One unexpected thing that happened to me after birth is that I suddenly cared A LOT about babies and children. A deep primal instinct took over and I wanted to protect every child and mourned for every adult that had something go wrong in childhood. Some of this is probably from my own personality and issues, but some of it was from the hormones that are produced during breastfeeding. They make you pay more attention to your baby. To this day I will usually wake up a little before Cedric wakes up. My body just *knows* when my baby needs me. It's the closest thing I've experienced to having some kind of God or spirit or extrasensory thing happen to me. But it's just good old fashioned hormones.
I wanted to help every baby. When we got home from the hospital there was a lot of crying. I frequently cried, "I feel so bad for all the babies that aren't being breastfed," or "I feel so bad for babies alone in their own room crying." I often had to have Brent change the channel on the TV. I would just burst in to tears about any negative story about a child or baby. Or I would just start yelling, "no, no, no, no, no!" Those were the worst times. I still have some of it now. I just can't read certain sections of the news paper. I don't just get sad about the stories. I get suicidal about the stories. I feel like the world has totally betrayed me and that I don't want to live in a world where such bad things happen.
I get triggered easily too. And I believe I have a much stronger reaction to these breastfeeding hormones than most. I don't see other mom's reacting the same way.
The easiest is responding to my own baby. I have control over that. The worst is when I hear a baby cry in public. In the beginning I would desperately want to go pick up the crying baby and would eventually start to cry if it went on too long. Then eventually I would say, "pick up your baby!" This all still happens today, but to a lesser degree.
I was 7 weeks post partum then my nephew was born. I visited him in the hospital and he was crying. He was not being ignored, in fact mom and dad were holding him and rocking him and feeding him and changing his diaper and basically doing everything to try to calm him. I still was freaking out inside my head and nearly crying. I really had to resist picking him up myself. I couldn't stop myself from trying to pat his head and rub his tummy during a diaper change he was screaming about. I NEEDED to help somehow. I now don't quite have such a reaction. But even today I found myself picking up a crying baby at my ECFE class while his mother was in the bathroom. This, of course, made my baby cry, and I had to hand him off.
I'm trying to learn to let go. To accept that not every baby is as well cared for as Cedric. I try to focus on him and how awesome he will be, but there is only so far that "my child will be better than yours" can take you. I have some very solid parenting beliefs that I know will go unchanged. I strongly believe in breastfeeding, co-sleeping when possible, responding to all cries, elimination communication, baby-led solids, disciplining without punishment, and natural birth.
It's hard to accept that I am not typical, even though the title of my blog is "Not Your Typical Family." When I created this blog, it was long before I realized how far off I was from the mainstream. Most mainstream authors and child "experts" and pediatricians are against the above beliefs or at least do not give very much support for it. Even though I find so many studies that the above things are the best. I don't really blame the mothers, the bad advice is so abundant out there.
For instance, the only reason to spoon-feed a child is if he can't self-feed, which is usually before 6 months of age (and then some practice after that), but they tell you to not give any solids before six months of age... so therefore spoon-feeding should be a thing of the past. Yet most people are told by countless books and doctors that they must spoon-feed. Even though it's way easier to not spoon-feed at all. It's insanity, but I've learned that most people are spoon-feeding and are SUPER nervous about finger foods. The shift is beginning, but I'm still in the minority. And I feel bad for the babies who are not getting the best. I especially feel bad for the babies who are given solids way too early, some of which die from it. Four to six months is questionable, but before 4 months is down-right dangerous. (Even mainstream people are now saying to wait until 6 months)
So I feel a lot of anger at these so called "experts" who give out terrible advice. Mothers need to connect more with their inner gut feeling. My inner gut feeling about Cedric has never been wrong. Even when I get frustrated and feel like giving up or have a melt down or storm out of the room, my gut takes over and quickly brings me back to what I really need to do. Cedric gives me lots of clues as to what he needs too. I follow those as much as possible.
In the post partum period, this gut feeling was unbearable sometimes, because I absolutely had no control over other parents and I felt like most of them were not doing what was best. This blog is my little way of maybe making a difference. Maybe someone will read this and decide to try EC or become more committed to breastfeeding, or will just relax a little bit. My observations of parents are that they need to let go more and not see every thing their kid does as a learning moment or a chance to redirect them to do something better. Sit back and enjoy your child, they are on a journey separate from you.
So, it's all getting better, but I have a feeling that for the rest of my life it will be difficult to hear about child abuse and neglect and mothers not even attempting to breastfeed. I just wish so much better for the world. I wished better for the world before I became a mother, but now it's internalized and has become a deep part of my being. I cherish it, but it has brought me lots of pain too. But I believe it will make me a better mother and a better human than I was before.
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