The fact that I am writing this blog post is HEART BREAKING. Never before has one month gone by so quickly in my life. It feels like we just welcomed our sweet, final baby into our home, and have spent the past month adjusting in both the best and hardest ways we ever have.
I wanted to do monthly updates of how we are adjusting. Some months I will combine my favorite products we are loving, but this month I plan to separate that into 2 different posts, just due to there being a lot of products, and a lot of ‘updates’. I plan to divide this post into updates on sweet Goldie, a bit of a postpartum update on myself, and then last I will answer some questions asked on Instagram!
Goldie Mae 1 Month Update
Our sweet girl is a whole month old. I think more than ever it feels like she has both always been here, but also as if she just arrived. With 4 babies the transition home each time has felt slightly different. I think maybe based on how the other kids have adjusted and such. This time Jack and Avé were so excited (and so fully understood what was happening) that when she came home they talked to her, and reacted to her as if she had always been there. (There has been a bit more of a transition with Walker that I will talk about in the Q&A, but nothing too bad).
At 1 month old she is roughly 7 and a half pounds. Most nights she sleeps her first stretch for 5 hours, followed by a shorter 3 ish hour stretch. She is most of the time pretty easy at night and although she sometimes stirs for a while when we lay her back down, she doesn’t cry.
She is a pro at getting out of swaddles, but definitely sleeps the best in the Ollie Swaddle (I did a full review of that here,) but it is honestly the best swaddle. She wears size newborn clothes and diapers, and LOVES to be held on my chest, worn in the Solly baby wrap and to have white noise or shushing around her.
Clearly there aren’t too many other updates on a 1 month old. She is just really emerging from her sleepy little newborn state and I am equal parts excited to see her little personality emerge, but also SO SAD to see the newborn age slip away each day.
1 Month Postpartum Update
And as with Goldie being 1 month old, that means it’s been a full month of me adjusting to her being here. I wish I could say that its been seamless for me, but that would totally be a lie. Her birth and the c section coupled together made the first 2 weeks hell for me. I was so worried about her all the time and I was so uncomfortable and frustrated with the limitations of my body. I have come home from the hospital 3 other times mostly ready to go, but this time around healing was so much slower, and that was both mentally and physically so hard for me.
Adjusting to 4 has also been hard with how busy life is. In her first month of life I am still yet to get to take a nap. Life is so busy. There is no sleeping in because I have to get up to help get the kids ready for school, so I am definitely a bit tired and run down. Praise God she is a good sleeper, but even the best sleeping newborn leaves you tired, especially as your body is trying to heal and get back to ‘normal’, so I am definitely not feeling 100.
Emotionally this has also BY FAR been my hardest adjustment. There are so many emotions running through my head on not wanting to miss a minute of her sweet little newborn life. But I also then miss the big kids and feel like I am not present enough for them. (and honestly when I am present our tempers are short because Sam and I are tired). So enter mom guilt. So much mom guilt in the first month. Knowing she is my last has been difficult as well. I think for me the finality of Sam getting a vasectomy and no more kids didn’t really process when I was miserable and pregnant. I mean lets face it – when you’re in your 3rd trimester with even your first you mutter the words “I never want to do this again.” It was the right choice for us, and ultimately I do not want more than 4 kids. But is still a hard adjustment. And there are so many emotions knowing that this stage that I have truly LOVED and looked forward to my whole life is ending.
I have also really struggled with balancing work and home life. With the bigger kids I was on a good schedule and routine where although I felt like I was constantly pushed to my limits, I also did have a method to my madness. Right now I don’t feel like I even have time to do it all, which has come with a lot of processing. I have worked VERY hard to grow this little spot on the internet, and have turned sharing so much of what I love into a job, so in so many ways I don’t want to see that slip away. In many ways I feel like juggling this will always mean I giving less than I need at home.
So, ultimately this has been a hard month. There is no sugar coating it. It has been a month of feeling like there isn’t enough Arin to go around, and like my heart and my hands are being torn in a million directions. I know ultimately that that feeling will change and that there will be more balance. But I also know when I emerge from that Goldie will be so much older which breaks my heart. So there has been a lot of emotional processing.
1 Month Q&A from Instagram
Q: How are her reflux issues?
I still think she is struggling with reflux more than my other kids, however after talking to her doctor we are holding off on medicine. It has gotten better on the horrific spit ups, just due to me knowing how to prevent them better, but once in a while they still happen, and man it is horrible!
Q: LOTS of Questions on transitioning the other kids:
So here are my pieces of advice, as well as my disclaimers. Know that you will miss your older kids. You may not even miss them physically, but the change in time and the mom guilt on how much time you are having to spend caring for the newborn will cause you to miss your older kids, and struggle with those emotions. I truly think all moms deal with that.
We always have the new baby bring the older kids a small gift – I think that tends to help them get excited about the baby, and this time we also had the older kids buy Goldie a gift which made them SO HAPPY.
Once you are ready, take little moments with your older child/children for your own emotional wellbeing, as well as your other kids. This is hard, but I still remember when Avé was a newborn and I took Jack to Dairy Queen. We both needed it SO BAD, and it helped us a ton.
If you older child/children are toddlers don’t push the baby on them. They will come around to the baby in time, but pushing the baby on them only makes things harder for both you and them. I know it’s hard when they aren’t doing all those viral video cute bonding moments, but I try to remind myself that this is a big change, that they likely really didn’t understand was happening, so it’s our job to let them adjust at their own pace.
Try to keep certain routines the same even with the new baby. For us that is dinner – bedtime. We have tried not to alter that at all, and who ever puts Walker to bed doesn’t hold Goldie at that time. That gives him just a little bit of normal.
Q: Lots of C Section Questions:
I am going to do my best to sort of touch on all of them. Was the recovery harder? I won’t sugar coat it. YES. For me the recovery was so much harder. I wasn’t emotionally super prepared for that, so that made it even worse. With my older kids I have come home and basically felt back to normal within a few days. This time it took me 3 weeks to really feel close to normal.
How to recover from a c section with other kids. – Thats hard. If your kids are older they just need to be more responsible for a little while, but for me with Walker, it honestly meant letting him get by with murder when I was home alone. I couldn’t lift him so there was no time out and I couldn’t struggle with him. Once the first 2 weeks had passed I was allowed to lift him again and that got better. I had to remind myself that 2 weeks of empty threats weren’t going to ruin him..and that it was just how it had to be.
C Section night time tips – for me night time was HARD. I couldn’t get comfortable and I was SO mad that it was so hard to sit up from laying down. After a few days I swallowed my pride and realized that sitting up was so much easier if I had Sam come around to my side of the bed and give me a hand to pull.
We have a great night time routine where Sam changes the baby while I either wake up and get alert, or make a bottle or whatever needs to be done, then he passes the baby back to me and goes right back to sleep. He is only awake for 10 min or so, but I feel supported and it allows for it to be a less difficult task for me. This was REALLY important this time because I just physically felt stuck in the bed.
Q: Is 4 Harder than 3?
I feel like I can’t fully weigh in. So far 4 is hard. But newborn life is hard. In some respects I can see why people say once you have 3 you can have how ever many. The transition to 3 is HARD. You are suddenly dividing and conquering everything when it comes to kids. So in a sense we are still doing that just with another human. I just think that during the newborn phase its of course harder. I will report back on this one haha.
Q: Lots of Eating Questions:
Right now I am still minimally nursing Goldie. The more I supplemented and we got into a groove with the older kids the more my supply dwindled because I wasn’t super willing to pump (nor was there truly any way I would have had time). I am somewhat sad about that, but I could tell that my mental state was not in a place to push that this time. Adding pumping to my routine would have sent me spiraling, so I am at peace. Most of her nourishment is coming from formula, and she is happy and growing well.
She once in a while still has some sleepy feeds, but the closer to 1 month she got, the more alert she got, and thus the more she is staying awake for her feeds.
Her feeding schedule is still very on demand but she usually eats every 3 fish hours. In the afternoon I do try to plan her feeds slightly to start getting her used to a bedtime routine. I will do a blog post on that.
Q: How is she sleeping/ What is her sleep schedule?
She is doing really well. All of my babies have been pretty good sleepers. Right now as of about a week ago we give her a bath around 6:30 when the other kids take baths and showers. After that she has a bottle and we put her down to sleep downstairs with us. At roughly 10 we wake her up and give her a bottle and she goes to sleep by about 10:30. She is sleeping roughly 5 hours then waking up and sleeping another 3. Most of the time the second stretch has been an issue more because of other kids stirring her. (no time like adding a newborn for lots of bad dreams haha)
I will talk more about that in a blog post, but for the most part she is doing pretty well. She has rough nights here and there, but she’s getting better and better.
She is sleeping in our room in her bassinet. We swaddle her arms in still, and she will likely remain in our room until 8-10 weeks. We basically keep them in our room until they are sleeping 10 – 5/6am. Once they are sleeping a good nights sleep for us we move them to their own rooms.
Overall, she has been a fantastic baby, and we truly CAN NOT get enough of her. The whole family is smitten, and we feel incredible blessed to have her. I will be back in a few days with my favorite products for a 1 month old so if you have a baby around her age, or are expecting a baby you will want to follow that series as I talk about what we have used the most during each month.
