how to feed a baby

Congratulations, you had a baby!  Planning on breastfeeding?  Perfect!  It's the most natural form of feeding your newborn!  Your body knows just what to do!  Your baby knows exactly how to do it!  Your milk will come when it's called!  Hallelujah, you got through labor and now you're smooth sailing through infancy as your perfect body perfectly perfects the perfect art of perfect food for your perfect baby who is perfectly able to tell you when he/she needs your perfect food for their perfect life!

Ahem.

For those mamas out there who experienced breastfeeding like the above explanation, I envy you, because that is certainly not how it happened for me.  And for the first few weeks after I had NC, I had convinced myself that I was the only new mama in the world who had trouble breastfeeding and that for some reason, I was just ill-equipped.

As I briefly mentioned in my last post, I want this to be a safe place for us to discuss the real issues facing us as human beings, and today, as new mamas.  Not all of my posts will be this "graphic", but today, that's just how the cookie crumbled.  

So without further ado…How to Feed a Baby in 5 Easy Steps

at my suggestion

Well, hello, my dear internet cosmos.  It's so nice to run into you again.

Five months ago, my life changed.  Since then, I've been busy trying to learn how to live as a new person.  Someone who now has two bodies, two hearts, two brains, two breathing sets of lungs.  Someone who now has another being to take care of.

Turns out being pregnant wasn't the only time I would hold this other being inside of me.  In fact, I do so now.  Maybe even more than before.

When I was pregnant, all I had to worry about was how I took care of myself, and that would trickle down to take care of this thing inside of me.  But now, it's not just about me anymore.  Now I take care of myself, and I take care of a new being.  Now, I take care of a new life.  My daughter, NC.

Needless to say, it's been a transition.  Parts of it have been the most difficult of my life.  Others have been the most joyous and ecstatic moments I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams.  Luckily, the second kind have far outweighed the first.

Anyway, I've thought a lot about this blog during my time away.  What is this space?  What do I want to fill it with?  While navigating the beginning months of motherhood, I've learned a lot about myself, and a lot about what I would have wanted to read about before I embarked on this journey.  I've also learned a lot about what my real priorities are now.  The things I find truly beautiful and inspiring now are in a big way, much different than they were before.  Some things are the same, but so much has changed.

For example, I realize that this space is not merely here because someone named "D" suggested it.  This time, I'm here truly for myself and at my own insistence.  I'm back because I realize that I have a lot to say, and it's me who is suggesting to myself that it may just be time to let you all hear it.

So, this blog is no longer "at D's suggestion".  Now, it is all at my own suggestion, a collection of ideas put forward for your consideration.  Everything here is my own opinion put forth to you in hopes that you find it as appealing and inspiring as I do.

I hope you enjoy the continuation of this space, and that you find meaning in my explorations as I do.  I expect the content will be just as varied as before, with a much needed added dose of reality.  I want this space to be a safe place for exploring the real feelings and struggles that come with being a woman, a wife, a working outside of the home/working from home/stay at home mom, a human member of the global community.

So, my first suggestion is for you to join me.  I can't promise anything except that it will be an adventure.

XOXO
--mel

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