Realizing you're actually somebody's mother

I'll never forget the forms I filled out for my days-old son at the pediatrician's office. "Henry Hartsfield Spencer," I wrote for the first time since his arrival. Even more thrilling was the blank for "Relationship to patient." Mother. On an intellectual level you know you're a mom. But the first time you're identified as such by the outside world  -- wow!

The I-am-a-mom moment for Lynn Lombard of Akron, New York, came when she picked up her 5-month-old daughter from the sitter. A little girl at the sitter's house sang out, "Amanda's mommy is here!" "It suddenly hit me," Lombard says. "Yes, I am a mommy! It was a wonderful feeling  -- and being called a mommy still feels great."

Doing mom duty  -- in public

When I first ventured into the world with my newborn, I used to think everyone around me was sizing up my mothering skills-how well I lifted the baby out of the carrier or changed a diaper or soothed a whimper. It required a leap of confidence to do these things where anyone besides my forgiving baby could see me.

Sometimes you plan for this milestone and sometimes, as Shannon Cornaby of Sahuarita, Arizona, discovered, you're thrust into it. She and her husband had just arrived at a restaurant with another family when 3-month-old Sarah began to wail. Cornaby had never nursed in public and was worried about trying. "But the choices were doing it, disturbing people with crying, or leaving," she says.

So she propped Sarah on her leg and started breast-feeding, struggling to ignore that her face was turning red. Then her friend surprised her by mentioning how calmly she could nurse in public. It proved a watershed moment: By the time Cornaby had her second baby, Noah, she was comfortable breastfeeding pretty much anyplace.

Making a mom friend

Sure, your prebaby friends are still your friends (when you get the chance to see them). But having a baby allows for a new kind of camaraderie  -- "momaraderie," the fast bonds you form with other mothers simply because you gave birth around the same time.

Katie Pabst of Tucson, Arizona, longed to talk to other moms after her daughter Rachael was born. "But none of my friends had kids," says Pabst. While visiting a park when Rachael was 8 months old, Pabst saw a mother with a baby, but was too shy to approach her. "Later, one of the wheels on Rachael's stroller popped off. That mom I had seen spotted me and offered me the exact part I needed to reattach the wheel!" The two then walked together and traded stories of sleepless nights and little victories. "We're still friends four years later," Pabst says.

You don't have to wait for fate to bring you mom friends. Contact your childbirth-class instructor and see if she can put you in touch with members from your group. Check the bulletin board at your pediatrician's office and your local newspaper for mothers' groups. Register with gotkidsnetwork.com

Feeling human again

There's a reason they call the first weeks after delivery "the fourth trimester." You need time apart from the rest of the world for recovery and newborn care. Your work, your interests, and even your mate fade into a postpartum whiteout. Gradually, though, the fog begins to lift, and you start to reclaim your brain  -- and body.

Dressing in an outfit that doesn't include maternity jeans or an oversize top feels great, but parting with your pregnancy clothes isn't always easy. I couldn't do it until I attended an all-employees meeting at my company. I looked at the big denim shirt and black stretch pants that had become my postbaby uniform and was seized with the urge to do better. I broke down and bought clothes that weren't my old size but weren't maternity wear, either.

"I didn't want to stop wearing maternity clothes because I was hiding in them," says Maribelle Lewis, a mother of two in Avenel, New Jersey. "When I finally got the courage to donate them, my husband started surprising me with hip clothes. He helped me realize that just because I'm a mother doesn't mean I have to dress like a great-grandmother!"

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