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After
Delivery
Visualization
for Bonding with Your Baby
This
exercise can help you to gain perspective and get in touch with any
past emotional block that keep you from enjoying your baby. In your
journal, write down what, if anything, was missing from your own early
experience of being mothered.
Take
time to identify feelings that might come up for you during the
postpartum period. Visualize yourself as a baby, getting whatever it
is that you needed. More holding, more secure cuddles, kisses on the
cheek, being talked to softly; absorb these images fully. You may want
to include your partner –- even have him hold you in his arms – or
share the exercise with a friend who can nurture and comfort you.
Then,
after you've taken these moments for yourself, imagine your baby
smiling up at you –- looking cute and cuddly – and feel your love
for your own child, growing as your learn to love and care for this
baby, too. Getting to know each other, with laughter and tears, can
bond you now. You are remembering that time passes, seeing your child
grow in your mind's eye –- to three years, seven years, 10 years,
the teenage years to adulthood. A time of sharing seems so long, but
as you adjust to your baby, you will be amazed at how fast babies grow
and how soon you will be watching yours leave home ... to continue the
cycle of life.
By
gaining a perspective on your own childhood, with the help of a
support group, a family counselor or a friend, you can find what will
help you nourish both yourself and your baby. Don't ignore these
needs. If you get help now, your enjoyment of parenting will greatly
increase. You deserve to enjoy your baby!
Within
the first year after birth, most mothers experience complete
adjustment to the new family constellation. Postpartum blues usually
resolve within three months after delivery. Occasionally, women
experience severe depression, which must be professionally treated.
Get whatever help you need. How you respond to your own needs and
those of other family members forms the foundation for your family
relationships.
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