Fess up mommies and pregnant ladies...
geeky
Posts: 4,995Registered Users
The other threads got me thinking. I enjoyed being pregnant but I can't say I had a huge bond to the baby in utero. I did not have cute names for him, I did not talk to him, I did not read to him, I did not play him music. That would have seemed crazy to me. He was very abstract to me. During labor, I was pretty much concentrating on what I was feeling - to the point that when he was crowning and Mark wanted me to look and feel I remember thinking "leave me alone, I am a little busy right now" I don't think it was love at first sight either. More fascination, like "OMG, I can't believe a little person came out of me with little fingers and toes and everything"
Sometimes I feel like I should feel like I was a slacker for not being instantly in love the second I found out I was pregnant, and for not enrolling my belly in college prep classes right away.
But I can't be the only one.
So fess up...
Sometimes I feel like I should feel like I was a slacker for not being instantly in love the second I found out I was pregnant, and for not enrolling my belly in college prep classes right away.
But I can't be the only one.
So fess up...
To Trenell, MizKerri and geeky:
I pray none of you ever has to live in a communist state.
Geeky is my hero. She's the true badass. The badass who doesn't even need to be a badass. There aren't enough O's in cool to describe her.
I pray none of you ever has to live in a communist state.
Geeky is my hero. She's the true badass. The badass who doesn't even need to be a badass. There aren't enough O's in cool to describe her.
0
Comments
The second time around it was all about the toddler outside but also the new baby. I definitely felt a bond with Ryan in utero and although I didn't talk to him Ian would and he'd touch my belly as I explained that his sibling was still in there. The love came in a rush during pregnancy but overcoming the guilt of loving another child and not feeling like I'd betrayed my firstborn didn't follow until several months later.
When I was finally into the swing of being home & she wasn't sleeping PhDcow shared a little gem with me---that for her the true bonding occurred on those nights when you were up until 3 & 4 in the morning. That the next day, no matter how tired you were, you were a little more in love with that little person. It was true for me, even when my PPD started to manifest.
Once I went on my meds for PPD & she was sleeping from 6/7 pm until 7am I really realized that I loved being home with her & that this motherhood business was great.
I suppose I can't judge you because you married a serviceman and it is wartime. Boo hoo. You must be loney sitting at home with nothing else to do but pick on people. Why don't you go masterbate again?
My SIL described what you were talking about as well. It took her a while to feel connected to this "thing" that came out of her. I think it is more common that most women would admit.
I lurk, therefore, I am.
My Blog
I loved her, and I loved her once they handed her to me. But it was a rough start, she was in NICU for four nights (and if someone told me NOW that she was going to be somewhere else for four days and other people would care for her, I'd FREAK). We spent most of our time going to doctors, she spent all of her time crying - for like five months. I didn't have the time or energy to "fall in love" with her. Like I said, of course I loved her and felt protective towards her, but it wasn't the crazy joyful can't-wait-to-see-her-in-the-morning kind of love. Once things settled down and she got better and we could all catch our breath - I am just flat eaten up with the baby love.
I have said like a million times that I would've been so different about my pregnancy if I had any idea just how much I'd be in love with her. I totally would've taken more pictures, kept a journal, spent more time daydreaming about the nursery, talked to her, and just generally enjoyed it a lot more.
But no, I didn't try to teach her Spanish in utero and I didn't sit around with a dreamy look on my face and my hands on my belly.
I suppose I can't judge you because you married a serviceman and it is wartime. Boo hoo. You must be loney sitting at home with nothing else to do but pick on people. Why don't you go masterbate again?
Products: Elucence clarifying & MBC; CK, F/X Curl Booster Fixative Gel (when I can find it)
I still dont feel this "bond" but I think it's mostly because I'm such a visual person. It all seems like pretend because I dont have something to look at. Although, the fluttering and belly kicking is a little freaky. I think I've watched too many ailien abduction movies
I'm a pretty practical person who excels in crisis situtations. I feel well prepared about the emotional and physical aspects about what's going to happen. I come from a long line of breeding women who have very little complicatons and have babies with midwives. I'm not too concerned.
Now that I'm feeling "normal" this part (the pregnancy) isn't so bad anymore. There's not much I can do to screw up. Once the kid gets mobile and starts getting into things, I think I'll start to worry.
I pray none of you ever has to live in a communist state.
Geeky is my hero. She's the true badass. The badass who doesn't even need to be a badass. There aren't enough O's in cool to describe her.
I liked him when I was pregnant. I didn't talk to him other than after my water broke and that was just in my head. I did play music for him if playing my music really loudly counts. He came out loving my music so it worked.
"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." -- Theodor Seuss Geisel
This time around with my husband is the loving, supportive, exciting time it's "supposed" to be, and my emotions and bonding are probably split between my husband for being there for me and for this new life that we're going to have together. So I feel calmer, more comfortable and more trusting of what's going to happen, but it's going to be more realistic for me once the baby's born and I have that tangible being to relate to and love unconditionally.
There's not right or wrong way to feel. I'll be the first to say I'm not really a baby person- never have been, except with my own child (ren). Then I'm complelely mushy-gushy because they're mine.
When I was pregnant the first time it was all about the baby b/c it HAD to be. We were living SUCH a completely different lifestyle that when I found out I was pregnant we had to do a total change in our life. There was so much focus on the baby b/c it was a HUGE change that we weren't expecting. But I don't think I talked to her or played music or sang or anything like that. There was a lot of focus on her coming, but it was very surreal.
After I had her there was that love at first sight, and for the first few months, but at around 3 or 4 months I started having PPD issues, and I didn't want much to do with her. There were times I didn't even want to feed her. It got worse and worse, and when she hit about 8, 9 months, and started moving around and exploring I was CONSTANTLY frustrated with her.
I feel like I lost the first year and a half of her life until I was treated b/c I was so stressed out and depressed. My husband was working all the time, so I had to do it all by myself. I honestly feel like I was the worst mother in the world at that time.
This pregnancy is TOTALLY different so far. The focus is ALL on my toddler b/c she's here in front of me. We know I'm pregnant, and that we're going to have another baby, but since that baby isn't here yet, it's kind of secondary.
Please excuse any typos. For the time being, we are blaming it on my computer.
I will read to my tummy b/c I want the baby to love reading and books.
I have been feeling a bit guilty about somehing though. Whenever my stomach starts to hurt, liek when I get cramps (pretty often), I just want the pain to stop. And I feel guilty about feeling like that b/c if something (GOD FORBID) happened, I know I would feel horrible b/c I didn't mean it that way really. i am also very nervous about not thinking my baby is beautiful. like, i have seen some people's babys who are not very cute, adn whiel it should not matter at all, i can't help but notice. I feel like a horrible person b/c ALL babies should be considered beautiful. So, I am scared that I will get "paid back" for having those thoughts. is that terrible or what?!
"...you could have a turd on your head and no one would notice."~Subbrock
"I had an imaginary puppy, but my grandpa ate him."~Bailey
Of course, my baby was and is beautiful. Really. I have the pics to prove it.
DOOD. Sometimes babies are not cute! I will not tell a lie! :P
I was just SO TIRED and generally unwell (I lost a lot of blood) after the delivery that I just didn't want to see my baby. I just wanted to sleep. I ended up sending the baby to the nursery for a few hours the first night.
Over the course of the next week or so, I'm sure there was at least a dozen times when I FORGOT that I had a baby! It was the weirdest thing. I would hear crying and ignore it and then realize "Wait, that's MY baby".
I'm mortified to admit it but it took about a month for me to start feeling an attachment to my baby.
And I never talked to the baby in utero except for the occasional "Settle down in there, Mommy wants to sleep".
This time, I have a life
I am divorced from my daughter's father and remarried to a very different type of man. He touches the belly alot, but doesn't talk to it very much at all. Right now I think it's very abstract for him. I am big enough now that you can SEE the baby move and that is seeming to make it "more real" for hubby and his 2 daughters. One of them will touch the belly when the baby is moving, the other just stares at it wide eyed. Her father told her she can touch me and her response was, "I don't want to!!!" I told her she didn't have to. But I will tell her when it's moving and she'll watch it.
I do have this sense of love for the baby already. But part of that is just my nature or even learned behavior. I pretty much love all children, mine and otherwise. I guess part of that comes from my childhood issues and feeling like there were times when I was not loved or I was in the way or whatever. So I've always hugged everyone's children and made them feel welcome or special and loved.
________
Colorado marijuana dispensary
I'm sorry about your feelings as a child but the latter part of your post is one of the most loving things I've read around this board. Love it and the fact that there are poeple like you in the world. It's great to love one's own children but to love others is a gift to be nurtured.
DA, we talked about this kind of situation a lot in my doula training. It is normal to feel like this after a traumatic birth experience. It is not a screwed up way of coping--it is a normal way of coping.
During my training, the RN who manages Women's and Infant's Services at my hospital came and told us about her traumatic birth. She had a drug-free delivery and everything went fine until 30 minutes went by and still no placenta. The doctors had to reach inside her uterus and try to manually scrape her placenta from the uterus--and remember she did not have an epidural. I think she actually ended up in the OR, faced with the possibility of a hysterectomy and never having another child. It was such a traumatic experience that it was a long time before she could bond with her baby.
Your story also reminded me of a recent experience I had. I went to visit one of my professors and he started telling me that he had 10-day old twins in the NICU--they were born at 26 weeks. I'll never forget the way he talked about those babies--like they were someone else's, like he was almost disgusted at how small they were. He was distancing himself from loving those babies because the situation was so traumatic, and their lives so fragile.
sorry this is a long post, but I just wanted to say that delayed bonding is more common than we think, it's just that no one wants to talk about it.
You may know this information better than me, but there are a few different stages of post partum. One is called the "taking in stage" where the mother is kind of 'queen-like' and has everyone around her do for her.
Another, which I can't remember the term, is the stage like you explained where the mother wants nothing to do with the baby, and typically goes to sleep, or turns away from it.
Please excuse any typos. For the time being, we are blaming it on my computer.
"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." -- Theodor Seuss Geisel
I'm glad I could help.
If you come to Missouruh I'll be your doula
Hey - no one told me I got to be queen-like and have people doing stuff for me. I totally missed out. :x
I pray none of you ever has to live in a communist state.
Geeky is my hero. She's the true badass. The badass who doesn't even need to be a badass. There aren't enough O's in cool to describe her.
I never gave him a cutsey name or talked to him. When we found out about his illness i threw myself into learning everything i could about it and spent the next 10 weeks at dr's appointments.
My labor was cake. went in to be induced Sunday night, water broke on its own monday afternoon, baby at 12:12am tuesday morning. very little pain and i was up and walking less then 1 hour after his birth and discharged 11 hours later.
Steven spent the next 6 weeks in a hospital 1 hour away from home.
in the end, i felt cheated. I did not get to bond with him untill just recently. I did not get to sit in the recovery room and be waited on while i took care of my baby. I did not get to breastfeed. Mike did not get to cut the cord. So many things that i felt i missed out on. To top it off, i did not fall in love with him right away liek everyone said i would. Mike would look at him all cutesy and you could just see how much he meant...i did nothave that feel and i could not make myself feel that way. There was one point, i wanted nothing to do with him anymore. i was sick of the dr's and test's and surgeries. i was sick of people telling me he was going to die. I just wanted my life back
When we brought him home, i was scared to be alone with him for the first week and a half. I wanted someone else to keep taking care of him. I wanted a baby who was allowed to sleep through the night. It gets a little easier everyday, and i know if we ever have another one i will be fearful until we see the heart and ALL 4 chambers. I also know Steven will always take priority in my life b/c he needs so much extra care.
Come swag with me!