Stages
part 1
Dear motherhood,
Some days you are light. Some days you’re a knife. I didn’t understand you. But now I know, you are both. You prune and you heal.
And that makes you good for my soul.
Hello,
Sometimes I catch myself.
Wandering down the streets of yesterday, taking apart the memories, and then reimagining them in ways that could’ve been. It’s an old habit, as if my present depended on it.
Except, these days when I catch myself, I say no. Not again. Not anymore.
Time is relative to gravity, and right here, where my feet are, gravity is me.
Sarah
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This edit was prepared for you to take a moment for yourself. You might be in the middle of a busy day, you’re needed elsewhere, but this will just take a moment. Read, reflect, and I hope a small part of you will walk away renewed.
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We romanticize childhood.
Because it was when we fell in love for the first time.
Because mom and dad were everything we’d needed. Because dad called just to talk. Because mom’s hugs were soft and warm. Because dad had broad shoulders to climb on. Because mom offered her shoulder to cry on.
Because they were none of these things.
And we loved them, anyway.
And then we grew up, we offered our hearts to strangers, and some of us had children of our own, trying to love them in the way that we know.
To the mother and her inner critic.
It probably started in childhood, from the way our loved ones spoke, we listened. Words that were not intended for us, but from them we learned the ways of criticism.
By now we know the critic’s tricky ways. Belittling ourselves and those around us. Spurring arguments inside our heads. Spewing hurtful words in silence.
May we remember — we are not it and it is not us. It can be loud and we can be different.
To the mother who feels behind.
Maybe one day we’ll wonder, what was the rush?
To the mother who can’t decide.
Maybe the wise choice is to wait. To be still is a decision, too.
To the daughter who means well.
Maybe motherhood is learned. Not since we became mothers, but from when we were daughters. And what we learned as a daughter, makes us want to be a better mother.
If this is you, but first, forgive her.
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Emily, Juliana, Aria, Alessia, Dylan, Hattie, Monica
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EPILOGUE
Dear motherhood,
Some days you are pure light, piercing through the walls I”d built since childhood. Some days you’re a knife, cutting into my deepest wounds, driving into my bones.
Now I know that you are both. You prune and you heal, you’re vast and misunderstood, a metaphor for things unsaid, a blessing that some of us can hold.
A decade later, I know that you are good for my soul.