Single Parent Talk

What do you miss most about your pre-baby or pre-children days? Let’s not lie: though you adore your little one(s) and you wouldn’t trade a moment with them for anything, there are always moments of nostalgia for things that you miss from your dating days together, before the babies were born, the mortgage was due, and life was a little more complicated.

For me, it’s the days when my then-boyfriend and I stayed up late watching scary movies, did, ahem, grown-up activities, ordered a pizza, watched more movies, then slept all morning. We worked rotational shifts at a restaurant, so we did this ritual a couple of times a month when we were getting off the night shift. We really miss just spending this lazy time together. Another thing we used to do was run out to an all-night diner or store at two in the morning to simply eat, or even get groceries. It sounds silly, but it was always quiet and intimate, which are two words that don’t fit into our lives as much these days as they once did.

What do you miss most? Whatever it is, see if you can give yourself some of it this Christmas. Though we had to finish our shopping while my parents had our daughter last night, we managed to fit in a few activities—from restaurant hopping for tapas to some us-time when we got back home—that really recharged our batteries and gave us a bit of that couple time back.

This holiday season, schedule a babysitter—ideally someone you really trust whom your child can spend the night with—just for a date with your partner, your friends, or yourself. Make it your gift to each other. Then spend the time doing something that you used to love to do, whether it was skating, going to the movies, or just necking in the backseat of your car!

While you are at it, schedule one each month for the rest of the year. If you have to pay for it, it will be well worth the money. It will also make you a better parent, since you won’t be wasting time resenting your poor child for something that’s not his or her fault, and you’ll feel all the more in love again with your partner, which will help strengthen your relationship, too. But above all, it will simply be fun—and who couldn’t use a bit more fun in their lives?

Prematurity is pretty big in my family. I was born a few weeks early, at only four pounds, which was pretty big back in 1982. My mother had to fold my diapers in half when she used them, and there are photos of me next to a glass soda bottle, which was bigger than I was. My mom likes to say that everyone gathered around the table at Thanksgiving when I finally came home from the hospital, thankful that I made it home.

Then my own daughter was born three months early when I had preeclampsia, at only one pound, one ounce, and there were so many complications that could have happened and didn’t that we could only count ourselves as incredibly, incredibly lucky. She came home three months after she was born, and we celebrate both that day—the day she would’ve been born, if born on time—as well as her real birthday.

Any preemie parent will tell you that life at the NICU is terrifying. You don’t know what will happen on any given day. One day your baby might be making progress, moving on to the CPAP to breathe normally—and the next, be intubated yet again, unable to breathe on her own. There may be surgeries, ex-rays, ultrasounds, blood transfusions, and plenty of other stomach-lurching procedures; my daughter had all of these and then some.

Prematurity is one of the leading causes of death of babies in our country, and if we could find a way to not only understand why it happens but to prevent it from happening, it would mean so much to so many families. Worldwide, 13 millions babies are born too early every single year. 12.2% of babies in our country are born prematurely, which is one of the highest rates in the world! This is just unacceptable, and the March of Dimes is leading the fight to make it a thing of the past.

Please click here to join the March of Dimes in the fight against prematurity. There are plenty of ways you can take action, from leaving posts on Facebook to donating, watching videos to learning more about prematurity and the few ways we know to prevent it. These preventatives, of course, are by no means exhaustive—or else we wouldn’t have so many kiddos die. There’s still no known cause for my disease, preeclamsia, for example. That’s why it’s so important to help support this cause and find a way for moms like me to carry babies to full term in the future.