This Freakin' Adorable Baby Belongs To Me

Major Grin
Originally uploaded by Poundstone.

It's been six weeks since Sophie crashed into our lives. My first words (directed at Ben) upon seeing her for the first time as she was lifted out of my belly C-section style: "Does she really belong to us?"

I never knew whether I wanted to have kids. And then one day, I just felt like it was now or never. And I picked now. And Ben picked now with me. And then within a few short months, I was pregnant. And it felt like I was pregnant for a very, very long time, even though I felt pretty normal and good through most of it. And then sort of all of a sudden it was time for Sophie to join us here on the outside, and then kaboom! There she was, exploding onto the scene.

Since then, a kajillion thoughts have raced through my mind, and I've been able to jot some of them down. The problem is that I hate the idea that every thought I have has been thought before by some other woman (women, more likely) who's just had a kid. I also hate the idea of this blog becoming about nothing other than parenthood. But I've decided that I really need an outlet for processing all of the new parent stuff and this is as good a place as any.

So here goes: some of the notes I've been able to capture so far, with likely more to come.

The actual baby had nearly nothing to do, in my mind, with the creature I had felt moving around in my body. They didn’t seem at all related.

“Becoming a mother” and “having a baby” are two separate issues. Becoming a mother is all about facing up to identity issues and intellectual and emotional baggage about what you think that means. The experience of “having a baby”…well I spent nine months preparing for the physical act of birth, and I ended up having a C-section. Also, even if I had had a regular old birth, it still would have only taken a day or two. I should have spent more time talking to other moms, getting useful tips.

It’s not that you can’t prepare at all to have a baby. It’s just that every baby is different. And there’s no amount of rest you can get before the baby comes that prepares you for the enormous, endless and physically and emotionally draining work that a newborn requires. It’s work that you feel privileged, excited and amazed to do, but it is exhausting. And it requires more than one person to do it.


I asked Ben, after the end of the second week or so, when breastfeeding was pain, pain, painful; Sophie was waking us both up at all hours, and was requiring all every bit of every kind of energy I had to give: “I love her, sure. But how can I like her more?”

I didn’t know it would be this emotional. It’s easy to know in your head that much of the rush of emotion is due to a massive shift in hormonal balance. That doesn’t mean you don’t have to live the emotion.

Both wanting to and fearing to make a record of how I spend a day. It seems incomprehensible to my pre-parent self. Instead of forward movement, progress, accomplishments, goals set and achieved, everything is cyclical.

In a note to my sister-in-law: “I need to find a way to feel less like I'm just getting through each day and starting to try to enjoy it in some way. Like so many things in life, I thought it would be a series of sprints (crises - running to get a bottle, trying to stop her crying, etc.) when really it's a marathon (drudgery).”

There are really no “good days” or “bad days.” There are good moments and bad moments. And they come right on top of one another. It’s like the weather in Oregon: wait five minutes and you’ll get something you like better. Focusing on good moments will get you through lots and lots of the bad ones.