The birth of a psychotic worry wort

Growing up, I always thought of my mom as a severe worry wart. She was always overprotective in my opinion, reiterating thousands of times common sense safety reminders which she herself had drilled into my head at a ridiculously young age; 'don't talk to strangers', 'look both ways before you cross the street', 'always have a buddy with you', etc etc etc. I always thought she worried far more than was logical. But becoming a mother myself, I realize that logic has nothing to do with it. What I thought should be easily controlled by logical thinking (i.e. "she knows I know to look both ways before I cross the street, so she shouldn't feel the need to tell me this every time I go out to play") is, in reality, not controlled by anything. Worrying is not just a mother's job; it is a mother's inherent compulsion.

The second Audia was born, a psychotic worry wort was born in my head. I went from what I thought was a fairly logical, realistic woman to a paranoid worrying maniac. It's not something I talk about very often, as the logical part of me still exists; I do realize that some of my worries are totally over the top, and I do manage, for the most part, to shut up the psychotic worry wort, but it doesn't change the fact that these worries pop up. For example, we have ceramic tile floors in our bedroom and throughout part of our dining room and kitchen area. When we got home from the hospital, I was overcome by the paranoia of dropping her on the tile floor to the point that I was being ridiculously careful when walking on the tile with her. I managed to reason with myself and get out of this state of hyper-caution after a couple of days, thankfully, but the fact that I have to reason with myself at all bothers me. Then there's the every day little things; is she eating enough? why does her poop seem extra watery today? why is she abnormally fussy this evening? Of course each question is answered, by this psychotic worry wort, with the worst case scenario. I have to psychologically lock the psychotic worry wort up every time she rears her ugly head, but she keeps getting out. Lately the ridiculous worry has been about, of all things, eye contact. Audia makes eye contact with me on a regular basis, but I find myself worrying that she's not making eye contact enough. How many times has she looked me in the eye today? Is she looking at my eyebrow or my eyes? Does she seem to find the fan more interesting than my face? Is this a precursor to Autism? Is there something I should be doing that I'm not? RIDICULOUS WORRYING.

How do I get the psychotic worry wort to go back where she came from? I have a feeling that the answer is that I don't. This is motherhood. The psychotic worry wort comes as part of the territory.