Age 24; Pregnancies 2; Births 1; 8 months post partum
There are too many days I wake up to my 8 month old daughter talking to herself in her pack and play at 5 am. When I look in, she sees me and her face lights up with joy; I can’t help but pick her up, put her in my husband and my bed, and pray for just 30 minutes more sleep. What I get, rather, is my hair pulled and kicked in the tummy. Between my daughter, our two dogs, my husband and me, our queen sized bed fills up pretty quickly. I roll out of our bed, pick her up, and we start our day. The days I don’t have to work, I immediately get thrown into a whorl-wind adventure of dirty diapers, sweet potato and peas, and of course chasing our golden retriever around, attempting to get the socks he has stock piled somewhere in our tiny apartment. Those days, I’m lucky to get a shower, let alone put make up on. On the days I work, I quickly get the two of us ready, and shuffle off to drop her off at her babysitters before I rush off to work, hoping to get coffee so I can stay awake throughout the day. Every day I wish I could sleep in until 12, take a 30 minute shower, put make up on and do my hair (in other than a pony tail that looks like I didn’t brush it), but those days are long gone. But would I change it? Absolutely not, because my daughter’s smile brings me more joy than not looking like I’ve just rolled out of bed ever has. Am I embarrassed of how I look: every day? Thank goodness my body bounced back pretty quickly (minus my breasts, which now hang somewhere by my belly button), or I think I may be completely devastated.
My lack of fashion isn’t the only area of my life to be drastically different. The complete aloneness I feel from the people I used to call friends is becoming more and more apparent to me. Being a mother and a young adult sometimes do conflict, but I wasn’t aware that also included the people who were once around me. I suppose our priorities do differ drastically, but I never imagined that people I were so close to would have never met my daughter in her 8 months of life. Hopefully there will be a day when that changes, but until then, my husband has always been my best friend anyways. Thank the universe for him.
So I’ll go home this evening, fix my daughter her favorite meal of spinach, apples, rutabagas and cereal, feed it to her while I’m in my pajamas, and go to bed at an early 8 pm. I’ll wonder if there’s ever going to be a time again when I have time to look decent when going out, or if I’ll ever have a best friend to call my own, knowing both are probably not going to happen any time soon. I’ll kiss my gorgeous daughter goodnight, put her favorite pink hippo in her arms, and tuck her in. Fight with the dogs for space on my growing smaller by the minute bed, and get ready to take it all on again tomorrow.