Baby Amnesia

Everyone says that you will experience amnesia, forget how hard pregnancy, labor, delivery, and those first few weeks (months) are, and want to do it all over again. To them, I say:

You serious?

1. Pregnancy

I am surrounded by a lot of pregnant women, and anytime I see them I get a twinge that says "awww, I kind of miss it". Then I'm like

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed being pregnant and I do miss some aspects of it. For example, people aren't kidding when they say that no one really cares anymore after the baby is like 3-4 months old. Trust me, lots of people DO care, but eventually people stop asking you 24/7 about the baby and tolerate you babbling about the baby less and less. At some point, people outside your most immediate circle don't really want to hear about it every time your baby pooped up and out the back of his diaper in the grocery store. You stop getting the "pass" for being sleep deprived, except you are still as sleep deprived and you still deserve a goddamn red carpet for being able to get out the house and be a functional human being almost every day. Pregnancy is just so obvious that everyone and anyone wants to talk to you about it (sometimes to a fault). 

Here is where I DON'T have pregnancy amnesia:

Being so large I couldn't fit through some doorways

Being so swollen and uncomfortable that I sat in my yard pouring cold water on my legs

The inability to tie my own shoes, or eventually even wear my own shoes

Having legitimate tree trunks for legs

2. Labor and Delivery

PEOPLE AREN'T KIDDING ABOUT THIS ONE. I have labor and delivery amnesia, however, there are certain things that stick out very clearly in my mind and I will never, ever, ever, forget. Let's start with what I do have amnesia about:

When the hell did I look this good? I'm like 10 hours into labor, and not just the first stage of it. 

When the hell did I FEEL this good? Oh wait, it was the nitrous. 

I LOOKED THIS BAD?

I saw that last photo a few weeks after Noah was born and went "holy shit....I look like I'm about to die". I didn't know at the time that I was a hair away from getting a blood transfusion, and I can see it in this photo. I look like I'm about four seconds away from being reanimated as a zombie. This was also the first time I really met Noah, because he spent about 15 seconds on my chest after he was born before being taken away to the NICU. It was just a few hours after birth and I was an emotional mess, I'm surprised I was even able to smile for that photo. I know I felt pretty wrecked but I don't remember it. I also don't really remember or know how to describe exactly how labor and delivery felt. The know the pain of it, I can remember how much it hurt and what it felt like, but there's something I can't pinpoint and can't really describe when people ask me how much it hurt. Like, it's something I wouldn't be scared to do again.

That being said, I will always remember: the feeling of his head being pressed up against my spine and pelvis (like you need to poop a 10 pound brick), screaming at the top of my lungs without medicine through contractions, realizing contractions hurt worse than getting a needle inserted in my spine, the sound of an episiotomy (google for birth control), watching my doctor hold up my placenta and say "oh, that's a nice one!" (I laughed out loud), and hearing Noah's billy goat cries. 

3. The Fourth Trimester

Oh, let me tell you, I have no fourth trimester amnesia. The fourth trimester, aka the first three months, are hard on everyone. It was exaggerated by colic. I had a tough recovery from birth and still deal with the physical repercussions. Our stay in the NICU felt like a month. I'll never forget how hard it was to have him strapped up to a bajillion wires. 

Our little space man

You would think the sleep deprivation would blur your memory so much that you would forget how hard the first three months are, but for me it just seemed to extend every minute, every hour, and it felt like there was no end in sight. 

We're all struggling, bud!

I know parenthood always looks like some version of this

"Please send a team of professionals to my house immediately"

But what you get in the end

is a lot of love from a tiny, hilarious, adorable human, who also happens to be so cute and he spreads smiles to everyone that sees him.

It's totally worth it... but that whole amnesia thing is a bunch of bull. Anyone that says they don't really remember how hard it was probably has an empty nest.