8 things I didn’t know about babies until I had one

Welp…. it’s been 2 glorious months since Violet came and moved into our spare room and they have both seriously been awesome. Motherhood is the best most important job on the planet and I can’t believe I discounted it before. I honestly did. I would hear Mothers of young children tell me about their day and how challenging it was and how little time they had for anything else. I was like ‘blah blah blah…complain some more why don’t you. Is it even worth all the trouble to have a kid?! You SAY it’s awesome, but you sure don’t show it.’

seriously. that was me talking. looking from the outside in.

wow.

I’ll slap my own face.

BUT now that I’m on the INSIDE…

Now I see. Now I understand. It’s just one of those things you have to DO to ‘get.’ Just like in X-ray school when they kept telling us ‘memorize these physics equations and it won’t make any sense to you now, but someday it will just ‘click.‘ And it did. Just like they said. So Mothers who aren’t yet Mothers! Tune in now: Motherhood is awesome! But I want to share with you some info about babies that you may not understand just yet… but I wish I had known this stuff ahead of time. Then maybe I could have spared myself from frantically googling ‘why is my baby crying for no reason?’ and ‘will my hairdryer make my baby deaf?‘ at 2 am.

1. BREASTFEEDING IS LEARNED.

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Misconception No. 1. I assumed that since breastfeeding was ‘natural’ that Mommies and Babies just automatically know what to do. um… nu huh. This is why lactation experts exist. I had to call on my mom’s friend just once, but it’s definitely a learned skill for you and the baby. And if you can make it past 6 weeks, I feel like you are then a pro. There was a time at the 4-5 week mark that I was ready to throw in the towel. We went back to Beatrice so Ryan could deer hunt… we stayed at the in-laws. It snowed and we [my mother and law and Violet and i] were house bound for 48 hours. Violet was frustrated… I was tired and sore and annoyed. I mean, here you are feeding this little screeching creature 8 + times a day for at least 30 minutes a whack and that’s bound to make anyone crazy who doesn’t know what they’re doing. But again, if you can make it to 6 weeks, you’re golden. I’m really proud of my little baby bird now… I taught her to open her mouth really wide before she latches by singing ‘Ahhhhhh’  and she does it back to me. Sound and all. No joke. It’s the cutest.thing. in. the. world.

Young babies can learn things! They aren’t just helpless blobs!

2. YOU HAVE TO PUT BABIES TO SLEEP

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Not like you ‘put dogs to sleep’ but rather you have to put babies down for a nap. They don’t just magically sleep when they’re tired. We were thinking we were pretty smart when we thought ‘Keep her awake during the day as much as possible! Then she’ll sleep at night!’ WE WERE WRONG.

911.

May day.

Not the correct thing to do. This actually makes baby overtired and they trick you! They are deceptive and sneaky and make you think that they are so happy, alert, and cute. When in reality they are getting over tired and will flip on you faster than the Dugger’s can reproduce. When it happened to us, we didn’t know about the cuddle cure yet and we were frantically googling the topic. What we read was it’s just best not to let that happen. Put them down for a nap at the first sign of sleepiness and you will have a happy, well-rested, good feeder and not a devil baby.

3. BABIES COMMUNICATE A LOT. YOU JUST HAVE TO PAY ATTENTION.

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When a baby looks away… what’s our instinct? To turn their body so they are facing you again… jiggle them around… put our faces even closer to theirs and make crazy faces and loud noises to get their attention back, right?  DON”T DO THIS! This is the baby’s way of telling you that they need a break. It’s their way of self-soothing. When they want to play and interact again, they will look at you. If you over-stimulate them, they will turn into a devil baby. (read No. 2) Also, just by her cries I have gotten pretty good at telling what she needs. She has different cries for hunger, wet, burping, pooping, and tired.

4. THE WOMB IS A NOISY PLACE

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It’s louder than a vacuum, I guess. Violet is a sucker for white noise, so luckily theres a free app for our iPhones and iPads that is on pretty much anytime we put her down to sleep (in airplane mode). Calms her right down. And if that’s not enough, we get out the blowdryer. My Dad (who has hearing problems from his years of construction work and wears hearing aids) is really worried about this damaging her hearing, but I guess babies are born with a ton of wax in their ears and it dampens the sound pretty well until they are 3 months old. Then I guess at the 3 month mark, they are pretty much used to life outside the womb and don’t need the noise to soothe them any longer.

5. THE CUDDLE CURE IS OUR LIFESAVER

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the 5 S’s help get her to stop screaming (granted she doesn’t need anything like fed or a diaper change)

1. swaddling

2. side or stomach laying (on their back, they feel like they’re falling)

3. shhhhh-ing

4. swaying (specifically making their head jiggle)

5. sucking

As long as Vie has 2 / 5, she can nap okay during the day. If she’s really screaming, you match the noise to her level of screaming and a little louder, even. The longest she’s cried after the 5 s’s are implemented is 20 seconds. I’m telling you! The Cuddle Cure is the shizzle. Read more about it in the book ‘The happiest Baby on the Block’

6. ADEN & ANAIS EASY SWADDLES ARE THE BEST

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We received one as a gift and wish we had 2 (in case one’s in the wash). She loves a tight swaddle. Even though my Aunt Judy thinks it’s ‘mean.’

7. TAKE THE BUMPY ROADS HOME

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Don’t worry about taking the black top. Take a washboard gravel road home and be jerky with your breaks. They’ll love you for it (the baby, that is. Not your breaks). Wahoo has 1 brick street still and I always take that home.

8. BABY WEIGHT GETS PUT ON AFTER THE BABY IS BORN

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For me, at least. Call it luck or just that my stomach no longer had room to eat my pre-pregnancy portions and I only gained 13 pounds with my pregnancy. I owe a lot of that to a massage I got every 2 weeks… because I never did swell one bit! And I drank my water and stayed active. HOWEVER…. after she was born, I thought… ‘oooo! breastfeeding burns 500 calories a day and therefore I can eat whatever I want.’  Wrong again, Stace! Lies! Lies! My baby weight (99% of this now 20 lb weight gain) is due to me eating lots and lots of dessert and sitting on the couch too much. I was starving when I first began breastfeeding and ate accordingly…. but never stopped. And it didn’t help that we had so many delicious meals brought to us.  I can’t WAIT to start walking again on a regular basis. I really really really hate that it’s cold outside now.

So there you have it. My little list (that’s sure to grow) of things that have surprised us newbies. Hopefully it was worth a gander to you. And we are by no means experts… we’ve only been doing this a couple months. And do whatever works for your baby because the Lord made them like snowflakes… all different.

So any other tips we’d welcome in a message or in the comments!

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