This is my cousin's new baby. Isn't he precious?
It's been a long time since I was a new mom, almost fourteen years. Man! Time flies because it seems like just yesterday. Have you ever noticed how when you're pregnant, people always feel free to put there hands on your belly and spout advice, whether you ask for it or not? Your baby could be crying while you're shopping in Wal-Mart and suddenly you are surrounded by women telling you to try everything from stick your finger in his/her mouth to give him/her a drop of honey to make them take a pacifier (and babies aren't even supposed to have honey because of the risk of botulism). Anyway, new moms are surrounded by advice, good and bad.
Seeing my cousin's new bundle of joy got me thinking about all of the advice she must be getting. It got me to thinking about the best piece of advice I got. You see, with my first baby, I was a total freak. I worked in a pediatric clinic for several years. While it was good for me in some ways, like not FREAKING out about holding the kids down for shots, it freaked me out to see 3 day old babies having to have spinal taps. Yikes! So, I was a bit of a germaphobe when my first one was born. Nobody got to touch her until they used Purell on their handsl. I was downright FREAKY about it and carried a bottle with me everywhere I went.
Funny how things change. By that fourth kid, she could play in the mud, drop her pacifier and put it right back in her mouth, basically eat dirt and it didn't phase me much.
Seriously, this kid never met a mud puddle she didn't like.
Anyway, the best advice I got was that God was watching over them and babies had been surviving for hundreds of years before mine got here. It's one thing to be careful and protective. It's another thing to be a complete crazy lunatic germaphobe mom.
Like I said, lots of advice, both good and bad. BUT, what was the one thing NOBODY told you about being a mom? I read tons of books to prepare me for pregnanacy, delivery and rasing a baby. I got tons of advice, but nobody EVER told me how HARD it s to deal with feeding your kids. I'm not talking about breastfeeding/bottle feeding, etc. That's a whole different issue and don't even get me started on the whole lactation specialist chick. Every single lactation nurse I had was weird! Do they got a special class that teaches them to be so hard core that they know how to turn you off of breastfeeding? Yes, all of mine were breastfed (which is why my boobs look like jersey socks instead of half cantelopes, by the way), but I'm not hardcore and all up in somebody elses's business about it. Okay, stepping down off my soapbox. Anyway, nobody ever told me that trying to get a child to eat healthy food was so time consuming - that getting them to eat vegetables and fruits and have a well rounded diet is so HARD! I guess for some it comes easy. It's a little better now that I can bribe them (I know, bad mom) to eat their veggies.
My girls are pretty good eaters. My boys, not so much. It's so frustrating! UGH!
So, I wonder, what your best piece of advice? What did NOBODY tell you about being a mom? If you're not a mom, I want to know what kind of crazy advice you've heard or what you hear moms complains about? Or if you're a teacher, what about kids surprised you?
Oh, there is plenty that no one CAN tell you, cause you just cannot hear or understand until you are in it.
ReplyDeleteI never knew how hard parenting was going to be. I never understood that my kids could push my buttons so much or make me so mad or so depressed. I never knew that they could bring out my worst character traits. I never knew how helpless and hopeless my own kids could make me feel, or how just plain tired.
I also did not have even the tiniest understanding of what joy they would give me. I did not fully know that having them would be the most important thing I would ever do. I didn't know how deeply and unconditionally I could love.
Also, they make a lot of laundry. Stock up on detergent!
I have actually thought about what no one ever told me before I was a mom, and it's this:
ReplyDeleteThey DID tell me that it was impossible to have it "all". They didn't tell me that I wouldn't want to have it all anyway. Make sense?
Best advice? Well, there are two pieces, but they were more toddler advice than baby advice.
1. My mom said, "If you remove them from a place where they are being naughty (like in church) and take them to the nursery, it won't take them long to figure out that being naughty is a free ticket to Toy Land." Her advice was to take them out, discipline them however I saw fit and then bring them back. She was right.
2. And another older woman said this about my angst over the aforementioned public naughtiness: "Of course they're going to be naughty. They can all get naughty. All the other mothers have been there and done that and will not judge you for your child's less than perfect behavior. They will, however, judge your reaction to it.
Anyway, those were my best two pieces of advice.
Well, that was long winded...
ReplyDeleteGood timing on this post for me! As much as people told me I would be tired from being at home with the baby, I didn't really get it until I started living it myself. Exhausting!
ReplyDeleteAt my baby shower, the hostesses had everyone write down their 2 pieces of advice for us as parents. It will be fun to read it in a few years and see how much is true!
LOL on your comments about the lactation specialists. You're right...they're all pretty weird. Every time one of them came to visit me in the hospital, my husband would comment about how strange they were once they left. And jersey socks...oh boy! Looking forward to that!