The fugue state of motherhood
The fact that I’ve been meaning to write this post for months says it all.
It says that when you’re a mom, everything else comes first. You put your own thoughts and dreams on hold for so long that you sort of forget who you are or how you got here. Why am I in the kitchen? Why am I always in the kitchen?
When you have to make small talk, you invariably end up in a monologue about your kid’s dance class or food allergies or sleep routine as the other person’s eyes glaze over and you realize your personality has flattened to a 2-D cliched version of “mom”.
Outside of kids and work and groceries and laundry and all the random stuff that fills up my days, what is there? Bad reality TV? Is that it?
Don’t get me wrong, I love my family. But how textbook is that? I can’t even talk about myself and my ambitions without needing to mention how lucky I am to be a wife and mother.
The fugue state of motherhood is that time shortly after having a baby (or two or three) when you don’t see the point in getting dressed. When you wear a nursing bra for four or five extra years (the post-post-post partum years). You mean to text your friends, but wouldn’t you rather have a snack and go to bed?
The fugue state of motherhood is when you put yourself on pause and spend your free time googling baby toys (Pikler triangle, anyone?) and checking car seats and trying new yogurt muffin recipes.
Eventually you get glimpses of yourself through the fog. Maybe you exercise or buy a new shirt or go to a bar. Hey, look at me! I can hang!
It’s not perfect, but it’s a start.
And maybe maaaaybe you’ll get to the point where you have your own life as well as your mom life, independent yet intertwined, two squishy spheres of your personality that bounce and bobble around your brain, happily coexisting.
Perhaps I’m being melodramatic. I’m a mom in the deep end right now with a toddler and a preschooler. If another person tells me “the days are long but the years are short” I will scream.
Will everything be different after we move? Will I miraculously have a glamorous life where I get to sleep as long as I want in the morning (til like 7!) or eat my whole dinner while it’s warm?
Probably not. I don’t think moving changes you that much, even a big move like this. I’ll still be the same person. I’ll still have two little people who depend on me. (And, let’s face it, one big person.) Our family dynamics won’t change even if our U.S. ZIP code turns into a U.K. postcode.
But little by little, maybe this fugue state will lift. I’ll start doing things that I want to do. I’ll have ideas and interests and pursuits that are completely mine. I won’t be the person I was before I had kids, but I’ll be stronger and better for it.
