You are not alone.
The women around me as I grew up were… tough. They were the grit & grind, keep feelings to themselves, do what you gotta do type. I think that’s mostly how it was for women of the 90s. And so I just kind of assumed that was the kind of mother I’d be, too.
For one reason or another though, after we had our second baby, the voices in my head got so loud, I couldn’t grit or grind anymore. I laid in bed one night and told my husband the ugly lies I couldn’t stop telling myself and where I thought those lies were taking me. I sobbed as I promised to find a therapist.
For a girl raised by a really tough generation of women, therapy felt… lame and whiny (my words and feelings, not necessarily theirs). But the alternative was keeping it all to myself, and that had become too dark and ugly to bear.
And so began my awareness, my pursuit of maternal mental health. It’s been four years [and two more babies] since the darkest point in my own journey, but the lights still go dim every now and then. Motherhood, for me, has been anything but simple, pretty or clean.
For Maternal Mental Health Month, I thought I would share some of the most raw moments of my motherhood journey, just in case someone else still thinks they need to grit & grind through, too.
If I’m not pregnant or nursing, I feel like I don’t know who I am or what my worth is.
I adore the newborn & toddler stages, but the bigger kid stages scare the shit out of me.
I have mom rage, usually triggered by a messy house or my kids fighting. And I yell. So much more than I thought I would.
I know that sometimes I really need an afternoon or a weekend away, but leaving my kids with someone else feels paralyzing. I don’t trust that anyone else can care for my kids’ particularities, and I fully believe my kids’ particularities will make someone think I am a terrible mother.
No matter how many babies I have, I forget things (like how to swaddle and trimming nails), and I feel like an imposter, wondering when someone is going to figure me out.
I have spent countless nights sobbing in my nursing chair about the sleep routine we don’t have, the vegetables my kids don’t eat, the schedule I can’t keep and the words I did or didn’t say before bedtime, believing each one is yet another way I have failed.
I want to love and appreciate what my body has done, but I get angry at it. I wonder why other moms fit into crop tops and run marathons like they do. I’m scared I’m stuck in this body now.
I end almost every day counting my mistakes and promising to do better tomorrow. Even though I don’t know if I have better in me.
I wonder if I made the right choice to stay home with my kids. Would I be a better mom, would they have a better connection with me, did I make this choice selfishly, would they be better equipped for the world if I went to work every day?
I perpetually walk the line between asking why this is so hard and knowing these are the very best moments and years of my life.
Maternal mental health. I never knew it would be so freaking hard to maintain. But I do know that it’s worth it. My kids are worth it, my husband is worth it, our future as a family is worth it.
I think I am worth it.
And so are you, my friend. You are worth facing the ugly, kicking the lies straight in the teeth, speaking the truth and stepping into the light. You are worth acknowledging every dark & twisty thought you have and still believing you are good.
Because you are so good at what you do… mothering. It all matters, and you’re good.
Until next time,
