0:00 [Music] there's so many emotions i mean it just feels like you're shedding the hormones but also shedding emotions there was a lot of like just bursting into tears and um [Music] it was as difficult as i expected and the ways that i read about in the videos that i watched for sure i had these expectations that came true like no

0:32 sleep breastfeeding's gonna hurt you know those types of things but the emotions that i had were unexpected i mean at first there was the high of giving birth and like we're a family now she's here this is amazing um you know i have so much love for my my husband and this child and my family and the world at large and then you come home it kind of wears off it gets difficult and um something you

0:58 mentioned in your course which i had told my husband practically from day one was like i don't um i don't bond it to her or anything and i think that that's a myth that we really need to break because uh it's like a pet it's like this little pet that you have and you just need to keep it alive and you need to get it used to you and they don't give you anything they can't even focus their

1:24 eyes on you and um it just felt miserable and um i did allow myself this moment of like yeah this feels pretty normal i i feel like later there's going to be stuff that's cool um but right now kind of sucks so there was that but there were also weird emotions that i had that i wasn't expecting like my husband all of a sudden meant so much more to me like you're not just this person i love

1:54 you're a person who can protect us without you i can't do this and i need you to stay safe and i need you to stay healthy he like threw his back out in the first week probably from like rocking the baby you've never done it before right and he um couldn't help me for like a day he was just in bed and i just sobbed all day because i was like you're not okay so i'm not okay so

2:21 baby's not okay um but then i just started to get weird paranoid feelings that um like i don't want you to drive on the freeway i know you have to do it so i can't do anything about it but i don't want it i i just was worried about stuff like earthquakes that i don't love but happen anyway and um just things happening to break up the good good goodness that i was experiencing like the other

2:52 shoe is gonna drop like for sure something bad is gonna happen and um and then it just kind of went away so the thoughts were intrusive and then they just kind of left i mean i i suspect that this was related to postpartum depression and anxiety um the anxiety didn't fully go away for a while um you know i uh started sort of like peeking at my skin and doing unfortunate kind of things that i had to get a

3:23 fidget spinner and sort of um develop these habits from the anxiety um but the depression and that feeling of intense fear did pass [Music] i have a tendency and i think because of my anxiety but also you know my temperament i'm um i'm a learner you know i i read a lot i do a lot of my own research

3:53 i try very very very hard to check myself and to look at the sources and to you know um i come from a science family too so it's just it's how i was raised right um but the the sort of there's a there's a balcony and a basement to each strength and the the basement of the strength that i have to constantly collect input is that i keep a lot in my head and it can get very confusing in there

4:25 and just full of information and there's so much to know and there's conflicting information um and then there's just really too too much information there's a point where there's too much information online especially about parenting and what i wanted was like some reasonable kind voice that can do this for me right um so that especially now when i need someone to you know metaphorically hold me right i like to to so that i can let go and just let

4:56 someone else do the thinking someone you know smart someone who knows how to do research somebody who uh knows how to present it in a way that's real and authentic um and that those were all the the feelings that i got from from right from the start and just your parenting mojo was like this i think this will deliver i think this will deliver there um so i just wanted someone else to hold the knowledge that i didn't have to i

5:22 wouldn't go down these rabbit holes anymore i think um having people who encourage um parents to look at their own needs identify label them and really take a deep look at how that can create a better connection with your child with your partner with anyone really i mean this has to do with parenting but this is a life thing you know um that that was incredibly um meaningful to me

5:53 um and it's something that i'm going to take with me outside of this course again into my life um but i think to going back to that those feelings of isolation that i had i really wanted to find a community um of people who seem to share the same values that i do about how to respect your how to respectfully raise your child right um what does that mean what are the words that we say what are the

6:20 things that we do what does it look like in the day-to-day i can have an idea of what that is but um how do you do that you know it's something that i was lacking and there's there's so many things that you know you feel intuitively but you don't know how to verbalize what you like about something like well i i want to be a kind parent okay what does that mean right so um it's taking those values and really

6:48 putting like a framework around them um with people who are also who i know are also learning in the same way that i am looking to better themselves looking to perhaps um looking to be those types of parents um and raise the kind of children who um will quite honestly like make the world a kinder place so it really um i really was so lacking that especially in the during the pandemic

7:19 and and felt like i got that from this course [Music] i feel calmer i really do um i feel like um now when we're in a situation with a baby that's not working for us or for the baby um i feel like now i have almost have permission to take a moment and to say what what are her needs right now what are my

7:51 needs right now how can we get both of these needs met or you know what's going on in the environment right now that's not working for her what's going on with her that's a little different um or me or you know so adjusting um and taking a moment to think about that okay so instead of uh you know leaving her in her uh swing with the bastard uh with the pacifier in her mouth that she keeps

8:17 spitting out and we keep putting in 15 times maybe she doesn't want to be in the swing we just want her to be in the swing because we want to be able to do other stuff but is there a way that we can hold her and do other stuff um maybe she just needs a little cut some cuddling and then she can be calm and swing you know so how can we make those adjustments so that we can all have a

8:40 better time that was not um i didn't even have that language before so i feel like that's a big um big benefit to how i'm approaching things now and i've noticed um because i use this language now and i've noticed my husband being like what do you need right now baby and just which i think is really cool i feel like you know everything changes so quickly with babies right it's like you feel like you've got it i got i got this i got

9:09 this and then they change or someone's got this anymore no no it's all new um and so yeah i mean i'm anxious about what's going to come up like even just having a toddler like i'm anxious about that and sure i've been a nanny for toddlers but i've never had my own and it's gonna be very different and so the unknown is always so much scarier than the reality and so i think just knowing that there's tools out

9:37 there knowing that i'm not alone too like there are people who care very deeply about making um this experience easier on everyone everyone my child as well as me right so um and not just sort of treating it as like a problem to be solved um you know it's just so much of what i see is like you have this commodity you have this thing and just throw everything at it and here's all these products and here's all this information

10:06 um which can be helpful but that's all it is is sort of information there's no um it doesn't help to process your feelings about it right um and it's just sort of this band-aid and so feeling like okay there's something out there that i believe in um and that will help me not just now but later if i can come back to it um you know i can i can do it i can do this

10:38 i don't know the problems will be yet um but i'm fairly confident that i'll be able to handle them to some degree and this coming from a person who tends to think the worst that everything is going to happen is this this confidence is i mean it's a 180 right it's a um it's a very different outlook where you are right now and uh and one that's kind of grounded in this

11:08 understanding of your needs and understanding of this other person's needs as well my therapist told me yesterday that i have a mom voice now and i'm like what is that and she said it's just a calm voice like you just you have a calmness about you now i thought that was cool [Music] you