Nine months of waiting, planning, preparing your body, your home… Nine months of falling in love again, touching your belly, dreaming of tomorrow…

Nine months rocking, hugging, loving, feeling…

Nine months of being filled with emotion, nine months of excitement, nine sweet months… nine long months…

And at last, your baby arrives, at last, your baby is born, and at last, you live this moment, those moments in which the world stops. At last, you look into each other’s eyes, embrace each other, cry with joy, tremble with emotion. Finally, your baby is here. Finally, you caress each other. Finally, your baby suckles from your breasts, looks at you, and gifts you their smell… Finally.

Or not?

Finally, your baby has arrived, and you have waited for it to happen as they told you it would: you look into your baby’s eyes and embrace them in every moment, but you have not felt it or noticed it. Finally, your baby is born, and although your soul is stirred, you have not fallen in love.

Finally, your baby has arrived, and none of what they told you has happened. You love your baby, yes, with all your soul. But you are also very tired, overwhelmed, and exhausted.

Your baby is doing well, is healthy, you are holding it, as it is searching for your breasts, smelling your skin, searching for your gaze… and I respond in the same way, but although I search and search for the intensity of this moment that should happen, it seems that it does not arrive. Are you a bad mother? Why doesn’t it happen to you? What have you done wrong? You got prepared, read, you have wished for it and longed for it, but no matter how much you look for it, the intensity doesn’t come, and without it, you feel that nothing of it is real, that everything is bad.

Love follows no theory

These are both equally valid scenarios. Mothers can fall in love instantly and it’s love at first sight or little by little. Love has no rules, no structure, and follows no theory. It is not socially acceptable for a mother not to fall in love with her baby instantly, and this creates confusion and guilt. Mothers love their babies more than anything else. It’s true love, love that cannot be measured, that cannot be touched, and it is so real that it can come on you like a high or creep up on you slowly, forging bonds with kisses and hugs.

Happy Day of Love to ALL mothers!