Baby’s First Month

 The Reality…

Shower? What’s that? Sleep? MISS THAT! These are just two of the luxuries stripped away from you during the first month of motherhood.

Sleep

At first he slept pretty good at night, sleeping for 4 to 5 hour stretches, but that was short lived. One night he slept so long, my boobs started leaking like crazy through my bra; I had forgotten to put on my nursing pads. Note to self: never forget your booby pads.

Him sleeping so well was a trick to making us think this parenting thing would be easy. For the first 3 weeks, swaddling was to sleeping, as water is to fire, it put him right out. He quickly wiggled right outta that phase, literally.

Derrick would put him down for naps on his stomach and realized that he slept so much better. He kept suggesting that I put him on his stomach throughout the night, and at first I was reluctant because it is advised that babies sleep on their backs to reduce the risk of sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS. Despite the sleep recommendations, he would not stay asleep on his back, and with a baby, you have one of two options, their way or they’ll cry all day.

Dirty Diapers

The first couple of poops are dark and sticky like dirty chewing gum… only messier. It’s not easy to get the poop off his booty either, so we used quite a few wipes. The dark poop only lasted for about 3 days, then the mustard seed poops began. I know this is gross, but a poopy seed got on my hand and I rolled it around between my fingers and passed it to Derrick. Let me tell you, It. Did. Not. Smear. It was like a little play-doh ball.

His poops started to smell on day 6. Days 1-5… those were the days.

Oh, and EVERY time we go to change a diaper, if we don’t hold his feet, they go right into his poop.

Bath Time

At first we would just fill the hospital bucket up with water and lay him on the bed to wash him up. Everything would be going smoothly until the cold air started to hit him and then he started cuttin up.

After the first couple weeks I started to sit his little booty in the bucket, which was and still is a little tricky because he slides, but he loves it. He was so relaxed as the warm water ran over him, again, until the cold air hit him. If he had a dirty diaper before bath time, we would clean him up with wipes, but no matter how well we THOUGHT we wiped, there always seemed to be a poopy seed sitting at the bottom of the bucket. Yuck!

His skin was still peeling from being inside fluids for 9 months, but we just let it peel naturally. Didn’t pick at it, put lotion or oils, nothing.

He’s pretty chill when it comes to cleaning his nose, which is good because having a flailing baby when you’re trying to clean their noses is tricky.

Breastfeeding

He came out the womb ready to eat. He already knew to open his mouth wide and latch on, but that did not stop the feeding pains over the next couple weeks. I would have thought he had teeth by how bad it hurt. Articles and videos make it seem like there are no challenges to breastfeeding, but that s**t hurts. In the beginning, getting him to latch on properly was the most painful.

At first he would go 3-5 hours without eating, because he would be sleep, but now he wants to eat every 2. When he is hungry he will devour anything that is near his mouth; fingers, pacifier, Derrick’s chest… if only he produced milk.

He is definitely eating good because he surpassed his birth weight by his 2 week pediatric appointment, but sometimes I can’t help but I feel like he is not getting enough milk.

It took 4 long, painful weeks for him to learn to latch on the right way, and sometimes it still hurts, but I didn’t stop trying, and neither should you.

*Tip for breastfeeding mamas- Put lanolin over your entire areola before they latch on because it will help their mouths to slide.

I learned quickly that you take a lot of L’s in the first month. You lose sleep, you lose the function of one of your arms, and you lose track of time.

Although your life will be forever changed as a mother, or parent, it is amazing to see that tiny human you created, or help create, grow.

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