Is Overwhelming Love for Your Baby Normal? What New Parents Should Know
It’s 2:17 a.m. I’m on the lumpy hand-me-down glider in the nursery, the one with a permanent coffee stain on the right arm from when I spilled my lukewarm latte three weeks in. My 7-week-old, Lila, is latched, her warm cheek pressed to my forearm, her tiny fisted hand wrapped tight around my thumb. And out of nowhere, it hits me: this wave of love so big it makes my chest ache, like I can barely breathe around it. I’d do anything for her. I’d give up every single thing I ever cared about before her, no question, and the thought of that is so big it makes my eyes burn. I fumble for my phone with my free hand, text my best friend who has a 2-year-old: Does anyone else feel this overwhelming love for their baby? Is this even normal?
She didn’t text back for five hours, which makes sense, she was asleep. When she did, she just sent a meme of a mom crying over a toddler’s macaroni art that said “my heart is too full for this body” and then a text: “I thought I was broken for feeling this way. Turns out everyone just doesn’t talk about it.”
A week later, I’m sitting in the pediatrician’s exam room waiting for Lila’s 2-month shots. She’s kicking her legs, smiling at the little dinosaur sticker chart on the wall, drooling through the shoulder of her yellow duck onesie. That same wave hits me again, so hard I have to step out into the hallway to blink back tears. My pediatrician catches me leaning against the wall, asks if I’m okay. I laugh, tell her what’s going on, how this love feels so big it’s almost scary. She nods, says she gets this question at least twice a week from new parents. “We talk so much about postpartum depression and anxiety, and that’s so important, but we rarely talk about the other end of the spectrum,” she says. “Your brain is flooded with oxytocin right now. It’s supposed to feel overwhelming. This is how your body gets you to take care of a tiny human that can’t do anything for themselves.”
I went home that day and thought about all the pregnancy books I’d read, all the blog posts I’d scrolled while I was waiting for Lila to arrive. They talked about birth recovery, feeding schedules, how to get them to sleep through the night. None of them mentioned this. I thought back to the first week home, when I spent three straight days holding Lila against my chest, didn’t change my pajamas, forgot to eat twice. I told my partner I couldn’t bear to put her down, like if I let go something bad would happen. He thought it was sweet, but I thought it was weird. I’d always been the person who needed alone time, who planned weekend trips away from friends just to recharge. How could I not stand to be 10 feet away from this tiny person for 10 minutes? My sister, who has a 4-year-old, told me she once went six hours without peeing because her son fell asleep on her chest and she couldn’t bear to move him. I didn’t feel so weird after that.
The thing no one spells out for new parents is that overwhelming love isn’t the same as harmful anxiety, but it’s good to know how to tell the difference. My pediatrician gave me a really simple check-in that I pass on to every new parent I talk to now. If the big love feels like a warm weight you can set down for 10 minutes to go to the bathroom or make a sandwich, even if you don’t want to, it’s normal. If you can still feel other emotions too—like irritation when they scream for an hour straight, or boredom during a 45-minute cluster feed, or even a little nostalgia for the quiet mornings you had before baby—this is just what new love looks like. It’s supposed to be big.
But if the intensity gets to the point where you can’t sleep even when the baby is asleep, where you can’t let anyone else hold them because you’re so convinced something bad will happen, where you skip basic things like eating or showering for days on end because you can’t bear to step away, that’s when you need to say something to your doctor. That intensity can be a sign of postpartum anxiety, which is treatable, and there’s no shame in asking for help. It doesn’t mean you don’t love your baby; it just means your brain needs a little support to adjust to all the big changes.
I have a couple little tricks I figured out that work for me, when the urge to hold her 24/7 hits. I stashed a granola bar and a bottle of water next to the glider, next to the couch, and by my bed, so I don’t have to put her down to get something to eat. When I need to shower, I put her bouncer right outside the bathroom door, so I can see her through the crack in the door and hear every gurgle. I don’t force myself to “get used to being away” just because some article says I need to. It’s okay to take it slow.
Lila’s four months old now. She just figured out how to roll over, and she spends half her day rolling around on the play mat, grabbing at her feet and cooing. Yesterday she rolled off the edge of the play mat onto the hardwood, and cried like I’d never see her again. I picked her up, pressed her to my chest, and that same old wave hit me—so big it still takes my breath away. I still get caught off guard by it sometimes. I still text my best friend at 2 a.m. when I’m up feeding her, saying this is wild, right? She still texts back that she feels it with her 3-year-old when he falls asleep on her lap after a long day at the park. It doesn’t feel as scary as it did the first time it hit me. Most days, it just feels like being a parent. Some days it’s still too big to hold, and that’s okay. It doesn’t mean anything’s wrong. It just means you love them more than you ever thought you could love anything.
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