Grandparents Visit
Baby Sierra is now 5 weeks old. On top of the tribulation of getting 100% older, Sierra also met her Grandparents for the first time. My Parents visited day 5 thru 18 of her life, and Robins parents visited days 25-30 of her life. It was wonderful having their company as I grew into my own parenting style during these early days with my newborn.
This was the most time I spent with parents in my adult life, and I got to observe the role they planned to take as grandparents. It seemed that holding the baby gave my mom anxiety, and she would fret around the house nervously whenever the baby cried. Sierras cries rendered my mom completely ineffective at changing the baby’s diapers and clothes, as every earth shattering scream would make my moms hands shake and resort to the reptilian brain instinct of grasping tightly. It made me afraid that she would either crush the baby or drop her. She was anxious in a way that I could have done without when I was sleep deprived and stressed myself. She did help, though. I was able to spend more time with the baby in her presence. She spent her days cooking meals, doing laundry (especially the cloth diapers), and cleaning. She saved about 2 hours a day that I spent focusing on breastfeeding, learning how to soothe the baby, and discovering a livable sleep schedule. My dad held the baby a total of once for a photo, changed no diapers, and didn’t do any cleaning or cooking. My moms anxiety seemed to get a bit better by the end, and my dad became more forthcoming and conversational. My overall assessment was that those two weeks offered them a much needed vacation, which I was glad to have provided them.
Robin’s parents, on the other hand, were very good with Sierra, and I learned quite a bit about newborns from them. They taught me what the specific cry for hunger sounded like, how to tell if baby is crying because she had a stomach ache, and some tips on how to soothe her in various situations. On top of this they planned all meals. One evening they gave us a date night by babysitting. I had no idea how much I needed that. We went out for dinner once (baby’s first restaurant!), and Diane also treated me to spa day pedicure. This will probably be the last time I could have time without the baby for the next month (before I go back to work). Their visit made me realize how much better life would be if I lived closer to family, and how so many people structure their life decisions around that support system.
Now that our family unit is left alone with our thoughts. I am spending my time finding small pockets of joy among the chaos.
Like Baby feet. Babys’ feet look just like Robins feet. It brings me an endless amount of joy to see my husbands big masculine feet shrunk to the size of a small baby girls’. She waves them around, and see them peek out from under blankets. They are so small. I can fit both in a single closed palm. Cooing sounds escape from both me and baby as I observe her small paw foot power.
Like Kissing baby’s sticky milk drunk face as she falls to sleep.
Like petting her forehead and seeing her eyes close, and breath slow.
Life is sweet here in our bubble. I am hoping next month we can participate more socially and reintegrate into society, but for now, I am enjoying learning how to take care of this little person, my daughter
