Being Alone with a Baby

When you're of baby-having age, you tend to hear a lot of advice from people. When you actually get pregnant, watch out! It comes at you left and right, wanted and unwanted! Everyone tells you how your life will change and how nothing will ever be the same. They were all correct, that's for sure! However, I don't remember anyone ever telling me how lonely I would be!

Now, I've been alone before. Most of my job required me sitting alone in a room talking to myself all day. Or writing or creating commercials etc. Nonetheless, I was alone for the majority of the day. Sometimes my husband would get home from work late and I would be alone in the evening for awhile. Sometimes he would have things going on on the weekends and I would be home alone. I never really minded that. In fact, I actually kind of LIKED being alone.

So, now that I have a baby, why am I so lonely? I'm never TRULY alone. I have human contact all day everyday. She's never far away from me. And it's not like it's complete silence in the house all day. I talk to Kaelyn pretty continuously. And sometimes she talks back! Nothing I can yet distiguish, but plenty of various babbles and motor boat type noises.

I still work a few hours a week but for the most part, I'm at home...alone...with Kaelyn. Don't get me wrong, I love spending all of my time with her. When I'm away it's all I can do to get back to her as FAST as possible. But when I've been alone with her for 10-12 hours straight, things start to go a little crazy in my head!

Is it strange that I start to gaze out the front door for my husband's car around 5 even though I know he won't be home until at least 6? Is it a bad thing that the highlight of our day is often a trip to the mailbox? Do I get a little TOO friendly with the check out people at the grocery store?

Case in point...the other day we were checking out. It was our one and only outing for the day (other than the mailbox). The check out person says, "Did you find everything okay?" as they usually do. "Sure did!" I say and then I make a comment about how cold and windy it is outside or something to those effects. In return the check out person nodded and that was that. I left the store just crushed. Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration, but I was certainly disappointed. Couldn't they have told me about their day? Couldn't they have asked about mine? Couldn't they have been one of those people who decides to tell me their life story for no particular reason?

When we got home we read the book Bubbles Bubbles for the eleventh time that day. Kaelyn lit up and giggled up a storm at Bert on the first page, as always. I don't know what it is about Bert but she just loves him. My best human interaction for the day.

And I can live with that. It's great to see her grin at me when she's thumping around in her crib after a nap. It's the best to see her eyes light up when I do something that delights her like sing a silly song or bounce her next to the back door. Sometimes I like to hear stories from check out people, so sue me! :) But if all I get is a smile or two from my baby, I'll be just fine.

Warning to my husband, though...he's a quiet sort of fellow. But when I have a day of isolation from the adult world, he needs to come home prepared. Chat me up a bit! So what if I only have stories about diaper explosions and spit up, ask about it anyways! :) And pretend to enjoy what you hear! It's all I have to look forward to after a long day of the Bubbles Bubbles book!!