Love, love, love, love.
But what is TABS or trauma after birth syndrome? Often an inability to love your child because YOU feel damaged. You become the center of your world view.
TABS is caused by many, many things for sure but after spending 45 years involved with pregnancy, birth and newborn period I can tell you that a huge amount of TABS has recently been caused by The Birth not living up to the hopes, dreams, plans and choices that have been promoted in the present childbirth trend.
I thought about this the other night: ‘Choices can fail but skills endure’. It’s so hard for us to prove that few skilled birthing women and skilled birth-coaching dads experience TABS but common sense tells us this makes sense.
We’ve all experienced very, very challenging circumstances. When we face those situations with skills we always feel better. Skills may not change the circumstances but our skills permit us to change our responses. This matters.
Children need parents who love them and when you are carrying a personal trauma it’s hard to love others because you are so full of need for love yourself.
You can reduce or prevent TABS by becoming skilled for a future birth OR even by learning skills you might have used!
Love, love, love, love … loving ourselves and loving others