The Fourth Trimester

Witten is 2 weeks old today and I'm sad. I'm sad that he is growing fast, although he is still a skinny little newborn. I'm sad that some days I feel like I don't get to hold him enough because every time he is asleep on me and I'm just minding my own business someone else wants to hold him or wants me to get them cereal or macaroni. I'm sad that he will only be a newborn for a short time.

There are things that I'm more neutral than sad about though. Maybe I'm not ecstatic, but I'm not crying about them. After you have a baby your body is tired. Like I fall asleep sitting up watching TV at night and one of my ankles got kind of swollen after I had him because I went to Target when he was 3 days old and that was a lot of standing for me. I have about 20 stitches and I wake up covered in sweat in the middle of the night. Those are things that are livable. I've dealt with them before, I know they're temporary.

In the past the one thing that has been really hard for me to deal with wasn't really something I could control. I can deal with night sweats and lots of stitches and one swollen ankle. The one thing that I hate postpartum is waiting for my belly to go down. I know its a temporary thing, I'm not completely irrational. My hips still have to go back to normal and I'm sure my uterus hasn't quite recovered, but I'm tired of wearing maternity pants.

Yesterday, against my better judgment, I put on 2 pairs of my regular pants. One of them is very elastic and fit and buttoned, but they did not look the way they normally look. The other ones don't stretch, and while they fit over my hips they were about an inch from buttoning. It was a little depressing, but not totally unexpected. I knew that they weren't really going to fit yet. I made the mistake of trying on pants too early after I had Alana. I didn't realize that my hips had gotten bigger while preparing to have a baby. The thought didn't even cross my mind. Now I know better, but I was curious I guess. Now when I try them on again in another 2 weeks I will know I've gotten skinnier, cause they will fit better. Maybe they'll even button.

The biggest mystery for a lot of women, especially when they're pregnant with their first baby, is how fast their body will bounce back. I don't know if there is a secret to it, probably diet and exercise, yuck, but for the most part it is just luck. If you only gain what you're supposed to gain your life will be easier. But that doesn't mean you will be wearing a bikini ever again.

I'm pretty sure my ab muscles threw in the towel around January, so they aren't excited about the prospect of looking normal again. Whether they're on the bandwagon or not my stomach shrinks a little bit more each day, and I've sort of been keeping track of it just so I can know how long till I look normalish again. Aside from my regular jeans not really fitting that great, at least I don't look pregnant anymore. Behold: the backwards belly shots, starting from the day after I had him while I was still in the hospital. I must be crazy for taking pictures of my belly while its clearly not flat, but for the purpose of keeping it real I'm not going to pretend that we don't all still look pregnant the day/week/month or however long after we give birth.


*****Post edit: I got weighed at an appointment the day after I wrote this and the grand total was 135 pounds. That puts me down 20 and about 10 off of what I normally weigh, but since I'm 5'7" I'm still in a healthy weight range. I don't love weighing 135 pounds, but I'll take it since I just had a baby 2 weeks ago.

At this point my stomach is flat enough, but if I want to wear jeans they are my maternity ones. Lucky for me I have a lot of maternity pants and shorts. I don't own a scale so I have no idea what I weigh but I know that the number the scale says doesn't matter as much to me as my reflection in the mirror.

Lucky for me this little guy is totally worth it.