Finding Peace

    Having Lucie changed everything. Seems like a pretty obvious statement, I know. I don’t know that anyone with half a brain thinks that having a baby won’t change their lives completely. I knew it would. I went into this with my eyes wide open. Yet, I have been trying over the last 3 months to make peace with the fact that I am, in every sense of the word, a mom, and a stay at home mom at that.
I live and breathe for this child- and wouldn’t change that for all the rice in China; but it has definitely taken some getting used to.

    I never wanted to be one of those obnoxious women who completely lives for her kids or talks about them nonstop. I never thought I really needed to know when or how often your baby pooped,  how much they ate, or slept. And, honestly, their little baby coos all sounded the same to me. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always loved babies; I’m just one of those people. But still, I did not understand the need for these new moms to send pictures of, what appeared to be, the exact same face over and over and over again to the point of insanity.

    So now I am one of these women. And at first, I was quite ashamed of this. I didn’t want my friends or family to know that I really didn’t care to do much but stare at my baby all day. It felt like I had the bipolar opposite of postpartum depression. I’d try to think of anything and everything to talk about so that I didn’t overdo it with the Lucie stuff. “Let’s talk about yoooouuuu, I am dying to know what you have been doing lately.....” I wanted to be different, I had to be different. I still wanted to be regular Landrie. But I wasn’t; I’m not. And now, three months in, I’m finally making peace with it. I am a mom.

          I don’t mind talking about poop, in fact, it can be the most interesting part of my day at times- especially when you find it in places you don’t expect. I have learned that how often a baby poops really is quite important stuff; it can truly make or break your day. And the vast array of poop I’ve experienced? Well, that’s enough to get me going for hours. (Did you know that there is an entire website dedicated to the “rainbow of poop”? True story. I’ve been there.) I have a running total of the number of ounces per bottle she’s eaten in my head at all times and could spout it off to you in mere seconds- just ask me. I have learned that, no, not all of the little baby coos sound alike. In fact, sometimes you can hear vowel sounds, sometimes consonants, and even the consonant sounds are different from time to time. I mean, this is important stuff people. The vast array of sounds and faces my baby makes is intriguing to the point of addictive.

I’ve finally made peace with the fact that when people ask me “What did you do today?”, my responses always involve taking care of Lucie and maybe sprinkling in a few house chores and cooking just for fun (hey, gotta mix it up sometimes). But, honestly, it's been a rough transition mentally. I felt like less of a person for awhile. I thought that people would think I led an awful boring life & feel sorry for me. I was afraid that people would use me as their example of who they don’t want to become. I realize now how harshly I judged other "devoted" moms before, and to all of you, I apologize. Everyone said it, and it wasn’t until now that I understood, but being a stay at home mom truly is the hardest, yet most rewarding job on the planet. I’m responsible for raising a human, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and in that there is very little room for error. That's pretty heavy stuff. Who in their right mind wouldn't be overly-devoted to doing a job like this?

I realize now that when you decide to have kids you have one of two choices: either take care them yourself, or pay someone else to do it while you maintain your career outside of the home. And neither option is the right or wrong one; it's all relative and dependent on your individual situation. I, for now, am choosing to raise her myself. It is my profession. It is “what I do,” and there is absolutely nothing at all wrong with that. I have finally found my peace. And it comes in the form of a beautiful, 3 month old blue eyed baby girl.