You are Enough for Your New Mama Friend
Is there anything more thrilling than the expectation of a new baby entering the world? The anticipation begins from the moment you get that first text/call/telegram(?) announcing “headed to the hospital!” or “water broke!” or “so…I think maybe this isn’t gas but actually my contractions coming two minutes apart!?”
I went through this just last week with a dearest friend’s first baby. While the magnitude of the moment is obvious, you feel somewhat helpless. From that first text, I could do nothing but wait and send my best high school cheers and favorite emojis across the line through the nervous spouse giving the play by play. And that moment when I couldn’t handle the suspense much longer, the text comes across the phone, “It’s a girl! Mom and baby are doing great.”
And then the water works. The relief, the joy, all of it wrapped into one little text and I could do nothing but cry.
I cried because I was so happy, of course. Welcome to the world new baby! Welcome to the world, new parents!
But then, as I stared at the phone willing the parents to tame this anxious audience with a picture of the sweet new face, I suddenly felt a wave of different tears.
These tears felt heavy on my heart. These were not the tears of joy but those of empty sadness.
Because suddenly the miles between me and the new mama were too many. Suddenly everything thing my heart wanted to do, I knew was not possible.
I wanted to show up at the hospital with a sweet little hat and a bottle of champagne to celebrate the new and exciting little person in our world.
Because that is what my friends did for me.
I wanted to come over with a bag of Thai takeout food and hold the new baby while the parents scarfed down a meal as fast as they could.
Because that is what my friends did for me.
I wanted to call up my friend on a Friday night and insist they sneak away for a dinner alone and pretend to be grownups and not have to pay a babysitter.
Because that is what my friends did for me.
I wanted to meet her for brunch and talk to her about Real Housewives of Wherever, or my job, or my wedding, or that crazy blind date, or anything and everything that had nothing to do with spit up and nipple shields and nap schedules.
Because that is what my friends did for me.
When I first became a mother, my friends physically surrounded me with love and kindness and helping hands because that is what you do for a friend when they need you.
But I can’t do that. Not here in Texas while she lives in Chicago. Not while I have my own little mouths to feed and babies to hold.
Suddenly I felt the weight of a million miles and a million stages away. Because I had the baby first, I couldn’t be there, by her side, for my friend in her new amazing and terrifying stage of motherhood. I was already there, smack in the middle of it myself. I felt inadequate. I felt like I wasn’t enough.
But then she reached out in a text message. And we finally chatted on the phone about all of the exhaustion and frustrations that surround that first day/week/month of new life. Later a group text flew around with a bunch of mamas sharing the crazy things we have all done just to get a baby to sleep.
Suddenly it occurred to me that I do have something to give to my friend. Something she was not able to give to me. Something I never went to her for in the first place.
What I have now that is important and unique is the mama ear and heart, to listen and to understand. That is what she needs from me. That is what I can give to her. That is enough.
I may not be able to show up at her door with a casserole, but I could send her the link to my favorite sound machine app. I may not be able to hold her baby, but I can respond to a text message at 3 AM because she is up feeding and I am up worrying, as all moms do. I may not be able to distract her with a conversation over brunch but I can distract her with a phone conversation during the witching hour, where we can still talk about the latest tv shows, or about the shenanigans our little ones put us through that day, the kind of shenanigans a mom can only truly understand.
As new mamas, we need the meals and the extra hands and the distractions. But we also need the support and the cheers and the fist bump emojis from the mamas who have been there before. Each of these tasks are a vital part of the village that raises a new parent and a new baby. I learned to lean on each of my friends for what they could give me in that moment of their lives. Because what they could give me was enough.
Whatever you can give to a new mom, be it casseroles or pep talks, that is enough.
You are enough for your new mama friend.