For my first blog post, I thought it would be appropriate to try to describe the point of life into which I have recently stumbled. The nature of the way I write is most probably quite similar to the way I parent – an often long winded trial and error process. A struggle to make immediate sense of things, but an overall feeling of certainty in my thoughts and actions. So please bear with my witterings, I usually get there in the end.
The recent sunny weather has got me thinking. I can’t help the comparisons between this year and last year. I really feel like the sun is giving me a new lease of life. I didn’t have time to stop and enjoy last summer so I’m appreciating the warm rays all the more this time round.
This time last year I was in my first trimester of pregnancy. I make no secret of the fact that I hated pregnancy. Well, not the actually being pregnant part, because there is a lot to appreciate there. But rather the circumstances and stresses surrounding my pregnancy. The big questions: Where are we going to live? What will I do about work? How on earth will we get by?? Not to mention the constant worry that comes with the territory. Is this normal? Will my scan be ok? How on earth am I going to manage to expel this watermelon sized thing from down there?? I could not stand all the attention, and answering the same questions over and over again for every friend I hadn’t seen since being pregnant….I won’t go on.
Someone asked me a question recently; What’s it like being a mum? How do I sum it up? It’s not like anything. It’s life to me now. It’s feeling like you’ve done nothing all day when actually you’ve been doing everything. My baby brain desparately tried to form a coherent response to this question, but there was nothing, no words to describe the completness of this ‘everything’. My eventual reply, ‘Yeah,it’s….good’.
Last year was all about the big things. Big uncertainties and big bellys. This year is all about the little things. A typical day on maternity leave can feel like a drudge of monotony and routine, but then somewhere within the drudge emerges light. That first little smile that definitely wasn’t wind, a new noise or giggle I haven’t heard before. Simple appreciations in mundane tasks like hanging the washing outside with Arlo’s bare little toes wriggling in the sun. A sudden moment of quiet that causes me to look up at Arlo to find he’s stopped what he was doing to smile at me, or stare thoughtfully like he’s figured out a new facet of our relationship and what mum means to him. Or the pleasure in his eyes when I lean in to kiss his cheek. This year is all about the biggest and most important little thing of all.
12 comments
The little things really are amazing 🙂 you can be having the worst day and they do something cute and makes everything better 🙂
Ahhhh I have visions of tiny toes kicking outdoors on a sunny day now 🙂
(which is far better than the dreary rainy night outside my window) x
I’m with you on the dreariness. I wrote that post just as Spring was getting warmer and we had those lovely hot days in April. I’m no good in winter, everything’s brighter in summer. Already counting down the days!
Ahhh lovely first post, I have to say that I loved being pregnant, in fact I miss it! But I know what you mean about the worrying, I couldn’t have got pregnant at a worst time – me and Dad2BabyInsomniac were on a break so he could go travelling! And I was the same with worrying about something going wrong, i can remember trying to get my midwife to make me feel better but she just said that things can go wrong at any point in the pregnancy, umm thanks for that! But it is all worth it when you meet the little baby that you have been carrying 🙂 x
Now that I know that having a baby isn’t the worse thing in the world (in fact, quite the opposite!), I will be much happier in pregnancy second time
round.
lovely first post
Thank you. I am rather fond of that post, reminds me of the best bits of that first year.
Oh what a lovely first post. Makes me want to sneak to where my little ones are sneaking and kiss them on the cheek x
Thank you. I like retreading my first post. It still holds true and sums up the best bits of that first year of motherhood for me.