Dear (new) Grandma – From my heart to yours

A letter written by a mother and dedicated to all grandmothers.

Dear Grandma,

The moment we have all been waiting for is finally here. Your precious grandchild has taken his first breath and we all took a deep sigh of relief at the same time because the wait was over. The worry and the anxious doctor’s visits are all over now and we can hold this little miracle in our arms. 

But dear Mom, I am so overwhelmed by joy, excitement, fear, pain, just all kinds of emotions and I need a moment to just process the events of the past few weeks and I have to tell you something but I can’t without bursting into tears so I am writing instead. 

You have been a mother for many many years and you know this journey and the bumps in the road and the difficulties, but also the joys that lie ahead to raise a tiny human being and watch this child grow up and become an adult. I look up to you because you have walked this road and I want you to hold my hand as I give my first few steps on the road of motherhood. Like a baby learning to walk for the first time. But the same way we encourage a baby to walk independently and let go of his hand, the same goes for me holding your hand. At some point I am going to want to let go. And please let me, Mom. I have to figure this out for myself and sometimes you want to share your experience and knowledge but I don’t want to listen at that moment. Dear Mom, it is not because I don’t love you or respect you. I just need to do this in my own way because I am in survival mode when I bring my baby home and I need to find what works for me to learn to cope and not just survive from day to day. I know you mean well and I love you for that, but please allow me the space to make a decision that is different from the one you would make. And please don’t be angry with me, I am so overwhelmed with emotions that I cannot stand you being upset with me.

Right now I feel pretty ugly because my body still looks very much pregnant, I have pain down *there* because this baby was a chubby one! My breasts are full and my nipples are cracked and sore. My baby is crying all the time or a least it feels like it and I am fighting tears myself for the majority of the day. I am suffering from information overload. In the hospital, every nurse told me something different about breastfeeding and I am confused. So anything you say right now might make me doubt myself as a mother and I already feel like I am failing my baby because I am not getting it right. So if I am reaching out to you, please help me as much as you can. But if I am not reaching out you or not heading to your advice, please know that I am trying to find the mother within me in that moment to ask her what she thinks should be done and sometimes I want to listen to her voice instead of yours. Please allow me to try things my own way.

I know you have loads of advice and tricks from the time your children were small and I would love to listen to all of it and then choose what I would like to do. I have been reading and doing my research in this pregnancy and things have changed a lot over the years and I would really like to follow the latest research where possible. I am being judged by colleagues and random people in public for things I do as a mother, so please don’t join them. Know that you have raised me well (or the son that I am married to) and that I will do the same with my child because I value what you taught me.

Dear Mom, I will never keep your grandchildren away from you and will do everything I can to make sure they know who you are. But I am begging you to do the same on your part. If you want your grandchildren to know you, you need to visit and make an effort to see them. You need to call so that they can know your face when you are not here. When you are here you need to play with them on the floor, take a walk with them. Feed them and bath them when I ask you to, or at least offer if you are not too scared. In the beginning, I might not let you do much else but hold your grandchild but that is just because I don’t trust myself as a mother yet, let alone other people to feed or change him so again, please allow me the time to build up my confidence. 

When we bring him home we might need a few days to settle in. Can you please ask me what I want in terms of visiting? One day I might be too tired for any visitors and arriving unannounced is really putting a lot of stress on me. I am so worried to look like I am not coping and unexpected visits make it worse because I cannot even comb my hair or get rid of my smelly t-shirt. If I invite you over, please come because it took a lot of courage to admit that I need help. If I don’t want to breastfeed in front of you, please don’t feel offended. My body has been so exposed in the past few days that I am finally able to have a say over my privacy and even if you’re okay with it but I’m not, please give me the space to do so. If you are the one that doesn’t want me to feed in front of you, please don’t voice it loudly because you make me feel judged. Then rather visit some other time but if my baby is hungry, I am going to feed him.

Dear grandma, I know you have raised kids before and you clearly did a good job because look at the daughter you have today! For the mothers-in-law also – I married the result of your upbringing because you did such a good job! But I really want to figure this out for myself. I have this image in my head of what kind of mother I want to be and I don’t know if I am going to get it right but I really want to try. Being a mother has a lot to do with confidence in your abilities as a mother and if you constantly remind me of what I should or should not be doing, it is really tough for me to build my confidence as a mother. So if I don’t ask or follow your advice it is not because I disregard your knowledge and experience, I just need some time to find my feet and start believing in myself as a mother. Rather tell me I am doing a good job even if you think I am really struggling, I need to hear that I am doing a great job and maybe I will struggle less if I have more confidence, who knows? But if I am falling apart, please catch me and don’t let me go down the dark paths of postpartum depression and punish me because I didn’t want to listen to you before … I have never in my life felt this vulnerable and never before did I have another human(s) depend on me entirely for their survival and this is new and it is scary. I know I am asking a lot from you but please give me some time to adapt to this new role. I am putting myself second from the moment this baby is born and I do need you close to me, but not all the time. Think of a toddler crossing the street – they want you to be close because they feel safe, but they don’t always want to hold your hand as they want to establish their independence and build their confidence to cross the street on their own one day. If it becomes dangerous however, mom will take their hand and guide them. This is what I am also asking. Walk with me but if I don’t want to hold your hand, let me be. But if you see danger lurking and that my struggling is no more struggling but barely surviving, gently take my hand and guide me to safety until I feel ready to let go again.

So in summary dear Mom, please don’t be too far away because I might just want to grab your hand and hold on for dear life. But if I want to let go, please let me and whatever you do, I need your love and support right now. I cannot handle your criticism or doubt my maternal abilities because I have no clue what I am doing but I am figuring it out. I just need to know that I have your support right now and that you will do everything you can to help me when I need it because your own baby is growing up big time right now and need to know that everything will be okay.

All my love,

Your Daughter