One year of motherhood
Hello there, mommas and papas. Thanks for tuning in again :)
I can’t believe that a year has passed - it is incredible that my anniversary as a mom (and of course Sam’s birthday) and mothers’ day fall so close together and I get to celebrate both occasions.
Sam was born on the 30th of May last year, on that day I was reborn as a mother. And today I celebrate my first Mothers’ Day with Samuel, and I am very excited. Today I want to share with you some ups and downs of this journey. Coming so close to that year mark feels like the ending of a cycle and the start of a whole new phase for myself and my family.
The importance of vitamin D for newborns and new mothers
For newborns, Vitamin D is needed to support healthy bone development and to prevent rickets, a condition that causes weak or deformed bones. Vitamin D deficiency rickets among breastfed infants is rare, but it can occur if an infant does not receive additional vitamin D from foods, a vitamin D supplement, or adequate exposure to sunlight. I am in favor of supplementing whenever the natural vitamin source isn’t available, but getting enough sun exposure is the best way for me and Sam to absorb vitamin D, so we were out in the sun as much as we could.
For new moms, vitamin D is not only important for calcium absorption, but also for hormonal balance. The drastic hormonal changes after pregnancy collaborate for the onset of mood swings and postpartum depression in many new mothers, justifying the increased interest in the relationship between vitamin D and postpartum depression.
Thankfully, despite the social isolation, the opportunity to enjoy longer and warmer days helped me to cope with the symptoms of puerperium and the challenges of learning how to raise a newborn.
The tough 4th trimester
Most people close to me advised regarding how tough the 4th trimester is. For those unfamiliar with the term, the 4th trimester refers to the first 3 months of life of the baby after birth. We believe that babies are born still underdeveloped, and that birth happens around the 40th gestational week basically because the baby would be too big to pass the birth canal if nature waited longer. Because of this, newborns are still super dependent on their mothers. They should be in close contact with their moms most of the time, hence the need for a lot of skin-to-skin contact and nursing. This goes on for three months.
For me, this was the most amazing and at the same time challenging period of my life. To situate you, last year in May we were in complete pandemic lock-down, and we did not receive any visitors (friends or family) and had to learn how to care for a newborn completely on our own. Tiredness soon hit us and we were on each others’ nerves.
On the bright side, Samuel was doing great. This baby was thriving. I am still not sure how we did, but we did. We were able to manage parenthood pretty well. We were also lucky that he was born in the summer and as soon as we both felt ready we were out and about enjoying the sunshine. And let me talk a bit more about how important this was for his development and my recovery.
The fruits of a healthy pre-pregnancy and prenatal choices
Another thing that I noticed right away is that I had a fairly easy recovery from birth which makes me believe that the choices I made before and during pregnancy had a great influence on my health after birth. Since before I decided to become a mom I was in the pursuit of a healthier lifestyle, by consciously eliminating toxic food items and environmental toxins. I did not do anything super complex other than adhering to a vegetarian diet based on fresh whole food items. I also started to buy more organic products from personal hygiene items to home cleaning products. I continued to exercise throughout pregnancy, modifying my workouts to accommodate my pregnancy needs.
As a result, during pregnancy, I had few discomforts and gained little weight - which came off almost right after I gave birth to Samuel.
After birth, I completely laid down for about 2 weeks to give my body enough time to heal. Although I did not feel any pain, I felt a lot of discomfort and soreness, especially on my pelvis. After the second week postpartum I started to go out for walks with Samuel, which I think we both enjoyed a lot. I did not need any pain medication or laxatives (thankfully I did not have to deal with constipation or hemorrhoids). I continued to take my prenatals and fuelled in iron-rich foods to support milk production.
I believe my diet influenced Samuel’s health as well, as he never developed colic or any other illness or discomforts usually felt by newborns. He was exclusively breastfed and started to gain weight right after my milk supply was established.
I may have no scientific basis to support my thesis here, but from experience all the choices I made for healthier food items, products, and constantly exercising helped both myself and my baby thrive during pregnancy and postpartum.
Breastfeeding: the untold truths
That breastmilk is important everyone knows. Every pregnant woman is told how important breastfeeding is for nourishing the baby and promoting healthy growth and development. Breastfeeding is also a bonding opportunity for mom and her child, and there are benefits for mothers as well. Breastfeeding will help the body to heal and the release of oxytocin during nursing helps to combat baby blues, mood swings and depression. As the mother breastfeeds the body recovers more quickly from labor and the energy burnt to make breast milk helps the mother return to her pre-pregnancy weight. All that are more than great reasons to breastfeed, but the truth is: breastfeeding is hard. The baby doesn’t know how to latch on the breast, and poor latching can hurt (a lot). The baby will cluster feed, and it will feel like all you do is to feed your baby day and night. This is extremely tiring. It can also be super frustrating, because most of us are not told that this isn’t a natural process, that it can take time for both mom and baby to learn how to do it. We expect that our babies will know how to do it right out of the womb, and when this doesn’t happen we get frustrated. Sam was good at latching, I think I was lucky to have people around me that alerted me that this process could be harder than what we are told, and I had the chance to inform myself and learn what to expect. And even for me it was challenging.
Feeding another human being is hard work, especially during these first few months. The energy your body needs to make milk is so great that I was feeling tired and hungry all the time. Top that with lack of sleep and you can imagine how drained I was feeling. I can only feel for women who have hard time nursing and I understand why they chose to bottle feed or switch to formula. Breastfeeding is hard (yes, I am saying it again).
Thankfully, for me any hardships were outnumbered by the benefits of seeing my baby thriving. I was also able to share an uncountable number of bonding, nourishing moments with Samuel. Moments that no one else could share. I love breastfeeding and I am still doing it a year after.
Puerperium after the 4th trimester
Whenever someone tells you that all you need to recover from childbirth are 40 days, please do not believe it. Each one of us is different and each body will respond in its own way. For me, the blues and anxiety stroke after the third month postpartum. And I believe this is because I still had a lot of energy reserves on me for the first 3 months. Also, we were both so in love with Sam and excited about our new lives that we could not notice the tiredness and stress building up. But after a few months of baby care, sleepless nights, breastfeeding, and isolation the anxiety and the loneliness struck us. I believe that for us, the period between the 4th and 7th months postpartum was the hardest one.
Remember that just like today, we were still self-isolating because of the Covid-19 pandemic. So we were not seeing anyone else for almost 7 or 8 months, and looking back that doesn’t seem like a huge amount of time, but we had few people to share our fears, troubles and simply socialize. So we were lonely, stressed, and tired. The loving phase from the first 3 months winding down and it felt like we could not stand each other anymore. My husband and I were doing couples therapy and trying to keep the marriage together. It was hard, but we pulled it off (thankfully!).
Sam had so many milestones during that time, he started to smile at us, sitting and playing more with us. He also had his first two teeth. We spent our first Christmas as a family of 3. Although we are not religious we love Christmas time and the whole rituals surrounding it from cooking, cheering each other, and exchanging gifts. Those cheerful moments helped us move through what seemed like the toughest phases of new parenthood for us.
The light at the end of the tunnel
It is Mother’s Day, which means Samuel is almost one year old. I don’t want to sound cliche, but this year has passed so fast! It is like the days were long and tiring, but looking back it feels like yesterday that I welcomed our newborn to our lives. He is more independent now, playing and roam around the house by himself. I am feeding him mostly solids and he needs breast milk less and less each day.
It is wonderful to see how he grew from a being that did not have any idea it was even human (and separated from myself) to a little person with his own wishes and personality in so little time.
I am not going to tell you it is less work, but that the workload shifts. While now he doesn’t need to be held and breastfed as much, he asks for more playtime and attention. He knows more what he wants and when he wants. It is fun to be able to interact with him and see how he responds to different stimuli. And I believe that is one of the beauties of motherhood. Although I still feel tired most of the time, mothering gives fulfillment a whole different meaning. Because of Samuel, I was able to find my way in my nutrition journey and start my own practice. I found meaning in what I choose to do for a living. My willingness to share my experience as a new mother and help others like me to thrive and find balance is all thanks to this little human being.
I know that this article got a little bit somber, but I could not write about my experience and how I feel about motherhood without mentioning the lows as much as the ups of my journey. Today I know that I am not the same person that started this journey, and I will never be. I am more knowledgeable about myself, I have more focus when it comes to my work and I have a whole different view of how my choices impact my relationships and the world. I learned to love my new self and I am looking forward to knowing the person I am still maturing to become.
Thank you for reading. I hope my experience can bring light to your life as well :)
As always, if you need any help adjusting to the challenges of fertility, prenatal or motherhood let’s connect. I will love to learn more about you.