Today is Mothers' Day.
I never was the girl who wanted to hold babies and dreamed of motherhood.
Yet, I knew that I would be a mother some day and that when I became a mother, my children would be my priority. I appreciated how my mother was at home with us as we grew up, and I was going to do the same for my own children.
My logical mind had these things figured out but I was not emotional about it.
12 years ago at the age of 36, my first child, Isaiah, was born at home with midwives. It was a quick and relatively easy birth. Everything went amazingly well.
I am now blessed with three wonderful children!
After the Birth:
We had a very rough ride shortly afterwards, when concern arose that Isaiah was losing weight because he was not nursing successfully -- (Inverted nipples and poor sucking helped create low milk supply which further weakened ability to effectively suck.)
I was stubbornly determined to provide my child with the best start in life and would NOT give up. I grew exhausted from waking up every 3rd hour during the night to pump and try to nurse using a Supplemental Nursing System. The pumping wasn't working at first and baby wouldn't attach properly. I got less than 2 hours sleep at a time.
source
One of my midwives stayed with me an entire night to help get things working. I hired Postpartum Doulas, two of whom specialized in breastfeeding. My mother stayed with me for a few days. Thankfully I had LOTS of support!
The midwives had suggested a certain formula for me to use. I asked whether or not it contained soy, as I knew that I wasn't going to feed soy to my baby boy. She did not know if it contained soy and since I would not just buy that formula brand without asking any questions, that midwife told my worried mother that she would have to call Social Services if I would not feed my baby. What???
I was not refusing to feed my baby! I just wanted an answer to my question so that I could determine the best formula to supplement with!
I'm glad that my mother never told me about that conversation until after the breastfeeding situation resolved itself, because that was the first time someone attempted to make me shut up and listen to the "experts" and shut off my own brain. Ughh!
I'm not sure how you can be an expert when you don't even know the ingredient list of what you are trying to force on someone?
As it turned out, my super wonderful friend, Doreen, pumped her own breast-milk, froze it for me, and friends transported it to me so that I could supplement the little breast-milk that I could produce with hers. I only had to supplement with formula for one single feeding.
My Postpartum Doula, who specialized in breastfeeding help, and was even in discussions to do a Reality TV Show, told me that I was her "Hero of the Month" for persevering through, as it was rare to see someone stick with it after so many obstacles.
I won't give a detailed account here, but finally my baby boy was sucking effectively and my milk was producing sufficiently, and baby Isaiah was getting all his nourishment needs met solely through my milk. In fact, he quickly became quite plump and people remarked how I must be giving him cream and not milk! (What a relief.)
I did pay for my lack of sleep with a horrible bout of mastitis. But it was all worth it to be able to give my new baby the best nourishment that he could possibly have.
I had stopped at nothing to give my own child the best start in life.
And I continue today to fight for my children and to fight for what is best for them, whether that be health, play, education or simply lots of love.
Before becoming a mother, babies almost always seemed to end up crying when I held them for long.
Shortly after the breastfeeding chaos died down, and I had a chance to simply hold and thoroughly enjoy my first-born child, I looked up at my own mother and said, "THIS BABY ACTUALLY LIKES ME!"
My mom has reminded me of that moment several times. She was amused that such a thing surprised me. Of course a baby would like his own mother! But to me it was an important observation. THIS BABY OF MINE ACTUALLY LIKED ME!
I was now officially a mother.
I had almost no experience or knowledge of how to care for babies.
But everything fell into place. It was natural. I was born for this!
My life has never been the same since, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY to all the wonderful mothers on Steemit!
Okay, this is incredible, you and I become more kindred with every new thing I learn:
I never cooed over babies. I also imagined I would one day have them, but did not imagine anything past that. And babies in general did not seem to like me, they also tended to cry shortly after holding them. I think they could sense my disinterest.
I was very young when I had my daughter. My husband-who I met when I was just eighteen- is a bit older and already had two boys-he started out with an 'oops' in high school, so the boys are just over a decade younger than me-young men now and I adore them, have always adored them though they were quite a handful as kids, ha!.
Also, I was not a glowing pregnant woman, in fact I hated it with a fiery passion :) I was lightly concerned about my maternal instincts which seemed a bit lacking considering my disinterest in babies (children are a different story, once personality shows up and they begin talking I thing they're the greatest) My concern was for naught, the moment my daughter was put in my arms I was in love. And I also said "She likes me!" haha!
I did not expect to have another, in fact was quite adamantly against the idea since the boys were with us a great deal of the time and I'd had our girl.
Then when Zoe was two, out of nowhere I suddenly wanted another. When I told my husband he thought it was temporary insanity, reminded me of my hatred of pregnancy, and also expressed his concern of pushing his luck having three healthy children already.
A few months went by and the desire became an obsession. I couldn't figure out why. It wasn't that I wanted a boy that I'd given birth to, couldn't be sure of that happening anyway, but the want was a constant drum beat in the back of my mind.
My husband gave in.
After Ethan was born I was back to the 'no more' and this time I did not ever feel differently. Ultimately it's been decided that it was Ethan who had caused the obsession. That he was determined that Howie and I would be his parents. He concurs which makes it seem even more likely since most teenagers would scoff at such a thing ;)
Anyway, I am not generally one to check out people's wallets, mainly because it really doesn't occur to me. I do take note of rep and how long someone has been here. But one thing I do is check out who is voting on me, I like to reciprocate, I feel mutual support is important. When I took a look at the votes for my 'blue' post I saw that you were on the top--and in cases like that I do check out wallets, and holy mama, you are a whale!
I had to put this in here, because the fact that we have so much in common is the reason I will be coming to your page, but I dislike the idea that you might wonder if your sp has anything to do with that. So I prefer just getting it right out in the open. I won't pretend that it's not an awesome side effect of this happenstance meeting, but it would not have mattered if you were at 5000 sp, and that is the truth. I don't do fake or superficial. I can do 'pleasantries' if I have to, but it's not something I enjoy.
But now I am curious of course, did you invest? Or is this from content? My husband has made a pact with me, that as long as I continue my diligence here for a year he is going to start moving big portions of his bit coin and other alt currency investments into my steem (you bet your ass I will be continuing my diligence here haha!)And while I am friendly with a few other whales, none of them are women, and I'm not meaning to be gender biased but I feel like it does make a tiny bit of difference. So I will most definitely be coming to you about different things pertaining to being in that position, if you don't mind :)
Sorry about writing a whole post on your post! I can get carried away sometimes :)
Wow. Yes, we do have a lot in common. Thanks for sharing so much about yourself.
Are you on Steemit.chat yet?
I was very recently delegated some Steem Power by a whale. So I didn't buy it and only the 10,000 Steem Power is what I have earned here through blogging.
Yes, I am on chat :) Do you know @kiwideb? She's my chat buddy :) She also shares a great deal of our convictions, I was going to send her your way in case she wasn't aware of you. She doesn't post a great deal lately, but she's an avid reader on the site.
Yes I know kiwideb. I follow her but haven't chatted too much with her.
Thanks!
Sure, and you're right, chat probably would have been a better place for that comment :)
I think you are a mother and a child. Mother for your child and child from your mother. Before i apologize. I share my post for you because a valuable lesson in the story that I post in steemit yesterday
read plesea: https://steemit.com/story/@ijoel/the-sadness-story-one-eyed-mother-edition-of-refinement
Isaiah was born at home. It is amazing.
Thank-you. Yes, his home birth was really amazing. I should write on that topic soon.
I'm glad you shared this with me. We had a few rough patches with the latch as well. Yourr friend Doreen should receive a mommy medal for wet nursing for you. I just sent this to my wife to read.
Yes she should have received an award!
I'm glad that you enjoyed it.
All the best!
Your story of how you fought for your firstborn Isaiah is inspiring! In your comments you speak of becoming "teary-eyed" as you remembered this, and I wanted you to know that recounting your story made me teary-eyed as well.
We have to fight for our children against all of the "powers that be" who seem hell-bent on destroying them. Someday when I can keep it together, I hope to write the story of fighting for, but losing our precious grandson to cancer treatment.
Thanks for writing this, because it's helped fortify my intention to write that story. I'm only sorry I didn't get here to up vote and comment during the rewards window!
😄😇😄
Please come back here an link to your story when you finally write it.
I am so so sorry about your grandson.
Thanks for your wonderful comment.
Thank you, friend @canadian-coconut. I will surely do that.
I suspect it will become a series of stories. There was much pain involved, and I have to evaluate how to tell it without causing more pain to some of the survivors because I have some very harsh opinions relating to conventional cancer "treatments."
I appreciate your encouragement a great deal! :D
Yes, that needs to be carefully thought out.
I feel the same way about conventional cancer treatments too.
When my mother-in-law found out she had cancer, I did so much research for her and made recommendations. She had the money to follow through, and I paid for some of the supplements for her to try. But she never opened any of them, and never sought a second opinion. She went for surgery as per the doctors advise and never came home from the hospital. The surgery killed her. She would have been better off to do absolutely nothing and get many more months/years out of her life.
But being that she was an adult, we both accepted that it was her life and her decisions. We weren't angry in any way, just sad that her and her husband couldn't think out-of-the-box on this one.
I can't imagine those decisions were to involve a child in my family though.
All the best to you,
My condolences to you and your family for the loss of your mother-in-law.
Thank you for sharing your experience and story. I find it grievous to observe what appears to me to be a trance that people are in when they blindly follow the advice of conventional medicine, what I've come to think of as the "medical-industrial complex."
I must confess to experiencing anger at how our grandson's situation was handled, but by God's grace also the ability to forgive. Thanks so much for your very kind wishes. :)
That was a beautiful post- thanks so much for sharing- you sound like one heck of a mother- I bet your children will grow up to be strong and healthy because their mother shows them her love through her awareness and has the courage to do what's best for them- I honor you : )
I appreciate that. I do my best for them.
Yeah- I can tell.
What a wonderful way of recounting your life. Motherhood is the best gift given to us, even when kids dont know it :)
Mastitis is horrible, my sister went through a bad bout, but we do it for our children. I had trouble breastfeeding too, but we keep at it until we get it right. We would do anything for them! Our live suddendly becomes theirs and not ours.
Hope you had a wonderful mother's day...although to me, every day is mother's day :)
Very nice thoughts for all those important mothers in this world.
Thank-you azfix!
Beautiful children I like to see them
This is such an amazing read!
The chaos these so called "experts" create is enormous.
I really can't wait to have my own babies. Learned a lot already. Following you for more.
Thank-you. I am glad that you are learning so much of this stuff before the babies come.
All the best!
Awesome post!! I like your thinking, and writing. So I'm catching a few older posts.
I appreciate that. Thanks again.