Something Not Many Indians Talk About….Breastfeeding

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Man, I wish I would have known more about this just so I’d be ready for how difficult it would be, how much it’d affect me as a new mother, and how my emotional self and rational self would battle. 

It’s definitely not something a lot of people talk about, at least in terms of what it would take from me to get to the point where I could do it. Here’s the thing: Breast milk is supposed to be the best thing for your baby. However, there are circumstances that can arise that don’t always allow you to be able to give your baby breast milk or maybe not give it to them in the conventional way.

Let’s start at the beginning. I had done the research to find out if my epilepsy medication would affect my breast milk. After getting cleared from the ob, the neurologist, and the pediatrician, I just assumed that I would breastfeed my baby as soon as she came out the door. Yeah, so much for that.

The first problem that hit us that affects a lot of people is that getting a baby that knows nothing about eating via their mouth to actually latch on and start eating. While it’s supposed to be natural to both of you in some sense, it’s not. The lactation consultants at the hospital try to help but in all honesty, they weren’t that helpful to me. We couldn’t get my baby to latch and she wasn’t eating much. The nurse scared us when we told her the baby would be latched on for maybe 5 minutes. She said that she couldn’t release us from the hospital if that’s all the baby was eating. 

Then came my blood tests. Somehow, without anyone realizing it, I had lost a lot of blood. My blood count dropped the two days following the day I gave birth. The funny thing was I showed no signs of it. My doctor wouldn’t discharge me. The nurse told us that if I had to stay one more day past the 4th day, my baby would have to go home and I would have to stay. So, in order to prepare for that, we started giving the baby formula just in case I wasn’t able to go home and feed her. Luckily, I was discharged at the same time but we had lost a whole day of trying to breastfeed since I was getting a blood transfusion in order to raise my blood count. 

The first week with a new baby is hard enough. I tried to breastfeed but giving her formula was the only way we knew she was getting fed enough. I must have cried 100 times in this first week. It was so hard. I felt like a horrible mother. Rationally, I knew that as long as my baby was getting fed, that’s all that mattered. But I wanted to do it on my terms and I hadn’t gotten a choice in the matter. 

Next came pumping. I tried that the first day I was home. Nothing much came out. Which meant we stayed on formula for a bit. I knew I had to see a lactation consultant. I tried one recommended but she just made me feel guilty for not breastfeeding right away and for not starving my baby until she learned how to latch hon correctly. I don’t care what anyone says. Starving my baby was NEVER an option. We found another lactation consultant who really was much more compassionate and understanding and knew that it took work to get there. She is the one who finally showed us what we were doing wrong so I could get my baby to latch. I also started pumping regularly after I saw her. 

So I learned how to breastfeed but another thing no one tells you is that it hurts like hell. Who is used to that kind of pain? I tried and tried but it hurt so I kept pumping because that didn’t hurt as much. Another 9 weeks went by. I was pumping every 3 hours. I was planning my life around pumping. I knew at least my baby was getting breast milk. But it’s hard. Pumping is a serious commitment. You have to keep doing it every 3 hours because otherwise your body will think you don’t need the milk and will reduce the amount you produce. It got to a point where my baby was sleeping at least 6 hours through the night and I was still waking up every 3 hours. 

This lack of sleep is one of the factors that convinced me to try breastfeeding again. I needed to sleep. I got tired of waking up all the time. So I decided to give it another go. And I’m happy to say that we have finally got it down. Somehow, all of a sudden, at 10 weeks, my baby and I both seem to have figured it out. 

It’s been a rough road. And I’ve learned that the end goal is that your baby is healthy and well-fed. I did know this but I had to really learn it, if you know what I mean. Not any one of those feeding options is the only right one. You have to do what’s best for you and your child. Do whichever makes you the best mother possible for your child. If it’s formula or pumping or breastfeeding, be proud and know you’re doing the best you can. 

Undervalued and Unappreciated

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Talent is a great thing. We all have talent in something and we’re lucky to be able to share that talent. But what about when your talent isn’t appreciated?

I don’t know if this is all groups of people but I feel like sometimes this happens especially in the Indian community. We just take other people’s talents for granted. And this shows up when something such as price is discussed. We just assume anyone could do whatever we want someone to do, all while making that person feel expendable. We then go on to insult that person and talk to them like we are doing them the favor of giving them an opportunity to work with us. 

I’ve seen this happen over and over again (and yes , it’s happen to me a few times as well). If the person was not within our own community, would we expect free work? Would we feel like we could just say whatever we wanted to them and they will do whatever we ask for? Would we even try to appreciate them for sharing their talent with us? 

A long time ago, I had an event and a family friend of ours mentioned to my mom that we should hire dancers for the event. For some reason, that family friend failed to comprehend that people actually hired me and my sister to do the same exact thing at their events. He took our talent for granted because he had seen it all his life. 

There are times when I believe doing something for free is warranted. One of those things is donating your talent to charity. Unfortunately, most of the time though, people are trying to make a profit off of your hard work. And usually, it’s not a request. It’s assumed that you will do it because they gave you an opportunity. 

I’m glad I’m at a point in my life where I understand the importance of respecting myself. If someone decides to undervalue my talent, I can walk away because no one is allowed to make me feel like I owe them something or like they are allowed to treat me like crap.

We need to start appreciating the talent that people share with us and actually valuing those people. We need to support those within our own community especially. No one deserves to be disrespected.

And a specific recommendation to the Indian community: If you would pay someone of a different race and treat them with respect, you should do the same for those within your race as well. 

Yes, I Want To See You….Maybe

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Have you ever made plans with people and then, as soon as that day comes, you hear an excuse to cancel that plan? I once decided not to go to an event my friend was having just because it was really far and I didn’t want to drive all the way. But I didn’t want to tell her that I was just being lazy. So I tried to find an excuse that wouldn’t make her feel like she wasn’t worth me making the trip down there. It was really a lame thing to do. 

Why aren’t we just honest about how we feel about something? Or if you are the type of person that usually cancels, maybe it’s just better not to ever promise anything. I know we don’t want to hurt the other person’s feelings but then again, are we sure that that person already doesn’t just know that we are making an excuse?

We all do it. I know there are things I need to get done by a certain deadline and there are times where I let that deadline slide a little. 

I wonder how we would all be if we stopped BSing about reasons to not do something. Are we really protecting someone else’s feelings or are we just trying to not feel guilty ourselves? I mean, I also wouldn’t want to hear from someone that they are more interested in doing something else other than hanging out with me. That wouldn’t help my self-confidence at all. 

Maybe we should just be friends with the people who do look at us as priority, that wouldn’t cancel on us without a good, honest reason to start with. I had this friend one time that would always just say that he would see about the plans that I was offering to him. It made me think that he was waiting to see if a better, more interesting offer was going to come. Otherwise, he would follow through on my plan. Why would I want to be friends with people like that? 

More importantly, why do people do that? I just don’t understand why you’d make plans with someone that you don’t consider high priority anyways. Is it just so that if nothing else happens, you’re not sitting alone at home? I would rather be home than out with people that I don’t consider my friends. 

The one last part of this I wanted to bring up are the group of people who tell you they will talk to you and even tell you when they will contact you. And then, that day comes and goes and you never hear from them. I know someone who keeps giving me future dates with promises of contact and yet, I haven’t heard from them at all yet. It’s gotten to a point where I don’t even bother clearing my day because I just assume that I won’t hear from them. 

All it takes is a little honesty and some effort to keep your word. If you can’t follow through on something, be straight about it. If you constantly can’t follow through with something, don’t say you will. Maybe it’s better to be the spontaneous person and just show up to places so no one is actually disappointed, only pleasantly surprised. 

Let’s stop the BS and maybe we can all trust each other a little bit more. 

When Will I Be Normal Again?

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This post is hard one for me to write. Especially when I hear other moms talking about how wonderful their lives are and how being a mom is all they ever wanted. Let me make sure one thing is clear. I love my child and couldn’t imagine my life without her. I’ve been waiting for her for a long time and am truly happy she is here. But I know I can’t be alone in feeling this way so here goes.

It’s been about two months since I’ve had my baby and yet I still don’t feel like myself. I know it takes time to get into a new groove and to really find yourself again but it’s hard waiting for that time to come.

I want to teach my daughter to have confidence in herself and really learn how to carry herself in a way where she knows who she is. It’s a hard thing to teach when your own confidence is so low. This time period is one where we, as new moms, are still recovering physically, we are a mess emotionally, and we are sleep deprived. It’s no wonder that having confidence in yourself is a struggle.

I want to feel good about myself but am having a hard time doing so. My body is still returning back to normal and I’m still not cleared to exercise. I don’t recognize myself physically. And this results in me feeling unattractive and like I don’t even warrant a second look. We all want to feel validated on how we look even though rationally we know that we did just put our body through something major and it’ll take time to get back to what we remember.

A lot of validation for me also comes through in what I have accomplished. Lately, my accomplishments only come in the form of whether I got my baby to sleep through the night. It’s hard when you see others still going out and doing things that seems amazing or further their career and you don’t get the chance.

I know that these feelings are temporary and I am proud that I’m raising a child. I think about whether I want to go to work right now but I couldn’t even imagine being away from her for a minute.

I’m hoping that catching up on sleep and my life slowly returning to something I remotely recognize will help boost my confidence back to where it used to be. No one said being a new mom was easy but no one mentioned all of these changes that you feel as a woman.

i know this time period is dedicated to my child but, at the same time, I want to feel good about myself so I can show her what a strong woman looks like. It’s important to me to be able to show her the confidence I have in myself so she will know how to develop that same confidence one day.

What You Need To Survive Pregnancy (and much more)

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All right. Let’s get down to it. I mentioned in an earlier post that I wanted to talk about this in much more honest terms than you hear out there. So here we go.

Pregnancy is tough. There is so much you go through that only another woman can understand. You could have the nicest, most understanding significant other in the world (and I did) but there are times when he won’t understand what you completely feel. Things hurt, everything changes. I had morning sickness for the first 3 months. My legs ached literally from the beginning to the end. And that second trimester that everyone says is easier than the other 2, well, I spent that one worrying about all of the scans where the ultrasound specialists told me that various things could potentially be wrong.

The worrying kills you. Like I’ve mentioned before, you become a parent the second your pregnancy test turns positive. From then on, you watch what you eat, what you drink, what you do, all in the name of not hurting your unborn child. I stopped eating sushi, burgers, soft cheeses, and other various items. I googled every food I was unsure of.

Every doctor’s appointment I went to, I held my breath when I went in for the ultrasound. And I’d relax as soon as they found a heartbeat and took a look and said everything looked good. That would last for literally half a day and I’d start worrying about something else. I had a new pain or something felt different. I was definitely not one of those people who relaxed into pregnancy. I couldn’t even look at baby stuff and feel excited until I had hit somewhere over 30 weeks where I knew if needed, the baby could survive outside of me.

And then there was all the help from the ultrasound specialists. They are programmed to tell you the absolute worse case scenario (I’m assuming in order to avoid a lawsuit). I spent so much of my second trimester worrying about things that might be wrong like the placenta wasn’t doing its job or my baby wasn’t growing according to schedule. I learned a valuable lesson in how to think positively in this time frame because guess what. There’s nothing you can do at that point. You just have to think positive and move forward.

One of the biggest helps I have had is other women friends who have been pregnant. Every time I had a question or felt something new, I would text them and find out what they had been through. It helped me remain calm because I knew I wasn’t alone. There are no rights or wrongs when it comes to pregnancy. We all are just trying to survive it so that, at the end, we can hold our beautiful baby in our arms. I still text them with baby questions. And luckily, I’m surrounded by a bunch of great women who don’t judge or think there is one way to do everything. So I definitely get the best advice possible.

Let’s face it. Pregnancy is tough. The best thing you can do for yourself is to make sure you have a great support system. An amazing husband goes a long way but you will also definitely need friends who have gone through it so that they understand what you’re feeling and can truly empathize with you. It’s a long 40 weeks. Do what you can to make those weeks as good as possible.

Labor and Delivery: When Your Relationship Really Changes

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So labor and delivery is something I get asked about all the time now that it’s happened. It’s definitely a surreal experience. There were some things I definitely expected. Contractions, epidural, the actual delivery. But what I didn’t expect is how all of it would change the way I look at my marriage.

You see how having a baby is portrayed in movies and tv shows. Your husband stands next to you and holds your hand and coaches you while you go through the delivery. I’m sure there are people who this happens with. But my experience was a little different.

We get into our marriage and still have some things we don’t share with the other person. We try to at least have a nicely maintained image in front of our significant other. Obviously, we let our guards down with them more than with other people. But pregnancy and actual labor and delivery changes those boundaries more than you can ever imagine.

I honestly believe that we had a pretty open relationship anyways. Both of us are the type where we don’t really hold anything back from each other. We share almost everything. But I didn’t realize how much more of a connection we were missing until we went through this pregnancy together and the birth of our child together.

Let’s just say going through labor is tough. There’s pain involved. There are tough decisions involved. There are fears of something going wrong involved. Then, there’s the delivery. When you give birth, there’s nothing you can even hide from your husband. He’s there, seeing you go through even more than you ever could think of.

Then, there’s after you have the baby. When I got home, there was still a lot I couldn’t do. My husband had to help me shower because I was still in pain. Can you imagine needing someone that much? And that’s just where I’m involved. We aren’t even going to get into how many times he has taken the night feeding so I could sleep or tried to calm our baby when she’s up crying.

After having a child, this became a true partnership. Like I’ve told him, we are now permanently linked in our life. Everything we go through, everything we feel is now more important than it ever was before. It’s not just about us anymore. It’s about the family we created together.

Like everything else, this takes work. Who we were as a couple before is no longer completely true. Obviously, the foundation is there but the way we grow from there changes. We aren’t just husband and wife anymore. We are mom and dad.

And that distinction becomes the most important thing that changes about your relationship.

When Our Past Returns

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A few days ago, I heard from someone who I hadn’t talked to in 5 years. The last conversation we had wasn’t a good one and I never expected to hear from her again. Then, all of a sudden, I received a message, wishing me a happy birthday and congratulating me on my new kid. I was in shock and I couldn’t respond for a couple of days because I needed to process. It’s interesting when that does happen. It was a really nice message and I was glad to hear from that person. 

When a relationship of any type ends, there is usually a reason for it. I know, in this case, I had hurt the person pretty badly and I didn’t know if she would ever understand the reason behind it. It took a lot for her to message me just to say as much as she did and I really respect her for it. It makes me think that maybe she finally understood why the relationship ended. 

I’ve been through this before. Just like most people, I have had falling outs with different people throughout my life, whether it was a friend or a relationship. And, in my experience, one of the two people involved, if not both, will eventually come back and show that they have put the past behind them. There have been times when we walk away from something that is not good for us personally and hope that one day, the person involved will understand the reasons we move on. 

But, when we do finally hear from whomever we have had the problems with, it still comes as a shock. We don’t expect to hear an apology, let alone good wishes from someone who we have ended on bad terms with. 

I hope that, one day, every relationship of mine that had ended badly does eventually resolve itself. I hope that we can find a way to move past our past and maybe that will lead us to making sure our current and future relationships are good. It takes a big person to be able to walk forward and I still see people who hold onto the bad even though they have a chance to move towards the good. There are people that refuse to accept an apology or find ways to see the other side’s point of view, regardless of who was right or wrong. I don’t want to be one of those people. 

I’m not saying that everyone deserves a second chance but usually, in these types of situations, it doesn’t hurt to at least try.

Sometimes, we just need our past to return to show us where we used to be and where we are now. 

Independent Career Woman vs. Stay At Home Mom

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This is a topic that I never thought I would have to consider since I grew up believing I’d always be working. I grew up in a household where both of my parents worked and I spent a lot of time in day care. I actually believe a lot of my independence came from this so I had no problems believing that I would go a similar route and be a full-time working mom when I came to that point in my life.

Life doesn’t always work out the way you imagine it to. Because I was already pregnant when I left my job and that job was over 45 miles away in LA traffic, it seemed to be the best decision not to look for another job through the pregnancy. And, obviously, I’d stay home with the baby for a while since we didn’t have a need for me to go back to work right away.

And while this was the best decision for me and my family, it was a hard one for me. I have always been the type of person who did multiple things at once. I worked at my day job while being involved in a lot of activities. All of a sudden, I was limited by my own body during the pregnancy. I couldn’t maintain my level of physical activity. Even when we went out socially, I’d get tired a lot. I would have to be careful with what I was doing and where I was going.

Now, let me get one thing straight. Everything I had to do or not do in order to get my beautiful baby, I do not regret. She will always be totally worth it. But this is an emotional time with a lot of change for anyone and I wanted to share what I was feeling (and still sometimes feel).

I’m still going through figuring out who I am now. I’m not the same independent woman I was 3 years ago. I’m now a mom whose primary job is to take care of my child. Until I decide to go back to work (if I choose to do so), my life is about raising my baby. I have to figure out how to reconcile the person I was to the person I am now. It’s difficult. How do you go from being someone who participates in all of these activities to someone who only possibly might be able to do it again some day but not at the moment? You can never go back to being the person you were.

Somehow, a new person has to emerge that combines both the independent woman with the stay at the home mom. And, somehow, I have to learn to become that person.

Things Change

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I haven’t written a blog post in over 10 months. There was a reason for that. In that time, I had my first child. Pregnancy is such an interesting time period in a woman’s life. There are those for whom it’s the most amazing time in their lives and there are those where it is the hardest 40 weeks they will go to. And then, there’s the stuff that no one ever tells you. I get it. In the end, you have this really cute baby that is a part of you and your significant other. You have now created a family. There’s so much you go through to get there and no one can fully prepare you for everything. I’d like to try to talk about it honestly. The good, the bad, and the ugly. My entries won’t just be about pregnancy but also the changes as a result and it will always continue to be about things in the world that I have opinions about. So I hope you enjoy the return of Who We Are Today.

One of the biggest things no one ever talks about is that you become a parent the second that positive sign comes up on a pregnancy test. Every little thing you do, you double check to see if it will affect the baby. I can’t tell you how many times I googled different types of food and drinks to make sure that it wouldn’t be bad for the baby. It’s crazy how many things you can’t eat or drink. It makes you wonder what our parents did without internet over 30 plus years ago. I also wonder if everyone is as paranoid as I was with what was happening as my baby developed or if I was just crazy. I sometimes forget the age of my baby based on when she was born. I consider her age to be that of when I found out I was pregnant. Once you become a parent, that’s it. There’s no going back.

Another thing no one ever tells you is 40 weeks is a long, long time. If you count that there are 4 weeks in a month, it’s actually 10 months. If you count there are more than 4 weeks in a month, it’s actually somewhere between 9 and 10 months. Trust me, when you’re throwing up every day or your legs hurt or you’re just craving sushi, it’s a long time. You just have to get through it.

I had to keep reminding myself that a lot of women go through all of this every day. It doesn’t feel like that though. It feels like you’re the only one in the world and no one can understand it.

Pregnancy is definitely an interesting phase of life. The one thing you always hear women say, though, is no matter how tough it was, it was definitely worth it.

The Wedding Day

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I keep seeing some patterns on Facebook with the wedding pictures posted that I wanted to address. It might be judgmental of me or maybe I’m wrong in interpreting the meaning or the situation behind the pictures. I don’t necessarily know the couples beyond an acquaintance and maybe there is something there that I’m not seeing. But here are my thoughts and I wanted to share them.

1) On your wedding day, your smile should be real. Note that I said “should be”. The posed smiles are really easy to tell especially if you aren’t an actor. And maybe you have a great posed smile but the smiles I want to see are the ones that reach your eyes. The ones that really look like there’s nowhere else you’d rather be than in that spot with that person you’re marrying. A lot of times, the first pictures that go up on Facebook are not the professional posed pictures but the ones that your friends and family take at the event randomly. My question is: When the pros aren’t looking and it’s not a posed moment, do you still look happy?

2) My next question is: Is the person you’re marrying your best friend? If that person is, then what’s the need to ditch that person on your wedding day to hang out with anyone and everyone else? I understand that there are family and friends that you haven’t probably seen in years and you want to spend time with them but is it necessary to do it in a way that abandons your partner? Isn’t it possible for both of you to hang out with your friends? Besides, if you ditch your significant other, aren’t you ditching your best friend? Would you do that to your other best friends?

3) A wedding day is just that. A wedding day. I keep seeing people who are so concerned about the wedding itself that they forget to have fun themselves. You plan for a year for this one day (or in the case of an Indian wedding, this one week) and then what? It’s over. But guess what? Marriage is for life. So what if your flowers aren’t the exact colors that you chose or everything didn’t run in the order that you wanted? In the end, you married the person you are in love with. As long as that happened, who cares what else happened? It’s just a small piece of a marriage. There will be many more challenges in life than your wedding day. Get ready for those.

4) If you are more concerned about the wedding than what comes after, maybe getting married at this time or to this person isn’t the right path for you. I can’t necessarily see this in photos but again, you can see the connection between people. And you can see when someone is more in tune with the planning than they are with the fact that they are committing themselves to one person for the rest of their lives.

It frustrates me to see this. Again, I know I don’t have the full story always and there are always things behind the pictures that I will never know. But I definitely hope that I see wedding pictures where the bride and groom look so joyously happy that I can feel it when I see those pictures.