I’m not sure if this is the right forum for this, but I felt the need to post…
My son is now 3 and a half months old. He is wonderful and a much longed for baby. It took us a really long time to get pregnant and in the end we had to turn to IVF. I was so, so overjoyed when we got our positive and I had a really lovely pregnancy.
The birth was very traumatic, and I woke bleeding as my placenta had started to detach. I had to have an emergency cesarean which was scary and not at all what I had planned for (of course).
The recovery was tough, but manageable, what I found most difficult was the postpartum blues. Although this doesn’t seem like a strong enough term to describe it. I’d done NCT courses and undertaken extensive reading on pregnancy and childbirth but nothing could prepare me for those feelings. DS wasn’t a particularly difficult newborn in hindsight, but I cried every day for 3 weeks. I felt like my whole life had turned upside down, I had no idea what I was doing and felt that I’d made a terrible mistake. I felt so guilty for having those feelings, but I couldn’t shake them. We had family members come to visit and I’d just burst into tears in front of them and then panic that they would think I wasn’t coping. Overnight I would hold my baby, in floods of tears, crying to him that I was sorry I was doing such a terrible job and promising him that I would be better. I spent hours and hours scrolling through mumsnet to read posts from people going through the same thing. My friends/family hadn’t really talked about this shift in hormones after giving birth so I didn’t prepare myself for these awful feelings. I wonder if people forget and switch off to how it felt when the dust settles.
I suppose the point of my long post is to say that for anyone who stumbles on this message…believe people when they tell you that it’ll get better. It doesn’t feel like it now, but these feelings will pass and you will feel the overwhelming love you had expected to feel. The first few weeks are unlike anything you can imagine, the sleep deprivation and complete lack of the independence you once had are such a lot to get your head around, but you will get past it and won’t be able to imagine how you ever lived without your beautiful baby. Take help when people offer it and grab the chance to sleep whenever you can - I felt like I could never leave DS which didn’t do him or myself any good.
You’re doing an amazing job.