The challenge of swapping your old life for your new ‘mum’ life
When I fell pregnant in January 2012 I was absolutely delighted! I’d been married a year, I ran a travel business with my husband, I lived in the beautiful French Alps and I worked and socialised with a fantastic, fun group of people. Life was great! I carried on through pregnancy as normal. I felt really well, I was working hard, socialising with guests and team members and having fun.
In November, after a lovely, busy, sociable summer and autumn, I went into labour with my gorgeous son. I had a traumatic birth but my baby was healthy and happy. My parents were here, my husband was on hand, I was well looked after, my baby was gorgeous. Yes I was tired, but that was ok, to be expected. I felt like I was winning at life! Becoming a mum was all I’d ever wanted, and finally I was a mummy! I was absolutely over the moon – so happy – and so in love with my baby!
However, over that winter I started to feel a bit different. Everyone said that I was coping so well, that I was a natural mum, that my baby was doing wonderfully. But I felt lonely, sometimes bored, a bit sad, left out by the ‘real world’. My husband was at work running our business 6 days a week, often 15 hours a day or more. Ollie, my tiny son, was my main source of company. I suddenly realised I didn’t have any friends or social life outside of work, I didn’t have any family here, I didn’t really know what to do with myself every day. My baby needed me constantly but surely it shouldn’t be so hard to get out and do things too? The snow was ridiculously heavy that year and I was frequently battling the elements single handedly with a baby, a buggy and all the gear. I took Ollie to all his health checks on my own and I barely understood what they were telling me. I didn’t have the confidence in my French to ask questions so I read up on the internet and did the best I could. It was exhausting. But didn’t every new mum feel like this?
Luckily I found the Annecy Baby and Toddler Group, where I made some amazing friends – I lived for Tuesday meetups – and I had people I could go and have coffee with who were at the same stage as me. I went back to work, which gave me purpose again, and Ollie started Creche at 11 months old which gave me a bit more time. Life got into a rhythm, things were good again, and in September 2014 I gave birth to my daughter, a gorgeous easy little thing.
But it became evident I couldn’t continue to work in the tourism sector with two babies under two, where the hours are predominantly evenings, holidays and weekends. I slipped into the stay-a-home mum role quite easily. Every day I ran around after the babies, I cleaned the house to within an inch of its life, I cooked homemade food and did the never-ending laundry. I created a complete and all-consuming job role of ‘being a mum’. I could ‘mum’ most mums hands down! I was acing this!
But I wasn’t happy. It wasn’t enough. No matter how clean my bathroom was or how well fed and dressed my babies. I just felt angry and lonely and lost; and really resentful of my husband who got to leave the house, see people who asked his opinion, made him a coffee, told him jokes, worked with him in a team. I wanted that for myself. I wanted some professional respect, some thanks, to earn some money knowing it had been a challenge but it was well earned. I wanted a reason to brush my hair, put on a nice top, leave the house. I wanted to be ‘me’ again and not just an invisible, sad, middle-aged mum.
I thought endlessly about how I could achieve this – how I could get a job using my talents (except what were they?), in French (my French was basic, how was that going to work?), that would fit around the kids (almost impossible as Ollie was only in school for half days to start with and on holiday every 6 weeks)? Tensions ran high with my husband, I wanted to go home to England, to be near my family. Most of my friends here with babies had either moved away or gone back to work, so I was lonely too. We couldn’t move without uprooting everything, our business was here, the main source of income, we couldn’t just sell it and move on. I was stuck, totally stuck.
The irony was that when I fell pregnant with Ollie, 3 years before, I couldn’t wait for my maternity leave, to spend some time away from the hotel, the guests and my husband! I was so looking forward to having some time to myself. And now I had all the time in the world to complete my household chores and take my toddlers to the park, but I wanted more, so much more. But what?
My loneliness, my lack of self-confidence, my lack of French, my boredom, the monotony of motherhood and housewifeliness had to change. I was exhausted and miserable and lost. I had to find my joy. And the worst thing was my joy should have been right in front of me – my two gorgeous amazing beautiful little people who I loved without question! I adored them, would do anything for them, was so lucky to have them. I loved being a mum – but in becoming a mum I had really lost my way, and myself.
All was not lost though! Fast forward a few years and now I know who I am! I have worked hard on finding ‘me’ again. Not the ‘me’ I was before the kids but the new post-40, mother of two ‘me’ that I have become. A stronger, better version of the ‘me’ that I was before.
I thought hard about what I could do, what my experience was, what my passion was and what I could do with that to fit around the kids – and I realised it was right under my nose! I retrained over several years to finally become a Doula, perinatal coach and hypnobirthing teacher. I now spend my days running antenatal classes for expectant mums. I teach them about their body, their baby, taking control of the birth that they would like, and what to expect after the baby is born. After birth, I support them through the tough days, the difficult decisions and generally cheer them on in their transition in gradually becoming a mum. I run postnatal recovery classes, baby massage, and baby music and movement classes – and I absolutely love my job!
So now I can say, hand on heart, that I have grown into my role as a mum and found out the person that I really want to be. A ‘me’ that has empathy, a ‘me’ that understands the dichotomy of wanting to be a mum more than anything in the world, but not wanting to give up your own life. A mum who can now say ‘please help me’ when I’m struggling and can hopefully say ‘yes I can’ to other mums when they say the same thing.
And most of all I have found my joy! It was there all along – my kids are my absolute joy, but I just needed to be able to step a little way away to see that!
If you need someone to talk to about the challenge of becoming a mum, don’t hesitate to contact me for a chat. I also run women’s circles on this topic too – why not come along! Whatever you do though, reach out! I’m here as a listening ear and will support you through this new journey of parenthood.