Motherhood is not a problem to solve

How our cultures obsession with seeing every difficulty as a problem to fix is leaving us disconnected from our insides and the deep connections we desire.

Hi, I’m Emma, welcome. I am a mother, writer, artist, and space holder. I use my years of studying trauma, therapy and mindfulness to explore being in relationship with ourselves as we navigate motherhood.

Before you dive in, a reminder on September 25th, I will be opening submissions for the Unspoken Words and Motherhood Musing series. You can read about the submission process here and vote on the next Motherhood Musing topic below.

Motherhood has been relentless lately. I would love to offer you a concise explanation as to why, but I do not have one. All I can say is everything that was working in caring for and setting boundaries with my son, is now being faced with resistance. Sure, it could be what people love to call the terrible twos. I am sure a big part of it is developmental, but it feels personal.

One of my core wounds is not being seen or heard, and I have a toddler who loves to tune out the sound of my voice once it shifts its tone to ask for something I need from him. I know, he is not trying to hurt me, but it hurts me.

In the midst of all this discomfort, an email dropped into my inbox about a course for mother’s offered by a local counseling center. It is an online membership where they share classes each month addressing different topics of motherhood and early postpartum life.

My heart sank as I read it.

It has a title of something like mom’s ultimate guide to success. Sandwiched between the mental load of motherhood and the mother wound was a class on improving your baby’s sleep. This community costs $250 a month, with a proven method to success promising to leave you feeling empowered and connected to the ever elusive village.

This is how we are failing mothers. This is how we are failing as a culture.

We are convinced our lives are problems to be solved with one more course, program, or book that will fix it all. We are sold this lie we are broken and consumption will fill us, but not any type of consumption, the right kind, the one kind, the perfectly design for you in this phase of life kind.

There is something deeply wrong with thinking that with just the right resources and education, motherhood will no longer be hard. Like enough right resources, education, and even loving support, can remove the humaness of life, of motherhood.

It hurts me. I want mothers to be supported, I want to support mothers, but I want myself and others to avoid this trap of problem solving and completion.

There is a different between engaging with something that helps you be with discomfort and helps you to honor your experience and engaging with something that tells you just a little more and it will all be better because you have the right formula for success. As if motherhood or life is a problem to be solved.

Your mental health is not a problem to be solved.

Your children are not problems to be solved.

Motherhood is not a problem to be solved.

It just is. It all just is.

What if there is no problem to solve? What if we embrace, with piles of acceptance and compassion, what is?

This does not mean not taking action or trying new things. Sometimes we need a different approach or to try a new boundary. Sometimes there is something to do, but when we do it…can we let go of the age old myth that we are broken, and motherhood is hard because of something we are doing (or not doing)?

Motherhood is hard because it is hard. Motherhood is hard because we have never been as isolated as we are right now. Motherhood is hard because we live in cultures hell bent on disconnection and distance. Motherhood is hard because we are being sold over and over again that we are the problem, or our children’s sleep is the problem (insert any topic around raising children here), or our way of approaching their sleep is the problem.

We are told over and over again, we are not good enough, we are not trying hard enough, we do not know enough and it is utter bullshit. Continuing to believe these lies makes mothers prime candidates to buy a course like the one I mentioned above, thinking it will solve something for them, thinking it will help.

But if we buy from the place of thinking we are broken and a problem to be solved, we will often feel like we are losing.

What if there is a new story we could write, together?

What if there was a different focus of motherhood?

What if there was a way to alleviate some of the constant pressure we feel?

There is. There is a different way. It is rooted in listening to ourselves, quieting the noise, and resting in places that help us do that.

After another sales email I received recently for something I cannot remember, I made a promise to myself:

I refused to buy anything under the assumption that I need fixing and I will only work with people who’s purpose is rooted in helping me come home to myself.

I am done with externally seeking, the outside does not have the answers we long for, not about motherhood, life, purpose, or anything. Culture will tell us it does. Culture will tell us we need their products, offering, and services.

I only want to buy services or offerings that I can feel the connection to the other person’s heart. I want to surround myself with people who are figuring out how to do motherhood on their own terms to serve their unique wiring and their children’s unique experiences of being in the world.

Because motherhood is not a problem to be solved.

We are not objects to be fixed, neither are our children and anything they face as they navigate their complex human development.

When I hear talk about the village, I want more than a village of mothers who are tired, complaining, and checking out. I want a village who shows up at each other’s door steps. I want a village of women who lift each other up. I want a village of women who parent similarly and differently because they trust each other to listen to their instincts when it comes to motherhood.

Please hear me as I say, I am not against resources for mothers or postpartum mental health. I wish there had been a program like the one now being offered in my community, because in the early days of motherhood, when I was disconnected from my intuition and myself, I would have signed up for something like this.

But our lives are more than a class away from being healed. Mental health is more than understanding boundaries and our needs. Motherhood is more than this thing we try to wrap into a box.

It is wildly complex, different for each mother while also similar in many ways. It is hard to raise a child from cells in our body to a full fledge human being who is respectful, kind, and courageous. It is a process. It is a process we are not meant to walk through alone.

Our ancestors knew this wisdom of listening within and supporting the mother by holding her, listening to her, tending to her. There was not this emphasis on fixing and solving, there was an emphasis on being with, being held, being tended to.

This is the movement I want to see as we are trying to create our villages. I want to create spaces where we can listen to ourselves and to each other while holding each other with love and respect. I believe this is what I am doing here. I believe I am holding space for you to listen deeper to what is true for you and offering you things to contemplate as you do so.

Once again, my love, you do not need fixing.

You are not a problem to be solved. As complex as motherhood is, so are you. What my soul is craving, and maybe yours is too, is space, quiet, nurturance, and gentle guidance. My soul is craving to not do this alone. We need spaces, places, and people to hold us as we journey who know there is nothing to fix, there is nothing to change.

It just is. You just are. Motherhood just is.

We can assign different labels to our experience, but whatever is happening is what is happening. We are the ones assigning meaning to it. One meaning we often assign is how hard it is to mother. And it is, and it is also about perspective. Another meaning is motherhood is joyful, motherhood is heart work as

Lauren Barber

would say.

What if there is no problem to solve?

What if there are only feelings to feel and thoughts to notice?

What if we learn how to listen more deeply to our insides, our truths, our needs?

What will our children learn then?

Who will we become then?

What kind of movement and revolution will we create inside our homes when we look within for our next steps instead of out there?

You tell me in the comments or reply to this email. Share with other mothers who need this reminder of their wholeness.

Love,

Emma

If you want to held in a nourishing and gentle space, I invite you to join the membership ($6 a month, $50 for the year) and tend to yourself through monthly guided journeys. Each journey focuses on a topic, provides questions to guide your reflection, and practices to support your integration. There is also a monthly thread for members to connect, share their experiences, and be held.

This month’s guided journey focuses on self-stewardship.

Recent writings you might have missed…

• This is where we start - an introduction to me and an exploration of being in service to the mother in this next season of Being in Motherhood.

• September guided journey: self-stewardship - how to build a nourishing relationship with yourself by starting exactly where you are.

• Anticipating the feeling of fall - a reflection and experiences from Summer, what is to come, and a practice to help you tend to what is present in this season.

• My own unspoken words - my version of the Unspoken Words series where I share what is hard for me to admit about this season of motherhood.