Baby,
There was a forum thread that I was reading that asked whether new moms were more excited about having a baby rather than a person. I actually can't imagine you as a newborn--all I see in my head are sleep deprived night and days and dealing with a recovering body. Whenever I picture you, I see you as a toddler or as a child. Interestingly, never as an adolescent either. Maybe it's my brain's way of skipping ahead to the child ages I know best. Anyways, my answer to that forum was that I am most definitely more excited about discovering you as a person than dealing with a terrifying newborn that I have no idea how to handle.
I don't even like to hold babies, especially the ones that can't hold their heads up. You might be spending a lot of time on your dad's lap while he plays the latest video game because of my fear of the floppy head.
This has probably been my most random letter to you but as always, lots of love,
Mama
I never wanted to hold babies and the floppy head thing always made me nervous. And neal and I used to talk all the time about how fragile Addison felt -- even though really she was a strong little cookie for her age. We never really stopped talking about how strange it was to have a baby and hold her, but we still ended up loving to do that. Daddy's lap is good, but I suspect you will want to hold her a lot too when push comes to shove!
ReplyDeleteAs for travel, I know a number of pediatricians say no airplanes until after 2-3 months -- the germs on the tray tables, stagnant air, etc. on still-developing immunity. I didn't do a flight with A until she was probably 8 months. We did our first big drive from UT to CA when A was four months old and it mostly went well. I know a couple of people who did long car rides (from UT to CA and AZ) with two-day old babies -- I don't think I would even try that. But depending on the child, it seems like young babies can travel really well because they are sleeping most of the time, but I also know that they warned us about having A in the car seat for too long (I think they said that like don't leave her in the car seat for more than an hour at a time if at all possible) for the first couple of months because sometimes their breathing can be impeded by slouching over in the car seat -- which totally made sense to me because babies to look all crazy and slouched in car seats. If I were trying to do a trip with a really young one, I would do it by car and plan on stopping frequently. Even though Neal and I used to always drive straight from UT to CA, with A we always stop overnight in Mesquite -- super cheap hotels and it's good for all of us to get a break out of the car.