Time heals all wounds ?

My C section still hurts !

I don’t mean just physically. I mean emotionally and mentally. This blog isn’t a jovial one , and isn’t really about baby either. This is about what happens to you in becoming a Mum. Not the responsibilities , the pressures and the expectations. Thats all talked about in other blogs. This is about what happened to me and how I am struggling with it now. It’s kinda hard to explain, and I have had it foggy in the back of my mind playing on repeat. Something I could not put my finger on till the other night. Becoming a mum and having a c section made me feel less of a person. Which is a weird thing to admit. So I felt I would write about it , to try to makes sense of this revelation. This isn’t about losing freedoms, I’m different person from when I did not have kids nothing like that. It is definitely not about my baby , who is my world. She really is.

That day I found out I was pregnant I felt like I was finally becoming who I was supposed to be. The day I held her I knew who I was, her Mother and it’s been a life time coming. It’s what happened between being pregnant and not being pregnant . Birth day that has caused me a problem.  

Battling expectations, physically and emotionally

Which leads me on to the emotional scar the section has left me with, not feeling good enough , like having a c section I failed. This is alone my own feelings as thousands of woman have sections, elective, urgent ( like mine ) and emergency and come away feeling fine. I feel , maybe because I so wanted a natural birth that my body and my baby were taken away from me. It has left with resentment residue ?  I also, due to complications did not get immediate skin on skin , etc. Did I miss an important piece of the puzzle. 

I know these are almost irrational thoughts as said before many woman before me, have missed some of these things too and seems to be fine. Do natural birthers feel inadequate in any way  ? One who tore , etc.  I really must go ask them. It really is something we don’t talk about (enough ) My sister had sections , urgent, emergency and elective, three babies, three different experiences , but she hasn’t voiced feeling less by any of them , lucky to be alive after one of them ! But not inadequate.   Like they say you forget the birthing experience, but do you? Have I not given it enough time ?       

All in my head?

For me, physically , I’m numb from the belly button to the pubic bone. It’s a weird sensation and not pleasant at all. Im numb only a few layers down and then if pressed on in pain. Guessing  it is the knitting back of nerve ending etc and my non existent abs. Now talking to others who have had sections, I got away lightly with recovery, I was up and walking etc. But I seem to be having long terms effects which once discharged from the NHS no one tells you about. I loved having kicks from my baby from the inside but not the outside. My scar is angry and red and she seems to know exactly where to push her toes in when feeding. It kills and it’s hard because the pain is enough to want to put my child down and I don’t want to put that on her. I feel tears in my eyes as well as tears in my flesh.  I have been checked over and everything is fine in medical terms.

P.T.S.D

But  the pain is mental, rubbing along the area, not only being numb, has had a physiological effect on me. I want to scream internally when it gets touched, by my baby , by my husband , by me. Its hard to explain but emotion bubbles up the back of my throat and I feel like I’m drowning in it.  Is it a reaction to being cut ? It’s horrible and always present in the back ground as when leaning over feeding my child, bending over, any waist band touching it. It’s almost a panic feeling and I have no idea how to deal with it.  I had never been in hospital before , not even to be born so to have my baby in hospital was something I never wanted let alone to have an operation to do it. Maybe a reaction to that ? 

Some woman wear their scars with pride, with honour. And I do get that , look what my body made. And I have days when Im good but get me naked and or getting dressed and I catch a glimpse of it and or touch it in the shower and I fall in to the well of despair again. I guess in the past I have not been the most confident and not had the body that society desires , so it is vanity ? I don’t think so. The section has just dented my confidence in my self, as the control was taken away from me and Im left with the scar of it. Much like an attack victim ( I do speak from experience and I overcame that ) Thats why I feel so helpless to this emotion as it has come from a positive event in my life. It floors me sometimes for no reason.

For me right now it is a permanent reminder of not being good enough , that I could not or was not able to sustain letting nature take its course. My baby was so hard fought and won , I assumed that I would not feel like this , I would just be so wrapped up in her, so enamoured by her and I am. Except when that pain preservers and fear enters, as I accidentally brush across my lower mid section, I am crippled by it momentarily. 

Like we don’t have enough to deal with

I do think it ironic or funny as we as Mums have enough worry about actually raising the babies that we don’t need to second guess this too. Hormones and emotions play havoc with so much of other aspects of our lives in being a Mum , why lump this on too . Another layer. I cant feel my layers physically so Ill labour under them mentally instead. 

Right  now Im not ok, I bear the scars of my struggle inside and out  and Im hoping that voicing the demons might banish them , or air them out and find others that will either talk some sense in to me, have an explanation or be united at we are not alone in these feelings. But for right now I’m putting my faith in that old proverb, time  heals all wounds …. maybe these ones too.