Because the unspoken things are often the ones that need to be celebrated the most.

There’s something entirely unique about the physicality of coming home from the hospital with your baby. If you’ve done this before, you don’t need me to paint a picture of the beautiful chaos involved when looking after a sweet, helpless little babe while still being a patient yourself. Throw a c-section or traumatic birth in there and life is just bananas those first few weeks. There’s a lot of…stuff going on with both yours and the baby’s bodies. 

If you’re pregnant with your first and reading this, don’t worry! We get through those hazy postpartum weeks. And now a few months after delivering my third baby (and second c-section), I may have something that continues to bring a light at the end of the foggy recovery tunnel. 

The mini milestones checklist. 

Yes, there are common and popular milestones you’ll be checking in regards to your baby’s development. Is he rooting? Can he lift his head? Is he rolling over by however many months? Yes, those are important. But what about the unshared milestones? 

What about the little wins that help you fix your eyes on hope? 

My world was a little rocked when we got home from the hospital with our third baby. It had been over six years since I had last danced this dance of patient and caregiver. Oh, there was SO much good in those hazy first days. I was older this time around (hello, geriatric pregnancy!), calmer, I knew what to expect. The older boys were six and eight, meaning they still needed me but in less demanding ways than when I juggled a newborn and toddler all those years ago. 

But like I said, I was older this time around. Older as in, you throw your back out just by sleeping funny the night before. And honestly I had forgotten the toll that delivery can take on my body. Of my three deliveries this was my second c-section, so in a sense I knew what to expect. This one, however, drained me differently. Literally. I lost too much blood and looked like an actual ghost for several days afterwards. Not a cute look. 

I remember going right back to my old panicked way of thinking, “Things will never be normal again,” “I will never feel like myself again,” or the all-time classic “What have we done?!” If you’ve never had those thoughts before, let’s just pretend you didn’t hear them from me, either. 

It’s a beautiful mix of bliss, exhaustion, oxytocin-fused snuggles, pain, gratitude, and a tinge of anxiety. But let’s focus on recovery. Things turned around for me in a positive way when I began to acknowledge the mini milestones of baby’s and my progress. The first couple of weeks looked like this: 

Baby:

• His umbilical stump fell off! No more folding diapers under his belly button
• His circumcision is healed! No more squirting vaseline all over him 
• His weight gain is steady! No more frequent checks at the doctor’s office
• The jaundice is clear! No more heel pricks 

Obviously, each baby’s mini milestones would look different.

Mine were a little more graphic and c-section specific:

Mom:

• I went to the bathroom and didn’t die! IYKYK
• I stopped taking Ibuprofen and Tylenol! No more tracking every six hours
• The sutures fell off! No more Jack-o-lantern smile on my belly
• I walked down the street!
• I wore real pants! 
• I drove my van!
• No more ice packs! No more heat pads!
• I can stand up straight in the shower now!
• We kind of, sort of, have a feeding/pumping schedule worked out (that one took longer this time around)!

You get the point. And in case you’re wondering, YES, the exclamation points are necessary. We’re hyping ourselves up, remember?

It may not feel like it when you’re in the thick of things, but all of this is so temporary. It won’t be long until your family has found its new rhythm, and adjusted to the new ‘normal.’ That newborn will transform from, let’s face it, a bit of a potato, to a vibrant, smiling, babbling little baby. You’ll love that phase, but want to know the kicker? You’ll ache to go back to those early trenches again.

But that’s just motherhood.