Good Moms Have Scary Thoughts

I’m afraid to leave my child in the care of anyone other than myself. I feel guilty when other people old her too. She is my responsibility and I don’t want to have to trust anyone with her. She’s my most precious gift. The idea of leaving her or going somewhere without her stresses me out to the point of tears.

I was so convinced by baby would die of SIDS. I couldn’t sleep for months. I kept checking to make sure she was breathing. One day when she was about 6 weeks old I put her in her crib, took her monitor and went outside to sit on the deck. I sat there for 4 hours doing nothing but staring and ruminating. She woke up crying and I couldn’t make myself go get her. I thought, just leave her, let her die from SIDS, just get it over with already. I couldn’t even bring myself to use a video monitor. I only used the sound monitor because I just knew it would happen anyway and I didn’t want to have to watch it on the monitor. I told myself it would be easier to let her die in her sleep and find her gone the next time I checked on her.

That my baby will choke and I am either not there or unable to assist.

When I was bottle feeding him early postpartum, he appeared to choke on the milk and actually went limp for a second! After that, I was terrified he would choke on milk and die while I bottle fed him. I would let my husband or mother in law feed him instead of me out of the sheer terror. When I would bottle feed him I would get extremely anxious and my heart would race. I was afraid I was hurting him with my anxiety. Eventually he stopped gagging on the bottle (I know now that it was not choking), but then would gag then vomit when we tried baby led weaning foods. At almost a year old, feeding is finally less stressful but he still gags some while eating which can bring these old fears back.

There are times I’m so stressed and exhausted the thought of killing my entire family crossed my mind. So that way, they can be happy in heaven and my son wouldn’t have to have a bad mother and my husband wouldn’t have to live his life with a horrible wife. And my mil so she wouldn’t have to live without her son. The worst part is that I’ve thought about how I’d do it. My husband, my mil, my baby to many sleeping pills or a gunshot to the head and myself. But if I were to kill myself I’d cut my toes off or something so it’s slow and painful. Sorry that’s morbid but that’s how deep I to crap I’m in right now.

Every time I get into the car with my baby I envision us getting into a horrible roll over car wreck, with my baby being thrown from the vehicle and killed. It feels so real that I start crying, sweating, and can’t shake the feeling that it is really going to happen.

I didn’t take my baby to the Church nursery for over a year. I was paranoid she would be abused physically sexually or neglected somehow. The first time I dropped her off I had a panic attack during worship and had to go get her. I had visions of the sweet young lady caring for her sexually abusing her during a diaper change. In church! I was paranoid that everyone was a sexual predator. Her bothers. Her grandpa. Everyone. And I couldn’t stop being fearful. I couldn’t shake it.

I am afraid that I wont break the cycle in my family. That I would be just like my mother. A manipulated overbearing mother. I’m afraid that I will lose myself in motherhood. Every day I forget my old life like what I loved to do. Im afraid that when my children are grown it would be too late to remember who I was. I’m afraid that I’m going to lose myself and my marriage. Because motherhood is all I know. Plus I feel that I am not doing my best in motherhood.

I’m afraid that if I have a bad thought – like something awful happening to her- that it will come true if I don’t shake my head and say it won’t happen out loud. I’m afraid someone notices how often I shake my head. People probably think I have a tick or something. I won’t be able to handle it if something happens to her and I can’t stop thinking “what if?”

I wanted to breastfeed so badly. I didn’t get to with our son, so I was beyond excited to with our daughter. I didn’t really read up on it because I was hoping the nurses would help me, or my OB, but little did I know they wouldn’t. I was in so much pain and I was suffering. This was my dream and I loved the bond, but the pain was excruciating and I was too much in my own head to ask for help and lacked the proper support from my friends and family. I quit at 3 weeks because my support system told me it was okay to quit instead of maybe helping me get the proper support I needed. My mother and my mother in law had no issues breastfeeding so they didn’t know what I was going through.
I still cry every day because I was too in my head to ask for help. I wish I could go back, but I know I can’t, and no I fear that these thoughts will get the best of me.
I mean, I guess they already are.

My 2-year old is now going through Occupational Therapy because of a delay and I can’t help but feel like I’m a failure as a mother because of this. I regret not listening to the warnings about screen time etc and now I’m worried that everyone is silently judging me for not raising my son properly. I wish I could share this burden with my husband, but he just asks me if I feel anxiety over his classes or not without really listening to me.

I am so bored and fed up of the relentlessness of motherhood. I feel more isolated than ever before yet at the same time am so desperate for time alone and freedom from these baby chains.