A non-student, not writing for a living, blogs. : post-partum anxiety and self-denial

As I've mentioned before, S was hospitalized soon after he was born. The time at the hospital was stressful but more bearable in some ways than the second return to home, because at least then, I had a legitimate reason for not doing anything.

Ready for Home-->Take 2

The transition to motherhood felt like it was delayed for three weeks after S's birth. (Almost as if he was born on his due date). More sleep-deprived than ever, we were relieved to finally be in the comfort of our own home. I would have to make my own meals and clean up after myself again, but at least I would have a full-sized bed and I wouldn't be woken by nurses or beeping machines that needed to be "flushed." S would be right by our bed in his little bassinet and I would be able to redouble my efforts to nurse him (as it was still very painful) without worrying about flashing a nurse.

Though S was a fairly easy baby--in the sense that he usually cried for a reason I could attend to and would stop crying when I met those needs--I was still operating at high stress levels. What had kept me alert and ready to go at the hospital fed a voracious beast at home. I was in survival mode during peacetime.

I remember how hard it was for me to leave the room the days before he would watch for me. He would be contentedly lying on the ground and my stomach would grumble. I would think, "Well, I could go eat something, but what if he starts to cry?" After 30 or so minutes of putting it off, I would feel the burn of my stomach acid working to digest non-existent food, and I would finally run to the kitchen, grab a granola bar and a glass of milk, and hurry back over. I was so relieved every time I saw him right where I left him, alive and happy. Hunger abated and baby safe, my anxiety would then subside for the next little while. Going to the bathroom was a similar routine and it was easier to refrain since my I had room in my abdomen for a bladder as a non-pregnant person. I didn't watch TV (for fear of S becoming too familiar with the TV), I tried to not look at my phone (for similar reasons), and I didn't want to read (for fear that S would think I was ignoring him). He had literally all of my attention.

The doctor told us to not bring him to Walmart or church until he was three months old and we were more than happy to keep him safe. The downside was that I was stuck home and worried about every visitor. I had to actively stop myself from asking people if they had gotten their flu shot. I tortured myself with articles of infants/young children dying from catching diseases from children who were not vaccinated and very nearly went on a pro-vaccinations social media campaign. (I still fill strongly about getting vaccines, but I'm a little less obsessed than I was.) I determined we would never go anywhere populated until S was at least a year old and had most his vaccines.

Besides the fear of S catching another deadly disease, I was afraid of every other pathway to death. I had this unshakable sense of foreboding whenever I picked my husband up from his school five minutes away. We would into a car accident, and if not a car accident something else would shatter our lives. I had this strong belief that God had mercifully given us S for only a few more months but would take him away soon. Was today the day? He was like an overdue book and I would pray, "Just a little longer."

Imagine living like this for months. I didn't even have the excuse of a demanding baby, but I acted like I did. It's hard to explain it when the storm has passed, but I do remember wishing I could just get away. My husband would get home and I would hand him the baby and eat a double serving of dinner (or make dinner and THEN eat a bit more than two servings), take a shower, sequester myself in the corner of the living room, and just stare at my phone and push away the guilt. He was more than happy to take over and it was always nice to hear his excitement in the other room. I would borrow that energy to keep me motivated for the next day.

At night, I would often dream of being a single student with no responsibilities only to be woken in the middle of the night by S's cries. When I didn't dream of escape, I dreamt of death--usually baby or husband dying. The song You are My Sunshine made me cry every time I sang the line, "Please don't take my sunshine away," and I eventually decided to sing other lullabies. I cried to my husband about feeling trapped and he didn't get it. Of course he didn't get it; he was gone the whole day! I even tried talking to other stay-at-home-moms about it, and while most were very understanding and empathetic, their understanding of "feeling trapped" seemed different than what I was experiencing.

Around the time that S was 3 months old, I went in to my doctor for mastitis. He asked me a few questions about life and some of my stress leaked out of my eyeballs. I was given a post-partum depression screener and I was prescribed Zoloft for post-partum anxiety.

The best way to describe my experience with taking this drug would be to compare it to turning down the volume. Prior to taking Zoloft, it was almost like someone was shouting warnings all the time in my brain (Brain: "Don't put him down there! Something might happen!" "I have a bad feeling, you should leave soon!" "We should double wash his bottles--it's not safe!"). With the Zoloft, it was like the red alert sirens suddenly became background noise, and because it was in the background, I could ignore it or be more critical of these thoughts (Critical thoughts: "Whoah, that was random. Not listening to that "warning.") I felt suddenly normal again. I started to notice the little things I used to notice like the way the breeze would shift the tree branches outside the window. I would hear the firetrucks or police sirens and ignore them as they sped down the street, my heart rate fluttering initially but keeping a normal pace otherwise. The neighborhood went back to being predictable and boring as it should be, and I was free. Well, freer. It still took me a while to test my prison (in my mind) and get out of the cage, but I could get up and do things without feeling unbearably anxious about my son's life. Life got better.

I started using more of the skills I had learned as a therapist to manage those automatic thoughts to cope with my anxiety. With the anxiety in the background, I realized that there was something else lurking there beside the anxiety: I had embraced a new schema of self-denial. Somehow I had reasoned that a good mother lives a life of self-denial and had never questioned it. While good parents inevitably deny themselves of many things, I had taken for granted that moms just give up any sense of self. My anxiety about not leaving my child to take bathroom breaks was simply a more compelling reason to adopt this new schema--the self-denying mother.

Is that crazy?

The realization hit me one day when I was playing my keyboard beside my baby. While I had gotten the keyboard out to get back into my interests, I was dutifully teaching him cause and effect and also hoping to inspire him to like music. I enjoyed this exercise--his excited interruptions, slapping the keys--but as soon as he lost interest, I thought, "Well that was enough for today." I hadn't even got to playing any music for myself even though I had a window of opportunity. Now even my hobby belonged solely to my baby and his learning experience.

I guess you could describe it as a mental shift. While I still engaged in my interests and hobbies, they were framed in terms of his benefit. Why was I practicing my guitar? Not for my own pleasure, but for his learning and growth. Why was I exercising? Not to be a happy human--to be an energetic mom. Activities that did not benefit my baby in some way were harder to find time for. (I should clarify: doing things for the benefit of your child is always a good motivator even if it an activity you love in and of itself, but that should never engulf your self-motivated passion/interest. For those tending toward self-effacing, think of it like this: What would you rather have (a) a passionate teacher who gets excited about the material and nearly forgets the student while teaching, or (b) a teacher who is focused on just teaching and is more interested in thoroughness than interest. I know the former is more inspiring.)

I would hazard to guess that my experience is not unique, though maybe less extreme than I'm describing. I have felt a thread of this in the culture of my church. I grew up hearing this refrain of "sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice," and it was almost never paired with "enjoy, grow, thrive." The conversation has since changed and I hear more and more about taking care of the individual inside the mother (imagine that, a mother who is also an individual) and I eat it up. Despite the shift, there was a poisonous belief that I had let take root.

I think it's also partly my own mother's selfless example. I often felt like she had let go of her interests and passions to be a mother, and while I knew she loved us (more than herself), I often felt like she was giving up too much and unhappy for it. It's no wonder that I dreaded having children one day. Though excited to have unlimited access to a cute baby, I bore my child with the expectation to give up a part of my identity, and what a sad, unnecessary sacrifice. Luckily, it was short-lived. I pruned in the garden of my brain, my schema, and took an honest look at myself. I needed all of me to be a good mom, let alone a happy human.

It took me a while to not feel guilty about having a mind that was not singly devoted to my baby. It also took me a while to work through my anxiety. I still have moments where that feeling of foreboding comes but I try to not let it upstage other thoughts. I really should have seen a therapist for some help with that, but I did make some progress. I eventually got to this point where I put all my housekeeping stress to the side and delved into projects--Coursera, painting a new dresser, decorating S's room, planning out a children's picture book, etc. The house was a mess for a couple weeks, but I don't regret it even a little. I'm still working on all those projects and I'm much more motivated about completing them since they're all already started.

It probably sounds like I was just miserable those first few months. I can't say I was completely miserable, just not fully living. (Though, I've heard that's not uncommon with how sleep-deprived you are when they're that little.) The trapped feeling I had mostly came from my mind--both the anxiety and that spirit of denial. I did have plenty of joy in the midst of my mind prison and all the deprivation.

A bit about S...

From the beginning, S was very curious about his body and his surroundings. I remember him staring at his hands and observing his fingers move (much like an alien inhabiting a new body). He would also notice tiny objects or minute details that were close by and gently brush his fingers against those things before developing the grab-everything-in-sight reflex. He may have lacked the fine motor skills, but he was so patient about trying to manipulate those little fingers. Even after his vision expanded, he would still stare at those hands. His hands became something of a safe haven for him; when the environment overstimulated him, he would go back to staring at them. I love that image of him staring down at his hands, large cheeks bulging, and his little fingers slowly moving or touching the object of his attention. (As a rule, I always interrupt his focus and smoosh his face with a kis--at least 10 kisses).

S has also always been determined. He usually won't get discouraged when there are obstacles in his way and has learned how to ask for assistance from me. When S was younger than 6 months old, he was oblivious to our interference of his objectives (e.g., rolling off the bed, taking away our phones from his reach) and so it was easy to continually jump in the way. He got really good at finding alternate routes and we had to get creative. Nowadays he can see right through our sabotage and he will give us a talking to for interfering.

S is a very social baby. In role-playing terms, that kid has high charisma. He has always smiled easy, he loves copying noises (and knows how to make 5 different types of raspberries), he can lure us back to his crib by making false excited high pitched noises, and he has the best fake laugh ever. He knows how to charm anybody who passes the grocery cart by smiling, tilting his head, and babbling in the most adorable, cliche way.

I call this one "Distressed"