. But really, no matter what I'm feeling, I always feel extremely blessed.
From the very beginning it was an emotional roller coaster. Grace ended up in the transitional nursery (it's like one step above the NICU) for the first 24 hours of her life. The reason for that was because she didn't think breathing was necessary.
It was super surreal when she was born. You expect that your baby is going to come out and scream because they are cold and blinded and have no idea what's going on.
Not Grace.
She was quiet.
We knew she was breathing, at least somewhat, because she was moving and we saw her responding to the world, but there was no scream. No crying happened. The nurses whisked her away to their little table and they worked with her for awhile on breathing. The little timer above the table was going and she finally let out a cry at the 22 minute mark into her life.
With her being in the transitional nursery came a whole bunch of those emotions that I was talking about. We knew she was fine. Every time we went to visit her the nurses told us that she really didn't need to be in there, but they had to keep her just as a precaution. I was so tired and drained from everything that had happened with the labor and birth that in a lot of ways I was feeling pretty lucky that I had a nurse whose sole purpose was to constantly watch my baby. At the same time though, I just wanted my baby with me.
Ever since then, though, she has been with me and always wants to be with me, it seems. Asleep or awake, she basically always wants to be snuggled up against me. We are definitely working on that, slowly getting her more independent, while still loving every minute that she acts so needy and lovey.
We've definitely had quite a few ups and downs (mostly ups!) so far, but the majority of that is me trying to figure things out. The other day I said to Jeff......."Do you think everyone takes this long to figure things out?"
And really, I bet the answer is....probably. Sort of. Depends on the person.
Ha ha.
I have learned though that there is no distinct time period for when life is supposed to be "figured out".
More specifically....
There is no exact time postpartum that you need to feel "normal" or like you have it all put together or that life can go on without any hiccups.
By society's definition most moms would have been all figured out by now. Two months seems like a long time, but it's amazing how fast it has gone.
I think the second biggest emotion that I've felt so far as a mother is guilt. The first would definitely be happiness....but the second is guilt. How can happiness and guilt be so close to each other?
Eh. It's possible, believe me.
Our biggest challenge with Grace has been feeding her.
Babies......they eat, sleep, poop, repeat. Right? So the whole "eat" thing being an issue has brought on more guilt than you'd imagine, because really, it's one of the major things that taking care of a baby entails.
In the beginning we got off to a bad start with the transitional nursery business. But then the issue just never went away.
Grace would just scream and cry after I'd feed her for sometimes 2 hours. After trying what seemed like everything we opted to give her a bottle. Guilt guilt guilt.
Being a stay-at-home mom I felt so guilty for giving her a bottle, because in my mind I shouldn't have had to do that. Working moms have to because they are away from their babies, but I was never going to be away from her, so it seemed unfair that I had to.
.....but at the same time my anxiety went away after we finally gave her a bottle, because I could see that she was full and happy. I saw that she was gaining weight and wasn't miserable.
We found out when she was six weeks old that she was tongue tied and that's the reason why she wasn't being able to eat properly. We ended up going to the doctor and getting her tongue clipped so she can have full range of motion with her tongue now.
Moving past all of that guilt has been the hardest thing for me as a mom so far. Even knowing that it's not my fault, it was because of her dang tongue, I still had a hard time with it. Being up all night with her is fine. Dealing with spit up and dirty diapers is all good. But coming to terms with her unexpected feeding issues has been hard.
In the end it's taken eating a lot of humble pie to just let it go and realize that having a happy baby is more important than setting unrealistic expectations for myself.
"The Lord doesn't expect us to work harder than we are able. He doesn't (nor should we) compare our efforts to those of others. Our Heavenly Father asks only that we do the best we can -- that we work according to our full capacity, however great or small that may be." -President Dieter F. Uchtdorf
Although I have to remind myself of that message a lot, I know it's true. God doesn't want us to set too high of expectations, especially if it means we aren't going to be happy.
So here we are two months going strong and still trying to figure it all out.
BUT we are very happy.
As you can see. :)
Grace smiles all the time now and Jeff and I love it! We love knowing that she's happy and that we can give her everything she needs. More than anything I just want her to feel joy and comfort and know how much we love her. I love how I can pick her up and she'll immediately snuggle into my shoulder. I love how she already knows I'm her mom and that that brings her comfort.
Babies are amazing little things! Becoming a parent is way more humbling than I ever thought it would be. (Like I said....lots of pie eating...)
Everyone tells you that you'll never truly be prepared to be a parent....and believe me....I believed them, but at the same time I never knew it would be as humbling as it has been.
We are so lucky to have such a good baby like Grace. She's a big sweetheart and we feel very blessed to have her in our family. And without any doubt I'm so lucky to have Jeff by my side. Single mothers all around the world are my new heroes, because oh my goodness......I'd be a complete basket case without him.
Jeff couldn't be more supportive and I am amazed daily at how nice and loving he is.
(Never can escape a blog post without a bunch of Jeff praise. Nope. Never.)
Here are some extra pictures that I think are fun!
This was the other night where she didn't want to sleep and she would make her body super stiff and upright so we couldn't make her lay down. Little stinker....ha.
She's always super smiley when we put her on the changing table. The only explanation is that she's smiling at Jesus. :)
On our walk with the froggy!
She got her newborn pictures taken on her one month birthday! These are just a couple, the rest are on Facebook if you'd like to view them. :)
I don't know if this video will load, but I'm watching my nephew who is three months older than Grace on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and sometimes Fridays. This is what happened when I tried putting them next to each other on the ground, ha ha.
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