angel face
what happens behind the scenes
believe me, i laughed while i was writing the title of this post so know that it is written in jest. it's just that a friend of mine commented on my last post that i seemed to have "mastered motherhood" which made me laugh out loud for about a good ten minutes.
true, all my posts as of late have been all about Isabella, simply because she is my entire life in this moment and these posts are also meant for her to look back on someday, should she choose to. i always want her to know how loved and wanted by her father and i she is but if any of that gives the impression that we have mastered anything, i wish to correct that immediately.
before Bella was born, i was always in awe of parents who had nursery's with cribs and matching bumpers, walls painted with bunnies and butterflies where everything was just perfect. i think about a former boss of mine who had a nursery that was taken straight out of the pages of a Pottery Barn catalog set up and ready to go before she was five months pregnant. these are things back then that made me feel that i would be a bad parent if i ever had children. knowing me, i knew i could never get it together like that and if i couldn't put the perfect nursery together, than how could i compete?
i know now that none of that matters and gorgeous nurseries are just eye candy for parents, however, i admit when i was pregnant with Isabella i felt guilty that she didn't have her own nursery. she shares part of my studio with me and we had wonderful friends lend us things like her bassinet, bathtub, etc. however, we don't have a crib for her and aren't sure when, or if, we will get one. Reason being that we love having her in our room with us snuggled closely.
now that she is here and i am experiencing motherhood firsthand, i wonder if we would even use a nursery for her, we have kind of approached parenting in a "try it and see" kind of way. meaning that sometimes i feed her on the couch in the living room, sometimes in our bed, wherever works. we roll the bassinet from room to room depending on where we are, but have discovered she sleeps better, and longer, in bed snuggled with us so that is where she is most nights now. we do change her diapers on her changing table, but she gets swaddled anywhere there is an open space. which, by the state of chaos our place is currently in means searching hard for an open space in which to swaddle.
i think of my former boss who did all these things, with grace, style and perfect hair all in her baby's beautiful nursery while i snuggle Bella on the couch with my feet up on one of our dining room chairs watching an old episode of Sex and the City and wondering how long it's actually been since i have had a shower and guiltily waiting for her to go to sleep so i can sneak into the bathroom to brush my teeth.
i have also been wearing the same clothes pajamas
since Monday. i attend an amazing breast-feeding support group so i
don't give into the frustrations that sometimes occur at 4:00 am when
she is crying and i am tempted to give her formula to satisfy her and
say to hell with breast-feeding.
this is just to say that although we are showering this little girl with oodles of love, snuggles, kisses and off key lullabies, which i know is what is most important, we are two dog-tired, tag-teaming parents who when she projectiled yellow baby poop all over herself, us, the walls and her changing table the other evening burst into laughter at the sheer comedy of it all.
i have mastered nothing. i am just a new mother doing the best i can, enjoying the hell out of my daughter and learning what works, and what doesn't, along the way.
