So this is what love feels like

The image of Motherhood that is portrayed on social media and in society couldn’t be more different to the reality of it. The so called ‘rush of love’ that everyone gushes about when you first meet your baby doesn’t always come and it didn’t for me.

One of my friends gave birth to her little girl at 28 weeks and experienced the worry of being in the neo-natal unit and months in hospital following her birth.. she didn’t go on to develop PND but she told me that she never felt that initial rush of love. She was the first person I spoke to who agreed with me.

I remember the moment that Little A was placed on my chest. I remember staring at him in complete and utter shock; the little person I had been carrying for 9 and a half months was finally here. I was also full of drugs so perhaps my feelings had been dulled down but I was waiting for the ‘rush of love’ that everyone had told me about. It didn’t come. Don’t get me wrong; I was in complete awe of this teeny little person who had the cutest little button nose but I didn’t feel the initial burst of love I expected to feel.

As the days and weeks passed and the baby blues slowly developed into Postnatal Depression, I felt completely unconnected to Little A. I described it at the time as feeling as though I was looking after someone else’s baby. The rush of love was nowhere to be seen and I felt nothing when I looked at him. I watched my friends with their babies and the love that was there for everyone to see and I felt jealous. I had wanted Little A… why was I not feeling the way that everyone else was??

Early November 2019, me and Little A went to the GP for our 6 week postnatal check-up. I had expected more of this appointment; I assumed that she would check my stitches to check I was healing ok and ask more questions to check that mentally I was alright and that I was coping. She asked me how I was. My reply was that we were exhausted as Little A had an aversion to sleeping during the night. Her response was “That’s part of being a parent. The tiredness comes and goes as the baby reaches different milestones. You just need to get used to it”. That was it. She moved away from me and began the check-up of Little A. I had no idea at that point that I was suffering with PND but looking back she could have been more sympathetic and less dismissive. Perhaps she might have noticed the onset of my struggles if she had spent less time patronising us.

This appointment included Little A’s first set of immunisations. Every new parents worst nightmare. All of my Mummy friends told me how upsetting it was watching their tiny bundle being poked with a very sharp needle and then hearing their cries afterwards. I didn’t share this feeling; yes it wasn’t nice hearing him cry and I have the worst needle phobia but I didn’t feel like I wanted to run over and protect him from harm like a Mother should. Thankfully, Mr N was there to do that.

Looking back it breaks my heart that I could have ever felt that way about Little A. I have many moments where I feel like the worst human being ever and this was definitely way up there.

The lack of emotion I felt towards Little A continued until halfway through my Counselling. It was the afternoon on a weekend in early January. Little A had just woken from his nap and I went up to get him as usual. I went through the motions of every bum change, every feed just as I was supposed to. Something was different that day though; I felt like I was suddenly seeing him differently. Without warning, I felt like my heart was going to burst with love and I don’t think I could have cuddled Little A any harder. I ran downstairs to Mr N and screamed “I love him so much”. If anyone had been listening in on our conversation they would have thought I was mad but Mr N knew what a massive thing that was for me. He grabbed hold of me and I cried. I cried a lot. I remember thinking ‘so this is what love feels like’.