Do Other Mothers?...

Being a mother is the most difficult and scariest role I have ever played. Played. Such a light word compared to the impact the act of mothering has on the world. We are raising humans who will change the course of our existence as we know it. Humans who will maybe make spaceships an attainable mode of transportation in 50 years, or who will bring back polar bears to a sustainable population again so their children can know of them too.

I wonder if women think of the miraculous possibilities we are molding under our wings of love and guidance. Under our brokenness and perpetual exhaustion. I wonder if those looking from the outside see how we bear the weight of knowing this. If they notice the guilt we carry in our labored breathing when the 20 lb toddler falls asleep on our chests. If they can feel the sadness when we are fluttering for survival at the surface of their inconsolable tears when we give them what they want and it’s still the wrong thing. The tiredness we feel behind the eyes oozing pride when they’ve accomplished a first or reached a milestone.

Do other mothers feel badly about themselves too when they dream about being away from their children? When they wish it could happen once a week? I wonder if other mothers think they don’t deserve their position in their children’s lives because they don’t know how to make their children happy. Or if they think that by trying to make them align with many socially acceptable things, like not throwing yourself on the floor, we are breaking their natural instincts? Do other mothers wonder what a good balance is between discipline and allowing them to be who they are? Not what I want them to be?

It crosses my mind often when I am observing my very emotional and quite often, unstable, boys, that they will one day encounter a world that will tell them they are less than for having feelings. Do other mothers think they prepare their sons to fail by allowing them to explore the extents of their emotional spectrums too? Damned if we do.

Do other mothers cringe when they pass the hospital they gave birth at? My body used to get hot and my anxiety would kick into full gear. I don’t remember much from birthing my first son except I got over 40 stitches with something that resembled a fish hook. I remember touching my stitches when I could walk again and feeling something reminiscent of a mesh the doctor weaved to keep my insides from falling out of the gaping hole my son made to enter this world. When he tells me he loves his dad more than me, I remember that mesh sometimes.

I absolutely love the doctor who delivered my second son. I remember her asking me if having a c-section was better than my vaginal experience. Do other mothers have an orchestra of negative emotions? Like a symphony of anxiety on the drums in my chest, strings of resentment plucking at my throat when I’m trying to swallow, and me, the conductor, telling all my feelings this is not the place and the time. I had nerve damage, I felt the needle for the epidural go in my spine and a bolt of pain ran through my leg. I couldn’t walk for seven weeks without help. I didn’t even know that was a thing. Sometimes when my two year old forces himself to throw up when he’s having a tantrum for no reason, I touch my scar. I wonder if other mothers do that?