What is happening in our relationship

The baby is now 8 weeks old and one kilo heavier than when she was born. It's amazing to watch how the face and body changes as well as the whole being of a small human. We saw the first smile a few days ago. How can such a thing turn your heart in a knot. To feel for that short moment so important to another, her within the look in her eyes, giving me a smile. Nothing has ever felt the same. It's unbelievable to experience all this jot of motherhood. Although I always knew that I wanted to be a mother, I had no idea of what that meant. Motherhood, the word only has a meaning once you yourself are a mother to another.

That small child is so totaly dependent on me. It's odd to be so important to someone, so infinitely important.

I wanted to write a blog about these feelings, because I think otherwise they will be forgotten and taken for granted.

When I look at my baby and admire her small fingers, everything about her is so perfect. The small nose snivels, the mouth clicks, and the arms wave about uncontrollably. She clearly recognizes my voice and can best be calmed when crying in my or her father's lap. At the same time, all this is so hellishly heavy and the world's most wonderful thing. How can one love something this much. Earlier, when I saw mothers with their babies, I didn't know anything about how that actually feels. That feeling when you carry a small sleeping baby in your arms, your own happiness, your own love, it's something so unbelievably wonderful! You just want to kiss its head while walking and all the time there's a highly euphoric feeling that it is mine and no one can take it away from me. My baby is my everything. Even though some days I lose my nerves with all the screaming and crying, that's all forgotten once she finally calms down.

Penny is an enormously strong baby. A big girl at 57 cm and 5.3 kg at week 7. She holds up her own head and has been doing that almost since she was a few weeks old. She likes to be held and close.  Penny sleeps during all car trips and the funniest thing is when she laughs in her sleep. Mom and dad noted that while calming her, what, is she laughing. Penny is really expressive and often I burst out laughing whan I watch her twisting and struggle to poop. It's amusing that I turned out to be such a softy, and Stuart as well. We're both sold on this little thing. Penny is our everything.

Foto by Jamie Gilmore StudioDC3

Happy girls

Our house is being built at the other end of our property. Right now my dad is here on vacation and helping out with the construction. We've now decided to enlarge the house a lot. Half of the house is almost ready and now our bedroom side is being built. Stuart is working 14-hour days and spending all his free time at the construction site. I'm keeping our home running, taking care of food and the mountain of laundry. That's how the weeks run by as our little family grows stronger. It's lovely to follow Stuart's nesting process, how he's proudly building a nest for our girl. Taking all kinds of little things into account, which corner needs to be just so and how the concrete should circle the house so that little Penny can then ride her bike around it. How can a man go through such a change from never wanting children to someone who says that this isn't so bad, maybe we should try for a second one...apparently mother nature has just arranged things like this. You can't buy or build the instinct to care, it comes by itself when it's time. Stuart turns out to be a  complete softy. He is so in love with his little girl. Always taking her into his lap when he comes home from work, and only then remembering to give me a kiss. He takes Penny on his shoulder and carries her all evening until it's time to go to bed. It was wonderful to say to him Happy Father's Day, my love.

At Bunnings. My outfit Muotiputiikki Helmi

My hoodie Disturb.fi Yakuza 

I've healed well from the operation. The wound can barely be seen and my stomach has almost completely recovered. I feel a bit like a stranger in my own body, which is not the same anymore. Although there's not a lot of time to spend on my own looks, which is actually quite a relief. I've always suffered from some sort of eating disorders and hated my self image. Now I feel that I'm finally getting rid of those thoughts. While breastfeeding my daughter, it never crosses my mind how much I don't like myself. I'm actually quite an awesome chick although my body isn't up to model standards and my waist isn't as narrow as it used to be. I'm more ok with myself than in years. I'm not saying my body is exactly as I would like it to be right now, but I like myself as I am as a person. I don't think that I'll ever be completely satisfied with my body. No one is perfect and in the end, what defines perfection and why one should even be that.

I'm getting a lot if support from my friends here and that feels immensely important. I feel that I'm very loved and important, as well as my daughter.

Penny went to a doctor to have her tongue tie cut. I've had the same thing done back in the day. It was shocking to watch the operation and and see how much blood came from her mouth. She is just so horribly tiny and dear. It was awful to watch her in such pain. Finally she calmed down to eat and sleep. Apparently she's healed very quickly. Having a too short tendon affects many things, so it's taken care of here already at a very young age.

Some days the situation is completely different and I feel like I can't get anything done and the whole place is almost full of halfway started projects, dishes, laundry, vacuuming, and me on the way to the shower half naked for the fifth hour running...Penny swallows a lot of air when eating and those days she is very demanding and heavy company. That's when I slightly struggle to cope. I wouldn't want to complain with a"miracle baby", after having been deemed childless and now I should cheer, but I'm just not up to it. And then I think that I have only one baby, many have several kids etc. I feel like a loser piece of shit. I'm tearful because I'm so tired and I don't seem to be able to help my screaming child and I don't want her to cry alone and fall asleep in tears. Definitely not. I feel I shouldn't complain but it feels like everything is just so difficult...Then in the evening the baby all of a sudden looks me straight in the eyes and smiles, and all the painful hours of the day are washed away.

It's extremely frustrating that there isn't an instruction book for babies. You begin to respect every mother in a totally different way. So unbelievably strenuous even with just one baby, alone with many children. I humbly raise my hat to you all. Wow, some days I'm so broken that I don't know how I'll make it through to tomorrow, let alone many more months and years...It came as a complete surprise to me how incredibly tiring everyday life with a baby is. I probably sound annoyingly stupid writing this blog, but I was completely ignorant of everything that this is in reality. Anything that I was, suddenly I'm not anymore and I've become a home slave. I laughed at my mom when she said that years ago and me and my brother were amused. Well that came back to bite me.

Becoming a parent truly comes through growing. I could never have known how proud and possessive you feel about your own child. I'm so infinitely happy and blessed in this amount of love. I wanted to write this blog in these baby fumes, so I will never forget these feelings. Not even when it's more difficult with her, or even when she's a teenager. It's really important to remind oneself what a huge gift your own child us, no matter how annoying they might be at times. Family is everything, every parent tries their best.

Translated from the original Finnish text by Stiina Rasimus-Sahari