Life with three little ladies

I was reading through my journal last night about my feelings upon finding out I was pregnant. I was mostly scared about things given my rough second go around with Mia and I didn't want to be pregnant. The worst part being the pregnancy sickness. 

And I was right.

That sucked the most. Sucked balls really. I was throwing up 6-8 times a day for 24 weeks, and then I'd become so dehydrated I got at least 5 IV treatments in one month. Then towards the end my midwife ordered blood work done only to reveal my iron was severely low due to a genetic disorder (thanks Moira) and I was ordered to have 6 iron transfusions.

"Next time we'll start those at the beginning" she said.

HA! There will be no next time.

Then I gave birth.

Birth wasn't easy or anything. But it was doable, shorter than last time and recovery was better. Except for the after birth contractions. Those things SUCK. Apparently they get worse with every consequent baby so there's that to not look forward to.

It was life after birth with my third baby that happened. This post-partum phase was amazing. Actual, legitimate bliss. I've never felt so much adoration to be honest. And that's not just towards Teuila, but towards all 3 of my girls. I just love them so much my heart feels like it's going to beat right out of my chest.

Seriously? Seriously.

It's not like she's this amazingly easy baby either. But she is pretty amazing, and has some amazing habits. She's been sleeping through the night (at least 8 hours) every night since she was 5 weeks and 4 days old. She did it all by herself and has kept it up. I don't even have to rock her to sleep or nurse her to sleep. I do nurse her right before bed but as soon as she's done I burp her, then lay her down and leave the room. She stays awake for a few minutes by herself then drifts off to sleep. I stare at her while she's asleep. I stare at her when she's awake. I laugh at her sisters' smothering. Mia's sweet "awwwww my baby!" Kiki's first person she says hi to when she gets home from school. She loves being talked to and has the sweetest coos back. At least they're sweet to me. Her favorite thing to do is stare at ceiling fans (aka Fanny) and smile and talk to them. She gets a sore tummy a lot because I'm pretty sure my let down is a bit strong for her but she LOVES to have a bath and hates it when she's taken out and has the sweetest little shivers after her baths. She hates it when the car stops when she's awake but is really good at sleeping in her car seat. It stinks that car seats are unsafe for babies to sleep in cause if we leave her in her car seat for a couple of hours she'll nap the entire time.

So, it's not like I got this easy child that makes loving her easy. But I do credit a lot of my bad experience with Mia to my happiness with Teuila. 

Because of how bad things were with Mia I had low expectations. I expected her to be a terrible sleeper until 5 months when I finally had to sleep train her (didn't happen), I expected exhausting cluster feeds at 2, 4 and 6 weeks (also didn't happen), I expected to grudgingly get through the early phases until she could sit up and eat regular food (loving each phase she's in and hating that she's growing up so fast), and I expected to be stressed about pumping and producing enough milk for her (I've got about 100 oz of frozen milk at home and pump almost twice as much at work as she drinks at home). 

Since I had such low expectations, I'm exceeding them and ending up proud of how well I'm doing mentally. I'm not stressed so things are going well. I don't have any expectations about what our baby should/shouldn't do and am pleasantly surprised when things are going well. I nurse as she wants, cuddle her, love her and in return I've got a sweet baby. And THAT, is where I failed Mia. I had all these expectations of what she "should" be doing, when she should be doing it and how she and I should be together. I set us up for failure when I was looking for items to check off my list.

To baby Mia bear I apologize. But I'm grateful for those experiences because they helped me figure out what DOES work. Also, for the very first time in my entire life, I'm baby hungry! I just want my baby to stay a baby forever so I can cuddle her, nurture her, help and watch her grow and just be everything she needs. I want all 3 of my girls to know they're enough as they are. But they'll need to keep growing, developing and improving because that's how you move forward in life.

I feel like a legit mother now that I've got 3 kids. We're a family of FIVE! We have more kids than adults. We can't fit anyone else in a car now and because of that, we got a van.

A VAN.

I'm so ashamed. And admittedly vain. I get embarrassed to sometimes drive it but it's way more comfortable than our other car (that almost has 200k miles on it), it has a TV to occupy our girls on long trips *anything over 45 mins, or late ate night*, it's easy to get 3 kids in and out, the doors close automatically as does the trunk - it's just easy.

Life with 3 kids is amazing. I love it. It's not easy but it's not hard either. I didn't think I could fall in love with my baby this soon, or this much. I didn't think I could love Kiki and Mia even more but I do. A smothering-over-the-top kinda love. Those girls are what our family needed and they're the biggest joy.

I love you girls.