How I'm Managing to be SuperMum

It's been 11 days since Adelais arrived (that's pronounced Ad-E-Lay, for anyone wondering) and things so far have been wonderful. Nothing much has really changed. I'm up an extra session in the night, but I've had months of getting up in the night to pee anyway so no major difference there. I'm breast feeding of course, but those new sessions of sitting on the sofa unable to respond to my other two children's needs has only replaced the previous sitting on the sofa in utter sickness unable to respond to my children's needs so, again, nothing feels much different. Even the heat has been something I'm revelling in as previously I was a pregnant sticky mess in anything over 20degrees whereas now I am flaunting about in 28degrees quite happy after the two stone loss that labour has brought. Life is pretty good.

My friend's keep calling me 'super woman'. This is normally in response to me showing up to all of our regular activities after only a couple of days with make-up on my face and my hair blow dried. I've not missed any meals, in fact I've been eating even better than I normally do and my general outlook on life is pretty great - no baby blues here. I'm rocking this mother-of-three malarky.

But that's not because of me.

You see, I have one of the best support networks around. My husband is incredibly hands on. Except for perhaps the dusting and window cleaning, if something happened to me and Lee was in charge of all aspects of house keeping, I know for certain that not only would he be able to keep both children alive but he'd keep the house fairly tidy too. He's been so amazing in these early stages of newborn life - doing lots of nappies, looking after the other two children whilst I have quality time with Adelais and washing endless cycles of laundry. The man has been a star and it's meant that I've been able to take time out to have a bath, do my hair and slap a little bit of make-up on my face.

My friends have been paramount to my success as a new Mum of three too. For the past 11 days we've had a meal brought to the house every single night. Pudding too! I've had text messages and phone calls from people asking how I'm doing and if I need anything. I've had family checking in on my mental health and making sure that I'm not struggling under the burden of it all. I've been meeting friends for coffee and chatting through some of the early day struggles like navigating the older sibling's response and time management. I've constantly been surrounded by people. My tribe.

What I'm trying to say is I wouldn't be bossing it without those people around me. There's no way I'd be able to even get out of bed in the morning if it wasn't for the knowledge that Lee will be downstairs making me a cup of coffee and will have already changed Joel's nappy. I wouldn't be as happy as I am if it wasn't for my friends constantly telling me "You can do this", "You're doing a great job" and I wouldn't be able to get to any of the regular activities if I didn't know I was going to be met by my friends with a piece of cake. Having a great support network is paramount to my success as a Mum. In a world where we're told, "Do it yourself, you can't rely on anyone", I'm bucking that trend and saying, "Take the pressure off, swallow your pride and allow others to help". 

So if you wanna be SuperMum and totally boss it? Grab some friends, work out a support network and do this parenting thing together. It's way more fun that way.


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