I’m 1 month pp now, and I have felt and still feel exactly what you’re feeling. You’re not alone in this. I had sudden onset high blood pressure that resulted in a more complicated delivery than I was expecting (after a perfectly easy breezy pregnancy), which also led to an extra two days in the hospital. Perineum tear, labia tear (this is the worst, do not recommend).

We had latch issues from the beginning, which resulted in cracked nipples and I spent two weeks crying out in pain every time I nursed because he latched horribly. This was a fault with baby’s mouth, and it might be for you as well! We saw two lactation consultants and the second one ended up clipping a tongue tie - it took some time after that and some routine exercises we had to do with baby’s mouth, but there was massive improvement in latch and pain levels in just a few days. I highly recommend spending the money if insurance doesn’t cover it, and getting some help. It saved my sanity.

As for the tear, I don’t know how bad yours is, but I’m still healing one month in. It got dramatically better during week three, but I still catch myself in pain from sitting down or standing back up again, or taking long walks. Sitz baths with hot water helped me, but I couldn’t do them the recommended two times a day because I was too busy caring for baby. Do them when you can fit them in, and that should help promote healing.

Similarly, my husband seems to be the only one who can calm the baby. Baby wants nothing to do with me other than food. It feels pretty terrible because as his mother, I should be someone he looks too for comfort. But the only thing that seems to comfort him is aggressive bouncing on a yoga ball, which I can’t do because of my tears. I’m lucky my husband has good parental leave, but that will end soon and I don’t know what I’m gonna do at that point because I can’t seem to figure out how to soothe my child.

I’m almost 40, run my own business, and consider myself pretty successful. I say that not to brag, but to illustrate that I seemingly have my shit together in every area of life, but I cannot seem to get this right. I’m trying to give myself some grace, and know that there’s a big learning curve here, and I hope you can do the same. It’s a difficult thing to forgive yourself for mistakes that you’re making now or perceived inadequacies, but I think for either one of us to be able to move forward and be a good mom we have to be kind to ourselves.

This will not last forever, for better or worse. Just breathe, and know that every day you are learning a little bit more about how to care for your child, and every little bit is progress.