I was sitting on the couch in our apartment the other evening, philosophizing to myself about how life changes once you have a baby. Sooo I decided that I should write about it.
This isn’t a post about the obvious stuff: like how your home gets taken over by baby things and the fact that you find yourself humming the tunes from your child’s toys at random times. 😉 I was thinking more about a few changes that I didn’t even expect.
Let me say here, I’ve only been a mom for a little over a year. I’m not too experienced yet. I know that there are tons of things that I have yet to experience and learn, and I know I’ll encounter a whole lot more changes in the coming years.
But anyway, with that being said, if you’re anything like me, here are four ways your life will change when you have a baby:
1. You’ll cut other parents more slack
You might not have known it, but sometimes I secretly judged other parents before I had my own child. I mean, we all have at one time or another right? It usually goes something like this:
Their kid still doesn’t sleep through the night? When I’m a parent I won’t be such a softy. My baby will be sleeping through the night way sooner. If he cries he can just cry it out, it’ll be good for him.
Or this:
Those parents clearly aren’t training their kid well. Look how he totally doesn’t obey them! When I’m a parent I’m going to be consistent from the beginning so that I don’t have that problem.
Etc. etc.
Well let me tell you, I feel a lot less prone to think judgmental thoughts of other parents now! Because let’s just be honest, things aren’t always as cut and dry as you may have once thought in your pre-kid years.
Every child is different and every family different. We all have to do the best we can, asking God for wisdom and a whole lot of grace along the way.
2. You’ll form a stronger bond with your spouse
No one else understands your love for your child quite like your spouse does. No one other than your spouse really wants to discuss the cuteness of said child all the time. No one else gets as excited as the two of you do when your child does something momentous like stands for one second without holding onto anything. 😉
My husband and I were already blessed with a close relationship pre-baby, but I love that we now have an even tighter bond because we get to be parents together. It’s really cool.
3. You’ll grow more thankful for your own parents
Being a parent is incredible, but it’s a huge responsibility! One of the first times I took Caleb to the doctor I had to make a snap decision about something and I was in tears on the way home questioning if I’d done the right thing. I felt suddenly overwhelmed at the huge responsibility that it is to be someone’s mom!
It makes me a lot more grateful for my parents and all the tough decisions that they’ve had to wrestle with over the years, trying to do what’s best for us kids.
I also feel much less inclined to give my parents all my opinions about how they are raising my siblings (to their relief I’m sure.) 😉 Maybe I’m realizing that I’m not quite as wise about parenting as I used to think…
Oh, and I can’t forget to mention labor! Man I have a much bigger respect for my mom after going through an unmedicated labor and delivery. It was all obviously SO so worth it but really not fun. I really look up to my mom for how many times she went through that.
4. You’ll experience a love like nothing you’ve known before
I think I mentioned something along these lines in a previous post, but it’s worth repeating. Pablo and I both love Caleb more than we knew was possible. And it doesn’t matter what he does – when he’s older and maybe not such a huge of a fan of mom and dad as he is now – because no matter what, he is our kid. We have a bond with him that we will never have with other people’s kids. We would die for him without a question.
Making the decision to have a child – it is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body. – Elizabeth Stone
I love that quote. 🙂 It’s awesome to love someone so much but to be honest it’s also a little scary because you realize how completely devastated you’d be if anything ever happened to them.
But that’s when God’s love is so reassuring. He loves us, and our baby, more than we are even capable of loving. And He’s our father. We’re in good hands.
I’m sure there’s a lot more changes that I could talk about, but those are the four that came to mind right away. Do you have any thoughts? Feel free to share in the comments below!
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