I had a Baby and I guess I’m Ok
Tags: Quarantine, Motherhood, Pandemic, Birth, New Mom

I had a Baby and I guess I’m Ok

Yesterday I cried. It was one of those nights, that you experience as a new mom when your newborn is crying all night and you have tried the feeding, the diaper change, the burping, the rocking your child while walking around in circles around the living room for what seems to be hours and nothing is working. It’s one of many nights that may be like this as both my child and I settle into this new life together. It would be one of those anecdotes I share with friends that are expecting in the future just like my family and friends shared with me. That night when all you can do is cry because you are overwhelmed and there seems to be no solution. I’m a shower crier. I don’t like to cry in front of others. I don’t like burdening others with my emotional baggage so I work through things on my own. I cry in the shower and I write and I keep both to myself.

Thanks to my husband who took over the “find out whats wrong with our newborn” duties, I was able to briefly escape and head into the shower where I would have a good cry and move on with my night. As the tears started streaming down my face and mixing with the water from the shower, I started to feel all of these different emotions. It had occurred to me that since I had the baby, I had been operating on pure adrenaline. I was on this constant “fight or flight” mode for seven days since my water broke and I had walked into the hospital and I had not come down until this very moment.

I started to process everything that I had experienced at the hospital a few days ago. I replayed the events in my head from beginning to end like I was processing some sort of trauma. And it was traumatic. So why do I feel so guilty saying that? For most of my life, women would speak about pregnancy and child birth like it was the most beautiful experience one can go through. And I agree that it is absolutely the best feeling in the world to feel a life growing inside of you. I built the most incredible bond with my daughter as she was in my belly, way before she was born. It was absolutely magical. But to speak about this experience and say that it was “beautiful” and just leave it at that would be doing a disservice to those women who have not gone through this experience.

In my case, as a mother delivering a child during the current pandemic, I had an extra layer of stress to add. When I pictured my delivery experience, I had always pictured my mom there as well as my partner of course. I pictured family waiting in the waiting room with excitement for news that beautiful baby had been finally born! Well…due to the coronavirus there was non of that. I had been informed a few weeks ago that the hospital would not be allowing visitors during my stay. Not having my mom there was a tough pill to swallow but I knew that these safety precautions were in place for our protection so I accepted it. For a brief moment I was informed that I would have to give birth completely alone as the hospital had decided to ban partners in the delivery room as well. This was THANKFULLY reversed by the Governor before I gave birth but during my labor I couldn’t help but think about it every time my husband held my hand when I was getting a contraction, or every time he made me drink water or forced me to eat Jello. What would I have done if he hadn’t been there?

After 20 hours of labor and a few minutes of pushing, my little girl was finally placed on my chest. I can’t explain the emotions I felt to finally meet the little human that had been moving inside my body for months. After what felt like a few minutes (although I’m not really sure how long it really was) of skin to skin, my baby was grabbed by the nurses put under lights, inspected, poked, flipped, needless to say after being in the quiet safety of my womb and thrust into the world in this manner, she was absolutely terrified.

By this point, my epidural was slowly fading. I started to shiver and it became progressively worse as the time went by. I started to feel all of the pain that the epidural had numbed me from before. The catheter that had been placed in my body hours earlier was removed and I was asked to see if I could use the restroom on my own. I couldn’t. After my failed attempt in the restroom, I walked out and caught a glimpse of my husband holding our baby, who had fallen asleep in his arms. She finally felt safe again. Once again, the thought came into my mind…What would this scene have looked like if my husband had not been here?

The nurse turned to my husband and said “not to kick you out, but you’re aware that you can’t stay at the hospital after the labor, correct?” He knew. We both knew and I thought I had emotionally prepared for this but I guess I hadn’t prepared enough because in this moment, I felt absolutely distraught. I sat in a wheel chair ready to be rolled away to my room for the next 2 days. My baby was rolled in a bassinet next to me. I said my goodbyes to my husband and I thought to myself “how am I going to do this?”

At this point, my pain was at a 10. I could barely move and the idea of taking care of a newborn baby, something I had never done before, seemed absolutely impossible. I knew I had no choice and all that was left for me to do was pull through. I asked for pain medication and put my “big girl panties” on for the next 2 days. I put a brand new pair of “big girl panties” when I arrived home and I have had them on ever since.