Malcolm is losing his hair and so am I. He’s balding at the very crown of his head — like a little monk’s tonsure — and on the right side of his scalp. The goofiness of his lopsided hair loss makes him even cuter in my eyes.
I am not balding, thank goodness, but I’ve entered the phase of postpartum hair loss. Another new mom friend called it “staggering” and she’s right. Hair is shedding everywhere — on my pillow, on my clothes, in the shower. I find my hairs clutched in the baby’s tiny fists. It’s gross and I hate it. There’s a lot of bodily shedding actually. Hair, blood, sweat. I wake up every night from hot flashes that leave me drenched in sweat. The baby is finally sleeping longer but I’m waking up to change my pajamas in the middle of the night. It’s another thing that I didn’t know to expect. My midwife assures me this is normal.
***
Taking care of my baby has brought immense joy and presence into my life. I laugh a lot more these days than I used to. Caring for my son also makes me feel like a dried-out husk of a human being on some days. Both are true. I don't know how, but that's how it is.
During night wakings, I frequently fantasize about having an elegant, quiet hotel room all to myself. The sheets are crisp, the temperature is just right, and I can pull the blackout curtains and sleep as long as I like. Sleep was a big part of my self care pre-baby. When grief or stress became too much, I'd throw in the towel and crawl into bed. There’s no such luxury now. I stumble through the second anniversary of my mom's death feeling foggy and sad. But the baby still needs to be fed, rocked and changed, so I plow on.
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When M’s hair begins to grow back it’s red, which takes me by surprise. His face fills out and his eyes begin to change color. He gets cuter every day — I stare at the curve of his cheek and the folds in his chubby thighs like I’m trying to memorize them. It’s really something to have a front row seat to human development. One day, the baby can barely hold his own head up. I blink, and suddenly he’s learned to roll over.
Sometimes our eyes lock when I’m in the middle of changing M’s diaper, and he blows the gentlest little raspberry at me. I laugh every time and his face lights up. This is something else I want to imprint in my memory forever.
***
Eventually, M beings sleeping longer overnight. For months, I eagerly looked forward to when we could transition the baby to his own room. The first night we decide to give it a try, I lie in bed wide awake, heart pounding with anxiety. Intellectually, I know everything is fine. I have a video monitor trained on my baby, who is literally right in the next room. But my mother’s lizard brain cannot grasp the concept of the baby monitor. It feels wrong not to have him next to me. “When he goes to daycare,” I think, “I am absolutely screwed.”
***
In the early days of my son’s life, if everyone was fed and reasonably clean, I didn’t worry about anything else. Now that he’s getting older and I’ve started working again, I’m haunted daily by the feeling that I must be forgetting something important I need to do. I am learning to live with this feeling — perhaps all that other stuff isn’t so important anyway? I used to obsess over my career. Now, after years of pandemic and an unending torrent of bad news, I just want to lean into giving and receiving care. I cut up a whole mess of beautiful vegetables as part of a dinner for a friend who recently had knee surgery. He and his wife brought us meals when our baby was born, and I will never again look at a homemade dinner as "just" a meal. Those meals are everything. And it is good to use my hands to prepare something for them in return.