Whew, what a rough couple of weeks it's been!

I love my baby, and he's cute and precious and awesome. But man oh, man, the first couple of weeks of parenthood are hard.

You can see from the time of this post that we've been up around the clock.

I got to thinking about things that I wish people had told me before I had my baby! Here they are, in no particular order.

1. When you give birth, there's a lot of extra stuff that happens that they don't show in movies and on tv. Yeah, like the part where you have the baby and you're all excited and happy...but then you lie there for an hour afterwards while the doctor: (a) delivers the placenta (which is like giving birth a second time but not as painful); and (b) sews you up down there. After a while, your legs get pretty tired.

2. After you give birth, your body will tend to be constipated for weeks afterward. Eat lots of salad and drink some Metamucil. I promise, your body will thank you. If your constipation ship has sailed, Rite Aid's laxative for women is awesome and really gets things going.

3. Breastfeeding is hard. It can be more painful than childbirth. Even though it's "natural" it doesn't come naturally. Use a lactation consultant. I wish I'd done that right away instead of trying to figure it out for myself for so many days. I'm still praying every day for my nipples not to fall off.

4. Recovery from childbirth takes a long time. I kept telling myself, "Well, my baby was small since he was so early. This will be a breeze! Maybe I'll go for a run next week!" WRONG. I can still barely walk down the hall. And that's ok - it's good to take it easy and let your body heal.

5. A lot of women get the baby blues after delivery. Over the course of a day, your body goes from having the most estrogen of your life (pregnant) to having the least estrogen (postpartum). It's nothing to be ashamed of, and chances are a bunch of your friends went through it but feel that there's a taboo about admitting it. If the baby blues morph into postpartum depression, Zoloft is really ideal, since it's only minimally passed into breast milk.

I will probably keep adding to this list. Yeah, these are all things I wish people had told me in advance. Especially the one about the constipation.

Hey, everyone!

Sorry I've been MIA for several weeks now.

But I have a good excuse!

Our little one decided to make his appearance five weeks early.

We were very surprised when my water broke in the middle of the night at only 35 weeks. It was just like in the movies!

So far, so good. He is cute and precious and little.

Life is a bit crazy these days. I am up around the clock. But everyone says this time will pass quickly.

Happy Thanksgiving!