A new mom breaks the notion of pregnancy being touted as a magical period

Why going through childbirth and immediately having to nurture and nurse a newborn while also resting and healing can be a traumatic experience for first-time mothers

Pregnancy is considered to comprise three trimesters, or a period of nine months. I used to think that too. I believed that it was a nine-month-long rollercoaster that would magically end once the baby was born, and that my life would somehow go back to being the same (minus a few “minor”) adjustments. Then I got pregnant, went through the three trimesters, and delivered a baby, but the rollercoaster did not stop.

Having a baby is a true trial-by-fire experience. Your body is literally splitting open to let an entire human out—a human you created from scratch inside you. Down to every muscle, bone, tissue and cell in your body, you’re experiencing trauma. You go through childbirth and then you have to heal while also resting, nursing and ensuring you provide your baby with the most conducive early attachment opportunities so as to not ruin them for the rest of their lives.

My therapist helped me define it as “trauma,” and I don’t use that word lightly. I’m healing not only from what post-partum brought up, but also what it may have brought up from my past, along with the guilt, frustration and anger that comes with it. There’s a fear that I’m working through right now that I might never want to have another child—biologically, at least—because I don’t want to put my body through this again.

Getting there

My pregnancy was a beautiful journey. Despite a few weeks of intermittent nausea, it felt like a breeze for the most part. There were some days filled with anxiety, worry and fear. But there were many more moments of calm and joy. I was working, exercising, eating right, reading to my belly, playing music to it, resting and, overall, giving my body and baby the best. I was growing and glowing. I felt positive. I was naïve enough to think I would somehow be able to continue this balance post-delivery too.

My labour, on the other hand, was long and excruciating. It ended with an episiotomy. My episiotomy stitches—which normally take a week to heal—didn’t heal for a month. I was in too much pain to sit, which made it difficult for me to breastfeed. A process which so many mothers describe as a beautiful bonding experience was only riddled with anxiety for me. Every time my son was being fed (10 times a day!), it was a reminder of how slowly my body was recovering. I was struggling with fissures, gut issues and anxiety—it was a difficult time, and the healing became that much slower.

The physical healing was difficult, but so was what was going on in my head. I began to compare myself to other mothers and almost envy those that had it “easy”. I couldn’t enjoy the simple moments of being a new mom because I was preoccupied with my own body. I couldn’t find any inner strength, and felt guilty about that. I felt guilty about not being able to do much for my son. I felt guilty about spending so much of my mental energy on my own recovery. I felt sad and angry, and then felt guilty about feeling sad and angry.

Figuring things out

There’s a lack of support for women post-partum in terms of sharing what is real. The fourth trimester is painted to be a magical time full of love—everything smells good, tastes good, feels good and looks good. But it’s harder than I ever thought. Nobody teaches you how to deal with how you feel then. You know how to breastfeed and how to eat, but the emotional aspect is a different ballgame—nobody teaches you how to be a mother, and how to focus on your own healing while keeping a new human being alive.

Six months after I had a baby, I went back to work. I’m a therapist, so my patients need a hundred percent of my attention when I’m working with them. I had to figure out a way to give myself permission to disconnect for eight hours of the day so I could do my job, and be a good mother at the same time. That’s a lot of emotional wrangling to have to deal with, and it's a lot to do with the social conditioning we’ve been given about what being a good mother really is.

I’m working on reminding myself that prioritising your baby and prioritising work can look multiple different ways; it can look as many ways as there are mothers in the world. Being a mom is literally that—it’s doing something new. We’re not good at being comfortable in the unknown, or in newness. I needed to reframe motherhood as an experience, or a new job that I’m learning to do without struggling with new-mom burnout.

Being a therapist definitely helps me make sense of my experience. It has enabled me to give words to it and access the appropriate resources for the help I know I need. It has made me understand so much about myself. The anxiety, the pain, and the state of being overwhelmed I feel right now are pieces of luggage I have carried before. This new experience and phase has made them resurface. The fourth trimester, having a baby, being a mother—these have not only helped me work through what is surfacing right now but also given me the impetus to dig deeper and heal all the layers of my being. Or at least as many as I can right now. I want to do that to be able to heal myself but at the same time, be the best version of myself I can for my son.

As told to Avanti Dalal

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