SO…two adoptive families from church asked me the same questions this week:
1) Is it just surreal?
I said, yes!
2) Do you feel like you’re babysitting?
I said, yes!
Isn’t that horrible? I feel like I’m babysitting. It’s so…weird. I mean, I love Little Man. I can already distinguish his cries, his wants, his needs, his different expressions. I know how he likes to be held and rocked, how often he wants to eat, what his cooing is starting to sound like. He knows I’m his momma, because he turns into me when we cuddle, he searches for me if someone else is holding him and he hears my voice, he settles right down when I pick him up, he understands “kisses from momma” and opens his mouth up wide and turns his cheeks to me…
But I feel like I’m playing house.
Now, a very good friend of mine told me that after she gave birth to her oldest daughter, she very much felt the same way. They came home from the hospital and she found it all very surreal. She knew she was her daughter – she “knew” everything she was supposed to know. But she felt very strange.
I feel very strange.
Again, don’t get me wrong – I love Little Man. My mom was holding him today and after a while I just wanted him back in my arms. I know he is my son and I am his mother. But I feel like I’m faking it…or I’m playing at mommy…or it’s all a dream.
I know it’s permanent. I know it’s “for real.” I know this is what I’ve wanted for almost 6 years of trying to conceive and have a family.
But it feels…weird. Happy? Yes. Challenging? In ways I’d never imagined. Fulfilling? Absolutely. Right? 100%.
But…weird. A dangerous opinion to naysayers, I’m sure. But it’s the truth.
danielthree18 
thanks! i've often wondered this, and it's nice to know that if i DO feel this way, I won't be alone. My sister told me that she had a hard time really believing her sons were permanent additions to her house until they were at least a few days or a few weeks old, so i don't think this is unique to adoption, but i wonder if the physical body changes of “oh, there was someone inside me and now, here they are!” that pregnant people experience helps them to make that shift more smoothly? ah well, i guess we'll never know.
did you ever figure out a way to make your wrists stop hurting?
🙂
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The first night we had Samuel home Richard and I talked about how it felt so strange for the hospital just to let us take him home….like ok…now what do we do?! How do we know what to do? Is this right? Is that right? How should we hold, feed, burp…etc….
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Forget naysayers! Any mom who tells you it's not a little weird having this new person in the house for at least the first few weeks is lying to you. You leave the house with two people, and you come home with three! And that third one isn't leaving! It's totally weird. I felt like it was too easy to bring him home. “They're not going to give me a quiz or something? They're just going to let me take him? Suckers!” lol
Reid is over a year old, and it's still weird that I'm a mom. I feel like a kid—who in the heck would let me have a kid when I'M just a kid? I try think of Future Me and Future Boy and what we'll be like, and I can't imagine it. Like it all has to be a dream, and I'll wake up before the future arrives. So it'll be weird in other ways after you get over the initial shock.
But it's those little moments of weirdness—the moments that bring you out of the “mom fog”—that make you look to God and say, “What is this amazing gift you've given me?” The moments that make you stop and think of what you've got right in front of you. Treasure those!
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I haven't posted here before, I don't believe. I just recently came accross your blog. However, I wanted to reassure you. I felt the exact same way after I gave birth to my daughter. She is my biological child. She was a much anticipated arrival. However, when I brought her home… it just felt very surreal. I felt like I was playing house. That being said, we are very very close, and she is 3. So, just know. You very well could feel the exact same way had you given birth to him. 😉
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Those are all very normal emotions. Before too long, you won't be able to hardly remember life before Little Man.
I think it is completely normal to feel life is a little weird now after waiting so long for motherhood and now it is finally here. Plus, like we IFers tend to do we romantize motherhood without thinking of all the not-so-fun things that come along with it too which makes for a rude awakening at the beginning. 🙂
I think it is just something that needs some time to sink in and then having Little Man will be the new normal and life before him will seem light years away.
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I'm sure it takes time to bond, just like it would with one who gives birth naturally. It'll come.
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Screw em! Honesty is good. It all sounds perfectly normal to me 🙂
I'll let you know how I feel about it if (when!) my time arrives!
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I've heard these exact same words from woman who gave birth to their babies…you are not alone! You are brave for sharing this and I'm glad you are hearing that you are not alone! I'm patiently waiting for more pics of little man, lol! Oh, is there a part 3 of your story?
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I have felt, and sometimes still feel the same way. It was really strong in the beginning but most of the time I don't feel that way… only every once in awhile. A lot of it is that I feel so blessed I just can't believe it!
I think as adoptive parents, we are more likely to point out that feeling even though I think many many new mothers feel that way.
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It took me awhile to get to the point where I was 100% mommy in every way I thought I should be. And I've heard the same from many other adoptive moms.
You're also dealing with a lack of sleep. You'll get there. But it sounds like you are doing just fine.
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i sometimes feel that way too, and i was in labor 26 hrs
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