If We Were Having Tea Together, I’d Tell You…

I love a good chatty check-in, especially with the mom-friends in my life who I know always have things changing in their lives.  So let me catch up with you!  If you and I were sitting down to grab some coffee or tea together, I’d want to tell you…

Life with a little one gets easier in so many ways!  If you’re in the midst of a new, first baby, I’d want to assure you that in my experience, things get so much better with time.  I remember thinking I’d never sleep a full night again, and that I’d probably just drop dead from exhaustion.  Now, I’m eager to take my little girl to the park, go on bike rides together, and manage to find time for myself that isn’t just napping.  There are still difficult times — times that I didn’t anticipate when she was a newborn, times that challenge me, times that confound me.  But a lot of things have also gotten easier with time and experience.

If we were meeting to catch up, I’d also want to talk about how motherhood has made me a more confident person.  Keeping a little baby alive, first through some difficult breastfeeding times, and then onwards into her current toddlerhood has made me a much more self-sufficient, confident woman.  Before having my own child, I always worried that I wouldn’t be enough for my child — that I wouldn’t be able to do all the things babies require.  But I did them, and while before the thought of taking a baby on a plane ride while solo-parenting would fill me with dread, now, I can say that I’ve done it, and it wasn’t that bad.  Of course, your mileage may vary.  But sometimes, things really aren’t as bad as they might appear, and sometimes, you’re stronger than you think.  You can do the things!

If we were having tea, I’d tell you that sure, potty training seemed daunting — no, downright terrifying.  If I’m being totally honest, my husband and I put it off as long as we could before agreeing that if we didn’t try soon, we might miss the mythical window of opportunity.  And…it turned out fine.  Oh, the first two weeks or so were frustrating as we worked to figure out a schedule and what we could do outside of the house and what would have to wait (trips to the grocery store were fine, long car trips not so much).  But after the initial difficult two or so weeks, we settled into a rhythm and a new routine, and slowly but surely things worked themselves out.  It was surprisingly less horrifying than we’d anticipated.  If we were having tea together right now, I’d knock on wood while exclaiming that sometimes, things you think will be horrible…just aren’t that bad in the end.

Finally, if we were spending some time catching up, I’d want to encourage you to invest in some self care.  The books All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood by Jennifer Senior and Overwhelmed: Work, Love, and Play when No One Has the Time by Brigid Schulte both make the case that women — especially mothers — need to take the time for activities that benefit only them, in addition to all the caretaking and (frankly) self-deprivation that motherhood involves.  Whether it means taking a class or taking time each week to go someplace solitary (a museum, a coffeehouse to write by yourself, a long walk in the woods), your own self-care is vital to your personhood outside of parenting.  Life makes it easy to deprive ourselves of time of our own.  Grab that time by the horns if you can.  I’m not saying it’s easy, but the times when I’m supported and able to do that are worth the effort every time.

Oh.  And as always — if we were having tea and catching up together, I’d want to remind you what a great job you’re doing.  We mamas have to have each others’ backs, you know.