{"id":2052,"date":"2007-09-18T08:53:08","date_gmt":"2007-09-18T15:53:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/2007\/09\/18\/dispatch-1-from-motherland\/"},"modified":"2026-01-27T13:03:37","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T21:03:37","slug":"dispatch-1-from-motherland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/2007\/09\/18\/dispatch-1-from-motherland\/","title":{"rendered":"Musings On Motherhood (MOM) #1"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Update:<\/strong> The title of this post has been changed from <em>Dispatch #1 From Motherland<\/em> at the suggestion of my sister-in-law, L. Excellent idea, my dear!<\/p>\n<p>Things I have learned:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I&#8217;m still not ready to visit via phone (I can&#8217;t believe I&#8217;m so loved by so many), so it&#8217;s not personal and I&#8217;m not ignoring you. I am depleted and need to give what I have to the one little being who needs me most. In-person visits from select friends are brief and usually involve bringing food or running errands. The only person I want now is my Mommy to talk to (and we do). (And it&#8217;s easier to steal a few moments to quietly write my thoughts to share here.) <\/li>\n<li>The last ten days have been the hardest of my life so far.<\/li>\n<li>My mother-in-law&#8217;s presence has been a blessing and I will be ever grateful for this.<\/li>\n<li>I have never experienced the present so immediately, relentlessly, and urgently. There is no time to think about past or future.<\/li>\n<li>I&#8217;m hopelessly far behind in reading other people&#8217;s blogs and worry that this makes me a &#8220;bad blog friend,&#8221; because I&#8217;m not as interested in what y&#8217;all are doing and writing about and don&#8217;t know if I ever will be again. But this is not a primary worry. I just want to let you know I still care.<\/li>\n<li>The cat is not overly curious about Bean, but is vocal about her desire for attention (<em>Pet me, I beg you!<\/em>).<\/li>\n<li>Feeding the baby with a supplemental system plus pumping after every feed to stimulate milk production as often as required feels like getting ready to go to the airport eight (or more) times a day. It&#8217;s exhausting.<\/li>\n<li>I&#8217;m aware that even a century ago my labor likely would have resulted in my and\/or Bean&#8217;s death (pre C-section era). Same with the feeding problem (my body is not producing). I&#8217;m thankful for scientific and medical technology.<\/li>\n<li>As events, projectile baby spit-ups rival <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nps.gov\/archive\/yell\/oldfaithfulcam.htm\">Old Faithful<\/a> in performance.<\/li>\n<li>Sometimes the body can&#8217;t provide all that is needed.<\/li>\n<li>Mommy&#8217;s well-being (especially mental health) may be more important than providing breast milk. I am coming to terms with this.<\/li>\n<li>Babies have prolific digestive systems, and I think about poop far more than I ever thought I would.<\/li>\n<li>Bean has a sweet disposition and is very alert and interested. (Of course, by writing this I have jinxed myself, and the People in Charge of Irony will cause me to repent my hubris.)<\/li>\n<li>She utters little <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/How-Grinch-Stole-Christmas-Seuss\/dp\/0394800796\/ref=sr_1_2\/102-7018967-9346508?ie=UTF8&#038;s=books&#038;qid=1190128902&#038;sr=1-2\">Cindy Lou Who<\/a> coos that make my heart clench in adoration.<\/li>\n<li>The place where Bean&#8217;s earlobe meets her head is <em>so<\/em> tender and kissable.<\/li>\n<li>As is the nape of her neck.<\/li>\n<li>The incredible lightness of her being makes me love her so hard it hurts.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I&#8217;m making an exception to my &#8220;no baby photos on the blog&#8221; rule.<\/p>\n<div class=\"photopost\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/mindfulone\/1400578834\/\" title=\"Photo Sharing\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm2.static.flickr.com\/1230\/1400578834_3995a02415.jpg\" width=\"374\" height=\"500\" alt=\"mommy cuddles\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Update: The title of this post has been changed from Dispatch #1 From Motherland at the suggestion of my sister-in-law, L. Excellent idea, my dear! Things I have learned: I&#8217;m still not ready to visit via phone (I can&#8217;t believe I&#8217;m so loved by so many), so it&#8217;s not personal and I&#8217;m not ignoring you. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2052"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13438,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2052\/revisions\/13438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kathrynpetroharper.com\/mindfullife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}