New Father of 4 days Anxiety is crippling
Good day everyone!
Boy is this a wild ride but I see other fathers helping here so I wanted to post because this has been… hard
Speed run of me, I have had extreme anxiety for a long time (or so I’m told) I don’t take medication for it I work in a high stress job I deal with it, problem is I’ve ALWAYS dealt with it a specific way…
Hard day come home drink, play video games, I was essentially a functional alcoholic no bad behaviors no drinking and driving…
My wife finds out she is pregnant and says she would appreciate if I didn’t drink anymore during the 9 months, I agreed and drank extremely minimally I mean maybe once every 6 weeks if that
I panicked I wouldn’t have emotion for the baby because pregnancy I was just terrified about getting our house ready and making sure everything was okay
Baby comes on the 16th… and when I saw that little girl something inside me snapped hard… I mean hard… she came at 35 weeks ran a 9.9 on her abcar, and when we saw the pediatrician they said she seems super healthy, good weight gain coming out of hospital no bad
But when I say snap I mean I broke down I balled I have never felt like this for anything in my life, I wonder why I wasted time playing games, drinking, anything… everything pails in comparison to my emotion for that baby
The problem is I panic at everything my anxiety is on overdrive I am afraid when she moves, when she doesn’t move, I’m afraid when her eating habits get weird when she is asleep too long everything
I am so terrified something will happen to her because I can’t live without her I now know… funny having anxiety about me not having emotion then a flood of it where I cry multiple times a day sometimes happy sometimes worry
I just stare at her endlessly because I’m afraid when I’m not something will happen, more over and I’m sure this is a good thing I don’t want to drink or do ANYTHING that would inebriate me in ANYway and so there is no end to it it’s just constant
I have a wonderful wife, loving beautiful and she is also having some complications that are just adding.. I have no issue being there for her when she is worried, but I cannot stop my endless stomach pit I want to just be happy and not waste this time
Anybody else have this crippling fear? How did you deal with it? Does it go away? I mean ever now she is laying on my wife’s chest (who is wide awake and sitting at an incline) but because she has a shirt on I wonder if she can breathe okay, my poor wife says she’s fine I promise and tries to comfort me but I just… well this is already long… love everyone here, I don’t know how yinz did it and kept sanity but I have never loved anything more then that baby
UPDATE: I finally started to calm down thanks to everyone here and we had a great morning me and my girl she had a decent awake time where I told her stories and sang songs, she ate well… I was finally feeling the pit go and then the pediatrician called and
told us to go to the children’s hospital to get another billirubin (we did this yesterday) and a thyroid check… and I broke down again after my wife left the car to take her in and I parked I balled and balled I walked in and am now in the waiting room while they do the heel prick because I was causing more stress…
The nurses don’t seem worried my wife says she’s fine I am crippled I mean crippled… I just have thoughts of not having that morning cuddle or seeing her beautiful face grow and I don’t know… are these tests scary anyone have this no one seems worried but me but I can’t calm down