The first time I remember feeling content in my life was the first year of my daughter’s life. Up until that point, I was notorious for always wanting more. Nothing was ever enough, even my wins fell overwhelmingly short, and I would constantly bounce around looking for the next best thing.
Then, that tiny human slowed and steadied me.
I remember around my fourth month as a stay at home mom, my therapist asked me if I had finished my book—a project I was working on prior to giving birth. I was flabbergasted. How could I?! I was a mother now. I had a mouth to feed and nursery rhymes to sing. There was no time for the betterment of myself. When you take on the role of a mother it means you sacrifice, or so I assumed.
Turns out, therapists get paid a lot because they have incredible foresight.
It wouldn’t be long before my old ways returned and I found myself longing for something more stimulating than my child. At the end of most days, I felt washed out and depleted. I had done everything, yet nothing at all. I had been constantly in motion but never used my mind. By the time my second child came around, the storytimes and play dates had lost their novelty. You couldn’t pay me enough to sing ba ba black sheep again.
This is what happens when women spend an exonerate amount of time focused on just one thing—a child, a job, a number on a scale. We are obsess-ers. And we are also notorious for pouring all of ourselves into another person, namely our children, until our cup runs dry.
But how do we pour when we are depleted?
What I now know is that no one person can complete you, and that surely applies to a child. If we find our identities in things that are constantly evolving and changing (or eventually leaving the nest) we will never know our truest selves.
My self-care now involves actively carving out time for the woman I was before my children, and the woman I am becoming now.
We don’t need to be selfless to be good mothers, because who really benefits from being less of themselves?
I want to be full of the life I would most like my daughter to lead.
To More Love,
Stephanie
