I knew becoming a mother would change my life.
Everyone told me that. They told me I would be tired. They told me my priorities would shift. They told me I would never sleep the same again. They told me my heart would grow in ways I couldn’t imagine. What they didn’t tell me was that postpartum could make me feel like I had lost myself. They didn’t tell me that I could love my baby more than anything in this world and still sit in the shower sobbing, wondering if I had ruined my life. I remember those moments so clearly. The water would run, and I would just cry. Not because I didn’t love my baby. Not because I regretted him. But because suddenly my entire world had changed overnight, and I didn’t recognize myself anymore. I was grieving the person I was before motherhood while trying desperately to become the person my baby needed me to be. And that grief is something nobody prepares you for.
Postpartum wasn’t just exhaustion. It wasn’t just “being tired because the baby wakes up.” It was feeling like I was drowning while everyone around me assumed I was just adjusting. I isolated myself from my family because I was so exhausted that even holding a conversation felt impossible. I didn’t want to explain how I was feeling because I didn’t even know how to explain it myself. I was surviving.
Some days, I was too overwhelmed and too depressed to even eat. The thought of taking care of myself felt impossible when I was already struggling to take care of this tiny person who needed me for everything. And then there was the anxiety. The kind of anxiety that takes over your entire body. Every time my baby stirred in his sleep, my heart would race. Part of me was terrified he would wake up because I knew the crying, the feeding struggles, the exhaustion, and the feeling of being needed every second would start all over again. But the other part of me was terrified he wouldn’t wake up. I was terrified something would happen while I wasn’t watching. I was terrified of sleep. I was terrified of being awake.
For weeks, I slept on the floor directly beside my baby. I would wake up every 20 minutes just to check his breathing. I would stare at him, making sure his chest was moving, needing the reassurance that he was okay. My body was exhausted, but my mind wouldn’t let me rest. That’s the part of postpartum people don’t always talk about. The constant fear. The intrusive thoughts.The feeling that if you let your guard down for even a second, something terrible might happen. And while everyone else was telling me to “enjoy every moment,” I was desperately trying to make it through each moment. I want to say something that I wish someone had said to me:
You can love your baby deeply and still struggle.
You can feel grateful and still feel overwhelmed.
You can look at your child and know they are the greatest gift you’ve ever received while also grieving the life you had before.
Those feelings can exist together. Motherhood is complicated. It is beautiful and heartbreaking. It can fill your heart while completely exhausting your soul. I think one of the hardest parts of postpartum is how many mothers are experiencing these same things in silence. Because we don’t want to admit the hard parts. We’re afraid someone will misunderstand. We’re afraid someone will think we don’t love our babies enough. We’re afraid to say, “This is harder than I expected.” But saying it out loud doesn’t mean we love our children less.
It means we’re human.
The truth is, mothers need more than congratulations after having a baby. We need support. We need community. We need people who will sit with us in the messy parts, not just celebrate the beautiful ones. We need someone to say:
“I see you.”
“I know this is hard.”
“You’re not alone.”
That is why I want to share my story. Not because I have everything figured out. Not because my postpartum experience was perfect. But because if another mother reads this while sitting in the dark, feeling like she is the only one struggling, I want her to know she isn’t. The hard parts deserve to be talked about too. Because motherhood is not just the smiling pictures. It is the tears in the shower. The anxiety at 3 a.m. The moments where you question yourself. The moments where you find strength you didn’t know you had.
And somehow, day by day, you keep going.
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