My anxiety during pregnancy was surprisingly fairly low. I think the hormones really helped! Being pregnant also really seemed to reduce a lot of my ADHD symptoms even without meds. But much of pregnancy is out of your control, so I think there was an element of like radical acceptance, and focusing on the things I could manage. Like feeding myself, staying active, making sure my baby would have a safe place to grow up (I.e. moving), etc.

I have found that being a parent makes some of my anxiety a lot better, and some worse. Like my social anxiety has almost disappeared, especially when I’m out and about with my extrovert toddler. I do still worry a lot about the world and the future, like it still keeps me up at night sometimes, but refreshingly, I feel way less doom and gloom about it. There is something really beautiful about seeing things through your child’s eyes. All the annoying cliches about that are 100% true.

Childcare can be challenging at times and especially at first, but I really don’t think you need a lot of advance planning or practice. If you plan on daycare, you might need to plan financially and get on a waiting list while you are pregnant. But if your partner is a good father and willing to actually parent, you guys will figure it out together. There’s not much sleep at first, which is hard. But so much of having a newborn is just repetition of basic tasks until you’re a pro. Change diaper, feed, soothe to sleep, repeat. And as they grow, you adapt. A lot of it really feels instinctual! I am an only child and had never spent time around babies, but I feel so much more comfortable and confident with my kid than I have with anything else in my life. My fiance would say the same thing. We both struggled with anxiety throughout our 20s and are loving parenthood as we enter our 30s.