On Becoming A Parent

Lovelies,

I have been thinking a lot lately about my transformation into parenthood. And it was a TRANSFORMATION with a  capital T.  You see, I wouldn’t say I really felt like a ‘parent’ right away when we got to take Bean Sprout home. At first, you are really just muddling through. No sleep, sore boobs, sore EVERYTHING. I didn’t feel HUMAN for a really long while, never mind a mother. And then, eventually, you find a routine and a new groove and things become easier… but I still felt mostly like I was faking it. I did NOT feel comfortable with the new title of mom. Well, my new ROLE as a mom. Becuase at that point, my child couldn’t call for me. Maybe that’s what the shift was. When I had to stop SEEING MYSELF as a mom and just started to hear myself REFERRED to as ‘mommy’. I think that has been a really crucial change.

It’s a heady thing, being called ‘mommy’. Bean Sprout is now closer to 2 than 1 and almost never calls me Mama anymore. I am now Mommy, and I love it. He speaks a lot and so is constantly using my new name. And somehow over the course of the last few months, it has finally started to ‘fit’.

And I don’t think it’s just me. Slowly both hubby and I have found our groove. I feel settled in our new role as parents in our relationship. We casually discuss things like upcoming holidays, memories we hope we can make over time, morals and values we hope to instill in our kids… It’s all starting to just feel like our new reality. It was a really slow shift but it was a profound one. And now that we are looking at having a second baby I find that this mental shift reflects a little in how I am pursuing that outcome.

I am feeling pretty optimistic about doing this upcoming FET. I really feel like I can imagine adding another little person to our family. I have already gone through the transformation of “mom” and so I am not as scared. I know the shit show I am in for initially, but then it will simmer down, and then there will be two. The thought of that… two… fills me with such utter contentment that I can’t adequately put it into words.

I get now what people mean by “knowing” they wanted another kid. I just feel it a little differently… It’s not that something is MISSING per se right now… it’s just that adding another in feels more content. More fulfilled. I feel happy with my one amazing little boy, I’m not missing anything right now, but I can think of all the things we would GAIN as a family of 4. Being a mom now I can see it more clearly. I hope against the past 4+ years of trying that we will be lucky again and get to take a second baby home with us.

I am a little scared, which will probably morph into a whole lot of terrified as the FET actually happens, about if this doesn’t work out. Becuase I know what it would look like and a want it deeply and I can totally feel the changes that would come with another child, and I long for them. I am scared that it will hurt me horribly if it doesn’t work.

But I am a parent now. I am a mom. I like this new look on me. I want another little to call me by that name. And so, we will soldier forward. And so, we try again.

XOXXO,

The Chicken