Recovering From Having a Baby

If I have any regular readers, I have to thank you all so much for your patience. It has been way too long since I posted and the truth is, nobody wants to read mostly about my weight-loss (or lack, thereof, ha, let’s be honest, here).

My son just turned 11mo old. Anyone ever heard the rumor that it takes 6wks to recover from having a baby? HA! Yeah right. It might take 6wks to get over the immediate post-partum period but in all honesty, it takes about a year to really work out all the kinks. I was told this by someone before I had my first child but the reality of that truth didn’t really hit home until I gave birth to my 2nd child. Now that my 3rd child is nearing his first birthday (already!?!?!), I’m a firm believer. It is only now that I really feel like we’re settling in to being a family of six.

I guess I should back up and explain how it is that with three children, we’re a family of six. My husband and I live with his mother. This situation came about a little over a year ago so not only have we been adjusting to the birth of a new child, really, we’ve been adjusting to an entirely new family unit. It’s been quite an experience! We moved here just a few months before Ethan was born. It’s been crazy, difficult, fun, and exhausting.

Yeah, so, six weeks? HAHAHA! Maybe if the only thing recovering from giving birth is my girly bits. But since the entire family has to “recover” and adjust from the birth, it has taken much longer. I’ve got two little girls adjusting in their roles as “big sister”. I mean, for Morgan, I admit it’s kind of old hat. For one thing she adores being a big sister and for another, she’s used to it! I do think, though, that it was a bit difficult for her to adjust to me having even less time to spend on JUST her, though. Not only that but she started kindergarten right after her baby brother was born and that’s a whole new world in and of itself.

Abigail has had to adjust to no longer being “the baby”. She has done very well with this but her struggle has shown up in little ways. I talked about one of them in a previous post. She adores her baby brother, though, sometimes more enthusiastically than he really appreciates, hehe.

Me? Well it’s all been a huge adjustment for me. First there was the fact that I was SO not planning to be having a baby so in some ways, his birth was kind of a shock. Then I’ve spent most of this past year trying to really BELIEVE that there is another baby! And what a lovely surprise he’s been! I’ve finally stopped answering the question, “How many do you have?” with “Two-I mean-THREE!”. Not only that but I’ve had to adjust to caring for him and nurturing him in different ways than I had grown accustomed to with my girls. AND I had to do this all while learning to live in harmony with someone I have “history” with. Fun times! But it’s working. It’s working and my children are thriving and things are starting to really roll along.

My MIL not only had to adjust to having an entire family move in with her after living by herself for over a decade (and crazy, hugely pregnant me), but then there was a tiny little baby, too! It’s really only been in the last couple of weeks that things have started to settle down and our new family is really starting to feel comfortable together. I haven’t talked much about what an enormous sacrifice having us all live here has been for her but she has made it and continues to make it, as graciously as she can. We are so grateful for her perseverance with us on that score, let me assure you!

My husband has had to deal with watching his plans fall to pieces, an unexpected pregnancy, moving in with his mother (lots of history there!), finding a new job, attending school full-time and of course, being a father to three children and a husband to a slightly-less-than-sane woman . How he does it is beyond me. There was a long time there when neither one of us was sure what was going to happen. Was everything going to fall apart? How were we ever going to get through this?

I think I finally began to believe that things were going to be ok last week, when my oldest daughter, totally out of the blue, paused and said to me, “Momma? I like living here. I don’t want to move anymore.”

So now you know why my blog has been kind of sketchy, lately. There is just so much going on and Little Man has only just begun settling into a loosely reliable routine during the day. We just moved him out of our room and across the hall. I tell you, it’s almost like being newlyweds, having the room to ourselves for the first time in almost 6yrs! I’m still trying to figure out how to blog reliably while juggling three kids 6yrs old and under (well, almost 6-next month!) while dh works and is a full-time student. The truth is that my goal is to eventually have a successful blog that brings in a little income to supplement my husband’s hard work. This would allow me to stay home with my children a little longer. These two goals (staying home with my children while supplementing our income) are very, very important to me. But good GRIEF is it time consuming! I’ve had to adjust all of my expectations and I have to admit, it’s been far more challenging to fit it in than I ever appreciated before. I’m having a lot of fun, though, and learning a lot. So I hope you keep coming back while I get my feet under me. You guys help keep me (mostly) sane and I appreciate each and every one of you.