My baby is a baby no longer. He talks (and talks, and talks, convincing most people that he’s a year older than he really is), runs, is learning to dissemble and delay, and rarely cuddles. He can say, “I love you!” and also, loudly, “NO! THAT IS NOT A GOOD IDEA!” if he is displeased with a parental suggestion. Although he still likes to be “held like a baby,” it is awfully hard to cradle a 38-pound, over-three-feet-tall child in your arms, especially when said child loves to kick and swing his legs.
He was never a tranquil baby but even so, when I was nursing him and he’d lie on the pillow in his milk daze, arm waving as if to conduct an invisible orchestra, he was as peaceful as he ever got and I got to hold him more than I ever have since. These days I am lucky if the whirlwind of activity ceases long enough for me to get a cuddle or a kiss. After all, he is a Big Boy [tm] and since he’s never been a Mummy’s boy anyway, preferring just about anyone to me, the time it takes to cuddle Mummy is time that could be spent kicking his Sounders FC soccer ball, or chuf-chuf-chuffing Thomas around the track, or “helping” Baba in the garage, or running laps of the room as fast as he can, or playing baseball, or drawing red skyscrapers, or doing any number of other activities that are of vital importance in a three-year-old’s day.
It’s hard.
When I look back on his newborn days, I regret. I regret that unfortunate combination of PPD/PND and high-needs/colicky baby that made me hate him so much of the time. I regret that I was a first-time mother trying to do everything perfectly without realizing that there just is no “perfect” when it comes to parenting. I regret that I never, ever treasured those newborn days, because I simply wasn’t in any kind of mental state to do so. I regret that those days are gone forever and I will probably never have another child so that I can have a “do-over” and, this time, enjoy that time instead of hating it with every fiber of my being.
Let me make it clear that 99% of me doesn’t blame myself for what happened. I simply didn’t know that depression was taking over and I couldn’t have known how to cope with one of the highest needs babies (outside of children with special needs) that even the expert parents/midwives around me had ever heard of. I couldn’t have done anything differently then because I simply didn’t know how to do it differently. I can’t feel guilty over that (at least most of the time) because it wasn’t my fault.
I see other people with babies who are quieter, sleep more…parents who aren’t struggling through the morass of despair caused by PPD/PND and I envy them. Deep down I see them and I hate them a little, I think, for having what I did not. I see my beloved little boy in all of his marvelous curiosity and intelligence and I am wounded by the fact that the first year of his life is such a miserable memory for me. If I feel guilty about anything, it is that I didn’t fully love him during that time…and part of me can’t help but believe, however illogically, that the reason he prefers Daddy, Baba, and Noni to me is because I failed him during that first year. I screamed at him. A lot. I left him to cry more than I wanted. A lot. I resented time spent with him. A lot.
I’m not trying to say that I could have done things differently, because I simply wasn’t in a state then to have it over. I’m just so, so sorry that my husband (and finances) are so set against another child because I’m never going to have another chance to enjoy a newborn of my own, to have patience that I wasn’t in the position to have with my son. It breaks my heart that I was so depressed that I really missed that part of his growing up and that not only can I not have that time with him back, I’m never going to have it with another child either.
I know all the reasons we shouldn’t have another baby. I know that Graham doesn’t want one…and then I know all the reasons I wish we could have another one. Not just because of the newborn thing but because in moments like Halloween night, when I lay on my son’s bed under the glow of his star-light and his pumpkin lights, while he popped a Smartie in my mouth and another one in his, I realize how deeply I love him, for all the times when living with him is like herding cats, and I wish I had another little being to lavish that love on as well, because I’ve got more in me than one child who’s not interested in cuddles could ever possibly use on his own!
Being a mother is so hard. I have similar regrets, and no answers to speak of…
((HUGS))
*hugs* I could have written so much of this post too.
Oh my dear. I didn’t experience PPD, but I did have PTSD after #1 and a tremendously colicky baby, so I know that hardship all too well. Then I had a second child and he was always more difficult to bond with in some ways, even to this day. Some kids are just like that, but it doesn’t make it any easier, does it. My third and fourth were much easier in many ways, but have their own challenges too. But even as I feel “done,” I know there are opportunities and babies and experiences I’m leaving behind, and that is always such a bittersweet thing.
There are so many regrets in motherhood. Be gentle with yourself, but honor your grief too. It’s OKAY to feel like this, it’s okay to honor it. You have to feel it to heal it. You’ll move beyond it in time, but honor your process. You’ll do it when you are ready.
I know most of my friends have similar feelings sometimes but they are learning to roll with the kids growing up and embracing the children they are turning into whilst holding the “baby” memories both good and bad.
I would say you should definately learn to love the fact you’ve been given the gift of motherhood and make the most of everyday whatever it brings with a lively healthy little boy.
Be ever thankful you have been able to have a little one even if it was hard in the beginning. There are so many will never know that joy.
I understand. And I’m still dealing with it. It’s so hard when the experience is poisoned by the darkness of that time, and knowing that there’s nothing we can do to go back and change it.
It was what it was. My wife went through a similar situation with our first. She had PPD. I knew she was depressed, but didn’t realize the depth of it for almost a year. It was a terrible, terrible year.
But you should not regret what happened. It could not have been any other way. You’re blessed with a beautiful, loving son who, despite not being mommy’s boy, still loves his mom with every ounce of his being, even when he’s being a turd.
Sever the past, you cannot change it. Embrace the present and live in it fully. Your son does not resent you for what you were going through or how you behaved. All kids prefer one parent to another. Both of our girls lean toward Dad. I don’t know why. It’s just the way it works. Veronica was remarkably different in her first year with Linny than she was with our second daughter, Lottie, and both of them take her for granted in the same way.
You’re a good mom, that you love your child so much as to worry about his first year. But the past is the past and you are no longer there. Sever the past and love the present.
You’re gonna be fine.
Peace,
Shannon