Worrywart

I have so much on my mind that it's hard to choose one thing to write about. My worries as a new mom are dislodging my ability to organize my thoughts, so I figure the first thing to write about is worry itself.

I have already noticed myself slipping into an obsessive stay-at-home-mom realm. The outside world? What's that and who cares, anyway? I am pretty happy to be the one to hold the babies when they cry, feed them when they're hungry, and assess what they sound like when they sleep or after they eat. However,... with that comes a world of worry. The things that I look for, think about, experience are simply not things that anyone else will know. I wouldn't have understood the intensity of being a primary care-giver before this. The natural intensity certainly has not been eased by my very difficult experiences as a new mother. Now, I am living this new life of actually having them both here with me, and instead of this life feeling free or blissful it seems fragile, unreal, radical. I hope the tedium that other stay-at-homes sometimes describe comes to me soon.

Already I can't believe how fast the time is going. Yesterday M didn't fit into some 0-3 mo. clothes we have. It's pretty weird to think we probably won't have any more kids and that this is the time to soak everything up. ...strange and even a little sad to think that he will never be as tiny as he was when I first held him. At the same time I am still so shocked by having two new babies and all that we've been through with them so far, that I am a little too numb to enjoy or even probably notice everything going on with them. Does that make sense? It's a weird place to be.

Having said all that, I do feel a subtle decompression from day to day, going slowly from a 10 on the stressometer to a 9.9, and that provides some hope. I think it comes down to this: most moms are told that their every little fear when it comes to a runny nose, strangly colored poop, or a low-grade fever is unfounded - the "new parent jitters." I was told early on that my babies' problems ranged from the mildly serious to the very serious. Where does that leave me? I'd like to think that every worry I have is me being a paranoid, first-time parent..., but I have no foundation for that notion anymore. That's really tough. I don't know what to do with that. My instinct is that time will help a lot, and that I will go from a 10 to 9.9 to 9.7 to 9.3 to 8.5 to 6.5, in bigger and bigger chunks the fear will shed, and eventually I'll settle into a cushy 3 on the new parent stressometer. For now, though, worry fades at a rate of a tenth, and at the same time my baby is already growing out of his clothes.