Therapy for New Parents in Denver, Colorado
“It feels like I’ve lost my identity.”
“I feel constantly on edge, and second guess every choice I make. Am I feeding him enough? Did I pick the right daycare?”
“Time just stretches on - it goes by so slowly in the moment, but at the end of the day I blink and it’s gone. I feel guilty if I’m not with the baby or being productive.”
“My partner and I are snapping at each other all the time. We’re both so exhausted and resentful”.
“Sometimes I miss my old life, but I feel guilty for even thinking that.”
“No matter what I do, it feels like it’s never enough.”
“It feels like no one appreciates me.”
If you’re a new parent and any of this resonates with you, you’re not alone. The adjustment to parenthood is HUGE, and nothing in life can prepare you for it. In movies, TV shows and on social media, we’re fed images of blissful new families smiling together, bonding with grandparents, or even adventuring on exotic excursions. If this is our expectation for what parenthood is like, we end up feeling slapped in the face with the reality: sleepless nights, burnout and struggling to make sense of our new roles. The blissful moments of joy and connection will exist - but they rarely make up the majority of new parents' experience in the first few months of having a baby, or even the first year. Let’s dive a bit deeper to explore the challenges many new parents face, and how a counselor for new parents can help.
New Parent Anxiety Can Look Like:
New parents who are struggling mentally can experience many different kinds of challenges. Here are some examples of what anxiety might look like for new parents (although this list is certainly not exhaustive):
Intense anxiety and worry, often related to your baby’s safety and wellbeing
Struggling to relax, perhaps to the point of laying awake at night even when your baby is sleeping
Feeling scared to leave the house, take your baby to new places or be taken out of your routine
Being so distracted with worries or fear of what could go wrong that you struggle to be present with your baby
Spending a lot of time Googling to try and get reassurance about your fears (and finding that it often makes you more anxious)
Difficulty letting go of control and feeling anxious when others (even your partner) are caring for your baby
Panic attacks, stomach issues or physical tension in your body
Increase conflict, snapping at your partner and feeling constantly frustrated that they aren't doing things the “right” way
Being overwhelmed by feelings of guilt and the pressure to parent perfectly
The Challenges New Parents Face
Loss of Identity
The loss of identity with the transition to parenthood can be incredibly disorienting. We can feel so much excitement and anticipation about adopting a new identity as a parent, but what we don’t often predict is where that leaves our old identities. The role of “mom” or “dad” can quickly start to feel all-consuming, especially when there’s another human being suddenly depending on us to keep them alive. And sometimes our old identities can feel incompatible with our new ones - maybe you were someone who got a ton of validation from your performance at work, but all of a sudden work isn’t your top priority anymore, and that leaves you feeling really confused and inadequate. Or maybe you still want your job to be a top priority, but that leaves you feeling like you’re failing as a parent. In your pre-baby life, you had it all figured out, with a full schedule of hobbies, social time and work obligations. Now, you’re trying to find space for a new part of your life called “taking care of (and spending quality time with) a baby,” and it suddenly feels like it all doesn’t fit. Redefining your identity as a new parent is an ongoing process that takes time, patience, communication and intention. Working together with a therapist for new parents can help you integrate your old values with your new values, and communicate with your partner to redefine both your personal and family goals.
Exhaustion and Overwhelm
Interrupted sleep (or let’s be real - sometimes totally sleepless nights) plus the onslaught of responsibilities with keeping a newborn alive are a recipe for feelings of total exhaustion and overwhelm. Poor sleep is one of the biggest contributors to mental health challenges postpartum, and this holds true for both birthing and non-birthing parents. Sleep deprivation can lead to poor concentration, lower mood and difficulty using the coping tools that you normally use to deal with stress. And research actually shows that both partners can experience hormonal changes while adjusting to parenthood - the sudden drop in pregnancy hormones for the birthing parent is usually more extreme, but there is actually research that men experience hormonal shifts as they become parents as well. New parents often feel like they’re running on empty, overwhelmed with all there is to do but feeling like they have no energy to get it done. Working with a therapist for new parents can help you implement coping tools to manage your stress that actually feel realistic in your current situation, understand what is “normal” in adjusting to parenthood and help you learn to cut yourself some slack and set realistic expectations for yourself.
Relationship Changes (and Challenges!)
When you become parents, it’s not just you as individuals that go through an identity crisis - your partnership goes through one as well. All of a sudden you are going from being partners to co-parents, and have a whole new set of responsibilities to communicate, negotiate, collaborate on and divide. This shift puts a strain on even the strongest relationships. On top of these new responsibilities you are both feeling drained, exhausted and spread thin - and when we feel this way, our partners are often the people who bear the brunt of our frustration. Parenthood leaves you with less quality time together, changes in the physical intimacy in your relationship, and oftentimes feelings of resentment or being misunderstood. Therapy can help you shift your perspective to better understand where your partner is coming from, so that you can be more patient with each other to focus on your shared goals. You’re on the same team, although in the new parent haze it can sometimes be hard to remember. Counseling for new parents can help you communicate your needs and feelings before resentment starts to fester, and find ways to prioritize small moments of connection.
Anxiety and Perfectionism
If you were prone to perfectionist thinking before having a baby, chances are that becoming a parent has only made these thinking patterns stronger. But sometimes people who identified as relatively “chill” or laid-back before having a child can find themselves suddenly struggling with unfamiliar feelings of pressure and perfectionism. The images we take in on social media and stories from friends and family can cause us to compare ourselves and feel like we’re not measuring up. Especially if parenting is something that you have dreamed about your whole life, it can feel like so much pressure when suddenly that moment is here, and you feel like you only have one chance to do it “right”. Postpartum anxiety is also a very real condition affecting as many as 34.5% of women in the first 6 months postpartum. The constant worry, feeling of being “on edge” and difficulty relaxing (or sleeping!) that many new parents experience can make this period extra challenging. Working with a counselor for new parents can help you to develop self-compassion, overcome your perfectionism and learn coping tools to better manage new parent anxiety.
Guilt
Feelings of guilt as a parent are one of the most common emotions new parents experience, but also some of the hardest to cope with. Guilt can be such an uncomfortable and heavy experience - the pit in your stomach, tightness in your chest or nagging voice that you “screwed up” - that we go through such lengths to avoid it. What many new parents quickly figure out is that it’s unavoidable - one minute you feel guilty that you’re not spending enough time with your baby, then you feel guilty that you’re “slacking off” at work. You feel guilty that you’re not bonding quickly enough with your newborn, but also feel guilty that you haven’t had the bandwidth to answer messages from your friends. Working parents feel guilty that they spend so much time away from their child, and stay-at-home parents feel guilty that they aren’t able to contribute financially or feel burnt out even after being home all day. Guilt, guilt, guilt - it’s an endless cycle as a new parent. Working through feelings of guilt is one of the most common things that people work on in therapy, and seeing a therapist who specializes in new parent anxiety can help you learn to identify where these guilty thoughts are coming from, create context for them and practice sitting with these uncomfortable feelings, rather than doing the first thing that comes to mind to push them away. Therapy can help you learn to recognize that you are just doing the best you can, and shift your mindset to focus on your “wins” as a parent, no matter how small.
Therapy for New Parents in Denver, Colorado Can Help
A trained therapist for new parents can help you overcome postpartum anxiety, depression and other mental health conditions that can arise after giving birth. Therapy for new parents can help you cope with identity challenges, feelings of overwhelm, changes in your relationship with your partner and struggles with perfectionism and guilt. Anxious thoughts, mom guilt and the pressure to be perfect can all feel so powerful during this time when we are so vulnerable: adapting to parenthood, recovering (physically and emotionally) from childbirth and coping with it all from a place of literal exhaustion. Working with a counselor for new parents in Denver, Colorado can help you better understand what you are going through and build the tools to get through it together, with your partner and growing family.
Work with a Counselor for New Parents at Root to Rise Therapy
Root to Rise Therapy in Denver, Colorado specializes in treating clients struggling with anxiety, postpartum mental health and the adjustment to parenthood. Check out additional resources on our blog to learn about mental health resources for new moms in Denver, understanding postpartum anxiety and more. Get in touch to schedule a free consultation with Victoria, counselor for new parents in Denver today.
Other Services at Root to Rise Therapy:
Other mental health services at Root to Rise Therapy include Therapy for Anxiety, Therapy for Perfectionism, Therapy for People-Pleasing, Cultural Identity Counseling, ADHD Therapy, Counseling for Moms and Postpartum Counseling. I see clients located in Colorado, New York and New Jersey. Contact me to learn more about how I can help you overcome anxiety and reclaim your life!
