Ba·by blues.
noun
- Depression affecting a woman after giving birth; postnatal depression
Before I continue where I left off, let me define what the baby blues are just in case you have never heard of them before. Baby blue occurs when a new mom may experience mood swings. Such as crying for no reason, irritable, restless, anxious, lonely, or very happy and then out of nowhere turns around and is very sad. This phase is only supposed to last for about 1-2 weeks and then anything after that is considered postpartum depression from my understanding.
After the crying episode, things were okay. I felt like I was too worried about things I had no control over after the baby. I remember telling myself that for Ashraf’s first doctor’s appointment I would get dressed up. Like brush my hair, do a little makeup and wear something other than PJ’s … guess what hair tied up, no makeup on, and definitely had some PJ’s on. My sister was like so did you get to dress up and I told her I didn’t want to talk about it, lol. I was kind of bummed that I wasn’t able to do that, but I still found the hilarity in it all.
Later on that week, I’m in bed feeding Ashraf and I decide to do a side view picture of my tummy. WHY WASN’T THERE ANYONE THERE TO STOP ME! LOL, so I took the picture and just stared at it crying. I quickly stopped myself though and threw the phone down. I hate that I’m even admitting this because as I have always mentioned to people, I never had body image issues. I’ve always been an athlete, always doing some type of physical activity. I felt like the same person inside, but there’s always someone reminding you that you are bigger than before. Especially in Nigerian culture, auntie’s love to point out how big you are … smh lol.
A N Y W A Y S …
The next 2 1/2 – 3 weeks were smooth sailing, goodbye baby blues! I was so busy enjoying bubs, that I did even have time to sit and worry about things. I wouldn’t say I got a full 8 hours of sleep, but I did not feel sleep deprived since my husband would help me in the middle of the night and feed Ash. Which was such a blessing! I was taking care of a newborn round the clock and my gosh being able to sleep at least 4 hours was heaven sent.
Things were pretty good. Focusing on baby, patiently waiting to be cleared to workout by my doctor, enjoying my new family of three, and being able to relax was most definitely nice. Then it was time for my husband to go back to work on the oil rig and I was definitely bummed about him leaving because it was so nice to have him around … life felt complete.
When he finally left, I decided that instead of going to my moms that I wanted to stay home because in my head … I had complete control of everything! Like, how hard would it be with just baby and me?
Well, I was about to find out that this motherhood thing was not a piece of cake.
Stay tuned for part 3.
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