In the initial months after our boy was born, one constant thought loomed in my mind, “Why would anyone make the mistake of having more than one?” It wasn’t just that life with a newborn was hard and hectic; it was that the whole stretch from labour to recovery was difficult in ways that no one could have anticipated.
It started with me labouring (drug-free and drama-free) for nearly 20 hours until a change in condition landed us in a Category 1 Emergency c-section. A Cat 1 Emergency is the sort you’d see in Grey’s Anatomy, where someone presses the crash bell and a platoon of doctors rush into the room and the patient is wheeled away within seconds for immediate, life-saving operation. Luckily for us, the health concern turned out to be a false alarm, and our 4.0 kg (~9 lbs) baby came into the world with a loud, bright cry.
Yet what followed were some of the darkest days of my life. We had hired a confinement nanny – an Asian postpartum nanny who is part-nutritionist, lactation consultant, private chef and night nurse. Their job is to help the new mum with her recovery in that crucial first postpartum month, taking on a huge portion of newborn responsibilities so that the mother can spend the bulk of her time resting. Initially, I was pampered. There were freshly cooked meals, soups, and snacks each day plus foot spas and massages every night. She even insisted on helping with the whole family’s laundry. Knowing that we had an experienced hand eased a lot of the anxiety that came with being new parents.
But within days of being home, my husband tested positive for Covid. The highly infectious Omicron variant was just sweeping through Britain, and despite every precaution and quarantining my husband in a separate bedroom, I tested positive two days later as well.
I was distraught. We’d been Covid-free since the start of the pandemic. We had been so, so careful at every turn. Now suddenly: this.
The timing was awful. This body of mine – a supposed source of nourishment and protection for our newborn – was suddenly a danger to him through the simple mingling of our breath. My baby had to be kept away from me outside of nursing times in an effort to keep him safe. Can you imagine what that felt like for a new mother – the fear, the sadness, the guilt?
The confinement nanny was understandably worried about contracting Covid herself and decided to leave us within days. Left on our own, we made the decision to prioritise the baby’s health above all. Instead of exposing him to a high viral load from two adults, I decided that I would be the sole caregiver until my husband tested negative.
So imagine: you’re freshly discharged from hospital, still struggling with basic tasks whilst recovering from giving birth, major abdominal surgery, blood loss, etc. You can barely walk, yet instead of properly recovering with in-house help as planned, you’re suddenly living the life of a single parent. You have to care for your newborn whilst battling with Covid and being in constant pain. And because there’s no one who can take over a shift, everything falls to you and you’re doing it all amidst serious sleep deprivation. It might have been slightly easier if our baby was a typical newborn that sleeps loads, but this kid woke every 45 minutes or so, day and night. To make things worse, having Covid meant we couldn’t ask our lovely community of neighbours and friends for help. The isolation was absolute.
For days, I dragged what felt like my hollow carcass around, carried merely by the torrent of critical tasks required of a caregiver. The relentless stress of this reality sent my mind into constant dissociation – that terrible space where our mind disconnects from our thoughts and feelings and from reality in general in an effort to protect itself from immense stress and trauma. I often found myself asking if I wasn’t just stuck in a really bad dream. I do not know how I or we survived that hellish time, except that we seemed to have kept the baby Covid-free and that alone meant success.
The months after the newborn phase was more typical of the new parent experience, which is to say: it was a roller coaster ride full of the highest highs and the lowest lows. We navigated the choppy, often-anxious waters of being first-time parents, doing things as quickly as we could when we knew how and muddled through when we didn’t.
Eventually, imperceptibly at first, the balance shifted: the harried days gave way to slower ones; the good days slowly outnumbered the bad ones. Like deep frost melting in the slow creep of spring, we shed the dizzying exhaustion of those newborn months. In time, something different emerged – a fledgling confidence in our new roles, a growing sense that maybe we could do this parenting thing after all.
Last month, somewhat unbelievably, we celebrated our dear boy’s first birthday. It was a milestone that had in countless difficult moments seemed inconceivably distant, doubtful even. But we’re here, and as so many thoughtful friends have pointed out, we’re not just here to celebrate his birthday, but also our first anniversary as parents (a.k.a. the “yay, our kid is still alive!” milestone). That anniversary is something to be celebrated too, because we’ve grown leaps and bounds as people, as a team. Our capacity to love has burgeoned, our patience deepened beyond what I thought possible – all because there is now a little human in our care.
In all, motherhood has felt at once restrictive and also profoundly expansive – as if one has been pulled into some great continuum of life, into an ancient river linking us to our ancestors and those who have yet to be born. I revel in the instant and unexpected bonds I’m now able to form with strangers with a single glance, on account that “I have a child too, so I get the crazy you’re going through.” It’s about ceding a portion of yourself so that a new generation can rise, and hopefully thrive. We do this by riding on the wisdom, kindness and generosity of those who have come before us. And so the world turns, our lives built upon such little acts of love, as waves push each other on in an endless sea.
– Written early 2023
