6 things I wish someone told me about Motherhood

I didn't expect some of the things I've gotten so far from Motherhood, but it doesn't seem to care. Just when I think I have it all figured out, I'm surprised again. Here are some of the biggest surprises to date.

Gaining alot of weight after my pregnancy. I excepted the weight gain while I was pregnant. I mean there's the 7-8 lb baby, some fluid and other stuff, so we're looking at 15 lbs tops, right? Wrong! No one told me that it stayed there. No one told me about how easy it was to gain weight after you had the baby. I'm talking a stone weight. I guess all that sitting around cuddling a new baby and drinking teas and eating cupcakes didn't help. Be careful! It creeps up on you.

Just how little sleep I would get. It's not much people. There aren't even any good, long stretches. No such thing as a lie in either. If someone doesn't first wake you up, you're waking up to make sure everyone is breathing. Don't laugh! When they do finally sleep through, you too will check if the baby is breathing. When my daughter slept through for the first time, I panicked and thought something was wrong. I put a mirror under her nose to see if she was still breathing. She was. So I didn't touch her. I'm six years in and still rarely sleeping through the night.

How difficult it is to change a nappy. Between the belly button and the fact that they're so small and fragile, the first couple weeks of nappy changes were life-changing events. By the time you've got everything cleaned, creamed, and replaced, it was time to start it all over again. And that's just the girls. Add the boy pee-stream in your face and it just gets better. Oh, but wait. Wait till you have a 2 stone, 2 year old who's favorite pastime is to kick and wiggly his way through his nappy changes. My floor and clothes have seen more poo than they ever wanted to.

How long it takes to do...everything. I can't really tell you exactly what I do all day now. I just know it involves lots of preparing meals, cleaning meals up off the floor, butt wiping, breaking up fights, 10 times more laundry than before, and picking up toys that are pulled out at twice the rate I'm cleaning them. And don't even think you can "run in" anywhere. What was once a five-minute run to the shops will literally take 30 minutes with kids. And that's just to get them into the car. Seriously! 

That my children would ever be those children. You know those kids. The kids that are sitting on the floor screaming because they can't go on the train at the supermarket. The ones running wild like the only meal they had that day was a bag of sugar. The ones that can be heard over every other kid at the playground. Those are my kids. And one day it will be yours. Why? Because it's payback! We were once those kids.

That my kids will make my heart burst with love.  I took my kids to the park for a picnic during the summer when we had the weather for it and on the way home my daughter said " Mom, You're the best Mom ever. I love you!" . That right there, melted my heart. All the drama in the supermarket and the lack of sleep was all forgotten because of that. That is why we become parents. That is why we do it.

Being a parent has been, by far, the hardest and most rewarding thing I have ever done. Some days? I'm so done. I'll be the first to be honest and say those days where there were no kids? They were way easier. I never thought I was loosing my sanity from lack of adult conversation. I never found myself crying and asking my husband to take them back. But life has never been as full of joy as it is today. It may be crazy, loud and grey-hair causing, but it's completely wonderful and I wouldn't change it for the world.

Motherhood is hard but the rewards are worth it. Big time!!

Thanks for reading!