1. Mom Body
I’m 13+ months out from giving birth to my first child. The other day, I stretched my legs a little too hard thinking, “why is this leg not stretching further,” so I pushed my knee a liiittle bit straighter and POP! I reinjured my left hamstring that I’ve waited for years to heal. I do yoga at home, because I’m stuck with the same postpartum fear (which is unreasonable at this point) that I’ll queef in front of a class, and my hips scream at me like they’re someone else’s. I always had flexible hips. I took pride in it. I used to love yoga because it came easy to me — I mean, at least the stretching parts.
Prior to my own birthing experience, a close friend confided her story of bodily change — and how she couldn’t move the same way — but there was no way for me to imagine what it would actually feel like.
Now, things are different.
For nine months my body shifted and expanded and sent out all kinds of hormones and little neuropathic messages like my brain playing telephone with my ligaments day after day to incrementally transform my bones so a little bitty human could arrive in this world.
And then, at 41 weeks, I stretched and tore and received the ancient wounding of life.
Like the rest of all mothers who have ever given birth, this is not new. This transformation of body and being is as old as time.
I was talking to a friend the other day about how much our bodies change after giving birth and breastfeeding. My friend said to me, “it makes me sad how my boobs are so different” (referring to post-breastfeeding). I said “I know!” I turned around to face away from her husband who walked in front of us, and I reached for my boobs to show how I pulled them up from the top where my nipples would aim a little higher, like a facelift. “Just the other day I stood in front of the mirror and pulled them up like this,” I said with a pouty face. “Makes me sad too.”
We both laughed.
For me and many mothers, we have felt the shift to parenthood entirely with our bodies (brains included). It’s like we’re not the actor in the transformation. Something else, life itself, is acting upon us. Our entire beings are taken over, consumed, transformed, and sometimes, rewritten.
And we learn to give in to it all. To receive it all.
When we give birth, we learn to let go. We learn we aren’t in control at all, and sometimes that’s the most painful part. Our bodies remind us of that over and over again. When we do yoga, when we put on a bra, when we run… or choose to walk.
The bodily changes were what I was most afraid of pre-pregnancy. I wasn’t quite ready to sign a waiver and let go of what I thought were the good things… like killer flexibility, thanks to my gymnast mom, and perky boobs (maybe also thanks to my mom). But maybe what I couldn’t anticipate the most was the way giving birth is much less of doing, and much more receiving. Yes, our bodies DO these increidble things like give birth. But really, it’s supernatural. It’s life happening to us. With(in) us. Beyond us. And the gift of motherhood is learning to let go.
When we accept, let go, and receive this new life — like the spiritual journey — we mothers are also like the child.
We get to learn things as though for the first time, like how to walk, how to do yoga and kegels, and how to feel sexy in used skin.
Now, I have this little almost 14-month-old who is learning how to walk.
She’s taking it slowly, one tentative step at a time, always with a big grin.
She reminds me that maybe I can wear the same knowing smile, having received the transformation as old as time, and enjoy the mother’s journey of learning to walk again, too.