Last week Isabella was 6 months old and it's left me feeling rather sentimental to the extent that I upgraded my phone and I was feeling really rather sad about giving up my old one.It may sound like a pretty silly thing to be sad about but it had been my constant companion through my pregnancy, Isabella's birth and beyond.
It kept me company when I spent the majority of my pregnancy gripped by bad morning (noon and night) sickness and spent countless hours sitting on the toilet floor either waiting to spew or for the nausea to pass. It helped me stay awake during every night feed when ever bone in my body was aching with weariness and I just wanted to sleep. Got me the right information when I couldn't get Isabella to latch on properly and I was fighting her for a week and was so knackered I couldn't remember what the right way to do it anyway. It provided a lifeline, a small connection to the outside world when I was spending almost all my time breastfeeding and felt like I was glued to the sofa.
Being a new mum can be an incredibly isolating experience your life changes completely over night: you have a beautiful, awe-inspiring new person who is completely dependent on you and it's the hardest work you've ever done on a smaller amount of sleep than you've ever considered possible. It's suddenly hard to leave the house both because there was so much stuff to take with you and I became incredibly anxious about even the smallest things and stressed when I couldn't settle her while we were out and about. I spent most of my time at home, feeding and not able to go very far - I couldn't go on my computer and I couldn't read while feeding (a skill I've now developed) and I probably didn't have the excess brain power as I seemed to almost get a fog on the brain while feeding so my phone became my main source of information, entertainment and my connection to the world outside
It's all different now she's bigger, bonnier and coming out of tiny babyhood and I don't feel anxious about taking her outside any more and I can read a book and breastfeed -even if I still feel like I've got a bit of brain fog - and she mostly sleeps through the night. So I'm a wee bit sad to be giving up a friend that helped me through an amazing but hard time but glad to be out the other side where it's a wee bit easier and more fun and wondering where the hell the past 6 months went.
aww, this was a lovely post to read lori, you've got a nice way with words. happy half birthday to isabella :)
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