What I Had Dreamed of My Whole Life…
I didn’t experience the “newborn bubble”; that overwhelming bond and love didn’t come instantly for me. I can barely actually remember my little girl as a newborn. Those days are a complete blur. I experienced a relentless screaming baby who would not sleep and huge feelings of anxiety. I felt as though I had regressed into a child myself, needing my husband or mum to hold my hand to do anything new. I was a complete shell of myself.
My journey to have my baby wasn’t straightforward. After a year of trying, my husband and I proactively attended a fertility clinic, where all of the usual tests were conducted and were all deemed “within the normal range.” I ovulated later in my cycle, but it wasn’t viewed as a roadblock to conception.
We did a tracked cycle with timed intercourse—that failed. The next cycle we added in an IUI, which also failed. I was completely devastated and so lost, worried that there was a bigger underlying issue. The specialist then recommended IVF, saying that the IUIs only had a 10% chance of success, whereas IVF had between 40–50% success. I was terrified. IVF in my mind was for people with really complex issues who had been trying for years. We weren’t there yet, but I also didn’t want to waste any more time.
We commenced our first IVF round the next cycle, and despite only retrieving six eggs, we made four beautiful 5-day embryos. A fresh one was put back into my uterus, and the dreaded wait began. I had no symptoms and really didn’t want to get my hopes up. We were on cloud nine, finding out that our results were positive! I was in shock and couldn’t believe our luck.
My pregnancy progressed well and was pretty uneventful. I really loved being pregnant, for the most part. I did so much birth education and felt really ready to deliver my baby. I didn’t necessarily have a birth plan— all I wanted was an epidural and to go with the flow, taking the advice of whatever the midwives and my lovely OB deemed safest for my baby and myself. As the later weeks of pregnancy rolled around, my OB was starting to monitor my baby’s growth, which seemed to plateau around the 35/36-week mark. It was decided to induce me and deliver at 38 weeks. I was totally on board with this and read a lot of positive induction stories to calm my nerves.
On the eve of the 38th week, I was admitted to the birthing suites, and Cervadil tape was administered to thin my cervix. My OB’s exact words were, “This isn’t going to put you into labour, it’s just going to thin your cervix, and I’ll be back in the morning to break your waters and get it started.” My husband stayed for a few hours and then left to go home around 10 p.m. He would be coming back at 7 a.m. to start the process. My job was to get some rest—but that didn’t happen! The midwives were coming in really regularly to check the monitor, and by midnight I started to get a bit crampy. By 3:30 a.m. it was getting pretty intense, but no one told me I was in labour—and it was my first baby, so how was I supposed to know? The pains were getting worse, and I was offered two Panadol to take the edge off. After another half an hour, I asked for an epidural—and I honestly felt like such a failure. Maybe I had a lower pain tolerance than I thought? The midwife examined me before calling for the epidural, and I was 4 cm dilated. I then felt a pressure change and a pop. I told her that something had changed. About a minute later, my waters gushed out.
They called my husband and said to make his way in, but not to rush as I was 4 cm… 15 minutes later, they called him back to see if he was on his way, as I was 10 cm dilated. Yes, 15 minutes later. I heard one midwife say to the other, “Cancel the anaesthetist,” and I screamed in panic, “No, please don’t!” But she was coming! In calmly strolled my OB at 5:20 a.m., and I did three huge pushes with gas and air for pain relief, and my little girl was delivered onto my chest. I cut the cord, and she was quickly passed to the paediatrician for assessment. I couldn’t believe that I had just had a first labour that was that quick. I lay there with my legs shaking, and she was passed back to me. I was euphoric having her on my chest, and the sense of accomplishment was amazing. My husband rushed into the room and missed her entrance by four minutes. I was in too much shock to even process it at the time, and we happily spent the next few hours inseparable as a family. We were moved up to the maternity ward and had a really straightforward recovery.
Day 3, when my milk came in, was the worst. I felt like I was at rock bottom, emotionally. I was so unsure if I could do this—sleep-deprived and deep in the baby blues. (I had never even heard of the baby blues before experiencing them firsthand.) They lingered well and truly for at least two weeks, but I feel like they never fully went away.
The next three months were spent in a state of sleep deprivation and anxiety. I was a shell of myself and found it so hard to bond with my little girl. She was constantly miserable, screaming and hard to settle. We had no kind of sleep routine, and the afternoons brought a feeling of dread over me, just thinking, What am I in for tonight? I had so much family support—I was really lucky—but I could not see the light at the end of this tunnel. I wished the days and weeks away, just wanting her to be older and imagining her running around at the park or riding her bike.
Four months rolled around, and I bit the bullet to sleep train. It’s one of those “taboo” things that people are made to feel guilty for, but I was at my wits’ end. I chose a method and consultant who didn’t use a cry-it-out method, and within 2 to 3 days, my little one was falling asleep unassisted and sleeping for four-hour chunks in the night! This was life-changing for my husband and me. It helped me tremendously to feel like I had some control and routine again in my life.
On reflection and after working with a perinatal psychologist, I can now see how my delivery did trigger a stress response in me. And while there was no physical trauma for me during the delivery, my body experienced a trauma response to such a quick delivery—especially without having my husband there. My body was in fight or flight for a while, and by the time I could recover, the lovely postpartum hormone crash happened. On reflection, I probably did suffer postnatal anxiety. If it weren’t for my husband and mum in particular, I would have had no idea how to get through that time.
Fast forward two years, and I sit here writing this at 38 weeks pregnant with my second child, having just lost my mucus plug and being 2 cm dilated. I am a mixed bag of emotions and feeling worried that I will experience the same postpartum feelings again. My saving grace this time is thinking about my little girl, who is the light of my life. She’s funny, witty, active, and so loving—I absolutely love being her mum. While there have been some tough days being pregnant with a toddler, and I’m sad about her time as our only child coming to an end, I know she is about to have a friend for life, and I can’t wait to watch her become a big sister. Those sleepless nights that feel like an eternity ago are back on our doorstep, but I know now that I can survive them and I will feel like myself again. Life will be beautiful again—this is just a season.
Anonymous x