Memoirs of Motherhood, Mental Health, and the Magic in the Mess. ♡
I’m feeling this profoundly hard today, and I am making this public so I don’t have to answer (as many) questions later:
My broken, bruised and harmful relationship with my mother has reached beyond its inevitable breaking point, and I am finally having the courage to cut ties and walk away.
And, in time, hopefully heal…
I’m trying to make sense of who I am as a mom. Still.
I don’t really know what this making sense looks like, tastes like, or feels like to wear against the skin of my arms, but I keep trying to reach forward into the realm of mom identities and find something to latch onto.
I’m not the crunchy mom. Not the boss mom. Not the Pinterest/crafty mom. Not the helicopter mom. Not the wine mom. Not the perfect mom. Definitely not the cool mom.
There is nothing wrong with any of these moms, I’m just not them.
In this attempting to make sense of my mom identity, I’m doing something I try hard to not do to anyone else. I’m labeling myself, and admittedly masking it as attempt to try to figure out where I fit. I’m taking a square and pushing it into the round hole of mom identities, and expecting to meet my deliverance.
These walls are too thick.
I guess I could be a wannabe minimalist mom. An RIE mom (on my good days). An obviously plus sized mom. A boring/little too honest mom. Kinda the hot mess mom. A “reads too much and really loves sleep and chocolate” mom.
Or, in any case, the sum of those moms.
But what lies in the lingering and claiming/writing/marinating of such mom identity(s)? Is there sense to uncover? Ease to be found? Will I be less of a foggy mess and more (wiggles fingers *magically*) “with purpose”?
Side note: will blogging in this bloody thing become not be such a forgetful, directionless conquest?
Or in claiming something, anything, on this mothering journey, and trying to fit into it — will it only further lead to my own bewildered, dazzling confusion?
Perhaps this making sense… it is more than a label. More than a type. More than a niche.
Perhaps it is simply settling on where I find myself smiling in this mothering journey, and letting that be the sense and the identity that I need.
I don’t know. But I’m fumbling. It is a peaceful, awkward tumble. I’m reaching towards and casting away. Eventually, I’ll land.
I’m unexpectedly revisiting an old journal of thoughts that I opened as I couldn’t remember it’s purpose.
These are the words of postpartum anxiety and postpartum depression.
Attempting to get philosophical about how much I’ve grown or healed since these days is a bit too wax-poetic for the raw pain of what this experience was and sometimes continues to be for me.
But, I can now say, and truly believe, that my kid loves me. 💚
7 years married, 11.5 years together.
D, I have no idea how you continue to love me, support me and put up with me. Truly. It baffles me.
We’ve changed a lot these past years — and not always in the same direction. We’ve given each other the space and the love we needed to find ourselves among such change, however. We’ve experienced the reckoning that is having a kid, and how to put the pieces back together of our marriage and our identities in its wake. We’ve loved, we’ve struggled, we’ve worked hard, and we’ve refused to give up.
We are entwined. Deeply. These roots are infallible. We might not always see eye to eye, and sure, we make each other a little crazy, but you are my home. I know not myself or my life without you.
And you’re still the one.
You always will be. 💚
We just got back from a trip to Las Vegas.
We’re home, unpacked, resting and watching O engage with his play space like it’s the most magical ever (and thank goodness for that, ‘cause we are tapped and have nothing at this moment to give him).
We may be tired, but the trip worked out well.
It was sad to say goodbye, as it always is, but I’m happy to have learned more about the resilient parts of my child.
He CAN stay the night somewhere else and actually sleep.
He CAN stay up late, or skip a nap, and not be a total mess as a result.
He CAN withstand a plane ride and all it’s weird/loud sounds and “not being able to move around lots” bits.
He CAN warm up to animals and in time, pet them and grow to be okay around them.
He CAN be at large gatherings for long periods of time and not completely shutdown because of all the loud sounds.
He CAN make his own way in places he’s never been and with people he’s never met or remembers ever meeting.
He CAN find camaraderie with his counsins and love his Vegas family from the get go, even if he hasn’t seen them face to face much in his life.
He CAN bust a sweet dance move to any length of music (expected or not), dislike other people’s “ceilings” and be terrified of his baby cousin no matter how freakin’ hard you assure him that he’s safe.
Some of these things may be obvious, and they should be even more obvious to me as an early childhood educator.
That’s the thing with post-partum anxiety + first time motherhood, though.
You convince yourself of everything but the obvious.
It was so good to be proved wrong. 💚
Thank you to those who told me it was time. You were right.