These Moms Got Real About The Most Unhinged Things They Did Postpartum

Yahoo

3 days ago

From hitting a frog with a stick to put an end to sleep interruptions, to smashing plates and making coffee for the baby, here's what they had to say.
When I was newly postpartum with my daughter Alma, I suffered through the same sleepless nights everyone else does with a new baby. But she loved long nursing sessions when she was a newborn, sometimes as long as 40 minutes.
Time stopped having meaning. It was just us, sitting in the recliner, for what felt like forever in the pitch black, silent night. That's when I started having a waking nightmare that a woman with stringy, greasy black hair and grey, rotting skin, wearing a tattered white nightgown was in the room with us. I never screamed, I never moved from the recliner—I knew it wasn't real—I just sort of…accepted this terrifying presence.
When Alma started sleeping through the night, the nightmare simply dissolved—and I never had it again. I know it sounds strange, but it still seems like a good example of how the postpartum brain works—you are in your own world, almost trance-like, tired to the point that you sometimes don't even feel human and your anxiety manifests in ways that would sound outlandish at any other point in a person's life.
So I certainly sympathized with all the moms in the comments on an Instagram post asking them what the most 'unhinged' thing they did or that happened to them postpartum—and the commenters did not disappoint.
Moms Share Their Most 'Unhinged' Postpartum Experiences
Responses ranged from poignant to hilarious—after all, learning how to take care of a whole new human while still healing physically and emotionally is an experience that often hits both those emotional notes all in the space of a day.
'I walked to the coffee shop down the street and realized I was wearing only the baby in the carrier on top. No shirt. No bra. Just the baby,' wrote one commenter.
Another revealed that she woke up so tired from a night of baby care that she made two cups of coffee in the morning: 'One for me, one for the baby.'
Another mom highlighted the anxiety-driven attachment many new parents have to their babies, writing that she 'Made my husband stand in the bathroom holding the baby while I showered so I could see the baby at all times.'
One mom revealed her method for dealing with interruptions to those precious moments of sleep she was able to get: 'Went outside at 3 a.m. in a bathrobe to hit a bush with a stick repeatedly because a frog kept croaking outside my window and desperately needed to sleep,' she wrote.
As for coping with the frustrations and stress of raising a baby? This mom shared that she bought a stack of plates, and whenever she reached her limit, she 'went outside and smashed one.' Sounds pretty smart, actually."Made my husband stand in the bathroom holding the baby while I showered so I could see the baby at all times."
@missamykatherine on IGWhy It Is So Important to Share Our Postpartum Stories
Of course, the postpartum period can lead to scary symptoms like depression that need to be treated by the new mom's doctor and a mental health professional. But sometimes it's actually healthy to look back on that time in your life with a light-hearted sense of humor, and to forgive yourself for making mistakes or doing something potentially silly or embarrassing.
Sharing these moments takes courage, but it also helps other parents see that no matter how strange they think their postpartum experience might have been, there is always another mom out there who has been right where you are, and understands just how you feel—even if no one else around you does.
This sense of camaraderie and community these stories provide to new parents should not be undervalued: Trading shame for openness with each other helps us all feel seen—and acknowledges the often unspoken struggles that go along with new parenthood.
Read the original article on Parents
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