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First Time Mom . . . and how it turned out 20 years later

Ada was our first, which means that we were sparkling new parents, trying to imagine how a new baby would impact our lives.

I knew that a baby was a fulltime job, and I quit my job in preparation for this new one.

I knew that I had been born at home and I wanted my baby to be born at home.

I knew that I wanted to breastfeed exclusively. To save money, for convenience, for bonding and health benefits, but also because it’s natural and I wanted to do things the natural way.

I knew that I wanted to carry my baby on my chest, so I had bought a ring sling and a second-hand Snugli in preparation.

I knew I wanted to cloth diaper. For the planet, and also to keep chemicals away from my baby’s parts.

I read that some parents skip diapers all together by teaching their babies to pee and poop on command but I could tell that this was a kooky minority and I read the paragraph about it aloud to my husband as a point of trivia, assuring him that while I had plenty of non-mainstream parenting ideas, he didn’t have to worry that I was entertaining that one!

This was 2004, so of course there was internet but it was before we always looked everything up on the internet first, and before we made purchases on the internet by default. It would still be almost 10 years before I’d get my first smartphone.

So when I was buying cloth diapers, I purchased wool diaper covers from an ad in a magazine (Midwifery Today). I loved the idea of all-cotton diapers and natural wool covers on my pure and organic new baby.

Especially since we lived in hot, humid Florida where the walls grow mildew if you leave your AC off for a day or two. I did not like the idea of a plastic cover holding in heat and moisture around my baby’s delicate region!

I thought I was prepared to be a mother, and I probably was as prepared as I could be.

Because what can really prepare you in this nuclear family society where most of us have very little to do with babies until they slide out and all at once we’re wholly responsible for another human?

A helpless and 100% needy human. One that needs appropriate support to grow and develop, to not be dropped or stepped on, to eat, to be cleaned up and cleaned up after, and to be toted from place to place and never left alone.

So here’s how it went:

Ada was born at home. It was hard. Labor lasted almost forever. We had exhausted my intended position of supported squat and I was now reclined and semi-upright on my bed, held up by my husband, David.

Baby’s shoulder got stuck so David and the midwife and the assistant flipped me over onto hands and knees on my bed.

I knew what was happening because I had read everything I could find about birth and I knew that this position was called the “Gaskin Maneuver” and was helpful in cases of shoulder dystocia.

The midwife fished my daughter out by catching the armpit with her finger. This was extremely painful but I can barely remember the pain through the haze that labor disappears into after your baby is born.

You know that haze, right? The one designed, I’m sure, so that we will be willing to go through it all again in cooperation with nature’s greatest primal urge – to procreate beyond unexpected adversity’s trek toward extinction.

And as I sit here 3 babies later, I can attest that it worked on me. When I eventually did stop making babies, it was because nature has not devised a way to trick me into thinking I don’t have my hands very, very full when the noisy, volcanic, joyful, chaos-causing, underfoot bunch are immediately before my eyes 24 hours a day!

Fool me 4 times, shame on me, but my mama didn’t raise me to be fooled a 5th time!

Of course, I jest. I wanted babies and I am so happy with them. They are still bringing me joy everyday. And if a little forgetful haze helped me to not dread labor and birth, I can appreciate that!

She came out and I was immediately helped to turn over onto my back and my baby was placed in my arms. The midwife gave her oxygen but I wasn’t really paying attention. David and I sunk into a cocoon of wonder and awe as we gently welcomed a new soul into our family.

She was supposed to be Molly but, according to David, she didn’t look like a Molly. So we spent a few days pouring over names and debating their merits and when we found Ada, a Hebrew name, I loved it immediately. It harkened back to Ada’s Jewish heritage from her granddaddy’s family, and later, when a 5 year old Ada was obsessed with fairies, we learned that Ada sounds like the Spanish word for “fairy,” another reason it was perfect for her!

Her middle name, Maria, was my grandmother’s name and we would later find a secret and appropriate meaning for that name, too. One of Ada’s first words was “moon” and she would later outgrow fairies to become entranced with astronomy. When she was eleven or twelve years old she learned that the dark patches we see on the moon are called lunar maria because maria is Latin for “seas” and these dark spots were once thought to be lunar oceans.

And then our quiet days-long babymoon was interrupted by Hurricane Ivan. Our mothers informed me that there was a strong hurricane headed straight for where we lived in Clearwater Florida, and they wanted us to evacuate with our 4 day old baby.

At that time my father worked for the Tampa Electric Company and was needed at work to keep electricity on as much as possible during the storm, but my mother and sister, and David’s mother and the three of us, piled into a couple of cars and left the state.

Thus began baby Ada’s long lived hatred for driving.

And one of my first revelations about how much I thought I knew about babies.

When I was pregnant my mother had advised me that if I couldn’t get the baby to sleep, I could always fall back on the sure-fire method of putting baby in the carseat and driving around until she fell asleep. I didn’t know if my baby would be a “good sleeper” but I was glad to have this trick in my back pocket to pull out as needed.

Ada’s first car trip was an 8 hour road trip to Georgia.

And she screamed. And screamed. And screamed.

We tried to stop each time to comfort her and nurse her and reassure her but it soon became clear that if we were going to drive, she was going to be very unhappy, and so were the rest of us.

So far her life had pretty much been lying in bed with me nursing, maybe taking a trip to the gliding rocking chair to try nursing there. Not much excitement.

And I hadn’t known her long enough to have figured out that she just wanted to be in my arms – preferably nursing – constantly.

It wasn’t until we got to a motel room in Georgia and an exhausted, post-partum me desperately needed a break to sleep that we learned: if Ada wasn’t nursing, she was going to cry. Loudly. With what appeared to be zero concern for the fact that there were other guests on the other side of our paper thin, motel room walls.

But I needed sleep and I got it, drifting away to the sound of my baby crying in the distance as David walked her up and down the walkways outside our room.

But one good sleep made a world of difference. Not to her. She did not learn that it was okay to be apart from me until she was much older. But I felt much better and able to mother again.

The brightest point in the motel stay was that Ada’s granddaddy who had been out of town met us in Georgia and got to meet Ada for the first time.

And we went to a park and David got to try out our Snugli for the first time, which was lovely.

But even though our family was extremely helpful and making my life as easy as possible during this surreal trip, it was hard not being at home. I went to all the trouble of having a homebirth where I was comfortable and we had all our own furniture and clothes and food and kitchen equipment and baby clothes . . . only to be living in a motel room with a baby who was not yet a week old!

And instead of learning my lesson from the universe about how much we can control in life and how we should be flexible like the willow instead of stiff like the oak, I resented it.

For one thing, as a brand new cloth diapering mother, I did not feel up to tackling cloth diapering laundry on the road, so we purchased newborn disposables to take with us. While a more natural journey might have us incorporating disposables months into parenting if we couldn’t keep up with laundry or when we chilled out a teeny bit about our pure and organic baby . . . this roadtrip had her in the dreaded disposables on day 5!

For another, hours of driving with a screaming baby was not how I had planned to introduce my new baby to the world and it felt like something I ought to be able to avoid while she was so freaking new and fresh.

We were only gone a couple of days and then another dreadful roadtrip back home, arriving during rush hour and caught behind a schoolbus with a baby who hated driving. And finally back home to our sanctuary.

And just like that, the regular business of learning how to parent a new baby could commence.

We were lucky that breastfeeding came fairly easily. But then again, Ada ALWAYS wanted to breastfeed. And that soon made life very difficult for me.

Plus I was back to using the cloth diapers I had so excitedly purchased. I had ordered cotton prefolds – they are several layers of cloth sewn together into a rectangle with a thicker third down the middle and thinner sides. You can wrap them around baby pretty easily without much folding like you’d have to do with a flat diaper. Thus the name.

And because I was new to cloth diapers and hadn’t done much online research, I thought these were pretty fancy because they were so much handier than “flats.”

We had cute diaper pins to hold the diapers on and then I wrapped the purple wool covers around them. The covers had velcro so they were essentially the same shape as a disposable diaper and seemed just as handy.

Unfortunately, I soon learned that it took multiple prefolds to contain the amount of pee my daughter peed, and the wool covers proved unable to keep up.

When spread around her diaper, the purple knitting stretched out so that it was full of holes. And they weren’t big enough to contain the cotton diapers which stuck out through the leg holes. Anything touching my daughter’s diaper when she peed would soak pee right onto it. This was usually my shirt because she was definitely a mama’s girl.

So far, attempts to use the bouncer and the swing and the stroller had not been well received by our little one. She’d take my arms, thank you very much.

On the bright side, the bouncer and the swing and the stroller didn’t get peed on, as they would have been harder to wash than my clothes.

As I am a smart, modern woman, I didn’t just put up with these inconveniences. I decided to use the Snugli more to get my arms back and not be trapped in a chair all day.

Unfortunately, 2 layers of prefolds and a wool cover had turned my baby into a big purple ball with arms and legs sticking out. And when I got home from a lovely walk to find I couldn’t pry my baby’s giant purple diaper butt out of the carrier, I vowed never to put her in the Snugli again.

I still needed to solve both these problems – leaking diaper covers and being stuck on the couch holding my baby all day.

Luckily, I found I could nurse while sitting at the computer and since I couldn’t get up all day anyway, I had plenty of time to surf the internet and find many wonderful diaper options as well as reviews – life changing for the modern consumer and first time mom!

I still loved the idea of wool and a little research reassured me that it wasn’t wool that was the problem, just the design of that particular cover. I ordered a couple of Aristocrats – thick (and tightly woven) wool pull-on diaper covers that had fantastic reviews.

Since the purple diaper covers also had weak velcro, I was thrilled to find pull on covers. I was learning fast. Unfortunately, all through trial and error.

I also bought some doublers – pads you can lay down the center of your diaper to add absorbency without using a whole ‘nother bulky prefold.

Between those and the new covers, I was feeling more optimistic about this whole cloth diapering thing. And I came across snappis – rubber doodads that hold your diaper closed without pins.

Talk about high-tech!

While I waited for the new diaper accessories to ship (because there was absolutely nothing like this for sale locally in 2004), I was still trying to solve the nursing. The always nursing. The not being able to do anything except nursing.

So I had a go at the ring sling I had purchased. It worked. Pretty much.

I mean I could figure out how to put her in and tighten it up. But it wasn’t so hands free. And the position it held her in seemed weird but it also seemed to be how the thing was designed to hold her, so maybe it was right?

I did like being able to walk around the house with her – and even better to go for walks outside.

But it wasn’t great and by now I knew that I could nurse while surfing the internet, so I returned to my computer chair and found The Babywearer forums.

Young mothers, you may not realize, but this was before there was social media. So instead you would find forums dedicated to the topics you were interested in.

I learned that there were several different style of baby carrier, each with raving fans. Ring slings were one, but I was just not feeling it. Looking at the photos and instructions, I was immediately drawn to woven wraps. After much deliberation and agonizing I purchased an EllaRoo Mary wrap from an online store.

It was super expensive for our newly single income household and I had already spent what seemed like a fortune on the new diaper covers (because, surprise, cheap covers are just that).

So I wanted to be as sure as possible that it would work for us. I checked with David which color options he would be willing to wear, because if we were spending this much on a baby carrier, we better get a LOT of use out of it. And I worried if the thin EllaRoo wraps that were reported to be great for hot weather (which we had nearly all year round) were going to be cushy enough to be comfortable on my shoulders if I ended up wearing my daughter all day, which I knew I would.

The owner of the website was very patient, answering my lengthy worried emails in detail – something I so appreciated and have never forgotten, so that I try to provide the same kindness and help to every mom that emails my business.

And finally I pulled the trigger and pushed the buy button and there was nothing to do but wait.

Oh, there was one thing I could do – I had found directions for a no-sew Bei Dai and I ran out to Joanne Fabrics to find some stretchy fleece which I cut into a panel with 2 short straps and 2 long straps and I was able to start wearing my daughter immediately without waiting for my wrap to be delivered.

Oh my goodness. This changed my life!

I know now that the ring sling could have, too, but with no one local to help me troubleshoot, it just wasn’t intuitive enough for me to get comfortable and secure on my own.

The custom fit of tying a woven wrap around my baby had seemed simple and intuitive to me and a Bei Dai had a similar appeal. Tie the waist straps, pull the panel over baby, and then you tighten the shoulder straps around you both very much like a wrap, and tie.

And cue the french horns because . . . we could nurse in it!!!

I was officially free!

And baby’s bottom was by now safely ensconced in cotton and wool that didn’t leak.

It was all coming together. I could really do this mothering thing!

But I couldn’t wait for my wrap. I loved everything about the idea of wrapping, the different ways you could tie it and customize it. How it would be more supportive and hands-free than my stretchy homemade Bei Dai.

It was at this time that I met my first real mom-friend and best-friend-for-life. We were both at a huge Superbowl party thrown by a mutual friend. I was sitting at a plastic table out on the lawn eating snacks not too close to the giant outdoor screen (because I don’t actually care about football).

Rachel walked by and stopped as we both did double takes. “We use the same diaper covers!” she said when she saw Ada’s beautiful new Aristocrats diaper cover. I couldn’t tell because her baby was wrapped up on her chest. I had NEVER seen anyone wrap in real life.

“I love your wrap! I have one, too. I mean it’s not here yet but I’ve ordered one and it’s supposed to be here soon. I’ve been reading all about them and I can’t wait,” I babbled.

This was in a time and place where neither of us had ever heard of anyone cloth diapering or wrapping. This was huge.

That’s the first time motherhood lead me to one of my favorite relationships with one of my favorite people.

Can we take a moment to just appreciate all the people that motherhood connects us with? I’m sure everyone has a different experience but I know I’m not the only one who meets best friends through like-minded mothering styles. And my mom best friends have impacted me so hugely I can’t even imagine who I would be without the lasting effects they’ve left on me.

Here’s Rachel with Ada (left) and her daughter Serena (right) petting a goat.

It wasn’t long after that I received my wrap. I walked outside to pick up the package while holding my nursing baby and hobbled back inside holding the package and still nursing. I sat down in my computer chair, not on the couch because I couldn’t wait a moment later to try this out and I knew I might need help from the internet to figure out what I was doing.

But I had been pouring over tutorials and tips for the entire week I was waiting for the wrap to be delivered and I guess I had soaked up enough. I was able to wrap around my nursing baby, while sitting in a chair with arms, and tighten enough to hold her until I was hands free!

Instead of hunting and pecking with one hand, reaching over the keyboard to use the mouse with my non-dominant left hand because Ada was nursing on my right side and that arm was busy supporting her, I was able to use two hands to get onto the woven wrap forum and tell them all about my success and how I couldn’t believe how well it was working!

Then it was time to try standing up and walking around. I had to tighten and adjust when I stood up but it was easy for me to untie the knot and adjust the loose ends before retying. Ada was looking up at me with wide dark eyes, as if to say, this is new and different and strange, but as long as I’m still latched on, I don’t mind.

Now I really felt free. I didn’t have to use my arms at all!

Exulting in the luxury I strolled into the kitchen and got myself a glass of water. And made a sandwich. And walked over to the phone (it was attached to a wall, you see) and called David.

It had taken almost 5 months. But with my baby contentedly nursing, her cloth diapers working, my hands free, and a new best friend, I was finally feeling I could do this mothering thing.

That newfound sense of capability is probably why, the next time I encountered the idea of “infant pottying” online, I actually considered it. It actually seemed kind of awesome. Like something I might actually do. And so I tried it. And it worked! I cannot describe what it feels like the first time you off your baby the potty and she understands and pees.

And it was obviously meant to be because the next time I talked to my new mom-friend Rachel on the phone, she mentioned that she was doing this crazy thing where you give your baby opportunities to pee in a potty or sink and I said, “No way – I’m doing that too!”

I mean, what are the chances?

And then Ada helped me teach local moms to wrap, battled thrush, went to the beach, took several plane flights to visit friends, to attend great grandma’s birthday party, to attend a wedding, to attend a funeral, and to attend another wedding, learned to walk, read tons of books, learned to swing, became obsessed with fairies and wore wings everywhere, went to story time at the library, drew pictures, played at the park, sang songs, enjoyed Halloweens and Christmases and Easters, reluctantly weaned, got up in the middle of the night to see a lunar eclipse, performed on a stage, took ballet classes, read more books, danced at concerts, joined lots of fun homeschool classes, painted pictures, learned to shoot a bow and arrow, rode a horse, went to the zoo, lost a sister, got a new sister, got a brother, lived in an RV fulltime, danced on mountaintops, swam in the Pacific, visited the Grand Canyon, saw Niagara Falls, found Paul Revere’s house, took the Staten Island Ferry, fell in love with astronomy, went to music festivals, took flute lessons, went camping, moved out to the country, joined 4H, learned to use a telescope, lost a grandfather, learned to train horses, volunteered for disaster relief in Puerto Rico, got 1st prize in a county fair, read books on physics, studied American History, worked for the family business, saw Jaws in 3D and started college.

Yup, Ada’s turning 20 on Monday and this is for her. We have had so much fun together and we have been through A LOT together. I practically wrote a novel just about her first 5 months, and that was just a brief look at a few of the things that came up for me as her mother in that time!

I have two younger children and I can tell you that once one of them grows into a wonderful adult, it helps you so much to be relaxed about whether you’re parenting right and how they will “turn out”. Turns out they turn out fine.

And it’s easy to look back and see that it’s not because of where they are born or what kind of diapers you use. It’s all the moments experienced together and it’s recognizing the circumstances that cause things to go well so you can do more of that.

Look for more joy and love and connection. Prioritize that, always.

And recognize the common elements present when things go poorly and try to eliminate those conditions more and more. But also realize that doing something one way once doesn’t mean it’s beginning a habit that can never be reversed. Schedules and routines are convenient for babies and young children to predict what’s coming next, but you can mix things up, too, without lasting damage.

And you can’t shield them from hardship or sadness or hurt feelings, even if you try. So don’t agonize about trying. Error toward honesty. The more accurate information we give our little ones, the better they can make good decisions and learn how to respond to “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” so that they are equipped to go on when we’re not around.

And let them see you having fun in life, so they know that life should be fun.

And it really does pass in a whirlwind, though it doesn’t seem like it at the time. So don’t dwell on the bad days. That just makes the bad last longer and effect all of you more. When it’s tough, pull out a baby picture or remember a sweet baby memory. And before you know it, your baby is 20 years old and you are laughing at funny movies together and comparing notes on your favorite novels, and sharing fascinating scientific facts you learned on Facebook.

When your baby turns 20, you get all sentimental and start to sum up the lessons learned in your head. And then you want to share them. And here we are.