Living In A World Of Pressure

A former colleague (and mentor of mine), shared this video on Facebook, and I thought it was insanely powerful. The message likely resonates with all women, but I felt it especially poignant since becoming a mother, because I do feel an insane amount of pressure to be not only a good mom, but a fulfilled, successful woman.

Are you in danger of burning out? Take a watch and see if you cried as much as I did!

The Truth About Why Being a New Mom Is Hard

I've been doing some reflecting recently on the first few months of motherhood. I really found being a new mom challenging. With a one year old now running around and getting into everything, I look back at those early days and wonder what the hell was so hard? Babies have such basic needs: they don't move around, you have complete control over them... so why was I crying every day? Why was it so damn difficult?

After careful thought, I think I finally have some answers:

• It wasn't the baby that was hard, it was the reality finally hitting me that my life was never going to be the same, and having to actually accept that. 

To My Boy - On His First Birthday

I'm not sure if it's normal, but I find myself visualizing bad things on a fairly regular basis. Usually it's when I'm in the car; I'll see a horrible accident that doesn't happen. But sometimes I just think about what would happen if I wasn't around anymore.

The thought of my death never used to bother me, before I was a mom. It was never one of my fears, in fact I sometimes would wish I died in a really spectacular way, like a plane crash or shark attack, rather than in my sleep or of an old age illness. But now I have to live. Someone in the world really depends on me, and if I was to die soon it could really fuck him up.

I am a Horrible Selfish Mom: I Weaned My Baby.

When my son was born I knew nothing about breastfeeding. It was terribly ignorant of me to just think everything would be fine, even though I had heard it was hard. What the hell did that mean? How could breastfeeding be hard? Your baby opens his mouth, in goes your nipple, and bam!, milk starts a flowin'. The reality for me was not that simple. It was 6 weeks of pain and bleeding and crying and feeding every hour and a half.

But this post is not about that, because in the end I figured it out. I sought the help of a lactation consultant, and my son was diagnosed with a tongue tie. After 6 weeks things were great. Perfect, in fact I would say. I had no need to supplement ever with formula. My son was gaining weight famously. It was another bodily miracle, and I was proud.

Fast forward to when son was 6 months old. Now, in my head I had never placed a time limit for how long I would breastfeed. I just thought, "I'll do it as long as I can". But what about what I wanted? Forget my ability, forget what I could do, what about my desires as an actual individual person?