10 things I would tell myself before becoming a mother (Part two)

That mother rubbing her belly…oh, how she was on a precipice she couldn’t even imagine.

This is a continuation of a previous piece. Read Part One first!

6. Surrender to your journey

No time is the highlight reel of someone else’s life more threatening than early motherhood.

For me, it started in my nascent postpartum days. I suffered unusual complications. Couldn’t walk or sit upright for weeks. The images of other mothers flashed through my mind, going to farmer’s markets with their week-old, thermoses of coffee casually in hand. Sitting prettily on white sheets for a newborn photoshoot, gauzy light falling over them like a heavenly blessing. In comparison I was reclining in pools of blood, wincing in pain, making tearful calls to hospitals to schedule another procedure.

Why did my journey have to unfold the way it did?

There are endless opportunities to compare in parenthood, from birth and beyond. Motherhood calls you to hold a strong center. To live your journey, and yours alone, for yourself and your family.

Our child has struggled to sleep. When someone shares their story of their three-month-old who started sleeping through the night, it’s hard not to feel that same anguish I had after birth. Why does our journey have to unfold this way?

Then I realized: I wouldn’t want my child to look back and feel an ounce of us wishing he was different. And you know what? I deserve to give myself that same grace. I don’t want to waste my energy wishing my motherhood story was different. I just want to live it.

Sure, there are things you wish would go differently, especially if you or your child’s health is threatened. There is so much beyond our control. That’s life. Thank goodness for supportive therapies that have helped me work through my traumas, slowly weaving them into the larger story of my life.

In the midst of it all, I’ve found that the strongest posture to maintain is surrender. Things are unfolding. This is my journey.

The caterpillar is metabolized into goo before it emerges from the chrysalis with wings. After breaking free, why would the butterfly waste time comparing its metamorphosis to another’s when it just wants to taste the sky?

7. When you’re in it, you’re in it

Before pregnancy, I questioned whether parenthood was the right journey for me. It sounded like a terrible pitch. Here! Do this big thing that will completely change your life, and you can’t know what it’s like till you’re in it, and it’s utterly irreversible, so too bad if you don’t like it! 

Any lawyer would rugby tackle you to the ground before signing that contract.

I ended up making my decision, and in the process, this question has been answered by a very simple, yet comforting, truth.

When you’re in it, you’re in it.

With each plucked diaper wipe, each snick of my nursing bra clasp, each swipe of a tissue beneath a runny nose, I am saying yes to this path.

You don’t answer the question “should I become a parent?” with your mind. You answer it with your life. If it’s a path you ultimately live into, know that you already have everything you need. There’s no test, no reading list, no prerequisites. All you have to do is jump in with both feet and let it swallow you whole. 

Be in it.

8. There is no perfect. There is only whole-hearted commitment

This is not a time to blithely construct aspirations of perfection.

Hear me now: there is no such thing as perfect, in motherhood or life. Do yourself a kindness and stop setting unreachable goals.

You will make mistakes. Those lessons will at times be painful. You will question, second guess, and wish—in moments of confusion and overwhelm, oh how you will wish—there was a handbook.

None of this means you’re falling short. It means you’re a messy human doing a big thing.

The antidote? Focus on being whole-hearted. Someone who forgives herself when she makes mistakes. Someone who invests in her growth. Someone who values the power of her love. Someone who, at the end of the day, wants to gaze in her child’s eyes and offer a moment of connection.

When you forget and furtively build those towering, false castles of perfection again…whole-heartedly tear them to the ground and let the sun shine on your face.

9. Motherhood will ask everything of you…and give you more than you could imagine

My partner and I have joked that if you want to break someone, wait until they’re on the brink of sleep, then wake them up with a screaming baby. Then do it again, and again, and again, night after night, for months.

Oh, how we have been brought to our knees.

Before becoming a mother, I was at the hot springs and overheard two couples talking. One was advising the other: “Just make sure you live your life before having kids, because then it’s all over.”

My stomached turned, hearing that. It was an impossible task. No one could live their entire life before having kids. And what about the life you had with your kids? Didn’t that count?

Yes, parenthood is “hard.” It is hard to go on trips with a baby. It is hard to plan social dates with a baby. It is hard to show up for your job when you’re running on a few stolen hours of sleep and you forgot to brush your teeth and you desperately need groceries and your partner said something careless that felt like stepping on glass and your baby screams every time you put them down because they’re teething and they want you, but they won’t sleep either… 

Motherhood asks everything of you. Before having a kid, that’s all I heard. How much people felt like it took from them.

But there’s a whole other side, one that far outweighs what is sacrificed: motherhood gives you more than you could imagine.

Never have I been more inventive, more creative, more skillful, more expansive than in motherhood. Never have I been more joyful, more grateful, more loving. Never have I been more forced to take care of myself, to seek supportive therapies, to unearth what needs to be met, to grow. Never have I been more excited to live this life I have been given.

Is it what I thought? No. Is it harder than I thought? Sometimes. Is it better than I thought? Yes.

My brother was lost to suicide, one of the most excruciating thing I can imagine for a parent. I once asked my dad, “Would you become a parent all over again, even if things ended the way they did?”

Without missing a beat, he answered, “Yes. You and your brother were the best thing that ever happened to me.”

I’m starting to understand what he meant. After all, being brought to your knees…it looks a lot like bowing.

10. Community is everything

I would not have made it through this first year without the meals dropped off, the grocery runs from neighbors, the soothing responses to my chaotic audio messages, the texts checking in, the shoulders to cry on, the calls at all hours of the day, the gentle hands that held my baby and my body, the ones who have invested in loving my child alongside us, the messages from people online saying they resonated with what I shared…

There are times when motherhood feels isolating. When that happens, reach out, reach out, reach out. Now is not the time to have it all together. Now is the time to lean into that ocean of support and let it hold you.

Your community wants to hold you, and oh, how you will want to be held.

Bonus: Savor

It goes so fast. As much as you can, as often as you can, savor.

This year, and beyond

It is almost impossible to write about motherhood. It cannot be pinned down to something as constraining as words. I feel like I’d be able to convey myself better in a dance. Limbs undulating, movements volcanic, flesh sliding along the frame of my bones.

It’s primal.

I am a student of this path. Most days, I don’t feel like I “know” much about motherhood. Just vague shapes of it; feelings of it pulsing through me like an electric jellyfish. I have to imagine that’s by design. We aren’t meant to fully comprehend the divine. We’re meant to express it through our lives.

That mother rubbing her belly…oh, how she was on a precipice she couldn’t even imagine.

Now I’m curious to know: if you could go back and talk to yourself before having children, what would you say? There is no one way to walk this path. How would you distill your personal wisdom?

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If you’re interested in diving more deeply into the transformation of motherhood, I would highly recommend these books: Mama Rising, Matrescence, and Baby on the Fire Escape.