The newborn phase
Cloud nine, or storm cloud?
Before the baby arrives you fantasize about what it’s going to be like once the baby has arrived. Well, I did. I was fantasizing about it before I was even pregnant. It seemed to me that it would be wonderful to have my own baby: a baby I could kiss as much as I want, and cuddle the whole day long, and not have to give to anyone else unless I chose to. It sounded like heaven to me!
On the other hand, during the pregnancy so many people were telling me things like: “enjoy the peace now, while you still can”, and “it’s not all that wonderful” or “don’t expect too much, because if you do it’ll never match up to your expectations”. I also heard many people saying: “I’m so glad my baby is bigger now. I really didn’t enjoy that newborn phase.”
During my pregnancy I talked to Denny about it more than once. Would it really be so bad? I thought: we’re both at home, we’ve both chosen to give work less priority right now, he already has 2 kids so he knows what he’s doing, I have lots of experience with babies, and lots of knowledge… how hard can it be? And besides – I LOVE that newborn phase! That helpless-adorable-eat-sleep-poop-pee-make-cute-little-noises phase. Assuming of course that you have a healthy baby… because we talked about that too. What happens if you have a ‘colicky’ baby? I could totally understand that having a baby who cries so much would not be wonderful at all. I wondered many times how I would cope if that would happen.
And then, after years of fantasy, trying to stay realistic, and lots of waiting, she was finally here! And I’m apologizing in advance to all those people who often find that they can relate to my blogs, and who found the newborn weeks to be very hard, because this blog is not about that. We’re so much higher than Cloud 9! It’s more wonderful, more beautiful, more fun than I ever could have imagined!
My recovery from the c-section has gone so well. On day 8 I went for a walk in the city (ok, I staggered a little, but I was there), on day 10 I was on a bicycle (and in the evening I was motionless on the couch, because moving hurt, but it was still fun), and the wound healed better than expected. I did see the osteopath about the wound 3 times, because the underlying tissues were healing more slowly, but all in all: I really can’t complain!
The 2 nights we spent in the hospital, I kept Liv with me. Just because I could, because she’s my baby. 🙂 I could nurse her whenever I wanted to, and wasn’t dependent on the nurses. Denny cleaned her diaper, and if he wasn’t there he made sure everything was on the bed. I enjoyed every day, every hour, every minute from the moment we were reunited after the c-section, and I’m still enjoying it now.
But, we are also very blessed – we have the sweetest, most relaxed baby ever made, I think. 😀 (most moms say that, right?) She seldom cries, and when she does she’s tired or hungry. No screaming baby without a reason, so we can always solve it, and soothe her. The nights are going incredibly well. I wake up from her little noises, put her to the breast, and she nurses until she falls asleep again, and I put her back in bed. ‘Worst’ case scenario that happens every 3 hours (so 2x per night), but usually she leaves 4 – 6 hours between feeds, which means she only wakes me once (and once she slept through the night already). The result: 2 rested parents and a well-fed, happy baby. Life is good! The only tiny cloud in our sunny sky is that we – Liv and I, thanks to the antibiotics given for the c-section recovery, have got thrush. Luckily Liv is not troubled by it, and for me it’s just a question of getting through it.
Denny and I tell everyone: life is the same, but with a baby now, so it’s even better than it was. We can do everything we’ve always done – we go out for dinner, we go for drinks on a terrace, we go cycling (I know opinions differ about that, but it feels right for us), and we go everywhere we want to go. I always have Liv’s milk with me, and when she’s in the wrap she’s as happy as can be.
Of course we understand that this can change from one day to the next, and we can enter a new ‘phase’, but for now, we’re enjoying this to the fullest.
So much love – I could never have imagined that.♥
#stoptheclocks
Ps. There are two things that help this phase to be so perfect. More about that in the next blogs!
Iphone photos: 