Unsolicited Advice for New Mothers

Dispatched from the trenches.

Congratulations on your new baby! You can now expect to be inundated with lots of well-meaning advice from every a-hole who has ever procreated. I am no exception. What follows is my Advice for New Mothers (fathers can read it, too), composed in the feverish, sleep-deprived early months of my life as a new parent. That I was even able to construct complete sentences is something of a miracle.

Don’t Buy the Love at First Sight Myth

Many parents like to describe their initial feelings for their newborn as “love at first sight.” Love at First Sight is a very pretty story ascribed in the rosy glow of hindsight. (In layman’s terms: kinda bullshit.) What you may feel upon seeing your child for the first time is: curiosity, amazement, deep affection, relief (you did it!) and a little disgust (they come out, after all, smelling like uncooked brisket and smothered in what looks like jam/beeswax.) You will like them, and maybe even like like them. But love? That requires a “getting to know you” period that could take anywhere from hours to months. You just met this person! If you subscribe to the Love at First Sight myth, you risk feeling inferior as a mother.

Fret not, New Mom. If you don’t love your newborn at the very first, slimy sight of her, you will love her soon enough. Just look at your early twenties! Back then, you fell in love with pretty much anyone who tried to put their mouth on your nipples.

Breastfeeding is easy! For some people. For the rest of us, it’s a total bitch.

All it takes is a few hours of watching Animal Planet (preferably stoned) to completely skew your perception of how breastfeeding works. The puppies! Look how they just KNOW what to do! Most animals instinctively know how to eat. Hell, many take their first, stumbling steps before the afterbirth even has time to cool. Human babies are dumb. They can’t walk, eat, or see farther than your face. They have to be taught how to eat. Have you ever tried to teach a newborn to do something? They don’t even know what their hands are. To make matters worse, you have to be taught how to teach them. It is truly amazing that the human race has survived this long.

Some people find breastfeeding to be Animal-Planet-easy. Their infants instinctively crawl right out of their vaginas and onto their engorged breasts. (On a good day, I call these people “lucky.” On a bad day — when my nipples feel like I’ve been jogging braless in a hairshirt—I call them something else.) But many of us find breastfeeding to be clunky, awkward, painful, and twice as frustrating as putting together an IKEA EXPEDIT bookshelf. If you’re in this latter category, keep at it — it does get easier. (Especially with help!) Soon, you and your baby will have it down. Your nipple pain will be replaced by a feeling that’s not sexual, but definitely pleasant, like a really good back-scratch, or eating Doritos out of the bag. (But don’t freak out if it sometimes does feel a leeeetle bit sexy. It’s not uncommon.) You’ll be stealthily whipping that boob out in public places like a nursing ninja (or awkwardly flopping it out and not giving a shit.) And you’ll supposedly* get into your pre-pregnancy jeggings much sooner, which is, in my opinion, a much bigger incentive than all the supposed health benefits for your kid, because…

Formula, These Days, is Pretty Slick Shit

It has probiotics and prebiotics and all kinds of cool things in it! So don’t beat yourself up if you are not able to do any of the following:

• Make it through labor without an epidural
• Deliver your baby vaginally
• Breastfeed**

All of these things are great, but if you can’t do them, you are no less of a badass. Your child will be fine, and will grow up to be the kind of person who says witty things at cocktail parties, listens to NPR, sorts their recycling correctly, and gets laid frequently.

Anyone who says otherwise can eat meconium.

Sleep Deprivation is No Joke

“Sleep when the baby sleeps.” You will hear this from well-meaning RNs the moment this baby leaves your vagina (or the gash in your abdomen, or the NICU bubble she’s been living in, or the Guatamalan adoption agency.) Here is what I have to say about this piece of advice: TAKE IT.*** Seems simple enough, right? Oh, sure. Until the baby takes her first 2-3 hour nap and you suddenly feel like Queen Shit of Shit Mountain. You will clean the house! You will finish those thank-you cards! You will make risotto! DON’T DO IT. Get your ass to bed. I’M SERIOUS. There is a reason sleep deprivation is a favored method for torturing prisoners. It will cause you to lose your mind and do crazy things, like shake your baby (P.S. DON’T SHAKE YOUR BABY.) You will hallucinate in the middle of the night and think you left your newborn in a strange place, like the floor, or the cat bed, or on top of the bookshelf. You will have really stupid middle-of-the-night fights with your partner, fights like “Who Threw the Bobby Pins on the Floor.”

Excerpt from “Who Threw the Bobby Pins on the Floor”

NEW FATHER: Who threw all these bobby pins on the floor?

NEW MOTHER: Well, obviously, it was the cat — why would I throw bobby pins on the floor and just leave them there?

NEW FATHER: I don’t know, I just see bobby pins all over the floor.

NEW MOTHER: Yeah, well, I wish I’d never met you.

It is, in fact, a helpful exercise to keep a journal of all the ridiculous fights you have with your partner in these early weeks of parenthood. Assuming you even have time to write anything down. Which you won’t. Which brings us to the next piece of advice…

Baby Books are Wishful Thinking

Don’t believe me? Ask your parents to dig out your baby book. See? It’s mostly empty, except for your birth date and weight and one sad-looking lock of hair pinned down with yellowed Scotch tape. If you are a new parent and you have time to fill out your newborn’s baby book, you may want to check the crib and make sure the little asshole is still breathing. Wait — did I just call your baby an asshole? Yes, I did.

Babies are Assholes

You think I’m wrong? Politely ask your infant to sleep through the night, or to not cry at restaurants/in church/during the season premiere of your favorite show. What does she have to say to any of that? That’s what I thought. Now try to get that booger out of her nose. I bet she let you know her opinion on that, too. Think of the biggest asshole you’ve ever worked with; that person pales in comparison to your newborn baby. The difference: your baby is Seriously The Cutest Thing That Ever Lived. This is nature’s way of making sure we don’t feed our offspring to a saber-toothed tiger or leave them in the bathroom at Target. Because, cuteness aside, newborn babies are TERRIBLE PEOPLE. You can’t blame them, really — their living situation went suddenly and without warning from Club Med to Gitmo. But you can’t blame yourself, either, for sometimes flying off the handle. Now, don’t get me wrong here: there is physical, verbal, and emotional abuse that is real and very serious. But occasionally calling your beautiful baby a shithead or begging her to PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE GO THE FUCK TO SLEEP or letting her wail in the crib while you leave the room in order to keep yourself from doing something really V. C. Andrews-novel-nutso? That is not abuse. That is how any sane person reacts to a total asshole.

There Will Be Things You Will Miss

A clean house. Smoking. Multi-course meals. “True Blood.” Drinking until you pass out. Sex. Karaoke. Sleeping in. Sleeping, period.

There Will Be Things You Think You Will Miss, But You Really Won’t

Live indie rock concerts full of stupid girls who insist on dancing right in front of the stage like it’s Woodstock. Movies at theaters. Work happy hours. New Year’s Eve. All those Saturday nights that you and your partner got drunk just because you were bored.

It Goes By Really Slowly

Everybody’s favorite thing to say, second only to asking how you’re sleeping, is “It goes by so fast!” This is usually said by people whose “babies” are now pre-teen miscreants with nose rings and gonorrhea. One day, you’ll feel this way, too. But right now, your baby is a black hole that has caused time to move at the speed of molasses. When your child is five months old, put this in your pipe and smoke it: You were pregnant only five months ago. Five mere months ago, just putting on your pants was a chore. RIGHT? Feels weird, doesn't it? That’s because five months with a newborn feels like five years. You’ll look at your infant and think: Shouldn’t you be driving by now? But here’s a fact: they won’t even recognize themselves in a mirror for another year.

Everything Changes

That goes for the bad as well as the good. Baby is waking up every thirty minutes to nurse? Don’t worry! One day, she will sleep all night. That adorable sound she makes that you love so much? It’ll be gone in two weeks, replaced by a new adorable sound. (This is why God made smart phones. Take a video.) Baby finally slept through the night? Enjoy it, for soon her teeth will come in.

Parenting a newborn is an exercise in Zen. Don’t get attached to anything. Especially if that thing is not having a cold.

You Are Going to Catch a Cold This Year

Wait. Did I say “a” cold? I meant “anywhere from seven to ten colds.” Double that if your infant goes to daycare. Now that you’ve used up all of your sick time for maternity leave, get ready to be sick all the time.

You Are Going to Screw Up Your Kid

No matter how hard you strive to be a perfect parent, your child will, at some point, sit in a therapist’s office and blame you for everything. It’s a rite of passage.

Your Parents Don’t Know Anything

This is as true now as it was when you were thirteen. You have read every baby book on the planet. You spent many late nights during your pregnancy gobbling folic acid and obsessively reading BabyCenter.com. Your parents, on the other hand, read Dr. Spock thirty years ago. (Well, your mom did. Your dad was too busy watching football and drinking Schlitz.) Your mother gave birth to you zonked out in twilight sleep, put you on your stomach in a crib full of plush animals and heavy quilts, and fed you formula made by the same company that makes chocolate milk. Put your hands over your ears and sing la la la when your mother says “Well, you survived, didn’t you?” Survival is an extremely weak argument.

Your Parents Really Do Love You More Than Anything in the Entire World

You get it now. You finally get it.

* Empirical evidence based on my own big ass says the breastfeeding/weight loss connection is only half-true. Yes, I lost about half my pregnancy weight rather rapidly due to breastfeeding. Also due to breastfeeding: my body has clung to the last half of my pregnancy weight like Rose on that door in Titanic.

** Some people choose to forgo breastfeeding from the start due to a medical condition, inverted nipples, medication, or just, you know, PERSONAL CHOICE. If you think these people are doing a disservice to their children, keep it to yourself. Ten bucks says you weren’t breastfed, either (see: “Your Parents Don’t Know Anything” above), and you turned out okay, albeit judgey.

*** Some people have great difficulty napping. Others have work (you know, the kind that puts food on the table) that can only be done when the baby is napping. This piece of advice is not for them, but for the mother who is debating between a short nap and JUST ONE MORE EPISODE OF BREAKING BAD.