Those few first weeks, as a new mum with a newborn...

Hi all,
Just a quick survey of us BB girls. I'm willing to bet that for every mum (or dad) who found the first few weeks of parenthood like a blissful babymoon, there is at least one of us who found it to be the hardest thing they ever, ever done (and possibly quite a few who think it was both).

So, what do you think? Is this one of motherhood's best kept secrets- the the first few weeks can be downright horrible? Was it horrible for you? Were you warned beforehand, how very difficult it would be? (And would you have believed them, had they told you?)

The blissful part is true... but it is also HELL ON EARTH!

Having a newborn is one of the hardest things you'll ever do. In fact I think a lot of people would rather go through birth again in a trade for a few hours sleep and the ability to eat a warm meal.

Most people don't get warned, and a lot of people who do get warned think it's all horror stories and "my baby won't be like that". People don't realise the cold hard truth of hormones, the fact that our partners don't always hear the baby, or know what to do with it and we generally can't do it all on our own and sometimes babies cry not because they are broken or you have done something wrong but just BECAUSE.

But yeah they're still cute, and I wouldn't give it up for nuthin'... but I'm done and I'm glad LMAO!

Exactly what ROuge said....though if someone had forewarned me - well i would have thought they were just poopoohing my vision.

I was so heavily clouded by AND/PND with Darcy that I don't actually remember much - but that's the horrendous bit.

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The blissful part is true... but it is also HELL ON EARTH!

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:yeahthat: I love the feeling of adoration, amazement and pure love that we created this little human. That we created the miracle of life :o

And then there is the other part :rofl: The constant sleep deprivation, the breastfeeding difficulties that lasted 6w plus, the overwhelming exhaustion, the hormonal shifts and changes, the adjustment to a new person and to a new relationship with your partner .....

I love it and wouldn't change a thing (in fact we are going to do it again :lol:) but my goodness it is hard work and part of the transition to parenthood you just don't get until you get there.

I was kind of thinking about this last night. But more along the lines of "WHY oh WHY do we have to contend with all the hormonal stuff, while recovering from birth, learning about our new baby, and being more sleep deprived than ever!!!!". I honestly think that the hormone rollercoaster makes it sooooooo much harder.

I can't comment on the hard yards that some mums do with newborns........despite having my baby 5 weeks early (unexpectedly), having massive feeding and weight gain issues, and having a broken foot myself, I still had the blissful babymoon. And I guess I can thank my hormones in part for that ;). But my DH also had a wonderful babymoon, we were hopeless together :lol: crying, happily, over everything little thing. And I also was lucky enough to mostly have really great support networks.........I really do think that helps.

But we did have the hard yards down the track.......so we didn't totally escape ;). We were just fortunate I guess that we didn't struggle too much in the early daze.

As for next time, well we'll just have to wait and see! Could be a whole different kettle of fish!!!!! :)

I was told a few things about those first weeks - mostly bad

eg: "They were the darkest 6 weeks of my life"
"It was like living in a fog"
"I felt like I had lost myself"

So I was expecting it to be horrendous(especially because I LOVE to sleep and love to be "in control")...and it wasn't:redface: It certainly had its challenges - mainly due to my extreme anxiety - but because breastfeeding was working and he didn't seem to have wind problems - our babymoon was pretty good - but I know how lucky I was/am - and am very grateful. I have found the 3-4 month sleep regression MUCH harder.

I think if I had the feeding/wind challenges many babies have - my experience would have been very different. :hug: to the mums who have coped with these things!

TBH, it wasnt as bad as what i thought it would be. I remember telling anyone who would listen that i thought it would be harder. I must have gotten the worst horror stories beforehand.

Yes, breastfeeding was terribly painful but the sleep deprivation wasnt that bad. I just slept when he slept and yes i am one of those people who can slepp anywhere anytime so it wasnt really an issue for me. Ds wasnt a baby who had wind issues or colic or just cried 'because' so i was lucky there. He was a pretty textbook newborn (if there is such a thing) - eat, sleep, poo.

I found the challenges to come around 4 months. Trying to establish routine, crying at 7pm every night for an hour, not wanting to sleep etc. That's when i started to find it ALOT harder andthis continued until about 8 months. Not horrible all the time but i just found it a bit challenging.

So for me, our babymoon was actually quite lovely and fingerscrossed for the next one to be the same :)

Controlfreak - just actually read your post and sounds like we had the same deal :)

My experience was very similar to Janie's - four weeks early and all he wanted to do was sleep. We were often waking him for feeds during the first six weeks or so.

I do realise that a lot of my experience with Sam as a newborn at home was set by spending ten days in SCN in a very structured routine (but he stuck to it when we left) and by realising two weeks in that breastfeeding was never going to work for us and switching to formula full-time. I also don't really recall any wild hormonal swings, but hormones are one area where my body just doesn't do what it's meant to.

I did find the lack of sleep hard, but I have a very supportive husband who did a lot of night feeds for me.

BW

I personally found those first few weeks just so easy. I had DH home.. We work well as a team.. I was on a high from having welcomed this new little being into the world.. I did find around 3-4 months was when the utter exhaustion set in lol..

Of course it wasn't all plain sailing but I am talking an overall feeling.

It was different with our Ds2 as he was sick but we were still on a high once we got him home

Depending on what mood I'm in when I look back on those first few weeks, I either smile or burst into tears. Some days, I remember the good moments, but other times, I remember that feeling of hitting rock-bottom, bursting into tears at nothing, looking at my new baby and honestly wondering what it would feel like to just throw her on the floor and shut the door behind me... so yeah, it wasn't really all that fun. And the thing was, I had plenty of familial support, we lived with my parents so help was only down the hallway... it was just such an overwhelming time, trying to adjust to this new, dependent little person while being sorely sleep-deprived, having BFing issues (ie, failing miserably at it), and learning all the ins and outs of caring for said little person. Of course I'd been warned about how it was going to be, my mum particularly was quite gleeful before the birth about how I was never going to sleep in again (I'm the queen of mid-afternoon wake-ups lol), how I was going to have to put baby's needs before mine, etc etc... I think even she saw that my struggling was more than just, 'But I want to stay in bed because I'm a lazy a**e'. I knew it was going to be hard, but sheeeeesh. And I was extremely lucky in that DD1 was pretty much a 'textbook' newborn - no wind/colic/reflux issues, only cried when she was hungry or wet, ate on a strict 3-hourly schedule (ie, I knew that I had until 3pm to go shopping because at 3 on the dot she would start screaming for a bottle), and was quite content as long as someone was cuddling her... so in comparison to a lot of new mums, I had it very easy! (And to all those mums out there who DID have difficult babies.... I kneel before you, you're AMAZING!)
I think my problem lay more in having issues myself (ie, mild PND after a traumatic birth), than with my baby. I especially believe this after having DD2 - easy, complication-free birth, home from hospital same day, not even a hint of tears or 'baby blues' in the days and weeks afterward... it was blissful!

I never felt blissful!! Just about from the moment she came out I was a mess. I felt anxious and we had feeding issues, she ended up in special care and I just wanted to run away. Ended up with PND. I don't remember when I felt better, I think I step forward was getting feeding issues sorted and I decided to express full time and as I learnt more about her and how I wanted to parent her I felt better and of course the treatment!!!
I understand for some it is blissful but for me it wasn't...next time hopefully will be better :)

With DD1 it was down-right horrible, DD just cried, never slept, did not feed properly. I was so tired (18hr labour) and never got a chance to catch up with DD never sleeping, not to mention a PPH and shocking birth trauma. It took a good 4 months before I could look at her and not resent her :( Not that she would have ever known it, as I still hugged and kissed her all the time, in hope the loving feeling would come, and it did.
With DD2, is was totally different, I did not have an instant bond, I just did 'what had to be done' so to speak. I just went through motions for first few days. (I went home 6hrs after birth)Then everything fell into place I was calm cool and relaxed about the whole thing, and she is an awesome baby.
So first few weeks/months varied greatly between girls. I am not sure, if it was just more me knowing what to do second time round or what.

I barely remember the first 6 weeks of DS number 3's life :( it was a blurred version of expressing, being away from my other kids and making residence at the Royal Childrens. I use to sit and watch him sleep until he was a good 4 months because I was so scared that he would have more strokes and would die without me near him :( as I was told if he made it to the 3 month mark we would be lucky.

In all honesty it was the worst out of all my baby moon's....and its just something that is to painfully to think about let alone want to chanch having to do again :( .

Yes Cai...Hell on earth...your dam right hon

I'm one that thought it was going to be a lot harder than it was. It wasn't easy, but I did have DH home for 5 weeks and he did everything other than feed DS in that time. If I didn't have him there to help me as much as he did, things would have been a lot different. DS always settled easily, I didn't experience any crazy hormonal changes that had me in tears like many people warned. I remember saying to DH after about 3 weeks that this was easy! He rolled his eyes at me! lol he was more exhausted than me I think because he was up for the night feeds changing nappies and then doing all the cooking/housework during the day.
It took 3 weeks to establish breastfeeding and that's the main thing that sticks out in my mind as being the hardest part of having a newborn.

I was NOT blissful. I hated the first few months!

For starters, no one told me that I'd be in so much pain afterwards and that I wouldn't be able to sit or stand for long periods of time.

No one told me that the moment I would try to have a nap, or lay down to take some pressure away from the nether region, the baby would cry.

No one told me I would be up every 3 hours to feed and that feeding would take a whole hour!

Everytime I think that I might want to have a 2nd baby, I just remember those first few months and that's enough to put me off for a while!

i enjoyed the first two weeks of the babymoon when all DD did was eat and sleep she didn't cry and was very placid - THEN all of that changed and from 3 weeks of age to about 10 weeks of age i hated it - yes, hated it. i thought i would never sleep or feel normal again and whilst i love and adore my DD i actually wished the newborn stage away - i often say to my Doula and my DH that I would do labour and birth over and over and over again if someone would take the first 6-10 weeks. :o

I'm another one who is scared off number 2 because of the NB stage :redface: and the first 12 mnths quite frankly.
It was not blissful for me at all and if felt like I could have given him away in those early months but knew I would regret it the moment I did... I have never been soooo conflicted in my whole life. I think it took at least 12 mnths until I actually got it that he was my son and I was his mother and stopped questioning it.

my girls were both in the SCN for 4 weeks each being premmie so I found those weeks just a maze of milking, trying to teach these little babies to feed, anxious weight gains and losses and trying to comprehend that they would let you take such small babies home. At home all structure that was in hospital went kaput and was just a mess of sleepless nights and days. After about 3 months the fog lifted and I really began to enjoy my girls

One of the reasons I went back to full-time work when DD was 4.5 months old is because I wasn't happy and didn't like that stage at all. I've enjoyed being a mum a lot more since I went to work

Great thread.

I did feel all the blissful feelings and thnak goodness for that as physically I felt like I was experiencing a 6 WEEK HANGOVER!!!!!

My body was only just functioning but I tried to stay as positive as I could for my own sake.

A very wise BB member in my Belly/baby buddies group named Det (who had previously had twins) gave us some great advice and that was "that it is just a phase". SO TRUE!!! (love you Det!) That helped me heaps!

Great thread LoriRae!

It WAS NOT bliss, there WAS NO babymoon! It was the hardest couple of months in my entire life and there was NO forwarning. . .
It was a major major shock because I always thought I'd take to motherhood like a duck to water. I'd waited 30 years for this bubba and all of a sudden she is here and I was thinking I'd made the worst mistake of my life.
Bub wouldn't feed well, she cried A LOT, she had acid reflux. Add the fact that I had insomnia since the day she was born and the baby blues hit very bad, and subseqently I developed into PND.

It still makes me so sad when I think about those first couple of months. And I must admit I feel a tincy bit jealous when I hear of people and their blissful babymoons.

My experience was very similar to CF and MrsB26... pretty blissful, sleep deprivation not so bad. I was overwhelmed if anything purely by the amount of time it takes to care for a newborn but I was surprised to find myself happy and enjoying it. I suffered from the 4 month sleep regression though ...

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I found the challenges to come around 4 months. Trying to establish routine, crying at 7pm every night for an hour, not wanting to sleep etc. That's when i started to find it ALOT harder

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I could have written that myself! Still had plenty of sleep issues and only now :crossfingers: starting to get some full night's sleep. I've coped better than I thought I would, not being someone who finds it easy to miss out on sleep.
I think in a lot of ways DD was an easy babe, we had a dream run with BFing (still going strong at nearly 16 months) and was a good sleeper in the early days. But I do sympathise, with those who find it hard. I'm glad I didn't do it when I was younger, I'm not sure I would have coped.

I found the NB stage first time around fairly sweet - other than those 'wonder weeks'!

Round two was a bit tricker as I piled a lot of additional stressors onto myself, studying, quick weight loss for my wedding etc - but I pulled through it. DH was a great help too.

Having two under two is tough at times, and sometimes I feel I've lost my mind :lol: but the smiles and laughs are all worth it!

Both times round I was let down by my supply (pardon the pun) and made the switch to f/f, which caused a little guilt at first - but the payoff was seeing both kids flourish so it all turned out well.

I still feel bad that I find it hard to spend more quality play time with the kids - I'm not sure how many hours a day I should be spending, but I know I do the best I can. We now always have at least 20 mins - 40 mins each day of me reading aloud to the kids. I wish I had started doing that earlier in both instances though.

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Depending on what mood I'm in when I look back on those first few weeks, I either smile or burst into tears.

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:yeahthat: GC has summed it up pretty well for me, too

After going through really traumatic IVF experiences (including an early loss), I was on this amazing high from the moment I had my DD in my arms, as it was only then when I actually felt that everything was going to be okay and that I could stop fearing that I was going to lose her... but then the hormones kicked in (as well as the sleep deprivation from extended 44 hr labour and then emergency c/s) despite the high. And I had PMDD (Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder) prior to being pregnant so for me the hormone rollercoaster after birth was like mega PMDD... And then the colic/wind started.

I loved every moment of having our beautiful girl with us in our arms finally, but I was completely overwhelmed by her needs, particularly because of the colic/wind. I had had AND, which quickly progressed to PND and I thought I must have been doing something to cause my baby to be so unsettled (I even worried that my AND had badly affected her in utero) and that I wasn't being a good enough mother to her, and I became obsessed about "fixing" things so that my DD could be more comfortable and settled. But that's a whole other story.

So... my newborn experience was as close a definition as I can get to as bittersweet as I can think of, on reflection now. I would not change it for anything... but perhaps in hindsight and what I know now I would have been different in myself - I'm sure we could all say that! :D Who knows? We will see next time... if we are given the chance at bringing another miracle into the world as we hope and try. The fact that I want so much to have another child speaks wonders :)

Those first few weeks for me were filled with amazing highs and amazing lows.
No one told me that babies can get theirs days/nights mixed up and that it would take weeks for him to actually sleep at night. For the first probably 3 weeks, DH and I took 2 hours shifts all thru the night holding him on the lounge, DS wide awake, us trying desperately to stay awake, while the other got some much needed sleep!
No one told me I wouldn't eat a hot meal or drink a hot coffee for the first 3-6 months!
I remember driving around on xmas eve as it was the only way DS would sleep and stop crying, I was bawling my eyes out while DH drove, thinking to myself will this ever end? Of course it did and I do look back on those days quite fondly now, but at the time I wasn't so happy :)
Having said all that, there were quite a few times I remember cuddling DS and crying happy tears too, was a very surreal feeling thinking this little bubba was actually mine, I was very emotional at that time :)

OMG I agree, it was pretty hellish. I had a very long labour, then c/s, then infection, and BF problems. I didn't expect to feel so bad physically. And I still had too look after a little baby, it was all too much. I remember thinking we'd made a mistake, we weren't ready for this, we couldn't do this on our own, etc etc. I found the first few months hard, then it got a little easier, and from around 6 months I've really been enjoying myself.

I also didn't know how long this lack of sleep would last, it's still going!! I expected a newborn not to sleep well but not an older baby, duh.

I'm scared of having #2 now!!

At the risk of going against the norm (and having something thrown at my head...)...

I got so many horror stories before DD was born that I thought I wouldn't be getting any sleep and would be in a constant state of chaos for months.

And yet, after I brought her home (a day early, 'cause I was bored in hospital), with Mum to help me do the housework (DP didn't get any time off work), it was (dare I say it?) easy. My Mum commented that you wouldn't have even known there was a baby in the house most of the time. I got on with my normal life, just supplemented my sleep with one afternoon nap and didn't feel anything negative at all. I did the odd bit of work from home pretty much straight out of hospital.

I realise I'm very lucky, but I often feel like I'm walking around with a very guilty secret. I couldn't talk about my baby much or how I was doing with her until I had 'trouble' (mastitis multiple times, but not until 6 wks, several months, 6 mths, etc). All mums and bubs are different. (Which is why I'm not expecting it to necessarily be the same with #2!).

I'll go and hide under a chair now...!

All of this rings true for me. I wrote a lot in my diary about those early weeks, and tbh I found the 10week mark harder than the earliest weeks, beause I felt like I should have had it all 'sorted' by then, and the sleep deprivation was starting to wear me thin.

Looking back, I was being too hard on myself and trying to do too much. I think I was shocked at how different life had become. I wasn't the same with a baby in tow. I was completely different!

I also felt the lack of support very keenly. DH was always my rock in the toughest times, and he went back to work in under 2 weeks, so I was very, very alone. That was hard.

It took me a while to recognise the rush of emotion as love...and I did resent her a lot sometimes (I even said I hated her :redface:) because she has always been a mummy's girl and DH can rarely settle her, or help when she is tired etc. The fact the buck stops with me and only me was a bitter pill.

I look back on it all with rosy glasses though and can't wait for #2.

The 8 month sleep regression...now that is a WHOLE other story :)

our first few weeks weren't as difficult as i'd thought they would be. we managed to adapt to having DD home really easily - DH was a massive support, and he would take one wake up at night every night - he'd pass her to me, i'd feed her, then he'd go to the other end of the house to settle her. by two weeks, we didn't need that - she'd feed, go back to sleep - seemed to know day from night. at three weeks, DH went away to work - and things turned to crap big time! i don't know if i was feeling more stressed, or if DD wasn't coping without Daddy - but we had a few really bad days. over the next couple of months DH was home a few days, away a few days - and it made it hard! DD slept through from five or six weeks, for at least 5 hours wake, feed, sleep another 4 minimum - so that aspect was fine - but the difference in her behaviour during the day was noticable. DH has now been back home just on three months, and it's mostly been good. we started solids last week and are having trouble with sleep again, but we expected that, so we just go about feeding her and getting her back to sleep asap over night...

i wouldn't say those first weeks were easy - but, like a lot of people, i'd been given every horror story in the book about how terrible it would be, had people saying i wouldn't cope etc - and it really just felt like she'd always been there and we were fine. we managed to plan, clean and cook for her baptism ok (she was baptised at 8 weeks!), with minimal outside help - so it can't have been too bad. adapting to having her in our lives definitely isn't a factor in putting me off having another...

The newborn weeks for me, were really hard.

In fact, they were horrendous. PND hit me like a freight train almost from the moment my hormones kickstarted labour. and i found that really scary as i had no hint of a depressive illness in my life beforehand.

I just wanted to run. i now have moments of serious shame about that and just wish that i didnt have to experience the PND. without i know that i would of had awesome fun! i did a great job with DD!

No one can ever really tell you what it is like, really. It either comes across as a 'horror' story or as a big whinge and nothing more. I think that is why for me joining a mothers group was my saving grace. here i was able to just be. to be with other girls that could barely string a sentence together due to tiredness, we could cry together and laugh together (there was one week where 2 of us managed to stand in cat vomit in the middle of the night on the way to a feed LOL!).

All i can hope for if i do have another baby is to not get pnd!! and also hope that DH will have time off from work, and that i can just be a bit more chillax overall. because 2 years in on this mummy train and i just cant get enough of my gorgeous gal!

Great thread! It is so refreshing to read about the mixed bag of emotions we all feel after having a baby.

I am very new to this, my DD being only 5 weeks old but my experiences so far have been mixed. The first few days were bliss, I was on a real babymoon high. DD slept well, fed well and didn't do much else. However, after the first few days my hormones went a bit crazy, DD decided she wanted to be an angel during the day and the devil at night. She wouldn't sleep and she cried.... a lot! Sometimes all night. DH & I had to take shifts so that we could each get at least a couple of hours sleep here and there. It was horrible, still sore from my c-section I had a baby that wouldn't settle at night and would scream for hours on end. I was exhausted, frustrated and basically at my witts end thinking I would never be able to cope with this. I remember every day thanking my lucky stars that I did not have twins (I'm a twin which is why I kept thinking that). And I clearly remember thinking - why the hell didn't anyone tell me it would be this hard?? Everyone told me I would love it, it was the best thing I could ever do. I wondered did I just have it tougher than everyone else or did they have it easy? My mind was struggling to comprehend why I wasn't forewarned about this nightmare that I was enduring. Then I met some friends of friends who had a 4 month old and they told me exactly how it was! Everything I said that I was going through they had been through as well and they told me just to hang in there as it's the first 6 weeks that are the hardest.

And so, by 4 weeks everything magically started to fall into place. DD started sleeping better at night and the crying diminished. I guess I am very lucky that things started to settle down after only a few weeks, but the tough weeks I did go through were the toughest of my life!!

It was incredibly difficult - I had a c/section and ended up doing everything I shouldn't after about a week, because I'm stubborn and my baby needed me.

Might have been easier had I had a natural birth. Also it was relatively easy with just one baby (no toddler or older child) so I could sleep when baby slept.

The first three days were hell, then i got out of hospital and came home - that was much better without contradicting advice from midwives at the hospital.

It took about 7mths before i could feel like I could use my stomach muscles or lay on my tummy again, wihtout major discomfort... stupid C/section.

But I have got a pretty darn good baby, all things considered. I look forward to the little things though. Definitely easier when they get older.

Fantastic thread.

I look back on those first weeks with mixed feelings, like many others have already said. I didn't take much notice of people dishing out the advice or forewarning me about what life with a bub would be like because I knew that its a different experience for everyone. So I never really believed them or took it on board and after my experience as a first time mummy with a new bubba, I'm not going to try and forewarn any of my girlfriends about what to expect either....because IMO its not until you actually experience it that you really get it.

The first 6 weeks of our life together as a new family were honestly the hardest thing I have ever done. Mostly because I had expectations that never eventuated. I was planning on a natural birth and to be out of hospital quickly, enjoying a blissful babymoon locked up at home with DP and our bub, ignoring the world. Not stuck in hospital for 4 days after an emergency c-section. I expected to breastfeed my baby.....I thought it would be easy....have boobs, will feed baby....when it didn't come naturally as I thought it should and went horribly pear-shaped instead, those first 6 weeks became a blur of expressing, finger feeding, settling an unhappy baby, no sleep, infections & illness..and round and round the cycle goes. I knew about hormones.....but I really knew about hormones when I couldn't stop crying for 2 day straight, both happy & sad tears at the same time.

I have never been so ill & immobilised as I was in those first few weeks after birth. I was a shadow of myself, and the stress and strain was so severe that I actually dipped well below my pre-pregnancy weight within a week of the birth. People didn't recognise me.

But gee I recall those moments of sheer love and devotion that make every little bit of that journey so worth it.

a familiar theme i get from this thread is the 6 week mark being a turning point. and i have to agree!

as a 'newbie' parent, i had NO idea how long the insanity of hormonal overdrive, busty boobie milk machines, lochia, and nightowl baby would last. looking at it from my couch in those first few weeks it seemed that it would be never ending and that was just the deal with babies, and that i would have to 'wait' until DD was a preschooler before things 'got back to normal'...

IMHO i just wish that someone (ie another parent of a young child) would of reassured me that it was all normal and that it wouldnt always be this full on. that it really is those first 6 weeks that can be the hardest as we all learn to adjust to this new way of life (and in DDs case to life outside the womb!).

but that's just me i guess. a friend of mine recently had a baby and when she asked me how i found it at first i was pragmatic i think. i told her that i found it hard, but that yeah, around the 6 week mark i felt more on top of things. i didnt feel the need to rose colour it, NOR to focus on the hardships. because like everyone has said, every experience is different...even to the point that some in my MG found the 6-12 MONTHS the hardest (as opposed to the newborn).

The first 6 weeks were the hardest of my life!! And I had DH home for the first month, plus no trouble with establishing breast feeding. Of course the first few days of DS's life he just slept & fed, but when he woke up...wow :o
He had his days & nights mixed up which I never knew could happen. He had an unsettled period from about 2am that lasted up to 3 hours.
He fed every 90mins - 2hours overnight, which I expected. But I don't think you can comprehend what that actually means until you're going through it. I thought you just fed the baby & that was that - I didn't consider the time it took to feed, the pooing twice per feed, trying to settle him, him NOT settling etc!! And I hope I'm not the only one who didn't realise they were actually going to have to be awake & semi alert during all of this :redface: As I said - cannot comprehend until you're there.
I remember being so tired it would get to about 3pm & I'd start slurring my words!!
I remember feeling like I had made the biggest mistake of my life.
I remember wondering why they don't tell you any of this in the antenatal classes. Not that I would've believed them anyway.
I remember telling my DH that I'd sooner go through the birth 100 times than deal with this (and my DS's birth was long & difficult!!).
DS got a cold when he was 3 weeks old & I was so worried about him!! He kept kinda choking on his mucus & I sat up all night just about, too scared to sleep.
He wouldn't sleep in the day unless I was holding him. Then I bought a bouncer & he'd only sleep in that. Some days I couldn't even manage to get changed outta my pjs.
Then he got to 6 weeks old & everything magically changed. As someone else posted - I too feel jealous when I hear other mothers talk about their wonderful first weeks.
Oops this has turned into abit of a vent for me, sorry girls!!

Great thread!!

If I wasn't at work, I'd post a much longer reply, but honestly I found the first 10 months so so hard!!! I had feeding probs from day one and massive amounts of guilt for putting DD on formula at six weeks. She was a terrible, terrible sleeper which certainly didn't help. It was really quite a blur!! Pre-baby I also thought that I'd be a confident, wonderful mother but the reality was much different!! And that was hard to deal with also.

Things settled down at around 10 months when DD started sleeping much better and I finally felt like I was (for the most part) on top of things.

While I always loved my precious girl, the love I feel for her now, and the bond we share, far outweighs anything I could have imagined. I'm proud that I survived the hard times, and now I can honestly say I love being a mum!!

I'm not too concerned about going for number 2 as I think that I will have more confidence this time (famous last words lol), and I will also be a lot more forgiving of myself if things don't go to plan. Not only that, but if #2 is a poor sleeper, I'll be getting help much earlier than 10 months old!!!!