A Lifelong Journey

Today isn’t a long one, but it is personal.

I think an interesting phenomenon, especially in American culture, is how even though all mothers go through a postpartum season, very little is shared with each other about this period. Whether it’s about what labor is like (spoiler alert: quite literally nothing like the movies), what our bodies go through in healing, or what emotions we experience in the fourth trimester. In addition to this period, how often during the first year as a new mama do we feel something, but are too afraid to ask a friend if it’s normal? We keep it to ourselves out of fear of looking crazy or like something is wrong with us. There’s no way they will possibly relate to how you’re feeling, right?

I can still remember the first time I started weeping after Colton was born. What. In. The World. Was. This. A December baby, the sun often set around 4:30. For weeks, every evening as the sun was setting, I would start weeping. I could be sitting on the couch, starting to make dinner, or in the middle of a normal conversation, I would feel my eyes well up and I’d just start to weep. For a while, Greg would ask, “what is wrong? What can I do to fix this?” But there was nothing to fix. It didn’t matter that my mind knew there was nothing wrong, my postpartum hormones were telling my body a different story.

Since Colton was a hospital birth, I didn’t see my midwife until the traditional 6-week check-up. In the meantime, I was afraid to ask others if they felt this emotion in case, I didn’t find anyone who could relate, or worse, they told me it was something more serious. Eventually, a couple of days would go in between weepy periods until one week, it just didn’t happen at all.

I felt a wave of emotions, mainly during the first six months. Some days felt like I had lost myself and forgotten about the things I used to love to do. When some of my best friends flew in from California to meet Colton and stay with us, we were sent away one afternoon for a girls’ happy hour. Overlooking the city and sipping cocktails, I laughed harder than I had in a long time. Good old-fashioned belly laughs. At that moment, it reminded me of, well, me.

Slowly, day by day, I found time to do the things that made me feel like a whole person again. Yoga classes, digging in the garden dirt, going for runs, baking. I was watching both my baby and myself grow up right before my eyes and they were both so beautiful. I am a true believer that you cannot pour from your cup when it is empty.

I had a powerful conversation with a girlfriend recently that reminded me of this feeling (hence, the journal entry this week). She shared that she had reached out to two of her friends to see if they ever felt the same way she currently is – like a piece of you is missing? Is this just the new normal?

I shared with her a concept I had read when I was postpartum with Cameron. It really applies to anyone, but especially to new mothers. I wish I could find the original quote, but the gist of it was eliminating the pressure to bounce back to your old self (honestly, I wish we could just eliminate the phrase “I feel like my old self” altogether). But equally important, is to eliminate the concept of arriving, too. Like your “new self” is a destination and one day you will just “arrive” at this new location.

We all go through seasons of life; some seasons are longer than others. During those seasons, our relationships might change, our hobbies might change, and our careers might change. What if we took the pressure off ourselves to stay like our “old selves” or arrive at our “new selves” and we were just, “ourselves”? We were just ourselves in that season. And let’s be honest, some days that might only be 50% and end up in bed at 7 pm with ice cream watching trashy tv, and there is nothing wrong with that. On other days it might be waking up early to meditate, workout, and drink green juice before the family wakes up. For new mamas, it might look like baby and me yoga, your toddler helping to “mix” the muffins, or your kiddo “lending a hand” to plant the garden.

If there’s at least one thing I can share with someone getting ready to join motherhood, it’s to look at it like a journey, not a destination. If you get lost along the way, please don’t try and find your way alone. Stop and ask another mother for directions – literally, any one of us will help you get back on the road. And please, take the time to enjoy the ride because that’s the best part of any trip, isn’t it?

Mother’s Circle was a safe space for me to share what I was feeling after becoming a mom for the first time, pregnant with a toddler, postpartum a second time, and figuring out what life was like with two under two. Having other mamas to relate to the different triumphs and trials was incredibly helpful to me. Our Mother’s Circle usually meets the third Saturday each month. We would love to have you join us. Follow this link to sign up.