Identity Grief

Identity grief: definition –  the realisation that life after having a child will never be the same, accompanied by an almost constant grieving for the person you used to be before becoming a mother, the career you once had and the social circle that kept your calendar full.

Somewhere in the madness, I decided I wanted an income for myself. I wanted something for me; a business, independence, a way to show the world I had my shit together. I wracked my brains for days as I sat knitting yet another baby’s blanket. I did a lot of knitting over that period. It was a way of doing something that I could see a result for the effort I was putting in, something I could do in between taking care of baby, that didn’t require a lot of brain power. During my search for money making ideas, I decided I would open my own business and sell the blankets that had been accumulating.

This great idea lasted a day. By the time I sat down and worked out how many hours it took to knit one blanket, with continual interruptions, (everything takes three times as long with a baby to care for), compared with how much I would need to sell them for to make any kind of money, it just wasn’t worth it. Anyhow, who wanted to buy knitted baby blankets in Central Queensland.

I was looking for something. Even though I’d begun to feel better within myself, not as edgy, a bit more confident, I just couldn’t get a firm grasp on the whole motherhood thing. No matter what I did, I just felt awkward like trying to wear shoes that are a size too big. It wasn’t as natural as I’d been led to believe, at least not for me.

Although I had been going out more with baby and wanted so badly to fit in, I was ashamed of what I’d gone through. The conversation of how many wees and poos baby Joe had done today did little to soothe my feelings of inferiority. I often left mother’s group feeling even more alienated than when I had arrived. I couldn’t believe my life had changed so much.  Was this all I had to look forward to for the next 18 years? The whole “my child is better than yours because mine can do ABC”.

Somewhere in the throes of hormones, sleepless nights, vomit, failed attempts at soothing the seemingly endless demands of a 6-month old, I decided I wanted my identity back. I couldn’t relate to being a mother. This was not what I’d signed up for. I wanted my life back where I knew when I was doing the right thing, the wrong thing, when people were calling for me, to get my advice, when I was validated for the job I was doing. That’s what I was craving. Somewhere in the haze, I thought the smart move was to go back to work. And my psychologist had recommended dipping my feet back in that pond, to do something for myself.

Eventually, I made the decision to go back to work. I was strong, confident and knew what to expect when I returned. Those days of sitting on the couch for hours on end, watching the meaningless TV shows, and hearing about life insurance over and over again, watching dead-pan soapies, cleaning up the spew from between my breasts yet again, were coming to an end. I was going back to work for 2 days a week. I was getting some of me back! Woo hoo! Party time!

It’s not just the fact that I had been struggling with adjusting to life with a  baby, not able to communicate in mother’s groups how I was feeling, feeling alienated, it was the fact that for 12 years I had been earning my own income, supporting myself. Suddenly, my baby arrived and I was cut off from that. If you are lucky, you receive a measly payment from the government, but nothing like what I was used to earning. I began to feel guilty about money. I didn’t want to spend it because I didn’t have it coming in. The whole time I was on maternity leave, I didn’t ask my partner for money. He paid for a lot of the household things, but I was too proud to ask him for any for myself.

Something tells me I am not the first, nor the last woman on this earth to experience this. The big thing for me was that I didn’t really know who I was anymore. My identity was tied up in what I was doing, rather than the kind of person I was. I can see now that the qualities of me as a person far outweigh whatever title I choose to put after my name. After all, I could have been “Super Mum” ticking all the boxes with an inability to show love and affection for my child.

Somewhere along the way, society has gotten us all mixed up. I think feminism is a fantastic thing. I am grateful to be on an apparently even-keel with our male counter-parts. Although it was something I couldn’t get my head around for the longest time. Women are having their children later on in life now. We have usually established a decent career for ourselves by the time we’re ready to start our families. And having children is something we slot into our busy lives, as opposed to a few decades ago, a woman’s purpose was to get married and start having babies pretty much straight away.

We have experienced so much freedom and have held positions of leadership, made decisions, had choices by the time a baby comes along. We have a strong sense of self – who we are, what we stand for and what we believe in. Somehow, what we do has become so intertwined in who we are. When that was taken away from me whilst I had my baby, it was so isolating because I had never known anything different. Motherhood was foreign to me. The identity of being a mother didn’t fit.  It seemed to go against the grain of what I was used to and perhaps that’s what led me on my journey. Learning that my values and who I am as a human on this earth holds so much more meaning than any position I hold has been one of my most empowering insights yet.