Sunday, May 31, 2009

Parenthood: Week One

A more appropriate title for this post might be: "We Survived."

What a week this has been as we get to know our little Eliza....so full of amazement, joy and happiness, but also stress and total exhaustion...I swear I must have gone several nights in a row with only an hour or two of sleep. I knew I'd be getting less, but did not expect to have some nights with absolutely none...silly me! This has been without a doubt the best and most difficult week of my life.

A few things we have learned about Eliza:

:: She misses life in the womb...in other words, she is fussy. We are trying to make things easier for her with lots of swaddling and white noise and of course lots of snuggling. Our new favorite sound around the house is a recording of our hairdryer, played on repeat, again and again.

:: She likes to eat...a lot and frequently -sometimes every hour. My girl is wearing her mama out! I honestly did not realize breastfeeding could take so much out of me, but it does. I see now, how much it really takes to stick with it and I am hoping I have what it takes.

:: She's a charmer. No matter how late she keeps her dad and I up, how exhausted we become, the next morning she is instantly forgiven and we are marveling at funny facial expressions or her yawns or her cute little baby sneezes (I never knew how cute baby sneezes were before Eliza).

We have so much more to learn...but if there is one thing this week has taught me, it is that you can only prepare so much...some things can only be learned on the job, and that is definitely what we are doing these days.

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7 comments:

Jessi said...

Love this image in the bottom right, looks like she must be tired too. My best advice is to drop everything else and nap when she does. Laundry can wait!

katie said...

Absolutely! I agree with Jessi. It's tough to let things slide, but you just have to in the beginning!

She is just beautiful--such big eyes and she looks so alert. Just looking at her gives me baby fever! ;)

Congrats, and take care!

BluegrassGal said...

Oh Amanda! Everything you're experiencing is so normal. You need to eat, eat, eat; bf'ing takes A LOT out of you, so EAT! And rest/sleep any and every time you can. Have someone else do the laundry, cleaning, cooking, esp. in the first few weeks. Take care of YOURSELF! Eliza needs you to do that. Lydia ate every hour, so I've been there. However, she did have problems latching on, so that made her eating not as efficient. Once I got that fixed (after almost 3 months!), then things were better, and I had a little relief. Make sure she's latched on properly.

BluegrassGal said...

And yes, Amanda! You can do bf'ing! You can! And just think: no one else can do that job for you, so that makes it the most important thing you can do. David (and everyone else) should sing your praises to the heavens!

Dianna S said...

Oh! I love those new baby wrinkles! Thanks for sharing the photos. I can't offer any advice, but I do feel sympathetically tired for you :) Have fun getting to know your little lady more!

Brook said...

ugh she is adorable!

Cat Herself said...

She's precious! WE all go through those adjustment things. I agree with Jessi - sleep when she does!

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