Читать книгу Work. Mama. Life. - Ali Young - Страница 17

How the stories we tell ourselves can make or break our experience!

I remember when I was a first-time mum, I felt the weight of expectation on my shoulders hard. I was in a foreign country with a three week old, an apartment, no car and a husband at work all day. In my mind, I was expected to keep the baby alive, to keep everything clean, to make nourishing food. I mean, man! How about you?

I also felt extreme joy and gratitude that there was this little person hanging out with me all day. I mean, she was cute and stuff. She did poo, wee, she boobed, she slept occasionally. Joy!

I craved the joy and the togetherness with her … and yet there was a niggle in the back of my mind. I felt a niggle to begin to look a certain way, to exercise, to not get too upset, to be in control, to never feel guilty or burned out or tired, to have my child ‘behave’ in a certain way. My perception was that my mothering was predicated by how well she did certain things.

This chapter is probably a little heavy on the concepts of society and motherhood. But remember that part I of the book is giving you the background to step into your awesome health and vitality with all the knowledge you need.

In this chapter we are going to explore:

 our inner critic as a mother — you know, that mean girl inside our mind!

 intergenerational motherhood: how the way we were mothered impacts our mothering

 the five common societal expectations of motherhood

 a quick expectation shake-off method.

Commonly, we poor mums have a lot of questions shoved in our general direction. I mean, really, do we want to judge our mothering on things that we have minimal control over?

 Is she sleeping well?

 Are you getting enough sleep?

 Have you read this book or that book?

 Are you following what this person has told you?

 Are they the right expert to be following?

 Are they the ones who are going to give you the best information?

Feeling all the expectations to wade through the information out there and derive the most knowledge out of the available resources and then put it to good use was a thing (a thing that I very much didn't enjoy!). As a professional woman, and particularly one in the health sector, I was supposed to do this better than the woman who didn't fit into this demographic of mother.

As a health professional who worked with babies and mums for a living, I felt that I couldn't ever fail. Failure meant, in my mind, that I was not a good health professional. The mothering I was doing was commentary on my ‘fitness’ to be a health professional. The internal judging if I felt I wasn't doing a great job. And when I chose to go back to work, how could anybody trust me again because I clearly sucked at this motherhood gig when it came to living it myself. So let's dive into how I fell into the society trap, and how I can help you get out of it a little easier using some simple steps.