MUM GUILT A CRYING SHAME
Navigating newborn life and health battles can be hard but it’s important parents don’t let stress take over
HOW much your baby cries varies, but anything more than three hours a day, three times a week, for at least three weeks is the general indicator you have a colicky baby, and that for the next three to four months, life is going to be tough for everyone in your household. (Dogs definitely included.)
In actual fact, three hours a day, three times a week would have been a breeze for us, because as we discovered, colic can also mean crying most of the day, most days.
So as I was in the throes of sleep deprivation and a major life change, I also found myself on an urgent mission to uncover what was causing my son’s colic.
I learnt it’s almost always gut issues; sometimes reflux, or its ironically-named sidekick, “silent reflux”.
You get told it can have something to do with your baby’s temperament, or maybe it’s too much foremilk, a lip/ tongue tie, allergies, chiro issues, or (and I hated this explanation the most) the “mother’s anxiety”.
Whatever the cause, I’d need a book, not a column, to discuss in full our journey with colic, and it wouldn’t be a particularly inspiring read, because I never got to the bottom of it anyway.
So instead, I’m here to offer survival tips.
I am not a glass half full kind of mum, or a glass half empty. I’m a glass with 125mls kind of mum. I like facts.
I never got any on colic, but if you’re in the depths of despair right now, let me tell you one thing.
Time, as my Mum would constantly reassure me, is the only thing that will help.
She was right. It did eventually pass. But that’s not going to help you now, so back to the survival tips.
Firstly, you need to know none of this is your fault! You’ve done nothing wrong, and it’s not your anxiety making your baby cry, kick and squirm.
You have anxiety because your baby is crying, kicking and squirming.
Secondly, you need to deploy white noise, or even the sound of a hairdryer. Sometimes the combination of white noise and a hairdryer will help your bundle of misery relax, perhaps even nod off for 15 blissful minutes.
Next tip, don’t use those 15 minutes to Google colic.
Use them to rest, recharge and remind yourself none of this is your fault. Perhaps the most important advice, erase all expectations you had of #mumlife, at least for a little while. Your experience will be different to other mums you know and meet, (the ones who have “chilled” babies) and it certainly doesn’t help to compare notes. It can feel like you’re being robbed of that first-time mum experience, of pushing prams through the park, stopping for coffee and confidently feeding at cafes with a lovely clean muslin draped casually over one shoulder.
My entry into motherhood looked nothing like that.
It certainly takes a tribe, and ideally you want one with members going through the same thing.
They’re hard to find in real life but Facebook groups are full of them.
Probably because a screaming baby doesn’t inspire many mums to leave the house and make new mum friends. Parks are your new best friend.
But it’s not all doom and gloom. If I can leave you with one glass half full kind of thought, it would be this.
A year and a half on, I have a beautiful, “spirited”, very healthy firecracker of a kid.
He still cries and kicks and squirms, but much more often than not, he laughs and dances and delights.
He is my whole world, the best thing to ever happen to me, and If we had to go through colic to get there, then how good is colic?
FIRSTLY, YOU NEED TO KNOW NONE OF THIS IS YOUR FAULT! YOU’VE DONE NOTHING WRONG, AND IT’S NOT YOUR ANXIETY MAKING YOUR BABY CRY, KICK AND SQUIRM. YOU HAVE ANXIETY BECAUSE YOUR BABY IS CRYING, KICKING AND SQUIRMING ...