Love, it's day 3. It would be strange if you WEREN'T feeling like this And it's totally, totally normal.
Yesterday I found the camcorder, and in it was a tape of my sons first few weeks and months. Watching the short clips plunged me back into that time and made me realize how much I have blanked out. He is almost 2 now.
I was absolutely TERRIFIED! Scared of the evenings, scared of the nights, scared of the mornings. In fact, the afternoon was the only time when I felt half human, and even then the tide of the impending evening was always threatening to sweep up and over everything. I hated breastfeeding, it hurt, it made me want to scream, he was tiny and rubbish at latching, alternately too sleepy to feed and too impatient to wait for my non-existent let down. I beat myself up about stopping after a few weeks, giving him bottles, expressing, when my milk dried up. I was scared I would roll on him, even though we didn't co sleep. I would wake in the night, casting my hands about frantically over the bedcovers, because I had dreamed he was in the bed with me even though in reality he was safely in his moses basket next to the bed.
I just couldn't believe that someone had gven me this small, trusting, incredibly vulnerable person to care for. If I did something wrong, he might die. There was so much room for messing up! Nothing I did had ever mattered so much, and yet been performed (in my mind) so badly and ineffectively. I felt like a failure, someone who had obviously been robbed of motherly instinct and peace when everyone else was born with theirs built in. It seemed so unfair, and I wondered how I would ever been a good enough mother for my son if I was falling apart after a few days and weeks.
But of course what you realize later is that NOTHING is as hard as those first few weeks. Nothing. Because it's the shock of it, the unfamiliarity and fear and confusion and lack of routine, and the massive weight of responsibility that a few days ago wasn't there in nearly the same way.
All I can say is it will get better, very quickly. Right now you are in pregnancy-hormone-withdrawal overload, and this exaggerates everything in the same way that dreams often exaggerate the calmer emotions of the day. Soon you will feel more like yourself again, you baby will reveal her secrets to you, and you will learn each other. Think about it this way - you two have only just met! It takes a while to get used to knowing someone new, especially when they can't talk, only cry.
You'll be fine But it's okay to feel like you're no good at anything. New babies are one of the steepest learning curves ever, certainly the most difficult thing I have ever done so far in my life. So props to you, and give yourself a pat on the back. It'll be okay.