They say that quarantine marks the point of return to normality after childbirth, but the reality is completely different. However, I did not internalize that it was a mistake to even think so, for fear of being called soft or “weird”.
Many moms say that they didn’t return to normal until a year later, but I admit that in my case it wasn’t until I was almost two years old. My oldest daughter had a lot of nighttime awakenings (about five or six), and I suffered from it night after night. If you don’t rest you can’t be a “normal” person, because you are angry and even negative . But how not to be, if after a day of teleworking, taking care of your daughter, doing things around the house and others, you know that a night built on the basis of “snippets” of sleep awaits you. Well, that, in my case, two years: when the nights began to be real nights, I really started to recover.
And suddenly, you see the woman again and not only the mother
One day you wake up, and you begin to see in the mirror a face that you haven’t identified for a long time . It seems that you no longer look so destroyed and that at last, a good night’s sleep really has an effect. After seeing for so long with sadness that reflection that only showed a mixture of tiredness with dignity, she returns to show the image of a woman, more than a mother.
In my case, that “click” had a domino effect that manifested itself in my relationship with my partner (for the better), and in my desire to resume projects that I had put on hold. Surely others feel the need to return to the classroom, others to look for the house of their dreams, and others even to go for another baby! The fact is that meeting yourself again has a similar effect as seeing a great and old friend after years: you want to catch up and recover that time in which you have been separated.
My intention is not to generalize. I know there are cases of “babies who sleep through the first month and whose mothers look great from the moment they leave the delivery room, but I was not one of them and it took me much longer than what is established as “normal” to feel good with myself Six years later, one more daughter and many talks with other mothers, I can confirm that it is more common than we think, and that we are not “weird animals” because we feel that we regain our identity after 40 days, or a year, or two. We’re really not the same and we all know it, but it’s reassuring to see a friendly face when we stand in front of the mirror.
Each case is different and that is why you cannot extrapolate “what the experts say” to everyone, much less in terms of parenting. If someone categorically affirms that at “xx” months everything is in place and any woman is fully recovered from pregnancy and childbirth, that person has not gone through a pregnancy, or a delivery, much less postpartum. Let’s normalize that having a child changes us forever, and that recovering that part that remains hidden behind the image of mother, takes time . The one that each one needs.
In Babies and More | The mother’s brain changes during pregnancy to take better care of the baby
Image | gpointstudio wirestock
