How My Life Has Changed Since Pregnancy and Becoming a New Mommy

In no particular order and this is probably not all of them!

Obvious: gained 35 pounds and am now almost 10 pounds lighter than before. However, my body is in completely different shape than before. And I'm a size larger. Everything "shifted" into different places!

I used to read about a book every 2 or 3 days. I haven't read a book since about a month before Cayson was born.

I do twice as much laundry (or so it seems).

I have to plan my showers, etc., in advance, where before I could take a shower when I wanted to.

I don't like certain foods anymore.

There are certain foods that I LOVE now that I hated before, like sweet potato french fries from Marketplace. I crave those things now! If you've never eaten at Marketplace, get yourself to Conway, Fort Smith, or Springdale (I think, it's somewhere in NWA) and try it out!

My hair has gone from being pretty thick and an average brown color (pre-preggo) to very, very thick and dark brown (preggo) to droopy and drab brown (immediate post-partum to 3 months after) to falling out by the handfuls and better brown (3 months post-partum) to shiny and almost normal (now).

This one's TMI so if you don't want to read...don't. I never had a...click here to find out, but I'm warning you...before pregnancy.

I'm less self-centered.

I've learned what unconditional love really means.

I know what it feels like to want better for you son than you had.

I have been "that" woman since Cayson's birth. The one who gets offended if you try to tell her how to raise her kids. It was just once, but this woman that I don't even know (she was a clerk at the Hog store in the mall) heard Cayson cry and insisted that he was hungry. When I knew that he had just finished eating not 15 minutes before. She insisted that because he was chewing on his hand that he was hungry when in fact he was just teething and pretty sleepy, too. Needless to say, my husband ushered me out pretty quick!

I know how to distinguish my baby's cries! Before I thought that was amazing that moms could listen to their baby cry and know what they wanted.

A typical grocery store night includes: Feeding Cayson right before we leave, going to Sam's (we don't always do this), stopping at McDonald's to get something to eat, parking in a discreet parking place in the Wal-mart parking lot, feeding Cayson while munching on McDonald's and watching an episode from "House" (usually), going inside Wal-mart, Shaun ending up holding Cayson because he's now full and sleepy, Cayson finally going to sleep, getting home later than we wanted.

Before: we'd go whenever we wanted and stay however long we wanted.

Before when a movie was coming out on DVD that we really, really wanted we would go to Wally world the night before it was supposed to come out and stay until after midnight and get it. Now we're lucky if we get it at all. (Although Shaun did make a special trip to Wal-mart to pick up season 2 of Grey's Anatomy.)

I have the "mommy nose". Where I can change the most foul of diapers and it wouldn't faze me a bit. Before, I have almost gotten sick over things like that.

I worry about germs more.

I used to go to the church 2 or 3 times a week (not counting Sundays and Wednesdays) to help my husband with various ministry stuff. Now I'm doing really good to make it on Sundays and Wednesdays!

I never missed church before, not since marrying Shaun, anyway. I had to be really sick. I think I missed maybe twice, once for our honeymoon and once for being sick. Since being pregnant I've missed about 5 or 6 Sundays and more Wednesdays than that. (The reasons why were either morning sickness, tonsilitis (me), and Cayson has been sick a few times.)

I used to sleep all night, without waking up at all. Now I get up at least once a night to feed Cayson and during pregnancy it was to go to the restroom.

TMI alert..........................................I haven't had a monthly visitor in a year. (I don't mind that a bit!)

Ok, this list is getting long so I'll wrap it up. I know there are more, so maybe I'll do a part 2 later.

The best change from pre-preggo to post is I have the sweetest baby boy that I love so much!