Motherhood

It is crazy how quickly time goes by. My son is now 2 months old. Life has been a complete blur. This sweet little man has me completely smitten. I have never been so exhausted, overwhelmed and overjoyed all at the same time.

It is hard to put into words how it feels to be a new mom, but here goes. It is a crazy mixture of emotions. After carrying this life inside me for 9 months and then bringing him into this world, I have never felt more empowered as a woman.  Then on the flip side,  I am now responsible for this tiny, perfect little person and suddenly I feel completely inadequate about how to be his mother and how to care for him.  I don't know how to make sense of everything that I am feeling other than I am just feeling A LOT. Way too many feelings. As I am now fully recovered from giving birth and at the tail end of a gnarly case of thrush (and by gnarly, I mean 6 weeks of the most intense pain I have ever experienced. Nightmare.) I am finally starting to feel more stable. I can feed my kid without crying and my emotions are leveling out and I am really starting to be able to enjoy being a mom.

I am also becoming more confident in my ability to keep him alive and happy and knowing that really that is all that matters. After reading tons of books ranging from one end of the spectrum to the other, ultimately I have had to let go of trying to get my baby to fit some mold that I was feeling like he should fit into. I am a worrier by nature and when I would read something that spelled out how my baby should be eating, sleeping, etc and he wasn't following that,  I would feel stressed out. A good friend of mine told me that the first 3 months you are in the trenches and anything goes. You do what you need to in order to survive and try get enough sleep to function and not worry everything else. This helped me to adjust my thinking and use those books as resources to get ideas to help me, rather than stress me out. It also helps that now Little Phoenix is starting to smile and laugh and there is nothing more rewarding or reassuring than your child smiling at you and melting your heart.

 I mean are you kidding me with how cute this kid is? Already looking so grown up.