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Transcript

Reclaiming My Identity After Baby · Mommywood

0:01
Welcome to mommy Wood. I'm so happy to have you here.
0:04
I this episode, it's a solo episode.
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I'm going to be talking about reclaiming my identity after
0:12
baby, which I know that most if not all women can relate to.
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We just all kind of go through it differently.
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So hopefully something in here that I say is something that you
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can relate to or connect to or makes you feel seen or less
0:27
alone, because I know that this journey into motherhood and
0:34
being a mom can feel very lonely and isolating.
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And we're all supposed to have this quote UN quote village that
0:43
doesn't really exist. So I hope that you can at least
0:46
find some community and some sense of village with mommy
0:51
would. And let's just get started.
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I'm going to share my my journey journey and reclaiming myself
1:03
after my daughter was born. So let's go back to my identity.
1:08
Before my daughter was born. I was I've always been an actor.
1:12
I'm still an actor. I was still nannying and
1:17
teaching. I still have pretty much the
1:20
same day jobs, which I don't love.
1:24
I can't, I have to be honest, I don't love that I'm still
1:30
essentially doing, I'm pursuing the same career and I'm also
1:36
doing the same day jobs. I wish I, I do want to level up
1:40
in my day job type of things. I mean, obviously I want to
1:44
level up in my career too, but but as an actor, I definitely
1:49
felt felt a bit stuck, felt a bit, you know, of course we went
1:57
through the pandemic and everything before baby, but but
2:02
it was definitely easier to be a bit selfish when it comes to
2:07
classes and all of that. So I did feel like I was an OK
2:14
after. Gosh, I'm trying to even think
2:17
of what my I not that I don't remember life before my
2:21
daughter. I definitely do.
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I think it's crazy to think that you wouldn't, but logistically
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I'm trying to think of, you know, all of that.
2:32
I think as like a friend and a woman.
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I was, I remember often like doing girls nights and because
2:41
my husband worked in the evening and I would do girls nights,
2:44
which I, I really miss. And I wish I had this space in
2:47
my home to, to do those more often.
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But I do not, I do not have that space in my apartment.
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And if my daughter is here, that would definitely not work out.
3:01
But I felt like I, I had a somewhat strong sense of self.
3:11
But I think now I have an even stronger sense of self and just
3:20
more of a confidence in, in saying no to things in the
3:27
people I want to surround myself with and all of that.
3:33
Obviously there is some things that change immediately when you
3:37
become a mom. And I think overnight, what
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immediately changed was, of course, I just take care of this
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human being. There's no, there's no stopping
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that. There is no pausing that.
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There's no taking a break. Yeah, you can tag team with your
3:59
partner or help or whoever you have, but there's no, you don't
4:05
get a break from becoming a mom. I always say, I bet I wish there
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was a time between being pregnant and actually being a
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mom because you go through being pregnant and it's like by the
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end of it, you're like, I don't want to be pregnant anymore and
4:21
you're so exhausted. And then you have a baby.
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I guess there might be a couple days in the hospital where you
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have a bit of help and like that's, that might have been the
4:37
easiest part. But but yeah, for me going
4:43
through an emergency C-section immediately, I had to slow down
4:51
very much. So I needed, I don't like, I
4:56
don't love asking for help. So to have my husband have to
4:59
help me in the shower, help me go to the bathroom, all of these
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things that are that can be embarrassing.
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I mean, I'm not embarrassed with my husband, nor should anyone be
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if that's your life partner. But those are things that did
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definitely change immediately for sure.
5:22
I feeling lost in motherhood, though I didn't I, I, I feel
5:30
very lucky that I didn't feel completely lost in the
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beginning. I've had, you know, logistically
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I've taken care of babies. I did have some moments though
5:45
in the evenings when I was like, I can only describe it as
5:50
homesick. And I think there's something
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about like, I forget what it's called the like twilight hours
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or some maybe it's twilight something where it's like not a
6:00
depression, but like a something sinks in during like once the
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sun goes down. And I was kind of like that.
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I don't know. It seems like a strange feeling
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of like wanting to be home, wanting to be back home, wanting
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to be comforted, you know, by my own mom, but like, now you're
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the mom. It's very strange.
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But again, I was very lucky that I didn't I didn't have to deal
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with any postpartum anxiety or depression or OCDI know that
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there's a lot of people, if not the majority of people who do
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deal with that. So I like to say that my
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traumatic birth, I, I even did out with that what started to
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make me feel more regulated more myself.
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I don't feel like I lost myself at all.
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And I again, like I'm saying, I'm also sharing that and I feel
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almost guilty saying it, but I do want people to know that that
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yes, a lot of women deal with a very hard time after it, but not
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everyone does. And this is and I didn't.
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And I feel, and I know that I'm very blessed.
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And then that's very fortunate for sure.
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But, but I know that a lot of times we hear if before having
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any kids, we hear of that. And sometimes they can scare us,
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scare us and scare us out of it. I don't know.
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But I think it is nice hopefully for somebody who hasn't been
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through it yet to know that like, it might not happen to
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you, you might have a great experience and and yeah, that's
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that's it. But I think for me, having a
8:09
schedule was super helpful, not only for my daughter and my
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husband, but making sure that we were following the schedule.
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We use the Huckleberry app. It was super helpful.
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But I like knowing things. I like knowing what to expect.
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I like being on a schedule, and I know it's good for babies as
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well. I also started back at work very
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lightly after like 2 weeks. It was like one or two things
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out of the house, like for an hour at a time.
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Like it was very small. But for me it was a nice way to
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kind of ease into it to get myself out of the house.
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Because we were not big, we didn't really take our daughter
9:03
out a ton. We weren't going to restaurants,
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we weren't going to gatherings. We weren't doing a bunch of
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things. Which looking back, I'm like,
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oh, she was so mobile, we should have done more things with her.
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But on the other hand, she never got sick, which was great.
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So take that what you will. There are definitely things,
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though, that I miss about my life before a baby.
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There are definitely things I don't miss about my, you know,
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she's the best thing that's ever happened to me.
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And I've been talking to people recently about how easy it is to
9:40
complain about motherhood, which which I do like that it's more
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common like that we feel like we're able to be honest about
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motherhood because saying it's perfect all the time, it's crazy
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and we should not do that. But I do like that we're
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embracing the struggle of motherhood.
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And at the same time, it's that part.
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It's easy to explain to somebody without kids that like you're
10:09
tired or you're this or that. Like that part's easy for
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someone without a kid to kind of comprehend.
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But to say how much you love your kid or to say like, Oh my
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God, when they laugh or they do something like it literally like
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hurts my heart. Like that part is so hard to
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explain to somebody who doesn't have kids.
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Like how do you explain that? Like I don't, I don't know.
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So things that what I miss about my pre baby life is just like
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obviously the freedom there. I would could sleep in, you
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know, if I didn't have work, I could sleep in if, you know, it
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was all about me. I could, you know, have a pool
11:04
day by myself. I could, you know, spend
11:08
whatever money on myself that I wanted to.
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Now, of course, I have to think of timing of like, OK, can I do
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this by myself? Is pressed in here.
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There's definitely a lot more logistics involved in planning
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anything for sure. I will say though, now that my
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daughter is in school again, I do have a little bit more
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freedom. There's something that surprised
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me about my timeline of getting back to myself, quote UN quote,
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which also I don't love that term getting back to myself or
11:47
bouncing back because you know, we never want to move back.
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We only want to move forward. We are different people.
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You are a mom. That doesn't mean that you're
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not still yourself. I have said before, I do feel
12:00
like the exact same person, just somebody handed me a baby.
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I've definitely grown exponentially in so many ways,
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but I don't feel that anything that I was before has
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necessarily left me. I don't think I'm a completely
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different person. I think that that is something
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that I was really expecting because everyone says like the
12:28
moment you see your baby, there's going to be, I don't
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know what I thought. I don't know if I thought just
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like my heart would explode or like something would change
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where I would. I don't know what I expected,
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but the way people describe it is so overwhelming.
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And I, I, I didn't have that. Like I think of the, I think of
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the musical waitress and that moment that she sees her
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daughter and it's like everything changes in an
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instant. And, and I didn't feel that way.
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I, I felt connected to my daughter.
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I loved her. I felt like I didn't, I didn't
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not feel a connection, but I think I had such a, such a,
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what's the word? It was just built up in my head
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so much that this is going to be like the one moment.
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I think also part of my struggle is that I wasn't necessarily
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there for my daughter's birth. I was put under and then had AC
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section. I was put under, had an
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emergency C-section And so so I didn't get to see her before.
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So I don't know if that makes a difference.
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And that's definitely something that that I've had to struggle
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with not feeling a part of my daughter's birth, which I don't
14:11
love. And I won't get into that
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therapy session. But Speaking of, but my getting
14:18
back to myself though, again, I didn't feel lost.
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I don't feel like I lost myself. So I don't think that that was
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necessarily a timeline thing. I feel like maybe maybe that
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kind of came to me later on, like a little bit later of like,
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oh, I'm not, you know, a brand new mom anymore.
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Although I hate that too. I think we're all new moms at
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every point in our lives because I my daughter's about to turn
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three. I've never been a mom to my 3
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year old daughter. I think when you have a second
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baby, you're a new mom all again because this baby is totally
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different. So honestly, I think new mom
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should be forever what we are called.
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I think we're constantly new moms, but I think once I kind of
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felt like I couldn't necessarily be called a new mom that that
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was kind of when I was like, oh, I should be doing XYZI should I
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need to get out of my feeling like I'm a new mom and all of
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this. So I think my as close to losing
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identity can come to came later, maybe like between years, like
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maybe around the second year or between years 1 and 2 or 2 1/2
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or something like that. And and the pressure to bounce
16:06
back. I think I did an audition like 2
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weeks later or something like that, which looking back, you
16:14
know, if I get out of frame a little bit, like those pants
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were not closed. Like I felt fine at the at the
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time. So of course it's like feel
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whatever, do whatever feels right at the time.
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As an actor, I'm not in this space to really say no to a ton
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of auditions. So and so I do think I feel felt
16:40
a little bit of pressure to audition pretty quickly.
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The pressure to get back to work was just like we're 22 income
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household like at living in America where we don't have
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maternity leave really and we don't have any.
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I work like freelance and stuff. So I really didn't have a
17:03
maternity leave. So that was my kind of need
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pressure, whatever to go back to work was because we was because
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I had to. You got to pay for this baby,
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start paying for stuff Physically.
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I didn't feel a huge bounce back physically pressure, Although I
17:30
will say I think I might be because again, mine came a
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little bit later because I was breastfeeding and that helped
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me. I never weighed myself, so I
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don't know if I actually lost weight or not, but but I think
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breastfeeding did help. So I was like putting on my my
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regular genes pretty quickly after.
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And then I feel like once I stopped breastfeeding, maybe I
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just kind of like, it's so easy to like not work out.
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So I do think I was like, oh, like a little bit easier,
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honestly. I mean, when it comes to like
18:16
that type of stuff. And it's much harder to, you
18:19
know, find the time to work out again logistically, but the baby
18:23
is so much harder. And so I feel like again, that
18:28
that came a little bit later for me where all of a sudden I'm
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like, oh, now she's 2 again. I'm not a quote UN quote new
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mom. And now I'm having to buy bigger
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jeans. These jeans that I was wearing
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early on post pregnancy are now tighter.
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So like that type of thing, just like trying to feel better in my
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body, which I think is a struggle for any woman trying to
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like feel good in our bodies, which I think only like feeling
19:04
strong and, and as moms, just seeing like what we've created
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with our bodies, what we've done with our bodies is so amazing.
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But that doesn't negate the pressures from the outside of
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like working out post pregnancy and doing all this.
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So again, mine was more of a slow burn and my daughter is
19:31
going to be 3 in a few days and I feel like now I am starting
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and she's back in school and I in school.
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So I do feel like I'm starting to do a bit more for myself and
19:48
feeling better about myself. I think it's also important to
19:55
find to surround yourself with the people who make you feel
20:00
like yourself, who aren't going to treat you differently, who
20:03
are there to support you. I have had people that, you
20:09
know, it hurt that they didn't reach out when I was pregnant or
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they didn't reach out when. After I have my baby or, you
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know, if they don't come to our birthday party, like things like
20:22
that are hurtful. And I know that sometimes people
20:29
don't want to reach out and they think that, you know, the mom
20:31
will reach out like that. The mom will reach out if they
20:34
want visitors or things like that.
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But I don't know, I'm, I'm not like that.
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I feel like if you want to see my baby and you want to meet her
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and you want to be a part of her life that you'll kind of that
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you'll make it happen. I'm, I'm, I've opened the door,
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I've invited people and I feel like.
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So again, I think it's just important to, you know, if, if
21:04
somebody doesn't, if somebody's not worth your time, then just
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like let them go. We're, we're all too life's too
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short and there's too many good people.
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Like it's better to have a small group of people that are
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supportive and, and help you be the best version of yourself
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that like get rid of the other people who don't like we
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nobody's got time for that. I do think creatively that the
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motherhood has changed me a little bit creatively, my
21:45
emotions were always kind of on the pretty close to the surface.
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But I feel like since becoming a mom, I I can see like one
21:56
sentence of a script and like just breakdown.
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I think like the tears are always just like right right
22:05
there behind the eyelids ready to come out of So I think that's
22:11
definitely something that's been that's impacted my my acting for
22:20
sure. I think, again, I think I've
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said before that I was already mostly auditioning for mom
22:29
roles, but I think now the connection to those roles is
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deeper for sure. The understanding is obviously
22:41
deeper. Build it again.
22:45
Again, the logistics, the logistics of like self taping
22:49
and auditions and all of that, it's just a little trickier, but
22:52
it's definitely doable for sure. Yeah.
23:01
So for me, I really think that being a mom has has changed my
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life obviously exponentially for sure.
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And yeah, honestly, I feel like I've found another part of me as
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a mom, of course, because a whole new, a whole new part of
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me has been born since my daughter was born.
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I was never alone before. So yeah, it's definitely
23:43
unlocked a different part of me again.
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I think it's funny that I'm I'm naming this episode reclaiming
23:54
my identity after baby, but I don't think I lost my identity
24:01
after my daughter was born. I think I only added more see
24:07
look tears just right on the surface.
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I think it really just only added more to my identity and
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being able to identify myself not only as a woman and an actor
24:24
and a teacher and all of these things, but to be able to add
24:31
mom onto that identity has been just like the best.
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And it's opened my, it's opened me to really connect with other
24:40
women, not only through this podcast, just like in person
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with other moms, because as soon as I hear that somebody has a
24:50
kid, I'm like, how are you? Like, let's get into it.
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Let's tell me, tell me everything.
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I'm an open book. Let's talk.
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It's so easy to connect with other moms on that level, You
25:08
know, when you're just woman to woman, obviously there's so many
25:13
things to connect with women, but put two moms in a room, talk
25:18
about their kids, talk about struggles and things.
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It's it's beautiful. It really is.
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Oh my God, I'm such a mess. But I will say to anyone who's a
25:33
new mom, who's feeling invisible, who has lost
25:37
themselves, who's who is trying to figure out who they are as a
25:43
mom, as a person again, all of these things, you, you're doing
25:51
great. You're doing great.
25:54
You, you don't have to figure it out.
25:59
You don't have to come back from anything.
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You don't need to bounce back to anything.
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Everything is on your timeline because frankly, nobody cares
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what your timeline is. Nobody.
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Everyone's too selfish thinking about themselves to be honest
26:22
and ask for help and listen to mom so you can hear everybody
26:30
else's experiences and stories. And hopefully there are people
26:37
and stories and things that you connect to and that you can feel
26:44
a sense of community. I see you, I see you, new mom.
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I see you again. We're all new moms.
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I see you. And please feel free to reach
26:58
out to me on Instagram at Mommy One Podcast.
27:03
I'm here to check all my DMS. I'm pretty good at responding,
27:07
so if you have any questions, if you're struggling with anything,
27:14
by all means feel free to reach out to me for sure.
27:19
But you're doing a great job and there's no measurement of what
27:24
makes a good mom, what makes the best mom.
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We're all doing our best. And if you care enough to be
27:33
wanting to be a good mom or worrying if you're good enough
27:36
mom, then you're light years ahead, then you're already a
27:41
good mom. And yeah, give yourself grace
27:47
and you're doing great. That's all I can say.
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So thank you for listening to this again.
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I hope you were able to relate or connect or laugh at me.
28:01
If anything. I don't know.
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But I'm always grateful to have you here as a part of my real
28:08
world.