What I wish I’d known

I read a lot of books and got a lot of advice from friends and family members before Reed was born. Some of it was really useful. Some of it wasn’t. Some of it I wish I’d never heard (and some of it scared the crap out of me). But there are some things I really wish I’d known before having Reed. As I get further and further from those early weeks and months of parenthood, I forget more and more of these lessons and practical tips. So I’m writing them down to share with other new moms (and those considering becoming new moms) and in an effort to remember them myself:

1. Have a flexible vision of parenting. Perfectionism is the enemy of sanity when it comes to caring for a baby. I recently read a study that discussed how women who tend to be perfectionists are more likely to have postpartum depression. It makes perfect sense to me. If you have this vision in your head of what kind of parent you’re going to be and then you don’t live up to that, you are going to beat yourself up about it. You have to let yourself make mistakes and change course as you learn to be the kind of parent that’s best for your child — and hopefully that’s a relaxed parent.

2. Trust your gut. No one will know your child as well as you and your spouse/partner. You will get to know this little person better than anyone else, and while other people might be experts in their areas of baby-raising, you are the expert on your baby. My gut told me that Reed was having a problem with my breastmilk at 5 days old. He was gassy and seemed to be in constant pain. His pediatrician told me he was totally fine. Four months later, we found that he had a milk intolerance when all of his digestive and skin issues went away as soon as we got him on hypoallergenic formula. If I’d only trusted my own instincts from the start, we could have avoided a lot of heartache.

3. Think about yourself (or happy mommy=happy baby). If you are making yourself miserable in some quest to be a perfect parent, you are not doing what’s best for your child. The best thing for a child is to be with two parents who love them and are happy with themselves and each other. Mommy crying all the time is not good for baby. Find the balance between doing what’s best for your child and what makes you happy. Take time for yourself. Mother does not equal martyr.

4. There is no one right way to raise a child (or, you won’t break them if you choose x). You’ll hear a lot of things about how people choose to raise their children and they all think that their way is the best. Every child is different. What works well for Reed may not work well for your child. Parenting Reed is so very different than I’d expected, but that’s because he is so different too. And most decisions we make are not going to “ruin” our child. While some decisions we make can have lasting consequences, the vast majority do not. The teenaged son of a well known mommy-blogger and author of a book on attachment parenting recently died from a drug overdose and drug-related beating. Does this mean that she raised him wrong? Does it mean that attachment parenting creates drug addicts? Absolutely not! While I do believe that we have some control over how our children turn out, having a child has made me much more convinced that children are born with certain personality traits. You can raise two kids in the exact same environment the exact same way and they may turn out very, very different. Reed is an always-on-the-move highly social little boy born to two introverted slugs. All we did was provide a nurturing space where he felt he could be himself. We only have so much control over who our child will become, in spite of the many studies published and Dateline NBC stories that make us think feel like every small decision we make regarding our child is life-or-death. God forbid he watch one TV show before he’s two or play with crappy, noisy plastic Fisher Price toys!

5.  Here are some of the many things I wish I’d bought before Reed was born:

• Lots and lots and lots of multi-use absorbent pads. You will be dealing with an ungodly amount of bodily fluids during the first month, and muti-use pads can keep you from having to change the sheets as often (I remember once changing them three times in one day!). They’re also great to have wherever you’re breastfeeding, laying the baby down, etc.
• Kimono (or side-snap)-type outfits. A baby’s neck seems so delicate during those first couple of weeks and putting a shirt over their head can be scary — at least it was for me. With shirts and onesies that snap on the side, you can just lay out the top, put the baby down on top of it, get their arms in, and fasten all the snaps or ties around them. I greatly preferred onesies (i.e. shirts that snap at the crotch) for newborns since t-shirts ride up too much. I didn’t put t-shirts on Reed until he started to stand up, since I figured it couldn’t be comfortable having his shirt up around his chest all the time.
• A swaddler with velcro like the Kiddopotamus Swaddle Me. I was one of those people who couldn’t fold notes in middle school into the cool origami shapes all my friends could, so I should have anticipated that I couldn’t swaddle worth a damn. Yet it put Reed into such a blissful state. No matter how many times I watched our post-partum doula do it, I just couldn’t replicate it. I remember standing with Adam in the middle of the night with Reed screaming, lying on the bed on top of a blanket, and trying to swaddle him while reading the instructions in Happiest Baby on the Block. Suffice it to say that each event like this ended in tears (mine and Reed’s usually). The Kiddopotamus Swaddle Me saved our lives and our sanity! If you’re concerned that baby origami might not be your thing, buy one of these as cheap insurance.
• Pacifiers. I had read so many anti-pacifier things and had many friend who were anti-pacifier, so I thought that there was no way my child was going to use a pacifier. So, of course, I didn’t buy any. Well, it turned out that my son was born with a frighteningly strong sucking reflex and after spending hours on end in the hospital with my finger twisted around to fit in his mouth, I realized that he was going to need pacifiers (or I was going to need a new index finger!).
• Bottles, just in case. While you might be totally gung-ho about breastfeeding, you have no idea what life will throw at you. You might have problems. Your baby might have problems. Having some bottles on-hand isn’t saying that you’re any less than 100% committed to breastfeeding — it’s saying that you’re prepared for all possible outcomes. Just like having a fire extinguisher doesn’t mean that you’re planning to start a fire.
• Formula, again, just in case. I’d be shocked if most people could go through their entire pregnancies without getting some free formula in the mail, so you probably don’t even have to buy any.
• Small receiving blankets like the very basic cotton flannel ones at Carters. Most of the blankets we had received as gifts were huge for a newborn. Carters receiving blankets were just the right size for wrapping up a newborn baby and were wonderfully soft.

6. Here are things I did have which saved my life

• A breast pump – when the problems nursing Reed had sent me to the breaking point and I was ready to give up nursing altogether, pumping gave me the breathing room (and healing room) I needed.
• Portable nightlights – these were so helpful when nursing Reed in the middle of the night. You don’t want to turn on the light at 3am, so portable nightlights allowed me to get just enough light to figure out where his mouth was.
• A dimmer switch in the nursery – this is a godsend for setting the light to just the right level for the baby to feel comfortable and for you to be able to change him in the middle of the night.
• iPhone – Reed would often fall asleep in my arms while I nursed him, so I’d just sit there with nothing to do and nowhere to go. The iPhone allowed me to surf the web with one hand, catch up on email, etc. I wish I’d had my Kindle at the time too, because leafing through a book with one hand and a baby in your arms is pretty difficult.
• Boppy pillow – this, or something like it is critical when you’re just getting the hang of positioning a baby for nursing.
• Cradle swing – The swing gave us our only opportunities early on to eat together or do pretty anything without holding Reed. He would fall asleep in it and we’d get a few quiet moments to relax. Bouncers are great later on, but swings are useful from Day 1.

7. Don’t buy large quantities of anything before the baby is born. You have no idea whether your child will have a bad reaction to the wipes you use, the skin cream you try on them, or the formula you choose for them (if you go that route). While you might want to stock up in advance because it makes you feel “ready”, it’s not worth doing. I bought a ton of 7th Generation Wipes only to find that Adam had a violent skin reaction to them. We had to get rid of them and switch to a different brand. Until you know what works for your child (and remember that may change over time too), don’t stock up.

8. Ask for help. Whether it’s friends, family, or a postpartum doula, new parents need all the support they can get. It’s totally reasonable to ask a close friend to organize your friends to bring you food after the baby is born. It’s totally reasonable to ask family members to come and help out so you can get some sleep. And, as we learned, paying a postpartum doula (who won’t bring the baggage and unwanted advice family members might bring) to provide whatever support you need in those first days at home is totally worth it. Adam and I both tend to be the sort of stubbornly independent people who don’t like to ask for help, and we really learned the hard way that you can’t be like that when you’re a new parent.

9. It will get better. Those first two months were rough! We barely slept, Reed was crying all the time because of his stomach problems, and nothing about caring for a baby felt intuitive. But now, other than when he’s sick and not sleeping, life with Reed has an easy, predictable rhythm and we’ve grown comfortable in our role as Reed’s parents. Over time, it all becomes more and more natural, the baby starts sleeping and eating at more normal intervals, and your body gets used to less sleep (unless you’re one of those lucky people whose child slept through the night by 6 weeks!). You do start to feel like a human being again. And eventually, you can get 8 hours straight of sleep, it becomes easier to go out of the house with your child, and the idea of being a “mommy” doesn’t seem so foreign anymore. I know I heard this from parents before Reed was born, but once I was in the eye of the storm, I didn’t really believe it.

Having a baby is the best thing I’ve ever done in my life. It’s also been the most stressful. And the best learning experience. And made me happier than I could have imagined. Reed is now 14 months old. He’s walking like a champ, saying more words every day (he actually said “thank you” to me when I handed him his shoe today!!!), and is so curious about the world around him. All day he points at things and asks “what’s that?” I feel so lucky to be his mom. It’s so cool to get to teach him about the world and introduce him to all the cool things, people, tastes, smells, etc. around him. We have plenty of tough days (and nights), but I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to get to spend time with him and how I live for that adorable little smile of his.

So, if you’re reading this with your first baby on the way, congratulations! You have SO MUCH to look forward to!