In My Photography Project "Postpartum," Women Reveal The Dark Side Of Becoming A Mother (25 Pics)

Guilt that I am not breastfeeding him exclusively, that I’m not the “warrior” mom from Facebook, that I’m not like the influencers and I cannot share a photo with me, my flat abs and my one-month-old baby at 8 a.m. And most of all, the overwhelming sensation that it’s necessary, that I have to go back to my rhythm, my work, my roles as soon as the baby left the hospital. Especially in my job as an actress, having a baby = to limit oneself, to put the creative and professional drive on hold.

I believe everything began once I gave birth. It was really difficult and I was alone there, surrounded by strangers with a cold soul.

But since I first held her in my arms, I forgot myself. For a few weeks, after I arrived home, I couldn’t fall asleep at night. I would stay and watch her, afraid to fall asleep in case something would happen to her during that time. All sorts of thoughts, anxieties, the fear that I wasn’t a good enough mother, would swarm my mind. I simply couldn’t find my peace and place. The anxiety was there almost all the time when we were visited by someone, when I fed her, when I was alone with her at home, but most of all, when the night came. I felt exhausted, both physically and mentally.

I would wake up and become sad, and the days were most of the time a fight between the rational and the emotions of postpartum depression. I didn’t understand what I was feeling and I was frustrated that I couldn’t fully enjoy the beginnings of our life as three. Happily, I’ve got a lovely husband who was my greatest support, while my family and friends were near me in a way they could be during the quarantine from the beginning of the pandemic. I spilled my feelings to anyone who wanted to listen to me and, step by step, I came to be able to truly smile.

The two hours that I spent daily inside the oxygen capsule helped me tremendously. I read a lot, I talked a lot to myself, I meditated, I made a plan of recovery and action.

I still have moments when I believe I’m not good enough when I get angry with myself when he cries and I don’t know what to do.

I work with myself each day. I’ve created mechanisms that help me calm down during hard times. I sing a lot. I dance. I clap my hands. I consciously touch myself. I wash myself with cold water. Every evening, I write what I did during the day. And I take a lot of photos. When he sleeps, I look at the pictures, I relive the moments, I reflect and meditate upon what I still have to work on. Then I breathe and live.

I’m starting to get back my sense of smell and notion of time.

Real-life is stranger than fiction because, unlike feature films, here, the unforeseeable strikes you. I hadn’t seen any scenario where I would play the role of a woman who, at 33-years-old, cuddles at her mother’s chest in fear. But that’s what I did! Postpartum depression is an ample, hormonal process that, in some cases, can lead to complete derailment.

For me, it meant the beginning of a period of insomnia, anxieties, panic attacks and hallucinations! I wouldn’t dare to talk not even to the ones close to me that I was NOT ok, it seemed as if I was spoiled. Shame. That’s what I felt.

I wasn’t myself anymore, and that graveled me terribly for a while. Those days, like two naughty ghosts, two thoughts would haunt me: either that I would go crazy, or that I would die…

The worst was when, all of the sudden, I felt tingles from head to toe, as if the cells were preparing to escape from a body that was already recovering after the C-section. With outer help, later, I understood that the reactions were considered to be normal when the anxiety and the panic attacks “embrace” you.

Within all the chaos, I adored my baby and not even for a second did I turn the storm I had inside towards him. What was his fault, a baby human with tiny hands, lifted towards me?

But who was I and what was I learning those days? The best decision of my life was to get help from a psychologist. Two weeks after giving birth I began therapy.

I can’t tell if it was early or late, but it was my release!