BEING A NEW MOM DOESN’T MEAN BEING THE BEST

“The day your baby is born is the day your life changes, and it’s up to you what changes you make.”

In this post, I will go back far in my memories, to the first birth of my baby. It was 5 years ago when Patrick was born. We lived in England at the time, but this post is not about the country and place, but the hard search for mother-mates. And it can be funny that I thought it wouldn’t be a problem because I became a mom at the same time as my best friends. But that was the biggest problem – mom’s brain – that’s it.

Why all my wonderful friendships didn’t survive when our children were born?

You’ve probably heard of baby brain, baby blue, etc, but I’m convinced another new term has emerged – Mother’s brains or “Mothers know best” from Rapunzel’s Mom song, the fairy tale “Tangled”.

I don’t know why or when we slowly stopped seeing each other. We wrote and called each other less often, but I kept repeating to myself: “We’re all busy mothers, so we don’t have time for phone calls and meetings.“

However, after the first three months with my newborn baby, my life was slowly returning to normal. I find out that I miss old habits. I started to feel a lack of friends, female subjects, a gap in women’s life experiences, and most importantly, no one shared coffee time with me. Here I will quote my mother’s words. I heard them several times when I complained about my loneliness:

“When you were single it was time for friends and now there is a husband and there is a family.”

Simple, right?

I’m grateful and will always be for a husband and children, but a little detachment from this pattern is also needed: to be a mother and a woman. https://littlepuzzlesandme.com/nobody-asked-me/

I was the happiest mother when I accidentally met my old friends on the playground, who were now mothers and all were walking with their newborns in a pram. I drank coffee with them and I tried to make nice conversations.

It’s just a pity that these conversations weren’t as fun and relaxed as they were before the birth of the babies. The mother’s brain begins to introduce unnecessary problems.

BREASTFEEDING STORY

Why do we act as enemies to other mothers when we become mothers?

“I don’t understand how you can give up the most precious gift for a baby, a wonderful connection with your baby, which is breastfeeding. After all, milk has all the vitamins and antibodies, it acts as an antibiotic.”

“The whole truth. I agree with you, but how are you going to go back to work and breastfeed?”

“I’m not thinking about it yet because I want to cry. But have you heard that Moms can take extra breaks for breastfeeding?”

“Yes, it’s true, but Dalibor won’t go through half the city to bring me, Patrick, for breastfeeding”.

“You know sometimes men can sacrifice”.

“But I don’t want that sacrifice, I’m slowly ready to quit breastfeeding.”

“What? How many months is Patrick?”

“9 and a half.”

“When do you want to go back to work?”

“In a month.”

“It’s terrible. You will see, it will be very difficult for Patrick and you.”

“And you are not planning to go back to work?”

“‘I do plan, but at least for the first years I want to be with the baby.”

“But you’ll be with the baby all the time, only the baby won’t be into your tits.”

“It’s not even funny.”

The first complications in our friendly relationship and our first mother’s brain example appeared.

ORGANIC FOOD

Why do we change everything after giving birth? Our behavior, habits, our diet. 

Never give another child a snack without asking their Mom’s permission. I consider it reasonable, nowadays there are various allergies, there is a fashion for vegetarianism and veganism, or the mother just doesn’t want to feed her baby with sweets. I understand and I always ask the child’s mother first if my child can give her child some snacks.

“Can Patrick share the sausage rolls with Felix?

“No, he recently had a rash after that.”

“After a bun with sausage?”

“Yes.“

“Ok. What about fruit?”

“They are organic?”

“Are you seriously asking?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know, probably not, because it’s from an ordinary supermarket.” But it’s just blueberries and they’re good, I tried.”

“Maybe another time.”

“It’s starting to rain, maybe we’ll come to me, the kids are having a great time.”

“We have to go home for lunch.”

“I have spaghetti at home, I cook in the morning, my Patrick loves this food.” 

“We are trying to convert to vegetarianism with Felix.”

“But Lucy, you love steaks and spicy chicken wings, beef, and ribs.”

“I have eaten enough, now the most important thing is Felix, and I have to take care of his health.

 “What, is he sick?”

“No, why?”

I could write more about the lifestyle of all these new moms, the behavior of new mothers, or the unnecessary pressure of mothers in everyday conversation, but I’ll let it go because I won’t change that anymore. Sadly, kids get along well, have fun with each other, and feel good with each other, and we don’t have it anymore. Only because the mother’s brain has gone mad. I’m sure I’m not alone in these feelings, and I know how difficult it is to find new mother-friends.

I just want to add that don’t turn into Rapunzel’s mother just because “Mom knows best.”