life: postpartum.

I have so many thoughts and feelings and they just weren’t coming together in the way I hoped so, a list will have to do.

 

·     * Lee Daken is the most wonderful blessing and miracle Kevin and I have experienced to date. 

·      *The process of delivery is a beautiful miracle.

·     * The incredible women who place babies for adoption to give them a better life are some of the strongest and  most selfless people in the world.

·     * A mother's-love is one of the most powerful things I have ever felt.

·     * Babies are so incredibly close to God.

·     * Each birth of a child is a miracle.

 

·      The desire and longing to be a mother doesn’t make me super-human in dealing with the physical strain of a new baby that doesn’t sleep at night very much.

·      Trying to meet the simple needs of an infant can be absolutely exhausting.

·      Spending all day everyday trying to meet the simple needs of baby Lee has brought the greatest happiness I’ve experienced as well as the greatest physical strain.

·      I don’t know how you couldn’t be absolutely obsessed with your children.

 

·        * I can’t watch or hold our sweet Lee enough.

·     * I don’t know how to properly thank our Heavenly Father for the much-desired blessing of being a mother.

·    *  My heart aches for those I love still waiting to be wives and mothers.

·     * I feel like I can relate to Alma the younger in his feelings after he repented and received forgiveness in my feelings during our trial of faith with infertility and since Lee was born;

Alma 36:20 “And oh, what joy, and what marvelous light I did behold; yea, my soul was filled with joy as exceeding as was my pain!”

 

* There is so much physical and emotional change that comes with having a baby. 

  *   Having a baby really changes a body physically. Those changes, though maybe not permanent, are really hard emotionally while they last.

*It is really emotionally straining when you don’t know how to help your baby. (i.e. when Lee had Jaundice or when his circumcision site was bleeding and we had to take him to the E.R. or when he wouldn’t eat at first and I tried everything with the aide of 3 different lactation specialists before I had any success.)  

      PS, Everything is fine now, all that happened in the first week of Lee’s life.

In his Billibed.

 

*     It takes no time at all to feel genuine and sometimes painful concern for your children. (I can’t imagine what it will be like when they have emotional hardships too.)

*     Nothing but continuously praying for strength and guidance could get me through being a new mom and having absolutely no idea what I’m doing really.

*      Motherhood has brought me a strong sense of need for the Atonement of our Savior.

*      Being a mother is the most wonderful occupation in the world for me.

 

·     * A good dad/husband makes all the difference for a tired mom/wife. Kevin has been my lifesaver.

·     * My own mother is an absolute SUPERSTAR, I can’t imagine how she managed to raise 6 of us with a husband that had very demanding callings in our church that required him to be out of the home most evenings and Sundays basically the whole time we were all growing up.

·    *  My Momma saved me the first few weeks of Lee’s life and we BOTH miss her like crazy now that we’re away in Colorado for the summer.

Me and Lee on our first outing.

The whole family.

 

·     * I can only imagine how hard it must be for our Heavenly Father to let us suffer to become like Him and to let Christ suffer so that we are able to return to Him someday.

·    *  My mind can easily go crazy wanting some semblance of order and activity in my life while my physical body is just not ready for it yet.                                                          

 

*      Family truly is the most important thing in the world, in whatever type or size of family we find ourselves.

*      Our waiting and struggle has affected every aspect of being parents now, we are different people and parents than we ever could have been if we hadn’t gone through that particular trial first.  

 

*      I STILL don’t understand God’s timing but I daily have to keep reminding myself that God knows truly what’s best for us and that I have to put my trust in Him.

*      As the sons of Mosiah learned from reflecting on their mission experiences in retrospect, I know that God fulfills ALL His promises and hears ALL our prayers.

Alma 25:17 “…the Lord had granted unto them according to their prayers, and that he had also verified his word unto them in every particular.”