All feels very surreal....Is it normal to feel this way?

[Cherryblossom200]

Hi everyone,

I'm nearly 35 weeks and expecting my first baby. Despite buying all the lovely baby bits and now not long to go, I still don't feel like I'm having a baby!? It's very odd, I can feel her kick, and just packing my hospital bag today but still don't feel like I'm having a baby at the end of this all!? Is it normal to feel this way? I'm the type of person who doesn't ever get excited about going on holiday until
I'm actually at the airport! Maybe it's the same for having a baby!?

x

It didn't kick in for me until she was placed on my chest. I went 13 days over and both myself and DP convinced ourselves that she was just never coming out. It's totally normal to be a little in denial! You can't imagine what it's like until they're here and at a month old, I'm still pinching myself that she's mine!

I couldn't wait for my first baby to be born - I was keen and thrilled and all the rest - but I can remember wandering round the house a week or so before I was due thinking, This is so odd, I have no idea who this person is going to be, I can't imagine putting a baby into those clothes, into those nappies, into that cradle.

Having your first is such leap into the unknown that it's almost impossible to imagine what it will be like (and I'd worked as a nanny, so you'd think I'd have had some idea). I think feeling that you're doing something totally surreal is completely normal.

Ah good I'm glad it's not just me then! Like you said it's weird to think there will be a new little person in my house! In her moses basket, in her bouncer, clothes even nappies! So odd x

I'm glad it's not just me! I'm 5 weeks from my due date, have a well stocked nursery and I am sat admiring my new push chair but I kind of feel like I am pretending that I am having a baby. I even forget that my belly hasn't always been this big! It's an odd feeling.

I feel exact same, I hope it all just comes naturally to me when baby arrives. I try not overthink things. I just ordered my pram & car seat today - head is buzzing

Yes totally normal. Don't worry, you'll be just fine xx

Your first is always difficult to comprehend! Its always just been u and ur partner, then suddenly this new little baby that's urs is thrust upon u. Its a very frightening, overwhelming time but also the best experience of ur entire life. Enjoy the freedom while it lasts though! Xxx

I remember feeling like this. I got to about 34/35 weeks and had a meltdown. When I tried to explain it to DH I just kept saying "I've just realised she's got to come out!" - he couldn't stop himself from laughing!

It really didn't feel real to me until she was born and I held her for the first time.

This is how I/we feel, it's surreal and scary and as such we're not excited, just apprehensive. This doesn't go down at all well with some insensitive assholes people, you're supposed to just slap on a fake smile and gush about how excited you are for something huge, terrifying, and still quite a few months away. I keep thinking something will make it feel real, the 12 week scan, then it was the 20 week scan, then I thought movement would do it, nope, so far so surreal.

When the baby is here we will of course be in love with it and devoting every second to it, for now it's a far off ideal that we're not getting too attached to the reality of due to our own practicality, knowing things can go wrong at any stage, and a nice dose of denial :)

Foggy I feel very much like you. I was worried that there was something wrong with me tbh! But I think it will change when she is placed in my arms. Like you said part of it is denial and part just being cautious.

I was at an antenatal check up yesterday and there was a woman there in the early stages of pregnancy - maybe 15 weeks or something and def a first time mum. She was talking to her mum in such an excited way and I was thinking - I'm not really like that and got a bit worried!? All my friends and family seem really excited apart from me! But I just think everyone is different.

I am due in around 4 weeks and I feel just like you. I cannot comprehend that I will be having a baby soon, and people telling me I should be super excited and gushing don't help . I haven't even packed the hospital bag! Good to see that I am not the only one feeling this way. Feeling a bit more normal somewhat reading this. I am sure (or at least hope!) it will all change when I have the baby in my arms.

I've heard from a few friends that even once the baby was put in their arms they found it all very surreal still. It took a while to get used to the fact the baby was theirs. So I'm preparing myself for all types of feelings!!

Ahhh I am only 20 weeks and I am so excited!!!! I can't wait for my daughter to be here but it still does feel like it is never gonna happen. I guess it is cause this is one of this biggest changes in our life we will ever experience! I feel like I am naively excited haha

I'm lucky in that my mum is exactly like me and felt the same way, we're realists, practical people, we don't get overly excited about things we know are more daunting than exciting! A friend of mine who is very similar to me is also pregnant and she and her husband are exactly the same too. I often think the people who are super excited from start to finish of pregnancy A. have far more energy than I do because that kind of sustained excitement must be exhausting and B. are just a more optimistic and - this sounds mean - naive type of person, who only sees the cute baby they are getting, not the work, the change, the pressure of raising a human, the cost of the next 20+ years! I'd like some of those blinkers please :)

I had somebody make a show of me recently in a room full of strangers, a "friend", because I said exactly this, not excited, just terrified, and she went off on one, it was mortifying. She totally has us pinned as bad parents already and we're only halfway through the actual process of making the baby!

Also what doesn't go down well with these Disney style excited people is saying you don't particularly enjoy the experience of being kicked to bits from the inside out. They don't like that at all, I should clearly be loving this bizarre lurching punching feeling that I've never experienced before and is really strange to adjust to.

Foggy, I know what you mean about being kicked to bits and how some people stare at you in shock if you say you don't enjoy being pregnant.

My pregnancies are a long time back now and I can still remember not enjoying them very much: sick, tired, huge. Yes, yes, I knew I was making a whole new person and that was exciting but the raw graft got pretty dull and uncomfortable. But if you say that to some people they treat you like a pariah.

Lookit leanne said the word naive herself just before I posted mine! Now nobody can give out to me for it :) Pass some of that on will you leanne, all I can think about are the massive responsibility and not ballsing it all up!

Haha foggy I have been broody since I was about 10 years old I just can't wait to be a mum. I am enjoying thing 'naivety clouded' excitement while it lasts because once I let my good ol friend anxiety rear it's ugly head I will probably be in a ball crying in the corner begging for just another year of sleep and freedom to be irresponsible!!!

Yes! I felt exactly the same...and I didn't even pack hospital bags until after my due date such was my massively denial! Luckily DS decides to show up 10 days late. My advice is to enjoy the last few weeks of "popping out" to the shops. Decide to go - and go! DS is 11 months now and I'm only just at the stage where I can leave the house relatively quickly again. Mindful that will all change again once he is walking!!

Entirely normal. And don't worry if the much-famed 'rush of love' takes a while to happen even after your baby arrives - there's no schedule. The whole thing is quite overwhelming enough without berating yourself for not feeling what you imagine you are meant to feel at any particular point.

Best wishes.

I think a lot of the time the media tend to make women think it should all be like something in one of those babybjorn adverts. Perfect parents to be looking excited with big smiley faces gazing at their bumps. But the reality for a lot of women I think can be very different. I am a realist too and preparing myself for the hardest time of my life! I'm anxious and scared at the huge responsibility! Plus even though I want this baby very much, it's also scary to know my life is about to change hugely and will never be the same again. All of that is a lot to take in, hence why I think I'm feeling the way I do! A friend of mine was all excitement and rose tinted glasses when she fell pregnant, she thought it would be baking cakes and cuddles. She had NO idea really what was in for her with her little one! She cried non-stop for about a month when her baby was born!!

Yep, I have a friend who sobbed for days when her baby was a few weeks old because "it wasn't how people said it would be", she had been told you'll feel such love, it'll be so amazing, she didn't realise pain, exhaustion, being overwhelmed, etc, would be part of it too. Thank god I pay no attention to the media and have real life experience of babies and small children! Although maybe if I wasn't like that I might be bouncing around with excitement now and not feeling like avoiding most people because clearly when I speak honestly they are horrified.