Thoughts from the dentist chair
Currently, I’m sitting in the dentists waiting room with my 4 kids. We alllll have cleanings today at the same time. You can imagine the joy I’m feeling right now. In all reality, my kids do a good job of not acting like total buffoons in situations like this. But wrangling four of them in a congested, claustrophobic waiting room for a couple hours is not anyones idea of a fun morning.
7 years ago I could just walk into the dentist and think nothing of it. Funny how things evolve, and what a huge evolution it is once you start having kids. Some seasons are really testing, sometimes it’s like you’ve jumped off a cliff, are free falling and you have to figure out how to grow wings. Sink or swim right? But as mothers, we just do it.
Becoming a mother.
It’s almost like a right of passage
The highest honor
It hasn’t been until recently that we’ve started being a bit more vocal about the realities, expectations, pressures
Our brain structure goes through a physical transformation.
Our our organs go through a physical transformation
If motherhood is a becoming
Meaning it’s so loaded that it’s not something that just happens to you, it is actually an active process of morphing into a new you
What I’m wondering is-
Is there ever a point when you can say..
“I became” or “I am”
Like it’s a period at the end of the sentence versus an ellipses
Like “I am mother.” as an all encompassing statement-
how do you get there? Does it exist? Asking for a friend..
What a loaded word: motherhood.
You find out you’re pregnant and you sacrifice your mind, body, and spirit. Every thing changes. Literally your organs rearrange themselves. Your skin changes. Your hair. Your feet. You don’t think the same. Like all of a sudden a switch flips and you enter a constant state of worry. Worry about their health, worry about the actual act of childbirth (which for some is actually traumatic), if you’ll do a good job, about all of the changes and uncertainty. The worry sticks with you for the rest of forever I think, this weight of being responsible for another whole entire human. Not to mention the joy-ride of these wild waves of hormones.
You’re trying to manage these huge mental, physical, and emotional changes while nourishing and caring for another human, throw on top of that maintaining and navigating relationships outside of your child (your partner, family, friends, other children) and figure out how you’re supposed to do all of that plus go to work and/or manage a home. Oh, and all on no sleep.
Fast forward as you navigate this new you, assuming you haven’t completely lost yourself in there. I’m sure most of us have gotten temporarily sucked into darkness of the all encompassing wrath of serving others- forgetting that you have your own needs and are your own separate entity.
You start to piece back bits of yourself, you get settled in to routines, sleep for longer stretches, your mind and body start reconnecting to their new normal, and life marches on.
For me, I can’t shake this feeling though of constantly being pulled in multiple directions. I feel like I’m held up by 3 main pillars:
myself
my family
work
And maybe rather than pillars because that feels so solid and separate, maybe it’s more like a Venn diagram, with me in the middle as the overlap and my family and work on other sides.
For 6+ years I was navigating all of the changes of my mind and body as it adjusted to humans being fully dependent on me. When they’re small like that, they are so reliant. So deeply attached, literally on the boob or in your arms, that it can be difficult to differentiate yourself as it’s own entity. You’re so entangled with another being, your body, your schedule, your sleep, literally your entire world revolves around them. I found myself so caught up in the beautiful, messy haze of newborn and toddlerhood that I lost sight of myself.
As they’ve grown and become more independent, it left space for me to enter new territory and explore what it meant to find myself as a person again.
When preparing for motherhood they don’t explain these things to you. They commend you for being a superhero, or comment about how we’re saints. We’re admired for carrying the load, keeping things together, getting things done, and doing it all. I’ve found most of us don’t want accolades or praise, we really just want to be seen- and I sure as hell know I ain’t no saint… We are labeled as mothers and expected to carry the load of all it encompasses. I’d love to get to the point where I’m seen as a human first. We show humans compassion, grace, empathy, and understanding. I’m Megan, I’m also a mother, a wife, a photographer, etc. and I’m worthy of being extended all the same decencies of every other human. I am NOT in fact a superhuman, despite the implications by the fact that I am also a mother. I don’t have to have all the answers, Im allowed to feel alllll the feelings about raising children, I’m allowed to not want to cook all the meals or be the only one reading stories at bedtime. And it’s perfectly healthy and wonderful for my husband to share the load and be an active participant in my kids upbringing- not just praised when he wipes their ass one time.
As a mother I don’t want to feel like I have to be a superhuman. I want help, I want (access to basic human healthcare) sleep, not to always be the default on everything, and patience.
For me it’s all been a true evolution
At this point on my path I’m juggling all of the points in my Venn diagram, trying to keep the lists even and in balance. I’m at a place where I’m not quite as lost, but I’m in new territory trying to figure out how manage everything- working without feeling overwhelmed, being as present and involved as I can in my parenting and spending quality time with my partner, and enjoying indulgences. It’s quite the juggling act with any ball ready to drop, but that’s okay. When that happens, I’ll just pick them back up and try again, without guilt and with the help of others- because I’ve learned I am, in fact, first and foremost, a human.
Period. End dot. No ellipses, no becomings. .
I am Megan
and
I am a mother.
