Ezra Wilder | Motherhood
“I will love you not starting with your skin or your organs or your bones. I will love madly first your naked soul.” Christopher Poindexter.
No matter how many people tell you your life is about to change, you will not fully grasp the meaning until you’re in the thick of it. Motherhood is beautiful and ugly at the same time. Wild and terrifying. Its brutally honest. Its painful, physically and emotionally. Theres a conflict between wanting this sleep deprived state to hurry up and simultaneously slow down (I already feel like Ezzie looks like a toddler at 3.5 weeks old!).
Nothing I envisioned about becoming a mom has happened. Maybe thats the purpose. It inherently changes you. Your brain, your heart, your physical body. I’m grateful that my introduction to becoming a mom has taken it’s own path. I’m learning the biggest lesson of my life, and as a person who loves an organized system, what a shock I’ve experienced. The lessons are funny, they are sad, they are scary. For example, breast pump flanges do not, in fact, suction on and stay in place without you (or a fantastic pumping bra) to hold them there. Maybe thats common knowledge but I wasn’t aware! The day we came home from the hospital, I sat at the kitchen table with Bryce and cried. No, sobbed. What a mistake we had made. Why did I upend our lives? Oh sweet new, momma, if you’re reading this, it will normalize. It will be okay. I tell myself this, almost every hour, of every day.
I’m so full of gratitude for the family and friends that have rallied around our new little family. The support we have (and continue to) received is amazing. From dropping food off, to visiting with us and talking about non-baby things, sending messages of support and their own stories, advice upon advice, reminders that this too shall pass. I knew before that it took a village to raise a child, but it takes a village to raise a mother too.
Love is not automatic. You now have a stranger living in your house, not paying rent. And everyone asks “Aren’t you so in love?!!” I don’t know about you, but I’ve never loved anyone I met off the street. Love takes time. Especially loving a little babe who deprives you of sleep, makes your nipples bleed, and pees into your mouth (poor daddy!). Somehow, along the way, you look into that milk drunk face, recognize their cry (from other babies), and figure out how to comfort them (1/10 times), and you realize, this is falling in love.
Being a mom is the single most, hardest thing I have ever done. Be gentle with yourself momma, you’re doing the best you can. Even when you feel like you aren’t.
