Having a kid knocked me off of my axis for 5 years. I felt in a constant state of chaos.
I like sci-fi, and I love the movie “Contact”. One of my favorite parts of Contact was when Jodi Foster realized that all the extra-ness of the spaceship wasn’t needed. They didn’t need to add the extra safety precautions. The design from the much more intelligent life was fine as it was.
I think one of the reasons that life is chaotic when you have a child, is because we, like the engineers that built the spaceship in Contact, are trying to make motherhood what we think it should be based on our past experiences and social pressure.
“Ugh. I can’t go workout because my kid needs me.”, we say.
“I can’t spend an hour locked away, because that’s not fair to my spouse”, we think.
“Well, that mom plays make-believe all day, so I’m a bad mom.” We think to ourselves and sometimes say to other.
We hold ourselves to an impossible standard because many of us are afraid of how others perceive us. Who is the standard? What authority said it should be the standard? My motherhood flow is not yours and is not the mom’s across the street.
I’m taking ownership of my definition of motherhood. I started taking time for myself and being unapologetic for it recently. It’s made everyone in the house happier, because I can get in my flow and all of us can flow together…it’s like a figurative dance.
Corny, but I don’t care. I’ll take the judgment in exchange for my family’s happiness.
And also, don’t be extra.
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