The messy reality of bringing up baby on zero sleep
I spent six years working the pediatric floor at Rush, so you'd think buckling my own three-day-old son into his car seat would feel routine. It didn't. My husband was driving twenty miles an hour on the Kennedy expressway, knuckles...
Jacqueline MacInnes Wood Baby Number 5 And The Boy Mom Chaos
Yesterday at roughly ten past four in the afternoon, I was lying spread-eagled on our sitting room rug while Twin A attempted to forcefully insert a plastic spoon into Twin B's left nostril. I had what I sincerely hoped was...
Dear pregnant Priya: What the jj mccarthy baby news taught me
I'm writing this to you from the floor of the nursery at three in the morning while the breast pump makes a sound like a dying asthmatic robot. You're six months pregnant right now, probably sitting on the couch with...
The Sweaty, Messy, Magical Reality of the Kangaroo Baby Phase
It was 3:14 in the morning, and the hospital room smelled strongly of bleach, stale hazelnut coffee, and my own big postpartum terror. I was wearing mesh underwear and a hospital gown that was entirely unsnapped in the front because,...
Why the best baby lotion isn't whatever smells like a powdery dream
I'm holding a violently slippery, screaming seven-month-old who looks like he just lost a street fight with a patch of poison ivy. It's a Tuesday night four years ago, and my oldest son—who has served as the trial-by-fire for basically...
The Honest Mom Guide to Bella Baby Photography in the Hospital
I was exactly forty-eight hours postpartum, bleeding heavily into a mesh diaper the size of a surfboard, when the sharp knock came at the door. My mother-in-law had just proudly handed me a stiff, scratchy, sequined tulle gown that looked...
The Midnight Panic Guide to Checking Your Baby's Temperature
Dear Sarah from six months ago, I know exactly where you're right now. You're sitting on the cold hexagon tile of your sister's guest bathroom. It's 2:14 AM. You've had roughly four cups of French roast today, the last of...
Surviving Year One: Letter To My Clueless Past Self (baby_jul1)
You're currently standing in the baby aisle of John Lewis, staring at a wall of breast pumps with the terrified, vacant expression of a man who has just been told an asteroid is hurtling toward Earth. I know this because...
The Great 3 AM Lie About Your Baby's Sleep Schedule
I was sitting on the very edge of our squeaky nursery glider at 3:14 AM with my firstborn, glaring at a four-dollar tracking app on my phone that was flashing a red warning to tell me my three-week-old was "off...