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...
I would like to see the baby and other newborn terrors
It's 3:18 AM in a freezing Chicago apartment. I'm holding a seven-pound alien that's currently shrieking like a defective smoke detector. My husband is dead asleep on the couch, entirely oblivious. I'm scrolling a forum with my free thumb and...
Stop Taking My Chips I'm Just A Baby: A Dad's Survival Guide
Dear Tom from exactly six months ago, You're currently sitting on the hallway floor at 4 PM, wedged between a pile of unopened mail and a rogue wellington boot, trying to negotiate with a toddler who has just hurled a...
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,...
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 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...
Finding a maternity dress for baby shower events without losing you...
I'm trapped in a zippered velvet prison. It's mid-July in Chicago, I'm thirty-three weeks pregnant, and the zipper on this supposed dream dress is stuck right over my left rib, which my daughter currently uses as a kicking bag. The...
How to Survive the Moro Reflex in Babies Without Losing Your Mind
Itβs two in the morning in 2019, and I'm hovering over a bassinet with my oldest, Jackson, holding my breath until my lungs actually burn. Iβve done the sway, the aggressive shushing, the hour-long rocking chair marathon, and he's finally...
The Unfiltered Shift From Mother To Baby: What I Actually Learned
I'm currently staring at a dried crust of spit-up on my left shoulder that has been there since Tuesday, and honestly, I don't have the energy to change my shirt. Iβm bouncing my youngest on my hip while trying to...