After becoming a mom, I realized that women are unstoppable with the right people in their corner.
Part of what led me to becoming a cheerleader to other moms, was my own insane postpartum “journey”… well it was more of a fever dream. There was something about the little messages of support or funny text messages from my people, that made me feel like myself despite the chaos in my life.
I had friends reassuring me that going home at night and leaving my newborn, however hard it was, would be the best thing for me and him. They were right. I was met with “GOOD FOR YOU!” when I admitted that my original plan to breastfeed went up in flames with Chaos taking the express trip to BCH at 36 hours old, formula was the better choice for my overall mental health.
Through all of this I realized that its key to champion other moms in the thick of whatever season they are in… because this shit is hard. It’s easy to pass judgement when you haven’t stood in someone elses shoes — we have all done it.
Last weekend walking through the grocery store with Chaos and C, as always during the back half of the trip Chaos started to get antsy. He had eaten his snack and had his pouch already— so naturally we did the next logical thing… sang the Wheels on the Bus. We had already rattled through the normal parts of the song and had now entered the slightly unhinged parts (“The Murphy’s on the bus say ‘I love cheese, I love cheese’) — a woman stopped me to say how good of a job I was doing.
I was just trying to keep my insane toddler from making his annoyance with being contained in the carriage the entire stores problem. I smiled and said thank you, and laughed saying “Really we are just trying to get out of the store without tears on anyones part.” It hit me that the world could do with more of this kindness… because lets be honest — we are all just doing our best and that should count for something.
I am lucky enough to have friends who have been moms for years, and friends who are in the same mom stage as I am. The other night over a much overdue glass of rose a friend and I somehow ended up giggling about the following question: would you rather a two year long pregnancy OR be handed a newborn (with your genetics etc) tomorrow morning with no time to mentally prepare? For me, it was a no brainer — the newborn. Pregnancy was not magical for me, and I am not afraid to admit it. Her giggling response “What? Really?! I would take a two year long pregnancy over no time to prep for a newborn.” Thats the beauty of friendship, differing opinions while still having each others back.
On a walk the other day with Chaos, Murph, a friend and her baby— we got to the point where chaos refused to continue to be contained in the stroller, shouting “I stuckkk! I stuckkkk!” Sir obviously you are stuck— thats the whole point of the stroller. But I got him out and let him get the wiggles out for a bit, he insisted on pushing my friends stroller. So thats what he did. He was thrilled to be helping and have a job to do, he also helped hold Murph’s leash proudly. As we passed people on the bike path, most of the people who genuinely smiled and said how great of a job he was doing — were women… probably moms in the thick of toddlerhood or just coming out of the haze. There was one grouchy old woman on a bike who mad a few rude comments, there always will be, but there were more smiles and kindness.
As moms have to have eachothers backs, I try to remember that I will either fight that battle (or a similar one) or have fought it, and in the trenches we all need allies.
Mildly Feral 
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