Postpartum Journey

Wow, what they don’t prepare you for. Postpartum is hard. You literally cannot prepare yourself to become a parent, and being in charge of keeping a little human alive. You can’t prepare yourself for what your body will endure, and the changes that will be made. You cannot prepare yourself for how your life is going to be flipped upside down, and have a whole new meaning to it. Everyone talks about postpartum, and the weeks, months, years, after having a baby but it will never be enough.

My postpartum journey has been a roller coaster. Between accepting my new body, which includes a scar across my bikini line, stretch marks that climb up my stomach, and the mommy pouch, learning how to become a mom, and learning how to care for a baby, breastfeeding, stopping breastfeeding sooner than I wanted, crying (all 3 of us), sleeping (and not sleeping), appointments, c section recovery, and seriously the list goes on and on. Even almost 12 weeks in, there is still something new to take on everyday.

The 3rd day we were home, we all were crying. Seriously all 3 of us. Babies cry a lot, and Joe and I were wondering how in the world we were going to do this. Being a parent is HARD! Being a C-Section patient I was also on a lot of painkillers, and in a lot of pain- so basically worthless unless it involved sitting on the couch or taking a nap for about a week.

Once I started to feel better around 8 weeks, the insecurity set in. As someone who has always struggled with body image, wow. I’ve never struggled like this. A scar, stretch marks, a mommy pouch, and much more. By 3 weeks postpartum I weighed less than my pre pregnancy weight, but my clothes still don’t fit because my stomach is so swollen from the c section. That’s hard to accept since I literally have no control over swelling. Let alone it being summer and having family on the lake, and wanting to be outside when really I just would like a large snow suit to wear and call it a day! Let’s not forget the terrible hives I broke out in all over my c section scar, OUCH, and so itchy. Then they spread to my arms legs and stomach. That was a whole new terrible adventure alone. It’s a constant reminder what my body went through and how amazing my body is as a woman. It’s a constant reminder I was cut 7 layers deep to bring life into this world. It’s a constant reminder that my body did HEAL itself from this, and that is amazing in itself! 10 weeks later, I am accepting this much better now.

My mood, oh my mood. Hormones are ridiculous postpartum. I asked myself for the first few weeks how I can be so sad with something so beautiful and amazing sitting in front of me. Becoming a parent is a mental toll, sometimes you really just feel like you can’t do anything right, nothing works, and how in the world did you get trusted with keeping this baby alive! It wasn’t just me either, joe was learning too. It took a serious hit on our relationship, as we both dealt with our new lives in our on way and really had to re-learn each other and how to help each other. This is still a struggle with her getting older and changing everyday. It seems as soon as you think oh I got this, she changes and you’re back to square one.

Breastfeeding- I loved breastfeeding. It was such a bond with my baby that literally no one else could have and I enjoyed my time with her so much. But WOW! That is HARD. There were nights we would both just cry and cry and cry because it wasn’t working, and then something would click and it was beautiful again. I breastfeed for about 6 weeks and ended up with mastitis. Mastitis is called the boob flu, and that is so accurate. I was ungodly sick, we were having to wash the sheets in the middle of the night because of my night sweats. I was weak, and so tired. They put me on an antibiotic and in seriously 4 days I had completely dried up and my breastfeeding journey was over. Luckily I had saved some milk in the freezer so she was able to get a little more that way.

You really look at life and take life in a whole new way after you have a baby, and every single postpartum journey is different. I can truthfully say no part of being pregnant, having a baby, or my postpartum journey has scared me away from having another baby (a few more for that matter!!) and it seriously is a beautiful thing. Also, it WILL and DOES get better.