Things I'm Learning

-It's really hard to find time to blog when you have a newborn. Diligent mommy bloggers, I salute you. I don't know how you do it!

-Nursing is really challenging, and sometimes a little maddening. If I wasn't so dedicated to doing this for my son, I would give up and just give him formula. (Or let daddy give him formula.) There's something wonderful but simultaneously overwhelming about being his only source of nourishment...especially at 3:00 in the morning.

-A perpetually late person + a newborn = a perpetually super late person.

-Time during pregnancy goes at a crawl. Time with a newborn rushes by so fast that I think I'm getting a little whiplash.

-Instagram is an awesome tool for recording the first few days (and weeks and months) of your kid's life. (Feel free to follow me; my username is blindvictory, of course!) Also, a smartphone is a lifesaver during the wee morning hours when you're nursing (again) and you need something to keep you awake.

-I was apparently destined to be an attachment parent. I LOVE bed sharing. Still working on getting him to tolerate the pocket sling. I'm realizing that I get a little jealous when family visits and I have to let other people hold him for a few hours...makes me a little glad when he decides to cluster feed. ;)

-Being a mom is still totally awesome. I can't believe that my husband and I created such a perfect little boy. I thank God every day for the blessing of my sweet little family.

Also, a quick note. I'm thinking about changing my blog name from "Waiting for Arrows" to something else. I haven't decided what yet. If I come up with anything good, I'll let everyone know! If you've got any suggestions or ideas, pitch 'em to me because I'm terribly uncreative. I also totally want a new blog design, but I am cheap and don't want to pay for a good one, and whenever I try to do the free ones, the coding gets messed up and half the blog reverts to the old style and half has the new layout. Lame.

The first few days

Life as a mom is so different from how I expected. Honestly, it's so much more fun and rewarding than I thought it would be at this point! Here's a little look at what life is like for us as Rowan's parents.

Rowan's a great sleeper. I'm probably still getting five or six hours a night. Which, as a girl who loves sleep, is still less than I'd like, but realistically, I know that's awesome for a newborn. I told myself through the whole pregnancy that there was NO WAY I was going to bed-share, but I was wrong. I find myself having more separation anxiety than I expected. I want him there, cuddled next to me. We've got a co-sleeper next to the bed, but if he gets grunty or squirmy, I just pull him up next to me and he zonks out. (And when he's sleeping quietly, I do, too.) I'm blessed that he'll nurse in the mornings around 6:30 or 7:00 and then go back to sleep with me for another hour and a half or more.

Rowan is probably the most laid-back baby I've ever seen. I thought at first it was because of the jaundice, but that's (mostly) cleared up now and he still is just so chill. He sleeps a lot, but when he's awake, he almost never fusses. He'll just sit and stare at us, or the light from a window, or whatever. He's not a huge fan of diaper changes or sponge baths, or anything that pins him down or makes him be still. He had to be re-hospitalized because of the jaundice, and I could hear him screaming from several rooms away while they did his IV. (I cried more than he did, I think.) My mom stayed with him and said that honestly, she thought he was screaming mostly from being pinned down, rather than from pain. Same with his circumcision. (We had a mohel do the circ...LOVED him.)

all warm under the bili-lights

Daddy and Rowan are bonding more and more, and it totally melts my heart. One of the things that I was most excited about was watching my husband become a father, and it has totally been everything I hoped it would be. Right now he's got Rowan sleeping on his chest, and he's leaned back in the recliner playing Final Fantasy 9. It's adorable.

In terms of post-partum recovery, I'm doing amazingly well. So much so that it almost scares me a little. I keep waiting for the crazy hormones and whatnot to hit me and make me feel lost or overwhelmed or manic, and it just hasn't yet. I'll go ahead and credit that largely to the placenta encapsulation that we did. I've been taking the capsules and haven't had the tiniest bit of baby blues or anything. The only time I cry is when I look at Rowan sometimes and am so overwhelmed with love and joy that I can't help but get weepy. (Scares the heck out of DH, haha.) Again, I am so blessed that PP recovery is going so smoothly. I'm barely even bleeding anymore, at 11 days post-birth. Amazing!

Life as a new mom is way cool. I love my little scrunchy, cuddly baby. I love my husband even more than I did before. To those of you who haven't experienced this yet: I can't wait for you to become moms. It is so, so worth every bit of struggle and prayer and waiting that you're going through right now. I know I didn't have to wait as long as a lot of my friends, and I'm so thankful for that, but I know that to have this little guy in my life, it would've been worth a lifetime of waiting.