I’ve had a second child since then and I have had five years to reflect on the massive overhaul of identity that happens when independent and empowered women become mothers and I’ve never felt like the reality of what becoming a whole new entity gets any validity.

So allow me to rant about becoming Mommy. Maybe, if you’re a new mom and feeling not at all like yourself and kind of depressed, you can relate. And hopefully, actually my prayer is, that if you find yourself relating this will bring you a little bit of peace about what you’re going through.

In America we totally minimize birth and the real trauma of the whole ordeal. One minute you’re You. A woman who gets things done. Maybe you order underlings around at work or earn the respect of coworkers with your skills. You have money to play around with, gets to wear clothes you like, cash a paycheck and invest in whatever. You make deals or writes articles or manage a business or do whatever you do in your career. You communicate with adults frequently and daily on an intellectual level.

Your body was yours and you shared it when you felt like it and didn’t when you didn’t want to. You had a regular cycle and hormones that had been predictable.  Therefore you’d learned how to manage your monthly issues since you were 12. 

Now BAM you’re body has experienced this traumatic violent event – birth. Personally, I thought it was about as violent as being hit by a car. You wouldn’t emotionally bounce back from that in six weeks, I don’t understand why Americans expect women to bounce back from birth in a month and a half. The event changed your hormones, shape, vajayjay and everything else about you. You gave up your body for nine months to grow a foreign life and told yourself you’d be back to normal after birth. Dream On. Now you’re a milk machine. Now you smell of puke. Now you never sleep.

You feel like you are no longer YOU anymore. Your whole entire identity has gone through a dramatic and intense transformation. That’s takes more than six weeks or twelve weeks or four months or a year to adjust to. You don’t do the things that used to define You as You.

If you’re staying at home not working means you’re not getting any outside validation for the job you’re doing. You’re getting no paycheck. You’re only getting poopy diapers and the occasional smile or giggle, but it’s hard to cash that at the bank. You have to cut costs as expenses rise and you kind of resent not having your hair done like you used to.

Your husband thinks you’re doing fandiddly-taskic – so obviously he’s not very tuned in to what is actually going on with you. Which equals even less validation. But, there’s no way he can really understand because becoming Dad may be an awesome journey for him, but he’s still going to work, cashing a check and gets a lot of time away from the needy baby. And no one is sucking on his body half the day.

So what I’m saying is that what you are going through is NORMAL. It sucks but it’s normal. You are doing everything right. What you are doing does matter in the long run and it’s a valid and legitimate thing to be doing right now. You just have to realize that you are never ever going to get the same emotional kick-back from diapers and naps that you used to get cutting a massive deal in pharmaceuticals or whatever you did. The pay-off is different and there’s not a lot of instant gratification staying home with a baby. It takes time and practice to get used to. 

I now believe that being a stay-at-home-mom is a craft. Just like writing or any other profession. You have to learn how to do it. You have to make a structure for yourself. If you wake up everyday and just wander around and only do whatever you feel like doing then you will become clinically depressed. Period. You used to look forward to weekends cause it was Your time-off. But, now what do you look forward to? I can tell you the answer – you look forward to your husband coming home from work and you look forward to his time off.

I know you don’t want to, but you really have to get out of the house every single day for something – anything. A walk. A neighbor’s house. A grocery store trip. A mommy-baby sign language class. You have to leave the house daily.

You also have to “accomplish” at least one thing every day so you don’t feel like a total loser. Laundry is something. Cleaning the bathroom is something. Doing a budget is something. Find something every day that you can accomplish and then feel proud of yourself for doing it.

And really you must ditch that baby! If you are taking the baby on your dates with hubby, that’s ridiculous! You mustleave the baby sometimes or you will lose Self. If You lose You all is lost, because the baby needs You to be You and not some drone who smells like puke and feels like crap. Go out with other women without the baby. Supplement with formula or pump, it’s not that big of a deal. Join a book club. Go to a movie. Go out to dinner. Join a gym and leave her in the nursery for an hour while you work out or take a yoga class. You can not become only mom. You must also be You who has other interests outside the home. Otherwise you’re just the weird crazy lady who believes the baby will die if she goes out to lunch. That’s the definition of insanity! The baby can be without you for a few hours. The baby shouldbe without you for a few hours or she will have attachment issues in only a few short months and that will not be fun for you or her.

Stop reading parenting magazines. They should all be titled “How many ways can you accidentally kill your baby.” They induce anxiety and you do not need that much information. They are full of crap most of the time. Too much information is just scaring you can creating anxiety. You don’t need to know about every freak accident that might possibly happened to a kid. Throw them away, stop your subscription and buy Secrets of the Baby Whisperer: How to Calm, Connect, and Communicate with Your Baby. She’ll give sound advice without making you a panicked mess.

Honestly, physiologically and psychologically, you need to exercise. You just have to force yourself to do it. The endorphins you get from exercise are worth any anti-depressant on the market. Your poor body just went through a massive hormonal surge with way to much estrogen and then almost none overnight. Be kind to your new body and feed your brain some endorphins.

You probably don’t want to follow this advice if you’re suffering from PPD, but get off your butt and do it anyway.

If you are having compulsive thoughts about hurting yourself or your baby, which now that my child is five, I will admit to having had them. You need to tell your OB/GYN that you’re having brief flickering thoughts of hurting your self (really, I think that’s enough information to give him a picture of what’s going on without getting any authorities involved) and get some medication. The Le Leche League has a list of anti-depressants that you can take while breast feeding.

That said, I wonder if what new moms are really experiencing is a full-blown identity crisis resulting from adding MOM to the mix of SELF.

Post from: Blisstree

Mommy Pains, PPD or Identity Crisis?

Hi fabulous people! I’m just coming off my spiritual high after being at a 3 day retreat, The Emmaus Walk. This non-denominational interactive experience was just what my soul needed. Absolutely no hellfire and damnation and total grace, love and joy. Bible recap: There were two men who were walking 7 miles or so to the town of Emmaus and talking about the very recent crucifixion of Jesus. Stranger comes and walks and talks with them about what had happened and interprets Jesus words. They invite the stranger to stay and then realize that the stranger actually is Jesus, right before he disappears. Obviously, my recap holds nothing to the King James Version, which can be found in Luke 24:13.

I can’t recommend this retreat enough. Not only did my husband’s experience transform our marriage, but I am feeling super-connected to the soul of the world with a faith that I can impact it in a positive way. And the intention to do so. Who wouldn’t want that?

I have been on other retreats and I seriously and with all genuine concern recommend that you schedule one immediately – as if your life depended on it. Really, here are some obvious reasons why a retreat is a wonderful experience.

Not one time did I have to think up something for dinner and wonder if we had all the ingredients? Nor did I have to change anyone’s diaper, get anyone a snack, clean a single thing, think about my work, think about my friends or husband or kids or anyone else who might be depending on my doing something. I didn’t have to remember any appointments or obligations. I didn’t even have a watch so I didn’t have to worry being anywhere at any particular time. I don’t know what time they woke us up or what time they sent us off to bed. Didn’t care. I didn’t have to worry about what I looked like. I didn’t have to worry about my hair or makeup or outfit – all casual all the time.

When was the last time that you have savored a total lack of responsibility? Perhaps you never have, in which case I must say – it is TIME.

Another great reason is what I’ll coin Commando Study. I’m a fan of what I’ve heard Dr. Phil call commando parenting, but what I originally learned from The Baby Whisperer. It’s where you put all of your focus on the issue at hand for say 3 days. You try to clear your schedule or put a lot of focus on say weaning the baby from his bottle of milk to prevent him from continuing to be a milk tyrant (my current commando parenting task). Spend 3 days of temper tantrums while offering only a sippy cup and refusing to give into demands for a bottle. Commando parenting totally sucks for 3 days – but then the struggle is over and you don’t ever have to deal with the issue again.

For instance, you might be having marital trouble and one thing you might do is go to a therapist. This might be effective. Every week you go in and try to work out what is going on and how you might be able to fix it. This approach will likely take months and months just to find out what is really going on in your relationship dynamic. It’s a long and painful process and seems to never end. Meanwhile you have to keep living together and struggling, (Well, maybe you’ve had better and quicker results than I have, but I’ve found this to be the case for therapists we have sought help with.) You might read a bunch of marriage books together about how different you are and how to overcome that.

An alternative to that long process would be commando marital intervention like the retreat offered by Gary Zukav and Linda Francis called Spiritual Partnership for Couples. I’ve not been to this 5-day retreat, but God-forbid we ever need it again, this is the first stop. It’s just better sometimes to get out of your comfort zone and climb right into the feelings, painful or not, and DEAL with them quickly and efficiently. And a 5-day retreat in which to focus on your marriage or spiritual partnership can’t be a bad thing. I think it would be great to get out of town and spend 5-days – all day and night – intensively talking about your most significant relationship.

I’ve gone on writing retreats as well and have found them to be wonderful. One of the greatest parts of a retreat is that there is no box they’ve prepared for you. You know, the convenient box people put you in and keep declaring this is who you are. Whether its mom or employee or the loud one or the shy one – there’s a million boxes and they are all probably just as confining for the person in them.

But, when you go to a retreat no one has any expectations of who you should be. You can go and completely reinvent someone new and they wouldn’t know the difference. Or you can go and be your authentic self and might find it interesting how the others interpret your authentic self differently than those you see everyday. Sometimes the people who love us the most expect us to keep being the same and don’t take our transitions, evolutions and growth very well. It’s great for us to go be that new self with people who didn’t know us when we had this job or that, used to party too hard, or just expect us to be a specific way.

I’m always a little bit surprised that people like who I authentically am as much as they do. When I’m on a retreat people tell me they enjoyed my company and I’m friendly and fun – sadly, I’m always a little bit surprised because I don’t hear that very often when I am at home trying to be my authentic self.

I’d love to go on a yoga retreat. I have been practicing yoga at my gym 3 days a week for about 9 months. I love it. I feel so much stronger than when I started. I always feel so powerful and empowered when I do it. Best of all I think it’s so spiritual, I feel my mind get some rest as it connects with God and the spiritual soul of the world and I really feel relaxed and connected during my yoga classes. I would love to go on a 3 day retreat and just really master a lot of poses and get really in that meditative zone and see where God might take me. I usually get a lot of inspiration for writing while I am in my yoga class, who knows I might walk away with the inspiration for the Great American Novel after a 3 day yoga class.

Whatever your interest, I strongly recommend a retreat of some sort. You deserve it!  

Post from: Blisstree

Walk to Emmaus