The Perfectly Imperfect Mother
I wrote this blog post in January 2018 for Monday’s Child (the sweet, but naive beginning of Mother Earthed), which was dedicated purely to my childbirth education work. Little did I know that Mother Earthed was waiting, so to speak, (perhaps for me to be ready) and a bigger creative journey was ahead. Why am I reposting this piece? Perhaps as a little reminder to any mother who is thinking this is all too hard, that sometimes taking a long shower and listening to yourself aligns everything. And as long as you’re doing this from a space of love and pure intention, deep down in your soul, you can’t go wrong. I’ve updated it slightly, but the sentiment remains the same.
Read on…
Somewhere in the middle of the snotty, sorry, this-is-all-too-much situation that was January, I was forced to take a long hard think about my work.
Everything seemed to be suggesting that I should quietly take my protea and pop it in the bin. But the thing with proteas is that you can’t get rid of them that easily (not that you’d want to). This bloom says bring on the fire. Its reproduction and regeneration depend on it and once the smoke is gone, it grows back even stronger than before.
Call it work, call it a hobby, call it what you will… When you’re doing something that sits right with you on a personal, social, ethical and deeply human level, you just can’t stop. It might exhaust me, it might not pay in the same way big business pays, but at the end of every day I know that there’s a reason I’m doing this. A reason beyond my own knowing. Of my four birth experiences (I absolutely count my first miscarriage as a birth experience) the last two were against the grain and they left me certain that the birth industry needs to change. From the education women receive before birth, even before conception, to the support they are given postpartum, there really isn’t much effort put in to making them feel like they truly know what’s going on, that their bodies are remarkable and that they absolutely need time to heal, bond, replenish and move into their new bodies and love themselves and be loved.
While Mother Earthed brings me fulfilment on many levels, this work is not just for me. It is for the woman contemplating motherhood, it is for the mom who had a birth that left her confused and feeling like she somehow failed, it's for the dad-to-be who doesn't want to feel like a third wheel, it's for the mother who wants to know how she can make a 5-minute nap feel like 5 hours. It's for my children who may one day navigate all this.
So what is my business?
1. My children
A cliché perhaps, but yes, first and foremost. My three little people and the birth experiences they brought with them, are the very reason I ended up training in HypnoBirthing, as a postpartum professional and as a meditation teacher. It is a daily mental marathon working out how I do this without sacrificing time with them. They remain my first “job”, my 4:40am to 7:55pm (give or take). And while I know that the world as it rotates today places very little value on mothering, I’ll press on because it’s the foundation of everything.
2. HypnoBirthing
I must stress that I did not get into HypnoBirthing and childbirth education because I had the "perfect" birth. I’ve had three births, in three settings (hospital, birth centre, home), in three countries. All very different experiences. Each with their own lessons. While pregnant with my second, I knew, with every bone in my body, that I did not want to go into another birth clueless and feeling like I was present but not really part of the process. After that “WOW!” birth, I trained as a HypnoBirthing Childbirth Educator because I think every woman should have the opportunity to have the priceless antenatal education I finally discovered and should be encouraged to have that “A ha!” moment that comes with a respected, informed birth. Every woman, the baby she has, and her partner, deserve a birth that is fulfilling on a physical, emotional and spiritual level… whether that is physiologic or surgical.
3. postnatal support
A few years ago, in the midst of international move (#3), throwing a farewell/birthday party and making sure my children had a school waiting for them on the other side, I blubbed to a friend that I couldn’t see how I could possibly guide anyone in the world of mothering when I felt like I was trying to hold five people together with a roll of dental floss and some packing tape. She looked me in the eye and said, “This is exactly why you need to do this!! Because you’ve been there and you can help people.”
And that’s it really...
I’ve been the Mom who’s up there, queen of the jungle gym castle, hitting the slides with shameless glee;
I’ve been the Mom with mascara sliding down her cheeks thinking surely it’s not supposed to be this hard.
I’ve been the Mom pinning the top 2,000 activities that some other perfect parent compiled for toddlers on a rainy day;
And I’ve felt like Martha freaking Stewart because I made enough multi-coloured playdough to bring The Hungry Caterpillar to life.
I’m the cheering mama at EVERY school event;
I’m also the Mom who wonders if it’s wrong to think that Hide 'n Seek is the perfect way to disappear and be left alone for… potentially… 5 minutes. *
I’ve been the Mom who aches at how much I just love this and my world would shatter without them.
And I’ve been the Mom who has yelled with such frustration wine glasses could shatter.
I’ve been a gold-star-worthy class Mom who could throw together school fancy dress overnight;
And I’ve been the Mom who who says “What?! There was a memo about school pj day?! Your pjs have holes in the knees!!! Can someone get me a PA?!”
You get the slightly off-centre picture.
And in my humble 13 years of momming, I can say one thing with absolute certainty. NO mother, even if she's one of those parents who has all her ducks in a cute, fluffy colour-coordinated row, has life as a parent down pat. It’s hard, it’s emotional, it’s messy and marvellous. Having people around you who want to see you doing this thriving, helps, a lot. My journey has meant that this is not always the case. If you don’t have these people, or life has scattered yours, then having a self-care and soul-care “toolbox” of techniques to help you cope and put things in perspective when the pressure cooker threatens to blow is what every mother needs. Sometimes I wish I’d had my toolbox when I started off this journey. But then, as Bandit Heeler** says: “The obstacles make the journey.”
Hearth Space would not exist without mine.
4. Meditation
I’ll share a little story here. When I was three, the headmistress at my nursery school requested that my parents keep me home on the day of our school field trip. I was a pint-sized wild child. It took becoming a mother and meditation for me to understand the source of this inner angst and the wisdom in it. So I cannot tell you how much joy it gives me to be able to share the wonder of meditation and breathing with others as a teacher.
And this sums things up slightly. I certainly don’t know it all and my children know that. My motivation is not to teach mothers everything I know. It’s to raise awareness (my own included) and guide mothers in nourishing their intuition so that they’re not mothering’ from a place of confusion and overwhelm.
* Please only do this in a safe environment where you can still hear every one of your children huffing and puffing as they hunt for you.
** Plan B when you need 10 minutes is to pop on an episode (exactly 10 minutes) of Bluey.