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Broke Wife, Big City
Becoming human
again
By Aprill Brandon
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a married woman in
possession of a few children must be in want of a life.
It took me 23 minutes to come up with that line.
I regret nothing.
My amazing literary pun skills aside, I’m not kidding about that truth.
Because we do. Oh, how we do. We want (and need) a full life.
Not that we moms don’t live for our kids. Our whole family, in fact.
Because do. Oh, how we do. When my kids were first born, my whole world
shrunk down to their exact height and weight. It’s a monumental change
you go through when you have a child, physically, mentally and
emotionally, and for the longest time, I couldn’t see anything past
them. Everything took a backseat to them. Part of this is because you
just created AN ENTIRE HUMAN and as such are completely mesmerized by
everything they do. Even farts took on a whole new meaning. Coming from
their tiny butts, it was the most adorable sound in the world.
But another part of this tunnel vision stemmed from the fact that I was
that I was terrified I couldn’t do it. That I would fail. That if I
took my eyes off them for a second they would get hurt. Or sick. Or
kidnapped. Or, my biggest nightmare, roughly thrown into a car trunk by
a kidnapper with the flu. Suddenly, I realized that THE WHOLE WORLD IS
ONE GIANT, FESTERING CAULDRON OF DISEASE POPULATED BY SERIAL KILLERS
AND PERVERTS AND EVIL BABY BLANKETS THAT COULDN’T WAIT TO SMOTHER MY
CHILDREN.
Eventually this passes. Mostly (I still don’t trust that baby blanket).
You learn that your kids are tough and resilient. They start to gain a
bit of independence. Life keeps moving on. And it was around this time
that I finally looked up and, to my surprise, had trouble recognizing
myself.
I felt I was losing myself. Or at least some very vital parts of
myself. Motherhood is demanding and it seemed like I no longer had time
to maintain the complex person full of contradictions and passions and
interests that I used to be.
I didn’t laugh as much. I was always tired. I was always distracted.
Always thinking about what had to be done. Or done next. Or done next
week.
Parenting can sometimes feel like a zero-sum game. You give everything
you have, and happily so, to these tiny creatures so that they can have
everything. You give and give and give and you love and you love and
you love. There’s also some yelling and vague threatening and an army
of curse words muttered under your breath, but mostly it’s the giving
and the loving.
Without a chance to replenish, however, it can soon feel like you have
nothing left to give. You start to forget who you are, just slowly
turning into a zombie mom robot. (Although Zombie Mom Robot would be an
incredible band name).
Luckily I had someone to remind me. Which is how I ended up alone in
Portland a few weeks ago. With an entire hotel room to myself. Just me
and a bottle of wine and an extra large pizza, which I ate on a
king-sized bed while sitting in my underwear and watching “Big Bang”
reruns.
And it’s how I ended up attending my friend’s beautiful wedding. And
how I ended up doing an unhealthy amount of tequila shots and doing
awful karaoke and having long conversations stuffed with every curse
word known to man (or woman) while eating late night fried chicken with
my long lost group of kindred spirits, relationships that were
neglected but now renewed.
And it’s how I ended up running a 5K last week with another good
friend. Like, an actual race, where you purposefully run fast even
though nothing is chasing you. My first one ever. And I ran the whole
damn thing. And I still feel like Wonder Woman.
It’s how I ended up picking up my camera more and writing more and
drawing my god awful stick figure art again.
So, thank you to my husband who keeps reminding me who I am and keeps
throwing me on planes and kicking me out of the house so I can pursue
my own things, my own passions. Because he knows ultimately that being
a complex person with a full life makes you a better parent.
And he understands that sometimes I just need the occasional hotel room
of one’s own.
(I’m butchering all the classics today).
(I regret nothing).
Can’t get enough of Aprill? Can’t wait until next week?
Check out her website at http://aprillbrandon.com/
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