I have a confession. I’ll be judged for it, I’m sure, but I feel like it needs to come out because there’s got to be someone out there who felt the same way that’s also processing the guilt.
I didn’t love my baby right away, the moment he was born.
They placed him on my chest, squirmy and peeing, and I did feel a lot of things: fear (I’m going to break him!), regret (have I just ruined my life?), relief (thank God pregnancy and labor are over), confusion (so… now what?), general affection (this little creature is pretty cute), excitement (I’ll remember this moment for the rest of my life).
But did I love him right away? No.
I still said I did on Facebook, when we announced his birth, with a triumphant, “We are so in love already!” because that’s what moms do, and I was pretty sure I was supposed to feel it.
But I didn’t.
I felt broken. Where was the primal hormonal rush I’d been promised? What was missing? Who was this little thing that suddenly demanded so much of me?
The romantic notion of love at first sight melted away. I certainly didn’t love my husband the first time I saw him, but obviously that changed. We learned about each other, we observed, we went out and experienced things together. Then, I loved him.
In our lives, we meet people, and we don’t fully recognize the impact they’ll have on our life right away. The lifelong best friend that started with squabbles over sharing a kickball, the mentor who started with a casual lunch invitation, the guy who was sitting at your usual table at lunch one day.
Why do we expect our relationships with our children to be any different?
As time went by, love came. And, wow. It’s the fierce, mama bear, jump-in-front-of-a-moving-car love like I’d always expected. It came, but it took time. Days turned into weeks. I went through the motions, and he became ours. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment I knew I loved him but I did catch myself sneaking sniffs of his sweet baby hair and rocking him to sleep a bit longer than necessary. And now, I love him more and differently with each passing day.
And then I wondered if it had been there all along. Maybe it had, in the background, like a seed planted but waiting to take root.
So whether you’re about to deliver a new baby, or maybe you just did, or you’re harboring years-old guilt about that moment — it’s OK not to fall in love right away. It will come. You’re not a bad mom.
