Help with my mat leave rut

[FluentFinch]

Hopefully this is in the right forum! (Parenting section)

potentially looking for a bit of advice or wisdom from other mums particularly those further down the line

I have hit a sort of rut on mat leave and am trying to make sense of my feelings and find a solution . Will try to keep concise

• background is a lawyer at a top London law firm. Had a v stressful time at work pre mat leave and ended up having a prem baby in v stressful circumstances followed by a NICU stint and months of medical stress and follow up
• things started to feel enjoyable around Feb this year (so 5/6 months PP)
• had a pretty bad pregnancy (nausea, exhaustion & digestive issues throughout, then a severe Covid case meaning I was out of action and essentially bed bound at home for 8 weeks from 24 weeks)
• had a brief reprieve when I felt better for a couple of weeks and then baby came early - I’d planned a month off before my due date to recalibrate but never got to take it!
• was under intense feeding pressure to BF which didn’t work. I then pumped until 6 months despite only pumping 4-500ml a day which was sole destroying
• first of friendship group to have a baby and a couple of friends have been really disappointing. One is a children’s physio and said my baby wasn’t really that prem and didn’t understand why I’d be traumatised. The other broke up with her boyfriend two years ago so repeatedly tells me I am privileged to have a husband so essentially can’t complain
• I have no family support. My mum is estranged from me and my dad lived abroad and is emotionally unavailable
• very tricky in laws until now as MIL wanting high involvement with my baby and NICU got in the way of that, and she was very anti-formula which meant I didn’t feel comfortable spending that much time with her
• husbands work not amazing: flexible ish with when he leaves for work but only four weeks off at beginning & all spent in hospital, and he gets no fixed work from home days
• I’m exhausted as I’ve not really been able to recover. At the same time dismayed I’m not back to exercising regularly
• ferritin is 30 so currently seeing a private doc and may get an iron infusion to help fatigue
• baby has never napped in cot and doesn’t love pram - sling or contact naps which are exhausting
• early days were strict feeding schedules etc and we had to stay at home mainly due to baby’s immune system - feel I missed out on the huge window of time where it’s quite easy to do things with a newborn
• loved 4-6 months but have hit a confusing rut recently. Dreading the days with my baby as he’s tricky to please and finding things mundane
• mum friendships have fizzled out
• miss my old life a lot. Find myself thinking about going back to work and miss it and feel upset with myself for. Missing it as I didn’t expect this
• really just not feeling myself and I just can’t put my finger on why.
• feel upset seeing mums who are so ‘mumsy’ and seem to love mat leave and the lovely but mundane nature of being with a baby 24/7. Always wanted 2 under 2 and can believe how un ready I feel for that and have had a dawning realising that I just don’t think I’m cut out for motherhood
• feel sort of sad how different postpartum has been to initial plans ie to travel with baby etc. we haven’t done that and I just think it’s too much faff

i think that’s the bulk of what I’m feeling and I’m really trying to make sense of my recent shift of emotions but I’m struggling to rationalise my feelings so any help or wisdom from mums would be very appreciated xx

im not quite sure that going back to work early is the answer

So sorry there are a few typos there but hopefully it makes sense nonetheless! Really just want to work out how to fix this / a way foreword as I hate wallowing!!!

Ohh darling I'm sos orry and this reminds me alot of my own feelings.

There's such a large amount of pressure on new mums to breast feed and I remember feeling like such a failure when I struggled but looking back it doesn't matter. My son was fed and happy. I was lucky one friend had had a baby 6 months before me and she made it OK. She tried she couldn't and she bottle feed. Don't beat yourself up. It's OK and I'm sure baby is OK.

6 months is hard theybwant to move but can't. My advice is get out of the house. Just a park or a swim gives them a change of scene.

I missed work and didn't think I would. I liked going back and having that bit of myself back. I liked being myself rather then just mum. That feeling is OK and I am very OK with admitting though I love my children I am not cut out to be a stay at home mum. I know alot of my friends have similar feeling and it's OK to want that bit of you back. Could you do some kit days just to feel like your still in the game?

2 under 2 is a risk factor for poor maternal and physical health. It’s fine for your decisions to change.

Have you made any Mum friends?

You sound like you could do with speaking to a mental health professional about birth and early months.

Some people’s parenting experiences are much harder than others and that is tough.

I will add I have been able to line up some therapy through a great organisation for NICU parents starting soon, so perhaps that will help. I think I still don’t think I have anything to be shocked or traumatised about as people just expected me to get over it

I just want to say that motherhood is for life. Some people struggle with babies, others with toddlers, others with teenagers. None are necessarily bad mothers.
I struggled for the first 10 years, then started enjoying it and I'm a very good mother (with limitations of course).
Few people enjoy the baby years, don't waste your energy feeling guilty. If you were/are a top lawyer, you probably have money to pay for help.
There's no medal for being a martyr.

Realised I sounded very blunt, but I was really trying to help, sorry. Don't feel bad, be gentle to yourself

I went back to work at seven months PP because I did shared parental leave with my partner. My baby at the time would not nap and it honestly ruined the end of mat leave for me. I found going back to work, even full time, actually pretty restful (and my job was sufficiently stressful it put me into labour two and a half weeks early - I hit submit on a big project and immediately had the first contraction).

A lot of my friends adored being on maternity leave and didn't want to go back to work, and I can't imagine anything worse than being a SAHP. It takes all sorts, don't be guilted into doing what anyone else does by peer pressure. Do what works for you.

i can really relate to your OP as I also work for London law firm and had a preemie in NICU for months. I’m used to being very busy and NICU was draining. The first few months at home were tough, especially dealing with medical needs.

After that, what really helped me was having an active social life with baby groups and activities. As we are coming out of winter bug season, it should be a bit safer (though I’d antibac everything around my preemie!). I know you’ve said mum friends have fizzled out, but you don’t need to know anyone at groups or activities. I found things aimed at adults such as comedy events or pub quizzes, all in the daytime where you could take your baby. I took over running a local mums coffee morning.

As the appointments started to reduce, I ended up extending my mat leave for 3 months over the summer so i could have some ‘normal’ mat leave as I felt I’d missed any sort of normality at the start.

Good luck OP

OP your husband will be entitled to parental leave due to your neonatal stay. Anything more than 7 days in nicu he is entitled to take as leave. So if you did 4 weeks NICU You've got 3 weeks to take. Also covers outreach services so if you went home tube feeding etc that is included. Him and you are both entitled to take it up to 13 months of age

Just wanted to chime in to say it's definitely too early to say you aren't but out for motherhood. Lots of people struggle with their sanity just being around a baby all day!

Are you getting out everyday? I think that's so important.

I'll admit I haven't gone through it yet so may be talking tosh... but my plan is to do lots of classes with the baby. Baby massage, mum and baby yoga, baby sensory, mum & baby groups, swimming etc. I'm fully planning to use the groups just meet mums and get out the house!

Perhaps time to pop in the office too and show off the baby /go for a coffee or use a KIT day.

I had baby/mum classes or events or brunch every morning Monday to Thursday and a lunch out every single Friday (alone (obv with baby) or with a friend). I was out of the house by 9am, regardless of how badly baby slept the night before. We were back home by 12 every day. It meant I had a routine and a reason to leave the house and then chilled all afternoon. Even when I couldn't find a friend to meet, I went anyway.

And it helped to decide on my schedule by Sunday evening. It meant I didn't get lazy and sit around because we had a bad night. I found the days where I would sit around in the house my mental health would take a nose dive.

Regarding missing your old life, well, the sooner you accept that parenting is extremely hard, the better. I'm a solicitor in the City too, used to pressure and all nighters in the office. I thought I was resilient and I've read all the baby books, motherhood will be great. I was a smug idiot.

Motherhood is much harder than I imagined. Even when you go back to work, your life will get even harder, not easier, in the short term.

So find a way to make this work for you.

In addition to my suggestion above about getting out every single morning, I suggest you go out without the baby every Saturday as well. Brunch with a friend, exercise class, whatever you want. It will be good for your DH to deal with the baby alone for a minimum 2-3 hours every week.

And 2 under 2 was always going to be a naive idea. But we were all just as naive once 🤣. It doesn't mean you're not cut out for motherhood, just means you're no special superwoman, but a good normal mum who obviously finds babies hard. Everyone would have 10 babies if it wasn't hard.

I think this may be an element of recent problems - used to get out more. I still go out everyday but not to groups and fewer meet ups

• bump and baby group v nice initially and regular meet ups - it’s fizzled a bit and the last few times I went my baby has been fussy so I’ve had to leave. There’s one quite highly strung mum I met up a few weeks ago with one other mum and my baby was having a meltdown and I was stressed so she said she was leaving and asked the other mum to go with her. I felt so embarrassed and inadequate and it’s really knocked my social confidence so I don’t want to do any group things anymore
• love the concept of classes but find the timings a nightmare - so many are 10.30 which is peak nap time. Unsure if any advice from other mums in this situation? The timing seems to get harder as they get older. Went to a baby massage clsss and my baby cried and all of the mums were really snooty to me about it as was the instructor
• bump and baby friends are now only free once every couple of weeks I think thy have full social calendars during the week and I don’t know how!

We seem to have this idea as a society that maternity leave is this magical time. In reality it is time off work to recover and do the hard work of raising a very small baby. Realistically the government and employers wouldn't fund it if it was a sort of sabbatical. Sometimes it is helpful to think of looking after your baby as your current job. Some is enjoyable, quite a bit is boring, some is quite stressful.

It is absolutely valid to feel traumatised by what happened. I had a bad tear when giving birth, but otherwise all was well, so objectively not that big of a deal on the scale of what could happen. It still took me a while to process emotionally. We walked past the hospital on DD's 1st birthday and I felt quite sad/odd about it, even though all was fine by then.

I don't have any answers for you really but just wanted to say what you are feeling is totally understandable.

Would love to know how you managed this and found suitable classes every day etc & mum friends & also how you managed this with nap times etc?

were you travelling far or was everything in close proximity

Also please would love to know how you chilled all afternoon & how you ate out I.e. was baby on lap and you eating one handed? Maybe we have very different temperament babies 😂

Everything was within 15-20 minutes walk or drive. I had a mum support group on Monday (I alternated this with a mum pilates class but pilates became impossible once baby was crawling as I was just chasing him around), mum coffee group on Tuesday in a church hall (I'm not religious but you didn't have to be), baby sensory on Wednesday and baby music class on a Thursday. I sound mad writing that down 🤣 we all lost touch after mat leave but it was nice to chat to someone else about my baby's crap sleep in the moment.

Naps were all in the crib from 7 months onwards, so I adjusted times as needed, sometimes I would only be out for an hour.

I have friends with kids but they were all older and back to work already so could almost never see them. Friendships recovered by about 18 months when my son was more independent and I could go out more.

Maybe "chill" is not the word. Our outings were not relaxing, but enjoyable.

When contact napping, I had Netflix on TV on low brightness and subtitles on 🤣 watched all seasons of call the midwife, downtown Abbey and a few others.

And yes, eating out meant baby in high chair, warm food in some thermos cup for him, and eating with one hand for me. Again, not chill, but enjoyable. Different. You need to lower standards. Once they hit toddlerhood you can't even do this anymore 🤣

Re nap timings - I think sometimes you have to be a little flexible. Your baby will probably stay awake a bit longer if you're at a playgroup or at the pool...or they'll conk out and then you can transfer them to pram/sling. If they wake up, they wake up. 🤷 I do have some mum friends who are super rigid about nap timings and will arrive very late/leave very early from groups (today someone came just for the last ten minutes of playgroup) but the friends I see most are the ones who are willing to play fast and loose with their baby's schedule.

Re temperament - from about 3-6 months old my baby would scream hysterically every time she saw another baby. I'd have to walk away to get her to calm down. It made meeting up with other mums really tricky and I did feel like everyone was judging us. But I just kept going to groups and ignoring the stares and eventually she got over it. Baby is now ridiculously sociable and constantly up in everyone's business.

Thanks so much these are both super helpful responses xx

I suppose perhaps it’s time I try to work out (or remember!) what I enjoy and basically try to weave my baby into that?

i dont really like tv or eating out but I did use my kindle a lot when breastfeeding so perhaps I get that out for contact naps & work out what I want to do out of the house and how to take my baby with me

thanks again - honestly found 0-6 months way easier in terms of things to do as I just put him in the pram and he’d be happy for hours and I could go for long walks, get a takeaway coffee and listen to podcasts !

Really sorry you felt judged by other mums, it’s so horrible! I can’t imagine ever treating another mum like that

Haha, it's all forgotten now! And to be fair, it was like she was possessed. Instant level twelve meltdown the second she saw a baby.

Hi OP, so sorry you’re feeling like this. It reminds me a lot of how I felt with my first. One thing I would say is definitely follow up on your iron. I was in quite a bad place mentally and it turned out I was really iron deficient after an untreated large blood loss during birth. After I was treated I felt like a new woman. Not saying it’ll solve everything but it may be making you feel worse. Also, I don’t think it’s bad or unusual to not enjoy the first year. There are obviously highs and lows but for the most part I found it knackering and lonely. My DS is three now and although I’m still shattered it really is so much better. Don’t let the ‘just you wait’ crowd tell you it’ll only get harder because in my experience it really was the opposite- you’re in the thick of it now! x

Yeah, the more mobile they get, the less you can actually do. My son was walking and running at 10 months so that's when all my chill time stopped. From that moment on, you're increasingly doing what they want and there's no room for even a lunch out (well, a quick one as they'll sit while they eat). Now he's a toddler, the only way to do stuff is to tag team watching him while the other goes out and we also get the nanny to do extra hours regularly (we have a part time nanny, he goes to nursery Mon -Wed).