To the wide-eyed expecting moms who have no idea what they’re in for; to the brand new moms who have only scraped the tip of the iceberg of the mama emotions; to the moms knee-deep in tears and fears and scary-strong love and paralyzing worry and snot and drool (your kids’, not yours, hopefully) and all of the foreign feelings you’re trying to wade through for the first time in your life—listen up: it’s all normal. And it’s all okay. Whatever “it” is for you, just remember you’re not the only mom feeling it. (Write that down, you guys. Maybe even tattoo it on your body somewhere inconspicuous?)
Every meltdown, every crazy thought, every doubt, every gut-wrenching fear, every irrational worry, every embarrassing mishap, every tear cried into your pillow at 3 am when the rest of the world is sound asleep and every #momfail under the sun. It’s normal. You’re normal. And oh yeah, you’re doing great. (Don’t even try to argue with me on this one, got it?)
If there was one thing I desperately needed to hear when I was first thrust into the tumultuous tides of motherhood, it was the validation of my pure and utter normality.
Because God knows the last thing you need when you’re in the trenches of these new, powerful emotions is to feel ashamed, embarrassed or self-conscious that you’re wrong or different or worst of all, in my case, certifiably insane. (I mean we’re talking straight-jacket, white-walls, padded-room insane here, just to be clear.)
Because when you’re casually loading the dishwasher mid-afternoon and suddenly find yourself sobbing into the dirty forks over the thought of something happening to you, leaving your babies without a mama, you need to know it’s okay. (Anyone else enjoy a good 3pm dishwasher sob sesh? Just me? Cool, cool. Sweeeeet.)
It’s okay to have irrational thoughts sometimes and it’s okay to cry over them: you simply love another little human so much that it brings you to your knees. (One day you guys will be in for a REALLL treat when I share the post on all of my irrational thoughts, worries and fears. Then you’ll probably buy Barton a drink and shake his hand emphatically, not unlike how one would do to a war hero, for surviving postpartum life with the hormonal crazy lady he naively vowed to love eternally.)
In other words, you’re a MOM! (Isn’t this fun?! I mean, more fun than a barrel of monkeys, this motherhood thing). And not a crazy mom, might I add, a freaking good mom (despite what your secretly-horrified husband’s judgey side-eye is telling you from across the kitchen. Pipe down, Judgey Husbands, or we’re gonna stick these dirty forks where the sun don’t shine.)
So let’s review what we’ve covered so far, shall we? Crying into the dishwasher at 3 p.m.? Totally normal! Just in case you had your doubts. It’s just how this heavy-duty, all-consuming love reveals itself. It exposes itself in new, strange ways. Sometimes it’s in beautiful ways, like when you realize you’re shocked that you don’t even care what the scale says—how soft your previously-toned stomach gets, how round your hips become—as long as you ultimately grew a healthy, happy baby. Or when it’s 2 a.m. and you’ve been rocking her for the last hour and your eyes are burning from exhaustion and you think your bladder is about to explode and you’ve lost all the blood in your right arm but you keep rocking, and rocking, and rocking, because you know it makes her feel safe and comforted.
But sometimes this new love manifests itself in dark, ugly ways— ways they don’t talk about on the mommy blogs, ways your mom friends don’t gush about on the playground. Like when you’re up in the middle of the night staring at your newborn for three hours straight with the sickening fear that she is somehow going to quit breathing in her sleep. Or the all-too-real possibility that you might get diagnosed with some horrific illness that rips you away from her and leaves her without a mommy. (Are you sensing a theme with me here?) Or the helpless feeling that someday, years from now, someone might really hurt her—either physically or emotionally—and make her cry real tears and it’s totally, completely out of your control. Or that you’re simply just not doing it well enough— any of it.
When you suddenly become responsible for a precious little life, new fears, new worries, new anxieties you never could’ve imagined quickly creep into the shadowy corners of your mind, kick off their shoes, settle into an all-too-comfy armchair and make themselves right at home for the foreseeable future. I’ve been working on tactics to kick them out, but so far, I’m thinking they might be here to stay.
And all of this isn’t because I suddenly became a dark and morbid person; it’s simply because everything matters more now.
Everything carries more weight—much, much more— and the stakes have been raised DRASTICALLY. Because at the core of literally everything in my world now are these two innocent little girls: one with a big, toothy grin and a squeaky little voice that says “mama” on repeat and wispy hair that isn’t quite long enough for a real ponytail yet (but she’s getting there), and another with big doe eyes and freakishly muscular legs and enough sass to last her a lifetime. Everything I do or don’t do now affects them, and sometimes I feel it would literally kill me to let them down.
Sometimes hearing other moms describe how much having kids has changed them makes me feel self-conscious. Beyonce said in an interview, “Motherhood has changed everything for me. I’m a lot braver and I’m more secure.” In another interview she went on to say, “I feel more beautiful than I’ve ever felt because I’ve given birth. I have never felt so connected, never felt like I had such a purpose on this earth.”
Well, Bey, I’m happy for you. Really, I am. But sometimes I’m not so sure I could confidently say all of things (and truly mean them). Sure, I’d LIKE to claim to feel braver, more secure and definitely more beautiful, but right now I don’t think I am.
And you know what? You guessed it—that’s okay.