Motherhood

Dealing with Postpartum OCD & Intrusive Thoughts

Photo by Sydney Sims on Unsplash

May was Mental Health Awareness Month, so I wanted to talk about something that I’ve been struggling with over the course of my pregnancy and postpartum experience. I’ve been working on this post for a while since I’ve been trying to find ways to cope, which is why it’s a little late. I was also a little hesitant to share as part of what I’m going to talk about. This has a way of isolating you, making you think you’re crazy. It’s something that I don’t think is talked about enough. Trigger warning- I talk about postpartum OCD, anxiety and depression.

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A sleep update: how to deal with sleep changes

A few weeks ago I posted about how I got Max to sleep through the night at only four months old. I was pretty proud of myself and really thought I had it all figured out! A few of my mom friends texted me asking if it was true- and it really was! Up to that day, Max had been sleeping through the night because I was following the Moms on Call schedule and doing things I had posted about in that blog post. But as soon as I pushed publish on that post, Max stopped sleeping through the night. I felt so silly! I had just told all of my readers and friends that I had all these methods of getting Max to sleep, and suddenly in one night they all failed me. I feel like it’s important to post this though because motherhood is not linear. What works one day is not going to work the next every time, and as a new mom, that’s something it’s taken me a while to learn. I’m not used to things being so up and down, but Max has other plans, and that’s okay! Being a new mama is a learning experience every day.

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How we got our baby to sleep through the night

When you’re pregnant, one thing so many people will say to you is “enjoy your sleep while you can!” Totally terrifying. You mean I’m not going to sleep ever again like a normal person? When does that end? How are other parents doing it? I still have to go to work on no sleep?? That sounds AWFUL. But I’m here to tell you that it’s not totally true. There will be some nights you don’t sleep as much as you would have before you were a mom, but your nights of sleeping are not over.

I was walking with one of my new mom friends when Max was about a month old, and we were comparing notes about how our babies sleep. She told me about how her baby slept almost all the way through the night from the beginning, but since I was struggling a little bit she told me that one of her friends had told her about this book called “Moms on Call“. She told me it was a pretty strict regimen, with rules about everything from how long babies can eat, to what they have in their room, to how long their naps can be. I decided to look into it just to see what the schedule might look like since so many people told me that I should get Max on a schedule anyway, and I didn’t really know what a schedule for a baby should look like.

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Six things to stop saying to pregnant women

Everyone is super excited when a family announces that they are pregnant. A lot of parents talk about how fun it is to be a parent and how life gets so much better when you add a baby to the mix. BUT sometimes in everyone’s excitement, people can say things that they don’t realize are stressing the mama-to-be out!

Photo by Camylla Battani on Unsplash

I’m going to blame the hormones for this, but when I was pregnant, with everything that a lot of people told me, I was pretty nervous my life was going to suck after I had Max. I thought I’d be like 500 pounds, a sleepless zombie, and that being a mom was going to be the hardest thing in the world in the worst way possible. I’m happy to report that none of these things happened. Being a mom is actually awesome, despite what everyone had me believing while I was pregnant. It’s not always sunshine and rainbows, but it’s not the hell that some people will lead you to believe. So I put together this list of things to stop saying to pregnant mamas, because even with good intentions or saying these things light heartedly, you could be really scaring them! Here are the top six things to stop saying:

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11 things that surprised me about postpartum

I thought I had a lot of surprises when I was pregnant, so I felt like I was pretty ready for postpartum and all of the changes that would come. I was ready to be back in my body and have everything be normal again. I knew about postpartum hair loss, to expect to look pregnant for a while after, but I mostly thought I would deflate and might be a little hormonal.

Some of those things did happen, but there was a lot that surprised me once I finally reached the postpartum stage. For the most part I was too wrapped up in learning how to be a new mom for any of these to be too crazy annoying, but nonetheless I think it’s important to talk about all these things because it seems like not many people do. So many people talk about how to care for your new baby, products you might need for postpartum, products you need for your baby, but not too many people go into detail about what exactly might happen once you are in the postpartum phase. So here are some things that took me by surprise:

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Bringing home a newborn in a pandemic

Disclaimer- I am not a medical professional in any way; the things that I talk about in this post are simply what I’ve learned from my own research and doctors and how we’ve taken the information and used it during this time. Please consult your pediatrician and physician to find out what is best for you and your baby as far as Covid guidelines.

Pandemic newborn sign
Photo by LOGAN WEAVERon Unsplash

Bringing a newborn home is scary. I remember driving home from the hospital in the back seat kind of panicking that now we were responsible for this baby. It’s a crazy feeling. When we got home I sat in the car for a while before I went into the house, just sort of processing what was going to be our new life of caring for a child. And on top of the regular anxiety of caring for a newborn, new parents are dealing with a whole other level of responsibility, because now we have to try to keep our babies safe, and figure out how to bring home a newborn in a pandemic.

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