This New Years Eve day I’ve been reflecting on my experiences of this past year. Being pregnant. Giving birth. The struggles that have occurred during my first 6 months postpartum.
I’ve been asked by people in passing questions of “Are you enjoying parenting?” and “Is parenting what you’ve expected it would be?”
The answers have been: “Yes and it’s been really hard”, and “Yes and I wasn’t expecting feeding to be such a struggle”.
I haven’t yet mentioned it on here explicitly, but my son was born with 4 oral ties that was diagnosed fairly late. I went to 12 different providers before someone finally showed them to me so I could finally know why we were struggling so much.
Fortunately, feedings have gotten better with time since the procedure. However, it still isn’t as easy as it is for many other babies and we still have a ways to go in recovery.
The whole experience has been hard for so many reasons.
There’s been grief associated with the loss of not having an easy feeding experience.
There’s been a lot of sadness in knowing that my son was struggling for 3 months without anyone telling me so we could give him the proper interventions to help him.
There’s been a lot of anger due to the gaslighting and dismissal that I experienced from providers when I described the issues we were having to them.
And, probably most of all, there’s been fatigue and exhaustion due to the sheer amount of energy put into both caring for a newborn and trying to help him recover in the best way possible.
The other day after explaining to my husband some information on oral ties that I had read, my husband said, “You know, if there’s any one person who can help him with this it is you.”
This immediately brought tears to my eyes. I really needed to hear it. I have exerted so much time and energy into educating myself on the issue so I can best help him. I’ve taught myself so much about oral ties and the recovery that at our last OT appointment the OT told me that I should be a feeding therapist because I was so knowledgeable about the treatment.
But despite all of my education. Despite all of my efforts. It’s still really, really hard.
Why?
Because if there’s one thing that I’ve learned the most from being a psychotherapist it’s that knowledge alone doesn’t heal.
Despite all the education you might have, it doesn’t stop the struggle.
Despite all the knowledge you might have, it doesn’t prevent life from being hard sometimes.
Despite all the efforts to know all of what you think you need to know, it doesn’t solve the issue.
Because knowledge alone doesn’t heal.
Sometimes, regardless of all of your best efforts, life is just hard.
You can know a lot, but your knowledge and education can’t control the outcome. Nor can your efforts force a certain outcome to occur in a certain amount of time (Side note: This is why I never tell prospective clients how long they will be in therapy because it can vary so incredibly much!)
Sometimes the most healing comes when you just move along with what is rather than try to push or force it to be a certain way. It comes when you just allow the water to flow the way it wants to rather than try to force it to flow a certain way.
And, after all, isn’t that the key to compassion and true connection anyway?
Things I’ve been finding nourishing lately:
Hot Chocolate made from real chocolate bars
Baby kisses and snuggles… always
Lounge wear
The sound of rain outside my window
Preparing my calendar for 2023
Chamomile tea before bed