“Self-neglect is not a virtue. Love is about becoming - not betraying - yourself.”
Before I started this parenthood gig, I was the world’s greatest self-carer. I had it down to a science and no stone was left unturned. I benefitted from being in the health and wellness world for 5 years so it was literally my job to know all the new super foods and crystals, the hottest movement discipline, the latest research on your brain when you meditate.
I got lost in it. It’s easy to. I am quite competitive with myself and always want to continue to improve, to a fault. With doing all the self-care, it ended up being no self-care. Because when you actually, really care, there has to be some feedback on what you really need. And it can’t just be all the crystals. We love, as Westerners, to use Eastern medicine like…. well, Westerners. More [insert wellness trend] HAS to equal more health! Turns out that’s probably not always true? And you have to kind of know yourself and what you need?
Listening to yourself is hard and subjective and takes a lot of practice. But it’s what I’ve been learning to do these past few months of living.
I wanted someone to tell me about how becoming a mother isn’t about not having time because you’re actually really busy: becoming a mother breaks all sense of time for yourself. And the world doesn’t help. I have seen at minimum 2,410 mom bloggers that talk about the best way to [ insert anything] but no one actually talks about how to be a person after you become a mom. So we’re left to read between the lines, which is: becoming a mom means to forget yourself completely.
And the easiest thing in the world is to fall in line and become your favorite sitcom mom: even if you work full time, perfection is the goal and less than isn’t acceptable. We must look flawless for our partners and full of love for our kids ALL THE TIME. And you know, shower and eat when you can!
This is especially triggering for moms that had a traumatic childhood. Anything less than all the love all the time and you risk giving your kids the worst childhood.
Except none of that is true.
I fell into this trap of just being a mom and working. That’s it. A lot of this started in COVID and continues, but there are subtle ways to reclaim my life that I have ignored because it’s easier. It’s really hard to accept that we live in a world where the default culture is placing invisible labor on women. We are a malnourished society because we have devalued women from the beginning. How does the economy still keep chugging along when childcare still isn’t affordable? Because we’ve all decided that this is “just what being a mom” is.
This is “just what being a woman looks like.”
On some level, we’ve all accepted this to be true. And now we’re faced with the fact that we’ve all gotten used to women doing it all. We should be thankful that (most of the time) we get to shower and eat, literally what is provided in prison, and we’re supposed to call that self-care. Nah, that’s basic needs. I think I’m finally ready to reclaim my time, the time everyone else gets to think and feel and process and move and enjoy life.
I’ve stopped following all these parenting Instagram accounts (ads) that pretend to be real humans (that’s a marketing trick: you’ve heard it here from your fellow director of marketing) and start really looking into what I want out of my life. Not anyone else’s. I didn’t become a mom to give up my life for someone else’s: I became a mom to share it. But if I don’t have a life, what are we sharing? What do I actually have to give, pass along?
I started going to the gym and rearranged my days to make that work. Not because I want to be down to a size whatever, but because it feels good. I started keeping a food journal again and noticed when I eat sugar all day every day, I feel terrible. So I started incorporating other foods again, making time to think about what I want to eat and no one else. Not because I want to be down to a size whatever, but because it makes me happier. I started going to yoga again because it’s one of the best ways for me to relax and move. Not because I’m trying to become a yoga instructor, but just because it makes me feel good and it helps me sleep.
And today I skied. Skiing teaches me so much about myself. It’s instant bio feedback. It floats my fears and worries to the top and sprinkles in a healthy amount of fun and vitamin D and failure. It’s both pleasure and reflection. It’s flow. And when I ski, I come home and I do better, focused work.
No skiing = less writing, less productivity at work. See what I’m getting at? Pleasure and fun isn’t a bonus you get for working hard: it’s a necessity to living a full, well-rounded life. It’s part of all of it. It’s how we get to the next level of where ever we want to go. Otherwise, what’s the actual point?
Self care isn’t showering. It isn’t feeding yourself. It’s real moments that nourish your life. It’s going skiing on a Monday with your best friend. It’s going to the gym by yourself. It’s making sure that these things that HAVE BEEN BRANDED AS AND feel like extra, selfish things, are treated like sacred time, just as important as basic needs. Because they are. Anyone that tells you otherwise is a person that either directly benefits from you being home all the time with your kids or wants you to buy something they are selling.
I’m not an expert. I’m going to struggle with not being home on Wednesday night to tuck my kid into bed. But I do know that Thursday morning I’m going to feel like a whole new person (and mom) because I went to yoga. And that’s the mom that this kid deserves. And that’s the Sarah that I deserve. Because even if I sit on the couch my whole life, hard times still come. The least I can do is make the good times better.