Hello everyone,
I'm a first time Mum to a 4 month old little boy. It's been wonderful and I love him more and more every day.
I suffer from anxiety and I worry (I get the irony of this!) that this is impacting my LO, as he'll pick up on my stress signals even when I'm hiding it by singing to/smiling at him etc. Can any other anxious Mums offer any tips on how they deal with this, especially once you start to get into the cycle of you and your baby stressing each other out?
First time poster so please be kind 🙏🏻
Context:
I've always been an anxious person and often get very stressed and overwhelmed. I think this stems from my difficult medical history (I was diagnosed with a spinal tumor age 15, had cancer treatment, still have many ongoing issues bla bla bla) but this is maybe irrelevant.
My son arrived a month early and had a tough few weeks at first. He needed phototherapy three times for recurring jaundice which really impacted our bonding and early feeding journey, and a hernia operation for which general anaesthetic was required, all which required hospital stays. Thankfully the last couple of months have been hospital free, but I'm noticing that he seems to be a lot more unsettled than other babies of his age. I can't put him down for more than 10 minutes, and some days it seems he's constantly on the edge and I'm trying to keep him from losing it all day. He gets very distressed multiple times a day, crying real tears and high pitched wails with frightened eyes. I'm sure he's well fed, gets enough sleep, changed and burped regularly, and we play and have lots of chats and cuddles so i don't feel I'm doing anything too wrong.