I realise when I hung up the pins. Got off the table. Handed over the tools. Turned in my badge. I could continue but I won’t. Ha

This day was recent, and in the moment that I had a full body decision to just be mum I felt so many identities disintegrate and my life shuffled. Quantum leap type stuff.

I felt naked in a way I hadn’t felt, probably ever. As a nudist at the best of times it was a strange vulnerable nakedness I hadn’t really known.

As anyone reading this may know or have felt, it is natural for me to become a master knower of intricate details. I enjoy going deep on all topics I find. Exploring them, teasing them out, categorizing and logging them into my memory ready for that moment you ask a simple mundane question expecting a simple yes/no answer. “but had you considered the ethics of that choice?”. Puzzling and peculiar, odd even (I know) but it seems to be the way I like to do things. To squeeze every last drop of juice from it, so it’s all received and internally perceived, and ready for use. (In the end I am a zero wastage kinda gal.)

The learning I do seems to just pack on in, like a donkey climbing Everest, nothing is lost and nothing is missing. So at just the right moment I can whip it all out and dance around all the different tabs in my mind that may be just fluffy enough to create a bit of a red thread and I can hold it all together like the conductor of some wild mystical orchestra of information. And maybe for you, you weren’t too perplexed and you found the joy and felt the resonance I felt in sharing.

But this sole mothering gig had me naked and nervous.

Don’t get me wrong I’ve read a good amount of content on instagram university and I’ve absolutely mummed for 6 solid years. But I hadn’t fulled immersed in the practice of mumming. I didn’t listen when Christa mum shared her secret stain removing recipe, or the best way to make mum toast (for her not for the littles). Or the home made baby wipes that Sarah mum tells me are just so simple to make as she easily gives me two before I’ve even open my own broken reusable container of pre bought wipes. Or the mum hack for keeping clothes clean. (Note: keen for tips on that because once a garment is soiled in my home it probably should be binned, don’t worry it’s not, it’s just a little loved). Or the crafts and sewing and sensory play space bonanzas.

But most of all, my most naked self absolutely felt like a fish out of water in the kitchen. A place most 6year deep mothers have made their domain. They are well and truly into their domination era.

I have admired these mothers over the years.

The way their hands just slip and slide around their kitchens. Dancing and prancing in their element. Making tasty magic. Snacks galore. Space for hunger in these homes can’t exist. Because there is a potential 3 month old dump bag ready and rearing to jump into a slow cooker at any given moment. The ease with which they flow is equal parts freedom and equal parts weakening for me at this point.

As here I am now laying down the vulnerability and fear and walking away from the highly qualified comfort of my healing woman identity and committing to the unqualified waters of the fully embodied mother. Facing the depths of this unknown woman and learning that it’s totally ok to be unversed in this. To not know what I’m doing. To wing it from a place of fake it till you make it and deeply trust the innate wisdom that’s in those DNA codes somewhere.
But please don’t misinterpret me as feeling low or needing to be reminded you are doing great. I’m confident enough to know that 2 apples for 3 kids as a snack and one shared drink bottle will suffice the truly hungry and thirsty.

There is a cracked open feeling that whilst scary has provided a new freedom and I’m trying not to fill it with too much learning/ mastery. Rather I’m trying to remember what is innately inside of me and bring that to the surface of my knowing.

So cheers to that and cheers to all the embodied mothers candidly giving this thing a red hot crack and hoping they figure it the f#%^ out before their kids are too big to notice. (I’m guessing the seasoned mothers will be here to remind me, you never do, figure it out).