New mothers often lament the things no one told them before they had children. “Why didn’t anyone tell me?” they ask. I understand the sentiment. But I also know that there’s a simple, yet hard to swallow reason why people don’t issue the warnings so many new moms would like: There are so many ways parenting will affect you.
Bringing another human into the world, and being responsible for raising it, is such a seismic life change. And one mom was recently open about wanting to go back to her old life.
More from CafeMom: How Therapy Has Made Motherhood Manageable for a Mom of 4 With Anxiety, Alcoholism & PTSD
A mother of a 10-month-old daughter wrote that she regrets having her.
On UK-based forum Mumsnet, one woman wrote that she regrets having a baby. “My baby is 10 months old,” she began. “I love her more than anything in the world. I constantly worry about something bad happening to her. She is a lovely, bright, happy, sweet, and quite independent child. But I just can’t shake the feeling that I regret having her.”
More from CafeMom: My Wife Had Postpartum Psychosis After the Birth of Our Twins & Now I'll Always Be Scared
The mom says she misses the laziness of her old life.
This new mom said she wants to go back to the way things were. “I had a quiet, peaceful, unexciting life, and that’s what I like. I’m a very introverted, self-contained person and I was always happy just being by myself, working from home, watching Netflix in the evenings, enjoying nature, having dinner out now and again. Maybe a holiday once in a while.”
But she’s found that with her child, all of that is gone now. And she’s not happy about it.
She wondered if things would get better as her daughter gets older.
She said flat out that she doesn’t like parenting. “I think it’s mainly the constant sense of responsibility, constantly having to entertain a baby, never being able to just sit and relax and do nothing all day, always having to be on alert,” she explained.
This mom wondered if things would get better when her child got older and more independent or she would always regret the loss of her old life. She asked the group if they had similar experiences.
Other Mumsnet users shared their opinions.
People were quick to chime in. Most were sympathetic and shared their own parenting struggles.
“It gets better!” one user wrote. “I found the baby age mind numbing because you are constantly on alert but never really doing anything YOU want to … Don't get me wrong, long boozy brunches are a thing of the past, but you get much more of yourself back once they get to school age.”
Someone else suggested therapy.
Another user offered this encouragement, although this perspective might be sad as well. “… depressing though it may sound, after a few years you just don't really remember your 'old' life — being a parent becomes the new normal," the parent wrote. "You get used to it, and it isn't so bad. Hang in there, it will get better.”
Others were less encouraging, suggesting the OP remember why she decided to have a child. Another user offered this more practical piece of advice: “Find a therapist to talk to about this. Pregnancy and giving birth, as well as nurturing a baby, affect your brain chemistry. A 'mother' is born at the same time as the baby. You are a different person. Let go of who you were, and find out who you are now." We couldn’t agree more.
