Every mom has a list of things that she wishes she knew before she had kids. Here are mine, the things I wish I knew, this wouldn’t have changed anything in regards to having kids, however I wish I knew how much it would affect and change me. Becoming a mother is something I know I was meant to do. It has defined and made me who I am. However it is has also been the biggest learning and growing experience of my life.
- Growing pains-Not physically but deep down growth as a person, as a mother. Motherhood defines you, it makes you the person you were meant to be, also while breaking you down and then building you back up stronger than before.
- The love you feel is like nothing else you will ever experience-I have truly, deeply loved others, but once my girls were born I felt a love that physically hurt. You feel their pain, you thrive off their joy and you need them as much as they need you.
- Hormones will be crazy!-I hate this part, its so hard to not feel connected to yourself. To not feel in control of your thoughts, emotions and even actions, makes anyone crazy. As time goes on, this lessens, but the memories of the night sweats, crying for no reason, screaming when loosing control of something that never used to even phase me, will always stay with me.
- You will never, ever be the same again-This is a good thing, but I “mourn” the old Sabra. The one who could sleep in as late as she wanted, who didn’t realize how much she had to give or how strong she was. I could go on and on, but you get it. The day I became a mother is the day my second life began.
- You will feel “normal” again-I say “normal” because it’s a new normal. This takes a long time, it doesn’t happen over night, its a slow process and one day you wake up and feel more like yourself. There will be good days and bad days and all of this shapes your new normal.
- Once your baby sleeps through the night, you will not!-I almost don’t remember what it is like to get an uninterrupted, full nights sleep. With two kids under three between pregnancy, night feedings, teething, leaps, its been awhile since I even got 8 hours of sleep total in a night. When your baby starts to sleep through a feeding/waking, your body will still wake you up and wait till the baby wakes. It’s a super fun thing, eventually your body gets used to less sleep, a different sleep pattern, but you will forever miss “normal” sleep until you get it again.
- No matter what you read, it won’t make sense till your baby is here-Before my first was born I read so many books, blog posts (like this one), articles etc., I thought I “got it” and understood what I was reading. I didn’t, nothing can really prepare you for the baby, except when that baby is actually in your arms. Then you go back and try to re-read everything you read and are still totally lost because your baby is not doing any of what the book said!
- One day your child will hurt your feelings, it will hurt and might even make you cry-They know how to push your buttons to the brink of your patience and then can turn around and love you so fiercely it hurts. The day they say or do something that hurts, is another story. Luckily they seem to forgive and forget easier than we do.
- You will miss them after they are in bed-When my husband and I first got back to having a little time alone after the baby went to bed. We often found ourselves looking at pictures and talking about her. It didn’t matter if we fought her for hours to go to bed and were so happy to have a break, we missed her. This still happens, honestly not as much, but it does and we go down a rabbit hole on baby pictures and reminisce of how wonderful our babies are.
- The title mama/mom/mommy does not define you, but you will feel as if it does at times-This one is so so hard for me. So many days, I look back and honestly have no idea what I did, I mean I took care of the babies all day long, they are happy, I’m exhausted but feel as if I did not accomplish anything. Which is the farthest thing from the truth, but its okay to feel that way on the non stop mommy days.
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