Today Bo is going to school/care for a full 6 hours. Which will mean it’s the longest time he’s consistently been away from me since he was born. Which also means, you will finally be regularly hearing from me again.
Although I have a million lessons from the last 22 months, here’s the one that hit hardest:
It’s impossible— IMPOSSIBLE— to run a business and be a full-time, SAHM at the same time. (…perhaps until kids are in school.)
And although there are many amazing mothers and businesswomen out there, we rarely see or hear of the nannies or baby nurses.
And if someone is actually running a business that takes in significant income, mama needs that kind of support!
(Or a grandmother in the neighborhood, or stay at home partner who handles those duties…. someone.)
How do Beyoncé, Chrissy Teigan, Serena Williams do it? With a whole team specifically dedicated to their children. That’s how they do it.
There are moms who want full time help so they can get back to work ASAP.
There are moms who want help so they can be with their children, not “work” at all, and not worry about domestic duties.
I have no judgment or shame about a woman’s choice or privilege when it comes to care— (you do you, mama)— but what we need to stop perpetrating is this outdated patriarchal paradigm that a woman needs to “bounce back” quickly.
Layered with this feminist (but not feminine,) modern (but doesn’t really work with our adrenals) new line of: just because I had a baby, that shouldn’t stop me!
It should stop us. The transition to mother is not 10 months of pregnancy and 3 months of maternity leave.
The USA would certainly like us to believe that. (Although not pay for it.)
It’s making a person, and then becoming an entirely new person yourself.
Out of all the phenomenal moms and women I witness (and they are ALL phenomenal) there’s ONE who took my breath away with her commitment to taking time for herself and her baby. She happens to be a former student, and now dear friend, Kelly Van Zandt. @yourmothernyc.
In truly honoring the 4th trimester (the 3 months post birth) I didn’t even know she had GIVEN BIRTH until she announced it more than a month after delivery.
Now THAT is baller. Or rather, THAT takes OVARIES.
This is the space we need to be celebrating more.
A month is nothing in the course of our lifetime.
2 years is nothing in the course of our lifetimes.
I’m infinitely grateful I chose to take this time with Bo. Although it feels in many ways like I am starting from scratch, the time he spent with his mama will be, I believe (and as my teachers in India taught me) serving him for his entire life to come.
I paid for it, in debt. Financially, in a loss of health, not realizing I couldn’t take it all on myself. So I’ve had to grow into a new way of being. I had to burn it to the ground and reconfigure. I don’t think it’s hubris to use the metaphor of a phoenix rising from the ashes: I was absolutely demolished.
My boundaries are now clearer than ever.
I shift with the rhythm of my heart, and my truth, and the world either falls away or rises to meet me.
I hold no ambition, only the ongoing question: is this the best way in which I can make the world more beautiful?
I’m just going to continue to do that.
In love,
p.s. I miss deeksha. Coming back to you soon, NYC.
