you know you’re a new mama when…

It’s probably no surprise to experienced mums that you have to give up a lot of things when you become a mama, including a few showers, full meals, and a good night’s sleep. Among the many joys of parenthood, there is always that list of things you swore up and down you’d never do, but somehow in the search for some balance, you find yourself doing anyways. I remember going out to dinner when Emily was 8 days old and when I went to the bathroom 3/4 of the way through, I noticed spit up on my shoulder and milk leakage on my (black) shirt. Yay.

There’s a learning curve to parenthood, and here are the things I found myself doing along the way. I have a feeling most of them are familiar to a lot of mama’s out there, but one or two of them may be allllll me.

You know you’re mama to a new baby when…

1. You’ve gone to the bathroom while babywearing your child.

2. You’ve gone to the bathroom while nursing your child. (maybe just me)

3. You’ve lost track of the day (and what month is this anyway?).

4. The pressure from the seatbelt of your car has caused immense leakage, on your way TO the store to buy more breastpads.

5. You need to add breast milk to thin some mashed banana and don’t have any thawed so you hand express milk, directly into the bowl. (again, maybe just me!)

6. You’ve fallen asleep while sitting on the couch nursing once or twice (mouth open and drooling from exhaustion of course).

7. You’ve mastered catching sneezes, throw up and drool with your hand.

8. That piece of fruit or mum-mum your baby just drooled all over? You ate it when she was done.

9. You’ve woken up in the middle of the night searching the bed covers or sitting up thinking the baby is nursing but can’t find them and panic until you realize they’re safe in their crib.

10. You hear phantom cries every time you step in the shower yourself the first few weeks (months?) and jump out to find them sleeping or cooing.

11. Cleaning sprayed breast milk off the screen of your laptop has become part of your normal routine.

12. Your baby FINALLY sleeps more than 3 hours and eventually, through the night, and each time they get a bit more sleep you don’t, because you’re checking to make sure they’re still breathing.

13. The first time they get a fever, a sniffle or a goopy eye, you’re checking your books and webMD for all of the horrible things that could be wrong with your baby.

14. You’ve waited an appropriate amount of time after they’ve pooped before changing their bum and they still manage to keep pooping, and pooping, and pooping (and pooping!) while you try and swap out dirty but not worn diapers under their bum.

15. You spend half of your time loving it as they get a bit older, sleep a little longer and learn to play and interact a little more, and half your time missing the teeny tiny, slept-a-lot-more-than-you-thought baby you gave birth to.