“Twins?! A Two For One Deal!” Excuse Me?
My pregnancy, birth, and postpartum story. Buckle up.
Let me set the scene. First ultrasound. I’m lying on the table, hoping to hear a heartbeat. Nervous. Absolutely uncomfortable. The OBGYN turns the screen and says words that rearranged my brain chemistry:
“I see baby….babIES.”
PLURAL. Like, that’s not a funny joke. Why would anyone think that was funny? Plural, as in I’m having two of them. Simultaneously. At the same time. Both at once.
As my husband and I are trying to comprehend what just happened, the doctor is explaining all of the risk factors that come with twin pregnancy. I cannot hear him. I don’t know what he’s saying. He PROBABLY should’ve given us a few minutes to recover before having this conversation. The gist of it was “be prepared for a lot of unknowns because you are high-risk for basically everything.” Each appointment, which there were many, came with its own little anxiety gift bag. Something new to look out for, another thing to monitor. Fun stuff.
I did my best to stay calm through it all. I’m a therapist after all, I know all of the tools. I used approximately none of them.
At 33 weeks, after crying to my husband because my swelling was so bad I could no longer bend my knees (true story), my water broke. I was taken in for a c-section after some failed attempts to slow my labor. My girls were born, and before I even had a real chance to hold them, they were taken to the NICU.
This was genuinely the hardest time. I was recovering from major surgery, in a hospital room with no babies, while medical staff were trying to manage my swelling and blood pressure. I was discharged without them and had to go home without them. There’s a specific kind of grief that comes with that. It doesn’t really have a name and I don’t truly know how to accurately describe it.
When my girls finally came home, I felt two things at the exact same time: pure relief and absolute terror. They were preemies and I was their mom. You’re telling me I am being trusted with their care now?
The anxiety was constant. I was Googling symptoms at 2am, running worst-case scenarios in my head on a loop, and CONSTANTLY wondering if anything I was doing was “correct.” Here’s the fun part: I am a whole ass therapist. I knew exactly what was happening to me and I still couldn’t make it stop.
Knowing what postpartum anxiety is does not grant you immunity. File that one away.
I had adequate support in my day-to-day life. However, this somehow made it even more difficult for me to actually share that I was struggling. I was ashamed, embarrassed, and felt like I “SHOULDN’T” be feeling this way. That it was a direct reflection of me not having it together.
When I was finally able to name it, get mental health support, move my body, prioritize myself for the first time ever, I started to have so much more hope. Also, I was starting to actually like this version of myself more than the one I left behind. And somewhere in that process, The Mindful Mama Therapy was born, because I KNEW there had to be other moms out there sitting exactly where I had been sitting, feeling exactly what I had felt, and wondering if something was wrong with them.
Nothing is wrong with you. This is hard. You deserve real support. AND two things can exist at once. You can love your baby unconditionally AND have a hard time rearranging every part of the life you once knew into a new reality.
With change always comes discomfort. You are not reborn into knowing exactly who you are the second you become a mother. Just like it takes months of pregnancy for your child to develop, it takes matrescence for you to develop into a mother. You deserve grace and support through that process.
That’s what I’m here for.
XO -