One Year

Nothing like ending Zara’s first year with a bang. One week before her birthday, we tested positive for Covid. 

We spent the next ten days isolating at home in sub-freezing temperatures with a baby who was sick and fussy but still wanted to get her hands on everything. After that experience, I’m confident we can make it through whatever else 2022 throws at us.

Zara’s first year also ended with a bang in a more literal way. An hour after getting our positive Covid results, in a maneuver that could put Harry and Marv’s Home Alone stunts to shame, I did a full-body wipeout on our icy front steps. 

For a few seconds I just laid there on the snowy ground, unable to move. I was sure I’d broken my tailbone, which was so rich that I couldn’t stop laughing even though I could hardly breathe.

My tailbone, thankfully, wasn’t actually broken, which is proof there is a God and he is merciful. Getting Covid and breaking a major bone in the same day would be some fresh kind of hell. 

Anyway. Before we were struck down with the plague, I started putting together this list of…lessons? Thoughts? Musings on the year that’s behind us.

Now that I’m reading it back it seems like I’m mostly just complaining, but I feel like that’s fair. Making it through the first year of parenthood is hard enough on its own, let alone in a pandemic that just won’t quit.

So complaint-filled as they may be, here are my thoughts. 

The lack of sleep is the hardest part

I knew becoming a parent would be challenging, but I had no idea how badly I’d struggle with the lack of sleep. I’ve always been someone who needs a solid eight hours to function well, and having that cut in half and broken up into fragments and then trying to get through the day was, to put it plainly, awful. 

Even now that Zara is sleeping better most nights, I still have a ton of anxiety around how much sleep I’m (not) getting. So many nights I just lie there in the dark, waiting to hear her stir.

I know one day we’ll all be sleeping much more soundly and this will be a distant, groggy memory, but right now it’s a phase I wouldn’t mind leaving behind. 

Nothing lasts

In the same breath as lamenting my sleep woes, I remind myself that this too shall pass, just like every other rough patch we’ve had so far. 

There was a stretch around the four-month mark (hi, sleep regression) where I was certain Zara would never sleep more than an hour at a time again and a point at eight months where I was so sick with some nasty respiratory bug that I’d wake up in the morning unsure how I was going to make it through the day. 

Those were tough times, but they only lasted a week or two. I’m trying to get better at remembering this when we’re having a less-than-perfect day or week.

Newborns can’t get bad habits

There is too much stupid information out there on the internet, and I read all of it. 

When Zara was still tiny, she wanted to breastfeed all the time. She would’ve nursed every hour if I let her, and many days that’s exactly what we did. 

But because of what I’d read online, mostly from “experts” on Instagram, I was constantly worried I was creating the bad habit of my baby needing to be nursed to be soothed or fall asleep. Ugh, I cringe just thinking back on it because of how wrong it feels. 

I now know that nursing your baby a lot is A) not a bad thing and B) not some unbreakable habit you’re doomed to live with forever if you decide you’d like to stop doing it. Color me enlightened, and damn those Instagram experts. 

We’re not planning on having another baby, but if we did, I feel like I’d be so much more relaxed about a lot of things during the newborn phase. 

Drink water. So much water. 

I’ve already talked about pregnancy dehydration in this post and being thirsty all the time in this post, so you’d think I would have this topic covered, but no, I’m not done talking about how much water I need to drink to not feel like complete garbage. 

I’m on the verge of becoming one of those wife-beater-wearing dudes with trunk-sized arms at the gym who carry around a gallon jug of water wherever they go. I understand your struggle, wife-beater dudes. The thirst is real. 

Fancy diaper pails are useless

We got the Dekor one that’s on all the ‘best baby gear’ lists, and wow. Hats off to the marketing team that convinced the world it’s a winner, because this thing is flimsier than a Times Square umbrella on a rainy day. 

It’s also SO COMPLICATED for no reason. It uses special garbage bags that have to be–no joke–sliced apart from one another with a blade that’s built into the side of the can, which is a genius and very safe feature for exhausted parents in the wee hours of the morning.

I’m filled with rage every time I have to use it. 

If you’re expecting, do yourself a favor and just get a nice, normal garbage can with a tight lid.

Secondhand is where it’s at

You go through clothes and other baby stuff at lightning speed in the first few months. It hurts to think of all the money we could have saved if we’d bought more of Zara’s gear secondhand. 

Some of the pricier items we purchased new, like her swing, only lasted a couple months before she was too big for them, while one of our most-used items, the glider in her nursery, was rescued from the curb in front of a neighbor’s house and has worked out beautifully. 

Facebook Marketplace is a treasure trove of baby items in great condition, and Once Upon A Child has become our go-to for clothing basics like onesies and stuff that we’ll only use for one season, like winter coats. 

My body will never be the same

I had heard a lot of new moms say “my body doesn’t feel like mine” after giving birth, and it’s so accurate, but it’s hard to understand until you go through it. It’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s just…different. 

Clothes are different. I haven’t worn 90% of my pre-baby clothes and it’s not just because we’re all cooped up at home. They don’t fit right.

Though I was narcissistically delighted to see my weight return to nearly where it was before having Zara (thanks, breastfeeding), trying to put on my old jeans was a riot. I can’t get them up past my thighs. 

Things are squishy where they were once firm. Things are loose where they were once, ahem, not loose. Climbing the stairs too quickly makes me winded, but I can easily hoist a 25-pound baby over my head and carry her long distances. I can no longer contort my upper body in the proper way to scratch an itch on my own back. 

It’s trippy to feel like the skin you’re living in belongs to someone else, especially in those very vulnerable early days, but I’ve come to love this 2.0 version of my body. More than anything else, I’m in awe of what it has accomplished.

Don’t do anything you can do while the baby is awake while the baby is asleep

I like this one so much better than ‘sleep when the baby sleeps,’ which is ridiculous advice when you haven’t showered in three days, the dogs need a walk and the volume of dirty laundry is no longer even close to being able to fit in the hamper. 

Yes, napping while the baby naps is awesome and has gotten me through many a rough day, but sometimes what you really need is an episode of Real Housewives or a mindless Instagram scroll or, if you’re really feeling like an overachiever, a workout. When the baby’s sleeping, it’s mom time–time for all those things you simply can’t do when you’re monitoring a tiny human (also, I hate the phrase tiny human). 

Each dog counts for ½ a baby

So for the nosy Nellies asking why we’re not having another, it’s because this math means we already have two. 

I have so many more thoughts after one year of parenthood–how we were never meant to do it without a village, how the mental load disparity between men and women gets exponentially bigger after a baby, how Pinterest-perfect moms make my blood boil–but a post covering all that would take me at least another year to write. 

For now, I’ll wrap it up with a few final thoughts. 

This past year with Zara has been the most challenging of my life, but also the most joyful. It’s been like reuniting with someone I’ve known my whole life and simultaneously meeting them for the first time. It’s been full of contradictions, surprises, and moments of pure awe. 

I’m not sad this first year is over. It was full and complete and I’ll treasure it. Instead, I can’t wait for all the things we’ll experience together as a family in the years ahead. 

Happy birthday, my sweet girl!