Hmmmm there are some things that nobody tells
you about childbirth, being a first time mum and parenting, probably because they
will scare the heck out of expecting mums. For example, nobody told me that
breastfeeding will be so painnnnful..Geez!! I remember the first few days, I cried
my eyes out and my mum would scold me for crying. Apparently Nigerian tradition
forbids one from crying whilst breastfeeding a baby because the food wouldn’t digest
properly or something like that Naija mysteries lol. I had sores all
over my ni**les and found it very painful to breastfeed. My mum kept telling me
I had to endure the pain and that it would only last a couple of days/weeks and
its gone… well that was true because after the first 2 weeks of breastfeeding, I
learnt how to properly position my baby and he was able to suckle properly
without causing me pain or injury.
Talk about sleepless night *sobs*...
looking back, I’m not sure how I was able to cope with only 3 to 4 hours of sleep
at night. How come babies reverse day and night time?? I guess there’s nothing
like 'time of day’ in heaven because there has to be an explanation for this
kind of inconsiderate behaviour lol. Ahhnnn why will you sleep all through the
day and be awake all night? Even if you decide to stay awake, why must you
disturb your dear mummy? Hahaha All these questions for an infant abi? Lol
Also who knew that circumcising a male
child will cause the mother more pain that the child? I cried more than my son when he was being circumcised.
The circumcision was done in a Jewish center (I was told hospitals in the UK do
not perform circumcision). We booked the appointment in the first week of my
son’s birth and were given an appointment to come when he was 10 days old. The
whole process didn’t take up to 10 minutes but I couldn’t stop myself from
crying.
Shopping!!!! No one told me that I would
forget about my needs and only concentrate on the needs of my child. I remember
that I did not buy a single dress for myself after my son was born, all my attention and
finances were dedicated to my son. I totally forgot I was going back to work
and I couldn’t fit in any of my old work clothes, however my son had boxes of
new clothes waiting for him to grow into. I remember my first day back at work,
I decided to wear a body shaper to work. After I settled in my desk, I realised
I could breathe properly I was literally gasping for air. I just respected
myself, went into the restroom and took the body shaper off. Unfortunately for
me, I couldn’t zip up my dress afterwards because the shaper took a few inches
off me which had automatically resurfaced...Talk about deceit Lol. I had to
wear my jacket all through the day in the pretence that the air in my office was
too much for me. Hahahaha Naija Scopes
First day of baby day care nko…I called
the day care about a zillion times lol. The receptionist was very pleasant as I
called every 20 minutes lol. Despite paying a whopping £980 monthly for day
care, I just didn’t feel like they would pay him the much needed attention because
they had other children to look after. Hehe so in my mind if I call them every
20 minutes they would be forced to go check up on him and tell me whats he’s
doing at that particular moment … Talk about mummy drama!!! Lol
My boss was really understanding because
he allowed me to resume work 30 mins early, have half an hour lunch break and
then be able to leave an hour before close of work. I had to pick up my son at
6pm and my normal closing time was 6pm, it was humanly impossible for me to be
able to meet that timing so I had to ask for special consideration given my
circumstance. So I would leave the office at 5pm and would get to the day care
center a few minutes to 6pm. Talk about being a superwoman as I had little or
no sleep, plus office work, plus mummy duties Phewww!
All the strain I thought I was going through
did not take the pregnancy weight off me…Arghh What was going on here?? After
all the stress from work, sleepless nights etc I was still carrying my
pregnancy weight about. Sigh! I then decided to ditch using the bus and walk 1
hour to and from work every day. That was the only form of exercise I was doing
as apparently house chores don’t count as exercise Sigh!. Finally, I was able
to get a few kgs off with my daily 2 hours walk which gradually reduced to
almost half the time when I became fitter and able to do same distance within a
shorter time frame.
In all of these, I would not trade my
experiences for anything. Ladies, tell us some experiences you had which you weren’t
forewarned before you had your little ones…
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