when 'mom rage' finally makes sense
after much deliberation and overpacking my hospital bags, i never end up using any of it. i can’t bring myself to shower during my three day stay, the thought of running water on my episiotomy stitches is too much to bear. when i’m back in the comfort of my own home i’m brave enough to step into my shower and become slowly reacquainted with my physical form. taking a shower helps me reconnect with my mental and emotional bodies too.
erh, it normally does.
but i’m feeling so many things in rapid succession and i have no way to describe them. i can’t place myself in my emotional experience because there is no depth to my being, i just am. i am just existing as a mother. the happiest one you’ll ever meet, by the way. i’m on some sort of postpartum MDMA trip for the first two weeks and everything is high energy bliss. but my baby feels like a long term nanny gig, like when i’d accompany families on vacation and make myself available around the clock. i have love for this baby, of course, but the deep connection i had with my child in utero isn’t this.
when i show up to therapy i’m exhausted and speechless. sometimes i use a handful of my fifty minutes to lay down and rest in silence. if i nod off my therapist will notice and break the silence, gently waking me up with her voice over the phone. every week it’s the same, “i just don’t know what to say. i can’t access any depth of feeling, i’m just doing. i have no deep thoughts, will i ever have deep thoughts again?”
the only other feeling i have access to is rage. and it scares the shit out of me. it feels so foreign, yet all too familiar. it always catches me off guard. i feel like it comes out of nowhere, but my biggest trigger is dan asking me why or how i’m doing something pertaining to our baby. before the question has finished leaving his mouth a tidal wave swells within me and the rage pulls me under and i’m crashing down on him faster than i can think.
i’m infuriated by the questioning in his voice, how on earth could there be anything to question? of course i know best, there’s nothing you need to know. but somewhere inside of me i know that my rage is fueled elsewhere. it’s in my embarrassment, shame, and frustration with my inability to properly address his questions. i can’t explain the why or the how, i’m just doing what i need to do and i’m doing it faster than words or a coherent step by step process can be articulated. don’t make me explain. how dare you ask me to explain this thing that is so innate and so obvious to me because of my lifetime of being the eldest daughter and years of nannying. and now — well now it’s all so perfectly clear to me because i’ve spent nearly ten months growing this child inside of me so don’t ask me why.
most of the time dan is just trying to learn, but my body responds to his every question as an attack, a threat to my way of mothering our child.
and i realize — i’ve never done this with somebody else before.
i text my mom the day i get home from the hospital. i’ve heard of mom rage, but i didn’t think it’d come on this fast. i get it, mom, i really get it.
the kinship i feel with her is immediate, the forgiveness, instantaneous and complete. i get it now, but i don’t like it. it doesn’t make it any easier for me to feel what i’m feeling. is this me? is this rage forever?
THE SNOWBALL
i’m driving my infant to my parents’ house for the very first time. there’s snow on the ground and i’m giddy, yet more cautious than i’ve ever been. i get halfway to my parents and there’s a taxi pulled over on the right side of the road dropping someone off. normally i would inch my way around the car, but i don’t want to do that. i don’t want to accidentally get stuck on a snowbank with my baby in the back, i just want a smooth driving experience. so i wait.
a car behind me honks, but i stay calm and sit tight. once the taxi pulls out in front of me, i follow. they make it through the light, i stop at the red. and then a block of ice hits my back windshield. i turn around and the driver is waving his hands wildly in my direction and yelling at me to drive faster.
how fucking dare you threaten my child.
i put the car in park, tell my son i’ll be right back, unbuckle my seatbelt, and walk up to this man’s open window. as soon as i see the crazy look in his eyes i know i’ve made a terrible decision, but i’m already in it so i yell back, “i have a newborn in the car! how dare you throw ice at my window! do you know how dangerous that is?! leave us alone!”
shaking, i step back into my car and a realization washes over me; this man could have a weapon, he could follow us. i’m instantly sober. my anger put me and my son in an even more dangerous position than we were before. i silently make a promise to myself, my child, and my unknowing partner that i will never, ever, do something like that again.
i keep an eye on the truck behind me and finally exhale when he turns off the road. within the next block i find myself stuck again. this time there’s a trash truck pulled over to the left and it’s a narrow street. Normal Me would drive around it, no problem, Freshly Postpartum Me does not see how it is physically possible that my car could fit through this tiny gap.
i stop and the cars pile up behind me and honking ensues. i’m paralyzed and overwhelmed and the tears are flooding my eyes and i can’t stop them from streaming down my cheeks. i give in. i put on my hazards and park, throw my forearms on the wheel and bow my head in between them. i am in full-on freeze mode and i don’t know if i’ll be able to get out.
then a man taps my window and startles me. i don’t want any trouble, but i see kindness in his eyes when he sees my face.
“honey, are you okay? you can make it through."
“no, i can’t. i’m so sorry, i really can’t. there was this man, and he threw ice at my car and i have my newborn in the back and i—”
“do you need us to call someone?”
“no, no, i just can’t drive through. i’ll just wait.”
“we’re going to be here for a while, let me help you through. i promise you can fit. i’ll get my guys to handle the traffic. we’ll walk you through this. and then do me a favor and get some food and water when you get to where you’re going, okay? you’re pretty shook up.”
he motions to one of his guys and gets them to quiet the traffic behind me while he talks me through a very reasonably spaced path and i inch my way through. he waves kindly as i pass and i offer a limp hand in response. i’m still shaking from the sound of that ice hitting my back window.
i ask siri to call my mom and briefly tell her what happened. i promise her i’ll drive safely and ask her to draw me a bath. i tell her i’ll call dan when i get there. i need to be calm when i tell my big worrier husband that everything is okay, but it was very much not okay.
throughout my pregnancy i’ve been using my parents bathtub because i don’t have one in our apartment, but this will be my first postpartum. i hand off my child to my parents as if i’m turning myself in as an unfit mother, but they both know i’m just a scared one. i step into the bathroom and peel off my sweat-damp clothes, locate my lavender bath salts that i store underneath their sink, pour the crystals into the running water and gingerly step into the near-scalding hot water. i breathe, i soften, and eventually, i thaw back into myself.
GETTING TO KNOW MY MOM RAGE
there is a switch that flipped inside of my brain when i gave birth to my son. and while that mama bear instinct may be very real, i’ve had to learn how to work with it instead of letting it overcome me. i also had to figure out a new way to communicate with my husband.
while these might be two totally different situations, my animalistic response was the same, a threat response sounded off inside of me and i was acting before thinking. it can be really confusing to try and give myself space to metabolize these feelings, while also ensuring that i keep my child safe and the conversations within my home, kind.
several months after “graduating,” dan and i called up our couples therapist and had a few sessions to make sense of our new roles and my new instincts, to repair and to make a plan going forward. we defined our areas of expertise and i stepped into my role as expert on all things caretaking and all of the nuances of our child, those were mine too. the well-meaning questions dissipated and a new sort of trust was established between us over time.
in the same way that dan trusts me to know the best way to wrestle a diaper, i count on my chronically online husband to stay up to date on the latest safety precautions of raising a child. we may not always agree, but at the end of the day we rely on each other to be experts in our division of labor.
as for the explosive responses to safety threats, the snowball experience scared the shit out of me. when i feel that instant fight response, that memory comes back to me and i can feel my vision widen instead of tunnel. over time, and with practice, (plus some hormone rebalancing that’s occurred naturally over time) i’ve become more adept at assessing situations quickly and completely. it’s taken time for me to build that trust with myself.
it’s not that i don’t have mom rage anymore, i absolutely do. there was a rewiring that happened in my brain when i became a mother, and it’s my job to find ways of channeling that instinct. this will be a lifelong journey and it’s a big part of the work that i signed up for when i decided to become a parent. i just try to give myself and my partner grace as we grow together as parents.
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I saw 'mom rage' in the subject line and never clicked an email so fast. I'm 4 months pp and feel this so hard.
What a valuable reality-check for new (and old) moms ♥️ And also a reminder to forgive yourself for being hormonal, maternal, and human ❤️🩹🥲