1 month, wishing you could go back and not have a baby, postpartum thought or worse?

[katrina2017]

@yuliia This could also be PPOCD, which explains the dark thoughts. It’s okay that she’s having the dark thoughts, it’s just a symptom. You are not your thoughts. Separate the thought from the Self, and allow her to voice the negative thoughts. Thoughts fade, just like this difficult time.

Edit: thoughtsss

 

[yuliia]

@katrina2017 Great point thank you so much.

 

[sarahavian]

@yuliia Since you’ve gotten good advice already I just wanted to say that the baby stage will be over one day. She will get her identity back and parenthood becomes much more enjoyable. My first is 5 and he was a difficult baby but he’s an awesome kid. The older they get you can hang out with them, my friend has a 12 year old and they go to concerts together. It won’t be like this forever with the screaming and the diaper changes but it’s easy to feel like your life is over in those early days.

 

[yuliia]

@sarahavian Thank you so much. Really. The encouragement means so much. Looking forward to that.

 

[fluffstah]

@yuliia I think that's a normal postpartum reaction. I was like that until I upped my dose of antidepressants. Once the baby is two or three months old he will start smiling and playing with toys and life should start to feel less like groundhog day. Between three months and a year old he should start sleeping through the night which should help your wife's sanity a lot.

 

[yuliia]

@fluffstah Thank you for sharing. Let’s us know we are not alone and horrible. Can’t wait for more sleep.

 

[kevyt]

@yuliia Yeah this was me. Newborn stage was hellish. It does get better but it will get better a lot faster with help.

 

[yuliia]

@kevyt Thank you

 

[dienkimt]

@yuliia I never expressed it to anyone (and as a side, I think it’s really wonderful your wife feels supported enough to talk to you about this stuff, keep up the good work), but I felt all of the things your wife has. Probably up until she was about a year, though it got better and easier with every passing month. I hated HATED having a baby. In general I usually loved babies and struggled to really connect with toddlers. But I have a toddler of my own now and I no longer feel like I made a huge mistake having her. She’s funny and smart, everyday is different, I’m really actually enjoying being her mom now.

This is a really tough stage and probably one of the hardest life transitions I can imagine. I do think it’s somewhat normal to feel this way but I would keep a really close eye to make sure it doesn’t get any worse, and continue being there for her and supporting her every step of the way. These days do end, but when each day is long and repetitive, it feels like the future will never come, so it is easy to lose hope

 

[yuliia]

@dienkimt Thank you so much for the words of encouragement. They mane so much. I will continue to help as much as my body will allow it. And I will watch her and encourage her to get help.

 

[bazzapr]

@yuliia It gets better….the newborn phase is the worst, esp with a colicky baby. I have a 3.5 and 1.5 year old and they have their own challenges but nothing as hard as those first few months, esp with the first baby.

 

[yuliia]

@bazzapr Thank you for the encouragement. It helps.

Could you maybe lightly explain what challenges you’re dealing with? We could face the same both having colicky babies.

 

[bazzapr]

@yuliia The biggest challenges during that newborn phase were adjusting to having almost no time to ourselves (esp true for the first baby), for me the raging hormones (but that got better after about two weeks post partum, if it doesn’t your wife should be screened for ppd), again for me adjusting to breastfeeding (the pain and the not having my body to myself), with our second every night around dinner time she would just cry and cry and cry and nothing you could do could console her, it makes you feel like a terrible parent even though you are doing everything right and some babies are just like that (make sure you switch out and realize baby can lay there and cry for a few minutes on their own while you take a breather), constantly watching them sleep and worrying about SIDS, and the biggest one: navigating all this new territory on little to no sleep, and the sleep you do get is crappy and disjointed little chunks. Also they give nothing back, it’s a very unrewarding time.

The challenges we are dealing with now are minor things like our 1.5 year old will just pull all the books off the shelf for fun, or she will go through phases of not wanting anything to do with eating meat and we worry if she’s getting enough iron (she’s never shown any signs of deficiency, it’s just tough sometimes to realize they are going to do what they want on their own time and we as parents can’t control everything), she’s learning new words constantly but sometimes we don’t know what she wants and she gets sooo frustrated and whiney. But honestly my colicky baby has so far been an easier toddler than my non colicky baby. The toddler phase, I think, is so much more fun too, they change so fast and every new skill is so cute and they start to communicate with you and the way they pronounce words is the most adorable thing you’ll ever hear! Sure they throw tantrums for no reason and some days they’re exhausting but they also laugh, and want to “help” with things, and give you hugs randomly.

I would say I didn’t feel like I “enjoyed” my first baby until about 18 months (although it got better around 5-6 months, and again around 9-10 months when she started sleeping better) and my second I started to enjoy a little earlier (around probably 3-4months) because I was already used to some of the adjustments and it was cute watching the two interact.

 

[shrek1]

@yuliia This reaction to parenthood is extremely common and understandable. Your wife is in no way a lesser mother for these thoughts and feelings.

However, just because it’s normal doesn’t mean you and she have to suffer. PPD is so common and there is treatment. You might have to help her advocate for herself depending on how on the ball her provider is.

You can make sure your wife is eating, sleeping and showering. Call in any reinforcements you’ve got (extended family, friends, paid help if it’s in the budget.) Remember and remind yourselves that you are doing an extremely hard thing and you are doing a great job.

 

[yuliia]

@shrek1 Thank you so much. I really hope she gets help.

 

[degehieno]

@yuliia Post partum depression is a real thing that affects a ton of women. AND her doctors should be able to help or support get her in a more stable direction where she recognizes her life and how to feel better, can you call anyone for support? Provider or family? If she's making statements of wanting to hurt herself or others or you can't keep her safe, this is an emergency and she needs crisis support/emergency services.. It's so sad, truly. Wishing you both the best through this transition.

 

[yuliia]

@degehieno Thankfully I don’t think she at that level. I will be keeping a close eye. And I really hope the most she gets herself help. I don’t want to push too much. Thank you for the support.

 

[aletha]

@yuliia I was like this until about 4 months pp. My son had horrible colic and SCREAMED 24/7. Not even kidding he barely ever slept he just screamed. We had to have family members come over on rotation to help us out. It was nearly impossible to become attached to a little human that just screamed at you non stop. Once his colic got better, I got better. My hormones settled and I felt like I could finally see what my life would be like after a baby. It does get better

 

[yuliia]

@aletha Wow can’t even imagine. So sorry you had it that bad. Puts things in perspective. Thank you for sharing. It means so much right now.

 

[imwithgod57]

@yuliia I'm going to sound like a broken record if people see my recent comments lol but : A bit unrelated to the question but please make sure baby is getting enough to eat. I had problems with my supplies and had to combo feed and the bottles we were using were too hard to drink from for our poor baby. She would scream and cry all day until we figured it out. I'm not saying that's what it is but might be worth checking.

I bonded quite quickly with baby but even if i did i wondered if we made a mistake or if we were able to do this etc early on. LO is 15w now and it's such a distant memory. It will get better but please talk to you Dr/pediatrician. That's what we did and it helped a lot.

I had a traumatic birth and couldn't sleep at all for days. I honestly thought I was going to die, especially since I developed GH late pregnancy and still had problems with it in the first few weeks PP. My readings were wack and the lack of sleep + lots of meds + lots of pain from emergency c-section didn't help.

Dr told us that it's so very normal to feel off/depressed in the beginning and people keep it kind of hush hush. We see a lot of perfect little posts about baby/newborn life on social media but it doesn't show the full picture and i think that can affect us mentally. We feel like we're doing something wrong because it doesn't correlate with what we see online.

Dr did tell us that if the feeling of helplessness/depression etc lasted longer than 2 weeks that we needed to consult. Seems like this threshold has passed so please please seek help for your little one and your wife's sake.

Also don't be scared to ask for help. We reached out to family and friends even if we don't have a lot of them lol. Having other familiar people in the house to talk to and get help even for just an hour made a world of difference and kind of brought a bit of normalcy back into our life. All that helped us get through it.