Everyone tells you when you become a parent your life changes forever, but until you do it you never really get it, you can’t, it’s just not possible. I remember when I found out I was pregnant unexpectedly I was half shitting myself half over the moon. I looked down at that blue and white stick, that I had fearfuly looked at many times before, and for the first time in my life it had a little pink plus sign there. I called out my husband’s name in a waivery voice and as soon as he saw me he knew. I looked up into his face half worried I would see disappointment or sadness there but all I saw was happy support.
No one even tells you how hard pregnancy is. They sugar coat it with this “oh my god, you’re glowing” bullshit. In a “short” 9 months you go from being obsessed with the idea that a little human is growing inside you, to wanting this human out and your body back. HA, your body back! Yeah right!!!!! Everyone’s pregnancy is different but man I went from being nauseous every hour of everyday for 10 weeks solid, to have chronic pelvic and lower back pain, to peeing myself every time I coughed or sneezed, to having sore boobs, sore feet, sore hips, sore ribs, sore everything. I just wanted that human out.
Then that human comes out and everyone builds up this idea that labor is horrible, and don’t get me wrong, it was f**king horrible, I thought I was going to f**king die, but no that’s not the most horrible bit. The most horrible, draining, sole breaking thing is the moment you’ve finally done your job. This job that you’ve been building up to for 9 months. It’s finally done. Once that jobs done, once you are so exhausted, and sweaty and disgusting and you can finally say you did what you came here to do, you’ve just created yourself another job. You don’t get to rest, you don’t get a nice 10 hr sleep that you deserve. No. You have a baby to take care of now. All the RNR out the door, now it’s only hard work. I remember I had my cousin call me when she was in labor, she was in a bad way, and she needed me to talk her through it. Someone who had been there, someone who knew the pain. As I’m talking here through it, trying to get her head in to the right mindset of “this will end, you will get through this, your body was made to do it”, whilst I’m saying all this, all I could think was and then the hard work starts and you have no idea what’s to come.
Even though my husband and I both had post natal depression after our son was born and yeah that was f**king hard, and in hindsight I can see all the signs and wish we had friends or family who had been through it all recently, who could have asked if we were okay. Despite going through such a messed up time the first few months, the hardest part of being a parent is knowing you want to be a good role model for this little human. You want to put their physical, emotional and mental well being above everything. You go from putting yourself first, or trying to, to putting this little human first every time, above everything.
So as I pondered today what I wanted from my life, what my heart really wanted, I realized I knew. I knew what my heart wanted it had made up it’s mind. That’s a contradiction if I ever heard one. But what I had just started to realize was it wasn’t what I wanted that mattered as much anymore, it was who I wanted to be, who I wanted my son’s role model in life to be. Telling a kid how to be a good person is one thing, but showing a kid, saying it and backing up your words with actions, that’s where it’s at. That’s how you really teach a kid to be a certain person.
When you’ve faced adversity in your life, especially as a kid, you know how shit life can be. You know that being a kid doesn’t give you a free ride, it doesn’t get you off scott free. Kids can still, and do still experience the horrible realities of life every day, and as a parent you just hope your kid wont be one of them. But at the same time I know the only thing I can do is prepare him for what might come his way, and I don’t just want to prepare him to deal with it. No, I want to teach my child how to face adversity, process it, and come out the other side as a kind, caring, open hearted, selfless, happy person. That’s the bit that’s hard. Too many people go through shit in life and come out broken, bitter, selfish and hating the world. To come out and still be a happy, kind person now that shit, that shit is hard.
So how am I going to do that? I guess I realized putting what I want first isn’t necessarily what I want to teach my son. Sometimes, yes, putting yourself and what you want first is important, but all the good things that you want in life, and I mean all the really really good things are hard work. The most fulfilling things are hard work. So sometimes we have to choose not what we want, but what we think is right, what will let us go to sleep at night and what we can live with knowing for the rest of our lives. That’s what I want to teach my son.
Chicks, Dicks and Pricks 