@communicatewithchloe marks her post-summer return to Ruby Doo's blog with a great, insightful piece detailing the often complex emotions of parenthood.
Read, enjoy and click the heart to leave a like!
A Mummy's Paradox
Paradox - ‘A seemingly absurd or contradictory statement ‘.
Since having you, my little baby, I have been living in a paradoxical bubble. I am living a confusing contradictory life.
Let me tell you why.
Since the day I became pregnant I have never been alone. You have always been with me, inside me, in my arms, on my chest, on my hip. I entered a sisterhood called Motherhood. I joined millions of other women experiencing the same journey as me, I became connected to other Mums instantly. As my baby cries in the supermarket, one look and reassuring nod from another Mum wrestling their toddler into the trolley and I know that they just know. They get it.
I am surrounded by support of friends, of family. Being a Mum, in one way or another I am in constant company yet at times feel so alone. It can be such a lonely journey. You awake in the silent night and feel like the only person in the world. You are just next to your partner on the sofa yet feel so far away. You look at pictures of others care free on their summer holiday and feel isolated in your living room.
I desperately want to interact with people without children so I can talk about something other than children. Yet I am drawn like a magnetic force to other Mums, any Mum, of any age and I am elated to hear about their vaginal stitches and the colour of their baby’s poo. I want to talk about the amazing feeling of being a Mum and at the same time moan about how tired I am and that my concealer no longer covers my dark stained eyes.
I want a break. I want my friends. I want to drink cocktails and I want to dance. I want to talk to an adult. The day comes and I don’t want to go. I crave you, I wonder what you’re doing, if you miss me as much as I miss you. You’re not with me physically, in the flesh, by my side. Yet I feel you, you pull me like an energy, a magnetic force of love. It’s as though you are a attached to my heart on a piece of string. No matter where you are, or where I am, I feel you tugging and pulling.
You have a piece of my heart. No, you are a piece of my heart. I see you and I see my own heart beating outside of my chest.
Sometimes I miss my old life. Being able to leave the house in a minute and make a spontaneous decision to go for drinks and dinner. But actually I never want to go back to that and I refuse to imagine a life without you in it. I would rather take an hour to leave the house with 5 bags and leave with you by my side. I would rather have to plan my days a week in advance in order to spend a day with you .
I look forward to my bath. My 15 minutes of calm, serenity, to soak, to think, to not think at all... time for myself. But as I bathe you, from the outside of the bath, as I wash your feet, I stroke you hair, we laugh and we splash. I don’t want my me time, I want you time. So I climb in with you and we have a bath together.
I cant wait until you can sit up by yourself and walk so that I can put you down and get things done. Brush my hair, put some makeup on, cook some lunch with two hands. But I never want to let you go. I never want the day to come when you don’t need me to hold you anymore. When your tiny hand holds onto my T-shirt and you take in the world from over my shoulder and rest your head on my chest when the world becomes too much.
I dream about the night that you sleep through. The night I get a full nights sleep, no interruption, no 3am feeds. At the same time I don’t want that. I’ll miss you in the night, I'll miss you crying out because you need me, I’ll miss sitting with you, in the quiet darkness, whilst the rest of the world sleeps and I hold your hand and kiss your innocent forehead. I don’t want you to grow, I’ll miss you.
Motherhood is a crazy, self contradictory paradoxical, gift. Being sad and happy at the same time. Being in constant company yet feeling so lonely. Missing a life of freedom yet never wanting to stop being needed. Trying to make time for yourself whilst giving your whole self to someone else. Feeling blessed yet burdened. Your days are filled with excitement and monotony. The world becomes so small and something so small becomes your world.
Tonight when you slept in your own big girl cot and I could have sat down stairs with my glass of wine and watched all of the episodes of Eastenders I’ve missed... I sat on your floor and I held your hand through the bars. I watched your chest move up and down, I listened to the sweet sound of your breath, I stroked your soft hair and I kissed your smooth forehead. I felt your warm skin against mine. I counted your eyelashes and admired the shape of your tiny little ears and wondered how something so perfect grew inside of me. And the biggest paradox of all is I missed you. I do miss you and you’re right here. I miss you when you are next to me, when you are in my arms. I miss you before you have even grown x
Chloe x