I went into labor naturally 1 week late with Chloe when my water broke on a Wednesday afternoon. Through all of the chaos and pain (I still don't have her birth story finished yet!), I ended up having my body cut into to get her out. That was traumatic for me emotionally, physically, and, I think, psychically. After stumbling my way out of the stupor that was post-surgical Percocet I began to feel this weird ache...
I thought at first that it was my incision or even my uterus contracting back into its pre-pregnancy size but it was something different and I knew it. Then one day, I was laying in bed with that tiny girl who I was unmeasurably in love with sitting on my belly and the driving ache eased a little bit. Light bulb! My uterus was aching to hold my baby again. I think because she came out unnaturally, and my womb did not go through the process of birth, it was going through separation trauma! I know it sounds weird to speak of an organ like it has feelings but this was her home! It held her and grew her and nourished her until it was sliced open and the baby that it had embraced for 41 weeks was yanked from its loving warmth. And it was aching.
Realizing this was heart-breaking for me. My body was so in-tune with this child from the very start. I could feel when we conceived; I could feel that she was a girl; I could feel every little movement, every little hiccup and now my body was empty and it knew that it wasn't supposed to happen that way. It felt like a physical form of PTSD with an anxiety, depression spin to it.
So once I figured it all out, I did the only thing I could think of to ease the pain: I'd hold her little body against my belly and push her into my uterus so that it could get its "fix." I did this for a week or two whenever I'd feel that sensation and eventually it went away. It was like I had to reassure it that she was there and that she was okay. Like it was the mother inside of me that was taking care of our baby until she passed the responsibility on to me.
When I had Auron, I half-expected the feeling to come back and prove to me that I was wrong and that this feeling was a normal by-product of birth, but it never came. The Inner-Mother felt strong and stable. She worked hard to get him out, even when I was asleep and not consciously trying to help and afterward she slipped into a peaceful slumber, probably feeling accomplished and empowered by the successful birth she was finally able to achieve.
I remember the feeling of that ache and it is directly connected to my heart. It makes me want to cry because it was such a primal sadness but it reminds me how much I love my daughter. I am so lucky to have such a perfectly imperfect girl. She made me a mother. She made the Inner-Mother one too.
She is truly heart-shaped as she is a bicornuate uterus. Even the shape of her signifies love.
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