What They Don't Tell New/Expectant Moms

When you are an expectant mother, you get a lot of advice; actually they are more like warnings, from other people.  Mostly, people tell you that your life is about to change (really?!?! I had no idea!). Sometimes, they elaborate with things like, “say good-bye to those last minute vacations and late nights out” and “get your sleep now because you won’t be sleeping when that baby is waking up several times a night.” They tell you to how you will have less money to spend on yourself and the little luxuries that you are used to having. Basically, they tell you that you better enjoy life now because it is about to be over.

I don’t know why it occurs to anyone to say these things to someone who is about to have a baby.  “Enjoy that now, because you won’t be able to once the baby comes!” is my favorite. Really is that what you are thinking when you see a woman having a little fun while carrying a child? It just seems so mean and cynical. Most people don’t mean any harm, but it just seems odd (not the oddest part of pregnancy, by far, though- “hello, stranger touching my belly!”). When you are a first time mom, you are probably already a little scared and nervous, without Debbie Downer’s help.

So, are they right? The bad news is, yes. Not only is most of what they are saying true but also, they have also grossly understated those changes. The good news is that, there is so much more that people aren’t telling you and one of the most important is, that once you have a baby, most of those things don’t matter anymore.

They are right, there probably won’t be anymore last minute vacations. In fact, just leaving the house for a few hours requires diapers, snacks, bottles, wipes, extra clothes, changing pad, toys, a car seat, a stroller and quite a few other things. There are times when I don’t go somewhere simply because I don’t want to lug the car seat and diaper bag and stroller and that’s just leaving the house for a few hours. So going on vacation will require lots of planning. You will have to carry twice as much baggage, if not more. Ohhh and remember those times when you were trying to relax on an airplane and there was that mother, with a panicked look on her face, trying to quiet an infant before the other passengers complained? Congratulations! That is you now! (Bet you wish you had given her a few less loud sighs, don’t you?) It is going to be a pain in the butt to go anywhere. The destination of your trip will also be subject to change. There are not a lot of baby-friendly activities in South Beach (and they have very sensitive skin). So unless you are going to carry your baby in a pouch like Carlos, and attempt a Hangover reenactment, those last minute trips to Vegas are probably out the window. Here is what they don’t tell you.  The trips aren’t over. They may not be as spontaneous or to the same places, but you will pack your bags, as many as you may need, and you will go on vacation, again. Then you will ask yourself, why they didn’t tell you that the lights of Sin City can’t hold a candle to look on your little one’s face when they see the Magic Kingdom for the first time or the giggle they let out when they experience the cold ocean water running through their little toes on the sand. Those will be the vacations you love the most.

They are right; your late nights out will be numbered. You have a little one depending on you and you can’t exactly leave him/her home alone. So you have to find a babysitter, which isn’t as easy as it sounds. Your heart wasn’t easy to protect when it was inside of you and now it is living and breathing in a tiny human being that requires you for everything. Who are you going to trust with that?  Even if you find a trusted baby whisperer, you are probably going to be a lot more tired than you used to be and you will probably be getting up early the next day, so staying up late won’t be as easy any more. So yes, until they start opening bars with childcare (Note to self: not a bad idea!), your late nights out will be limited. Here is what they don’t tell you. Leaving your baby for the first time and even the second and the third will be one of the hardest things you will do. When you do finally go out, you will miss them, talk about them and wonder what they are doing (I have been told this gets easier and going out becomes a nice break. I will let you know about that when the time comes). So, you may not go out as much, but you will go out and you will get time to be yourself again. What they don’t tell you is that most nights you won’t miss it because the best nights of your life will be those you spend rocking your little one to sleep and they fly by so fast that you won’t want to miss one. The look of those little eyes staring up at you will erase any thought you may have had about wanting to go out and party.

They are right; you probably won’t have as much money to spend on your usual “luxuries.” You likely have the same income, if not less, because someone is home with the baby or you are paying for day care, yet you have a new expense. Remember all those things I told you that you had to pile into a diaper bag? You need those. Plus, on average a newborn baby uses 10-14 diapers, a day. So yes, getting your nails done every week may become a tight squeeze and babies grow fast, so yours is going to need more clothes before you can splurge on expensive shoes. So, things you used to treat yourself to may not happen as often. What they don’t tell you is that your definition of luxuries will change when your priorities change and your priorities will change. As a mother, you will never again think of yourself without thinking of your baby first. With that comes a lot of change, but one of those is that buying yourself a new pair of shoes won’t be nearly as rewarding as buying a tiny pair of sneakers for itty bitty feet that can’t even walk yet. The day one of your manicured nails accidentally scratches that soft baby skin you won’t hesitate to clip them down yourself. Trust me, when you buy your first pair of ruffle bottom baby pants, you will look forward to spending time in the baby section more than you ever did shopping for hand bags and your diaper bag holds twice as much stuff as an expensive purse, anyway.  Plus, no one will be looking at you. Your baby is the cute one now. ;)

They are right; you won’t get much sleep with your new baby waking up during the night. This is my favorite because it implies that you will be going back to your old sleeping habits once your baby sleeps through the night. Yes, there will be a time when your baby doesn’t sleep through the night and you will be up making bottles and rocking them back to sleep (you won’t mind nearly as much as you think). The truth is that you probably won’t get many good nights of sleep for a long time after that. After weeks (or maybe months) of 3 a.m. feedings, you will be begging for the day that they sleep through the night, but what they don’t tell you is that the night that 3:01 a.m. rolls around and you don’t hear a cry, you are not going to lie in bed and relax. You will be thinking, “Why isn’t the baby crying?” You will be rushing to the nursery to make sure nothing is wrong. The baby is probably just sleeping, but you will need to see first hand that he or she is okay. After repeating this, most nights, for a little while, you’ll get used to them sleeping through the night, but by then there will be a new reason to stay up and worry.

Worry. I think that is the number one thing that they forget to tell you about having a baby.  You will never again watch a news story without wondering if that could happen to your baby. Every bomb scare, school shooting, child kidnapping or any national crises will have you rethinking ever letting your baby leave your arms again. You will worry about what the world will be like when it is time for them to go out on their own and you will worry about whether they will be ready.  I can’t really think of an upside to this one, except that in some cases worrying will make you prepared and in all cases it shows that you are a good mother, who loves her child. Your child will fall but that is how they learn to get back up. So whenever possible just remind yourself that you can’t always be the perfect mother, but it doesn’t mean that you aren’t a great one.

So the things people warn expectant mothers about are pretty much true, but there is so much that they don’t say.  Maybe it is because, it impossible to wrap motherhood and its changes into one concise "warning," but there are a lot of things that I think they should tell you.

They should tell you that things that were gross before will suddenly not quite as taboo. When your baby has a runny nose, you won’t hesitate to use your sleeve to clean it (however, it is still completely disgusting to wipe you own nose with your sleeve). Also, there is poop. Your life will suddenly involve a lot of it. You will be able to talk about your baby’s poop with other people and it will seem perfectly normal. In fact, as soon as your baby is born they will start asking you about dirtied diapers and you will have to describe a poop to a pediatrician, at least once (By the way, you will probably wonder, but it is okay to call it “poop” when you are talking to a doctor- they don’t care). If you want to take a glimpse at how much "less gross" things are to moms, there is actually a a product called the "snot sucker." NoseFrida has a hose that you put up the baby's boogie nose and suck on the other end to get the snot out. (Even as a mommy, I think that is gross!)

Also, babies know expensive sunglasses when they see them. I don’t know how or why they feel the need to destroy them but they do and will. You probably only have a few months to enjoy those Chanel glasses before your baby has the motor skills to pull them off of your face.  

You will get peed on, whether you have a baby boy or girl and they will poop in the tub, at least once (told you poop was easier to talk about).

Babies love things that are not toys way more than any toy that you can find. (See expensive sunglasses). You will spend money on educational toys and soft, safe baby things but they will love spoons and paper and anything they generally are not supposed to play with.

If you ever want to watch television again, keep the television remote control out of baby’s reach. Trust me, we have considered just throwing out the TV and starting over rather than trying to decipher which buttons she pushed to make do the things it was doing.

Oh and mommy, things like jumping on a trampoline will become a lot more difficult to do without peeing you pants. This may also apply to things like coughing and sneezing, at first. One time the Giants scored a touchdown and my celebration dance ended with me changing. (Well, look at that! Apparently, peeing yourself also becomes easier to talk about).

You also get mommy super powers. You will have supersonic hearing that allows you to hear your baby cry from a mile away and if that cry happens to be because your little one is hurt, you will suddenly be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound (just like Super Man). Not to mention how many things you will suddenly learn to do one-handed (I have folded laundry with one hand and held baby in the other). 

There are a lot of changes, sacrifices and worrying that comes a long with being a parent, but I don’t know why those are the things people tell new (or soon to be) parents. My baby girl is only a year old and she has kept me up many nights. I have given baths, changed sheets, and washed clothes at 2 a.m. because of a “diaper malfunction.” I have gathered more food off the floor than she has ever eaten. She has broken several pair of sunglasses and I have been peed on more then I want to admit. I have spent countless hours trying to figure out why exactly she was crying and I worry every day…

But I love every single second of being her mommy and I wouldn’t trade it for the world!

So, if they have to wrap it up into one concise statement, the number one thing that people should tell you is, that having a baby is the best thing that you will ever do.