Embracing the Mess

Spoiler: It feels really good!

I’ve been banging my head against the wall for the past several days because I can’t seem to get rid of a tight, churn-y feeling in my upper stomach when I sit down to write. It’s like there’s an anaconda in there squeezing my insides. I know it’s writer’s block. I’m overthinking. Whenever I feel this way it’s usually a good indication that I need to take a break and step away for a minute or two days. BUT I don’t have any childcare this week, my son is napping and the feeling is worse when I fail to use this time to figure my shit out (even though I could be cleaning the muffin crumbs off the floor downstairs, taking the laundry out of the washing machine that’s been in there since 7:30 this morning when it’s now 2:32 pm…)

Sometimes, you just have to push through. Luckily, this seems as good an intro as any to what I’ve been thinking about. Motherhood has changed me in a million ways. It’s made me softer, kinder, more empathetic. I see myself more clearly because I’m a mom, both the good and the bad parts, and because of this I’ve realized that I’m…kind of a mess. Alright, maybe I didn’t just realize this. I’ve always known that I’m kind of a mess. Motherhood, with all of its responsibilities and considerations and choices and what-ifs and questions (“ Am I doing this right?” “Did I fuck him up by doing that thing that one time?” “What are we having for dinner? Chicken? Again?”), has only made me messier.

Just to be crystal clear here, I’m not talking about being physically messy, even though we all know that moms Never. Stop. Cleaning. Since we got a toddler-sized table, rice is almost always stuck to the bottom of my feet. (One day I will get a mat. I WILL. But that day is not today). This afternoon I found half of a peanut butter cookie smashed into the rug. It went unnoticed for days.

I’m talking about that all-over-the-place feeling. When you have too many balls in the air and they just kind of stay up there while you look on helplessly. I’ve always hated feeling like a mess and I’ve gotten very good at projecting that I’m not one. It wasn’t until I became a mother that I began to accept my messiness, which is to say: it wasn’t until I became a mother that I began to accept myself.

This didn’t happen overnight. It’s more of a recent thing. The more confident I’ve become as a mom, the more I realize how capable I am and that I can do hard things. I’ve always been incredibly tough on myself. I set high expectations that usually leave me paralyzed instead of energized and because of this I’ve held myself back in a lot of ways. There’s been much self-sabotage and I have regrets.