Feeling Like Myself After Motherhood
Words by Jenn Norrell
I want you so bad
I'll go back on the things I believe,
There I just said it,
I'm scared you'll forget about me
John Mayer comes out of the speakers as my tears drop onto cardboard boxes. The dogs wrestle beside me knocking over a chair and the ceramic vase that was on it. Tears fall harder. I curse myself for the stupidity of putting a vase in their reach, for thinking I was managing this, for more things than I know how to put into words at this moment. I shoo the dogs outside, then I get the broom and begin to sweep. “One less thing to decide on,” I mutter to myself.
Looking around at our kitchen, the kitchen of my dreams, pots and pans litter the floor, cabinets and drawers are wide open, and packing paper, boxes and tape are at the ready. I take it all in as I decide if I should keep or leave the yellow Le Creuset pot. Did I give this to him for Christmas one year? Or did we buy this together for ourselves? I can’t remember.
We stood in this kitchen when it was nothing more than a frame of a house, open to our new neighborhood. I recall the excitement we had picking out the details: a warm earthy backsplash, modern yet rustic handles and slate gray countertops to contrast the white cabinets. How we smiled at the idea of little feet running around the island while we made dinner, baking together as a family, or sitting quietly doing their homework. Now, I cringe at the memory of envisioning children growing up here. I decide to keep the Le Creuset.
Turning towards the sound of the neighborhood kids’ laughter I look out the window and see the Colorado sun shine in the brilliant blue sky. I wish that it was raining. My mind ruminating on the happy families around me, I move from the kitchen and stop in the hall, devoid of windows and lined with labeled boxes brought up from the basement. Jenn’s oil paints/brushes, Jenn’s miscellaneous art supplies, Jenn’s dance shoes/attire. Boxes untouched since we moved to Colorado, maybe even longer than that.
Returning to the kitchen I unfold and tape together another box wondering how I start over. How do I remember who I was? If the simple act of separating one's things is so challenging how, after fifteen years, does a we become an I? How do I find myself when I am all alone?
> > >
Warm light filters into the dance studio from the setting summer sun. There are a few other dancers in the room as I make my way to the barre. I admire their posture, their outward display of confidence, their worn and well loved ballet shoes. I look down at my own shoes, new and unblemished, while moving my feet into first position. Waiting for the class to start I think about how I almost turned the car around on the way here, how I sat in the parking lot for ten minutes before forcing myself to come inside. I haven’t been in a dance studio since college, since my life became consumed with a career, marriage, white picket fences and now divorce. I question whether or not this is a place for me, or a part of me anymore, and remind myself that I need to try to find out.
The teacher arrives and introduces herself. She recognizes my face as a new one and smiles as she walks over, “And who are you? Are you a dancer?”
I’m caught off guard by her directness, “I used to be,” I reply, “but honestly it’s been a long time, and I am not sure I remember.”
She places her hand on my shoulder and says, “Once a dancer, always a dancer. You can’t forget who you are.”
As she moves to the front of the class, her words hold more weight than she knows. The piano music starts and without a thought my arms begin to rise, my knees bend. I feel like myself.
<<<
It’s 2:00 a.m., the house is dark as I pace down the short hall from the bedroom, around the dining room table, into the kitchen and back again. I stop and stare at the pale yellow bookcase bouncing and shushing and crying right alongside my child. I bought this bookcase during my first marriage, our first grown up brand new furniture purchase, shabby chic if you will, and full of memories and some heartbreak. Lining the shelves are books about childhood trauma, social learning theory and CBT from a career I choose to no longer have. Seeing a basket full of yarn, marbled gray and white waiting to be made into something beautiful, I recall how I began to rediscover my creativity after my divorce. Suddenly I recognize the fear I have of losing that again, of losing myself again. One month of being a mother and already it’s clear how easily my life has become intertwined with hers, how quickly women can lose themselves in motherhood.
For a moment I allow my mind to drift to my old apartment in Denver with it’s crystal door knobs, plaster walls and clawfoot tub. I remember how I used to love the feel of being there late, late at night when it seemed like no one in the world was awake but me. A warm mug of tea, my sleeping sweater and a book helping to wrap me in quiet solitude like a big cozy blanket. It was a place that immediately felt like home; felt like me as I was finding myself after my divorce. The only place I ever lived alone. The place were I mourned the loss of the chance to become a mother and found myself again.
Now shame envelops me, the result of resentment for this small human in my arms, of the overpowering desire I have to be by myself despite wanting this for so long. Here I am, only three years later, in a new state, a new home, a new husband, and not myself at all.
>>>
“Hey kiddo, I’m going to say goodnight now and Papa is going to do bedtime tonight, okay?” I say leaning over the give my daughter, Idgie, a hug and a kiss.
“No Mama, I want you to do it. You’re the one who is supposed to do it,” she whines while putting a death grip on my neck. I squirm out of it with the assistance of self-talk telling me to be strong, to do this for myself, that I don’t always have to be part of the we.
“I love you,” I say, closing the curtain to her room and allowing Adam to take over.
Removing the top off the kettle, I fill it and light the burner. While I wait for the water to heat I take my laptop out of it’s worn gray case, clean my glasses and grab a pillow to put behind my back. The water slowly starts to come to boil and Idgie rustles around in her bedroom, making requests of Adam. I resist the urge to intervene. The kettle whistles and I quickly take it off the burner, throw a tea bag in my favorite mug and pour. The steam rises, and breathing in the peppermint tea my shoulders relax.
Sitting down at the table, warm mug in hand, I touch the keyboard. The screen of my computer comes to life, a blank page ready and waiting to be filled. It’s only taken five years of motherhood, but I feel like myself here. The cursor blinks and I begin to write.
About the Author:
Jenn Norrell lives and travels full-time in an Airstream travel trailer with her husband, Adam, daughter, Idgie and their old dog, Dakota. When she's not homeschooling her daughter or out exploring a new place, you can find her with a cup of tea in hand while reading, baking, or rediscovering her creativity through writing. Follow her adventures on Instagram, @jenn.norrell.