Five things no-one tells you about parenthood

I’m slightly over a month into motherhood – I’ve survived so far, and more importantly so has Minnie. And while some of the predictions people made to me during pregnancy have been true (others have thankfully been wide of the mark), here are a few of the more unexpected things I’ve learned from parenthood.

1. Sleep while the baby sleeps. You’re guaranteed to hear this from a string of midwives, health visitors and friends and family who’ve dropped in to see your beautiful baby. And they’re absolutely right. Except you never get a chance to have that nap because of the stream of people stopping by to pass on this advice…

2. Big pants. If you’ve had a Caesarean like me (planned or emergency), every pair of pants you own will end up rubbing on the scar, so you’ll need some big knickers. You may be able to sell this to yourself as retro high-waisted 50s style but basically it’s granny pant time.

3. Vanishing point. You will spend more time scrubbing Vanish into stains in a few weeks than you’ve probably done in the past year. Stains created by the baby, I hasten to add.

4. Meet the over-protective husband. Again, this might only apply for a C-section, but while doctors do recommend you take things easy with no heavy lifting, this has apparently extended to anything heavier than a feather. Or even bending down to pick something up off the floor. I’m torn between rather liking being looked after (for a few weeks) and the complete impracticality of life if you can’t just get on with things.

5. Unexpected T-shirt destruction. Lanolin is wonderful stuff and I couldn’t have done without it during the early days of breastfeeding. But after discovering my liberal application included some unintentional smears on a vest, I’ve also found that nothing will shift it. Not repeated washing, not the aforementioned Vanish, not even special stain remover for grease and oil. Alas.

Image: jev55/Flickr