Advice can be a funny thing. It can slide off like Teflon or land right where, and when, you need it. Back in 2017 my mate Kearnsie had popped round for a cuppa and a chat. As we sat in the sunny kitchen with tea and bickies, I looked through the goodies she’d brought along for my wife and I’s pending arrival. After four years of trying, our first kid was on the way. Blooming beautifully in my wife’s belly. We knew everything would change, and to be frank, we were freaking out.
Kearnsie had brought some special bits and bobs she’d saved from when her kids were little: gorgeous vintage overalls and tiny terry-towelling T-shirts. It wasn’t all she gave us that day. As we leaned in to absorb the answers to questions we fired off about every potential need this baby would have, we hungrily took mental notes. Thankfully someone around here knew what they were doing.
The chat changed direction and we started musing about our identities as fully formed adults with our own needs and wants. When would we be able to be us again, as a couple and as individuals? Was that time over?
It was a simple phrase but one that hit like a lightning bolt. She said it like it was no big deal. “You’re still you, but with kids.”
Oh! It hadn’t occurred to either of us, really. I had grappled with this idea that I would have to disappear, to be a carbon copy of my mother (lovely as she is), to sacrifice everything I need to feel alive and safe. But Kearnsie had given me this epic yet simple reassurance – I’m still me … with kids.
That baby has just wrapped up their first year at school. It’s been a huge success with lots of friends and a new reading habit. Just like they’ve found their own groove outside our home and away from us, when the time was right my partner and I did the same. We’ve both had career changes that followed our interests, and faced the requisite existential crises and rapid life changes people tend to at this stage of the game.
When we’d approach one another with a fanciful idea and felt a bit shy about making these leaps, the other would gently offer a reminder. “Remember Kearnsie? You’re you, with kids.” Inhabiting who we are has helped us thrive.
It wasn’t just the big moments either. When a baby-shaped sleepy potato pudding joins your family, the first stretch is spent in protection mode. How do we best keep this person alive and flourishing? It’s easy to forget that you have a spine that needs to be held at a certain angle to prevent ongoing crushing agony. Many a midnight I whispered to myself “I’m me, with a baby” as I strapped my fussy babe into the gentle automated rocker we found on marketplace. I was present and protecting both of us, seeing the way we both had needs. As we got to know each other, I learned my baby’s rhythms and knew when the rocker could stand in and when I could gather them up in my arms to deposit safely in their cot. We’d both get a better night’s sleep and be ready to roll as the sun came up.
Needs will never be in short supply in any household. Rapid change and endless days and nights are all part and parcel of parenting, and if you don’t check in with yourself it’s easy for your awareness of your own needs to disappear. I hold on to the idea that I matter, even though my children also matter. There’s ample room for all of us.
