The Fight

As I stepped outside today I couldn’t help but breathe in every ounce of cool air that my body would allow. Focusing on breathing in the new season and exhaling old ones. For the last few months I have been dreading fall. Yes FALL, my favorite season of the year. And yes, Theo is about to turn one and that has my mommy heart hurting and jumping for joy at the same time, but it’s more than that. 

Did you know that smell is one of the strongest memory triggers? 

For me, fall is filled with the smell of crisp air, fallen leaves, sweater weather candles, and pumpkin everything. They were the smells I waited all year for (and on occasion broke into out of season because they brought me a sense of calm.) I fell in love with my husband in the fall, I got married in the fall, and perhaps most importantly I welcomed my little boy to the world in the fall. But what happened once he arrived was something I couldn’t have expected. 

No textbook, doctor, seminar speaker, or veteran momma could have prepared me for what postpartum would feel like. 

So when I say that I worried my first breath of fall air would fill me with unwanted emotions I meant it. I never did publicly share much about my postpartum journey. It always felt so heavy, something I could carry but that didn’t need to weigh others down. Something that weighed me down so much at times I struggled to raise my hand to tell my story. 

As we enter into a new season, and a year has passed and my precious baby is about to turn one, even though I am still fighting my postpartum illness and mental health everyday, I feel that sharing my story is a way for me to gain closure on those emotions. It is my hope that sharing my experience can help me feel all of the joy, relieve the pain, and help me to let go of any regret I may still hold. 

Most of you already know about my birth story. 38 weeks with gestational diabetes, 36 hours of labor, 1cm, c-section, 5lb 9oz baby, blood sugar concerns, a short NICU stay, tongue ties, lack of milk production, difficulty latching, etc. 

When I was preparing for labor, birth and motherhood I really tried to keep my expectations clear and conservative. I knew some women had trouble breastfeeding and as much as I told myself “if you can’t that’s okay” deep down I knew that if I couldn’t it could break me. I wanted that so bad for my baby, and for myself. Through my struggles I had to adapt and that was something with the surge of hormones I was not strong enough to do without falling apart a little. 

Lactation appointment after lactation appointment in the hospital and following ended in tears. It ended in disappointment, fear it would never work, exhaustion, and resentment of my birthing journey because I truly believed that the early delivery and the c-section made it near impossible for this to work. But still I tried, every two hours to feed, then pump, then sleep, then feed, then pump some more. 

My body was responding horribly to the pain medication I was convinced it was causing more harm than good so I stopped taking it pretty soon after coming home from the hospital. While in the hospital during a breakdown when they took my baby away for the longest I’d been away from him in 9 months, I couldn’t sleep and wouldn’t eat. The nurses tried to prescribe a Xanax but I refused. They ended up giving me Benadryl just so I could sleep. Medication was not something I wanted to rule my day, but I’d just had major abdominal surgery and a large part of me was delivered leaving what felt like a very empty space. It didn’t feel like he was ready and I felt guilty for having GD and having to deliver him early. Eventually I asked the doctor for a Zoloft prescription and they obliged. 

If there was one phrase that was constantly in my head and in my heart through these difficult moments it was “you have to take care of yourself in order to take care of your baby.” Of course once I got home I wanted to be sure that I wasn’t just experiencing baby blues and that taking Zoloft was the right option. I’d heard it could affect milk production and I was already struggling so much I didn’t want to add that to the docket as well.

Little did I know I was in for an even more shocking discovery that would send me into my spiral. 

During my lactation appointment soon after I returned home the pediatrician came in to deliver news that my baby’s newborn tests had revealed that he had a genetic marker for Cystic Fibrosis. My heart stopped for a moment and I couldn’t even hear what she was saying beyond that- all I could do was hug my baby and pray it wasn’t true. It didn’t matter that there was only a 5% chance he had it, it broke me in a way I’ll never forget.

Catatonic.

After that I became catatonic. My husband wasn’t with me when I received the news and I had no idea how I was going to tell him that our perfect boy could have a life altering condition. A condition in which he had known closely and had recently buried a friend who had the condition. (Thankfully we learned later in our journey that he did not have CF)

I remember is lying on the bathroom floor after throwing up and crying and wondering if my mom and my husband should take me to the hospital. My body didn’t feel like my own, and my heart was breaking in a million ways, I was trying to rationalize to pull myself out but nothing worked. All my old tricks to pull me from the depression didn’t work. Even today, as I feel like that person was not me, as I feel like I was having an out of body experience, I’ll never forget that feeling. The feeling of absolute disillusionment, of feeling like I had no control over my thoughts, my emotions or my body. I remember being forced to sit at the kitchen table, take my Zoloft and eat. One piece of lettuce at a time. I had no appetite, and I was drowning in fear that these emotions would never let up.

One thing I always held onto was my absolute love for my child. My love for my husband, and my love and gratefulness for the people who went out of their way to help me through. 

For the next few days I waited anxiously for the Zoloft to begin working, but I felt like I was moving through mud, every moment consumed with fear and my thoughts completely controlling me. Intrusive thoughts controlled me, and my tears felt like they were never going to stop. I could burst out crying at any moment for no reason, or maybe reasons I wasn’t ready to vocalize yet. My mom stayed with me that week, my husband constantly going out his way to get me things he knew I enjoyed, and me wanting so badly to want those things-but falling short everytime. I had this feeling of inadequacy and sadness that I couldn’t respond to his efforts better. 

As I moved through the overwhelming sadness I found that I couldn’t take naps during the day because I’d simply wake up to panic attacks and even in the morning it would take every ounce of strength in me to get up and to move from the bed to the chair. 

And I remember all these things in sadness but I also remember the things that pulled me out of it. Yes of course my husband but honestly? More than that, it was my baby. He pulled me out of every panic attack - all I needed was for him to lay on my chest, the slow breathing of his sleep, the calmness of his demeanor, and his weight on my chest seemed to break up all the panic. I remember begging for him in the middle of the day becauae when I was the most broken, his mere presence put me back together. And that is something that is truly the most beautiful thing I’ve ever experienced.

I never thought I would get through that time I remember praying that if I had to go to the hospital that there would be a drug, or a shot of hormones that would stop me from feeling this way. And I now know the only way to get through is to hold your baby close, squeeze them tight and pray. Pray for strength, pray for good weather to help you get out of the house, pray that support comes to you in ways you may not expect it. 

I don’t know that I’ll ever stop fighting postpartum. 

Because postpartum is not just the moments after birth and that first incredibly difficult week. It’s not just the fourth trimester. It’s not just filled with fears of being enough, or providing well. It’s not just the feelings of letting go of the way you thought things were going to go and holding onto the things that have to be and that are best for your baby. It’s not just baby blues, or bursting out crying, it’s not the pain of post labor, it’s not the waiting for the milk to come in, or the waiting for answers, or the paralyzing anxiety that kept me awake at night praying to God not to take my precious baby in the middle of the night. It’s not JUST feeling like you could do absolutely everything right and you could still lose your child. 

No that’s not JUST what postpartum is. 

Postpartum is felt in every transition your child makes. From the first time they smile, to learning how to clap, roll over, crawl, stand. It’s in every laugh, tear and bumped head. I don’t know what the future holds, but I know that my journey is not over just because he turned one. I know I will continue to feel everything as if it’s a first time feeling. I will continue to fight my anxieties and try to calm my fears. As he begins talking and walking I will remember that my body created this extraordinary human and everything I put into my life from here on out will influence him. 

So for my sweet boy I promise him this. I promise him that I will continue to fight my postpartum anxiety without losing sight of my love for my postpartum journey. I promise never to feel broken but that if I ever do, to remember one hug from him can put me back together. I promise him to never have regrets from my fourth trimester to remember that the moments we spent together, contact napping, feeding, playing, cuddling created this unique connection that I will cherish forever. But perhaps most importantly I promise to always be present for him,always be here for him, and to never forget that he saved me.