Things that were left out of my new baby handbook that I'm glad I know now...

After talking through a few facebook messages with a friend of mine last night, I got to thinking about things everyone tells women when they're pregnant, and what you read in books, and things of that nature, and how different it can truly be for some of us once the tiny, pink, wrinkled, curled up bundle of joy arrives. In the first few months, I often found myself saying or thinking "Well, this certainly wasn't in the handbook!" So today, I decided to write about some of my experiences, and fill you all in on some topics that should've, most emphatically, been in MY handbook.

1. Just because you have boobs doesn't mean you'll be a great breastfeeder. This also goes along with my number 2.

2. If your child ingests formula, she will not die. She will not have growth problems. She will not get sick more than breastfed babies.

These two things go hand in hand. So many different factors come together to determine how successful a woman will be at breastfeeding. I had just about every negative factor working against me. First, Lily was early, so her latch and suck weren't developed enough. Bottles are much easier to get milk out of than a boob, so she mastered a bottle quickly but never did have luck with breastfeeding. I also had low production and flat nipples. I pumped exclusively for months...sometimes up to 15 times a day for 30-45 minutes at a time. Then I went back to work and that was cut down to next to nothing. I took so much fenugreek I smelled like I bathed in maple syrup. I drank the nasty teas. I did everything to no avail. When Lily was about 5 weeks old, she was still a little bit of nothing. She hadn't made it back to her birth weight (which, by the way, they should do within the first week or two). We went to a lactation consultant who did everything she could for us, but who also suggested we start supplementing with formula. I had been so determined to breastfeed ("I'm going to breastfeed her until she's a year old!" I proclaimed.) that it was damaging to my spirits to have to supplement with the dreaded formula but I was more concerned at that point that my daughter, who was born early because she failed to thrive in my womb, was going to fail to thrive outside as well. There are a lot of very wonderful reasons to breastfeed, and I'm very proud of what I managed to accomplish for Lily, and I very quickly learned that while it was a setback to my "plan", it wasn't the end of the world. I did get some flack from some adamant breastfeeding proponents for supplementing and ultimately switching to formula. Some claimed I didn't try hard enough, and others claimed formula would cause her all kinds of problems. She'd get sick more, she wouldn't grow as fast, I'm not doing my motherly duty...I really let it bother me for a bit, but when we took her back at 6 weeks, after just 6 days of supplementing with a few bottles of formula a day, she had gained 15oz. The following week, she gained another 1lb 2oz. By the time my supply had dried up, in spite of the 20-25 herbal pills I was taking a day, I felt ok with going totally to formula. My child is thriving just fine. She's only been sick once, and that was just a cold (and it was brought on by teething), and though she's petite for her age (probably genetics inherited from both of her short grandmothers), her growth chart is arcing just perfectly.

3. Every book, birthing class, and nurse will say that babies LOVE to be swaddled, and when the baby is fussing, the tighter the swaddle, the quicker the baby calms and the longer the baby sleeps. Maybe this is true for every other baby in the world...but it was never, not once, true for mine. Oh, we practiced and practiced swaddling. Ask JP. He was a master swaddler of all of the stuffed animals in Lily's room before she arrived. But Lily? She was like Houdini in baby form. We'd put her in a long infant gown (another thing everyone swore was so easy to use and babies loved...except for mine) and swaddle her so tight she was a burrito with a face. We'd put her in her bassinett, sneak out of the room, and within minutes, she'd cry. We'd rush back in and there would be arms, legs, and an open swaddle. Several times she couldn't get out of the swaddle alone, so she'd get out of the nightgown! We'd go in and there she'd be, looking up at us, laying horizontally at the top edge of the bassinett instead of vertically in her sleep positioner like we laid her, naked except for a diaper. Houdini, I tell you, considering we'd given up the swaddle completely by the time she was about 3 weeks old.

4. Just because your baby CAN do something doesn't mean she WILL do it. Lily could crawl when she was 5 months old. However, she knew if she pitched a fit, threw her face into the rug, and reached up for us while giving us big puppy dog eyes, we'd pick her up. She preferred standing to sitting and holding our hands and walking to crawling. She has only just recently begun crawling to get places on her own, and still the whole time she grumbles. She slams her hands down and gives exasperated sighs the whole time. The reason she now crawls is because we get absolutely worn out walking her all over creation!! I'm fairly certain that the little whirling dirvish can walk, too, and just is too stubborn to show us. She's waiting until she's really good at it so she can take off running from me during diaper change time or something.

5. On a serious note, no one really told me how serious, scary, and real post partum depression is or could be. I was blessed with the opportunity to spend 12 weeks on maternity leave, and doubly blessed that JP was able to be home with me. That time wasn't all sunshine and rainbows, though. We had a LOT of things go on during that time-- the feeding issues, the discovery of Lily's Horner's Syndrome, finding termites in the flower bed, the air conditioner unit needing to be replaced (along with the hot water heater AND the dishwasher) and a host of other things, including some work stress that I will not go into. A few weeks in to being home, I remember JP's parents and sisters came over and instructed me to go get some sleep (I had been sleeping with Lily on the couch for the whole time at that point) and they'd take care of Lily and clean the house. I remember laying in the bed with the door closed absolutely beside myself with worry over Lily. I couldn't sleep. That fear quickly spread to whenever I was away from her, if anyone other than JP had her, I silently and quietly panicked until I was back or she was back in my arms. That turned into a nearly paralyzing fear that she something would happen to her if she slept in her bassinett away from me. I had myself convinced that if I wasn't with her every second of every day, something terrible would happen. As nursing and pumping got tougher, and every new bad thing happened, it got worse and worse. I was crying more than I was enjoying my time with my new family. I remember telling someone in my family who laughed it off and told me I was being ridiculous. It felt like I loved her so much that it physically hurt me to leave her. JP and his sister were the only two people who listened, didn't judge and encouraged me to talk to my doctor about it. I was put on anti-depressants for a while and the results were amazing. I could actually go take a nap without images of Lily being dropped on her head popping into my mind. Several months in, I started feeling so much better that I weaned myself off the pills. I don't recommend doing this because all of those feelings came back and quick. I'm only just now getting totally back to myself and even now, I still have some days where I don't know why I feel the way I do and don't know how to shake it.

6. I am almost completely convinced that my bladder will never work the same after being kicked repeatedly, from the inside, at increasing strengths, for 5 months. I am also convinced that my stomach will never look the same, and I may never be able to brush my teeth again, ever in my life, without gagging. Oddly enough, I am totally ok with it.

7. People will say that you'll forget the sucky parts of pregnancy, how tough labor was, and any other pregnancy, labor, delivery, or recovery discomforts as soon as you see your bundle of joy. They say that's the only reason why women choose to have more than one child, because they forget. That's a crock. I don't know that I will ever forget how sick I was and how just a totally miserable pregnant person I was, nor will I forget how awesome and easy labor, delivery, and recovery were. I really disliked being pregnant, with the exception how amazing it was to feel Lily move around all the time. That being said, I still want more kids. I don't think it is that you forget all the bad parts. I think it's that you get to see all of the fantastic good parts, and that makes all the bad worth it. I'd go through every second of what I did, every ache, pain, and nauseating minute of pregnancy to have another baby. And I doubt I'll ever forget any aches, pains, and discomforts I may experience with that pregnancy, either. But it'll be so worth it, because every time I look at Lily, or she gives me a kiss or does something hilarious, or even when she's sad and crying, she's totally, absolutely, unequivocably, worth it.