The Work in Progress Mommy

I am writing after almost a year… and that’s because there has just been so much going on. In my previous blog post, I was lamenting about how life felt like a Netflix Drama… just because of Nanny troubles… little did I know that life would take one big drastic turn and the Nanny drama would feel like child’s play.

There are phases in life when you feel like you are reasonably in control…

You have your lists. Your calendar. Your routines. Your work. Your child. Your plans for the weekend. Maybe even a vague idea of what the next six months are supposed to look like.

And then life looks at all of that and says, “That’s adorable, but so boring too… let’s make it fun!”

And then proceeds to throw everything at you.

That has been my life lately.

Just… TOO MUCH!!!

A few months ago, I made a decision that was both exciting and terrifying. I moved out of an organisation where I had spent eight years.

Eight years.

That is a long time to be somewhere.

Long enough to know the people, the systems, the unwritten rules, the coffee machine, who to call when something went wrong and, more importantly, who not to call.

But beyond all of that, it was a place that had valued me.

It had recognised my contribution. It had invested in me. I had been given consistent opportunities to develop, learn and grow. I had built credibility, relationships and a version of myself that I was proud of.

So leaving wasn’t easy.

There were the obvious questions.

What if I have made the wrong decision?

What if I don’t fit in?

What if the new culture is completely different?

What if I am not as good there?

What if I leave something good only to discover that I had no idea how good it actually was?

There is something particularly frightening about voluntarily stepping away from a place where you know your worth and walking into a place where you have to establish it all over again, not knowing the variables you’re going to encounter with every move you make.

You become a newcomer.

You don’t know the culture.

You don’t know the personalities.

You don’t know how decisions get made.

You don’t know which meetings actually matter and which meetings could have been emails.

You don’t know where the bodies are buried.

And you certainly don’t know where the good coffee is.

But I did it.

I stepped into the unknown.

New organisation. New people. New culture. New expectations.

Uncharted terrain.

And then, within three days of making that move, my personal life began to unravel.

Not dramatically.

Not with a warning soundtrack playing in the background.

Just one thing after another.

My aunt who lived with me, and supported me in taking care of my daughter, my home, and was a big support in every way, had a breakdown.

And suddenly, this new job — which already required me to learn an entirely new world — had to coexist with medical facility visits, phone calls, worry, logistics and trying to hold everything together.

Then, about a month later, my mother had a massive attack, followed by an angioplasty, and yet has only 15% of her heart functioning.

As if that wasn’t enough, within 4 weeks of the heart attack came a second visit to the ICU, with diabetic ketoacidosis because of her medical attendant’s negligence during my overseas travel.

And just when I thought life’s chaos was finally winding down, with Mom getting discharged from the hospital, I breathed a sigh of relief and thought, “Okay, surely this is enough for one person for a while.” But apparently, my own body decided it wanted to participate in the chaos too.

I ended up with multiple herniated discs, needing an urgent spine surgery.

Because apparently life had looked at my calendar and decided I had too much free time.

The irony of it all is almost funny.

I changed jobs because I wanted growth.

I wanted a new challenge.

I wanted to push myself out of my comfort zone.

And I certainly got pushed. I got pushed… and how… Life as I knew it, was a distant dream.

Just perhaps not in the professional-development sense I had imagined.

Suddenly, I was trying to navigate a new job while navigating hospitals, family emergencies, doctors, recovery, pain and a body that had very strong opinions about how quickly I should be moving.

And somewhere in the middle of all this, there was my little girl.

And that is the part that hurts the most.

Because when life gets overwhelming, you do what you have to do.

You run where you need to run.

You make the calls you need to make.

You show up where you are needed.

You take care of everyone.

You become the person who remembers the medicines, the appointments, the reports, the conversations and the million little things that somehow need remembering.

And somewhere along the way, you realise that your child has been waiting for you too.

I couldn’t give her the attention I wanted to.

I couldn’t be as present as I wanted to be.

I miss sitting with her and colouring dinosaurs and unicorns.

I miss watching her choose the most ridiculously bright colours for things that absolutely do not exist in those colours in nature.

I miss sitting on the floor with her and playing pretend doctor or restaurant and what not.

I miss going to the park.

I miss watching her run around while I pretend I’m not exhausted from watching her run around.

I miss our little rituals.

I miss the ordinary.

And right now, the ordinary feels like a luxury.

My mobility is restricted for at least the next few months, which means that the park is temporarily off the agenda.

Running after a five-year-old is also off the agenda.

Running after anything is off the agenda, actually.

I am currently operating at a speed best described as Windows 98 starting up.

So we have had to improvise.

And perhaps that is what motherhood — and life — is really about.

Making something beautiful out of whatever you have left on the table.

These days, my husband, my daughter and I lie in bed and quiz each other.

Sometimes she asks questions.

Sometimes we ask questions.

Sometimes she makes up the rules halfway through.

And sometimes I suspect she deliberately gives us questions she knows we cannot answer just so she can look at us with that tiny, smug smile that says, “Mama – Daddy, I got you.”

We tell stories.

Stories about dinosaurs.

Stories about unicorns.

Stories about princesses.

Stories about fairies.

Sometimes all four exist in the same universe, because apparently dinosaurs and princesses have excellent diplomatic relations in her imagination.

And I have discovered that lying next to your child and inventing completely ridiculous stories is not actually a bad substitute for running around the park.

It isn’t the same.

But it is ours.

And maybe that is what I am learning through all of this.

That life doesn’t always give you the version you planned for.

Sometimes it takes away the things you thought you would have.

Sometimes it puts you somewhere completely unfamiliar.

Sometimes you have to start again professionally while simultaneously trying to keep your personal world from falling apart.

Sometimes the person who is always taking care of everyone else has to lie down and admit that she needs taking care of too.

And sometimes motherhood means accepting that you couldn’t be the mother you wanted to be that day — and then climbing into bed the next day and playing dinosaurs anyway.

I don’t know what the next few months will look like.

I don’t know how long recovery will take.

I don’t know when I’ll be able to walk into a park again without calculating distances, benches and escape routes.

I don’t know when work will stop feeling like a new world and start feeling like home.

And I certainly don’t know what other surprises life has waiting around the corner.

Frankly, I am hoping and praying it has exhausted its supply.

But I do know this:

I am still here.

A little bruised.

A little tired.

A little terrified.

A little frustrated.

And occasionally laughing at the sheer absurdity of it all.

I am learning to accept help.

I am learning that slowing down isn’t failing.

I am learning that being present doesn’t always mean doing something spectacular.

Sometimes it means lying beside your child under a blanket and listening to a very serious explanation about why a unicorn cannot possibly be friends with a dinosaur because the dinosaur is “too stompy.”

Sometimes it means sitting at the dining table and colouring one tiny picture at a time.

Sometimes it means telling one more story even though you are exhausted.

Sometimes it means being there.

Maybe that is enough.

Maybe, for now, enough is actually quite a lot.

Because life has just been too much lately.

But in between all the things that have gone wrong, there are still these little moments.

A laugh.

A ridiculous story.

A sleepy cuddle.

A badly coloured unicorn.

A dinosaur with questionable parenting skills.

And my little girl beside me, reminding me that even when life becomes completely unrecognisable, there are still ways to find your way back to each other.

So for now, we lie in bed.

We quiz.

We colour.

We make up stories.

We negotiate the complex political relationship between princesses and dinosaurs.

And we wait for life to become a little less… too much.

One day at a time.

One story at a time.

One unicorn at a time.