"How's your baby?"
My frequently-asked-question nowadays. Gone are the days when people are more interested in asking about me, tsk.
"Baby's okay, mother je tak okay"
Yup, I kid you not. I wasn't okay.
I can't quite put it in words, this roller coaster of emotions called motherhood. If I were to be completely honest about what I feel, I'm pretty sure I'll be judged as an ungrateful brat. All I can say is I am well aware that this is not going to be easy, but I didn't know it's going to be this hard either.
The first few weeks were the hardest. I spent my days without the danna at my mom's place while she took care of my pantang. All I can remember about my stay there is me crying so much day and night cos #1. Handling a newborn is no easy feat and without danna around it fees like I'm handling our child on my own #2. I miss danna A LOT. And of cos #3. Crazy hormones.
Some days passed like a breeze, some nights seem longer but almost everyday feels like a never ending nightmare for me. Hearing my baby's cries around the clock turned me into a quick-tempered, helpless mom-ster. I've lost count the number of times I screamed at her telling her to shut up. Or the number of times I was on the verge of hurting her physically out of anger.
I wasn’t happy or joyful. Most of the time, I was feeling sad. Sad to say goodbye to my freedom. Sad to think that I'm stuck with this life forever. Sad when I look at my own daughter and I don't feel love.
That's when I realised I was falling deep into this dark hole known as postpartum depression. :x
And as if I wasn't feeling miserable enough, I suffered an allergy reaction to the param I have been applying all over my hands and legs. The itch started from my feet, and made its way up to my entire leg and eventually tummy, leaving really ugly scars behind. I cried so much during this period cos I was in terrible pain and I couldn't feed my baby in peace. Thankfully, it was over after a short and sweet yet very expensive visit to a dermatologist.
Then just as I thought my nightmare is over, I had high fever the day after the itchiness went away. Turns out I had the dreaded mastitis :( Called my makcik urut to help massage my right boobs for me and I swear that was 1000x more painful than my labour experience. I was crying so bad even the danna looked like he was terrified of me screaming in pain. What's worst is that the massage didn't help a single bit. My milk supply went terribly down I had no choice but to feed FM to my baby urgh
Long story short, I managed to snap out it after talking about it to my best friends and danna. The former, I can't be more thankful for the fact that we are all going through this phase together so no one understands what I'm feeling as a new mom more than they do. The latter, we recently talked things out and gosh, I love him so much. Suffice to say I'm grateful to have him as my husband.
I came back to school few days back to settle some stuff and talked to a few of my colleagues about my worries. It certainly helped a lot knowing they've been trapped inside the same hole before and that gave me hopes that things will get better.
It did. Slowly.
This picture was taken when my baby was two weeks old...
& this is her today at two months old. Such a cutie, don't chu think? :p
One of the things I always remind myself when things get out of hand is that my baby won't stay this little forever so I need to learn to take things slow and enjoy every single moment with her while I still can. My dear Sofia, it may be a rocky start for the two of us but we gotta stick together, alright? ♥
xoxo, N
