on cherishing every moment.

when melby was first born, every person who had already successfully raised a child insisted i cherish every moment. i would muster a half-hearted smile and wonder what was wrong with me that i just wished the moments would be done already. i got it in theory, but those were the weeks when each day felt infinite and the nights, even longer.

i didn't realize how sad and scared i was for quite a while.

then, this morning, i gave melby a water bottle with a straw for the first time. she sat on the counter, held it with her squishy hands and drank. i got a little teary-eyed wondering where almost 7 whole months went, how the tiny person, who once felt so cumbersome so quickly became the best part of my days, became this cool, hilarious person, who holds her own water bottle and begs for avocado.

i realized then, that i need to cherish every moment.

and surely someday, long from now, i'll forget how hard the beginning was and tell some tired-looking new mama the same.

mom friend

She cried for 6 hours straight. I think she's possessed.

Also, is pie a good dinner?

The messages come in rapid succession from my friend and fellow mama, Amy, who has 20 month old and a four week old baby. I am incredulous that she is functional enough to text; I survived seven weeks postpartum with my now six month old baby girl, Melby, before I realized I was deep in the most debilitating postpartum depression. I seemed high-functioning. Nursing was easy, my body healed quickly. I showered, I cooked and cleaned, I moved, I rested, but throughout it all, between my intently smile-filled visits with friends and family, I cried, blankly, endlessly, desperately clutching at some nameless thing no one could give me, until another day began.

I kept saying I was lonely. It was the only word that made sense to me, but in retrospect, I understand that what I felt was a chasm between my identity and what I perceived to be my new identity as a mother. I felt untethered. I had no concept of who or why I was, and this unfamiliar infant that alternately screamed inconsolably for hours on end and then slept so many consecutive daytime hours that I was sure she was dead left me totally reeling.

Every time someone would ask, with hope and reverence in their eyes, how much I loved being a mother, I'd muster a diplomatic response about how "we're figuring each other out," because it was true, but felt much milder than the Please send help/ what have i done?/ I'm not sure I even like her that was screaming throughout my entire mushy body.

I knew I needed something. For a while it felt like it might be a steady stream of IPAs and the candy disguised as protein bars on my nightstand, but at some point I realized even alcohol and sugar couldn't rescue me. I needed friends. Not just friends, but "mom friends--" as I said again and again, specifically other moms with fresh-off-the-press babies. Moms, who were also maybe reeling and crying and struggling to find their way, because, while empathizing with someone's experience is certainly powerful, inhabiting it with them is something else entirely.

As it turns out, making friends when you're trying to make friends is about as casual as wishing you weren't the only single person at a wedding. I felt crazed and desperate as I talked to people at a postpartum group offered at a local natural foods store. I heard some girls I loosely knew planning a walk together, which sent me into a spiral of self-deprecating thoughts, as I wondered what so mortally wrong with me that I wouldn't be invited (please see again: postpartum depression). When another woman introduced herself as "Ann," I heard "And," and then offered, "A conjunction! That's an interesting name!" and then started stress sweating when I realized I was wrong/ potentially insane and cried the whole way home for being so awkward. I felt zero percent my sociable, bubbly self and so much like a ninth grader at some horrific intersection of puberty and an identity crisis.

And then, a miracle. Pretty much exactly one year prior, my mom had sent me a Christmas gift-- a lusciously fuzzy blanket from Pottery Barn-- in the mail, except instead of sending it to our actual address at 1512, she sent it up the street to 1412. Through some convergence of small world connections and social media, the accidental recipient of my Christmas blanket learned I was the rightful owner and delivered it to my door. One year later, having still never actually met, we had become friends on Instagram and began slowly connecting over one another's baby-related posts. She had a then 15 month old with a hilarious disposition and a penchant for over-accessorizing and another little girl on the way. I had a newborn and a partner, who was a pilot and on the road at least sixty percent of the time. We were both stay at home moms.

So we sent messages on Instagram. And then we texted. And then we liked all of each other's post on Facebook. It escalated quickly; we now consumed one another's attention on all the most popular e-platforms-- a regular modern day romance. When I took Melby for walks, I'd strut by her house, sure to exude an extra bit of confidence and ease, thinking maybe she'd peer out and see me and think "I definitely want to go on walks with that girl and won't worry if she accidentally thinks my name is a conjunction." We took a ridiculously long time to meet in person. I felt anxious about it, because I really, really wanted this person to be my friend. It felt too good to be true.

It turns out it wasn't. One random Wednesday, we went for hamburgers. I drank a beer. She didn't judge me. She would have had a beer at 11:30 am too if she weren't cooking up a baby. She laughed when I made stupid attempts to be funny. Suddenly, we were not only real friends, but mom friends.

Fast forward four months, we talk every day. We talk about sleep, poop, baby food, adult food, clothes, and most importantly, we identify with each other's feeling that staying home is the most important thing we could possibly do, that it is filled with joy and intimacy and growth and is all concurrently sometimes the most mind-numbing, exhausting thing in the world. We have decided on what I now believe to some essential rules of mom friendship:

1. Leggings are pants. Whoever tried to convince us, when leggings first came on the scene in a big way, that leggings are illegitimate outside the fitness world is just wrong. As a postpartum woman with a weird, unfamiliar body, leggings are an appropriate choice anytime, anywhere. No gym membership required.

2. Texting at any hour is okay. We text at 5 am. We text at midnight. It is okay to seem overeager and text back immediately. It is okay to not text back for hours on end, because your baby is crying and you're losing your mind or you temporarily forgot how to create words.

3. Drinking at any hour is okay. I know the "moms + wine" paradigm is a little played out. I don't need a t-shirt that says how much mommy needs a nap and some wine (No judgement if you do. Chances are I love your shirt.) but that being said, when you haven't left the house past 5 pm in six months, it's cool to drink a beer at 11 am. I was awake in the middle of the night for four hours; what's time anyway? It makes what otherwise can feel like an endless cycle of drudgery seem a little bit more like a party.

4. We don't judge each other. Amy co-slept. When we decided to sleep train our baby girl, she supported me wholeheartedly. Her daughter loves cheese. I have sworn mine will not have dairy for years (check in when I'm more than a month into solid foods...). We are different in so many ways, but we rally for each other no matter what. We remind each other that we are total badasses, just doing the best we can. A friend once told me the part she was least prepared for in motherhood was all the judgement and comparison. It can be intense, but it turns out that if you lay it all out there and just say, I'm doing the best I can and I'm not sure it's enough, your girlfriends can be pretty darn supportive.

That's pretty much it really: leggings, phones, alcohol, total acceptance.

Motherhood can be really lonely. For me, it wasn't lack of support, visitors, or resources. I just really needed someone to know exactly how I felt, because she was feeling it too, and say, I feel you. I'm with you.

My mom lives cross country and wasn't able to be here when my daughter was born, but little did she know, she inadvertently delivered just exactly what I needed through a blanket sent to a then stranger's door. I take it as proof that, even though we might feel like we don't know what we're doing, a mother always knows, somehow. I believe it, fundamentally, but thankfully, when I forget, I have my mom friend to remind me.

in eleventh grade, i tried out to be in our school's extra special singing group, the madrigals. as it turns out, i get high marks in stage presence but am really not that good of a singer. i was not cut out to be a madrigal.

i think even more than an innate love of singing-- which i did have, but more in a scream-singing along with the sounds of jewel in the car kind of way and less in memorizing the alto line on a seven part classical italian song kind of way-- i just wanted to belong to something. i wanted the daily practices and the truly horrible outfits and the designation of being something, anything. i wanted to be part of a group.

because in quintessential high school fashion, my sense of self was floundering. if i had a self at all, it was only a self that existed in comparison to other people, always in flux, just a little better or worse than the next guy.

i remember these beautiful girls i'd always see in the bathroom between classes. i, always high anxiety, was peeing for the thousandth time, and they were reapplying concealer and eyeliner for the thousandth time. and despite remembering so few specific things about my life that i'm borderline sure i actually didn't exist, i do remember, crystalline, this specific moment of one of the makeup girls-- a statuesque girl in a slightly too short for the dress code tank top, standing in the mirror and audibly counting out three pimples on her immaculate skin-- a disgusting offense, she was sure. i had the kind of skin that made you wince to behold. i was covered in acne that looked more like open wounds, painful and raw, from my forehead to my chest. i matted all the clinique i could layer on top of it and then tried to distract from it with seafoam green eyeshadow and glitter. i felt uncomfortable existing, let alone being seen, and watching her stand there, critiquing her obvious perfection, i felt sure that i, so laughably far past three pimples, was actually nothing.

being part of an extra special singing group and being tasked with the all important alto line seemed like a way out of this mentality, but, alas, it was not my fate. several of my small group of friends made it into the group. it reinforced my feeling of being an outsider, but i was also happy for them. the people close to me knew i struggled, but i wasn't a wholly miserable person. i had a happy face. i was silly and weird. my turmoil was mostly internal and/ or saved for my parents.

the madrigals apparently had some sort of team building sleepover. they played games and ate food and sang. in my imagination, it was the 2003 version of pitch perfect. my friend, madrigal insider, reported back about it, specifically to tell me that in one of the events of the evening, they went around the circle and each said, if they could be someone else for a day, anyone, who they would be and why.

and one girl said, i would be beth loster. i knew her only casually.

my heart is pounding now, eighteen years later, just thinking about it. i can't identify it. i don't know if it's exhilaration or terror, but the idea that someone would ever want to be me is still now totally insane.

to that 16 year old self, it is even more incomprehensible.

what did she see? what on earth would anyone want with me for a single moment, let alone an entire day?

i can't quite remember now. i remember the report being something about how happy and energetic i was. that happiness and energy was real, sort of. it was a forced version of something inherently real. it was real and the effects of anxiety and desperation swirling together.

but that story stopped me in my tracks.

today i am almost 34. my skin doesn't hurt to look at. i have accepted my singing status as kitchen/ car appropriate only. i live in kentucky with my amazing baby girl. nicholas kaniasty is my partner.

he makes me literally insane a good portion of the time, but i also have an abiding belief that we are meant to balance each other out. where i am overly grounded and mired with routine, nic is floating and dreaming and spontaneous. where i am sensitive and cautious, nic is direct and pragmatic. where i fixate on the minutiae, nic stands back and looks at the big picture. where i get swept away in emotion, nic is practical and factual. neither of us is right or wrong; we both just need a little more of the other. we are a balancing act, and when we listen to each other, we exist in this really lovely harmony both as individuals and a unit.

recently i decided i wanted to chop off my hair. i had spent my entire pregnancy growing it out. somehow it made me feel safe. i wanted this blanket  of protection around my face.

i don’t know if it looked good. i still don’t. but eventually it started feeling good. i stopped blow drying and straightening and adjusting it constantly. i stopped trying so hard. it felt easy.

when i said i wanted to cut it, nic immediately said, NO. not because he cherished some need for women to have long hair, but because he knew i liked myself best that way. the desire to cut it initially came from seeing some semi-instagram-famous yoga girl’s NEW haircut. and then he said the thing that’s been echoing through me for weeks now, to someone else, you’re that girl.

this isn’t about people wanting my haircut. my hair is pretty uninteresting. but it IS about both perception and the reality that being yourself is the most attractive thing possible.

i thought about the girl in high school. she didn't want my hair, but she saw something in me that she felt was worth emulating, or at least experiencing. she saw it even though i didn't see it at all, because i was too busy feeling affronted by someone else's perfect skin.

there is something valuable in me. more importantly, there is something unique in me. it has taken me 34 years to even notice an iota of it, instead of wishing i were something else, but ever so slowly, i'm recognizing it. i'm realizing what i am and how i am most comfortable. i'm realizing what's true for me.

i am already a person worth being-- someone a 15 year old girl might stand back and say, 'i'd like to know what it feels like to be her for a minute." i feel grateful to that girl for seeing it so long before i did.

i am combatting my 16 year old critic as i write this. she thinks i am ridiculous for being a theoretically grown woman wrestling with a teenager's issues. but these things don't just go away. they get buried or bandaided or brushed aside, but unless you work to literally rewire your brain-- to build new neuropathways and intentionally experience the world a different way-- on some level, those old habits are rage on.

and my sixteen year old, incredulous, insecure, anxious, desperate-for-acceptance self keeps trying to rage on.

my 33 year old self says, i release you.

i will not pretend that girl didn't exist. she is a big part of how i got to be 33 year old mama/ woman/ uncut-hair adult beth. but i don't have to be her anymore. the past few weeks i've felt like things are simmering, bubbling over. i feel intermittently clear and present. i feel assured that i am exactly who and where i'm supposed to be, that i am unfolding.

i started going through all our cupboards and drawers-- spring cleaning, a tangible mirror of what feels like is also happening deep in my guts, a rending. i came across my piles of journals. i have written since i was 11. i have journals from when i was ELEVEN YEARS OLD. in high school, i started writing furiously, binders thick with poems and excruciating details of my misery. i piled them all in a box and unceremoniously took them to the huge recycling bin in joe creason park.

i've carried those journals, some of them now, for 22 years. i know they are my memories, my life, my making, but i realized i only ever used them to feel bad about myself. most of the time they just sit on a shelf, taking up space, but occasionally, i would use them to spiral. i'd bury myself in memory, looking back and not just witnessing that girl, but becoming her again. i carried those journals as a penance, a log of all the things i've done and been wrong.

it was time to let them go. they made me so heavy.

we took the short drive to the park. i dumped them and slid the door closed.

truthfully, i didn't breathe some huge sigh of relief. i didn't twirl in the spring breeze and radiate a lighter, more free sense of self.

instead i just thought, i'm glad i did that.

i unbuckled melby from her carseat and put her in a yellow baby swing. i pushed her recklessly high and caught her chubby toes each time she returned to me. she laughed on and on. just me and my girl, soaking up a sunny moment of our so far, unsure spring.

we stayed a long time. i didn't worry about dinner, my skin, the empty shelves.

one thought hummed through my mind, almost matching the rhythm of her movement, her laughter. this is exactly where i'm supposed to be.

on doors.

every morning, after some milk and a fresh diaper, melby and i read two books.

though abundant, i quickly tired of those on our shelves, so we incorporated a weekly trip to the library into our routine. melby pops her beautiful, big ole head out of the front of the carrier, while i troll through the shelves of the children's section, haphazardly amassing a combination of books i've grown to love over the years and books i know nothing about. i kiss her head one million times and talk to her endlessly. there's nothing too organized or ritualistic about the experience except the simple fact that we do it.

yesterday morning, i chose two books we hadn't read yet from the stack. one was harold and the purple crayon, which i remember well. harold is a tiny person, creating his world exactly as he needs it, exactly as the need arises with a purple crayon. when he falls into an accidental ocean, he simply draws himself a boat and sails to land. nic was home, and he read it to us, delighted by the story's unfolding. next came journey. i recalled that it was a wordless book, but not much else. we looked through the first few pages, in which a young city girl with too busy parents is shown feeling kind of dejected and bored. she's languishing in her room, when she finds a red crayon on the floor. she draws a red door on her bedroom wall and then walks through it into an enchanted world.

i found it curious and special that i'd randomly chosen two books with very similar premises. melby found my reflections uninteresting.

that afternoon, i went to a goal setting workshop hosted by lululemon and this badass woman, named bree. my friend, karen, had told me about it ages ago, and nic sweetly arranged his schedule so i could attend. i thought it was from 3-5. the day before, i realized it was from 3-6. somehow that extra hour threw me for a loop. it didn't fit into the little space i'd carved out for myself, mentally.

that's too long to be away, i told myself. i don't even know what my goals are anyway, i said convincingly, trying to talk myself out of it. why was i going in the first place? it was silly and presumptuous. i don't have goals. i should be with my family.

but nic, my always champion, insisted i go. i didn't think i'd be one of those crazy helicopter moms, convinced i'm the only one, who can properly care for their child, but i definitely am. as it turns out, when it comes to being a mom, i am basically everything i said i'd never be. motherhood is certainly humbling.

i am a worrier. the world cannot go on without me. as nic says though, reassuringly, totally correct, i'm her dad. as in, i can take care of this, woman. so get the hell out.

i don't need to tell him how to give melby a bath. i don't need to tell him how or where she likes to eat. this is his house and this is his daughter and they are fine. i can let go.

so i went, but a little begrudgingly. it was pouring down rain; i had trouble finding the yoga studio where it was hosted, which meant i was only 5 minutes early instead of the 15 or more i insist upon; we took our shoes off for the event and my feet smelled like a wet basement. i just felt soggy and uncomfortable. i felt so heavy with my own brain and my feeling i should be at home. i felt immediately resistant to whatever was about to happen.

one of the first things we did was an exercise, where we listed three people we admired and the qualities they possessed that we found admirable. then we shared them with the person next to us. the woman to my right chose brene brown, the dalai lama, and some other incredible, powerful, renowned person, who now escapes me. she went first in our exchange, and even the difference between our choices made me feel small. on my page, i had three friends. i wanted to critique myself for it, for focusing so narrowly, but that's who i am. i thrive on intimacy and connection. i admire people i really know, people whose ins and outs i witness firsthand-- flaws and all, because i've personally felt the effects of those qualities.

my three people are very different people, but they all possessed one quality: resilience.

i wrote it three times, unintentionally.

i sat with that a little bit.

the next exercise was a guided visualization meditation. despite my involvement in so many things hippie, spiritual, and mindful, i cannot stand that kind of shit. all i do is second guess myself. when they say, picture a room. what color is it? all i can do is summon an endless series of colors and then question if i really see that or if i made it up with some ulterior motive to seem a certain way to myself. it is waaaaay too many layers of self-doubt and -criticism.

but i do what i assume a lot of people do in this scenario: close my eyes, conjure up as supremely peaceful a face as possible, and act like i know what the fuck is going on. we're visualizing. i'm so blissed out it's crazy. i definitely don't hate sitting here.

but then the woman says, picture a door.

and i see a door. i really do see a door. it is the red door, drawn on the wall of the little girl's bedroom.

because i don't typically spend a lot of time thinking about or noticing doors. but this morning i did. i noticed a very particular door.

and then she says, open that door and picture what's on the other side of it. and i picture the exact forest of magnificent trees, full of sparkling lights and lanterns, depicted in the book.

the critic in me assures myself that i am the least original person in the world. i am just mimicking something i recently saw. and yet, it's all i can see, so i roll with it. there is some further imagining of meeting our older, wiser self, and asking that self a question. i think about how the idea of resilience had emerged so concretely for me.

how can i be more resilient? i ask my older self, whom, despite all my declarations that i am crazy and lost and insecure and terrible, is actually none of those things. the older self i imagine is kind of quiet and soft. calm, maybe. or... settled. older self is settled. i am sure of it.

she doesn't tell me then. i mentally just keep wandering through the book. but i realize later, that that wandering itself was the answer.

how can i be more resilient?

harold told me. the little city girl told me.

draw a door.

when you are trapped or lost or stuck, just draw a door. and open it.

that is resilience. that is ease. that is moving through life instead of around it.

i think it sounds overly simplistic. my doubtful self says, what if i can't? what if i forget how? what if i don't have a crayon? why do you say this awful hippie crap to me when i am actually, really struggling?

you just do it.

i've been struggling to write lately, struggling to draw, struggling to honor any part of myself that's creative or interesting. i don't write, i tell myself, because i don't have time or energy. i don't draw, i tell myself, because i am out of the pens i like. silly things. lies. and yet, i decided it is what i want to do. i want to do it, because it makes me feel like me. it makes me feel unique and real and connected to other people. i decided i would do it, that i would make it my life. and, in part of that decision, i reached out to a lot of bloggers and authors i admire to say, how? they wrote back about how hard it was to make money writing.

that didn't not resonate with me at all. i need money, clearly, but i don't care about money. lack of money isn't what's creating a feeling of longing and loneliness in my life. it is distance from myself. it is wanting to do what i crave and be who i am. it's authenticity. i want that. and one lovely, very right, amazing person wrote back, 

Beth, 

I think you've answered so many of your own questions in your email. You want to write, then do that. You want to become a writer? You already are. Write the things you want to read. And publish them online, on your own, or for whoever will have them. Just keep writing, even if it's not very good (or so you think).

Write what you love, what you believe in, and go from there. You already have all the tools. 

xxM

and that resonated with me more than any other words about money or copywriting or freelancing or anything else. it summoned all the pema chödrön i've spent a million hours reading and all the brene brown i've nodded my head in agreement with. it said: it's already right there. you're already doing it. you already are.

all the striving and yearning and chasing and penance for all the terrible things i think i am-- those are nothing. they're not getting me anywhere.

i am there. i am where i want to be. i have what i need. if i need to move from the space i'm in, i just draw a door. i make it happen. i am here.

that is resilience. it is being capable. it is having everything i need, because i know i can create it myself.

i realized that if i want to write and draw, i just need to write and draw. if i want to connect, i just need to connect. if i want to feel important and valuable, i need to live like i am.

part of the workshop was making a list of the things we'd need to have and do to reach our goals. my goal was, as written: i will be a writer and illustrator.

it feels lofty to call myself that. it feels pretentious. but it is who i am and what i'm doing, so why not? one of my steps for execution is to change me "about me" page to state simply that. another, more concrete one, was to buy my le pens so i can stop my bullshit and draw. i said nothing about this to anyone.

sunday, nic and melby and i met some friends for brunch. we were a few minutes early so we wandered into carmichael's bookstore beforehand. i popped into the bathroom before we left, while nic held melby.

i met them at the door, ready to walk out. here, nic said, sliding two fresh le pens into my hand. he had bought them in the small moment i was gone.

i tucked them into my purse and felt a wave of gratitude.

i have everything i need. where it feels like something is missing, i can draw a door.

It's 7:05 pm.

I'm in my pajamas in bed. My sweatpants are pulled up high over my bellybutton, because, even alone, I'm uncomfortable with how my stomach feels and looks. It's... loose. It's like pancake batter. Lumpy and mushy. I stuff the top of my pants with the mushy batter and then stuff the pants under the covers. I finished dinner 45 minutes ago. I had leftover rice, soft boiled eggs, and roasted brussel sprouts. I ate at the dining room table and looked at my phone. I pretend I'm not going to look at my phone during meals, but I do. I did the dishes and swept the kitchen floor and then turned off all the lights except my bedside lamps.

Melby is asleep. Every now and again, I look at her on the baby monitor, not because I'm worried, but just because I love seeing her little body flopped there in total peaceful resignation. 

I google "best movies on Netflix" and filter out anything that sounds scary/ too serious/ political/ sad. I just want to not be alone. I want a movie to keep me company in bed, something to pass the hours between her bedtime and my bedtime, something that doesn't require too much of me.

There is not a lack of time. Maybe the lack of time or energy to get things done that comes with motherhood is later. I am not working. Or maybe even if I were, time wouldn't be the time. Time isn't my thing. I have plenty of time.

I have too much time. To sit and spin in circles in my brain.

Motherhood is lonely. SHIT motherhood is lonely.

People said it to me beforehand. They said, motherhood can be lonely and boring. I, of course, thought I understood what they meant.

I did not.

I took it at face value. Motherhood must be lonely and boring, because you are in a house with small creature(s), who, while communicative and precious in their own way, just don't offer the most endlessly stimulating interactions. Because you are quite physically tethered to them for a time.

But, now that I'm in it, I see it quite differently. I was almost always in this bed at this time. I stopped going out long ago. I became a homebody, always choosing Netflix and a snuggle with Nic over anything wild. It is not the 7:05 pancake batter in bed that is lonely and boring. It is not missing out on whatever events I'm constantly saying no to, reminding people that Melby goes to bed at 6, and most of the time, I'm home by myself.

It's the feeling that this is all I am. And then the deep, deep sadness that "only" giving all my love and energy to the most beautiful creature I've ever met, whom I also created with my body, is somehow not enough. Feeling like what I still actually think is the most important job ever is so unfulfilling during the day-to-day, THAT is motherfucking lonely. Waiting for nap times to start so I don't feel guilty about spacing out for a moment is lonely and then waiting for her to wake up, because I just want to hug her again is lonely. Just moving between the micro stages of each day is lonely and breathing a sigh of relief when it's sweatpants time is lonely and then staring at the monitor because I miss her is lonely. Feeling dissatisfied with each moment is lonely. Wondering what makes you feel valuable is lonely. Having people tell you you're valuable but not feeling it one iota yourself is lonely. Wondering if you ever feel better is lonely. Being alone is lonely. Being with other people and still feeling lonely is lonely.

Sometimes, when I'm writing, I flicker back to the girl, who wrote the postpartum piece about crying in the late afternoon each day as Nic worked in the backyard. I cry much, much less these days, but I am beginning to realize I'm still that girl. The one, who feels hopeful and capable and satisfied each morning as I nurse my baby girl and make coffee with her and look out at the day with her in my arms and do my small collection of sun salutations with her smiling face beaming back up at me. The one, who does the errands, checks off the list, keeps up communications, exercises, hits all the marks, and then still, come afternoon, spirals into a pit of existential questions that just can't seem to be answered.

I hadn't seen my therapist in over three months, and when I told her that I had fallen into a serious depression and now I was okay, she asked what I did to become okay. I said something about food and moving and whatever else, and then, she said, maybe we should consider that you're not fully recovered from that and that's okay.

I do feel better. On so many levels. I feel connected to my baby. I feel wildly in love with her. I no longer feel like I made a mistake in having a child. I feel baseline (for me) in control of my body. I'm sleeping. I have good relationships. I get time to myself. I am beginning to feel physically strong again.

But I am still so lonely.

I am lonely when Nic is gone and I'm lonely when he's here. I'm lonely when Melby's asleep and I'm lonely when she's awake.

I am lonely and bored.

I'm not asking for a solution. I'm not asking for a claim that I'm good or valuable or doing the right thing.

I am telling you that this is the hardest thing I have ever done, because I am sitting with myself and it's not my body that makes me unrecognizable. It's the feeling that maybe I need a whole fucking lot more and maybe this is everything and maybe everything is not enough and maybe I'll never love myself and maybe if I don't figure it out really fast, I'll never be able to teach my baby girl to be different than me. And maybe it's the feeling that I believe it won't always be this way, that one day I'll walk tall, with my shoulders back, and own the fact that I am a motherfucking badass and I do actually know it. But that time feels impossible to get to. And I don't know how to get there. And I'm scared that I'll be stuck under the covers, hating myself and feeling alone forever.

That I'll LET myself stay here. That is scary.

That took 40 minutes.

I don't know if I feel better. But for me, there is solace in just saying it.

I am lonely and I'm terrified that I'll let myself stay here forever.

i stopped writing, because i got sick of saying the same thing over and over.

i wrote something about being unstuck and then, moments later, i felt like i had been cemented in place. STUCK.

what really happened is: it got cold. real cold. icy. for days on end. i tried to drive once in the snow and had a panic attack as i flashed back to the day the snow sent me spinning across the highway, totaling my car. it was dramatic, but also real. i was scared to leave the house.

suddenly, melby and i couldn't putter around louisville the way we normally do. staying inside all day, time just some choppy succession of naps and not naps, pacing our worn out floors like a caged animal, i really lost it. at one point, i googled "how to survive winter with an infant without losing your shit." no one had much advice. also that is a terribly ineffective way to use google. i started to try to curate an inexpensive hobby i could do at home. the internet suggested couponing and online gaming. sorry, no.

am i the most boring person alive? i'd ask myself. how do normal people pass the time? how often can i clean the kitchen counter? why are there so many things i could do that it seems impossible to do anything? i'd start writing. and stop. i'd start yoga. and stop. i'd start drawing. and stop. i'd start cooking. and stop. i'd start organizing. and stop. i'd even start crying. and stop. i couldn't even pretend to start reading. my brain was swimming too much. i felt insane.

so i did what any 21st century person does when they're listless. i looked at my phone for 3000 consecutive hours. i refreshed and refreshed. did you post a new story on instagram? because i definitely looked at it the second you posted it. did you comment on some stranger's post on facebook? because i'm definitely creeping on you and then creeping on that person and diving deeper and deeper and deeper into the black hole of social media. that cycle has no end. and it just makes me feel frantic and sick, but it's also a full blown addiction.

so i deleted facebook. and then i deleted my blog. (real talk: i didn't delete instagram, because i NEED a place to curate my 9000 daily photos of melby.) i just wanted myself to go away. i didn't want to hear all my stupid ramblings. i didn't want to wonder if people liked me or thought i was insane. i just wanted to escape. i needed a break from my brain. i felt so trapped in my own thoughts.

two weeks (maybe?) passed and i didn't even think about facebook. or my blog. until people started asking me if i'd unfriended them. or how they could see pictures of melby. or WHAT ON EARTH WAS HAPPENING. and then like 19 people told me their random friends i've never met really appreciated and related to my blog.

and i felt maybe even more insane.

because i didn't know what was right. because i just wanted to fix myself.

because i do this constant thing, where i try to pretend i am someone different than i am. i try to pretend i'm not going to share photos of every moment of melby's life or pieces of every one of my thoughts. i would like to be less transparent, less of a word vomiter. but guess what? i'm not.

i do need to hone it somehow. streamline. but i'm just not there. i'm still just exploding feelings. and the feelings are always different and conflicting. but this is where i am.

i also revived the idea of wine bar. over a year ago, i said i was going to start a wine bar. it took a year for me to realize that it's not about wine at all. wine is amazing. i like to drink it. but what i want is a community. i want my job to be about community. i want to create a space that's about community. but i literally have no idea how to begin.

i googled "how to write a business plan." i got to the part about numbers, the part right past my address and phone number, and i got stuck again. all i have felt lately is stuck.

FUCK.

the disparity between super loving my baby girl and wanting to drink up every moment with her and also feeling like i'm going to lose my fucking mind if i do it one more second has been really challenging. it's not about the moments with her. it's about the moments just being this list of things on repeat. nurse, change, play, laundry, nap, nurse, change, play, dishes, nap, nurse, change play, food, nap. it's dizzying. the time gets eaten up but it's nowhere. it's groundhog day.

i debated heavily a. if i needed to dig in and learn to be still. that this time is hard for me, because i've lived a life full of distraction and no longer have it and need to learn to just BE. or b. if i am an explosive, creative, dynamic person and being at home endlessly is just not for me. if i'm denying my most authentic self.

i feel like if i knew i were eventually going somewhere, this wouldn't all make me quite so crazy. if it was just this gestation period for my future self, it would be okay. but right now, i'm the zoo animal. and it's hard. and i feel guilty that it's hard. because i think staying home is THE most important thing i can do. but i also just feel like i'm floating in space.

i went to see my therapist after 3 months of absence. another thing i've been doing is trying to not hemorrhage money, especially since i make exactly zero dollars. but without shopping or facebook or treats (because diet became a whole other thing i was micromanaging but that's a different story) or therapy or ever leaving the fucking house, it was just too much. i am not a monk. i have achieved zero percent higher consciousness and sometimes i just need some help or a crutch. anyway, she encouraged me to stop fucking berating myself. she basically said, you had a baby less than 5 months ago. stop asking yourself to be a fitness model and a health guru and a new business owner and a perfect mother.

i cried because i forgive everyone else their imperfections, their being human, but i literally expect myself to be perfect 100% of the time. clearly that's working out great.

she likes wine bar, but she said i'm focusing on what i DON'T know how to do.

what do you know how to do? she asked.

i know how to talk to people. i know how to connect to people.

i am really sure that a majority of the things about me are shitty, because i am horrible to myself, but i DO KNOW that i am good at people. (for the most part. if you're someone who hates me, sorry, and why are you reading this?) i second guess everything i say and do and assume people think i'm a freak, but i also assume people like me. because i'm pretty unassuming and because i've shared so much about myself that i think i'm pretty non threatening.

this is a VERY LONG and painfully stream-of-consciousness way for me to get to my eventual point that's not a point at all, but an invitation:

i am starting a mom's group. 

that's the part i can do now.

i tried to make mom friends for a while (i think i did at least. i was really tired then and am not actually sure WHAT i was doing). i felt awkward and stupid most of the time. i also felt judged. i am pretty sure no one cares enough about what i'm doing to judge me, but i was judging myself, because i am a much different mom than i anticipated. melby sleeps in her own room, in a crib. we let her cry it out sometimes. i don't hold her all day. sometimes i give her tylenol. this is not the attached hippie earth goddess mama i expected myself to be. i felt like people saw that and went home and wrote in their diaries about how terrible i was to my baby.

needless to say, i didn't make friends. i was being too weird to make friends. i didn't feel like i fit in at the moms' groups i went to. mostly because i was too busy judging myself.

also because i really just wanted a glass of wine.

so i'm starting a moms' group that contains wine and the freedom to raise your baby however the hell you want. i certainly don't know what's right and maybe neither do you, but if we're making it through the days, then a-fucking-men.

if you have a young(ish) baby and you are willing to hang out with some other women, who are fumbling through it, let me know and i'll give you the details. because, even though i have high anxiety about what this will all look like, i think it's important to create what i want to exist. and i think that, even though it scares me, it's what i'm good at NOW. and maybe, in beginning that, i will feel a little less stuck. i just need some momentum.

this is admittedly the worst, most scatterbrained collection of words ever. but this is basically what it feels like in my head-- endless cycles of questioning, self-reflection/ flagellation, and anxiety-- so welcome.

i am not perfect. i am trapped in my head. i doubt myself at every turn. i want to do a million things and don't know where to start and am definitely too scared to start.

but i'm going to invite some moms over to my house and wear my imperfection and you are welcome to join me.

dear god it's cluttered in this brain. but i'm back.

on knowing.

some days, you can't win.

and some lifetimes, you can't win either.

so i'm going to try to stop listening to what everyone else thinks and wants and "knows," and instead trust my intuition, my partner, and my baby's cues more.

because, deep down, i know what's right for all of us. without any help from doctors, strangers, relatives, or google.

deep down, i really do know.

and that, my friends, is a win.

on happiness.

the other day, nic and i were walking through lowe's, looking for sink strainers and twine. it was bitterly cold outside, i was ravenous, and melby was on the edge of a big-nap-required breakdown.

and yet, i felt myself laugh at one of nic's dad jokes. i felt really engaged in the words he was saying, like i could hear them particularly well. the store seemed really colorful and intentional. i felt some brightness in my step. my body felt kind of light. my head felt kind of clear. i suddenly felt really, really grateful to be buying some string at a mega store on a frigid wednesday afternoon.

what was this sensation i was experiencing? what was happening to me?

i laughed, weirdly uncomfortable with how not horrible i felt, and looked at nic and said, i feel... happy.

i cannot tell you how long it's been since i felt this in my body. i forgot what happiness felt like. it doesn't feel like everything is right or all my dreams have come true or my waist finally exists again or i actually know how i'll pay the bills or anything other than a sense that whatever my life and dreams and body are at that exact moment are going to be just fine. that there's space to breathe, that things are moving, that i'm unstuck.

i feel unstuck.

dear lord, what a relief it is.

i can't quite say what it is or why. i know eating better has helped. i know not obsessing about precisely what i'm eating has helped. i know getting more sleep has helped and daily yoga has helped and literally stopping myself in my tracks when i spiral down a self-pity/ hatred/ flagellation hole has helped.

i don't feel amazing all day every day, but i feel clear enough to have some perspective on my feelings as a whole and THAT feels happy to me. the freedom to experience the whole range of emotions--not just anxiety.

i am trying not to hold onto it too tightly. often, when i am happy, i become panicked about staying happy and, in turn, create anxiety and unhappiness.

because that is what totally sane people do.

instead i'm trying to just let this feeling wash over me. i have a beautiful girl, who makes my heart sing. i have a beautiful man, who grounds and supports me. i have a life full of abundance. i have a clear mind to, for at least a moment, truly acknowledge and appreciate them. i am grateful. i am so so grateful.

tomorrow melby and i set sail for california. we'll wake up at 4, shuffle to the airport with our millions of things, and wait to see if we can fly standby (during the holidays!) to california to attempt a very lofty, multi-stop trip across northern and southern california.

i feel mildly insane and also sure we will be fine, because even if we're not fine, we will be anyway.

i am both excited to see so many loved ones, and also am wallowing a bit in anticipation of not seeing nic for so many moons.

last night my head was too full of things. creepy things, heavy things, hard things. we laid in bed and i said to nic, i need you to snug me. i make him go to bed usually hours before he's ready. i kindly allow him to read on his phone, but i just need him there next to me. last night though, i needed a snug too; i needed full attention. he pretended that he wouldn't, but then shut off his phone and pushed his knees into the backs of mine and draped his arm over my side, which was enough to calm my busy brain.

i am excited to leave tomorrow but am also somehow stuck in that moment. of needing my friend, who holds me when i'm weird.

but, as in all moments, i'll be fine, even if i'm not fine.

i probably won't write or draw for a while. we'll be visiting old friends, eating croissants, digging through our hearts, and making memories during melby's first christmas. so please excuse me for a bit. i, weird girl, loved girl, am off with my best, tiny girl to see the world.

wish us luck.

on being okay.

about six weeks ago, i posted something to social media about being in the midst of full blown depression.

the first few weeks after melby was born were weird and disorienting and lonely for me. at six weeks, we flew to california for my brother's wedding. i felt sure that, amongst the members of my loving family, with readily available emotional support, meals made for me, sunshine, and extra hands to hold melby, i would feel less lost.

i didn't.

two days into it, i realized i felt as awful as ever and the knowledge that my most comfortable place in the world couldn't rescue me from what i was experiencing throttled me into the scariest pit of despair. i woke up crying. i went to sleep crying. i cried on walks, in stores, at meals. i cried until i just felt dead and didn't cry anymore. there was no solution to the tears, no respite, no magical mountainous beachside place full of loving people that could fill the chasm.

so i said it. i said, i feel like i'm dying.

people reached out. people said, me too. people said, i've been there. people said, it gets better. people said, i'm here. people hugged me and brought me food and held my baby and held space for me.

sometimes i feel really dumb writing all these words. 

but at the end of the day, vulnerability feels best to me. i feel better when i connect to other people. and i felt so lonely. i needed connection. it didn't fix anything, but it felt like there were people close to me in my tears. it gave context to the loneliness.

i made a commitment to eat better, exercise regularly, get outside, drink water, take my herbs, and ask for help. i did mildly well at all of these things. whether or not i was particularly successful, i felt like i was trying, which made me feel less out of control. some combination of that, plus time, and i am happy to report that i'm okay.

i felt like i should say that: i'm okay.

i don't think it works that way for everyone. i think some people definitely need medication or more structured support. i acknowledge that wholeheartedly.

but i made it back to me. this is baseline beth. i think, honestly, i'll always be slightly tortured. i think too much. i live in my head. i analyze everything. it's a sea of words in there. part of why writing is so important for me is it helps line them up a little, shuffle some of them out, leave them somewhere other than swirling around inside me, weighing me down.

i can live this way. i'm not some breezy spontaneous spirit. i don't think i ever will be. i always wanted to be that girl. that free spirit. that fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants, relaxed, joyful, beachy girl. i am the opposite of that girl. i am reflective and intense and overly cerebral. everything has 40 meanings to me. everything is significant and thought out.

sometimes my whole life feels heavy. but i get through it. i am learning to find levity.

for a while, i couldn't. i was drowning.

now i have remembered how to float.

and i just wanted to say that. i wanted you to know.

today i had a little cry. not because i was sad this time, but because i felt so super grateful to be so loved. i have never, ever lacked support. i am grateful for the people, who surround me, who lift me up when i'm drowning, who carry me when i've become too heavy to support myself. 

people say it takes a village to raise a baby. 

it also takes a village to raise a mama. i am grateful for my village. you helped save me. you helped carry me through. from the bottom of my no-longer-rotting heart, thank you.

on endless chores, OR "this is it."

melby is down for a nap, so i just started doing all the things.

my house is a literal disaster zone. there are dishes in the sink and on every table. the kitchen floor is filthy. there are unpacked bags by the door, clean laundry on the dining room table, dirty laundry everywhere; seemingly every item from the bathroom cabinets is lying out on some surface, and tumbleweeds of cat hair are rolling across the floors. 

i felt overwhelmed by it all. i felt like this is all i ever do. i make food and clean and make food and clean and snug on and nurse the baby and put her to sleep in between and that is all. the days just keep passing by.

i don't mind it usually. in fact, sometimes it feels downright blissful. to just be with my girl and take care of the small immediate world around her.

but today it made me feel sick. i am tired of cleaning up, but too anxious to leave it.

i think the problem lies in my belief that life exists after all the things have been done. that once i have sorted and cleaned and fed and laundered the space around me, that then i can begin living.

but that is living.

i'm not saying that's all. i'm not saying that that's all there is to life, but rather, that the life i live exists between waking and sleep. whether i choose to do something new and wild and daring or whether i do the same millions of chores over and over, that is it. that's my life.

i have got to quit this constant waiting for the next thing, as if that's when it will all really begin.

i've literally even written these words a thousand times. and every time, i'm surprised. this is my life. it is now.

for a moment, i felt frustrated by that life, so i made a choice to stop the things that frustrated me and take a moment to draw a picture and write these words. i have agency in my own life. i can clean or not clean. i can draw or not draw. i can move or not move. i am the contractor. i put the pieces together. i am in charge.

what do i want it to look like? how do i want to feel about it?

i can do the damn dishes with joy and i could also take a carribean vacation with stress and anxiety. one situation seems naturally more appealing than the other; one is ostensibly much more of a beautiful moment than the other, but in fact it's not. what makes those moments anything at all is the energy i infuse them with. i want a life full of positive, grateful, present energy.

it doesn't mean i have to love cleaning, but it means, if i am a person, who chooses to clean super regularly, then i better darn well find a way to make it enjoyable, if i don't want my life to be shit. enjoy the cleaning. when i fail to enjoy the cleaning, stop and draw a picture. enjoy drawing the picture. when i fail to enjoy drawing the picture, do something else for goodness sake.

i don't mean follow your every stupid whim and neglect responsibility. i just mean, beth loster, this is your life. make it what you want. choose what you want. love what you do. be in charge. stop waiting. live big.

dance like no one's watching. love like you've never been hurt.

(kidding on that last part...)

i just don't want to be a miserable shit head my whole life. i don't want to miss it. i don't want to be grass is always greener. i don't want to not love this small, beautiful space i've crafted for myself.

because, as i come back to again and again and again, now i am a small person's teacher. she will learn what i show her, not what i tell her. i can say the words over and over, but unless she sees it in action, she will never believe and live it herself.

every night, i remind myself. i practice. melby wakes up, crying for snuggles and boobs. i feed her. and instead of putting her back down immediately, rushing onto the next thing, desperate for sleep, i take a moment and sink back in our fluffy chair, letting my body relax entirely, and feel her sleepy breaths on my shoulder. 

this is it, i tell myself. this is it.

this is my life. i am going to let it be good.

on fires in the mountains.

i chose not to write or draw today. 

or so i thought.

it wasn't avoidance. it wasn't a preference for something more trivial. i just chose to enjoy my life in other ways and didn't feel guilty about it. 

until, now, lying in bed. 9:35 pm, which, for anyone who knows me, is far past my bedtime, i laid in bed, my mind racing.

because i saw some translucent red shapes on a map of santa barbara, detailing the mandatory evacuation zones for the thomas fire. those shapes are so close to my parents' house, my childhood home.

when i was a kid, maybe about 8 years old, deep in my emotional turmoil i blindly named "the empty feeling," there were sometimes fires in the mountains. i remember, so distinctly, having nightmares that the fires would blaze down those mountains and engulf our house. everyone would die but me. i was so terrified of being alone. to me, the fires were going to leave me alone.

looking at a map on the internet, 25 years later, that feeling swallowed my whole body. that panicky, fearful, lonely feeling. that desperation to cling to my parents for reassurance and protection.

i immediately called my mom. it must be getting close to your bedtime, sweetheart, she says, knowing why i'm calling so late.

she tells me they were just discussing what they'd take. they have gas in the car. they're getting ready.

i feel frantic thinking about my parents outside of that house. they've lived in that house my whole life. that house feels like part of us-- my mom, puttering back and forth between the rooms, cooking things, piling things, cleaning things, nurturing a home, and my dad, carefully placed before the space heater and his computer in his office, tapping away, calculating, balancing, measuring things. that's where they belong. i panic, thinking about them having to leave, to be outside of their space and their routine. i panic, thinking about my home not being there.

and then i feel selfish, worrying about this in the microcosm. even if their house is fine, so many are not. i feel selfish, because i'm worrying about what my christmas looks like, which has taken place in the same living room with the same windows with the same purple mountains on the horizon every year since i was born. i feel selfish, because of how intent i am upon melby having that same christmas, now, her first year of life. i feel selfish for being so linear and stuck in my thinking. i have ideas and i need them to continue to look just how they have always looked, how i i expect them to continue being. my mom in her rooms. my dad with his numbers. my christmas next to those mountains. that's how it has to be.

i am holding onto it. i'm holding onto it, tight and panicked. i'm clutching it in my sweaty palm. i will not let this go. letting it go means the fires might come down the mountains and burn them up and leave me alone.

that is, truly, at 33 years old, the precise feeling i am having in bed, now at 9:47 pm. sheer terror at the idea of losing literally everything i love. that's how this makes me feel.

i keep reminding myself that they will be safe. that that is all that matters.

i don't say all these words to my mom. i don't know them yet. i just know i needed to call her and hear her voice.

i'm not afraid, she says. this whole thing is creepy, but i'm not afraid.

that voice echoes in my head as i lie in bed.

that's my mother. that's the woman, who keeps me safe.

i immediately picture this photograph that often comes to mind when i think of my mom. it's us in a pumpkin field. i am a baby. i must be 4 or 5 months old. i am curled into my mother's arms, facing her chest, just a pile of baby, totally at ease. and she is standing, squinting at the camera. she looks, to me, like everything a mother should be. what that is, i'm not quite sure. she's just... there. self-possessed. sure that i am hers. she is holding me like i'm hers. she looks not afraid.

that's the woman i feel when she says those words to me. i believe that she is not afraid.

she talks about the humanity of it all— of people helping people, of service and safety and joy amongst tragedy and fear. she finds the good in every possible situation. she is not afraid.

my own baby is just feet away from me now, sleeping. her noise machine mimics the sound of waves, almost deafeningly loudly. she is swaddled tightly and at peace. when i scoop her up, when she cries, she becomes at peace again.

i, quiet woman, 33 year old woman, adult woman in a striped holiday onesie, panicked in her bed, am that person to another living human.

i wonder, briefly, if my mother feels scared and wishes for her own mother some days. i wonder, even more largely, what it's like not to have a person, who makes you feel that way. safe. deeply grounded and safe. like their body itself is home.

i am 33 years old and i can still call my mom, not only when i am scared, but when i am scared for her, and she will reassure me.

she will say, i'm not afraid. and i will believe her wholeheartedly.

in some ways, this makes me feel totally unprepared to be a mother myself. how can i make the world feel safe for another person, when i feel so lost in it myself?

and then i think of that picture. i was so small. her arms held me so easily. she grew with me. she became the mother i needed at each step of me becoming the person i was. she heard me and held me. and she still does.

i still feel scared. i feel attached to a certain idea of home, of holidays, of safety, of certainty.

but i am also reassured that, wherever i go, i have this woman, not only to call, but in my bones. she wasn't afraid in the pumpkin patch and she's not afraid now. that's part of my make up. that person made me and grew me and heals me daily. and, in turn, it is a gift i hopefully will be able to give my own daughter. a lifetime of being held, even when she grows too big for my arms.

for now, i will hold her tight. i will acknowledge the little girl in me, who is scared. i will acknowledge the woman i am, who is capable of handling fear and uncertainty. i will say thank you for my own dear mama, who taught me that both of those things are okay and true. that is something no disaster can take away.

stay safe, southern california, landscape of my childhood and my heart. i am thinking of you.

on dancing.

so i did and thought seven thousand overwrought, complicated, neurotic things today. as usual.

but i also danced all over the house, while wearing melby and scream-singing along with full volume christmas music.

and today, instead of dwelling on all the neuroses, i'll give some credit to that dancing girl, who is also so much a part of me-- a girl with abundant energy, with silliness, with joy. that is me too.

i'll try not to forget.

on liking yourself.

today, i need your help.

but first, a backstory:

it is generally safe to say that whenever i accuse another person of doing something, it's because i am actually doing that thing myself.

for example: "she's so judgmental all the time!" (i say, standing in constant judgment of others) 

or: "they're always so negative" (i assert, always finding the negative, myself).

whether or not said person is also guilty of the accused action is irrelevant. it's not my job to police other people. i am only responsible for myself.

so earlier today, i was telling nic how much he didn't like me. i was sure he didn't like me. why didn't he like me? i was mad at him for not liking me.

i was really sure he thought i was boring, he didn't value my strengths, and he wasn't attracted to me.

we talked it through. we are good at talking through tricky things and being respectful of each other. we are good at admitting when we're wrong and making amends. we have a solid relationship that... i'm pretty sure is not founded upon one of us really disliking the other. he said, "no. you don't like yourself."

and i realized (yet again, painfully) that he is right. that is totally true. i dislike myself.

now i'll write both things. i'll write about how i'm learning to love myself, how it's growing and changing, how i'm being gentle with myself and taking care of myself. and that isn't untrue.

i will also write that i fundamentally dislike myself.

and really, both of those things are true. what i am is a girl, who learned how to hate herself, to talk about herself disparagingly, to treat herself like shit. i am also a girl, who's been actively unlearning it, getting some perspective on it. but the thing i realized today is it's all intellectual. my like for myself is cognitive, it's educated, it's a logical list of ostensibly true reasons i am likable, valuable, smart, and lovely. but what's in my bones, my synapses, my gut, that shit is toxic.

i don't know how to like myself bodily. i don't know how to feel it. i don't know how to let it be organic, the default. i don't know how to live it.

does that difference make sense? 

i feel like i'm constantly at odds with myself. instinctually treating myself/ talking about myself like shit and then actively undoing it with my brain.

it's boring.

i'm over it.

it felt really cute and romantic to hate myself when i was 16, but i am 33 and a mother now. i want to live a love for myself that my daughter can see and feel.

i'm not talking about getting pedicures and taking baths. i am not talking about some treat yo'self moments where you take time to show yourself how valuable you are, how you will make space for yourself. i'm talking about putting on leggings and a t-shirt and going to the grocery store on a tuesday and feeling secure in that woman just because of exactly who she is.

maybe that's a way too lofty goal. to just like the girl at the grocery store. but it's what i want. it's what i feel like i'm working towards.

and on some rare occasions, i feel like that person. i feel like that person when i'm helping kids figure shit out, when i'm hearing their problems and needs and i can respectfully help them navigate the world. i feel like that person when i'm dancing. i feel like that person when i'm with my bff. i feel like that person, sometimes, when i write something that's just exactly what i was thinking-- not even that it sounds good or makes any sense to anyone else, but when it's so authentically what was in my head that it feels amazing. i feel that way, sometimes, when i run. or do yoga. or go out in nature. that person is self-assured without being ostentatious, clear in her mission, open to criticism and input from others, vulnerable, and present.

sometimes i'm that person. i'm just on. it's effortless. it's not the on of a very special outfit or a very desired compliment or a very very anything. it's just me being so clearly me that it's easy. i don't have to second guess or doubt or ask for help or clarity. i just know.

so i guess my question is: when do you like yourself? how do you like yourself? what does it feel like to like yourself? what are you doing when you like yourself? do you like yourself?

i don't think you can tell me your version of self-like and i can replicate it and then magically become some integrated person, who never treats herself like shit. but i do think that the more i recognize what it looks like when other people are being authentic, the more i can recognize and BE that myself.

because it's not just about me anymore. i refuse to raise a daughter, who hates her body, criticizes others to feel better about herself, constantly needs validation, and blames others for her problems. 

i just want the girl to see herself. flaws and all. and embrace that.

certainly that's not too much to ask.

for me, or for her.

i know it in my brain. i've gotten that far. but how do i get it to sink into my body? how did you? what does it feel like, in your body, to like yourself?

on the two settings.

last night, inexplicably, melby slept for six and a half hours straight. half of those hours were during my evening awake time and 80% of the others were spent staring at her monitor, obsessing over whether or not she was breathing, because she was sleeping so much longer than she ever has before and getting what you want is really, truly terrifying. (the other 20% was “sleep,” if you can call it that.)

thus i have discerned that early motherhood consists entirely of either wishing your child would sleep or worrying they’ve died because they’ve finally gone to sleep. 

and that’s about as casual and relaxed as i am 100% of the time. 

on not rushing.

when you're pregnant, people try to prepare you for the aftermath of adding an entirely dependent human to your home by assuring you you'll have to let go of cleanliness and order. you'll need help, they say. you'll have to leave the dishes, they say. 

i heard this and, i think, internalized it as some sort of challenge. like, somehow, if i could "do it all," then i was successful. i was proving them wrong.

and i have been doing it all. but i'm doing it all by rushing. i shower and dress every day. i do the dishes and the laundry. i see people, i make food, i exercise, i write, i read, i vacuum the floors, i am on top of the grocery shopping and bills. 

i know that's no miracle. i know those things have to get done and everyone's getting them done(ish), but i have this ferocity about having everything in order all the time. in order to get it all done, i'm frantically cleaning during melby's short naps and cramming in exercises at any hands free moment and shoveling my roasted vegetables into my mouth during moments of respite. i have to do it all. because if i don't, i'm not a good mom. 

that extends to melby. i realized it yesterday. the good mom has a baby, who is happy and sleeps well. conversely, the bad mom has the baby, who cries and wakes up a lot.

i don't believe that for a single other human. i really don't. babies cry and sleep like shit. it's in their biology. but for me, that's my expectation. that's what i assume people are going around feeling about me. they see my restless, judgy, often disgruntled baby and think, beth is a bad mom.

WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH ME?

this is not going to cut it, people. life is hard enough, motherhood is hard enough, without this imaginary jury of people critiquing my every move.

my baby sleeps like shit. she sleeps like shit and yes i've tried swaddling and rocking her to sleep instead of nursing and laying her down semi-awake and keeping her room at the just perfect temperature and using gripe water and massaging her belly and sticking to a routine and reading the books and not reading the books and every other thing a person might suggest. and i end up feeling like some sort of monumental failure, because i can't coerce my 11 week old baby into sleeping well. like if i just did the perfect combination of things, if i just knew how to be a good mom, then i'd be REM cycling like a motherfucker.

but she sleeps like shit, because she is a baby and she is wired to seek comfort and security from me. she is being a baby. one magical baby sleeps 6 hours a night at 8 weeks and then everything i read tells me my baby should too and i feel like i’m monumentally fucking up motherhood, because i haven't figured out how to make that happen.

this morning, i realized, she's not ready.

i've said it to parents for years at school. they want their 3 year old to be potty-trained. three year olds are supposed to be potty-trained. but their 3 year old barely notices a toilet exists and doesn't care when they have poop in their diaper. they're just not ready, i'd say.

it's so clear when they're not yours. they will get there. they will, undoubtedly. they will not be 15 year old in pull ups. i always knew it for them.

it doesn't mean you, as a parent, don't have to do anything. you can have conversations about it. you can let them see you use the toilet, so they're comfortable with the idea. you can get them a little potty to explore. you can notice when they're peeing or pooping and help them make the connection between that feeling and the act of doing it. you scaffold, you participate, you create opportunities. but you can't MAKE anything happen.

and i realized this morning, the same is true for melby right now. she is just not ready to not sleep like shit. i hear some moms complain that they're 10 week old went from sleeping 6 hours at a time to waking up every 2-3 hours. 3 hours is a good stretch for melby. i feel like a champion when i get 3 hours of sleep. and that's okay. that's my baby. that's where we are.

I DO NOT HAVE TO RUSH MY BABY THROUGH HER LIFE.

i am saying that to my imaginary jury and myself.

melby wants to be held right now. she wants to nurse to sleep. she wants to wake up sometimes every hour and know that i am there to keep her safe. i am tired as all hell, but we will both survive. we are both right where we should be.

i have got to stop rushing. being at the next step doesn't make me better. it doesn't make her better. it doesn't mean we're good or not good. we don't get a sticker. we don't get more validation. we don't win.

this morning, it was time for nap and instead of rushing to achieve independent rest, i just held her in my arms and rocked her quietly. she was wide-eyed, staring back at me. she had the quietest smile on her face, the most trusting smile, the i'm safe smile. when melby looks at me, i see a soul a million years old. it sounds cheesy, but it feels very real. she's not a gleeful baby. she has big, beautiful smiles, but mostly she seems constantly discerning and a little dubious, like she is really assessing everything that's going on around her.

she gave me that quiet smile and then her eyes welled up with tears.

she didn't make a sound. she just looked at me, weeping a little.

i wept a little too.

it's okay to feel sad, i told her. i told myself too. being sad doesn't mean i'm a bad mom. it doesn’t mean you're a bad baby. it means we have feelings.

and eventually she fell asleep. it took a long time. i held her.

this is where we are. my baby sleeps like shit. i hold her until she falls asleep. sometimes i rush too much, but i am working on forgiving myself even that. there is no good mom. there is no bad mom. there is just now and how i choose to live it.

on crap.

today, honestly, i just feel like shit.

melby has been sleeping a small chunk at the beginning of the night (mostly while i'm still awake) and then is waking up every 45 minutes. she goes back down easily, but sleeping for maybe 30 minutes at a time really isn't resulting in my most glamorous and rested self.

i am exhausted and do not feel my usual level of rationalized hopeful.

i tried to do a small yoga flow while she napped her 25 second nap and couldn't even collect myself that long. i tried to nap during her later 30 second nap but couldn't relax.

and my solution to feeling like crap is eating crap, which in turn makes me feel and look like more crap. i feel totally out of control, depleted, and hopeless.

i am a mess, people. 

and that's all i've got today.

on celebrating mamas.

i went and visited some of my old coworkers today. everyone wanted to know how it's been going for me and melbs, and, amongst all the true things i said (mostly some variation on: holy shit), i just kept saying, i can't believe everyone, who has a kid, has done this.

and i got lots of amens.

even if it's a distant memory, every mama remembers. the beginning is crazy.

and then, i believe, it continues being crazy, just in other ways that hopefully involve a little more sleep.

but i said it again and again, and i really felt it. i felt in awe of women all over the world, who have raised small humans. i have this reverence for motherhood that i only could understand once i did it myself. and i've only just begun. 

so this is my small shout out:

mamas. mamas of newborns, mamas of multiples, mamas of preschoolers, mamas of teens or adults, who are mamas themselves, mamas of foster kids and adopted kids, mamas of anyone, anywhere,

you are a full blown miracle. i don't care if you breastfeed or use formula, cry it out or cosleep, carry your baby everywhere or leave them in the car seat, return to work or stay home. if you are doing your best and loving that little human, it is a lot. it's everything.

you are doing the most brave, terrifying, triumphant, challenging, demanding, selfless job in the world. you are doing it your way. you are doing it and i have the utmost respect for every body and heart that has been through this.

i am so grateful to be a part of the ranks with you. i am so grateful for all the mamas. this is my quiet song of praise: you are doing it. you are a miracle.

on the grit.

so last night was crazy. melby woke up about every hour and a half, and i, for whatever reason, kept waking up even in between those small stints of sleep. the cat adopted one of the christmas ornaments as a soccer ball and was running the length of the house with it throughout the night and then, around 3 am, i heard the wa wa waa waaan of muffled voices, like charlie brown's teacher had taken up residence outside our bedroom window. one of the neighbors was sitting in his car listening to talk radio at full volume with the windows down. because that made sense.

 needless, to say, i woke up less than refreshed. sometimes nighttime just feels like torture and, regardless of how tired i still am, i'm ready for it to be over so i can stop pretending i'll sleep.

i was chatting with one of the fellow new mamas from my birthing class yesterday and she said something about appreciating this “hard tired gritty season,” this crazy period of adjustment as we figure out who we are in an entirely new role that leaves us responsible for the physical and emotional growth of a whole human, while also affording us very little sleep to integrate or get any perspective on that process.

people on the other side of said gritty season tell me all the time to cherish every moment because it goes so fast! which i hear and appreciate, cognitively, but i am definitely still in the phase where it all seems so endless. 

maybe, this time, hearing it from another mom in the trenches, i actually heard it. that, yes, this will not last forever and i truly believe that at some point, i will miss waking up and patting my bundled girl on my shoulder so many times per night until her body finally relaxes into sleep. i believe i will miss that closeness, the smell of her skin, our bond, the stillness of the night, the way in which i am her whole world, her place of comfort, her everything. i do believe that.

this time is gritty. it's a lot of cold meals and clothes covered in spit up and endless laundry and piles of shit all over the house and wondering what on earth is going on/ will this ever end/ why is there so much body on my body/ where did my abs go. but, when fellow mama said those words, i was reminded of other gritty times. namely, pretty much all of my college career and post college flailings. honestly, i was drunk most of that time. i felt tremendously horrible and lost most of that time (a connection between the two?? noooooo). it was gritty af.

but now, in retrospect, i also remember it fondly. the friendships i created, the rawness with which i lived, the richness of emotion that comes with floundering so blindly: those things were powerful. and they are beautiful in memory. and sometimes, even, i do miss living that chaotic, wild, tumultuous life.

so in some ways, i have been here before. i have been in the grit and then out of it. and just like i might benevolently tell some maybe depressed twenty-something that they should cherish their blissful lostness, their period of discovery, i will also tell myself that i believe one day i will miss eating cold food and not sleeping, because my tiny girl wants me so terribly often.

because so much of what is hard in our experience is lovely when we stand and look back at it. because it shaped us. and only once we've moved through it can we understand how valuable that molding was. they are times of transformation-- so painful and seemingly impossible in the process and so tremendously cherished in hindsight.

i can't talk myself into sanity. i can't talk myself into not being tired or being comfortable with motherhood until i've simply practiced it. i can't talk myself into anything.

but i can understand that all these moments are magical. and someday i'll feel that.

there is magic in the hard, in the tired, in the grit. there is magic now.

on making memories.

today we were supposed to go to chicago to visit the german christmas market just for the day. i was beyond excited.

i wanted german beer and pretzels and a special ornament for melby. i wanted to speak my imperfect german. i wanted the big city with its bustling people and long blocks and skyscrapers. i wanted to walk from place to place, to take the train, to drink expensive coffee, to wonder at the chilly air and the deluge of christmas decorations.

we went to the airport early in the morning. yesterday the flight had 17 open seats. today, as we found out moments before it was supposed to leave, it was booked solid. we fly standby for free since nic is a pilot— a wonderful perk that also requires one to be infinitely flexible.

i am so truly bad at being flexible.

i cried a quiet, slow cry all the way to the car. i felt dumb. i felt dumb for being so excited and even dumber for being disappointed.

the world is full of tragedy, i told myself, who am i to mourn something so small and indulgent?

and the truth is, i was never really going to chicago. i would never have been going to chicago until my body was on the plane and the plane was in transit to o’hare airport. up until that moment, it was just an idea, a plan.

and i think, beyond being mildly bored— or feeling boring, more accurately— that the heartache of this unsuccessful trip laid in feeling so totally, constantly out of control.

i make plans so i feel in control. i look for patterns so i feel in control. i organize so i feel in control.

and i can make all the plans and patterns in the world but all that really exists is now. this is it.

and i somehow keep being disappointed by that.

i really, really wanted to go to chicago. but in the end, it’s not about chicago. it’s about letting go.

i will fight it at every single, fucking turn. i will fight fluidity, ease, change, spontaneity. i will try to line it all up and make it all make sense. i will try to organize my life into something i think i can control.

i can’t. i can’t control jack shit.

this is it.

i have to remind myself every single, fucking day. this is my life. i’m not waiting for it to start. my life is not getting on the plane and then my reaction to not getting on the plane. what do i want it to look like?

today it looked like a quiet cry and a small bit of self-pity. it looked like some pancakes, an early morning nap, a long talk with nic, and then beers and cards. it looked like a deliriously happy, splashy bath with melby and then an early snuggle and trip to bed for her. it looked like now, these words, a small fire in the back room, a movie to come.

it looked nothing like chicago. but it was still so lovely. and what would happen if i could just allow myself to love that? to just let it be? to stop trying to make it one thing or the next?

dear god, i’m trying. i’m trying not to try.

this is my life. it’s now.