Parenting after loss
Experiences of: Lucie
How many kids do you have and how old are they at the moment?
I have 4 children: 8 year old Elinor, 6 year old Aramis, 2 year old Rosalie and Aramis’ twin brother Maximus, our baby angel who heartbreakingly passed away when he was 4 months old. I also have a lovely 14 year old stepdaughter Emma who often stays with us at the weekend.
Could you tell us a little more about your parenting situation?
I am lucky that I could get pregnant easily despite starting my family late. I had my first at 35 and my youngest at 41. Finding out that I was expecting twins was a massive surprise and giving birth to them at 25 weeks was even more unexpected! My tiny boys (1lb13oz and 1lb11oz) had to spend the first months of their life in hospital. This was an extremely traumatising time for us, especially when Maximus had his cardiac arrest. I was absolutely terrified when I got pregnant again 3 years later but I ended up having the most straightforward pregnancy and birth. My 8lb12oz rainbow baby was born at home in a pool, surrounded by fairy lights, her older siblings peacefully sleeping upstairs. I caught her myself and she was latching like a pro before the cord was even cut. This was a deeply healing experience for me. Now I’m back to working full time so life is a bit hectic. Luckily my husband is able to do most of the school/nursery drop offs and pick ups!
How did you find the early years of motherhood?
I know I had it particularly tough with my premature twins but even with my full term older daughter I found it very lonely and exhausting. I had this constant voice in my mind saying that I wasn’t a good mum: breastfeeding was excruciating, the lack of sleep drove me to despair and I felt insanely bored in the baby groups I attended. I felt stuck in this new identity of being a mum that I thought I had to conform to and I felt very guilty because I didn’t enjoy it at all.
Who or what helped you most in the early days of motherhood?
I don’t know how I would have done it without my husband! I have got such admiration for women who embark on the motherhood journey solo. I’m not sure I would have been able to pull it off!
What do you wish you had known before having a baby?
I wish I had known beforehand how patriarchal the healthcare institutions are and how badly anchored in our society misogyny surrounding motherhood is. It is only when I realised this that I made my own research for the care I wanted for me and my baby and found peace in not being the image of the perfect mum I thought I was supposed to be.
What piece of advice would you give to your pregnant self if you could go back in time?
My advice would have been to trust my instincts and forget any expectations. If I had been foretold that I would be co-sleeping and breastfeeding well past toddlerhood I would never ever have believed it!!!
Funniest story (in hindsight anyway!) When my oldest daughter was only a few weeks old I felt so overwhelmed one evening that I put her in the pram and went out for a long walk. I ended up in the cemetery in the dark of the night, crying my heart out amongst the graves: ‘I love her too much!!!!’ My love for her was so big I didn’t feel like I could handle it! I mentioned it to the GP at my 6-week check as I didn’t think that going to a cemetery at night with a newborn baby was a very sane thing to do but she didn’t seem to be concerned.
Best bit so far?
The pure love I feel when I look at my children, even when they drive me crazy!
Anything else you'd like to share:
A colleague told me when I was pregnant with my first that having children is “the most wonderful and challenging experience”. That sums it up really well! Motherhood is tough but that’s what makes us grow and it’s all worth it.
*If you’d like to submit your own early motherhood experience (and I would love for you to!), ping me a message at silke@raiseupmums.co.uk You can give your name or keep it anonymous.