(otherwise known as WHERE DID ALL MY FRIENDS GO?)
days and nights are now totally changed.
the marriage is changed.
the routine house car food tv watching spare time reading
and wow - the focus of your life... your whole life
all changed
your brain is being changed for you too. you dont have ownership of your own mind any more.
in fact you dont have ownership of anything that you thought you had before. your heart and mind and body, your arms and tears and love and thinking..
it all belongs to the baby. he owns it. and the change is when you start to give into that and be glad for it and be willing to give it with love. to realize.. i'm a mommy. i'm HIS mommy. because what i think and do and eat and say - that impacts his life WAY more than it even does mine.
but this was all internal and close to home. thats what i thought would change. what i expected to change. all my stuff and all the house and family stuff, the things within arms reach.
what i didnt realize was how much all of my external relationships would change as well
im trying to figure this one out.
why does this event change relationships that other major events in my life didnt?
i think ive figured some of it out:
having a baby is intense!
being a mom is intense!
breastfeeding is intense
definitely not in a bad way - let me explain: breastfeeding takes up a lot of your day so if you breastfeed its on your mind a lot and how its going etc.
and more of an impact than the other routine baby stuff
- breastfeeding is very emotional.
it was made that way. we are given deep hormonal emotional changes when we breastfeed. thats how we were created to bond with our babies. it was built in.
so this is a lot of stuff going on a lot of changes and these are deep deep things that need to be supported and shared with us by our husbands and families and friends. but most people arent going through this same thing so its hard for them to get it. the husband goes through it with you and your friends kind of do.. especially if they have kids too. but it seems that only another current new mommy "gets" what the new mommy is going through. and new mommys really need people to be able to relate. to relate to I HAD A BABY! and I AM OWNED BY THIS CHILD! and I AM SO OVERWHELMED WITH WHAT IS GOING ON! even if its just the fact that this love is intense and these feelings are intense and the way that youre life is just forced to conform to this new role ITS INTENSE!!
and its hard for people without kids to relate to that kind of INTENSE
because its...
intense.
and people who do have kids, but their kids are older, well they're now accustomed to the deep impact and they're used to having their life in this new altered state.
unlike me, who is standing here still a bit stunned at this last year and feeling like "What Just Happened?!" yes because my life doesnt resemble what it once was (back when we were married and childless which we now refer to as "still single"). and it doesnt look like anything i had planned. so its just hard to know where to go from here when you dont know where on the map to look since you really dont know where you are or who to ask for directions or where youre even trying to go in the first place.
3 comments:
Julie,
It's very refreshing to hear someone express their feelings so openly. Where I do not presently relate to the feelings of a new mother, I am hoping someday that I will.
Deanna :)
www.eurodee.com
I remember feeling like that when I was the first of all my friends to have a baby. And I was just telling my husband that I feel that way again because of all of the friends I have right now, none of them have babies. I am the only one. I am all alone in it--having babies at this age. Everyone I know has their youngest children entering kindergarten or older it seems. They get free days and can easily schedule things and I've still got a hefty tether keeping me home. It's very lonely.
Julie-Things change when you get married and when you have kids it totally puts you on another planet. I think that the second one put me in a different universe. Third-not so much. I thought when we got married we would have the same friends as we did before. Well-not so much. They change-you change-values change. But I like to think that it is a personal challenge to find friends who only have time to have spiritually and encoraging emails. Who the heck talks on the phone anymore. If I am on the phone my kids think that is a personal invitation to talk to me, get into trouble, wash the windows with candy. Do you see the theme. I had the most amazing IM conversation with one of my friends this morning. Who cares if the phone was ringing or someone was having a meltdown. Neither of us heard a thing. So it could have been totaly chaios on each side-but in my mind we were sitting in our corner nooks drinking gourmet coffee, looking like we just stepped out of an add for country living. We were laughing and talking about all the good things in life. Deep conversations about how wonderful the watchtower was and all of the wonderful things that we will learn at the assembly. In real life the theory goes-huh-maybe I will get a shower tomorrow, I don't smell that bad. What's that noise-oh man the dryer stopped-if it doesn't go non-stop for the next three days we will never make it to the convention. Oh well-no one really sees if the kids have matching socks or not. If they don't care neither will I. Wait what if someones see the non matching socks and thinks that I am the worst mother in the world. I better just stop at the store and buy 6 new pair of dark socks. Sadly I could go on and on and on with these kind of thoughts-but at the end of the day-it is what it is and I wouldn't change places for the anything.
Accept change-it makes you into a better person. Take a little time to miss it but don't look back. This is the now and Ian, Ryan and Julie are the ones that make it all work together! There you will find the friendship and the love and the conversation. But take time to cultivate new friends-even if that means getting to know someone at the assembly and getting an email address.
Much love Shana
Post a Comment