via Unboxed Writers |
Sleep when he sleeps. Really good advice. Unless like me you have to work every hour your arms aren't filled with Boo Bear's lovey pudginess. Or if your sanity requires that your kitchen not smell rank from all your dirty dishes requiring you to wash them while he snoozes.
Enjoy this time, it will pass so quickly. I love this one. I got it a lot. But I didn't really remember it when my baby girl was screaming so loud that it made her hoarse. Or when she refused to sit still while I changed the gold metal winner for poopiest diaper in America and I somehow ended up getting poop on my lips. Yeah, then my reflex was of course to lick my lips to get it off. Seriously, where did my brain go?
Ask for help. My husband has to remind me of this one. I do need help. But who do I ask for help when he's off earning our living and my family is an hour away and my house is in no shape for visiting teachers? And who else can smell like me and sound like me and sing me and snug like me for the baby? Sometimes no one else can do what a mommy can do and sometimes mommy just can't do it anymore.
What can you say to a new mom that will tell her how terribly hard it is going to be without scaring her? How can you express to her how devastatingly fulfilling her life will be while she is sacrificing everything for this screaming poop machine? What advice can you give her to make her want to keep going when she feels like she can't take another step or lift that baby up one more time?
It will get better. Not only that but YOU will get better. There is a steep learning curve to being a mommy and often you'll feel like you are just barely ahead of it and sometimes you'll fall behind it and lose your focus as well as your mind. But it will get better and so will you. This isn't something you have to live with forever, just for a little while, a few weeks or months till you get caught up. And just when you do you'll start to want another one and it will start all over again. But this time you'll be a little bit better because you'll already be a mommy. You only have to do the first few months as a mommy once. You can do it and it will make you better. It will make you a bigger person. It will make you more capable of love. It will give you something to be scared about. It will give you something to make you love to wake up at 3am for snuggling. It will give you something to make your marriage iron clad if you let it. It will make your faith unshakable if you let it. It will make life better. It will make you better. You can do it because you love him, and that's the main ingredient for being a good mom. Everything else comes after that.
So my advice to this soon-to-be mommy and every mommy out there....
Just love them. If everything you do is because you love them then it will always be enough.
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Monica Lynn is wifey and momma dedicated to making life beautiful. You can follow her adventures at {domestic artistry}