Self-discovery in motherhood is so important because we undergo so many changes.
But so often, we feel lost in our new responsibilities and completely lose track of who we are.
That’s why being intentional about the strategies I’m sharing here for embracing your new identity becomes even more critical.
In this episode, we're talking about:
No matter who you are, what you've been through, the physical changes, the emotional shifts, the shifts in your priority, the changes in your identity, the relationship changes, sleep deprivation, time constraints, career adjustments, the responsibility, the learning curve– all of those things are happening to you regardless of how many kids you have, and you have to give yourself time and attention to move through those and navigate and explore what works for you and what doesn't.
So embrace this evolution and use this episode to guide yourself or the clients you serve through this journey with grace and self-compassion.
Feeling inspired and ready to learn more about how you can actively revolutionize postpartum care?
Self-discovery in motherhood is so important because we undergo so many changes.
But so often, we feel lost in our new responsibilities and completely lose track of who we are.
That’s why being intentional about the strategies I’m sharing here for embracing your new identity becomes even more critical.
In this episode, we're talking about:
No matter who you are, what you've been through, the physical changes, the emotional shifts, the shifts in your priority, the changes in your identity, the relationship changes, sleep deprivation, time constraints, career adjustments, the responsibility, the learning curve– all of those things are happening to you regardless of how many kids you have, and you have to give yourself time and attention to move through those and navigate and explore what works for you and what doesn't.
So embrace this evolution and use this episode to guide yourself or the clients you serve through this journey with grace and self-compassion.
Feeling inspired and ready to learn more about how you can actively revolutionize postpartum care?
Read the transcript of this episode:
Depression, anxiety, and autoimmune symptoms after birth is not how it's supposed to be. There is a much better way, and I'm here to show you how to do just that. Hey, my friend, I'm Maranda Bower, a mother to four kids and a biology student turned scientist obsessed with changing the world through postpartum care. Join us as we talk to mothers and the providers who serve them and getting evidence-based information that actually supports the mind, body, and soul in the years after birth.
Welcome back to another episode of Postpartum University Podcast, and today we are delving into a topic that resonates with so many of our listeners, and it's the journey of rediscovering yourself and motherhood.
We all know motherhood is a transformative experience that brings this immense joy, but it also comes with challenges that can sometimes make you feel like you've lost your mind, like you've lost yourself, and today we're going to explore the importance of self-discovery, share some practical tips, including my own journey after having kids and how I had to reevaluate every part of my life, including my business, after having a new kid.
So, after four kids and working with hundreds of mothers, I feel like I have this journey of rediscovering over and over and over again myself, and I can really speak to this topic in depth.
Becoming a mother is a beautiful and life-altering experience. It brings with it a cascade of changes, right, both physically, emotionally, mentally and many of us find ourselves caught up in this whirlwind of caring for our little ones and often forgetting to take a moment for ourselves, or simply not necessarily forgetting, wanting, needing, but feeling unable to do so.
And that self-care, that ability to kind of look in to see what's going on and understand these changes are not something that comes easy.
It's crucial to acknowledge these changes and understand the impact that they have on our sense of self, but also to realize how difficult it is to navigate those things.
And I really want to dive into what these profound changes are, that kind of accompanying motherhood, because, although we might be feeling it, although we might know it in the depths of our beings, bringing it to words is another way of understanding that many of us don't get the privilege to experience.
I know for myself I didn't. I had no earthly idea what the changes were that were happening within me, even though I could tell you some of the changes, especially the physical ones. Right, our bodies change and we understand this.
There's so much that's happening our weight gain our skin, our hair changes, the hormonal fluctuations, the alterations in our body shape, our physicality, our strength.
We understand those kinds of things and we can kind of name them, but some of the other ones we don't really talk about as much. There's emotional shifts.
Motherhood often triggers this roller coaster of emotions and these heightened feelings of joy and love, but also protectiveness and anxiety and guilt and sometimes even depression. And we have a shift in priorities.
We have a new baby and that often leads to this recalibration of what's important to us, and what was once very important is something that maybe we don't even get to do or be or say or anything.
Mothers find themselves in a place of needing their children to be at the forefront, and that is often at the expense of their own personal pursuits.
We have this change in identity. Right, the role of a mother can be all-encompassing, as we know, but it leads to these shifts in who we are, and this is not something that could ever really change, like it's inevitable. It's going to happen and oftentimes it comes with challenges.
How do we reconcile our pre-motherhood identity with these new roles and these new responsibilities as a mother?
It doesn't mean that this happens only that one time, when you first have your baby or your first kid. It also happens when you have your second or your third. We often hear like, okay, I love my child so much I just don't know how I'm going to have the capacity to love another human being.
This was me after my pregnancy with my second. How do you fit another child into that? And that got easier with a third. But the question came up again when I had my fourth.
It's constantly shifting and changing and of course. Of course there's alterations in our relationships changes especially with our partner, but also the relationships with our parents. They evolve, they change, things get redirected, our attention gets redirected in. That shifts things so much.
We have time constraints, sleep deprivation, career adjustments, increased responsibility and it's hard. We have a huge learning curve too.
I know, okay, I was in the field of childhood education, so I was a preschool teacher for 14 years before I started doing this work, before I started supporting mothers and doing the work that I'm doing now 14 years. I started when I was 15 years old and I worked at the childcare center and it was amazing.
It was such a beautiful experience. I learned so much of what it means to nurture and raise a child and I took all of the classes. I was in university classes.
I was actually the childcare center was at a university, so it was like very heavily focused on education and just raising these children in such a way to support their emotional and physical and their overall wellbeing.
I thought, man, it's gonna be so easy for me to be a mom because I have all of this experience. I think it was right around the 10 or 11-year mark when I got pregnant with my first and I was like, oh, this is gonna be easy. I have been a teacher to 18 months, to four-year-olds for so, so long.
This is gonna be easy because I got it, I know. Let me tell you I did not know I had no earthly idea that learning curve was so significant, not only because I didn't have experience with the newborn phase, but you know, and also breastfeeding, and there's this whole other component, this challenge of like I don't give this kid up at the end of the day, my responsibilities continue throughout the night, 24, seven, and there are so many different aspects that we have to navigate that I didn't even know existed, as a teacher who had done this for so many years.
So the learning curve is significant and I couldn't even imagine what that would be like for somebody who doesn't have that experience.
I mean, how many of us have never been around babies and children or have witnessed breastfeeding? That is not something our society shows.
We legit hide breastfeeding women behind blankets and, you know, cover-ups right, like that's not something that's normally a part of our lives.
When we have babies and our friends have babies, oftentimes they shut themselves out or they go find other means to interact and engage, and so, if we don't have children ourselves, it's not something that we get to witness, to see.
So the learning curve in itself is so significant. And so, anyway, these changes, they're transformative, but they're also presenting challenges for moms as they navigate all of these new roles in these new changes.
That is such a critical component putting words to these changes helps us understand what's transpiring so that we can begin the process of rediscovering ourselves in motherhood.
I remember so often the need for self-discovery happening around that two to three-year mark. It kind of felt like it was happening, you know, right around six to eight months and then it would hit super hard for me at the two to three year mark.
I noticed this with my clients. They would come to me most of them in that period, that timeframe, where they were so deep in the throes of early motherhood that they didn't have time to put towards these things, they didn't have time to kind of evaluate oh, what's changes?
I mean, you're so busy doing the motherhood thing that when your baby becomes a toddler and there's like this little bit more independence associated with them and that gives you this space to kind of step back just a little bit and realize like, oh my gosh, what just happened to me?
Where am I?
Who am I?
What is going on here?
What's happening in my body?
I don't recognize myself anymore.
You've had this opportunity to step back from the depths of motherhood and constant engagement to kind of really assess where you are.
Oftentimes it feels scary because you have no idea who you are. You have no idea how you got to where you are in the first place.
After my first baby, this started right around the six-month mark is right. When I became a single mom I didn't know what the heck to do or where to go, and in that, I remember realizing that I didn't have a clue who I was anymore.
I felt so lost lost in my own body, lost in my mind.
Motherhood had challenged so much of what I believed in, like the very definitions of words changed, like what it meant to have a family and what it meant to love, what it meant to be a mother.
My whole world was changed, and I didn't have the time to figure it out, to navigate the changes, and I didn't know where to begin.
Nobody was talking about this so many years ago, and rediscovering ourselves is so very important.
As moms, we play the central role in our families and our well-being significantly influences the dynamics at home, embracing our personal identity not only contributes to our happiness, but also positively impacts the ability to be present and to be nurturing mothers, or to be the mother that we want to be.
So I really want to share some practical tips to help you rediscover yourself or help your clients rediscover themselves amidst all of these responsibilities and all of the changes that are occurring in motherhood.
Become a postpartum university professional. Our evidence-based trainings, guides, downloads, tools and community membership is now open for applications. Join us as we learn, connect and implement better care practices for ourselves and for our clients we serve. You can learn more at postpartumU, the letter U dot com slash membership.
First and foremost is finding time for this self-reflection, continually engaging in reflection through practices like journaling.
It doesn't mean that you have to sit for 30 straight minutes with a journal, a pen, and paper in hand.
You can take five minutes and ask yourself questions about
5 Questions to Ask to Rediscover Yourself in Motherhood
Maybe it's just my baby smiling at me, right? Or maybe it's being able to sleep for two solid hours straight without interruption.
Write those things down, even if they sound silly, and I find that this is an evolving process.
As you explore and rediscover yourself, set realistic goals. So one of the things that I love to do when I was in the self-discovery process and I've been in this space so many times, so often, every single time, I've had a kid especially, sometimes multiple times, and sometimes it was just like I have to start with the things that I know need to will be able to bring me joy, for example, like journaling.
Right, that's a self-reflection practice and I didn't know what I was going to do or what I was going to journal about.
But I know that if I set the goal of spending 10 minutes a day journaling or five minutes a day journaling, then that was going to help me get out of this slump or understand who I am or rediscover myself again.
And so I would set these realistic goals for myself.
The other thing I did with these goals was prioritize self-care. I made those my goals.
So mindful reflection, like journaling, setting realistic goals, and then, of course, prioritizing self-care.
3 Steps to Rediscovering Yourself in Motherhood
That was like the emotional, the physical, the mental well-being, and so starting oftentimes with like those very basic things of I have to eat.
Well, how can I do that? I maybe a little bit of exercise, or movement.
Not even like exercise for me is always felt like an awful word. Sometimes I just love the word movement, like I love to move my body, and that always has felt so much better for me and maybe for you as well. So how can you have that movement in your body?
That's something you can use with your children, be with your children. Maybe it's going on a walk with your baby in a carrier.
Maybe it's doing stretches and yoga on a mat with your baby next to you. Toddlers love things like this. They are so engaged.
One of the things that we got a long time ago I don't even remember at what kid age it was, but it was like these little mindful yoga poses and they're like a bunch of cards and each card has a little yoga pose and the name and you have to like do the yoga pose, and so we would always do these things.
It was so much fun for my kids they would yearn for it. They would ask can we do our yoga cards today?
That would be something that I could use as kind of my excuse to get into the state of movement, and that was a goal that I would have for myself a couple of times a week to make sure that I was engaging in that.
Make sure that I was eating well. Setting those realistic goals for myself is part of the process of self-discovery, because if you're not taking care of yourself, it's going to be so, so difficult to find yourself right, and those are like the best of the things and also like finding things that will help bring calmness and relaxation to you.
I think this is probably the hardest part of that self-discovery because it's like what do I love?
Because oftentimes maybe you've had hobbies in the past, before children, that you absolutely loved, and now the thought of them is like that's not what I want in my life. Or maybe you do, but engaging in them feels so impossible because you have a kid.
Maybe you love to play tennis and it requires so much practice and then you would have to leave to. I've never played tennis, but I know lots of people do. Maybe you had to leave. Your house is like 45 minutes away from a court and it takes a good solid hour to two to play a game, and then you just don't have childcare for that long, or you can't because you're breastfeeding and there's not really a place to pump.
Whatever the case may be right, it just feels so impossible for you to engage in those things, and I think that's where the exploration happens.
So when I was in my journey and this is something that I recommend to all of my clients it's really going back to what feels doable from what you used to love. Maybe it was photography.
Maybe you love painting or drawing or doodling or whatever the case may be, whatever activity, or hobby that you loved.
Maybe it was wood carving, maybe it was playing with trains like we have our things.
There's so many different ways in which we can involve ourselves in a hobby, and sometimes it's a matter of going back to discover okay, what are the things that I used to love that maybe I don't feel so excited about, and what are some other things that maybe I would feel excited about?
What are some new things? Maybe I want to take pottery as a class.
Maybe I want to take up painting or sewing, or maybe I want to learn how to knit or cross stitch, like what kind of things sound exciting to you?
Start there, and even if something doesn't sound exciting, maybe you used to love, maybe nothing sounds exciting.
This was me, because I was in the depths of postpartum depression.
Nothing felt exciting, I had no idea who I was, and so I had to just start with something.
And then I remember, specifically I started with painting and I had bought a bunch of paints and I was like I am just going to paint.
I'm just going to, like legit, throw paint on paper and put my brush to it and just like, feel how it is moving. I'm not going to make shapes, I'm not going to make patterns, I'm just going to, like, move the brush and I'm going to notice how I feel, I'm going to pay attention to this moment and how I feel in it.
Does it spark anything for me? Does it sound exciting?
As I'm moving through and I would treat this like a science experiment y'all I would legit be like okay, does this work for me?
No, I don't really feel anything about this. It's not really exciting. I feel bored, I don't want to do this, and I would cross it off my list.
Then, the next time that I would have a moment to engage, I would be like okay, what's next for me?
What else do I want to explore? How about candle making, or whatever? I would go and do that thing and be like, oh, do I like this? Does it feel good?
Yes, no, then I would cross it off my list. If it was a no, and if it was a yes, then I would do it again.
Maybe I found something, and maybe that finding something will lead you to the next thing. I always love this, especially when other people are around.
One of the things that I highly recommend here, too, is connecting with others. How can you create a supportive network of friends and moms who share similar experiences?
There's fit for moms. There's a group that you can meet here locally. We have a mom's hiking group. You can go every week. They have a little hiking spot.
It's usually fairly easy. Everybody brings their kids and you can connect with other people.
Sometimes that spurs some relationships that would bring you to new opportunities and help you figure out okay, what is it that I love again, what do I want to do? How do I do this? Again, all of those things are so necessary.
We've got that mindful reflection and journaling, setting realistic goals, prioritizing your self-care, exploring new hobbies, and connecting with others.
There's one more that I find that is so incredibly important, and that is establishing boundaries.
Clearly define and communicate what it is that you want or need and your roles as a mother and as an individual. There are.
I'm gonna say it for everyone here, and I'm gonna say it for me too, because I often need to hear this it is impossible for you to do it all and thrive. It will not happen.
If you tried to do everything, you will flounder, you will flop, you will fall, you would. You're not going to make it. You might make it for a short period of time before you crumble, but you're always gonna crumble.
So delegate tasks, seek support, hire people if you have the privilege to do so, whether that's a postpartum doula or somebody to clean your house or a meal service. Whatever the case is, figure out how you can delegate those tasks to your partner, to somebody you hire, to a friend, whatever somebody to walk your dogs, I don't care what it is.
Whatever you're struggling with, you need to find something to help you remove it from yourself, or figure out another way to do it.
Be really clear about establishing your boundaries. And again, if you're like I don't even know what my boundary should be because I am so lost in this life, I'm going to tell you treat it like a science experiment.
If you despise doing laundry, how can you figure out a different solution? Maybe you're not folding your clothes anymore. Maybe you're doing the wash, you're doing the dry and you're grabbing up everything and you're just throwing it in a drawer and calling it good.
This works really well. I have four kids. This is how we manage, unless it's some nice thing that needs to be hung up, I don't worry about it.
It's not a big deal and wrinkles aren't an issue. It doesn't last in the drawer as long enough to establish wrinkles.
So what are we doing? Spending all of our time focused on folding our clothes, which is kind of crazy, because now my 10-year-old is like I want to fold my clothes, I want my drawers to look nice and organized, and so eventually there comes a time when it becomes important and they want to do that and I have the bandwidth to help her.
Now, whereas before it wasn't a thing and I've shared in multiple episodes there are times where I need somebody to come in and clean my house.
I have a friend who has, like, she had this huge room, a craft room, but it was so overwhelming and she needed to take care of it.
She couldn't even get into it and she wanted to start this process of self-discovery and she didn't know what to do and she couldn't hire somebody because it wasn't something that was in the budget. She couldn't afford that. So she gathered a friend like she said okay, I need you. What if you come over?
I cook a meal, maybe we have wine, maybe we just sit around and listen to music and maybe we can tackle this together.
And the friend was like, oh my gosh, yes, and they actually switched.
So the other gal had the same issue with her kitchen and her pantry and she was like, well, if I do this with you, you want to come over to my house and do it with me because that was so much fun?
And they were like, yes, kids can be involved, throw in a movie if you want. No guilt there. That's another thing.
We feel so guilty all the time for not being able to do it all and I'm telling you it's completely impossible.
So let's stop trying to burn ourselves out, stop trying to do it all and get the support that we so truly need so that we can do this rediscovery.
Because no matter who you are, no matter what you've been through, the physical changes, the emotional shifts, the shifts in your priority, the changes in your identity, the relationship changes, sleep deprivation, time constraints, career adjustments, the responsibility, the learning curve all of those things are happening to you, no matter who you are, no matter how many kids you have, and you have to give yourself time and attention to move through those and navigate and explore what works for you and what doesn't.
So embrace this evolution and understand that it's impossible to do it without support. So let's not feel guilty for it, because it's everything, it's everyone and this is just the way it is.
So let's move on. Let's move forward and take care of ourselves.
I am so, so appreciative of you joining me here today and, if you loved this episode, please subscribe and leave a review.
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In our next episode I have some incredible things coming your way, so stay tuned. I can't wait to share it with you.
I am so grateful you turned into the Postpartum University podcast. We hope you enjoyed this episode enough to leave us a quick review and, more importantly, I hope more than ever that you take what you've learned here, apply it to your own life, and consider joining us in the Postpartum University membership. It's a private space where mothers and providers learn the real truth and the real tools needed to heal in the years to come and the real tools needed to heal in the years Postpartum. You can learn more at www.postpartumu. That's the letter U.com. We'll see you next week.