Things I Wish I'd Known

my very first moment of motherhood, February 2006

My friend Graeme recently posted a blog entry asking for the advice mothers wish they had been given while they were pregnant. I was going to leave this as a note on her blog, but then it got really long because (surprise!) I have a lot to say. So here we go! This is what I wish I'd known.

Enjoy the belly as much you can while you're pregnant. I threw up almost every day through both of my pregnancies, but I have also never felt so great about myself and my body. I was growing a human! I'm not looking to have more kids right now, but damn I miss the feeling of a baby kicking me in the bladder.
 
It's good to have a birth plan. It's good to be educated and to read whatever books you want to read to feel ready. When I was pregnant with my first baby, my mother and I watched TLC's "A Birth Story" for two hours every single morning. I had a book called The Pregnancy Bible and I treated it like it really was the word of God. I memorized that thing. With my second pregnancy, I decided to have a natural birth with a playlist and a birthing tub and candles and instead I had a breech baby with a cord wrapped around her neck several times and a c-section. It happens. A plan is great, but birth happens with or without your plan. Your health and the health of your baby are the most important things. Everything else is sprinkles on the cupcake.


There are a few times when it is totally understandable to act like an asshole, and the delivery of your baby is one of those times. I had a wonderful midwife to assist with the births of both my children, and I developed such a wonderful relationship with one of my nurses that she actually came to the hospital on her day off to visit and bring me a candy bar. Midwives, nurses, doctors...they can be wonderful people. But they are people, which means they can also be awful. If you don't feel you're getting the treatment you deserve, or you feel uncomfortable or shamed ignored, it's okay to let that be known. Don't suffer through a crap experience because you ended up with a crap nurse. Say something.

When it comes to post-delivery (at least in my experience), there is going to be a LOT of blood and a LOT of oversharing. I had one vaginal delivery with an epidural and one c-section. My vaginal delivery was super easy (I only pushed for twenty minutes) and I never felt more than a little discomfort, so when the epidural wore off, I was totally unprepared for how much my crotch would burn and how much blood would be coming out of me. With the c-section, I sat in the bathroom for a full hour in absolute hysterics because I couldn't pee. When I finally managed it, my husband had to put my (giant, mesh, hospital-issued) underwear on for me. I had to have help in the shower both times. That's life.

Witch hazel. Witch hazel, witch hazel, witch hazel. Your vagina is going to burn like hot lava. Yes, it is.

You don't have to "sleep when the baby sleeps" or risk failing as a mother because you're too exhausted. If having a clean house will make you feel better, clean when the baby sleeps. If showering and/or putting on makeup makes you feel more like yourself, that's great. If getting out for a bit to go to the store or a movie will make you feel better, do that. If sleeping helps, that's good too. You don't exist only for the baby. You are still a human being with emotional and physical needs. They're just as important as the needs of the baby.
 

Round two, October 2009

Take pictures. All the time. Take pictures of their baby ears, their baby hair, their baby fingers and toes. Before you know it, they'll be little people instead of babies and you'll miss those infant features. Also, smell the hell out of their heads while you have a chance.

Breastfeeding is great for your baby and for a lot of women, it is also great for bonding and it's just the most magical thing on earth. For other women, it's kind of painful and kind of crap, but they can deal with it because for them, the benefits outweigh all the suck. For other women-- and I am one of them-- breastfeeding is a special hell that makes you seriously consider throwing yourself or your baby across the room and beg your doctor for antidepressants. If you are in that last group, for the love of God, do not torture yourself. Your baby needs a sane mother more than it needs to be breastfed. You're not making your baby weak or stupid by refusing to feel suicidal for a year after giving birth. I promise.

It's ok to ask for help. Not just when you have a newborn, but all the time. It takes a village. At the very least, it takes help from your partner (if you have one). Try to find someone you can call on in the middle of the night if you're really about to lose your mind. If you don't have a person like that in your life right now, mommy groups and support groups are great resources.

The baby will eventually sleep, I promise.

If you feel overwhelmed and the baby will not stop screaming and you feel the urge to shake the baby, put it down. Put the baby somewhere safe and walk away for a minute. This sounded like advice I would NEVER need to use, but then I had a baby and I realized how easy it is to want to shake a baby to "snap them out of it."  You're not a horrible person for having the passing thought, you're just exhausted and you can't think of anything to do to help. Both my babies had colic, though, so maybe this doesn't happen to everyone.

If you don't bond with your baby immediately, try not to worry about it too much. I expected motherhood to be something out of a movie, so when I had sore boobs and a fussy infant and post-partum depression, I really had myself convinced that I was not only the worst mother, but also the worst person, in the entire world. I thought I should be able to do everything, and if I couldn't do it, then none of the things I'd thought about myself were true. Who cared what else I accomplished in my life if I couldn't even bond with my baby? Fast forward almost eight years, and I would jump in front of a train for that kid in a skinny minute. I loved both my kids from the time they were born, but I love them both so much more now. It can be hard to bond with a sleeping/eating/pooping machine, but soon enough you and your child will have a real relationship and inside jokes and shared memories and it will be wonderful.
 

motherhood, 2012

Do what you feel you need to do, what you know is best. Even if it flies in the face of all advice. You can do it! It's going to be a hell of a ride.

But You're Such a Pretty Girl!

I'm over it. I'm letting it go. Clare doesn't need to fulfill my vision of how she would look most beautiful. She doesn't need to care about being beautiful. She DOES have to wash her hair at least once a week. There I will not budge. But my girl won't define herself by her appearance the way I did. The way I still do.

As both a mother and a daughter, Shannon Bradley-Colleary's article really gave me some thoughts and feelings. I definitely remember fighting with my mom before every school dance because she thought I "would just look so pretty with a little bit of mascara" and fighting with her when I went through a phase (an ongoing phase) where I only wanted to wear neutral colors. That I would look so pretty if I'd just get the hair out of my face, or buy a dress, or put some makeup on or just show SOME interest in how I looked and other than the few times a year (mostly proms) when dressing up felt like wearing a costume, I just didn't care. 

This is not an attempt to make my mom feel guilty or make her seem superficial. Wearing makeup, shopping, and getting dressed up just made my mom really happy and confident, and in her eyes, I think my refusal to take pleasure from that stuff looked to her like depression or self-hatred. She just couldn't imagine that I could both value myself and give very little value to my appearance. Granted, I did have some self-esteem issues, mostly due to a particularly traumatic high school relationship, but I always felt pretty comfortable with myself. When I did have issues with my body or appearance, I was quick to call myself out on them. When I went through a period in high school when I felt too fat to have friends, I wrote an essay about it and read it at a creative writing reading in front of all my friends and family. I had so much to worry about, and wearing uncomfortable clothing or makeup that made my eyelashes feel too heavy just didn't appeal to me. I lived very deeply in my own mind and wore the almost comically thick black glasses to let everyone know it. I still cut my own hair. I don't shave my legs unless I'm feeling particularly fancy. I didn't own a pair of jeans until sixth grade because they were uncomfortable and I refused to wear a bra until high school because WHY WOULD I DO THAT IT'S CONSTRICTING ME I CAN'T BREATHE, MOM!

Fast forward a decade and I have two daughters of my own. And because life is just this way, my kids love fashion. They "dress" to eat pizza in our living room, and every time we go to the playground, I have to explain over and over again that Christmas dresses are not appropriate playtime attire. Each kid already owns more dresses than I have probably worn in my entire life. They are comfortable in dresses, they feel confident in dresses, and while they also feel comfortable rocking a pair of holey jeans and a t-shirt, they feel most themselves when they're all dressed up. And it's hard for me, I'm not going to lie. When my seven-year-old asks me why she can only wear chapstick when all her friends are wearing lip gloss, it makes me uncomfortable. When she wants to get her ears pierced, I remember piercing my own ears twice before finally giving up on the whole damn thing, and I cringe. When she asks how old she'll have to be before she can shave her legs, I groan. "You don't have to shave your legs and wear makeup to be a worthwhile human being," I want to shout. But then I remember that she knows that. She knows she doesn't have to be conventionally girlie to be awesome. She dressed as a knight for Halloween and regards stereotypes about girls hating math or being bad at science with disdain. She is a good kid, a smart person, and yes, sometimes she wants to feel beautiful. And just like my mother finally gave up and stopped bugging me about mascara and embraced the frumpy, sweater-wearing daughter she was blessed to have been given, I have to embrace my fashion-loving, fancy dress-wearing daughters just the way they are*. Because they deserve to do whatever makes them feel best. And because I love them.

*Within reason. There will be no makeup or leg-shaving in this house until these kids are at least a couple years into the double digits.




 

Explorer Girl & Janice Take a Walk (and enjoy the season)

I have been having one of those weeks. It's been unseasonably cold and rainy and Stella has been beyond bored. It's still gross outside, but I'm so sick of sitting on the couch rereading the same three children's books and reading infuriating things on the Internet.

 

It's not like I didn't know motherhood would be boring sometimes. It's not like no one talks about it. But it's really hard to appreciate the toll that boredom can take on a person's brain, especially when she is a stay-at-home mom in a relatively unfamiliar city. It's gotten a bit better the past few months. I've met some women I really enjoy through Lucy's brownie troop (the love I have for the Girl Scouts deserves its own entry) and I get out of the house more days than not. I'm especially lucky because Stella goes to preschool three days a week, so I have time to do things like drive to Sandy Springs to have lunch with my husband, go to the library to browse the books without worrying that I'm boring the kids, and drink coffee while I read or write. Those twelve hours a week are truly lifesavers for me, and I feel guilty complaining about the two days a week (Monday and Friday) during which I have to entertain my 4-year-old all by myself. I know that staying home with my kids is a choice I made, and I am happy with that choice, but just like any job, it has its days when I wish I could call in sick or phone it in.

  

And, okay, I'll be honest. There are a lot of days when I do phone it in. I sit on the couch and read a book or mess around on Facebook or hold a Barbie in my hand so Stella thinks I'm playing with her when I'm actually catching up on episodes of Parenthood. Sometimes I get so frustrated with myself. I feel like a bad feminist because I have a degree in Women's & Gender Studies and I worked so damn hard for so damn long to get it and now I'm not using it in any capacity. My husband works and makes pretty good money and we live in the suburbs and I carpool my kids and husband all day every day and I really identify with those snarky comics on Facebook that say things like, "All the kids are asleep...it must be wine o'clock!"

Sometimes I really don't recognize my own life. And I'm bored, you guys. I'm so bored.

I'm bored enough that in the year since we've moved to Georgia, I have allowed myself to become obsessed with not one, but three (3) Mormon Mommy Blogs. What started out as a hate-reading things has become a part of my day that I actually really look forward to and love, which panics me a little bit. I look at the pictures of their kids and read about how confident they are in their roles as mothers and homemakers and how easy it seems to be for them to keep their houses clean and their children happy and their meals delicious and nutritious, and even though it pains me to admit it, a big part of me wishes I could be like them. Like them or like the women I know who seem to effortlessly balance work and school and children without breaking a sweat or a single commitment. And sure, having been on both sides of the "Mommy War," I know that there are struggles and boredom and joy and accomplishment and grief and pride and regrets no matter what we choose. No matter what choices we make in this life, we all-- from Mormon Mommy Bloggers to Staceyann Chin to Hillary Clinton-- wonder if we've made the right decisions. And sometimes we just have to sit around and feel shitty and lonely and unfilled for a minute. But then we keep going.

 

One thing I read in one of the Mormon Mommy blogs (and I wish I could remember which one it was because I would link to it or give her a shout out), is that she tries to remember when she is tired that this is a "season" of her life. That the time during which she will have children in her home who need and want all of her attention all of the time is temporary. There was a time before it, during which she had other priorities and interests, and God-willing, there will be a time after. It seems like a really obvious statement, but for some reason the image of life as a series of seasons really moved me and I still think about it a lot. Sometimes when I'm standing next to the car in the pouring rain, saying, "Stella, please get out of the car. Stella, please. Please, Stella. It's raining and Mommy is getting wet," I think to myself, This is the season where I stand outside the car in the rain while my kid takes five minute to put her raincoat on. Before this, there was a season when I worked full-time at a job I hated, a season when I worked full-time at a job I loved. A season when I was a student (that was a long one). I season when I was a single mother. A season when I was a college dropout. Seasons when I was a grieving sister, a newlywed, a "battered woman," a member of my high school drama club, a tap dancer (very short season), and on and on. Every season of my life has had its challenges, but every season has also contained moments of such beauty that cause me to look back on my life and know with certainty that this life is worth living.

I may not being using my degree or my feminism in a professional capacity right now, but that doesn't mean I'm not not using them. I'm raising two wonderful, intelligent, curious and impressionable girls right now. And if that's not a feminist act, what is?

Stella likes to play a game called Explorer Girl & Janice, in which I go about my daily life while Stella refers to me as "Janice" every five seconds and asks me questions about Janice's house, job, and family life. Janice couldn't take it for one more second today so she decided to take Explorer Girl on a tour of the neighborhood. 

For the record, Explorer Girl hates her raincoat, but it's adorable as hell.

Lucy and Lamott

So, I'll begin this entry with a disclaimer: It is generally not a great idea to have a surprise baby when you're a twenty-year-old unemployed girl with a pretty moderate drinking problem and no goals of which to speak just because you want someone to love you and you think your child will be just like you and you will be their favorite person and it will be happily ever after forever and ever. It rarely ever works out like the way you think it will and parenting is hard and expensive, etc.

That said, Lucy is exactly the kid I always dreamed of having and she made me grow up and become a better person and life is worth living now that she exists on this earth. She looks, talks and thinks like me, and we both agree that she is the coolest person in our family. Excluding the hours of 7:00-9:00 pm, during I routinely ruin her life by insisting that she go to bed at a reasonable hour, we have what I think is a pretty magical relationship.

One of the best things about my current relationship with Lucy is that she's at an age right now where I am still the most awesome person to ever live. Sure, there are moments-- like the morning I followed her down the street to the bus singing Rebecca Black's "Friday" at the top of my lungs-- when she wishes I would be a bit more like 'normal' moms, but for the most she enjoys having such a young, hip mama.  A young, hip mama whose idea of a fun night out is cramming herself into a church full of middle aged white people to listen to a lecture on grief by Anne Lamott and bringing her seven-year-old daughter along for the ride.

I'm not being sarcastic, here. I had a root canal Friday morning and spent the weekend moaning on the couch with an ice pack on my face, so she was bored out of her mind and willing to do anything I wanted as long as it involved leaving the house. We both got all dressed up for our night on the town. I even took a shower and wore a dress! I know I looked good because Lucy said, "You look pretty, Mommy! You don't even look like you need to go to the hospital." Score.

Lucy dressed in what she calls her "Mommy clothes," a costume consisting of a lot of layers, a purse full of garbage, and a very disgruntled expression.

We had to stop at the store on the way to the lecture so I could buy a cold coffee drink to press against the side of my face. We were running late, which meant Lucy took advantage of drug-addled panic and convinced me to buy her a giant chocolate milk and a candy bar, both of which she put her in purse. "See, Mommy, I really look like an adult now. I could easily pass for at least twelve. I have my purse all organized with papers in the middle, my chocolate milk over here, and my candy bar over her."

"I don't really think most adult carry chocolate milk in their purses," I said, pulling her across crowded parking lot in the dark while I tried not to trip over my very long dress which had seemed totally practical when I bought it.

"Oh, and most adults do carry at least three pairs of little girls' underpants in their purses?" Lucy asked. Touché, Lucy. It's not my fault your sister can't be trusted not to pee her pants out of spite.


It was so crowded inside the church that we couldn't find a seat unless she agreed to sit on my lap. She was the only child in attendance, and I could tell the women next to us were very disappointed to be sharing a pew with the only little girl in the whole building, but Lucy was a champion. While Ms. Lamott spoke of the tragic shooting in Newtown and the ways grief can unexpectedly bring us to our knees, my daughter combed my hair with her fingers and rubbed her cheek against my face. At one point, when Ms. Lamott started talking about ways to help someone who is hurting, Lucy moved to the floor so she could take notes on her little pad of paper. When Ms. Lamott mentioned the pain of losing a sibling, Lucy squeezed my hand, knowing that I would be thinking of my little brother, who died two years ago. She listened intently to descriptions of heartbreak and the difficulty of trying to explain grief and tragedy to children. She nodded her head along with the rest of the crowd and laughed when things were funny. She listened, and when Ms. Lamott asked if anyone had questions, Lucy was the first person to raise her hand.

Lucy's hand is very little and the church was very crowded, so she didn't get a chance to say what she wanted to say before the lecture came to an end. As soon Anne Lamott stepped off the stage, though, Lucy was sprinting down the aisle with her hand in the air. "Come on, Mom!" she said, and walked right to the front of the long line of hopeful fans hoping to have their books signed and photos taken. She rapped her knuckles on the table while I stood a few feet away, too shy to address an writer who has meant so much to me over the years.

"Excuse me, I had a question and you didn't call on me," she said.

Anne Lamott looked up from the table and smiled at her.

"I just have one question and that's all. I want to be a writer and I want to know when did you start writing?"

"Well, I probably started writing when I about seven or eight years old," Ms. Lamott said, smiling at me while I blushed in the background. "I think I was in second or third grade. What grade are you in?"

Lucy shook her head.

"You don't want to tell me what grade you're in?"

Lucy shook her head.

"Is that a secret?"

Lucy turned around and grabbed my hand. "I told her I only had one question and that was all," she said. "She doesn't have time to chat. She needs to do her job and sign those books."

On the way back to the car, Lucy waved her program in the air and talked excitedly about all the writing events she could see in her future. "We can go see Amy Tan on the nineteenth, Mom. Do you like Amy Tan?"

"Yeah, I do, actually, but I'm pretty sure you don't know who she is," I said.

"If you like her, I like her. I don't know who Anne Lamott is, but I liked the thing she said. I need to learn everything I can about writing and writers and maybe musicians like if we could see Fiona Apple or something, that would be cool."

"You want to see a lecture by Fiona Apple?"

"Um, yes! She is one of my inspirations. I know all the words to all her songs."

And she does. That's the thing. She pays attention to everything I like and everything I do, and she takes from it every single thing she can. That's what I mean when I say she makes me a better person. She makes me think about every opinion, ever choice of words, every song I sing along with or book I check out from the library. She is watching me all the time, wanting to be like me, wanting to get closer to me. I was definitely an adult by the time I realized my mother had a life and interests outside of my own life and interests. I never thought to get to try to get to know her by doing the things she enjoyed. I was too busy talking and thinking about myself. And at seven years old, my child knows almost everything about me, about the person I used to be and the person I am and the person I want to be in the future. She understands that I'm not perfect and I'm kind of a nerd and she loves me even more for it and wants to be like me because she looks up to me. Which is crazy because I look up to her. I may not really be a cool Mom, but I have the coolest daughter.

begin!

I grew up ten minutes from the Atlantic ocean. I spent many of my teenage days and nights at the beach, and I love the look and the sounds and the idea of the ocean. When I'm too far away from the ocean, I can feel the distance in my bones. Now that my family and I live in Atlanta, we have a membership to the Georgia Aquarium and there is nothing I love more than watching the whale sharks and beluga whales glide through the clear, clean water. But I don't actually want to get in the water. I'm terrified, actually. I don't like that I can't see through the murky green water of the ocean in my hometown of Charleston, SC. When I'm standing in the ocean, I don't know what kinds of creepy crawlers (or swimmers) are hanging out around my feet. I can't really avoid stepping on sharp shells or getting knocked around by a wave, and it has been years since I've gone a full day at the beach without getting stung by a jellyfish. I don't like having an experience I can't control. I don't like surprises. I don't like being in too deep.

The title of my blog comes from a book. I don't remember the title of the book, or what it was about, or whether I even liked it. I'm pretty picky when it comes to books, so chances are I didn't even finish it. What I remember is that I read it shortly after I brought my older daughter, Lucy, home from the hospital and that the image-- of an entire ocean crammed into the tiny space of a cradle-- is one I think of almost daily. It's the perfect metaphor for my experience of motherhood. Here is this cradle, or this house, or this life, right? And in the scheme of things, it's so small. My home, my marriage, my kids. But then inside the cradle, inside the pretty package of daily life as a housewife with two children, there is this whole terrifying, beautiful, unknowable vastness only comparable to the ocean in my mind because I am drawn to it, I need it to be happy, but it scares the shit out of me.

My husband, Thom, has been encouraging me to start a blog for a very long time now. I post a lot of pictures of my kids on Facebook, a lot of quotes and funny stories and the things that help me get through days that are sometimes so frustrating all I can do is reach a desperate hand from the depths of this cradled ocean and beg my friends and family to pull me out. About a year ago, I moved from Charleston to Atlanta and away from most of the people I know and love, and those people-- who love me and my children and who have helped me to see the humor and tenderness of raising a family-- have wanted me to start a blog as well. I told my friend Ben that if I started blogging, I would immediately end up oversharing and this is my first entry and it's already happened! But there's a freedom in putting all your mess out there. There's a freedom in saying, "My daughters are wonderful and hilarious and beautiful and they are the joy of my life and sometimes I seriously consider putting them up for adoption and my husband has to talk me out of it."

I hate starting things so let's just jump in and get this first entry over with.

My name is Lindsey. I'm 28. I grew up in Charleston and graduated from College of Charleston with a degree in Women's and Gender Studies. It took me eight years to graduate from college because I had a baby when I was 20, got married at 23, and had another baby when I was 24. I was really broke for a really long time and then my husband got a good job and now all of a sudden I live in a suburb of Atlanta in a house with a two car garage and instead of working the customer service jobs I've loved and loathed all my life, I'm a stay-at-home mom. The only thing missing from our All American family is a golden retriever, which is too bad, because I hate dogs.

My husband's name is Thom. He's six months younger than me and likes to celebrate his half-birthday on my birthday. We met when we were fourteen, but didn't start dating until we were twenty-two. He's an actuary. I've been asked more than once how it feels to be married to a man who handles dead bodies all day, but that's a mortician. They work in mortuaries, which are places, not people. A woman once asked him if he'd been in anything she'd seen, but "actuary" is not a fancy name for actor, either. He does numbers. He's a nerd. A very tall nerd. And he does not play basketball.

We are not the stars of this blog. We are not even the stars of our lives. We are, in fact, very dull. The only truly interesting things about us are our children, Lucy (7) and Stella (4). They need no introduction. Creative, intelligent, emotional, strong, silly, beautiful, funny, kind...they are everything, and they are everything to me. Literally. So it's a good thing I like them.

I don't have a plan for this thing, except to serve as a record of these precious, frustrating days. The funny, sometimes infuriating things my kids (and partner) say and do. And the way I feel about those things, about what a thought was just a cradle and turned out to be the sea.