Sharing the Unspeakable: A Raw Motherhood Memoir
Today, sitting on the couch in slightly stinky pyjamas, it became abundantly clear that there is never going to be a right time to write.
Hideous things are happening every day. Online personas are built by tearing others down, calling them out, retreating into echo chambers. I want none of that.
If I want to be real here, I have to let that shit go. I can’t live my life in apology.
So here we are.
It’s been a strange Q1 — a mix of highs and lows. My usual client work with brilliant-but-difficult senior leaders has been especially powerful lately. At the same time there’s been a wild recovery from a post-Christmas concussion involving a heavy tree, terracotta flagstones and my skull, also being ‘flooded in’ by a literal moat, and some very precious connected time with my family.
I especially love my early teen triplets and I say that with all sincerity and totally swoon when my seven older ones call to catch up.
But alongside that I’ve been battling some pretty nasty inner monologues and old stuff resurfacing1. Village support scarcity issues. Good-enough-mothering bullshit. Mood swings between questioning everything, anxiety and rage.
I heard someone say recently, “Is it fascism or is it menopause?” and I laughed out loud because honestly… who the fuck knows.
If you’re not a client or someone I see in real life, it may have felt a little quiet around PWT lately. Some of that has been by choice. Some of it because my capacity has been stretched more than usual. And some of it because… the state of the world.
I kept waiting for the right time to write here.
The right moment. The right topic. A time when it wouldn’t look tone deaf, when it wouldn’t be too much, when my big joy and tiny struggles and country life wouldn’t offend anyone.
But that perfect moment never arrives.
Candidly, my current plan includes working with my doctor on adjusting my HRT, seeing my shaman about the inner saboteurs, transplanting hundreds more snowdrops, and keeping going on daily red-light therapy2.
Spring, basically.
Which brings me to the piece I’m sharing today.
What I write about here happened a decade ago — I’m deep in memoir work, and this is part of what’s coming up.
This essay, originally published in Open Secrets Magazine, is a slice; one of the most vulnerable things I’ve had published elsewhere, on a subject that frankly scares the pants off most parents.
It also gave me a heavy dose of my own lessons.
My work has always been about poking at the taken-for-granteds of who we’re supposed to become once children arrive — and asking how we craft lives on our own terms, not other people’s formulas. Even through the messy bits, the 3am inner turmoil, and the moments that knock us sideways.
So here it is.
Some of you may already have read this piece. For others, it will be new.
The situation I write about happened some time ago, not recently.
Why share it now?
Because wherever you’re at, I want you to know it’s okay. High, low, or that strange middle ground of simply getting through the day — it’s all okay. You are okay. This isn’t about being good or brave.
When I feel lost, terrified, or morally and spiritually exhausted rather than brave or good, I look for inspiration in small things: planting seeds, children, community, hopeful stories. I look for them because I have to.
We need that inspiration to go on.
And we do go on. Because that’s what we do.
Sending love.
https://www.uclahealth.org/news/article/5-health-benefits-red-light-therapy
I love the real reference to the pyjamas. One of the best pieces of advise I heard on here was someone saying just write in your pyjamas so it gets done. The state of the world is enough to make us curl into a ball right now. I still remember how good that piece is. Don’t listen to anything the shitty committee in your head says. Don’t know if you’ve read Waking The Women by Jayne Manfredi but I found it so uplifting. Don’t know if you are a fan of massages but I hope you can book something like that for yourself soon if so. X
Couldn't read and run. Somehow I hadn't realised you were in the UK! The misogyny of that comment is unbelievable - how validating it must have felt to have curated the bookshelves.