Number two. Breastfeeding is super hard. If you guys followed me when I was breastfeeding, you know,I hated it more than anything in the whole entire world. It was painful for me. Max had tongue-tied, which made it super hard. I ended up being allergic to breastfeeding. I just didn’t like it. It’spainful. People don’t tell you how truly, truly painful it is. I feel like you’re like, oh, it’s beautiful. It’s so natural. They don’t tell you that. Even my lactation consultant at the hospital was like, Oh yeah, like it’s great. It doesn’t hurt at all. Girl, have you ever breastfed? I don’t think so because ouch…
Number three, newborns don’t stick. I truly do not remember,the first six to nine weeks that Max was born. Because it was just so much going on. I didn’t truly soak in those moments. I wish I had written more down in those first, like, six to nine weeks because I feel like so much happens then. And I have no idea what happened.
Number Four formula is not the end of the world. Max had to take formula a few times. I was able to keep up breastfeeding, but I remember when Max was born thinking, I am not gonna use formula, like, I’m not doing it. It’s fine. You’re keeping your baby fed and healthy. And just there are so many things that as a mom, I look at other people and I’m like, do you judge somebody? Like, they’re literally keeping their baby alive. I feel like that’s the best thing you can do.
Number five. Bye bye sleep. Yeah. You can pretty much goodbye to sleep for the rest of your life, for the next eighteen years. Max didn’t sleep for the night till he was eighteen months old. He still can’t sleep through the night. I still got bags, but I use a very special eye cream that puts those babies right back where they should be.
Number six, breast milk stinks. It’s sticky. It stinks. Don’t let it spoil under your couch. Make sure you know where your bottles are at all times.
Number seven. Bouncing back rarely happens. That’s okay. I was lucky enough to be breastfeeding like a cow, and I lost a lot of weight, I know some people don’t lose weight when they’re breastfeeding, but I did. I lost all my baby weight in like six weeks, but My skin was not back to normal. It was not tight. And that’s okay. It’s still not. I’m working on it. But just be proud of your body and everything that it did because, yeah, it stretched but is stretched to create a beautiful life, and that’s amazing.
Number eight. Find mom friends. I had very few mom friends through my pregnancy until I started this blog and I had thousands. It’s so nice to be able to ask people questions and not be judged, so find the right mom friends, because mom friends can be judgy. So find some good mom friends. I should’ve added that.
Number nine, it’s okay to say no. It’s okay to say no to going out with friends. It’s okay to say no to people touching your baby. It’s okay to say no to your personal choices. You are your child’s mother and nobody is a better mom for your baby.
Number ten, Co-sleeping won’t send you to hell, but being hateful will. There are so many things that our personal choices as a mom. Co-sleeping for me was one of them. It was just me and Max. We have the DockATot. We still have the big one. We just got the grand, and we love it. He calls it his Lulu. Don’t know where that came from. But, yeah, it’s not gonna kill you. I know there are sleep studies. Just be smart. Be careful. Be a good mom. That’s really it. It’s really not that hard. Just make your own choices and if you don’t like somebody else’s, move off with your day. It’s not that hard.
Number eleven. Babies are very very, very, very messy. It was really hard for me to, like, accept that. I couldn’t wear white t shirts for a really long time. I pretty much still can’t wear white t-shirts, unless I’m alone because Max makes a mess. And that’s okay. Invest in a time to go pen. You’ll be good.
Number twelve. Spit-up stinks worse than breast milk. Wow. I literally, the first time Max ever spit up, I was like, oh, that is rank. I used Dappell’s cleaning spray, and y’all that is by far the best product. It’s great for getting breast milk out of bottles. It’s the only thing that really ever cleaned all of the breast milk residues and milk in general off of my bottles. So I’ll put a link down below for you in case you need to shop it. t-shirts
Number thirteen. Invest in your baby products. Babies are expensive. I understand that. But there’s a reason some products are more expensive than others. It’s because they truly work. DockATot. Yeah. An investment, but he slept in his little one from the time he was born to the time he was sixteen months. And now he’s in this one and he’s two years old. I’m getting better sleep at night. He has his own personal space. He’s not kicking me in the throat in the middle of the night. For me, that’s a win.
Number fourteen. TV is okay. My child’s currently watching YouTube just so I can get work done. It’s okay. He’s not dead. He’s doing fine. He’s pretty freaking smart. His doctor said he’s way up on the chart for intelligence. I don’t know where he got that from, but not me, definitely not his dad. So it must be for my mom.
Number sixteen. The terrible twos, start at one. I swear Max turned one, and that little diva came out of his shell. He was like, no, no, no, mama, no, no. No, no. Okay.
Number seventeen. Your kids are always always listening. Be smart. One of Max’s first things he said was oh shit.
Number eighteen. They always listen and they always repeat.
Number nineteen. Once they walk, game over. I remember being like, oh, Max walk walk walk. That boy started walking and I was like, can you please just sit down for five seconds? But on the flip side….
Number twenty. Tag is all fun, and they can really only do that when they can walk and run. So it’s a win-win or I guess win lose, whatever.
Number twenty-one. Baby photos are hard. Getting your kid to pose for pictures is tough. I’m waiting for this no, no, no phase to stop and then him going back to being like mommy’s perfect little angel and he’s like, whatever you want, mommy. I’ve got it. Still waiting.
Number twenty two, spoil your baby. I’m gonna get so much hate for this, but I truly believe kids are meant to be spoiled by their grandparents, and by their parents, and that’s not just financially. It’s not with materials. Swaddle them with your love. Like, spend as much time as you can with them. I think for me taking this job and working a lot. I have appreciated the little bit of time that I actually get with Max so much more because don’t get to see him. I miss him during the day. I feel like I’m missing out on so much. So every spare second I get with him, like, I just want him in my lap. I tried to put him in my lap for this video Homey said no, but whatever.
Number twenty-three. They grow faster as they get older. I have learned this. I do think the first six to nine weeks are probably the fastest he developed, but I’ve noticed that as he gets older, he’s growing so much more because he’s learning so many more new things each day. He can learn a lot more now that
his brain’s more developed as when he was a baby, like, okay, yeah, he said, blah, blah. Cool. Now he’s freaking Zane full-on sentences. You can say octopus and animals and shark. I mean, the kid’s vocabulary is extensive. It’s insane. Right. So without further ado,
Number twenty-four. You will never love anything or anyone more in this world than your kids. I don’t know how I’m gonna feel when I have a second child one day, but I cannot imagine having so much love for more than one person because, I mean, that kid is my whole heart. Even when he is a jerk, I still look at him and I’m like, God, it’s a good thing God made you cute because I really do think he made him cute,
so you wouldn’t kill him. I just look at this kid and I just cry. I’m like, how did I get so lucky to have the cutest, most well-behaved, loving child out there? I mean, every parent feels like this, but I don’t know.
Being a mom is the coolest thing I’ve ever done in my whole entire life. It’s the hardest thing and sometimes I think what can I get myself into? How am I surviving? But you know what? I did it. I freaking did it for two whole years. And I know that there are like two hundred more to go. But I feel like if I got through these, I can get through so many more and I know you can too.
