Sabrina, 30 months and 3 days pregnant

Co-founder of Boome, Sabrina, 39, lives in the Drôme region with her husband and their daughter Alma. Her experience of motherhood, and everything it entails, has literally changed everything. She tells us about her whirlwind of a life.

6 MONTHS

I always knew I wanted children. It was something within me, without me necessarily formalizing it. I come from a small provincial town, and when I moved to Paris around the age of 24, I lived life to the fullest. I met my first husband, we were young, we traveled and worked a lot, we enjoyed our life as a couple, telling ourselves: “We’ll see later.” When I reached my thirties, I was truly ready to start a family, but we were not at all on the same page about it. We separated for that exact reason. I couldn’t, even for love, sacrifice my desire for motherhood.

Despite that painful and difficult ordeal, I was quite lucky, because I then met my new partner, who is an extraordinary dad today. When our relationship began, I was over 35, and so was he, so we very quickly broached the subject of children. We began to make our desire to become parents a reality in January 2019.

In the months that followed, I became pregnant twice… But I had two consecutive early miscarriages. I find that women aren't prepared enough for this ordeal, even though it is common. It was a shock; I wasn't expecting it at all. I then became pregnant with Alma in September 2019, so let’s say it actually took me 6 months to have a viable pregnancy that I allowed myself to believe in.

My difficulties, therefore, lay in maintaining my pregnancy, not in conceiving. Beyond the emotional impact, it caused me to question things, sparked curiosity, led me to consult specialists like a naturopath, and clearly set me on the path to a new professional life.

9 MONTHS AND 2 DAYS

At the beginning of my pregnancy, because of my miscarriages, I was very freaked out. I really let the pressure go after 4 or 5 months, after having the first-trimester ultrasound and getting all my positive test results. I announced the news to people other than my close circle; I made an official announcement on Instagram [laughs…], I wanted everyone to know, but the relaxation lasted two short months—not even that, since in March, COVID hit us! I had the combo: what’s called a late pregnancy—since I was 37—and a global pandemic! So I lived out the end of my pregnancy in the fear of catching this virus, in isolation, and the frustration of not being able to enjoy my maternity leave during the sunny days, taking beautiful walks, and savoring those last moments before meeting my baby. We lived in an apartment in Paris, but I was lucky nonetheless: my living room faced south, so I could soak up the light every day.

I worried a lot about my delivery, which happened after 9 months and 2 days of pregnancy. I think that, subconsciously, I didn't want to let my daughter out of my belly. I kept telling myself: “Not now, not now!” I wanted to delay the inevitable because, for a long time, maternity wards forbade dads from attending the birth. I found that incredibly violent. In the end, that scenario didn't happen because I gave birth after the lockdown, and without a mask, but it ended in an emergency cesarean section. I think the context and the anxiety it generated in me caused a moment of holding back, which led to a different kind of birth than the one I had wanted...

15 MONTHS

My postpartum was a tsunami. I collapsed. For one thing, I didn't feel supported during my stay at the maternity ward; I didn't find the staff to be kind. Finding myself alone at night with my newborn without the dad's presence, feeding her, changing her all by myself while I was suffering terribly from post-operative pain, was also extremely violent, so much so that I had a panic attack the day before I was discharged. That's what it took for them to take my daughter so I could get 3 hours of sleep. I was at rock bottom, and I wanted to go home at all costs. For various reasons, that was only possible a week after I was admitted.

When I arrived home, my parents, who had managed to catch a train, were waiting for us. I was in such a bad state that I gave them Alma, went to lie down in my bed to recover, and then followed 15 days of non-stop tears. I was so happy and, at the same time, so shaken up by not recovering faster, by having so much pain from my c-section scar… We are told over and over: “You’ll forget everything, you'll see!”, but I’m not forgetting a single thing [laughs…]. I am not at all looking forward to going through all that again, even though I want other children. Regarding feelings as well, I have an incredible love for my daughter, but it took me time to feel like a mother, to realize she was my daughter, to really meet her. Everything unfolds over time; there is this love and this bond that sets in, but it wasn't immediate, it's not true that it's always the case. All this to say that it was a profound upheaval; I didn't expect to have such a difficult postpartum.

It took me time to find my sensations again, for the pain to subside (at least 6 months!), to have confidence in myself, to look at myself in a mirror. I am one of those women who was really shaken up. Psychologically and physically, I would say I started to find balance 15 months later. All this also goes hand in hand with a profound life change: we left Paris, we wake up to the sound of birds, I have a garden, I see my daughter growing up in nature, and I have moved closer to my family. This pregnancy was the trigger for changes in my life on every point. Personal, but also professional, because it was my own struggles and the states I found myself in that pushed me to gather information and realize that there were missing solutions for certain needs of women going through motherhood. And that it was urgent to address them with kindness, modernity, and naturalness—everything we need during this period. That answer exists now, it’s called BOOME, and I am very proud of it!