Sophia Grace Reveals the Best, Worst and Most Surprising Parts of Being a Mom

A new boy has Sophia Grace Brownlee's heartbeat runnin' away. Can't you hear that? It's the sound of her 5-week-old son waking up. Again. 

"Before I had the baby, people say things like, 'Oh, get your sleep while you can,' and, 'You're not going to get sleep for ages,'" the YouTuber recalled in an exclusive interview with E! News. "And you take it with a pinch of salt, like, 'Yeah, I know, I'm going to have to wake up in the night. But how bad can it be?' But it really is bad. Like, it's amazing, but it is very difficult."

Still, the 19-year-old, who boom boom boomed her way into the spotlight at age 8 when she and cousin Rosie McClelland covered Nicki Minaj's "Super Bass" on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, thinks her newborn is a hell of a guy. 

"No one can really prepare you for how difficult it is going to be to be a mom," Sophia admitted. "But it's definitely all worth it."

Already back to work sharing snippets of her new mom life with her 3.5 million YouTube subscribers (next up: a reveal of the "really unique," "nature-related" name she heard years ago that made her think, "If I ever have a little boy, I'm going to call him that"), she's built up her proverbial village. 

At home with mom Carly and dad Dominic, "I have got so much help, which is so good," she raved. "Honestly, my mom helps me every single day. And my nan also helps me most days as well."

Auntie Rosie is part of her squad, too. In fact, the 16-year-old has been there since the beginning, joining the crew that, unbeknownst to the mom-to-be, gathered at the hospital to await the delivery. 

"They were all so excited," said Sophia of her son's Feb. 26 arrival. "They weren't actually allowed to be there while I was having him, but they were allowed to be outside the hospital."

And since then, she continued, Rosie has "seen him a couple of times and she loves him. We call her an aunt, even though it's actually her cousin. Because me and Rosie are like sisters, anyway. And he will feel like a close person to her because we're so close."

A little more than a month in, Sophia says her little man has grown up nearly as fast as fans feel she and Rosie have. 

"I honestly feel like he already doesn't look like a newborn anymore," she shared. "He's more alert and he looks around and he's just more like an actual baby. So I feel like he's already getting bigger, which is crazy." 

But Sophia's been enjoying every minute-to-minute change. "I would say that's definitely one of the best parts, watching their milestones," she said. "He's super young, but he's already done his first smile now, which is just so cute. No one can prepare you for how exciting it's all going to be."

She's had the expected struggles with the aforementioned sleep deprivation ("He wakes up every couple of hours for a feed"), the diaper changes ("They literally pee in your face," she said, "he's peed in his own eyes before as well"), and the general nervousness that comes with being a first-time parent.

"I was very clueless at first," she acknowledged. "So I found every tiny part of it very difficult. And when I was in hospital, the midwives really helped me. They even helped me change his diaper, change his clothes. But you get to know how to do everything day by day. So it's not so bad anymore."

With one surprising exception. 

Sophia had intended to keep both her boyfriend and her baby private, giving just a glimpse of the newborn in a March 18 video. "But it didn't go to plan," she revealed. Learning that someone had posted an image of her newborn's face on TikTok, she shared, "My heart just sunk."

Having petitioned the social media site to remove the video to no avail, she remains disappointed at both the app and the stranger who she feels violated her privacy. 

"It's a very awful thing to happen because you go online and you literally see your baby's face," Sophia lamented. "I feel like before posting something, you should have permission from the parents, which is definitely not what happened."

Still, she noted, that image was from his early newborn days, "so he doesn't even look like that anymore."

Which is why she looks forward to sharing more photos on her timeline, just one of the many milestones she's eagerly ticking off her list. 

"I'm really looking forward to when the baby hugs you back," Sophia shared. "That has just got to be the cutest thing ever. Because they're actually hugging you back and they love you. So I can't wait for that. And, obviously, also when he says his first word, because that's just going to be crazy that he can talk. And when he's going to walk."

For now she's savoring the sweet snuggles and, yes, the sleepless nights that come with the early, exhausting weeks. 

Her goal, she said, is to "just enjoy each part that you're in, because you're only going to be in that part once. And they're going to get older every single day."

Even though she's excited for him to start sleeping through the night, "I feel like I'm going to miss this stage as well. So I'm trying to soak it all in while it's still happening."