After birthing other humans you understand why women through history always died in childbirth. It’s an exhausting, often brutal and gruesome affair, no doubt. Thankfully, with modern medicine, women today are stitched up good as new and parenting commences.

I have issues with stitches. I think it stems from the time my sister fell off the bed and cut her head on the edge of the dresser when we were kids. She had to have four stitches in her head. I couldn’t even look at them. I had to sit on the other side of her in the car on the way to church the next day so I wouldn’t be near the dark blue stitches. The doctor used blue thread.  She smelled like apple juice after leaving the emergency room. While I was genuinely concerned for her welfare, I couldn’t deal with the little blue knots that tied together the tender flesh of her skull. Let’s not even get in to the stitches my Dad had on his face after multiple sinus surgeries.

One of my biggest fears going in to birth both times was a c-section or episiotomy. Scalpels mean stitches. Skin sewn together. I always smell apple juice when I see them. If you show a Facebook picture of your stitches after your ACL surgery, I will hide you. Period.

Fortunately, I was really lucky and delivered my babies vaginally with no episiotomy. Now, this is the point in this post when I talk about stitches in my lady parts. You’ve been warned.

No one really warned me about tearing. I knew about perineal tears, I guess. I never gave much thought to my perineum in general until it was stitched up. I followed all the doctor’s orders of proper care. I kept those ice pack pads coated in Dermaplast. After Charlotte’s birth I think I was in such a hormonal haze, I just prayed it would all heal properly. After Henry, I dared to see for myself how my most tender flesh was healing.

I looked, ya’ll. I looked! It was late. Jill had warned me not to. It was one of those postpartum nights when I was miserable, sore and exhausted. I gingerly lifted my leg on the counter and held a mirror under me. Stitches! Apple juice! I nearly passed out at the site of this vaginal crime scene.

For the record, I am healed up. Everything is pink and happy. It’s all back to normal down there. So, don’t fret ladies, for those gruesome few weeks, it may seem like your nether regions will be forever wrecked, but thankfully there are stitches. Just don’t look at them, that taint no joke.

What?! You thought I would get through this post without a taint joke? Come on! 

This has been staring me in the face for the past few weeks. I wondered what irreparable damage I was doing to baby 2.0’s internal organs and future psyche as I passed the 30 weeks mark a few weeks back.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a huge advocate of better-living-through-chemistry. Zoloft was a literal life and sanity saver as postpartum anxiety and obsessive-compulsive behavior started THE NIGHT I gave birth to my daughter nearly three years ago. I had a successful and mostly happy pregnancy the first time around. I had weaned off Prozac before conception efforts began with Baby #1. (I had taken that since my eating-disordered days as a teen many years ago.) I felt totally fine. I thought I would be totally fine. I was until I gave birth, the hormone drop began and mental illness reared it’s ugly-head again.

Fortunately, I knew about Katherine Stone and her amazing work for women all over the world. (She really has become a role-model for me in my life and someone I hope to meet in person one day so I can tell her that. ) So, I took action immediately. I talked to a therapist and joined Team Zoloft so I could be the kind of mother I knew I could be. I stopped worrying about the negligible amount of Zoloft in my breast milk thanks to Katherine and the community she built. I stayed on Zoloft throughout this pregnancy until recently. 

So you may be asking why I decided to wean off Zoloft in the 3rd trimester this time, knowing what I know about my mental health. Well, I just started to sort of panic that there would be a problem. I understand the odds. I took a very low dose and the odds were very slim that there would be a problem. My doctor said the baby could have some withdrawal symptoms like listlessness and trouble eating.   Yes, I know newborns are typically listless by nature and have to learn to eat anyway, but I just had a weird feeling. My doctor said there are many other women who feel the same way and take the bottle of Zoloft with them to the hospital and start it up right after giving birth.

That was good enough for me. Done. That’s the plan. It took 1-2 weeks to wean off the meds and feel fine for now.

I just felt like I had done everything in my power to have a healthy child the first time and I wanted to make that same effort for the second. My husband reminded me that even when you do everything to have a healthy child, babies still get sick and we’ll handle that together if it happens. True.

But, I still feel better knowing it’s out of my system and the bottle will be waiting happily in my hospital bag.

Maybe it’s  because it’s Shark Week. Maybe it’s because of that scary story that came out this week about Usher’s son. But, water safety has been on my mind this week. We have decided we officially have a water baby. I swear our child is part fish. She LOVES being in the pool. She loves summer and our little daredevil is happy to push away from us as she learns to jump off the side of the pool into our cautiously open arms. I in no way want to squash this enthusiasm. I love the fact that my 2 1/2 year-old  loves kicking, blowing bubbles and dunking her whole head in the water. I remember to my younger sister wailing during swim lessons at the pool because she didn’t want to get her face wet. I was far from a super swimmer myself, even though I was on the swim team for a few years.

As my daughter grins and giggles, inside I am reeling with anxiety that she will go under and we will not be able to get to her. I have horrible flashbacks to my early days of motherhood with Postpartum Depression when I was forever worried that she would drown in a pool, the ocean 2 hours away, lakes 20 miles away, the bath, a puddle or a heavy rain. I often let my husband take the lead on swimming in the big pool. I usually relax after a little while and we have a great time. The pool we joined rocks and we always have fun with neighborhood events on Friday nights.

It seems to be a trend that every toddler wears a Puddle Jumper. Have you heard of these? They’re like an arm floatie/life jacket hybrid. I felt like a sorry excuse for a suburban pool mom for not having my kid stuffed in one of these.  I held off on buying any type of floatation device because I heard it stunts their swimming progress or whatever. I’ve also heard “No! You can’t buy those because then they might not know when they aren’t wearing one and jump in and sink!” Huh? I mean, I think she’s going to know when she’s wearing one.  We don’t own a pool because of my anxiety. (Okay, right. We don’t own a pool because that shit is expensive and we would never clean it.) I feel like that’s a problem for pool owners. She’s never going to wander into our backyard pool and sink, nor will she ever be at the neighborhood pool by herself.

I bought a life jacket anyway.  Why?  Because it made me feel more secure. It reduced my mama anxiety, which made it worth every penny of $24.95. I didn’t get a Puddle Jumper because we tried arm floaties and she hated having something on her arms. I went with a Speedo life jacket for toddlers. She calls it her “puffy vest.” We had a very serious conversation about how she can float above the water with her puffy vest on and how she needs to always hold on to Mama and Daddy when she doesn’t have it on. I think she has a pretty good grasp of this concept and it has made pool time much better for me.

What do you do to ensure water safety with your little one? What do you think of my life jacket decision?  Any thoughts?  Did I do the right thing?

Alright, let’s get through Shark Week with no water injuries, shall we?

This weekend I went to the baby shower of a first-time mom.  Amber is a girl I grew up with and one of my sister’s best friends.  (See picture below. That’s Amber.) Julie is my little sister, but Kristen and Amber made up their gruesome threesome.  I feel like the other two are sort of “little sisters” too.

Amber had a mountain of gifts, thoughtfully wrapped and checked off her registry.  Many other young mothers, me included, talked about different gifts.  You know, how no Americans knew who Sophie was 5 years ago, unless you had a baby in the last 5 years.  Now like, OMG everyone’s baby LOVES them!

I sat there with my two-year-old but I found my mind running.  I wanted to shout out, “Oooh!  Let me tell you how to best use that!” or “I used that this one time when…”  I chatted with the mom-to-be about childcare and other things, but I wanted to say more.  I found myself bubbling up with advice that I had to consciously bottle up at the shower.  I didn’t want to be like, “I know it all because a person came out of my birth canal and I kept it alive for two years!”  No one likes that woman.  Then I thought, “Oh that’s right.  I have a blog.  I can write whatever I want to there.”

So here it is.  For all the Amber’s out there with your big bellies and glowing faces. My advice.  Take it or leave it.  I give it with love.

• Get a really good breast pump.  DO NOT cheap out on a breast pump.   It pays for itself as much as you use it.  Oh!  It pays for itself anyway.  For working mothers, breast pumps are now tax deductible.  Go ahead and warn your husband they are like $300.  But, save the receipt!  Again, TAX DEDUCTIBLE!  I did not rent one from the hospital because of this.  I had the Medela one that looks like a purse.  It was great.
• Get a hands-free pumping bra.  Looks hilarious, but extremely handy.  You’re welcome Bessie, now hook on up to that there pump and get yourself milked!  That’s  a good girl!
• Get on a waiting list for a day-care NOW!  If you’re not already on one by your baby shower, you may be screwed.  Sorry.  It’s true.  We were on five and only one could take us when I needed to go back to work.  Oh, it’s $150 to just get your name on the list at each one.  No, it’s not refundable.
• Wrap up those Dr. Brown’s bottles and take them back to the store.  They are a gigantic pain in the ass.  You will spend the next year of your life with a tiny bristle brush washing those stupid parts.  I’m not convinced they are any better than any other bottle and now I will have to use them for the next kid because I have about 25 of the damn things.
• Take the Brest Friend pillow to the hospital.  For me, it is the greatest breastfeeding invention of all time.  When I was shopping for Amber I saw the new Born Free pillow and got very excited.  It looks really great too and may have some features the Brest Friend pillow doesn’t have.
• You may have to buy more than one nursing pillow.  I had a Boppy at the hospital.  A friend brought me a Brest Friend.  Boom!  That worked.  Find the one that works.  For me, the Brest Friend worked when she was little, but the Boppy was better when she was older.  Like I said, the Born Free looks phenomenal.  You’ll have to adjust as you get more comfortable with nursing and your baby grows.
• Find a pediatrician.  We toured ours before the baby was born.  I didn’t know it, but having a lactation consultant at the pediatrician’s office was WONDERFUL for those newborn visits. Yep, I whipped out my boobs for the nurse at the peds office.  I needed advice and I knew she could give it.  Be weary of peds offices that don’t have them and be weary of peds offices that pump out formula samples.  Formula is fine, but advice that helps you keep nursing is even better.  You CAN do it.  It’s just hard at first.
• Buy a boxes of unscented maxi pads before you go into labor.  No one tells you you’re going to have a heavy period for 6 weeks after the baby is born and you can’t wear tampons.  Use unscented.  Trust me.  You’ll thank me later.  Use the big ice pack ones they send you home from the hospital with while you’re still sore.  But, you’ll run out and be with 8 extended family members who came to see the baby and you be all like, “Ah!  Someone go to the store!”
• Get your FMLA and maternity leave stuff lined up.  I was in a panic because we got a new HR rep at my old job when I was 8.5 months pregnant.  Fortunately, I got some of the necessary paperwork earlier.  MAKE SURE you know how much time you’re taking off and what’s paid and what’s unpaid.  My husband and my daughter were on my insurance so right after she came home from the hospital I had to get on the phone and make sure she was covered.
• Fill out paperwork for the cord blood banking now.  I totally didn’t and have no cord blood saved.  Not the end of the world, but it would be nice to have.
• Take everything from the bassinet at the hospital.  Diapers, wipes, everything.  It’s yours.  You paid for it with insurance.  Ask for two bulb syringes and two squirt bottles.  Get the nurse to grab you extra ice pack pads and that numbing spray to take home too.
• It’s okay to cry a lot.  You will.  You’ll cry at every freakin’ commercial with a baby, or when your mom leaves after staying with you that first week.  You’ll suddenly be afraid that EVERYTHING will harm the baby.  Ugh.  It’s a little rough sometimes.  You’ll get it together, but you cry a lot in the first few weeks.
• This is awesome.  It’s great.  Not all the time.  Sometimes it’s really hard, but it’s also amazing.

Phew!  That’s all I got today.  I may have to do a Part 2 of one of these posts.  Okay, other moms, what did I miss?  What did you wish you had known?

Pin it!  You know you want to!

Hey there, readers! I’m not here today. I’m over at Carolina Parent, guest blogging for them.

Check it out.

They are Central North Carolina’s premiere source for parents with a magazine that reaches more than 100,000 readers. They are a great group and I’m truly honored to get to write for them today.

Once again, I put all my business on the Internet. I get a little heavy, but the message is from the heart and I hope it helps someone. I discuss my personal battle with Postpartum Depression/OCD. There are lots of resources out there, including websites and publications like Carolina Parent