I got married a year out of high school. I had no idea how young I really was. Fortunately, almost 19 years later (whoa! I’ve almost been married half my life!) it seems like it was a pretty good choice (a very unique and personal choice. I’m not advocating for the general population of 19 year olds to get married. In fact, the thought of my own children marrying at that age horrifies me).
I had a few friends from school who got married within that same year. One of them was among the first to have a baby. When I ran into her shortly after having her baby, I asked, “So… how are you liking being a mom?” I expected her to say that it was wonderful and that she loved it. Instead, she shocked me by saying, “It’s really hard.”
As stupid as it sounds, it had never really occurred to me, until that moment, that being a mom would be hard. I know that was incredibly naïve of me, but you have to understand - I was about 22 years old and completely clueless.
I have never forgotten my friend’s confession. She made me realize, for the first time, that motherhood might not be easy. Through my pregnancy with Nicky, I would often think about her saying, “It’s really hard.”
Thank heavens she told me. I needed to hear it from someone my age. I needed to know! I needed to know because the second Nicky came screaming into the world, it was already hard to be a mom.
It turned out that Nicky had a birth injury and was likely in pain, but we didn’t know until he was two months old. He cried uncontrollably for hours when he was born, and I was immediately terrified of him. I also developed postpartum depression right away. I hadn’t really had any experience with depression prior to that (anxiety - yes, but not depression). The only reason I had any idea what might be going on was because in 2005 I’d watched Oprah interview Brooke Shields about postpartum depression, and there were a few things Brooke said in that interview that were suddenly happening to me. Postpartum depression wasn’t as openly talked about back then. Brooke Shields kind of helped pave the way for that discussion, but it still took time to become mainstream. For me it was the most humiliating thing I could experience. I remember finding out that Scotty told his brother that I had PPD. I was really upset. I didn’t want anyone to know! I was completely ashamed of myself for it. It felt like weakness. Like failure.
My feelings of weakness and failure were amplified by the fact that I’d had a difficult time becoming pregnant. I felt like I wasn’t allowed to struggle with motherhood in any form because I had fought so hard to obtain it. Having any sort of difficult emotions about my baby seemed like a form of ingratitude for a blessing I’d begged for and finally been granted.
I know now that it wasn’t weakness or failure, and I wish I could go back and walk my younger self through it. I wish I could praise her and say, “Look how brave you are! You know something’s not quite right. You talked to a doctor about it. You’re getting help! That takes courage, and I’m proud of you! You’re doing great!”
Now it’s been 15 years, and the fact that parenting is hard is no longer a shocking revelation. I understand now that the level of difficulty one experiences isn’t a measure of the quality of parent you are; whereas, I used to think that struggling equated to being a “bad” mom. That’s not to say that I don’t constantly question my own parenting or feel like I’m doing a poor job. Those feelings will never fully subside. I will always wonder whether I’m doing the right things as a parent, and in all honesty, I spend the majority of time thinking I’m not a good enough mom. Even though postpartum depression is no longer a concern, there are so many other things that feel like weaknesses or failures. Fortunately, I occasionally feel a prompting from the Spirit that I'm doing okay. I can't imagine trying to do this without prayer and personal revelation.
This has been on my mind lately as I’ve mothered my own children and been privy to some of the challenges other mothers are currently facing. Through all phases of life, being a mom is hard. It's full of heartbreak and sometimes pure helplessness. Some of the best mothers I know are going through incredibly hard things with their kids in all phases of life - things none of us imagined when we first held our babies in our arms and sniffed their precious, little heads.
I haven’t seen or talked to my aforementioned friend in a number of years. Her baby is now in high school, as is my first baby. I wonder what my friend would say if I asked her today, “So… how are you liking being a mom?”
I bet she’d say, “It’s really hard.”
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