Motherhood

I was ready for motherhood in my early 20s. Being an incorrigible dreamer, at the time I saw myself as possibly being the satisfied mother of 8 children and the happy wife of a wonderful man. So, when I had my first child at age 34, part of that dream was already shattered. The other thing that I was not prepared to do was giving birth a month before the due date. It was 10 pm and I was getting ready for my good friend's wedding the next day when my waters broke. Sudden change of plans, it was totally out of my control. I had no choice than to surrender - first great lesson of motherhood. Although the delivery was very easy - as easy as a delivery can be - and lasted only 5 hours, it was the beginning of the most wonderful, scary and life-changing experience. 

It all started with not having my baby with me right after birth. They encourage skin to skin contact for the well-being and bonding of mother and child, that initial boost of oxytocin, right?  Well, we didn’t have that. I saw my baby after they took her away, only in an incubator and all wired up. Tears came to my eyes, in part because I used to cry for anything and everything, in part because of the hormonal turmoil in my body, and a lot because that is not how I had dreamt about seeing my newborn child: through a glass, isolated and all wired up, looking tiny in that huge machine, and I couldn't even touch or hold her. I was in shock. And I was alone. She had the bad idea of being born at 4:25 am on a beautiful late spring day. Dad went home right after she was born. He was tired. My family was some 7,000 Km away, in a different continent, and I felt alone, like never before in my whole life. I was lucky to live close to the best university hospital in my region, and the doctors and nurses at the NICU were my family for two weeks. They smiled when they saw me tired and discouraged, they helped me and made me feel that everything was going to be okay. After all, my child was only 4 weeks premature and had a few respiratory complications that were resolved with a short therapy, so we got home two weeks after she was born. 

And that is when the most enriching, scary and life-changing adventure started. I had no idea how to care for a baby. Since she had stopped breathing a couple of times at the hospital, I was told to verify her regularly. I spent the first week looking at signs of possible breathing struggles, day and night. That meant sleepless nights, which were adding to the two-week long around the clock breastfeeding schedule I had already gone through at the NICU. And, of course, I was alone. I had doubts on how to care for my baby, she started crying incessantly, day and night, and I felt that something was wrong with her, she seemed in pain. My mother tried to help me from the other side of the world, as much as she could. The people around me were telling me that all babies cry. Others told me that I was spoiling her by holding her in my arms all the time, that was the only way she would stop crying. Others were sure that she was having colic symptoms. Everyone had an answer for what I was going through, but I was the one who wasn't sleeping and was worried day and night for my baby. I started thinking that, after all, I had probably made a mistake, I didn't like being a parent and all the big fuss about how wonderful it is to be a mother. I started to resent my own baby, and to doubt myself and my feelings mostly when I saw other new mothers looking good, happy, rested and relaxed around their babies. Then, about a month after my daughter's birth, my parents arrived to stay with us for a while. The day after they arrived my mom started telling me that my baby's cries were not normal. She was crying a lot more than other babies. She agreed that my daughter seemed in pain. We should see a doctor. And sure enough, I had to find a pediatrician (dad didn't think it was necessary) which was extremely difficult at the time, and after we sought a second opinion, we had an answer to our worries. She suffered from acid reflux, which seems to be quite common among preemies. Her cries were not from being spoiled or due to baby colic. With the treatment she was given, we could both start to sleep better. And my mother encouraged me to trust my motherly instinct. And I did. 

I had two more babies, my second child was born six weeks ahead of time. She was a handful until age three, when she started sleeping a bit better, and so did I. My third child was not premature, but he didn’t sleep for the first six months of his life due to recurrent ear infections. Thanks to my mother, and the confidence she gave me to trust my instinct, I started taking care of my children the way that felt right for me. It was not my mother’s way, it was not my kid’s father’s way. It was my way. 

It isn’t always easy to do something new. I was changing the parenting paradigm I knew. I remembered the way my mother brought us up. She always seemed so sure of herself, punishing us for our misbehaviors as very young kids, and never showing second thoughts or vulnerability as a mother and a woman. She was always on our side and at the same time she was excellent with discipline. Someone to look up to. But I didn’t feel like her at all. I thought it was because I was a new mother, but I can assure you that I still don’t feel that way almost 20 years later. I didn’t want my kids to be intimidated by me, like I was by my mother as a young child. I wanted them to know that I was on their side from day one. And that was not easy at all. I had to learn to set clear and firm boundaries. I am still learning that one. I had to learn to be the disciplinarian, which is not in my nature, while being the compassionate mother who wanted to understand and talk things through with her kids. I was so good at this. Finding that balance between those two ways of being was very difficult and frustrating for me. I was often filled with self-doubt and feelings of unworthiness. It was not easy to stand alone among people who didn’t agree with the way I was raising my children. But my mother’s advice to trust my motherly instinct made me move forward with a confidence that I never knew before. 

Today I know that I did a good job with my kids. They are well-balanced teenagers, with different personalities, expressing the most different colors that you can imagine. It wasn’t always easy, they’ve seen me get frustrated, sad and indecisive, not knowing what to answer to their requests. I have been alone making important decisions for them because officially I didn’t have my mother’s blessing, although she has always had my back, and I didn’t have their father’s approval. Today it is between me and my children, actually it has always been. We go through the thinking process together, I express my doubts, my fears, and together we find solutions, so that they can have what they want and I can feel reassured. Showing them my full range of emotions and my vulnerability has made them very open and compassionate, and very comfortable expressing their own. 

Will that help them be happy, fulfilled human beings? I don’t know, but I know they will have one less stress in their life, the need to be perfect. They have seen me go through ups and downs, laugh and cry, be incredibly happy and incredibly sad, be emotionally unstable, and still they have told me over and over how they love to have chosen me to be their mother, and how accepted and safe they feel with me. And that fills my heart more than anything else in the world.