Breathe some life into your maternity leave

I am on my second month of my maternity leave and I have a mouthful to say about the experience so far. Truth be told, maternity leave can be so routine and monotonous; it gets boring. I am so used to a hectic career life, but I am now reduced to such a monotonous programme that is not so thrilling and mind stimulating. Our daily schedule goes something like this, waking up with the baby, breastfeeding the baby, burping the baby, bathing the baby, breastfeeding the baby again, nappy change, lulling the baby to sleep and it goes on and on. For someone used to a high adrenaline career-life, this routine can depress and drive you crazy. But it need not end up like that because recently a friend gave me some lively tips on how to inject a dose of life to an erstwhile boring maternity leave. Here goes: Social media: Social media has opened up a whole new thrilling world. At just the click of a button, you can get into another world and interact with people of like mind. On Facebook there are groups of breastfeeding mums, posh career moms, forums on Kenyan mothers. These sites are everything from informative to entertaining. Any time the baby doses off, I get on an interesting page to get the latest ‘mushene.’ Watching movies and drama series: I am not a movies person, but if you are an addict and are on maternity leave, you can always catch up on an interesting film. Taking walks with the baby or by yourself: To break the monotony of the house, if you live in a safe, clean and secure neighbourhood and the weather is perfect, you can take the baby on a stroll. The walk always is refreshing. Go for a pampering session: You can do a manicure, pedicure, facial and a full body massage. These sessions are simply relaxing. If you are doing exclusive breastfeeding, the trick is to pump loads of milk for baby and store it in the fridge. Once baby is taken care of, you can hit it off at a good spa for a rejuvenating massage. By the way a massage does wonders on your moods and boosts your milk supply! Going shopping with the girls: For most women, there is nothing as therapeutic as going shopping. Once again, to be on the safe side, pump enough milk for the baby then call the girls. If you have left milk that can last the baby for hours, you can hop from upmarket to low market stores searching for the best bargains. And finally mums, when you go for such escapades do not make frequent “mtoto ako sawa’ frantic calls to the house girl. Let her call you in case of anything urgent. By the way, babies are always fine when mummy disappears for some hours.

photo:www.huffingtonpost.com