Motherhood!

As simple as it sounds, motherhood is more complex than I ever thought about in my entire life.

You carry a baby for 9 months (first lie, actually your first pregnancy takes 10 months) then you go to the hospital super excited because you will finally meet this human being who walked around with you for 9 months and then Buuummm, once there, you start having all these questions in your brain on a loop, is the baby going to be okay? I'll be fine? who will take the baby if it something happen to me? What if they hurt the baby in the process? it will hurt? OMG it's going to hurt, I can feel it already! and that's it, it hurts a lot, the baby is born and you feel in an imaginative bubble of love like in the movies... No! you are still in pain and now they are going to fix all the damage done in childbirth and it feels like it hurts even more. But the baby is there, in your arms and the only thing you want is for all of this to be over and you can go home with your baby and enjoy everything that is to come.

Once at home (and in my particular case, with no one to help) the first thought that came to my mind was, well, I just need to breastfeed, check that the baby is breathing, kiss her, and show all my love for her... she sleeps all the time so that's it... well yeah actually babies sleep most of the time the first few weeks and things seem easier so you relax a little (and it's better you relax and enjoy it because soon it will be over), but you have pain, you can barely move, shower, or even cook for yourself, which is super important when you're breastfeeding, and that's when things start to get complicated. After 2/3 weeks alone, cooking and bathing times seem non-existent, and stress starts to take over. You start to feel anxious about your routine, nights and days lose their meaning, just fade away and become just a day, the schedule changes, you stay up all night and sleep all day, you have lunch at 5pm sometimes at 10 am. ...dinner is finally ready at midnight!

and the baby? oohh the baby is perfectly fine, rested, fed (God only knows how, because after 20h of breastfeeding she was already sucking my soul from the breast because there was no more milk for sure) clean and finally sleeping... and yeah it is in that moment when you look in the mirror and see that unlike the baby, you are completely messed up, no shower, dirty and mismatched clothes, hair all tangled up and you haven't even brushed your teeth, so around 3 in the morning, you finally get your shower, change clothes, brush your teeth (while praying that the baby doesn't wake up) and at the end you just get ready for another 24 hours of breastfeeding, diapers etc...

After getting into the routine, you start to relax again, and that's when the cramps monster appears, the baby cries for 3 hours without stopping, at some point, you cry with the baby too because you don't know what to do. The first times you run to the doctor, then of always hearing the same answer, you end up accepting that it will be like this in the best of hypotheses until 3 months, however, the baby starts interacting with you, starts smiling (and what a feeling of happiness when she smiles) starts babbling the first sounds, to be attentive to what you do and what you say.

The feelings are many, there is still a lot to come, the journey has started now, but as hard as it is, I wouldn't trade it for anything in this world.

Luiza is perfectly fine and I am very proud of the work I have done so far, in my dirty clothes and messy hair.