To Me, Love Me

There are days I find myself looking at my children and wondering what my younger self would think if she saw me now.

I was the girl who was sure she would never have children. The dreamer who wanted a career and to travel the world. The one who never thought she’d cry over lost socks or feel so out of place sometimes, barely able to remember a life before she was mum.

Then, I fell pregnant at 19, and motherhood became my new identity.

Like so many mums, my life was suddenly consumed by this small human and I loved it. I didn’t even notice the small parts of me I would sacrifice, just to give them everything they needed.

Motherhood has this way of changing you, slowly. Over time you get used to giving up sleep for the sound of them beside you at night. You trade parts of your freedom for small hands in yours. You lose time for yourself, but somehow it doesn’t seem to matter, ou do it all without really questioning it.

‘I think she’d smile’

Maybe a little sadly, because she had no idea how much of herself she’d give away to get here

And yet every now and then, I catch a glimpse of her. It might be dancing in the kitchen to my mum’s 80s housework music, and I realise she’s still in there, just layered over, never completely gone. She just had to make space for someone else.

No one tells you how blurry the lines between who you were and who you’ve become can be

And maybe that’s why this matters to me so much. Not just for our children one day, but for us. To be able to look back and recognise the woman we thought had to disappear to make way for motherhood.

She’s still in there. And we shouldn’t feel guilty for sometimes missing her.

Sometimes I look back at photos of 20 year old me, holding my newborn, and I want to tell her it’s ok that her life turned out differently. That motherhood would become the making of her in ways she never knew she needed. She might not see all the places she thought she would, but she’ll live so many lives she won’t feel she’s missed out.

Maybe the biggest secret of motherhood

Its you that never stops becoming.

I’ve found versions of myself I never, in my biggest dreams, thought could exist. Some through experiences I wish I didn’t have to go through, but from a girl who was afraid, a little timid, just a dreamy home body, I found the fiercest strength and an overwhelming protective love I never knew was possible.

Now I sit here watching two young adults and a seven year old, dreaming for their futures instead of mine, and I feel completely at peace with that.

The hindsight

All of these lessons, they suddenly become the clichés. God what I wouldn’t give to go back, even just for a moment, to see their innocent smiles again, those truly are the only moments I’d choose to relive.

I try to hold onto them, but time has a way of stealing memories too.

I think as mothers we pour everything into our children and our families, and we don’t always stop to see our own growth in it. The daydreaming teen, the terrified 20 year old first time mum, the one who felt she had everything to prove, the woman trying to rebuild, and me now, learning to slow down. Each one layered into who I am today.

Things they'd all say to version me now... Be patient. Be confident; only you have walked this journey, and you're stronger than you give credit for. Try not to care what other people think, (I’m still working on that one- because I can't seem to help it!).

Say I love you more. Not just to your children, but to the people who matter.

Maybe this is why I take photos. Not just for other people, but because a part of me wants them to look back and feel something for the woman they were in that moment too.

If one day a future version of me reads this, and the house is quiet without the crashing of monster trucks in the living room, I hope she smiles, recognising I finally realised that their childhood was my motherhood.

Yes, it was all consuming, but it was never my whole identity, even though it shaped so much of who I became.

I hope she forgives me for rushing. For worrying and getting things wrong. Because she’ll know it was never about doing it perfectly.

It was always about growing love.

So to the girl I was, and to the woman I am still becoming… You did it. You kept going.

Even when life tried to break you, you loved with everything you had.

And that was always enough.