You’ve spent months preparing, reading, waiting. Then suddenly, you’re home – with your baby – and everything feels a little surreal. The moment you’ve been anticipating is finally here… but instead of feeling serene or “ready,” you might find yourself staring blankly, baby in arms, wondering: now what?
No one really tells you just how disorienting those first few days can be.
The Emotional Avalanche
The first days are raw. They’re full of contradictions – love so huge it hurts, tears you don’t understand and a fog of exhaustion that makes the smallest things feel impossible. Your hormones are crashing and shifting. Your body is recovering from something monumental. Whether you’ve had a straightforward birth or, like me, needed emergency surgery and intensive postnatal care, your body has been through something big. And your heart is trying to keep up.
After my youngest was born, I had to be separated from my eldest for a week while I recovered – a week that felt like a lifetime. I was in high dependency care, battling complications and relying on intravenous, topical and oral antibiotics for 12 weeks. It was a frightening time, physically and emotionally. I wasn’t depressed, but I cried – a lot, in fact, if we are being honest, I cried a lot after having my eldest and that was a much smoother journey… Great, heaving sobs that came from somewhere deep inside. My body was healing, my hormones were shifting, and my heart was holding more than it ever had before.
And that’s the thing: you don’t have to be diagnosed with postnatal depression to struggle…. Sometimes, this time is just hard. That’s okay.
Sleep Deprivation Is No Joke
Let’s talk about the tiredness. The kind of tiredness that makes the hours blur, the tears fall faster and the world feel like it’s spinning just a little too fast. The tiredness that makes choosing what to eat feel like a strategic mission and makes you weep because you dropped a spoon.
When you’re this sleep-deprived, everything feels bigger. Feeding challenges, a crying baby, a messy kitchen – these things can feel overwhelming not because you’re failing, but because you’re utterly depleted.
Your Body: A New Story
This part can be really tough, and it isn’t talked about enough. After birth, your body might feel like a stranger’s. It’s sore, tender, changed. Maybe you’re stitched, bandaged, leaking, or scarred. Maybe you’re still in shock. Even without complications, your body has grown and birthed a human – that is enormous!
There’s sometimes an unnecessary pressure to “bounce back” or be grateful no matter what but it’s okay if you’re grieving the old version of yourself a little. It doesn’t make you any less strong, loving, or grateful.
It’s Okay to Ask for Help
You don’t need to do this alone. And even if you can, you shouldn’t have to.
Help doesn’t always look like someone swooping in and taking over. It can be someone holding the baby while you shower, someone cooking a meal, someone sitting with you and letting you cry. I’ve been so fortunate to have incredible support – my Mum, Grandma, Auntie, and Sister, all stepping in before I even asked… Meals cooked, injections administered, babies rocked, messes cleaned. No task too big, no job too messy.
Not everyone has a built-in village like that – and even when people do care, they might not know when or how to step in. People worry about interfering. Sometimes, you’ll need to ask. That’s not weakness – that’s wisdom.
Routines Take Time
Whether this is your first baby or your fourth, each addition changes the dynamic. Finding a rhythm is hard. It takes time and patience and often a bit of trial and error. Let go of the pressure to “have it all together” by day three. You’re all learning each other, and that’s a process, not a performance.
You’re Doing Better Than You Think
If you feel like you’re floundering – you’re not alone. This is a season of wild transformation. You are healing, learning, and loving in ways you never have before.
There’s no perfect start. No perfect Mum (or Dad). Just you – showing up, loving hard and finding your way.
And you know what? That’s more than enough.
Guiding The Young Ones 
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