I always looked forward to motherhood. The thought of being a mom filled me with a sense of pride and joy. When I gave birth to my first baby girl, Lianna, I was overwhelmed with a wide array of emotions.
On the one hand, every little interaction with my baby, from seeing her adorable smile to burping for the first time, was new and interesting for me. We took her to a lot of places that my husband and I enjoyed, but the experience was much more exhilarating with our daughter around. It was like seeing a familiar environment for the first time again, but this time through a baby’s perspective.
As exciting as it was to be a new mother, there were also a series of hurdles that I had to overcome. Getting used to having a new person to take care of while also adapting to the changes in my own body took a lot of tough work. I also had a hard time trying to understand why she was crying or what she wanted during our first month together. They say ?the days are long but the years are short,? and I can totally relate. It was like running a marathon. I would feed her and put her to sleep, hoping to have some time to attend to my own responsibilities and obligations, but she?d wake again before I was even done.
As Lianna reached the two-month milestone, I had another massive hurdle to overcome. My husband and I were planning to host a traditional celebration to mark her first 100 days. Because of the pandemic, we initially thought we?d host a small dinner with just our immediat...