After the first weeks support group meeting many of the new moms go to a nearby coffee shop to chat. I was talking to a woman whose baby is a few weeks older than Jack. She wondered why no one ever told her how hard breastfeeding would be. We wondered why no one could ever adequately explain how hard all of it was going to be. She offered that maybe people felt she would not be able to handle the truth .. or, that if they told her and she fully understood maybe she, gasp, would choose not to have a child. We then went on a tangent about how condenscending that attutide was. But I was thinking later about how many times people had told me labor or baby "horror" (my word) stories and how I commiserated with other pregnant women about this strange phenomenon of people feeling compelled to tell us bad news. Now I think maybe they were just telling the truth and it wasn't what we wanted to hear. All of these stories came from other women.
I think my hormones have finally mellowed out and I am adjusting to my new life with jack. I know my blog has been depressing but many (not all) of my early experiences have been sad. I am not going to lie about that just so other people can be comfortable with my situation and think it fits in with some idyllic societal motherhood fantasy. Sadness is a part of life. That is the truth.
Me and Jack chillin
No comments:
Post a Comment