So I’m one month into motherhood. I definitely wanted to document my thoughts and emotions because it will be interesting to see how I feel come two months in, or even a year in.
When you are pregnant you just think about this cute tiny little baby inside of you, you prepare the nursery, take labor classes, but I honestly never really pondered motherhood much. Not sure if I was just too busy working on house renovations or the fact that everyone tells you motherhood is great, so why think about it much? I’m not saying it isn’t great, it’s just a lot different than I imagined.
I’d say the first month was pretty tough. You have all these crazy emotions, baby blues, you are exhausted, you start missing your old life when you didn’t have a baby needing your attention about 23 hours a day. The best way to describe my emotions were that I was jealous of all my friends who didn’t have babies yet, and if they were pregnant I wanted to reach out to them and tell them the honest truth about having a baby… get ready, your life is about to change and it’s not all rainbows.
I came across this article and I read it a lot, it puts into word my exact feelings the first month: What Nobody Tells You About the First Three Months of Motherhood. The whole “sometimes it won’t feel worth it” and the feeling like an ungrateful jerk” part really were how I felt. Many times I thought about what it would be like if we waited a few more years to have a baby… and then the mommy guilt sets in.
When I was going through some of the baby blues, I also read this blogpost The Baby Blues, My Fear of Pampers and Finding Joy Again. While I wasn’t facing depression, just the normal baby blues, this girl reminded me about the true purpose of motherhood. She also reminded me about how God’s called us to be Emerald’s parents and he picked us to raise her and how he is changing my priorities to make room for her and focus on us as a family. Suddenly my perspective changed, in that it wasn’t just all about me and my old life and how it is no longer existent, but about this new chapter in life where God’s growing me into Emerald’s mom. I’m now reminded how much Emerald needs me and her dad, that I need to be there for her. I think the thought of being needed changes so many things, everyone wants to be needed.
I’ve also learned to stop googling all my questions about babies, milk supply, and motherhood and really start praying and asking for God’s help and guidance. Sure I can try all these things to make my baby take a nap, but I can also ask God to help show me what she needs to she can nap. And I need to remind myself of this everyday.
So for me, motherhood is about changing your perspective from looking at myself to thinking about what’s best for her. It didn’t come easy, but I’m there and only expecting things to get better. There is a season for everything, and this too shall pass were things that I remind myself, so that I cherish where we are now, but look forward to where we are going.
