Tell us a bit about yourself?

I have actually done one of these before but I absolutely have so much to update from the last two years. But I am now a 27 year old mum of 2 (and a 3rd growing due at the end of the year). Outside of being a mum, I am a public servant and have worked with my boss since April 2021 (both Mat leaves have been while I have worked for him) and I teach Reformer Pilates at Her Fitness in Googong.

What were you doing before babies/children?

Working, living my life with my partner going camping and on fun adventures, hanging out with our 3 dogs and spending lots of time doing things on my own…

How did you come to be a mum?

Our journey was (fortunately) really easy. Our first wasn’t overly planned. I have always wanted to be a mum, and we found ourselves pregnant after not trying at all, but certainly doing nothing to prevent it. Our second was far more planned and we again were lucky to have no troubles falling pregnant the second time. And now this third time, again planned, we fell pregnant the first try again. I know that others have it far, far harder than we have and I am super, super grateful to have the journey that we have.

What has your feeding journey been like?

First time was pretty easy, the struggle we had was actually being able to keep up with supply. Matilda wasn’t an overly ‘big’ baby but was 3.8kg and as a first time mum I definitely had no idea what I was doing. But after about 3 months we struggled with feeds later in the afternoon and started to supplement with formula but that easily transitioned to me not wanting to breastfeed anymore. For me the main stress was keeping my supply up while adding bottles/formula feeds. I wasn’t keen on pumping, washing bottles, washing pump parts and also still breast feeding (I was only one person right???) so I just chose to move to straight formula at about 3 and a half months. Second time around, again easy to start and I didn’t have too much trouble with supply this time as Layla was born a bit smaller at 3.2kg. This time I was adamant to introduce a bottle early so I could get my partner/others to help with feeding and I wasn’t fussed on whether that was formula or pumped milk. But Layla never took a bottle (which only ever frustrated me…) which ended up being really hard with a 15 month old around too. I managed to breastfeed her for about 4 months, but we started to have a lot of night sleep trouble – sleeping for 1-1.5 hours at a time overnight and feeding constantly and I never had experienced this before. What that was attributed to I will never know, but I was convinced it was something to do with my milk. So one day (I think I might have been on the cusp of mastitis too…) I just decided I was done. I worked hard for 2-3 days on getting her to take a formula bottle (I wanted to make sure she was okay with the formula I had chosen too) and I was done with breast feeding. Looking back, I think I could have probably just taken the time to work through the bottle refusal issue and kept mix feeding, but I definitely did what was best for my mental health at the time. And we are a big time pro formula household here. This third time around, I am keen to try and breast feed a little longer (which to be honest is only fuelled by the fact that we will be doing an overseas trip to Fiji when baby 3 is about 6 months old. And I would absolutely love to be able to go without needing to take all the things related to bottle/formula feeding. BUT I will also have two other kids (two and a half and 18 months old) so I/m not convinced ill have the time to sit and feed…. 

What has sleep been like in your house?

Baby one – brilliant. She slept 3-4 hour stretches almost from the beginning. 4 month regression never hit. Every other regression never hit… EXCEPT… 6 weeks before her little sister arrived she decided she needed to be awake for about 2 hours a night at 1am just to cuddle mum or dad. That lasted maybe 1 week after we had Layla thank god. Since then she has been pretty good, sleeping through the night most nights with the occasional wake to come into mum and dads bed in the middle of the night.

Baby two – started off really rough… 1-1.5 hours at a time for the most part, I don’t think I put her down for the first 6 weeks (other that maybe to have a shower… I am certain I even held her when I went to the loo…) and i think I just soldiered on through the sleep deprivation somehow. We have gotten better that’s for sure. She is now 10 months old and wakes once most nights (I mean she did wake 4 times the night before last… so it’s a work in progress).

Baby three – will report back…

The hardest bits…

The constant battle of working out why things aren’t working… Are they not sleeping because they are getting teeth? They’re cold? They’re hungry? They’re getting sick? They haven’t pooped? You didn’t do the bed time routine right? The bath wasn’t warm enough? You didn’t read the same book as yesterday?

And also trying to get through toddler tantrums… do you die on the hill not letting them have rice bubbles for dinner???

The best bits…

From having my second, seeing the way they love each other. My first was only 15 months old when her sister was born and the way she has loved her sister from the beginning has made me cry too many times to count. She always called her sissy from when she came home and now every single night without fail she has to tell her ‘nigh night’ and that she loves her with a huge kiss and a cuddle. If we forget to tell her we are putting her sister to bed, she MUST go in there before she falls asleep. The first thing she looks for when she wakes up is her sister. And the way Layla looks at her big sister is the best (it’s also built in entertainment). Everyone told me how hard having two under two would be, and honestly, I can’t relate. The first 6 weeks were rough sure, but that wasn’t because of the two of them, that was the normal rought sleep deprivation start to newborn life. From 6-8 weeks on, life has been amazing. We always have been going out and doing things all together. Now 10 months on we can do everything together, they love the same things for the most part and it is just the best.

 How do you make time for yourself?

Honestly, I don’t really. I love my job, so I find that to be a bit of a break that’s for sure. But I also like to try and find time on the weekend to go and do a Pilates class. I actually have found, that making time for myself actually causes me more stress sometimes… I love doing everything with my girls and I get SEVERE fomo when I miss out on things with them. So far, that hasn’t yet lead to me having any kind of burnout/resentment, but I am sure one day it might…

What’s next for you and your family?

Baby three… and surviving that. The age gap between our kids (and plz don’t call me crazy haha) is 15 months and then 17 months so we will have 3 under 3 (for 4 whole months…). I have always wanted to have three kids in sequential years (2022, 2023 and then 2024) which we have just scrapped in with this baby being due 19 December). After that who knows… definitely not another baby that is for sure 3 is plenty for us. But maybe we might look at buying a farm, my partner grew up out of town so has always wanted that, and I am certainly not against it!!!

If you could talk to your pre baby/kid self, what advice would you give?

Honestly, I would tell myself not to ever stress. You just learn to go with the flow and make babies as hard as you want to make it. If you set your expectations low (like the baby isn’t going to be the best sleeper, or the house isn’t going to be as clean as it might have been before etc) you can never be disappointed, I also think I would tell myself to stop listening to random first-time mums (sorry first time mum’s giving advice) or random people on Instagram. You want to breast feed? Cool great. You don’t want to breast feed? Also great. You want to eat organic post birth because you think that’s best for your baby through breast milk? Great do that. You want to each a block of chocolate and drink coffee (like I did post partum both times and second time realised chocolate made my baby have a sore belly so I worked out maybe 1-2 rows didn’t make her sad as opposed to 1 whole block lol)? Also great. You just need to do whatever works for you and your family and not ever worry what any single micro-influencer says (they don’t know you, your baby, or anything about your household).