My beautiful girlfriend just gave birth to her first child; a gorgeous little girl. This beautiful little soul has the most devine get black hair, tiny little nose and is enough to make your ovaries go into overdrive. At just two weeks of age, she is at that most incredibly precious beautiful newborn stage that all Mumma’s know only ever lasts for a little short while.
Her Mumma on the other hand has been in an absolute depth of confusion, overwhelmed anxiety, more confusion and just a little bit of guilt. And you ask why? Because every second person is telling her something different, leaving an already overwhelmed anxious, sleep-deprived Mumma in even more anxiety. Everything has been told to her in these last few weeks:
“You shouldn’t breastfeed for more then an hour because it then interferes with their sleep pattern.”
“Don’t mix breastmilk with formula because it will harm their digestion.”
“If you give her a bottle of expressed breastmilk she will then not feed properly from the breast.”
“Wrap her this way”. NO, “Wrap her THAT way”.
And it goes on and on. What is a mother to do?
I think about some of the advice being told to her and I think “holy cow, my kids would have been doomed!” But the truth is, they are perfectly healthy toddlers.
I remember those first few weeks of my daughter’s little life. They were F***in hard. Really hard. I had absolutely no idea. She didn’t latch on, she didn’t suck, my nipples were as raw and cracked like gravel on pavement, I was sleep-deprived, overwhelmed and feeling like I could not do anything right for that little baby. What I thought was right one day was totally advised as being wrong the next. When I thought I got a “pattern” or “routine” down pat it turned on its side entirely the very next second, literally.
This parenting gig is hard, everyday. It is even harder when new mumma’s are bombarded with constant “words of advise”, that dare I say it, is actually not advise at all (for certain people).
So with a confusing world for all new Mumma’s, I thought I would put together a list of things to NOT do:
1. Don’t ever tell a new Mumma she is doing something wrong. She is the expert to her new bubba; no one else.
2. Choose your words carefully. Instead of saying “try this”, consider rewording to “what you are doing is incredible. Parenting is all a little bit about trial and error. If you feel up to it, you could try this.”
3. When you visit, make it brief. Don’t stick around.
4. Don’t flood her with everything you did as if it is gospel text for everyone to know about. Remember, every baby is different and every mother is different.
In many respects I think of it as a right of passage that every new mumma has to experience. Without experiencing the intense lows of motherhood, we may in fact begin to lose sight of the absolute intense highs. But it is all relative, isn’t it? No new Mumma ever in their wildest dreams imagines their vision of beautiful kisses, cuddles, breastfeeding moments to be transformed into something entirely different; a baby that only screams, does not settle after feeds, needs to be rocked to sleep, and cracked nipples that… lets not go there (there are a few cuddles and kisses in there too of course).
All I am saying is that we all need to just be a little more sensitive to the constant “latest news and trends” that is hard enough for anyone to keep up with. I mean lets be honest, there is always something “new” to publish when it comes to babies, children and what is best.
I am not perfect. My kids are not perfect. And that is the way I like it.
Linking up with Essentially Jess