Becoming a mother is supposed to be one of the most joyful, life-changing moments a person can experience. If you’ve gone through IVF, like I did, there’s an extra layer of pressure: you fought so hard for this baby, so you’d better be overflowing with gratitude the second they arrive. But the truth is, after I gave birth, my first real thought wasn’t about my son at all. It was about the Italian hoagie my husband had promised to bring me from Jersey Mike’s. I wanted that sandwich—layered with ham, capicola, and salami, nine months of deli meat deprivation finally coming to an end—more than I wanted to hold my newborn. And for the next few days, I quietly wondered if I had made a terrible mistake. It wasn’t postpartum depression. It wasn’t exhaustion, although there was plenty of that. It was something far more confusing: I didn’t feel the earth-shattering wave of love everyone promised. It wasn’t until a random Harry Potter scene popped into my head at four in the morning that I finally understood I was always meant to be this little boy’s mom. Before I get into that story, let me properly introduce myself to anyone who’s new here. This is Diary of a Work-In-Progress Mom, a weekly check-in on how life is going as a new mom who wasn’t sure she wanted to be a mom until she was told she couldn’t get pregnant. If you don’t already follow me on TikTok, Instagram, or Facebook, here’s the short version of who I am.
I’m a 34-year-old woman living in New York City with a 14-month-old, and honestly, I am making up my own rules for motherhood because I know absolutely nothing. As in, I had never even held a baby before I had one of my own. I know—my parenting style sometimes scares my own mom. She looks at me like I’m an alien who somehow produced a human child. When I first held my son, I looked down at his tiny, wrinkled face, and something primal activated inside me. I knew immediately that I would do anything to protect him. How could you look at the pure, defenseless innocence of a baby in your arms and not know you’d destroy anyone who tried to hurt him, without losing a wink of sleep? That protective instinct was real. But love? Connection? The magical bond they sing about in every movie, every TV show, every reality birth special? I felt something, but it wasn’t that. When my husband finally walked through the hospital room door with that hoagie, I was perfectly happy to let the nurses take my newborn away for whatever tests they needed to run. Because all I wanted was to devour that fat, glorious sandwich. It had been nine months since I’d been allowed to eat deli meat, and let’s be honest: I had just met this kid. We were still strangers.
And no, I wasn’t just delirious from labor. I had a scheduled c-section, so the day before I gave birth, I was getting a blowout and a French manicure, preparing to enter motherhood like Carmela Soprano. I had spent the nine months leading up to that moment expecting it to be huge. Movies, scripted shows, even reality television never shut up about the love a mother feels for her baby, describing it like this magical wave that washes over you the second you lay eyes on your child. Maybe that’s true for some people. If that was your experience, I genuinely think that’s wonderful. But it wasn’t mine. After my son was born, I spent days worrying that I’d made a terrible mistake. What if all the years I spent not dreaming about being a mom had been warning me? What if my c-section meant I missed some biological switch that only flipping on during labor could connect us? What if I was fundamentally broken? We sent our son to the hospital nursery both nights because, as my doctor put it, it’s the only time your health insurance will pay for daycare, so take advantage of it. If you kept your baby in the room with you, great for you, no judgment. As someone who is now an expert mom—and by expert I mean I’m figuring it out as I go—I’m a big believer that as long as your child is safe, loved, and secure, you’re a perfect mom. That was not a lesson I had learned yet.
Two days after he was born, we brought our son back to our apartment. That first night home, I sat in a chair rocking him while he alternated between crying and sleeping. Somewhere between three and four in the morning, I was snuggling this tiny little being, and I should have been exhausted. But the room was so peaceful, so quiet, that I didn’t feel tired anymore. I looked down at him and said softly, “Mama loves you.” And then, out of nowhere, my brain served up a scene from Harry Potter: Lily Potter kneeling at Harry’s crib, right before Voldemort kills her, whispering, “Harry, you are so loved. Mama loves you, Harry.” I started sobbing. Maybe I was a little tired after all, because I’m not usually that emotional. But in that moment, I realized I loved this little baby more than I had ever loved anyone in my life. The thought of him going through this world alone, without me to comfort him, support him, or love him, made me sadder than I had ever been in my life. That was the moment I knew. It wasn’t a magical wave. It was a quiet, overwhelming truth that hit me sideways at four in the morning, disguised as a scene from a children’s fantasy movie.
If you’re laughing at me, I completely get it. My sisters laughed too when I told them. Objectively, it’s an insane trigger. I’m not even that big of a Harry Potter fan, so why that scene popped into my head, I have no idea. The worst part is, I still tear up when I tell the story. I actually cried a little writing this paragraph. But don’t worry—I can laugh at myself. That’s honestly how I made it through IVF and motherhood with my sanity intact. It’s how I make it through life generally, and I highly recommend it. The ability to find humor in the absurd, to look at yourself crying over a fictional wizard’s dead mother while holding your real, living, breathing baby, and just think, “Wow, this is my life now”—that’s what saved me. The journey to this point wasn’t easy. There were years of uncertainty, needles, appointments, hormones, heartbreak, and hope. When you want something so badly and then it finally happens, you expect to feel pure uncomplicated joy. But real life doesn’t work like that. You can be grateful and overwhelmed at the same time. You can be obsessed with your baby and also desperate for a sandwich. You can love someone more than you’ve ever loved anyone and still not feel like the mom from the movies. The blend of emotions is messy, and that’s okay.
So, if you’re pregnant or about to give birth and you think it’s going to be this moment where you suddenly become a different person, where you feel that wave of love wash over you, and then it doesn’t happen—please hear me: you are not broken. You are not a bad mother. You’re just a person who just went through something enormous, and your feelings need time to catch up with reality. Eat a hoagie. Let the nurses take the baby for a little while. Don’t force the moment. The love may not arrive the way you expected. It might sneak up on you in the middle of the night, in a ridiculous way, in a moment you least expect. It might arrive slowly, over weeks, as you learn each other. There is no right way to become a mother. There is no magic formula. I’m 34 years old, I live in New York City, I have a 14-month-old, and I still feel like I don’t know what I’m doing half the time. But I know this: that little baby is the most loved child in the world, not because I felt an instant bond, but because I built one. I chose him every single day, even when I was terrified that I wasn’t feeling the right things. And that choice is what made me his mom.
That’s what this entire Diary of a Work-In-Progress Mom is about. It’s a weekly check-in on life as a new mom who wasn’t sure she wanted to be a mom until she was told she couldn’t get pregnant. It’s about giving yourself permission to be imperfect, to admit the ugly parts, to laugh at yourself, and to redefine what motherhood looks like. I’m making my own rules because, honestly, I know nothing. I never even held a baby before holding my own son. I had more confidence ordering a hoagie than I did changing a diaper. But I’ve learned that being a good mom isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about showing up, staying open, and letting yourself feel whatever you actually feel without judgment. Sometimes it’s overwhelming. Sometimes it’s boring. Sometimes it’s so beautiful it makes you cry over a Harry Potter scene. The love is there. It might not look like it does in the movies, but it’s real. If you’re on this journey too, whether you’re pregnant, freshly postpartum, or months in, I hope you give yourself grace. You don’t have to be perfect. You just have to be present. And if you’re looking for more of my story, my missteps, my wins, and my very honest confessions, you can find me on TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook. For more from Jenni Fink, subscribe to The Good Life newsletter—I’ll see you there, sandwich in hand.
