Confessions of a new born mom

My daughter was born on March 27th 2025 on a Thursday afternoon at 2.07pm. It was an unexpected birth. I was in my last month of pregnancy and was anxious for delivery, waiting for the signs and staying alert in case I missed the signs of labor. On the morning my daughter was born, I woke up as usual, had a heavy breakfast and was ready to start the day with some light exercises. Before I could begin my sister called asking how I am and if my baby is kicking, i told her yes she is but her movements have decreased. She immediately asked me to contact my doctor which I did, texted him saying is it normal that my baby’s movements have decreased. He replied back saying no it is not, come to the hospital now. I got ready and went to see him. He did a test which checked the baby’s heartbeat and I didn’t know what was going on as I lay there on the hospital bed. When he finally came he sounded worried and mumbled something to the nurses which i couldn’t understand. He asked me to meet him in his room. He explained to me that my baby is in distressed. I still didn’t understand what that meant, I asked again and he said the decreased movements could be because of lack of space for baby to move so he called another specialist for second opinion and the other doctor said this is not good, the baby is in distressed and needs to be taken out. Hearing those words made me froze and I still don’t understand what he meant by take it out. I wasn’t expecting him to take the baby out on that very day because I was expecting to meet my baby in April as planned but plans changed.

So they prepped me up for the surgery, different things were going through my mind. Am I ready for this? Do I want this now? But I just mustered up my strength and allowed them to prep me for the surgery. After the prep I was transferred onto a stretcher and was rolled down the elevator where I saw my mom crying and I didn’t want to cry as I still wasn’t sure what was going on, I mean this is my first pregnancy. I was wheeled to the OT and they got me ready. Someone came up to me and explained about the spinal injection to numb my body hips down. I had to lay still and curled like a ball, that was the scariest part of the entire thing. That got over and the real thing happened. All I could hear was my body moving, I couldn’t see anything of course cause I was covered waist down. I could feel them cutting me open and I was nervous to meet my baby, I didn’t know if it was going to be a boy or a girl as in India the law prohibits women from knowing the sex of the baby until birth. Before they took out my baby, the doctor asked me if I wanted a girl or a boy and I answered a girl, he said congratulations it is a girl. In that instance tears rolled down and I was overjoyed. I could barely hear her crying but he was very loud that her screams could be heard outside of the room. The nurse showed her to me and I didn’t react, I just looked at her and I did nothing, I just smiled. When thinking about it now I should have hugged her and put her on my chest so she could feel my heartbeat and I could feel hers. The nurse took her to the baby room to get her cleaned up, meanwhile the doctors were sewing me back together like a torned up toy.

They rolled me out to my room and outside I saw my mom, my husband and my sister. They all congratulated me for being a new mom. So the hospital stay was rough, couldn’t move an inch cuz I was still paralysed. After 3 days I was released from the hospital to go back home. I was excited to take her home and introduce her to my family. As I reached home, my sister’s daughter and my brother’s daughters were waiting to greet my little baby girl. I was showered with gifts and the excitement of the little ones. It was chaos on that first day, of course I was a new mom. After I showered and breastfed my baby I thought wow this is the new life, I switched on the tv to continue with my old normal life but this didn’t last long. She would get up and cry and I fed her and my mom helped changed her because i couldn’t bend yet. I didn’t realise how hard it was going to be until she was a week old when she would get up every 30 minutes to feed and changing her every one hour, it was tough and hectic. I didn’t know taking care of a baby was this tough. I was weak, sleep deprived and depressed. Everything around me when dark and I felt like I was drowning. Later did I know that I was under post partum depression.

I was too depressed to enjoy motherhood at that moment. Hated the feeling so much that I hated myself, I wanted my old life back, I wanted the freedom to do what ever I wanted at any given time. I looked at my daughter I felt nothing but anger. I felt like I was in prison and my daughter has held me captive since the day she was born. For a month I hated the responsibility of motherhood and my daughter kept waking up after every 30 minutes, changed her after every hour and I was doing it alone as my husband snores away into the night. It was hard and I would confine in friends who went through the same thing and they gave me courage and strength to carry on and I will be forever grateful for them. I confided in my husband but he showed me no emotion so I stopped and my depression got worse. There were nights I would have to sleep on a recliner because she refused to sleep on the bed. I would wake up with neck pain but i couldn’t complain because as a mother you should not complain about caring for your child. For a month and a half I would only sleep on the recliner so she would sleep in peace. My husband and I would take turns but I still had to get up and feed her so I barely got any sleep. It was the hardest thing I ever had to deal with. There were times I’ve had thoughts of giving her up for adoption because I just couldn’t handle it anymore. I wanted to give her up so I could sleep again, go out again whenever I want. I looked at her and I feel no love for her those first 6 weeks she was with me. I would cry every single day because I felt like my life as been robbed by her and I was grieving my old self in order to welcome the new version of me that I wasn’t ready to welcome.

Two months has passed and I was healing and my daughter was doing fine too. When she was two months and half things got better, I was better. Now my daughter is finally sleeping on the bed, breastfed whenever she’s hungry, at night she sleeps well and I thank God for giving me the strength to carry on. There were days I would look forward to having one more kid so she won’t be alone and there were days I would shut down the idea entirely. So the debate goes on in my head till now of a second child but I won’t say yes nor say no, time will tell and if it’s meant to be it will be.

I know millions of moms go through worse than what I went through but we all have our own experiences and this is me sharing mine. I hated it at first, now I’m tolerating it and soon I will master it. All that’s been said I love my daughter with all my heart.