Dear New Mom

I recently had a baby, my fifth baby, and I have been enjoying every minute of it! I remembered though it wasn't always like that and it's that memory that inspired me to write this post.

Our newest addition. Baby #5!

Dear New Mom,

First off I want to say that you are going to do great. The more you worry about how you are doing, especially if you are comparing yourself to others, the less you will be able to hear your own voice and listen to your own intuition about your child. You will also miss out on some of the joy that your little bundle will bring. My aunt gave me some great advice before I got married, that I think is applicable here. She said "Don't judge the quality of your relationship by anyone else or anyone else's relationship. You guys will have your own balance which you will find the longer you're together. Enjoy the differences in each other. It will make your relationship very unique." You will parent and nurture differently than anyone else you know, even different from your own mother and your style of parenting will be exactly what your child needs to grow and learn. Trust your own intuition and trust the times you need to stand your ground as well as the times you need to make changes and allow shifts to happen.

The next thing I want to say is...let him/her be little. There are so many exciting things to look forward to. The first cry, the first time you hold him/her in your arms, the first coo, the first smile etc. There are also things we look forward to for our own conveniences such as "I can't wait until he can hold his head up, hold his own bottle, sit up on his own, crawl, feed himself, walk" etc. Oh but the moments between are so precious. If you skipped to all of the milestones with nothing in between it would be like having christmas one day, then waiting another and having christmas again. There is no build up, no waiting, no longing, no excitement, no planning. It would be a tragedy if our children grew up in the blink of an eye.

Enjoy those sleepy moments, cuddle with the baby, sleep with the baby, savor the moments that you have the privilege of stopping everything you are doing and feed that baby. Before you know it that baby will be more independent than you would like and you will look back on those sweet baby pictures and think "why did I wish those moments away?"

My sweet bay is already smiling and laughing and

 it sees like he was born just yesterday



I can attest to this in a very deep and painful way. My first born was born with spina bifida. A congenital birth defect where the spinal cord is exposed in the womb and needs to be closed at birth. This affects his nerves and therefore affects his sensations and movements. Because of where his lesion is (the opening of the spine) the doctors weren't quite sure exactly what his lifestyle would be. While they can never tell you exactly how spina bifida will affect a child's lifestyle it was my understanding that where his lesion is, it has even a wider range of symptoms than other places a lesion could be. I was told he could be fine with no symptoms or he could be wheelchair bound, although they were pretty sure it would affect his walking, bowel and bladder at least.

I watched for every milestone like a hawk. I gave him plenty of tummy time so he could learn to roll over. We did therapy at 8 months to help him learn to sit up better. We did therapy at 15 months to get him to stand without holding onto something. When he was two I would take him out on dollar night to a local pool that had shallow water and let him practice walking in the water. At this point he couldn't walk without a walker and the water buoyed him up so he could walk.

Him at around 2 years old, using his walker.

One day a friend of mine met me at the pool with her little boy that was my son's age. We traded boys for a moment and I scooped her son up in my arms and took him straight to the deep end where I spun him in circles while dipping his feet in and out of the water. We both laughed and giggled. For a moment I had the thought "This is fun. I wish my son wasn't disabled."

Then it hit me. I had brought my son to this pool maybe 4x that season and not once had I taken him to the deep end and spun him around in a circle while lifting him up and down and dipping his feet in the water. I immediately went and grabbed my son and spun him around in the deep end. I learned an important lesson that day about not being so busy looking ahead that you miss the joy in the present. I learned that my son needed me to enjoy him right now, just the way he is. I learned that I needed that moment just as much as my son, if not more. I realized that by enjoying my son the burdens of his disability felt lighter.

So I encourage you, to do your best, to love every moment and to do all that you can to make hard things fun. I encourage you to definitely work in the shallow end. That's our job as a mom but don't neglect the fun adventures in the deep end.

My two year old I went swimming with is now 8
and as handsome as ever. Time flies!