Overwhelmed with new baby - please tell me it's normal to feel like this

[neuroticlady]

Our baby is just over a week old. My DH and I are in a state of shock, I think. Everyone warns you what hard work it is but the reality has hit in a way we never expected and, if I am honest, we are both looking at each other and questioning why we had him. We both have had difficulty admitting this to each other but at least we're talking to each other about it. What makes it worse is that this is very much a 'wanted' baby - we went through years of trying before he came along. It makes how we feel so much worse to deal with.

Baby is currently screaming and we can't work out why, we're both exhausted and feeling pretty miserable, the house is a tip, our old lives look pretty good right now. Please can someone tell me they had similar feelings and that it will get better....? Thank you from a stressed new mum and dad!

Good luck today!

Sorry- I mean obviously Monday in Oz- it is still sunday night here...

Normal. Ignore the house, if anyone comes round to "help" direct them to whatever needs doing in the house. DD1 was a v difficult baby, but after the first 14 days I felt a bit more settled. She is now 5 and adorable! Best of luck, and in a few months I'm sure you'll look back at this time and laugh!

Thanks everyone. I always wish I had more time to respond properly to some of these brilliant posts but I only have the amount of time the baby will let me sit here and type. He's driving me mad this afternoon - just won't settle. 20 mins here and there and even the sling isn't working. Everyone says rest when the baby does but if he's constantly grizzling and you're putting the dummy back a thousand times how are you ever meant to rest?

Sorry, I know from all your posts that this is all normal, and it's my reaction to it all that's at issue, but at times the sheer mundane repetitiveness just drives me mad. That and not being able to rest/eat/sit/whatever for more than about two minutes. I hang on to you all saying it will get better because I would be lying if I said I was enjoying any of it yet. And DH at work today, too, so it's just me and the baby... AGHHH!

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Hi pelafina, just about to plop into the bath and then into bed - ended up wearing the sling all last night - gave up trying to settle a by then raging baby at 1.30am - but amazingly got some sleep so will do it again tonight if it means we all get some peace and rest.

Mum arrives tomorrow, and I can't wait. An odd day ahead, though: psychologist first thing to talk through everything and how I'm dealing with the anxiety attacks, then back home to greet my parents.

Poor baby is only three weeks old (today) so I think half the problem is me needing to lower my expectations with him at this stage. I know I keep saying it but it's all just been such a MASSIVE shock.

Thanks for saying it will get better. And for the ipod tip...!

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Been thinking about you...
Hope tomorrow goes well! Don't be embarrassed to tell your parents exactly what you need from them, ie: shopping, cooking, taking the buggy out so you can just be quiet for a bit. Or maybe you will just love (as I did) the sense of someone else being in the house with you. Uncomplicated loving company.
Please, resist any temptation to be 'hosty' with them -- that's not what you or they need.
Give them leaflets etc so they get up to speed on the PND.
Hope the meeting with the psychologist is useful, I'm sure it will be.

first few weeks are a total shock. totally normal, you've just had a physically traumatic experience, wanted or not your DC is a totally new alien being that has just effectively been landed on you, not to mention the pressure to feel wonderful about it all.

i felt so scared for the first few days of having my DS but please remember this, it gets better and better and better as time goes on - they give nothing back in terms of love or amusement or anything at this stage but it does change and the time goes so quickly.

only advice i can give is to be kind to each other (you and DH/DP) and whenever you get a moment to yourselves stuff the housework and do something nice or relaxing.

you havent made a mistake you are just being so brave in being open and honest about the way you feel about something that well to be honest is completely off the rickter scale in terms of stress initially.

good luck, you will be fine honest. [hug]

Lovely posts MandyMac.

There's a piece on Woman's Hour at the moment about PND, and one about maternal ambivalence. Well worth a listen:
www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/womanshour/

NL - hope you're having a better time with your family there. Lots of love x

Hi NL,

Hope you're parents arrived ok. I remember never really getting the time to eat properly and it is sooooo important you do so as your energy levels need to be high to cope with all the extra stiff you're doing. Ask your parents to cook extra each meal and freeze the leftovers so when they have gone you have a stock of home cooked food in the freezer that DH can reheat when he gets home. Not sure if your dh is a good cook or not, but mine can barely make beans on toast so my mum and mil would regularly cook and freeze for us - it really helped. We would have meals at really wierd times of the day/night but at least we got some good food.
Hope your appointment with the psychologist went well

feel like i am losing the plot, one hour's sleep, 4am, he keeps looking like he's going to sleep then suddenly starts screaming again. i feel like the walls are totally closing in on me. had to walk away from him earlier. this is like slow torture. even my parents arriving has done nothing to dampen this suffocating anxiety, this feeling that we have made a huge mistake.

I remember feeling exactly the same - wishing there was an OFF button to just give me a minute's peace. I remember asking a friend of mine whether there wasn't some kind of sedative you can give them. I remember the same friend saying that she went to stay with her mum when her LO was 3 weeks old, and she arrived on the doorstep sobbing 'when will my baby stop crying?'. Her mum replied 'well, mine is 31 and she hasn't stopped crying yet'.

It isn't a mistake. You have made it to 3 weeks. You have taken steps to address your PND. You are getting there and you are surviving this. Another 3 weeks and it will get a little easier. That same time again and it will be easier still.

There is nothing more hideous than the middle of the night waking and anxiety and fear and dread and despair. Does it help to think that there are hundreds of thousands of other parents all round the world up in the middle of the night feeling the same way? I always thought new parents should be issued with CB radios so that you could speak to other parents in the middle of the night.

Are your parents still on UK time? Any chance they could take the baby for the night? Even one night of unbroken sleep will do wonders for you. Ask for their help - that's what they are there for.

What else: I took Valerian when my LO was teeny, just to stave off the anxiety - I know you've been prescribed the Zoloft so worth checking if you can take anything else natural remedy-wise alongside it. Even a bit of lavender oil might help a bit.

I used to pin my DS's arms down and cradle his head really tightly. It was sometimes the only way to get him to sleep.

You will get through this, and it is not a mistake. It's ok to feel thoroughly awful and it's ok to ask anyone and everyone for help hugs

umm, not a real link... meant to just say {{{hugs}}}

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Oh, and swaddling can really work for some babies.

Can you go for a relaxing post-natal aromatherapy massage? Get out and somewhere completely non-baby and just relax. An hour or an hour and a half of self-indulgence.

Baby massage classes really helped me bond with my baby and relaxed us both.

nl are you cosleeping? as i found this a life saver? your doing great you know, it will get better and it will get so much easier

I was going to say swaddling. With dd1 I had similar experience to you- I know the feeling of sitting there alone in the middle of the night, so tired it physically hurts to keep your eyelids open, tears pouring down my face, wishing she would just. stop. crying. And the only time she did was when she was feeding, and then she would slip off the boob and.....start screaming again. It was horrendous, but it really really really does get better. I used to get dh to take her out for long drives, just to get some sanity, and because the motion used to send her to sleep. It sounds like your lo might be crying cos he wants to get to sleep and hasn't quite learned how to. I read somewhere that there is a theory they cry to drown out all other stimuli. I am now on baby no 3 and SOOO much calmer this time! Now he cries, and I lie beside him, and tell him I'm sorry he is upset, and I wish I could help him in a quiet voice, if I have tried feeding/ changing etc. He usually calms down. Remember, a crying baby doesn't mean you are a bad parent- that's the only way your lo has of communicating with you, its not a criticism!

Just finished reading thread. The things that helped me with DD when she was colicky were white noise, swaddling with a miracle blanket (google to find suppliers) and a dummy. Slings are great, but it sounds like you might need to put him down for a bit?

However, the biggest thing that helped me was that she was my second so I knew how quickly things changed. With DS (no. 1), I thought that he would stay at the tadpole stage for years, and couldn't forsee a time when I would get to eat a meal with two hands again.

I am really impressed at how you are coping after all you have been through. Getting your PND diagnosed so quickly is such a positive step.

Oh and a cradle that could be rocked was the other thing I used. I was really full on with the going to sleep props at that stage.

Yes! Cradles. These are supposed to be amazing.

Everything will be fine. I went through exactly the same dawning realisation of what we had done. How did we survive? I watched lots of tv whilst feeding DS. DH slept in spare room at night and supplied food/drink during the day. I was BF but if you aren't that's great cos you can take it in turns to sleep. What's funny is that it all seems like a blur now. Ignore the cleaning for now. Being near family helps. We are miles away and its rubbish - although they do feel guilty and come over to help fairly often. DS now 18 months and just lovely. Good luck. It will go faster than you think. The first 6 weeks are the worst.

You haven't made a mistake. I know how overwhelming it all is just now, and the pnd must make it worse, but it will get better. I double triple promise that you can cope, you will get some sleep, and that in a while you will be reassuring another new mum that she can do it, and it will get better.
I found that 6 weeks was a watershed. That was the point I started joining in with the world again. My ds was a crier too, I felt like he didn't stop for 3 weeks. I finally gave in and bought a vibrating chair (one of those hammock/sling type things with a vibrating frame) and the result for him was bordering miraculous. That, swaddling and white noise were the things to do.
In fact the chair and white noise worked so well I got a little scared of it!!!
And when I did go out I had to keep moving- I likened it to being a shark, he was fine whilst I moved but screamed if I stopped to talk to someone.
Exhausting, but now he's nearly 4

and, to finish the last post , is a lovely natured lad.