What I wish I knew three months ago

Aspen will turn three months on Monday. I have been a parent for three months.

This is still a weird statement to believe.

The last few weeks things have been going really well. We've been exclusively co-sleeping for the last two months or so which has allowed us to get a lot more sleep with a lot less effort. I know she will someday have to learn to sleep on her own and we will transition her to her bassinet or crib sooner or later. However for the time being we'd rather let her sleep with us rather than spend hours walking her to sleep only to lay her down and have her wake up immediately.  Aspen has been smiling, talking, laughing, and playing more as well. It is so fun to interact with her and see her learn about the world. She is adorable to play with and talk to.

I've loved Aspen from the very start of course, but with these last few good weeks I've felt my love for her grow so much stronger than it was at the beginning. I've had time to reminisce her first couple of weeks. I wouldn't have admitted it at the time, but those first few weeks were hard.

There are a lot of blogs (like real people blogs from people who actually know how to blog and not my childish attempt) and people out there telling you what to expect when you have a baby, but nothing can prepare you for how hard it really is.

Let's first talk about the lack of sleep. I went into labor with Aspen on a Sunday night and was in labor for 25 hours. By the time I finally got to sleep, I had been up for at least 36 hours. I may have got a few small naps in, but between contractions, trips to the bathroom, and nurses checking in on me I never got more than 15 minutes of shut eye. So Caleb and I went into parenthood already tired.
Everyone tells you to expect the baby to wake up many times during the night so I expected that. However, for some reason I didn't expect to be kept up for hours at a time when the baby woke up. I'd always assumed the baby woke up, you fed them, and within 30 minutes they went back to sleep. I just want to warn any of you who might think what I thought, that this is not the case. The baby wakes up, you feed it, and then it wants to be awake for the next 2 hours. So you walk your baby around and they finally fall asleep but in an hour and a half the babies awake again and you start the process all over again except this time she's awake for four hours before she falls asleep again. She falls asleep and within an hour it's 7 am and it's time to wake up for the day. And this goes on for days.

Breastfeeding was pretty tricky at first for me. I struggled getting Aspen to latch correctly so for a while it was painful. Babies are born with such small tummies that they have to eat all the time. I feel like for the first three weeks I was pulling my shirt up every time I turned around. Bless Caleb's soul, but every time I was holding her and would say to me "I think she's hungry again" I wanted to kill him (even though he was right... she was always hungry!!!). That response probably didn't make sense, but a lot of the feelings I had at the beginning didn't make a lot of sense. Let's move on to the wacky hormonal stuff that happens after delivery.

The Baby Blues suck. For 9 months all I could think about was how happy we'd be when she got here. Then she got here and my emotions were all haywire. I was happy, but then I was sad, and then mad, then crying, then happy, and then sad again. I thought my life was going to be like that forever! It's so confusing and it hurts so much when you love your baby but sometimes you just don't like them. You feel guilty for not being happy, like your a bad mom or something. I felt horrible about the negative thoughts I had towards Aspen. I don't even want you all to know what I was thinking but if you know me well and you want to know, we can have a heart-to-heart about it someday.  It's not fun folks. It is a terrible feeling.

And the hardest thing for me has been the change of lifestyle that comes with becoming a parent. Up until Aspen was born I was working full time, hanging out late with friends, and Caleb and I were doing as many of the activities that my swollen and fragile body allowed. Prior to getting pregnant I was pretty active: Running, Biking, Climbing, Snowboarding, Slacklining, Camping/Backpacking, Longboarding, etc. I continued to do as many of these activities as I could until it was not longer safe for the baby. Now that she is here, doing these activities is much harder to do. Activities that Caleb and I enjoyed doing together are now activities we either have to do solo or get a baby sitter to watch her while we do them.  We've gone climbing a few times with her and some friends. It's not impossible to do. One of us has to hold her while the other is climbing and our friends have to belay more often than they used to. The amount of gear we take is much larger now. Pre-Baby we just brought a backpack and a rope bag but now we also bring her diaper bag, her stroller and her car seat. It's quiet a lot of stuff to pack into the wilderness. Someday she will be able to participate in the other activities we enjoy and I look forward to that with all my heart. It has been hard to give up the things that make Caleb and I us.

Now that I've made my grievances, I'm going to make my main point: It gets better. 

During those first few weeks I thought the sleepiness, the achy boobs, and the crying spells (both hers and mine) would never end. I thought Breastfeeding would never feel right. I thought I'd never feel like me again. Then one day I realized that things were shifting. The fog was starting to lift and I wasn't feeling sad, pained, or in a sleepy haze.  Suddenly it wasn't hurting when she nursed. She slept for four hours in a row and then went right back to sleep. I began feeling like myself and having hope for a normal lifestyle again. Those first few weeks I really didn't think things would ever feel okay, but they do now.

I wish I could go back and tell myself to have hope. I wish I knew that things would feel normal (ish) again and that it was going to be okay. I wish I could do more skin to skin with her as a tiny newborn. I wish I could go back and enjoy her being so little.

I go back to work this week. For the last few weeks I have been savoring my time with her more. We've done more cuddling and less cleaning; More naps together and less attempts to train her to sleep on her own; More gazing at each other than gazing at my phone.

I am excited for her to meet her next milestones and to grow bigger. She will get to be more interactive and play more. BUT mostly I am excited to cherish every moment with her as a baby at whatever age she is in that moment.

She turns three months old tomorrow! I love that stage she is in right now. She sleeps pretty well, she smiles when others smile at her, she giggles from time to time, and she chatters to herself all the time.  She has rolled from her belly to back twice. She tries to suck on her whole fist. She also tries to suck on her thumb, but she doesn't know what to do with the rest of her fingers. She is so beautiful.

Caleb and I are 100% percent in love with her (and also each other of course!).

All right folks! You survived me babbling. Here is your reward.

Aspens first bike race: The Hubapalooza

Adventure Baby goes climbing!

I felt pretty cool when another climber walked by us and exclaimed "Sweet! Crag baby!"

Her (my) favorite toy. She likes to watch it move when she wiggles her legs. 

Thanks for reading! :)


******* Just wanted to make a note that my experience may be totally different than yours. So, for those of you who have a four month old and you're still in the fog, feel free to tell me to shut up! I will gladly listen to you if you need to vent about how things are going! :) Remember, there is help for those blues that won't go away! Mommies gotta stick together.