Perfect parenting

We all know that perfection is unattainable. Right? Then why are so many of us perfectionists? 

Perfectionism crops up in various areas of my life. For a long time I let it stop me from doing what I desperately wanted to do, until I made a conscious effort to do it anyway. It was scary, because I really didn't want it to be crap. I'm still not convinced it wasn't. That's not the point. I had to reject a long-held belief that unless I could do something perfectly, it wasn't worth doing.

Before M was born, I had a special daydream. I was holding my smiling, beatific baby, and we were dancing together in his/her nursery as the sunlight streamed through the window. The song playing was something by Ronan Keating. I can't remember which one. Something about rollercoasters. This was my picture of impending motherhood. It was going to be magnificent and full of cuddles and the joy of togetherness.

If you're a reader of my blog, you may know that the reality was somewhat different. It still is somewhat different. There is laughter but there is also a fair bit of crying. I get cross a lot. Mainly, I suppose, because I want my toddler to behave like a grown up. I want him to appreciate everything I work so hard to do for him. Things I try to do perfectly. When he makes a mess, my first thought is, "I've just washed / tidied / arranged that nicely". When he gets frustrated that I'm giving something or someone else my attention, I think, "Can I not just do This One Thing without you getting uppity? It's not all about you, kiddo!" 

My son isn't conforming to the original image I had of him. Neither am I conforming to the image of a serene, well-adjusted me. We're just muddling through. Which is why I get irate (my favourite activity, it seems) when I see this sort of headline on a parenting magazine: "Perfect Play Dates - less fights, more fun". Our children's play dates are meant to be perfect now?! Here follows my letter of protest.

"Dear Coles Baby & Toddler Magazine

"I'm writing with regard to a headline on the cover of your Spring 2012 edition. 'Perfect Play Dates' is an irresponsible title for the article.

"Parents, especially first-timers, are under an enormous amount of pressure to live up to an ideal largely perpetuated by the media.

"If you were genuinely interested in offering advice and support to parents alongside self-promotion, perhaps you could consider your use of alliteration in future. Stop pressuring parents to strive for perfection. It doesn't exist."

May I encourage you also to fight against the tyranny of perfection. You will need to start by forcibly restraining me from arranging things nicely.

It wasn't meant to be like this.

I didn't think I was ever going to cover this topic, and even as I write I'm still not sure. What follows is a summary of my birth story. I'm going to keep it brief and devoid of detail. However, if you feel this isn't for you, now's the time to make a swift exit.

My son was born at 11:07pm on Wednesday 5 October 2011. I had been admitted to hospital the previous evening to be induced, as he was around a week and a half late. When my waters broke meconium was discovered. It meant that there was a chance our baby was distressed. There was a lot of waiting around after that but when things kicked off Wednesday lunchtime, it was the start of a very difficult birth.

I started off on gas and air which, if you have never had it, made me feel as though I was having an out of body experience every 30 seconds. I didn't like it very much but it helped to ease the pain of the contractions. After a while I had to progress to pethidine. I don't think it really agreed with me, but again, it helped to ease the pain. I have no recollection of what happened between that stage and the end stage of labour, as I was drugged up to my eyeballs.

Despite the coaching of the midwives, and despite my best efforts, our little boy wasn't able to make an entrance on his own. All of a sudden, the numbers in the room swelled from two or three to ten. There wasn't time to do an emergency cesarean so the doctors decided to use another procedure.

By the time M arrived and was whisked out of the room due to possible infection, I was exhausted and in shock. My husband was concerned (understatement) as no-one had told him what was going on and had himself been whisked out of the room at one point.

Now, the purpose of this disclosure is not to elicit kind feedback such as, 'poor you - what a rotten time you had', so please don't feel that you have to respond in this way. Rather, I wanted to give a context for what follows, namely an explanation of my psychological state after the birth.

When our son was brought back in, I felt detached. I just couldn't connect him with the bump that I had bonded with for the past nine months. I felt as if I knew my bump, or Bun, as we called him/her. I didn't know this creature, lying there staring out at the world. I knew how I supposed to feel. There was supposed to be a golden ray of light shining down from the heavens. There was supposed to be a choir of angels singing the Hallelujah chorus. There was supposed to be adoration and smiling and sudden onset amnesia regarding the recent unpleasantness. There wasn't any of that.

In the days and weeks that followed, I struggled to bond with my baby. Breastfeeding was difficult. The lack of sleep was difficult. I went through the motions, doing what I had to do, but I didn't know how to connect with my son. What made it exceptionally painful was the fact we had experienced a miscarriage. Here was our long-awaited baby, the baby we had been through so much heartache to meet, and yet I felt at best, numb, and at worst, wanting to run away.

In time, gradually, I was able to bond with my son. Now, I can honestly say that I love him with all my heart and we have a beautiful relationship.

With permission, I want to share something that helped me recently; a quote from Fleur Bickford (@NurturedChild on Twitter).

It's ok to love your baby but hate the way they came into the world.

Maybe your birth didn't go the way you had hoped or expected it would. Maybe after the birth you didn't feel the way you thought you should. Maybe you're finding it difficult to come to terms with your new life and the new responsibilities it brings.

It's ok.

You're not the first person to feel like this, and you won't be the last. You may be surprised at how many of your friends and people you know had similar experiences. Why do we pretend that everything's fine? That we're coping well when clearly we're not? Sometimes life is hard. We should be able to share our grief as well as our happiness. The good times and the bad.

I have no affiliation with them but if any of this is relevant to you, visit the Birth Trauma Association (@BirthTrauma on Twitter). It's all too easy to feel isolated, but we don't have to stay that way.