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I was one week into parenthood, and in the worst physical condition of my life: greasy, bleeding, exhausted, with a swollen, purple wound across my abdomen. I was tired to the point of dissociation, but also performing a new role with impressive conviction. Smiling at my baby, moving him assuredly towards my nipple: I was playing the part of a mother who knows what she is doing and is loving it.
There was love, or at least a disorienting swell of emotion. It was all so very blurry. Tears streamed from my eyes in satisfying gushes, as I discovered the “smile” a newborn makes after drinking milk. I was happy – these were happy tears. Could I just have a moment to take all of this in? Could someone take the baby for a few days while I recover? No?
Existing between two opposing states – suffering and joy – was the new reality of my life as a parent. I was going through a metamorphosis, transforming from a hungry, pregnant caterpillar into something else entirely. The newborn weeks were the bit where I was halfway between goo and my new solid state.
My partner and I wanted this baby so much: we had been through three years of gruelling IUI and IVF, and were elated when it finally worked. Throughout pregnancy, we had been studious learners, reading parenting books, sleep books and psychology books, in preparation for the arrival of our baby who, after all, was human just like us. We would understand him, and it would all make sense.
But actually, nothing made sense. Our baby was born by emergency caesarean section, and 24 hours later the hospital sent us on our way. I could no longer walk but I could stagger, and that was enough. Back at home, we remembered that, as well as a new baby, we also had a home to manage, and one of us was severely injured, and we lived 250 miles from any grandparents.
The baby books, which had promised so much, failed to help my baby sleep, feed or stop crying. Those things only came with time. What the books did deliver were impossible expectations and a constant, nagging sense of failure.
One day, we had some child-free friends for lunch and I ambitiously decided to make shish kebabs for the first time. Hands dripping with yoghurt and raw chicken, I couldn’t comfort my baby, who was crying for me in his bouncer. At lunch, I was possessed with a manic energy unleashed by splitting myself between the desire to comfort my child in a dark room, and to be a fabulous host. My friend looked at me and said, “You should draw cartoons about parenting. I bet other mums would like to see them.”
I started posting drawings to my Instagram account, often depicting the dizzying gulf between expectation and reality. What having a new baby looks like (two parents smiling adoringly at their child) versus what it feels like (the baby tormentor riding on the backs of the haggard parents). New mum from a distance versus new mum close up.
“So glad it’s not just me,” someone would comment. “This is me.” “THIS.” It was a relief to connect with other frazzled parents online. We had so much in common. We adored our children, but were highly critical of the conditions of modern parenting. We had all crash-landed into the same harsh reality, in which supportive communities have crumbled, childcare is unaffordable and our children are unsafe and unwelcome almost everywhere we go. It was very, very funny – when we weren’t crying about it.
Transforming into a parent is not a dainty, discreet thing to do. It’s messy and primal, involving a lot of body fluids, screaming and nudity. I actually loved a lot about this. It was a refreshing change from the repressive, grey monotony of office life. But you do feel shocking. From pulling out your breasts on the bus to carrying a screaming five-year-old out of a party, people are staring at you, and you’re doing something you’ve never done before, on two hours’ sleep.
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I have now documented this transformation in a graphic nonfiction book called Cry When the Baby Cries, to share the bits that have mostly been hidden away. The bits that made me feel lonely and ashamed because they are taboo: boredom, rage, insecurity, frustration, doubt. With drawings, I could also show the depth of my eye bags, the stains on my clothes and the unfamiliar texture and shape of my postpartum stomach.
My book is not a baby manual. There isn’t a five-step routine that will make having a baby in a country that lacks adequate parental support any easier. What I would like other new parents to know, on a deep, cellular level, is that if you are struggling, it is not your fault. As parents in the 21st century, we are set up to fail. So much has gone wrong with the way we care for each other, and this is true for babies, children, parents, those with disabilities and elderly people. We need to do things differently. We are still waiting for leaders with a radical vision for a better world.
My kids are five and seven now, and the prophecy from older parents has come true: it has got a little bit easier. Every now and again, the kids both sleep through. My husband and I will high-five each other when we go out for chips in the pub and nobody pushes a table over or sprays squash on the ceiling. On Friday nights we cook together and play games. There are moments that are exactly as I hoped they would be. And then someone will throw a massive wobbly from hunger or exhaustion, and it could be the kids or one of us, and I’ll think, “Help! We can’t do this!” And we can’t really, but we do.
