The Nitty-Gritty

     In the last post I introduced you to sweet baby Styles.  The love of my life.  Now lets get down to why I am here. The nitty-gritty.  In case you haven't read my profile, or the subtitle of this blog for that matter, my family dynamic is a little different.  I am a working mom and my husband is a SAHD.  He is incredibly good at it and I feel so blessed that while I am at work my sweet baby is in the best of hands. The only problem is, these hands aren't mine. It has been almost 2 months since the day arrived.  The day that I had dreaded.  The day that I had to spend away from my precious little boy knowing that this was going to be the first of many.  It took everything I had to keep telling myself that it was all going to be okay. I had a plan.  Of course I had a plan. Don't I always? I am a very dedicated nursing mom, and no matter how hard everyone told me it was going to be, I was going to continue nursing.  I had scheduled out my day to go something like this: Wake up, pump. This will the baby's morning bottle.  When the baby wakes up, nurse him.  About 2 hours after arriving at work, pump. At lunch, drive home, nurse the baby, drop off the milk so he can have it for his afternoon bottle, drive back. About 2 hours later, pump again. After work, drive home, store the milk and nurse again. But at least now I am home for the rest of the night to play, feed, bathe, cuddle, and put to bed my precious little guy. And somewhere in between all of this I have to remember that I have a VERY demanding job to do and need to do it well. Plus there is the other love of my life... my husband.  I want to spend quality time with him. He has been with the baby all day and of course I want to hear EVERYTHING down to the last detail.  Sound exhausting? Well.... it is. And this is the way my workdays have been.  I know there are other moms out there whose days are similar to mine.  I think for the first few weeks knowing that I was doing everything I could to continue nursing was what was getting me through.  I felt like this was all I had left to contribute to my son.  My milk. Since I couldn't physically be there for him because I was working, the only thing I could do to keep the connection was to make sure that I could continue nursing. And I know this sounds selfish.  But this is how I felt.  My husband got to be with him all day and I felt like I was missing everything.  This has gotten a little bit easier.  But I still feel like I am missing out.  I no longer feel that all I have to contribute to "Raising Styles" is my milk.  I am his momma.  And he loves me and he needs me. I know that I am SO lucky to have such an AMAZING husband and that baby Styles is in the best of hands.... even if they aren't always mine.