Adjusting to maternity leave

[Swollen88]

I'm on day 2 of maternity leave and despite being kept extremely busy with home improvements, I'm struggling to mentally adjust to my new role of "housewife".

With the end in sight I know my body needs me to stop work and wind down as I'm so drained and tired but mentally I've gone from a successful career in an extremely high pressured job, making important decisions all day long to spending the day doing nothing mentally challenging other than deciding what to cook the DH for dinner!

Any tips on adjusting to the change?

I think you may be underestimating how much work a newborn can be. Maybe if you get an easygoing baby who loves to sleep and doesn't fuss (do they exist?!), but otherwise it's incredibly time-consuming, particularly if you are breastfeeding.

I'm not proud of it but my baby is now 5 weeks old and I have loaded the dishwater a grand total of twice, put a couple of washes on and that's about it, DH has done everything else! DD is clingy, colicky and refluxy so I just don't have the time nor energy to do chores, my day is spent trying to stop the crying. There's no reason why it should all be left to you, I guarantee your days will be just as busy and stressful as his!