Hi, I’m Bre. I’m a severe preeclampsia survivor and two-time NICU mama navigating motherhood after pregnancy and birth trauma. I decided to create mothermade as a way to share my reflections on motherhood, home, and what gets made in between. 🤎
I heard someone say, “yearning for more babies doesn’t go away, but I just don’t have more to give” and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since. 🤎
Because how are we supposed to know when our family is “complete”?
When our first, Adeline, was born we had a really rough go of it. Many of you know she was born at 30 weeks and spent 7 weeks in the NICU. And this was on top of the 5 weeks I spent hospitalized in the perinatal special care unit with severe preeclampsia.
At that time we would have laughed in your face if you said we would have another baby in 3 years—or at all. After going through hell and back, it felt impossible to trust my body again. We thought we’d be one and done… or maybe we’d adopt. But definitely never have our own biological child again.
Well 3 years and some months later, I’m laying here with our precious second-born baby girl on my chest. She’s asleep, breathing deeply, totally heavy and relaxed on me as I contemplate how we ever lived without her.
Healing is a funny thing. I surely haven’t forgotten all the pain we went through with Adeline’s birth, but the enormous hope and yearning I felt about growing our family outweighed any traumatic fears—even if only just. It was hard work getting there, though. Many, many years of therapy and working through my pregnancy and birth trauma.
And then there was Evie. Another not-perfect pregnancy (although much better than my first!), and another less-than-ideal birth. But this new, fresh, beautiful little girl is here and it was all worth doing again, just as I had imagined.
I had an intense yearning to have a second baby. And after she came, I immediately thought “let’s do it again!” The newborn cuddles, peach fuzz hair, and scrunch can be so addicting. And I thought that yearning was how you know whether or not your family is “complete.” I thought I’d either clearly want another baby or clearly not want another baby.
In reality, though, I think I’ll always want more babies, but I don’t think I have any more of myself to give. There are so many reasons having another baby would be wonderful. But there are also so many reasons to not have another baby—health concerns, financial goals, and not to mention my mental and emotional capacity. I want to be able to be fully present for my babies and I already feel stretched thin with two. I love the idea of not being outnumbered and I want to be able to give them the world—not to mention travel and show them the world—and on one income that feels impossible to do with more babies in tow.
I can’t predict how we’ll feel in the future and I’m not saying this is our final decision. I might look back on this a year from now and laugh. But when anyone asks me if we want another baby, I tell them I’m 87% sure we’re done.
And 87% sure feels fine for now. 🤎
What to expect from mothermade.
Motherhood is already a beautiful, messy, wild adventure. So when you add pregnancy and birth trauma on top of it, there’s a lot to process. My hope for mothermade is to talk openly and honestly about not just the beautiful parts of motherhood, but the messy ones, too. I’ll talk healing, health, hardships, home and navigating mothering and family planning after trauma.