MY CURRENT REALITY

Our daughter, Elin, was born April 25, 2015. We ended up with two viable embryos, transferred one on July 30 (our nine-year wedding anniversary), and received the joyous news that the transfer was successful two weeks later. I wrote a blog entry about finding out all of our dreams were coming true, but I never posted it; the survivor's guilt was just too much. I didn't know how to share that I had been chosen for Team Motherhood when so many of my friends, virtual and otherwise, still hadn't.

Also, I had a really rough pregnancy. There were thankfully no medical complications, but I suffered from all kinds of pains and discomforts, from vomiting my way through the first 14 weeks to gaining 60+ pounds and swelling up like a balloon early on. I didn't enjoy the experience at all, which only compounded my guilt. I wanted to write about the challenges of pregnancy, but again felt that my readers who were still in the trenches would be offended and hurt by me complaining about something they longed for with such aching intensity.

Now, I find myself again struggling ... this time with parenthood. Elin is five weeks old, and while she's a healthy, growing baby, I am crying nearly every day over the challenges of caring for her. Getting her to sleep at night is a battle, especially when Philip and I are so sleep-deprived and my body is still healing from the birth. She often cries for hours in the evening, driving us to the brink of insanity as we run out of soothing measures to try. And acclimating to this new infant-centric life has been a major adjustment. Philip and I were married nine years before she joined our family, so we were very set in our ways, used to having the freedom to do as we pleased. Having to sacrifice our former priorities, including our physical and emotional intimacy with each other, has led to more than a few ugly arguments.

But by far breastfeeding has been the biggest hurdle. At first Elin couldn't latch effectively thanks to her "tongue-tie" condition; then she completely refused the left side. Now, with a diagnosis of reflux, we're dealing with her crying at my breast, choking, hunching and often projectile vomiting. I've seen three different lactation consultants and still feel like I'm floundering. Nursing is the most basic, natural, and important task I have as a mother, and I can't seem to get it down.

Of course, I'm constantly asking Dr. Google for advice, which only yields trite, useless tips (and often conflicting: Aim for shorter, more frequent feeds! Make sure she drains both breasts at a feeding!) and confidence-deflating photos of women looking tenderly down at their peacefully nursing newborns. I'm constantly bombarded with the romanticized idea that breastfeeding is supposed to be this intimate bonding experience that baby and I will both enjoy. My baby is supposed to find comfort, security and pleasure at my bosom, and instead, she's screaming her head off in pain and frustration.

Still, I have to persevere, because she has to eat. So we fight our way through feedings every two hours, which isolates me endlessly in the house. I'm fearful to go out because I don't want to have a breastfeeding battle in public, and if people come over, I hide out in the bedroom to nurse, every muscle tense, praying to God she doesn't cry and give away my ineptitude. My muscles ache from the stress and effort of it all.

And then there are the times when I totally lose my patience with her, cursing out loud, being too rough, shoving my nipple into her mouth while she shrieks, which later makes me feel like a monster.

It all leaves me feeling like a failure, and it makes me so sad and brokenhearted. Once again, I feel like my body is failing me. Infertility was hard, pregnancy was hard, and now motherhood is hard. Am I just one of those people who will never be satisfied, who looks at the downside of everything? And the deeper, darker questions ... Was I never meant to be a mother in the first place? Were my infertility and subsequent unpleasant pregnancy signs that I wasn't cut out for this? Did I "play God" by doing IVF and conceiving "unnaturally," and now I'm left with a child that I don't have the ability to care for?

I've found that I do need an outlet for these feelings, as hard as they may be to read for someone still longing for a child. I want to be able to verbally process the victories and the defeats. I understand if anyone no longer wants to follow along. But I hope to visit this space more regularly to document these days, my current reality - totally in love with this child yet bumbling and weeping my way through her first weeks of life.