Some of you may know, maybe some don't, but my mom journey began a little to early. I was blessed with a pregnancy at the young age of 16. I say blessed because it halted a life destined for lots of parties followed by lots of bad choices. His birth brought back a closeness amongst my family and gave my father a chance to be a grandparent for a short time before he passed away. I am not ashamed to have been a teen mom, im forgiven, its part of my testimony and I have embraced it. all that said, it was not an easy road. To have a child at 16 is not the easy choice. If you've seen the MTV show Teen mom, know that it is by far a very real reality show. I was blessed with support , sometimes too much, but even so, teen parenting isnt easy. Thankfully it all worked out and I have a wonderful, intelligent, sweet son :)
Parker was a high maintenance baby!!! however, many many first babies are. I equate this to user error! Like anything, the first time you do it, you have no clue what you are doing. He was up all night (duh, thats what babies do) He cried alot (because i expected him to hang out in bouncers, swings, playpens etc and be content with toys). He hated to get dressed, was a picky eater, wouldn't give up the bottle, he was a kid. Mentally I labelled him high maintenance, but i know i could parent that same baby now and he would be a joy.
Parker started K eventually and it was not a fun time. He was bored, he complained, he voiced he was too smart for his class, told the teacher her work was boring, coloring was for babies etc etc. This continued on through first grade, we did the advanced class thing and quickly parker realised it was fun but essentially he was pulled out of class and expected to make up the work he missed. He found this punishment for being smart and the day his teacher suggested I should provide books for him to read during school hours to keep him busy, i pulled him out and we began our homeschool journey. I'm spoiled, he has always been easy to teach, he finished 3rd grade in one semester and so we skipped him. He tested appropriately and has been super smart ever since. he sports beiberiffic hair, shoes with wheels and an ipod touch. He is just a normal amazing kid and I'm so glad he is mine :)
Paxton was conceived four months into my marriage to Beau. I was thrilled, Beau was thrilled and a bit overwhelmed....well, i guess i was too. This time i would be doing it without all my family (we moved to La). This time i knew a little more about motherhood and parenting. Once he was born, I instantly compared him to Parker, naturally. I labelled him an easy baby. He breastfed better because i didn't let him have a bottle for a few weeks and did not supplement with formula from the get go , a mistake i made with parker but had no clue :( . He slept better because he was breastfeeding, and I would fall asleep nursing him, he would fall asleep in bed with me. I was cosleeping (had no clue what this was) which scared beau but there really was no avoiding it. I was better at swaddling, so he was easier to comfort. I toted him everywhere, even got my first carrier (Bjorn) and he was a pretty happy kid.
He was born at Fort Polk Louisiana (the arm pit of the army) but we quickly moved to alaska a few weeks after his birth. he screamed the whole way up the Al-Can but we made it and there he grew. He loves learning and playing golf. He eats everything. We have always offered everything and dont do special meals. He eats what he wants, leaves what he wants and we take the same approach with his schooling. I let him keep working and working as long as he wants, but when he doesnt want to do it anymore thats fine with me. so far so good, he loves school and i want to keep it that way. He is our most dramatic, gets stressed over anything! but also our most loving and cares so much about others. a great P to have in the pod for sure :)
Paxton's birth was literally a near death experience, no lie! So I was done having babies. I laid in my hospital bed with that newborn bliss, my husband right beside me, and felt like life was perfect, i had my two boys, we were done. Id love to have a girl but really didn't want to go through that again and found motherhood exhausting. About the time Paxton was 8mos old, God had a better plan. I went to get my annual, get some bc and oops, it was too late. Piper was on the way. I was not ready, i was sad/overwhelmed/depressed. I didn't know if I could love a child as much as I loved my two boys. My husband was set to deploy a few weeks after my due date and there was no way I could care for three kids! by myself! in Alaska!
I got over it! I got a midwife, I set out to have a better birth experience. I was not eligible for the epidural (what caused the whole almost dying prob with pax). I did get drugs, and though her birth position called for a c-section, my midwife helped me deliver my biggest baby yet, a beautiful 8lb baby girl.....well, if I'm honest...she wasnt so beautiful at first. That whole birth position thing had her covered in bruises and her nose was completely crooked. She sported spikey black hair and looked like she had been living in a tanning bed for nine months lol (neither would have been a prob except id previously delivered blue eyed blondes, was one myself, had mated with one, so she was a surprise). But she quickly became a beauty inside and out. She still sports a year round tan :) and traded the black spikes for a honey blonde (just when i decided i loved her dark hair and wanted a red, a blonde, and a dark haired child, i just thought it was too cute).
She had some nursing probs the first couple of weeks but ended up a champ! She slowed in the growth department and became a teeny petite thing. When compared to her brothers, she was an even easier baby!!! I didn't think it was possible. She slept all the time, she stayed swaddled for 6 months like a tiny burrito! She co slept - still no clue what that was but my hubby was gone, she was warm and snuggly and with had an amazing ability to nurse without even waking me! the only prob was that meant she nursed all night, from the same side. I always woke engorged!!! well worth it :)
She is now 5 years old and is the best gift we ever gave paxton. She plans to marry him but he swears he will punch her if she does it. They will never admit their best friend status, but i will say she has her own pink princess room yet he forces her to sleep in his room almost every night! She is always willing to share (often taken advantage of) She is almost always kind and wears her heart on her sleeve. Her feelings get hurt easily and rarely has to be disciplined. She loves gymnastics and likes school ok. She is our precious angel and I'm soo thankful for God's better plan!
Pearce is our one and only planned child! out of 5! He was a deployment baby and is a little more than 2 years younger than piper (perfect separation imo). Finally I knew what I was doing! I knew how i wanted my pregnancy and birth to go. I knew how to take care of him so there was no anxiety there. I knew now that i would co-sleep :) and discovered better babywearing options when Piper was a toddler so I had my carrier stash growing and had my first didymos woven wrap awaiting his arrival (black elipsen).
Well the pregnancy went as planned, i stayed pretty small, did alot less prenatal care than before, ate super healthy, The Organic Pregnancy was in and What to Expect When Expecting was out :) but thats where my plans ended. I couldn't have a midwife for the birth because we moved to a small town and there werent any :( but i did have a doc who let me do whatever I wanted (not a great choice for new moms but remember, i finally knew what i was doing lol ). I stayed at home contracting for hours and when i was certain i must be 9cm i walked my teeny non maternity jean wearing butt (the one and only time so i had to brag) to the hospital feeling and looking great. My fave nurse Kacee shot me down real fast, i was 3cm and apparently had no clue what i was doing haaaaa. This doc would let me have that infamous epidural, i didn't want it , but caved pretty quickly then proceeded to have an amazing birth. I had my pretty pink dress ready, my new pink diaper bag, even pink bedding. I was prepared for my second girl, confirmed by u/s and intelligender urine test..............only prob........she came out with a penis!!! we had no name, no clothes, nothing. The nurses chose the name Pearce, my friends Andrea and Jennifer brought me some clothing, and so it was. Our third boy!
Id learned a few tricks by now. I did EC (elimination communication) with pearce, supplementing with cloth diapers. I wrapped him mostly with a few other carriers here and there. I intentionally co slept for the first time, he was my first kid to never have a bottle. He was a great baby. He didn't sleep as well as piper but one of those tricks Id learned was that my expectations of a baby can dictate the mood and attitude of the whole new baby experience. The day I became pregnant, i accepted that there would be many sleepless nights and i was ok with that. Ive learned to enjoy late night tv, bought a book light, and so when it happened that didnt make him a bad baby...it was simply par for the course. Sleep was a luxury much appreciated, never expected and certainly far from entitled to.
My great late night lovin baby quickly became a wild toddler. The EC worked great and he was potty independent by 18mos. You will clean more bathrooms with a pottying child so young, but soo worth it (because by this time i had lost a baby while on bc, and shortly after conceived our latest blessing while employing the "in Gods hands" technique). There were more diapers to come and i knew well that i didnt want two in dipes again!
Pearce is by far the most energetic. He has created more disasters, destroyed property, injured himself....he is exhausting. He is in gymnastics which is perfect for him! he never naps, is up at 6am, he is wild...but soo much fun. He says the funniest things, does the funniest things, and truly entertains the whole family. He requires alot of work but there is a big payoff and I enjoy each day with my little man!
Pike is our Halloween bean! I decided he would be born on Halloween the day i calculated my due date. ( i chose the bday for every kid but piper). I was quite busy with all the other kiddos during his pg (pearce is a full time job) so I wasn't quite as healthy, however I did get the best birth ever! I really wanted a homebirth, but dad wasn't too thrilled and our ins would not cover it. I hoped to have an "accidental" homebirth but when the day came the hubby and mil were pushing me out the door. Prob a good thing because i barely made it to the hospital. Pike was born as soon as we arrived. He was my largest baby 8.6. No drugs, no ivs , not time for any of that. It was amazing! He nursed like a champ from day one, was cloth diapered, breastfed, co slept and wrapped (in an ever growing stash of carriers his first being a didymos silk indio).
Pike is now crawling and standing and working on taking his first steps. He has a couple of teeth and can only say DaDa and Parker. He loves playing with his siblings most of all. He is our snuggliest kiddo so far and still somehow maintains his newborn squishiness. I'm loving it, totally limp as soon as he hits mamas arms :) I know five is alot, but I'm lovin what i got!
to answer a couple more of Beth's questions......
What did u do differently/similar? well they all coslept, whether that was the intention or not. Ive breast fed each one longer and longer. babyworn piper as a toddler, but mostly the last two...alot. cloth diapered the last two but id do anything to have started with the first.
who was high needs? we have been so blessed to have no medical issues making a child truly high needs. I thought Parker was high needs, but really i know now it was I who was high needs ( i call this first time mom disease) they were all just babies with different ranges of normal but id say none were truly high needs.
have u practiced attachment parenting with all of them? well obviously no. I didnt even know what that was until i was on my third. to tell the truth, I'm not a/p. Im 90% i cosleep, babywear, nurse, believe in bonding and almost always have all of my kids with me. We do everything as a family and started this with Paxton. We don't believe in "i cant do it with a baby" and the parent child bond is one of Gods greatest gifts........however, i have to out myself as a spanker. We don't spank often, it is reserved for a really bad offense ( blatant lying, stealing etc) but we do use it as a parenting tool (except for piper, she hasn't really needed one) thus excluding me from the a/p label. I hang with an a/p crowd and in general that is the perspective i support, but I'm really just a wannabe. Aside from the spanking id say i was only really a/p with the last two intentionally.
Those 5 Ps are growing too fast! I am so sad that we do not get to see ya'll more often!!
ReplyDeleteYour kids are really going to appriciate these stories when they get older. Somehow with such a full plate, you still manage to write...i think that's wonderful!
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