Motherhood

Hi, this was me before becoming a momma. I know, who is she? She didn’t have a real worry in the world. This was me before even thinking of doing hours and hours of research on ovulation. This was me before my OCD kicked into overdrive. This was me before the endless tears after months of negatives appeared in front of me. This was before I even knew what a pandemic was. Shortly after the pandemic started is when I decided to start trying for a baby, because I also, like many other women, decided to have a baby while the world was slowly falling a part. I figured that I could bring a bit of joy into this chaotic world. Whenever I went on social media, all I could see were pregnant women. Beautiful and glamorous pregnant women. They would prepare their nurseries, they would prepare their postpartum toiletries, they would buy all these beautiful clothes for their very small human that they spent nine months making. It seemed like there were no negatives to being pregnant. It almost seemed perfect. It is an honour to be pregnant and to become a mom I often thought. I would see videos of their partners rubbing their beautiful pregnant bellies. I would see their partners holding them through every difficult moment. I wanted that too. I wanted it more than anything I have ever wanted in my life. So it became my new obsession.

However, I never wanted babies before. I never thought I would ever become a mom. I was always the baby of the family so I was surrounded by mothers my entire life. These mothers would baby me endlessly. You would think that that would have given me the urge to become a mother one day. It didn’t at first. I spent most of my 20s alone with my fur baby, Jack. Here is a quick little picture of my darling:

Life was perfect. I had my apartment, my rescue fur baby and my career. I had lots of wonderful people in my life. I didn’t have a life partner, but who needs a relationship nowadays anyway, is what I would tell myself on repeat. I never thought that I would need anything more to be happy. I like to think of myself as a simple and peaceful person. However, eventually it became apparent to me that I needed more. One evening, after working a long day as an English teacher, I came home on my birthday to find myself alone, without a family to celebrate with. Of course I had Jack, but he couldn’t hug me or sing to me. I felt very much alone and the desire to create a family became a new aspiration of mine. It became not only a desire, but a need. Then three years later I met my life partner, Gabriel. He became my family, our family. He already had two girls from a previous relationship and soon I became a stepmom. It felt wonderful to be needed. I now had a real family I thought. But something was missing. My urge to share my body with a baby was still very much present. I felt the strong need to create a human and be a mom. So after only a couple of months we decided to try and make a baby. I had spent so much of my life trying not to get pregnant, I thought to myself this will be a cake walk. The hard part is trying not to get pregnant, right? Oh how I was wrong…

I want to share with other women, with other moms, my journey into motherhood. I spent most of my journey googling and googling and always feeling alone with my thoughts. I would ask myself “why do I feel like this when others don’t?” I felt so alone most of the pregnancy and even after I had given birth I still felt so alone. My expectations and reality were not quite the same. Nobody had told me about the reality of pregnancy. The hormonal changes, the many blood tests, the stress of it all. My goal for this series is to be relatable to others, so that they do not feel as alone as I did. I will be sharing with you the beautiful parts of pregnancy (before and after) and the ugly parts as well. This is going to be raw, real and detailed.

However, keep in mind that NOT ALL PREGNANCIES ARE THE SAME. This is my experience only and if you can relate then I’m happy.

Until next time my lovelies,

Ttyl ✌🏼