Feeling guilty about how I feel towards my baby?

[showersandflowers]

My daughter is four weeks old tomorrow. I love her whole heartedly but I don't always enjoy her. And I feel so guilty for that. I get so frustrated when she won't sleep or eat (going to see a feeding consultant today) and I don't resent her for it, but I do feel like it means I don't always feel overwhelmed with love- sometimes it's mixed with frustration towards her. Does this ever pass? I feel so sad that I don't exclusively feel love for her.

Hey lovely, please don’t worry. Not everyone feels that rush of love. I didn’t. I spent the first 8 weeks googling “I hate having a newborn” and wondering if I’d made a terrible mistake. Around 8-10 weeks was a turning point where my baby started to smile and I felt like I was getting something back for all the blood sweat and tears I’d put in. But it was still hard - sleep especially. My baby is now a year old and I’m completely and utterly besotted with her. Sometimes the love creeps up on you rather than flooding in straight away. That’s totally normal and okay. You need time to get to know one another and bond. All in good time xx

Also it’s unrealistic to enjoy them 100% of the time... this shit is TOUGH. But the good times do start to outweigh the struggles and there’s so much fun ahead for you x

It's ok and normal. Especially when it comes to lack of sleep. I've felt downright boiling anger when I've been at my most sleep deprived. Remember to look after yourself. If you're not looking after yourself, how can you look after baby? It's ok to be a wee bit selfish sometimes. Don't run yourself into the ground. Grab every bit of sleep you can.

And it does get better when the newborn, sleep-deprived haze passes.

Although mine is now four months and has just grabbed and squeezed my nipple hard while feeding. I yelped in agony. He laughed. I'm not feeling the funny right now. Wee bisom that he is.

For me the love feels constant but the "like" can sometimes be tested and the absolute googly-eyed adoration comes in waves when certain things happen. When he smiles or laughs, when he makes little serious faces and wiggles his eyebrows and examines his fingers intensely, when I see him interacting with family members, when he's gleefully enjoying bath time with his dad.

And most of all, when he sleeps well. Oh I skip about with love for him then!

Oh and I'll share a story that happened last week. I was really struggling with him. Had a few of nights of poor sleep and days of fractious behaviour. I felt really tired and fed up. The "like" was severely dwindling. I vented to my mother one evening about how bloody fed up I was with everything (partner working away and felt all alone). I was going through the motions and having to genuinely try hard to smile at my baby.

That evening he laughed for the very first time during a nappy change. I sneezed and he let out a genuine laugh.

The love that flooded me in that moment was so intense. I laughed and immediately burst into tears. Then we spent a lovely evening of me pretending to sneeze and him laughing. What a joy!

You've so much fun ahead OP. Don't worry. Your feelings are so normal and everything will be ok. Good luck and look after yourself just as you would look after your baby

@EmmaInParis and @GromblesofGrimbledon thank you both for your honesty, I really appreciate it. I'm hoping there is light at the end of the tunnel but it's wonderful to hear I'm not alone. I hope you are both enjoying your little ones :)

Sorry things are a struggle but completely normal. Don't worry.

I remember quite a few times when my son was weeks old, crying in the kitchen telling my OH that if I was sure I could find a good home for him, I would give DS away.

It passes! Hang in there, you're doing great.

I love her whole heartedly but I don't always enjoy her. And I feel so guilty for that.

At 4 weeks old you're doing really well loving her wholeheartedly. I think it took me longer for me to realise I really did LOVE my son. It felt like I was going through the motions at the start due to epic sleep deprivation.
There was plenty I didn't enjoy about the first 6-8 months. I hated it when people said enjoy every second because there was so much that really wasn't enjoyable. It felt more like torture! I think it felt like my baby was a terrorist and I had Stockholm syndrome!
There's a lot of guilt involved in parenting and most of it is really unnecessary and ridiculous. You won't enjoy every second of having a baby and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. As my DS has grown I've loved each stage more and more, because I found it just got easier, more fun and they were more interesting.
Please don't feel guilty!

Agree with what everyone else said. It took me a few months to feel I securely loved mine. Just wanted to add, it would be exhausting to be constantly overwhelmed by love - we have decades and decades to love our children. And I dont think people generally exclusively feel love for their kid, any more than they do for the rest of their family. The love is always there but usually, it’s alongside a dollop of frustration, boredom, amusement, fear, etc. the feelings co exist. They don’t cancel each other out.

Loving someone doesn't mean they don't frustrate us sometimes a 4 week old can be tiring. And wait until they start teething And when they get to the terrible 2s.....

Honestly you're doing great but just to keep in mind, if you start feeling sad, overwhelmed like you want to run away or wtv, contact your GP, they can help all of this still doesn't mean you don't feel love for them!

Omg OP I'm on baby number 3 after my twins and just wanted to say this is SO NORMAL! Don't worry! X

@showersandflowers mine is 4 weeks old on Monday, I’m struggling too exactly like you. My issue is feeding- breastfeeding is so hard! It’s painful, a guessing game and I’ve lost all my confidence. It’s horrible. I feel terrible, You’re not alone xxxx

@sjxoxo oh goodness, well done for getting this far with the breast feeding. I googled the other day and saw an article on the BBC that said that most women give up entirely by 6 weeks and I am absolutely not surprised. I have also struggled and have been pumping and feeding expressed milk while my nipples have been healing for the last couple of weeks, the bleeding and pain was too much. It's really helped and now she's back on the boob, pain free, once or twice a day. I also went to a local "baby bar" which is a breast feeding support group and it did the world of good- so good to talk to other mums about that struggles. It might also help with your confidence to hear other mums talk about their journey with breast feeding too! It made me feel 100% better, I came out of the group smiling for the first time in weeks because I felt like I was at the same level as everyone else, at least, and not failing.

We will get through it, we have to 🤍

@showersandflowers the baby bar sounds like a great resource! I think I won’t last much longer.. yesterday he had a bottle and today he’s had one aswell. The pain I feel when I feed is not far off contractions, it’s literally catastrophic for my mental health aswell the yo-yo-ing over what to do as I think he’s hungry still after an hour on the boob- bottom line is he needs filling up. I’ve been seeing a breastfeeding specialist but I’ve cancelled the appointment Monday as I feel it’s actually making it worse in the sense I’m going to and from ‘100% breastfeeding’ which is her perspective and then ‘your baby should be putting on more weight’ from the HV equivalent (I’m in France), and between the two I am absolutely torn over what to do. I’m not against formula really either. I think his latch is terrible and I can’t seem to improve it so every feed is a nightmare & im not convinced he’s full and then I feel awful and think ‘just do formula!’ Then feel guilty and round and round we go. What’s your sleeping like?? Im getting a fairly decent sleep in each night thank Jesus or I think I’d have just driven off by now 🤣 the day time however he hardly sleeps which again I think is issues with feeding/not being satisfied!! Xxx

The first couple of months are the worst. I would guess that the love is always there but often the overshadowing feeling will be frustration, worry and more than anything else tiredness.

Try not to analyse it too much while you get through the first few months.

My DD is 5 now and I know I love her so much it hurts but j still sometimes feel irritation and frustration. It's Normal.

So sorry you are feeling like this but it is normal to have these sorts of feelings.

I did with my daughter when she was born. When she was 7 months old I realised I had Post Natal Depression. I thought I was just tired all the time. I didn't enjoy my daughters company until she was about 8-9months. I felt awful about it but after speaking to other mums, I realised I wasn't the only one. I actually came of social media for a while because some of friends seemed so happy with their newborns and saying how amazing their new life was.

It does get easier I promise and there is light at the end of the tunnel but being a new mum is so bloody hard and lonely sometimes but I found so much support on groups like this when my daughter was little.

She is now 2.5 and I still have those wobbly moments. X

I don’t think I loved DS at all until he was about one. A good friend adopted her son around the same time and I think we took about the same timescale.

Don’t sweat it, OP. Think about it — babies are horrific mini-tyrants who scream, keep you up all night and puke down your back. What’s so immediately lovable? They ambush you with love eventually, but it’s far from immediate for most people.

I felt like this in the early days and the thing that helped the most was to stop expecting DD to do anything the way I wanted her to! Honestly just accepting that she would sleep when she wanted, wouldn't always feed as I would have liked (within reason obviously, not advocating letting a baby starve!) etc saved sooo much stress I found I was causing myself anxiety putting pressure on myself for things to run to some sort of plan when the truth is there is no such thing as a bloody plan with a newborn That was a turning point for me, I stopped getting frustrated with her because she 'wouldn't' and just let her do her own thing which made it much easier to take actual pleasure in her. Hope that doesn't sound utterly daft, it requires a mental shift but it really helped me

I often felt 100% love for my two. When they were asleep....🤣