Baby #3

Mamaxiety is meant for me to open up about anything and everything that causes anxiety for me. One of the biggest things on my mind these days is baby number 3, who is about to make his entrance sooner rather than later. Can I be honest for a second? Lately there haven’t been many feelings of joy or excitement because well, I’m scared. It feels so hard to admit that, like I should be so happy that I get to have another baby. Babies are great and not everyone gets to experience the joy of bringing one into this world but man, I am terrified. To be completely open and raw, this is the first of my 3 boys that my husband and I were not trying for. We actually had been having conversations about being completely ok with not having any more kids. Pregnancy is HARD for me, parenting is HARD and we were starting to feel like our family was complete. Then BOOM, a sick visit to the doctor had me coming home to tell my husband that I had bronchitis AND was pregnant! Since then, I’ve had my moments of being excited but as the time gets closer to him being here, I am absolutely terrified. I find myself struggling day to day to be the best mom I can be to the 2 boys I already have. Quite honestly, I end most days feeling like I’ve failed at that, so the idea of adding another baby to the mix is scary. I keep trying to tell myself that these emotions are perfectly normal to feel, but it doesn’t seem to make a difference with how I feel day to day. With my first two pregnancies I didn’t really go through a nesting phase, but man is it strong this time around. I don’t feel like anything is going to be ready and I keep telling my husband that I’m sure my water is just going to break and we won’t be prepared to bring him home. With the other two, my water broke early and we weren’t necessarily ready to bring them home, so I’m not sure why the idea of it this time is freaking me out so much. Then, there’s always the worry about “sharing the love” between baby and the other kids. I don’t really worry about sharing the love as much as I do the attention. Another big concern is that my youngest really doesn’t understand what is going on and is very much still mama’s baby. With all of his own issues, he has required most of my attention, so I’m almost positive he isn’t going to be a fan of having a baby in the house. With this entire pregnancy being so different from my first two, it makes me wonder if this time I’ll be able to breast feed since I’ve struggled with it before. With my first, my colostrum didn’t even come in the first few days so he had to have formula, and then I pumped for him for a month or two. With my second, my milk came in great but because he was in the NICU and started with a feeding tube it became extremely complicated to even try to breast feed. So now I wonder, if my milk comes in well, will I be able to do it? Will it be too time consuming since I have two other boys to care for as well? I thought that if I chose not to breastfeed with my second, I would be prepared to not feel like a failure. But, I ended up feeling that way anyways, so I’m sure I’ll have those emotions again this time around. I have other big things I’m worried about too, like needing a bigger car to fit all the boys in, and getting a room ready for baby. Since I’m struggling with SPD (symphysis pubis dysfunction), I’m in almost constant pain so I’m feeling like I’ll never get to those things before it’s time to deliver. I’m also so nervous for when he does decide to come, because it’s going to be such a different experience this time around. For starters, I’ll be delivering at a different hospital than before. Since I’ve only been seeing a high risk OBGYN and a midwife, I’ll just be getting whoever is on-call to do my C-section. Then, since we’re in the middle of a pandemic, it’s only going to be me and my husband. My mom won’t be there to

comfort me or see my son as soon as he comes out like she was with the first two. On top of that, no visitors will be allowed, so not even my boys will get to meet their new brother until we bring him home. All of this feels so silly because I know everything will be ok one way or another, but at the same time it’s so just overwhelming. For me at least, this is the reality of baby number 3.