Welcome back!
Best-selling author Andi Buchanan shared her top tips for new moms with Mother Shock on last week’s episode of The Mommy-Muse Is In. We had a great discussion in response to this listener question: “For those of us who don’t feel like natural-born mothers, who haven’t fallen madly in love instantly with our baby, what are your recommendations about getting to a point of feeling more empowered and comfortable in our new role?”
- Remember that you’re still on the normal spectrum. As Andi said, “I think we have this notion that you have your baby and you’re instantly in love. For many of us, it comes a little bit slower. Some of that is because of hormonal stuff. Some of that is because of emotional stuff. It’s all in the continuum of normal. Of course, if anyone is feeling as though they are so overwhelmed they can’t take care of their baby or can’t handle their baby, that is definitely a time to talk to a spouse, to call your doctor. But these kinds of feelings of ambivalence and a little bit of shell shock, like, ‘What the heck am I doing here?’ That’s normal.
- Be kind and patient with yourself. According to Andi, “When we’re beating ourselves up for not being where we think we’re supposed to be, we miss out on where we actually already are. For me, those questions I had in the beginning, about am I good enough at this, do I know what to do, were really useful for me to sit down and listen to my feelings. Talking about it, and listening to the things that came up from myself and feeling confident instead of letting the doubting voices take over really helped me grow into my job as a mother.”
- Be honest with yourself. Instead of shutting out or running away from those feelings and thoughts of ambivalence, doubt, stress, and frustration, be honest about what you are experiencing in the moment.
- Consider writing as a low-cost form of therapy. A favorite of Andi’s: “One of the things that I did when I was in the midst of this was to write things down and try to write my way through it.”
- Read. Andi read voraciously. “I wanted to read everything I could about what other people were saying about this enormous transition I felt I was failing at.”
- Talk with people. As Andi said, “It’s definitely much easier to do this now, with the Internet. You have access to amazing bloggers writing about their own struggles. There are all kinds of online conversations you can join. It was harder for me to strike up real-life conversations, being a shy person, but it was so useful for me to actually talk with other people who were going through what I was going through, even a tiny bit, and also to talk with people who were 100% confident, and seemingly not having any difficulty at all. They were models for me over what I needed to do to be competent. I tried to watch what these ‘natural mothers,’ so I could figure out what I needed to do. I really tried to become a student of my own life and really take myself seriously, instead of beating myself up or brushing off my concerns, and keeping it all to myself.”
- Choose to empower yourself when faced with judgments. Andi confessed: “I was so hard on myself, and other peoples’ judgments of me cut very deeply because I was so raw and vulnerable. I didn’t realize how much judgment I was sending my own way. It was also important for me to realize that all of the judgments that I felt from other people, says more about the person who is judging than it does about me. I realized I had a choice to either take in what somebody was giving me, or to deflect it. Instead of hearing somebody say I was a bad mother, (whether or not they said it in those words, but the way I interpreted it), I could instead say, “Thanks for sharing that with me,” and really let it go. That was a huge world-shifting eye opener for me, to realize I didn’t actually have to take people’s criticism. If it really did turn out to be something that stuck with me, maybe I needed to look at why it bothered me quite so much, and then let it go.”
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I did not feel like a natural-born mother. My mother was distant when I was growing up and we did not have a great relationship until the past couple of years (I’m 33). I did know that I wanted to parent my children differently, so set out on a mission to learn from others. I was 19 when I had my first child and none of my friends had babies, so I began to gravitate toward older women (20s, 30s) that had children to observe. I read books and when the internet became readily accessible to me, I joined parenting message boards and listservs to get ideas about the stages we were in and what was to come. Because I didn’t have the best breastfeeding experience with my first, mostly due to lack of support and knowledge and modeling, I joined a local support group (LLL) while I was pregnant with my second because I knew that I needed help and knew where to get it. I found mothers there who parented like I did and I felt at home. We had weekly playgroups and, again, I observed and listened and shared and learned a LOT about myself and parenting style, both good and bad.
As my children get older (13 and 6), I still watch other parents and read books and blogs for cues and tips because I am always learning. I will never stop learning because there is always another stage and my children are vastly different from each other, so the things I learned when my daughter was small do not apply at all in the parenting of my son.
I just keep learning and try to remember that I don’t have to know the answer because I wasn’t “born” with parenting skills, so I acquire what I need and leave what I don’t.