Light at the end of the tunnel

My friend just delivered her baby 2 days ago. I rang her today to find out how she was doing and she sounded pretty much how I sounded, overwhelmed by a baby who didn't stop crying. She asked me point blank when it was going to get better. I wanted to tell her that it would get better soon and then realised that might be hypocritical of me to say so because in some ways, I am still going through it and I would be lying if I told her that it was already better for me.

At the same time, I knew that she needed some sort of comfort and I told her what I believed to be true, the hope I cling to every single day, that this too shall pass and there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Some days, I do feel that I can see the light and actually have moments of "hey, I can actually do this" and other days, there's the "oh shit, when is this going to end?".

Some people have told me that it gets better after the initial month, and then others after 6 weeks, others tell me the 3rd month is better. I've crossed some of the markers and have on days felt like going after the poor sods that were just trying to console me yelling "YOU PROMISED!!!". Unfortunately, there's no use in that, there's no money back guarantee to what they said.

So, what can I tell my poor friend who's desperate for comfort? I told her the truth. It'll be hard. There'll be days that you'll want to cry and hide and ignore the child. You'll blame yourself or the husband and hate the world. I also told her that she should feel that it's ok to feel all these things and to cry if she needed to. That's all I could tell her because that's what I did.

In some ways, I don't feel equipped to give her advice since I'm still going through it myself. But in other ways, I feel like I can help her the most because all this is still fresh in my mind and I know exactly what she's feeling.

The most important thing I learnt the last 7 weeks that has kept me from really spiralling into the depths of depression is knowing that while the tunnel is dark and long and more often than not, you can't see the light at the end of it, knowing that there are others groping in the dark with you or that there have been others who have gone ahead of you in the same tunnel is the greatest comfort a new mom can have. So, I'm determined to do at least that for her.

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