Tag: the fourth trimester

Postpartum essentials

Two or three days after your baby is born, you’re going to wake up in a puddle of milk, with rock hard, uncomfortably swollen, surprisingly massive boobs. The good news is, you’re about to experience the sheer beauty of a milk drunk newborn…

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Oh baby.
If you’re female and use the internet, you’ve probably read some of Chrissy Teigen’s hilarious tweets about pregnancy and motherhood, viewed her extra adorable photos, marveled at her postpartum figure (hey! stop comparing yourself to supermodels. just an idea.), and seethed at the backlash to her daring to go out to lunch or for a walk or whatever. Come on. Let a woman live.

She gave birth about a month after I did. I laughed knowingly to myself when she wrote “no one told me i would be coming home in diapers too.” And then I literally almost cried when she followed it with her “push present” to herself, a perineal rinse bottle. Maybe I was just feeling a little emotional, but seriously. Her doctors and friends truly failed her if they didn’t let her know about the peri bottle.

I’m here to be the friend that Chrissy should’ve had. I am not afraid to tell you the gross and uncomfortable stuff. If you would rather not know, stop reading now! Bellies, blood, vaginas, pee, and boobs ahead…

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Essential mom skills

If you’re drinking lots of water (so you don’t whither into dust while nursing) while also recovering from childbirth… let’s just say your bladder might not make it until naptime.

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Since we’re almost three months in to this whole mom thing, I am pretty much an expert. I’d like to share a few favorite essential mom skills with you:
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Twelve weeks

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I’m awake again. My husband is saying to the squirming baby between us: “come on buddy, you’ve been nursing all morning.” It’s true, I realize, remembering like a forgotten dream the last several hours of half-awake contortions, baby talk, and soggy nipples. My entire body feels sucked dry this morning, like every morning, despite the many quart jars of water I down all day. My son is spitting out the pacifier and breathily mouthing whatever he can put his face on: my cheek, my knuckle, my shoulder, my clothed chest, my hip when I sit up in bed.

When I wake for the fourth or fifth time, my husband is dressed and about to leave for work. He is handsome in a button down shirt, grey hair brushed back from his face. I think: they don’t deserve him. I am greedy, and I want him here with us. Someone has to make money though. Today, I am grateful that it’s not me.

My baby is twelve weeks old today.

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Coffee in an IV

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My life today. Sleep deprivation is definitely accumulative.
The only problem is I am without my usual handsome barista and must fend for myself once this first giant cup of coffee is gone. So the question is, will I find a way to make more coffee while holding a squirming two week old, or will I pull myself together enough to walk us both one block to the local coffee shop before it’s too late for coffee?
It would’ve been smart to have kids earlier in life, back in the good old days when there was no such thing as “too late for coffee.” Too bad there was no such thing as “reliable income” or “stable relationship” either.