I was sitting at the kitchen table, the spoon frozen in midair in front of my little girl's mouth, and she was screaming because it wasn't the cup she wanted to drink from. And I just looked at her, this sweaty, raging little body of a year and a half, and I thought: I can't stand this child. Not that I was tired. Not that the situation was hard. I mean, literally, that I couldn't stand her.
That night, after I put her to bed, I locked myself in the bathroom and ran the tap so I wouldn't hear her if she cried. I looked at myself in the mirror and wondered what kind of mother feels this way. Because we were taught that love is automatic. That the moment we see our child, some warm, unconditional wave washes over us, and from then on we make every sacrifice gladly. That's not how it happened for me. When they first laid her on my chest, I felt more terror than rapture. I thought the rest would come later. I waited for it for months.
My husband, of course, didn't understand when I finally said it out loud to him one day, half crying, half furious, standing in the kitchen while I washed the dishes. He said I was just tired, that it couldn't be true, that how could I say such a thing about my own child. And right there, in that moment, I learned that I would never say it to anyone again.
It wasn't my child I couldn't love. It was who I became beside her
At the daycare parent meetings I smiled. At the playground I praised how well she climbed. And at home I sometimes closed the door behind me and just stood in the dark room for minutes, because I couldn't bear to look at her. Sometimes I'd be cooking for her, chopping carrots, while my mind wandered to what my life might have been if I'd decided differently back then. That thought filled me with terrible guilt, but I couldn't switch it off, the way you can't just un-turn a light once it's been switched on.
There was one week, maybe the worst of all, when my little girl came down with the flu, and I nursed her almost without sleep for three days. Her nose ran, her pajamas were soaked with sweat, and when she woke up for the fourth night in a row crying "Mommy, Mommy," something snapped inside me. I didn't scream at her, I didn't hurt her. I just sat down on the edge of the bed and cried. And she, this small, feverish child, crawled over to me and nestled into my neck.
In that moment I didn't feel love. I felt something else: a responsibility bigger than me, one I couldn't put down, even when there was nothing left inside me to give.
A few years have passed since then
I'm not going to say everything got fixed, because this isn't the kind of story where suddenly it all clicks into place. There are days when I look up at her and think it's unbelievable that this being came from me, that it almost hurts to look at her because I love her so much. And there are days when that old, cold feeling comes back, that we're strangers sharing an apartment. The one thing I've learned is that these two don't cancel each other out, even if no one told me that before I gave birth.
Sometimes I still stand in the bathroom, run the tap, and listen to my own breathing. But I'm no longer so ashamed that I have to pause before I go back to her.
Is it normal not to feel instant love for your baby?
For many mothers, that overwhelming wave of love doesn't arrive the moment they hold their baby. As this story shows, it can take weeks or months, and the initial feeling can be closer to fear than to joy.
Can you love your child and still struggle with motherhood?
Yes. The hardest lesson in this story is that deep love and a cold, distant feeling don't cancel each other out. Both can be true on different days, sometimes even the same one.
Why do mothers hide these feelings?
Because they fear judgment. When these thoughts are met with disbelief or blame, as happened here, many women learn to keep them secret and carry them alone, like something shameful.
What helped the most over time?
Not a sudden fix, but acceptance. Learning that it's okay to pause, to catch your breath, and to stop being ashamed of needing a moment before returning to your child.
