I Had a Baby, But It Didn’t Make Me Happy
Jealousy, friendship, and why sometimes “everything you ever wanted” still isn’t enough.
I nursed her while crying. For 15 hours per day.
Five hours a day, I cried while doing other things: washing and folding baby clothes, feeding myself, walking slowly around my yard, pumping pathetic amounts of milk out of my breasts, worrying. Worrying. Worrying.
For one hour a day, I sang to my baby and told her she was amazing.
And for 3 hours, hopefully, I slept, always restlessly. Shouldn’t I be pumping right now? Or worrying?
“I don’t know what she has to be sad about. She has everything she ever wanted. If I was her, I would be so happy.”
My childless friend stayed with us. She said that to my husband. He told me about it immediately.
“I don’t know what she has to be sad about. She has everything she ever wanted. If I was her, I would be so happy.”
How many times have I replayed her comment in my head?
Depression comes in layers:
There was the original sadness,
the layer of letting my baby down,
the layer of failing as a wife,
the layer of…
