KEEP IT IN THE PHAMLY

Every baby is different, which is why all the parenting books give out varying and often conflicting advice. The first eight weeks (aka newborn phase) were pretty much a roller coaster of anxiety, trying to interpret Baby's needs and adapting to them but never really knowing if what we did improved things or made them worse or Baby Pham just moved onto the next thing despite every effort.

The downside of growing up without much exposure to new babies and new parent life meant Boyfriend Pham and I fumbled around in the dark for a lot of it. Little Sissy Pham had forgotten a lot of the newborn nuances of her baby by the time we met ours.

Pretty much all of newborn parenting was an anxiety-riddled worryfest where we guessed Baby's needs and tried our best to roll with the punches. The one time in life, you wish everyone wasn't unique so we could have a 'how to baby' manual. I asked Little Sissy and Sister-Not-In-Law for their experiences and sometimes what worked for their bubs worked for us, sometimes it didn't and we had to try something different.

Baby Pham was mix-fed formula and breastmilk from day 5 of his life. As soon as he started feeding, we learned he had bad (though not severe enough for medication) reflux and couldn't be put down to sleep because he was uncomfortable. There was a lot of contact naps and even contact overnight sleeps with him on me in a reclined nursing chair and pillows everywhere so he wouldn't fall if I dropped him in my sleep. Thankfully no scares or close calls, mum hormones and instincts kept me semi-conscious even as I slept with him in my arms. We tried our best to follow recommendations (sleep baby flat on back in bassinet with no loose items that can be choking hazards), but sometimes you just gotta do what you need to get by.

The first eight weeks were terrifying and exhilarating, and I'm so glad to be out of that intense phase. The number of decisions you have to make on behalf of a baby that can only communicate through crying while getting very little rest or sleep is overwhelming at the best of times and crippling at the worst of times. Experienced parents tell us the next baby is easier because you know what to expect, which is basically a free-for-all unstructured shitshow where you hang on to the edge of your seat and hope to make it to the end of the show. Good luck, first-time parents! I wish you all the best with your trial by fire.

I've never felt so out of my depth before in my life coming home with Baby Pham in tow. There's so much support and scrutiny when you're pregnant, and while you're delivering the baby and then... you're on your own, kid. Except you're no longer the kid and you have a tiny fragile newborn kid that you have to somehow keep alive and thriving for the rest of your life.

I spent two nights in the hospital after giving birth because I needed to prove I could pee on my own the next day, and Baby Pham had to pass 24 hours of blood glucose tests because I had gestational diabetes.

The first night in hospital Baby Pham was sleepy from his exhausting journey to the outside world. The second night was torture for me with Baby's cluster feeding - I could not put him down or he'd start screaming. I'd been told about cluster feeding but I didn't understand it'd be a 5-7 day marathon I'd have to run immediately after giving birth. They don't specify that no sleep will be had with a newborn that's trying to bring in breast milk.

It was surreal coming home with a newborn that a couple of nights ago was in my belly. As Boyfriend Pham and I left the hospital we pushed Baby to the ward entrance in his trolley as per hospital rules for moving around with babies - carrying Baby in arms while walking about was a no-no. The nurse took the trolley and told us, "You're discharged. You make up the rules now." And so we walked out of the hospital with me carrying Baby Pham and Boyfriend Pham carrying our luggage. He drove us home while I sat in the back next to our teeny, tiny newborn in his gigantic-seeming car seat. We arrived home, took Baby inside and looked at each other. "Now what?"

'What' was and has been determined by Baby Pham ever since.

At first, he was hungry and wanted to feed constantly to bring in my breastmilk. The first night at home, I sat up all night with bub on the couch trying to let Boyfriend sleep but he could hear Baby wailing all night. The second night at home I sat with bub in the nursing chair and when Boyfriend checked in on us at 3:30am, I was sobbing and feeling like I was failing our baby because my milk wasn't coming in. We decided to give him formula that I'd bought as a 'just-in-case' from Day 5 onwards. And so, the nurse's parting words came true, we began to make up our own rules as parents to our newborn Baby Pham.

I haven't had many opportunities let alone the brain capacity to write blogs with Baby Pham taking up my every waking moment. I have, however, had plenty of time to sit in the dark in a nursing chair cuddling my baby at godawful hours, pondering random life things like what if I chop off all my hair to save blow-drying it and also, why didn't my postpartum hair loss thin it out more so there'd be less to maintain? Or what if I try to keep Baby Pham awake before dinner or let him nap for longer or let him nap for shorter to see if that helps his bedtime sleeping? (In reality, he does whatever the fuck he wants and some nights he'll nap before dinner and go to bed right after while other nights he naps and is up for two hours after dinner, then yet on other nights he won't nap before dinner and also won't go to sleep after dinner.)

Yes, I spent many sleepless nights pondering how to get Baby to sleep more so I, too, can get more sleep. But I don't think I'll ever figure it out and eventually Baby Pham will just sort himself out when he's ready. So then I move on to other thoughts. One of them is how I would approach blogging about my life while respecting Baby Pham's privacy. My world revolves around baby now, if I didn't write about him then I wouldn't have anything to blog about. Though I've decided with Boyfriend Pham to keep Baby Pham offline so I won't be sharing any identifiable information about him or images of him. The 2000 photos I already have (not an exaggeration) will remain locked away.

We aren't sharing Baby Pham's face on our private social media accounts either. We will wait until he's old enough to understand the risks of being visible online and capable of giving consent. If you're a Phamly friend reading this and don't want to wait almost two decades to know what my chunky monkey looks like, feel free to message me. If you're a stranger passing by my blog, you can look up the Boy Scout named Russell in the animated movie UP - our little dumpling looks a lot like Russell but with a naturally formed mohawk.

What happened immediately after Baby Pham was out of my womb is a bit of a blur as I write this four months later (I am posting this 7 months later, this year has been a blur). I will try and record what I can remember.

The midwives immediately placed Baby Pham on my chest once they checked he was alive and well. His little chin quivered and he cried. One of the midwives moved him to my right breast but he wouldn't latch. She started trying to express colostrum without asking my permission or telling me what she was doing and I yelped in pain when she pinched my boob. I didn't see it coming because I only had eyes for Baby Pham. I had moved him over to my left breast because Boyfriend Pham was on my left and I wanted Baby as near to him as possible. Thankfully, while she was just starting to try and express colostrum from my right boob, Baby Pham latched onto my left so she left me alone with Baby and Dad after only one pinch. This was the only misstep by the midwives in an otherwise great birthing experience.

I opted to get an injection to force the placenta out rather than wait for my hormones to manage it naturally. I'm grateful for the critical role my placenta performed in bringing bub to me, but I wasn't emotionally attached to it - nor did I want to eat it, or plant it or any of the other things people do with their placentas. Birthing the placenta was a really weird sensation after feeling such heavy pressure there from a solid baby moments earlier. The placenta was a flexible blob so it simply slipped out of me without the need to bear down. I asked to see my placenta out of curiosity. I'd heard of other mums whose placenta deteriorated towards the end of pregnancy. Mine was healthy and kinda looked like a red steak. Nature. How bizarre.

We stayed like this with Baby Pham for a while because we had to wait for a senior surgeon to come and have a look at my two second-degree tears. The one on my perineum the doctor stitched up but the other tear that ran millimetres from my urethra and clitoris needed someone more senior to look at.

Eventually, Boyfriend Pham cut the umbilical cord and watched Baby get checked and weighed, while the senior surgeon assessed my damage and decided I didn't need surgery so stitched me up on the spot. The midwives seemed proud that I hadn't taken any pain medication for birth and the doctors were impressed I breathed through the local anesthetic injections in sensitive areas of my genitals. I'm lucky I have a high pain tolerance, it would have made the unpleasant experience even worse.

Boyfriend Pham advocated for skin-on-skin time with Baby while I had a shower made a little awkward by my catheter (they weren't sure if I could pee or not with the tear so near my uretethra). I suppose this was a second misstep by the midwives that they didn't offer or suggest skin-on-skin time for the father while I was preoccupied.

Overall, we had a wonderful birth experience and the hospital team handled our hurdles and hiccups with care and confidence. Giving birth was the most intense experience of my life, and it was worth it to meet my little man on the other side.

Our fertility and pregnancy experience