Musings on Motherhood

Top 5 Post-Baby Workouts

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ Leave a comment

Top 5 Post Baby Workouts | babydroppings

This post isn’t sponsored–I just like working out! But if you use my ClassPass link, we’ll each get $40. If you join right now, you’ll get your first month free.

I was pretty active throughout both of my pregnancies, but the postpartum period kicked my butt. I thought I had done a pretty good job of maintaining my abdominal tone–turns out, the firmness I had mistaken for muscle was actually just all baby. Now that I’ve got two little ones, I really look forward to my time in the gym as a way to be healthy, active, and get in some much needed me-time. I use ClassPass religiously since I love to switch up my routine. Here are my top favorite post-baby workouts: Continue reading →

A Letter to Project Motherhood

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ 1 Comment

Mom Burnout | babydroppings.com

I’m not any everything-needs-to-be-perfect mom. I’m just a strung out WAHM who is kinda drowning a little bit.

-Allison Cooper, “When Mom Burnout is Your Reality”

Allison Cooper of Project Motherhood and I have been friends for years. Our husbands, Chris and Damany, have been best friends since high school, so we’ve known each other through pregnancies, weddings, moving days, birthdays, and now into multiple anniversaries of our 29th birthdays (haha!)

Back in November, Allison sent out an article called “When Mom Burnout is Your Reality,” and it landed in my inbox at exactly the right time. I had been diagnosed with postpartum depression after my son’s birth, I was in the middle of a full-time semester at school, and I had just finished a work conference that left me discouraged, drained, and sick. Continue reading →

Preparing for Leave as a Freelancer

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ Leave a comment

Preparing For Leave as a Freelancer | babydroppingsIronically enough, when my husband and I first knew that we wanted to have a baby, being a freelancer seemed like the worst idea ever. After all, grown-ups had grown-up jobs, right? They had benefits and salaries and paid leave. I spent much of my adult life chasing down that perfect “big girl job,” the one that would offer enough stability for me to be able to take care of my family.

Like many people my age, however, I was surprised and dismayed to learn that, well, there wasn’t a whole hell of a lot out there for me or for anyone else. Continue reading →

Ways to Relax When You’re Ridiculously Pregnant

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ 3 Comments
spa-ball-spa-herbal-ball-with-candle_41078-13
Photo courtesy of FreePik.com.

I feel like in the last couple of weeks, I have been subject to a near-perfect storm of fuckery that has conspired to make me as hot and miserable (in all senses of the word) as possible. When you’re this frigging pregnant (and in the middle of a summer heat wave), even the most saintly among us will have a hard time keeping their cool. To complicate matters, it’s not as if you can go out for a drink with friends to take the edge off or indulge in whatever your substance of choice might be. And if one more person tells you that “stress is bad for the baby,” you’ll have to add hiding the body to your third trimester to-do list. I wanted to share a quick list of my favorite, non-controlled-substance, mostly summer-friendly ways to relax when you’re very, very pregnant and maybe very, very mad.

  1. Prenatal yoga
  2. Massages
  3. Facials
  4. Going for a walk
  5. Reading something that makes you feel understood. For me, that’s Tiffany Dufu’s Drop the Ball.
  6. Indulging in something yummy (my favorites right now are mochi ice-cream and poke bowls)
  7. Cleaning (this is a psychological tactic called sublimation, and it’s a great way to get some stress out AND satisfy the nesting urge. Particularly if it involves beating rugs).
  8. Mani/pedis
  9. Swimming, or, for the lazy, float tank therapy
  10. Meditation
  11. Blogging/writing in a journal
  12. Sex (if you feel up to it and don’t want to kill your partner. And if you do, go solo 😉 )
  13. Napping
  14. Quiet time (particularly if you have a small child already)
  15. Get something crossed off your to-do list
  16. Try a class or something you won’t have time to do after baby gets here
  17. Watch something on TV
  18. Take a walk on the beach

What works for you when you’re feeling stressed and overwhelmed?

Why We Chose a Midwife Over the Hospital

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ 2 Comments
Photo by Janko Ferlič on Unsplash.

With just eight weeks left to go, I find myself thinking a lot about the last stage of pregnancy–birth. It’s the last hurdle to jump before we get to meet our new little one, and while I’m over-the-moon-excited, I’m also beginning to get really nervous all over again. Fortunately, we have the most compassionate and loving prenatal care that we could possibly wish for in our midwives, and with their support I’m eagerly anticipating our upcoming home birth. Continue reading →

Why I Started Crying in the Fitting Room

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ 3 Comments

It’s very, very early in the morning. My husband and I are sitting in our living room, quietly scrolling through our phones. Despite our best efforts to stay positive, cheerful and productive, we have had extraordinarily trying days. We are emotionally and physically wiped.

Part of the stress, I realize, comes from having to pretend that everything is A-okay all freaking day. It’s absolutely not. We’re dealing with work and school and family and finances and self-doubt and clutter and all kinds of other stuff too. I realized today what I needed to do was just sit with the negative feelings, because I was wasting a lot of emotional energy trying to avoid what most people I knew would inevitably say. Continue reading →

Becoming an Adult With the Second Pregnancy

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ 4 Comments

Becoming an Adult With the Second Pregnancy | babydroppings

I don’t know if it’s that I’m weeks away from my thirtieth birthday, or that I’m heavily pregnant with my second child, but I feel my adulthood keenly. When I was 25 years old and expecting my daughter, I felt like I was stepping into this new and exciting phase of my life. This time around, I feel settled, tired, and a bit sore. Or, to quote Bilbo Baggins: “thin, sort of stretched—like butter scraped over too much bread.” Continue reading →

A Shout Out to Step-Daughters

~ Allaya P. Cooks-Campbell ~ Leave a comment

A Shout-Out to Step-Daughters | babydroppings

My Mother’s Day started off in the most achingly beautiful way with a text message from my oldest step-daughter, Kayla. She sent me “Happy mother’s day. I love and appreciate you for everything I hope your sunday is awesome!!”

As I read the message over and over, I was transported back to what it felt like to hold her as she dozed off, still only three or four years old. I actually don’t remember how old my girls were when we first met. I just remember being so impressed with, and terrified of, these little tiny people. Continue reading →