Our expectations of motherhood

Motherhood Musings: Collection 1, Volume 1

Welcome to the first collection of Motherhood Musings.

This series means a lot to my heart. If I have any idea where I am heading on this writing path, which I don’t, it would be in the direction of weaving and sharing mother’s stories and experiences. This is one big experimentation with my creativity while holding profound respect and care for the women who shared their words with me.

If you are new to Being in Motherhood, I explore mothering, healing, breaking cycles, and learning what it means to be ourselves in motherhood. I also invite other mothers to share their words and experiences, you can learn more here.

The first topic in the series is our expectations of motherhood compared to our reality of motherhood. I will share the responses I received in three parts…

Part one is our expectations of motherhood, part two is our realities of motherhood, and part three is how we coped with our realities of motherhood.

Thank you for the kindness I know you will extend as I figure out how to do this new thing and share the experiences of mothers weaved together in this writing.

I want to start with

Ellie Nova

’s words because when I read them I thought, oh wow here are most of the expectations I had unconsciously about motherhood. I did not verbalize them or think them out loud, but reading her words I felt them. I thought yes, this is what I thought motherhood would be like. Ellie wrote…

I knew the first few months, and even the first year, would be 'hard' (though in retrospect I had NO idea what 'hard' actually meant), but I thought that, by the time a child was one year old, things got a lot easier. I thought that they naturally weaned themselves from breastfeeding, were happy being in childcare 4 or 5 days a week, they're waking maybe once or twice in the night but sleep is pretty much fine, and that the mum goes back to work no problem and everything more or less goes 'back to normal'.

She has her life, plus a child.

I thought that motherhood was mostly joy, with a bit of tiredness, loneliness and frustration thrown in. I thought that the good stuff made the hard stuff 'all worth it'. That a single smile from your child made the whole day perfect and wonderful.

I thought caring for small children was endlessly sweet and fulfilling - with baby/toddler groups wonderful fun and a chance to make new friends and that reading stories with your child in your lap was what made life worthwhile.

I thought that you 'saw the world through their eyes' and Christmas and birthdays would be magical. I thought that sharing things from your childhood would help you recreate the joy of your own childhood - only the good bits. That sharing the same books and movies and toys would bring you closer to the happiness of your childhood.

That you feel comfortable playing again and being silly. That you enjoy doing painting and drawing and crafts again, and feel OK being messy and making mistakes.

That it all comes naturally, easily, blissfully, joyfully. That, after a few hard months, you get into your stride and feel confident and say things like 'I love being a mum'.

That your relationship with your partner is difficult for a few months but then you find each other again and by the time the first baby is one you're back in love, having sex and making your second child.

I think these images lived in my subconscious and came to life when I read Ellie’s words because we are told being a mother is the most natural thing in the world. People forget to mention how hard it can feel, and even though the love that extends from me to my son is something I have little control over and feels abundantly full and natural, he also drives me crazy and in his presence I often question my sanity.

Other than these subconscious images, I was not sure what I expected of motherhood. I had experience nannying and babysitting since I was 10 years old. I liked being around kids, I was often told I had a way with them. I felt prepared with the practical things of motherhood. I knew how to change a diaper, I knew what to expect from babies.

But, I felt wildly unprepared on what to expect from myself. I leaned into my experience of doing the tasks of caring for another and did not consider how much my traumatic past would influence me. I knew sleep deprivation would be hard, but the rest I thought I would figure out.

And I did, I managed to navigate the first year without completely exploding, but I had no idea what to expect because in those years of taking care of other people’s children, I wasn’t paying attention to the mothers.

I resonated with what

Marika Páez Wiesen

shared about the expectations she held before motherhood and how it is hard to know what they were. She shared…

Of course I didn't think it would be a piece of cake. I expected my kids to annoy me sometimes, to limit my freedoms, to make life "harder" for me in some ways. But I didn't necessarily expect the kind of "hard" motherhood would be. The deeper emotional excavation and healing I would have to do in order to be anything close to the mother I wanted to be for my kids.

I feel relieved I did not have strong expectations about motherhood, because I was not let down when the reality of motherhood set it. But I was shocked by the emotional excavation and healing motherhood asked me to do. This was the area I felt most unprepared for and I am not sure I knew it was a part of motherhood.

Lauren Barber

also was unsure of her expectations of motherhood until she started to dig a bit deeper for her answer. She wrote…

I remember saying to someone loosely when I was pregnant with my first, that I thought I would be back to work a few months after birth, but, I wasn’t certain because I had no clue as to how I would actually feel when my baby arrived. 

I genuinely couldn’t even fathom it because i knew it was going to be unlike anything I had ever experienced and I didn’t want to create too many preconceived ideas.

But then when I dig deeper I know I definitely had narratives that had burrowed there way in.  Some of the ones that come to mind… 

That Motherhood was hard. That I would never sleep again. That my body would become unrecognisable. That I would turn into someone ready to sacrifice my whole self for my children. That I would be able to breastfeed. That my intuition would kick in and I would just ‘know’ what my baby needed. That I would be able to birth the way I wanted because I had done all the ‘prep’. That all the ‘work’ I had done on my self would mean that the transition to becoming a Mother would be easier on me. That when I had my second baby she would just ‘slot’ in.

So clearly… there were many underlying threads of expectation woven around my being even if they weren’t fully conscious. 

I thought all the work I had done on myself would make the transition easier. I spent my entire pregnancy in therapy and I thought it would help. But therapy did not prepare me to face myself in the way motherhood would ask (which I think was a reflection of the therapist and our relationship, and not necessarily a shortcoming of therapy in general).

I thought the loving, nurturing mother I wanted to be would emerge with ease and in some ways she did. In some ways, I had this access to nurturing energy that can only be explained as primal, because I did not have a foundation of nurturing. But to sustain this primal energy and bring it to the forefront, I had a lot of healing and awareness to cultivate about myself and my wounds.

I also asked each writer and mother how their expectations around motherhood formed. I think my lack of expectations formed from my lack of mothering. My mother got to remove herself when mothering got too hard, when her mental health crashed, someone swooped in. My dad, my aunt, my grandma, someone was there to care for us. I am not sure my mother had to face the hard moments with us, because she was often expected to remove herself.

Therefore, I never recall my mother…mothering. She would yell, rage, curse at us. I never saw her nurture us because she couldn’t. And the women who stepped in to fill her place were strong and confident. They knew what they were doing and you did not question them, and I think that also formed my lack of expectations. People around me knew how to take care of children (keeping them alive probably is better worded, I am not sure nurturing is in my family genes), and I knew I would know how to also.

Sarina Zoe

(who kindly let me use a photo of her daughter as the image for this post) also looked to how the women around her approached motherhood for what her experience would be like. She shared…

I totally expected it to be tough, because growing up I watched my mum buckle under the pressure constantly as a single mother. Her friends were mostly single parents too, and some of them used to say to me ‘Never have kids Sarina’ when I was just a child, they were probably half joking but children take things literally, so I understood that if I had kids it would be really fucking hard, and I'd probably have to do it alone, which thankfully I'm not, because yes it's really fucking hard, AND so damn beautiful (the bit I was never told!)

I am not sure anyone tells us how beautiful it is. I think sometimes mothers forget it in the moment, especially when it is hard more often than not.

Those fierce and confident women who raised me definitely played a hand in my expectations of knowing what to do as a mother. I thought I should know what to do when it came to caring for a child and I would be able to handle whatever the task was. I also think the women who raised me instilled in me a belief that I should not need to ask for help.

I was told my whole childhood how independent I was and how strong I was. I learned how to take care of myself because no one else seemed to care. The narrative of being independent got repeated and repeated that I became it. I learned along the way independent and strong women do not ask for help.

Eva Lydon

shared her high expectations of what she would be able to handle in motherhood. She wrote…

I had very high expectations of myself as mother and felt very strongly that I "should" be good at it and take it in my stride. I expected to be fully organised, together and on top of things 100% of the time. It was my purpose in life, my job... there was no room for failure! These expectations formed from having a Diploma in Childcare and Education, experience as a Nursery worker and a Nanny for…also, having a teacher for a mum.

I resonated deeply with what

Kaitlyn Elizabeth

shared about how her expectations of motherhood formed. She wrote…

My expectations were that it would be hard and transformative. That I would love it and be good at it. That it would fill me up. I think my expectations certainly came from society at large, friends, social media. My mother did not emulate a love for mothering itself and I sense a lot of my expectations were formed/born from that…’well I won’t be like that. I’ll love it.’

How many of us based the kind of mother we would be based on the mother we had growing up?

I know I saw my experiences with my mother and ran hard in the opposite direction. I knew I wanted to be a better mother than her. I knew I wanted to nurture my son. I knew I would have a emphasis on communication in my family.

This concept goes both ways. I can only assume there are people in the world who look at how they were mothered and aim to give that to their children. I know not everyone holds the mother wound that I do. I know some people find support from their mothers and their family of origins.

Finally, I want to close with Ellie’s words about how her expectations formed.

I saw so little of motherhood. When I was working, women would take a year's maternity leave and then come back to work 4 or 5 days a week. I maybe saw their child once if they visited during maternity leave and everyone cooed over them. And the mother seemed fine - she didn't LOOK any different. She didn't, to me, SEEM any different. I treated her the same, she worked the same, her child - as far as I was aware - was happy being in childcare and she was happy being back at work. Everything looked 'back to normal'. Of course I was seeing nothing of the realities of motherhood, but I didn't realise that.

Mothers from the previous generation would talk about it as if it was all wonderful too. Or perhaps they were just sharing so little, and I didn't know what questions to ask. I saw photos from my childhood and other peoples and kids and babies are cute, aren't they?

And the parents are always smiling in photos, aren't they? And then social media adds another layer - the posts with the newborns and the obligatory 'so in love' gushing words. The 'amazing mother' and 'best daddy ever' posts. The endless photos and videos of happy, giggling children and beaming mothers and words about how wonderful it all is and how their children are 'their world.'

And then there's celebrities. I was reminded of this recently when Emma Stone accepted her Oscar and mentioned, to my surprise, that she had an almost-3-year-old daughter. And I thought: how the hell did she film that movie when she had a baby? Of course she must have had a nanny but still - I wondered about all the practicalities. Was she still breastfeeding? Did she have to stop scenes if her baby was crying for her? What if the baby was sick and needed her? What about being away from her with all the press?

Before becoming a mother I never would have wondered about this stuff. It was just evidence that when you become a mother all it means is that you are exactly the same person - still working, still achieving, still wearing makeup and fancy dresses and going to parties, spending time with your partner, still living you life - PLUS a kid or two or three. It sent the message that kids just fit into your life, no problem.

Obviously I wasn't Emma Stone before I had my son but there must have been so many other celebrities I saw - mums I mean - who just went and had a baby and then went back to performing on stage/in movies, doing press tours, gushing on late night shows about how their children were 'their everything', going to tons of late night parties, carried on working just the same, making tons of money.... It all fed the idea that having a child just adds to your life. You have your life, then add children, and it just gets better.

Does it just get better? Did your child fit into your life no problem? Did everything go back to normal after a few months?

I am excited to share in the next post in this series about what our realities of motherhood looked like.

Please, share your expectations of motherhood or any reflections that arose while reading in the comments or by replying to this email.

One more thank you to the women who contribute to this series, I am in awe of you.

I invite you to share this post with other mothers who are in your village.