Baby blues

I was out with the girls last night and we were discussing babies, how some want more and others are fine with the number they have. I only have one child, and plan not to have any more. Do I feel bad he doesn't have sibling..sure I do, but I also realize that if I were to have another child, there is a very good chance that I would hurt that baby.

You see, when my son was born, I did not feel any maternal connection to him. In fact, I can honestly say I did not even like him for the first two years of his life. Yes, this is very sad, but at the time I did not realize just how bad things were. I had post partum depression, but blamed it on everything else. We had moved to Ft. bragg, my sweetie was not around much, family was far away...you get the picture.

My husband knew something was wrong, but he thought I just was upset because I was stuck at home and my son was a colicky baby. We also debated long and hard about having children, me not necessarily wanting them but giving in in the end.

We moved after one year to Long Island, NY, where I still was miserable, but this time I thought it was due to the monetary constraints we were feeling at the time, and because I never saw my husband (I worked nights and weekends so that we did not have to pay daycare costs). We never really discussed how I was feeling, but we should have.

So many woman figure they will shake off the "baby blues", but it is not that easy. I wasted 2 years of my sons life, wishing he was never born; when I could have been happy, enjoying his gurgles and coos. Did I think it was a sign weakness to get medication? I don't know. On some level I knew I was depressed, in fact was on the look out for it since it runs in my family, but I couldn't act on it to get help. Now, I have a good support system and friends who will be straight with me and tell me that I need help. Sometimes, it is that push that we need to do something. I share my story with my friends hopefully to wake them up, and let them know that it is OK to look for that extra help, that if you suspect something is wrong, it is and you need to do something about it. No one should "miss" those first few years, especially when they have a great kid like my son.