I had spent years yearning for a baby, convinced that motherhood would bring an overwhelming rush of love. But when I finally held my newborn daughter after a grueling birth, I felt nothing but despair. No matter how much I smiled, fed, or caressed her, I was emotionally numb.
Growing up in Italy, I was surrounded by images of perfect motherhood—shrines to the Madonna and Child at every crossroads. By my late teens, I knew I wanted at least one child. Yet I knew little about real babies. My family was small, and my parents' tragic history with childbirth cast a shadow over reproduction. My mother, who lost her own mother at age two, poured love into my sister and me when we were young, but later withdrew.
So where did my yearning come from? Perhaps from my godmother, a woman who adored children and whose fourth child showed me that a baby is something wonderful. It's not enough to look at a baby—you must hold and smell that warm, vulnerable bundle to truly feel the desire.
As a young feminist with free contraception, I had casual relationships but eventually realized I wanted what Jane Austen and George Eliot described: a good, loving man to have a child with. I found him, we married, and bought a tiny cottage. But babies don't arrive to order. After a miscarriage and a savage review of my debut novel, I wrote a second book and became pregnant again.
My husband was largely absent during the pregnancy, working long hours. I suffered from endometriosis and asthma, but my male GP dismissed my worries: "Birth isn't an illness." At 44 weeks, I begged to be induced; the hospital only acted when my baby showed distress. Labor lasted 20 grim hours, ending in an emergency forceps delivery. Our daughter was born at nearly 10 pounds.
My husband was besotted. I felt nothing. The epidural seemed to sever all emotion. Lying awake in the recovery ward, listening to other mothers sob, I felt only rage. Every woman who gives birth, I believe, endures a kind of war. Our culture fails to honor mothers, and poor maternity care adds to the trauma.
I was discharged the next day, with a mismatched blood transfusion and a verruca from the filthy bathroom. The numbness persisted, but eventually, love came—not in a rush, but slowly, inexorably, like the rising tide.