I saw a Facebook post this week that asked Mothers to describe Motherhood in three words.
These were mine: Motherhood is… “Not for sissies!”
This is how I know:
- In Aanavi’s first month of life I got jet pooh all over me – from my hair till my toes! I won’t even count the times I’ve been peed on. Vomit is just normal.
- I won’t bother talking about the paradoxical joy and peril of pregnancy, labour and breastfeeding.
- My relationships with everyone around me changed. Every thing was harder, expectations were higher, time and patience were scarce and I was too focused on my relationship with my baby to think about sustaining or developing relations with anyone else.
- I lost sense of who I was as a whole, individual person for a while. A normal adult with a personality, with my owns wants and needs, likes and dislikes, ambitions, dreams and aspirations. I forgot I could be just an “I” and didn’t have to be a “we”.
- Motherhood taught me that I can function exceptionally well on little or no sleep. I don’t mean the university style all-nighter to attend a dull lecture and party hard the following evening. I average 5 hours of sleep a night and somehow I’m still able get up everyday and raise a little person without messing her up while I attempt to run a growing business, renovate a house and have a life!
- I can say things like, “I have to pooh. Can you please stop staring at me?” With a straight face.
- You hear stories of children being drunk, on drugs, making irresponsible life choices, getting involved in behaviours that cause serious concern and still want to bring little humans into this scary world. You’re not sissy (but perhaps naively silly) by believing that your child will be different… It takes courage to have faith in yourself as a parent, to fight what seems like a generation of factors working against you.
Seriously, Motherhood is not for sissies.
So this is us as we bravely walk the path of the scariest and most beautiful relationship of all: Mum and Daughter.
What three words would you use to describe motherhood?