Still Me, Being Mommy
Image courtesy of the author.
Growing up I thought that when one became a mommy she would stop caring about her look; I mean, you have your life all figured out, so why on earth would your looks be important anymore? I remember I asked my mom once if she still attempted to look good at her age. She was as old as 35 then. What an innocent little girl I was! Being a young 32-year-old mommy today, I finally see it differently. I SURE DO CARE ABOUT MY LOOK!
Besides growing up, two core realizations led me to this conclusion.
I am a mommy every minute of my life and will be to the end. I am a mommy when my baby boy wakes up at 6:oo a.m. and goes to sleep at 7:00 p.m.; I am a mommy when I watch out for my baby boy to not fall down when learning how to stably stand up; I am a mommy when my heart skips a beat because my baby boy eats a piece of food that could make him (goodness no!) choke; I am a mommy when I assess infinite factors to understand my baby boy’s cry. These are situations in which you obviously can’t ignore your mommy role, but I am also a mommy when my baby boy is away with the nanny or when he is asleep two rooms away from me. I am a mommy when I am at work, out with my girlfriends, or when I drive off to a romantic weekend with my husband. So, if this status is here to stay (and it is fantastic, btw), I might as well decide how I want to live it best.
“I need to remind myself of this and insist upon it – to myself, to my beloved husband, and to my cute son: I have my own needs to honor and respect, I will keep making my own decisions to satisfy my own wishes”
I am an independent person. Holding this understanding of independence doesn’t make me less of a mommy; on the contrary, it only makes me a better one. Yes, my baby boy turned me into an ‘always and forever mommy’ but I still have myself to care about. And now, more than ever, I need to remind myself of this and insist upon it – to myself, to my beloved husband, and to my cute son: I have my own needs to honor and respect, I will keep making my own decisions to satisfy my own wishes, I still aspire to and seek fulfillment, I appreciate myself for my achievements, and I do what I need to do for my own well-being. Getting back into my pre-mommy sizes and wearing pieces that I feel comfortable with derive directly from this understanding.
There is a huge question that one starts asking themselves when their baby first spits up on their favorite t-shirt: should I walk around before and after work with my M.M. Lafleur office outfits and keep wearing my high-quality Anthropologie jumpsuits on weekends, or should I divest myself from any luxury item when in my house, within my baby’s reach? It’s actually quite a hard question to answer and you can find yourself asking it again and again, providing a different answer each time. Based on the two factors mentioned above — that this status is here to stay and hey, I am important here — I decided that I am choosing to keep my quality clothes in place, wearing whatever feels and looks good according to me (and yes, doing some more laundry than I used to, although my husband does that).
“Should I divest myself from any luxury item when in my house, within my baby’s reach?”
Collage: Laura Snelgrove
What I put on my body helps me define myself every day, helps me connect to who I am and what I feel, allows me to recognize my desires for the day and to see my goals for the future before me. In sum, although there could be times when what I wear gains less importance, for the moment I prefer not giving up the values and significance that my dress provides me with.
My baby boy hugs my lululemon tops with his cute little yogurt filled hands, steps on my Cos trousers with his chubby-dirty crawling knees, and kisses my Massimo Dutti blouses with masses of the spit drawing from his growing new teeth. And I feel awesome. This is exactly me, being a mommy.
After making it all sound so sexy and utopian, I feel the need to emphasize that adopting the ‘same me as mommy’ state of mind is not entirely simple, and that it’s fully understandable and acceptable to choose differently. It’s probably worth mentioning that I don’t live the perfect life that allows me to effortlessly choose this for myself, yet I still find it possible. I live thousands of miles away from my baby boy’s grandparents, my beloved laundryman-husband and I work full time jobs (if not double-time given our bosses’ expectations), my nanny works just 16 hours a week, and our home is a one-bedroom apartment which hadn’t all of a sudden expanded its configuration to meet the new COVID circumstances.
What I am capable of, any mother probably is. I truly believe that it’s mostly about wanting to think and behave in a ‘same me, as mommy’ way. Having assistance and being surrounded by an uplifting environment obviously makes it easier, but the lack of these should not be a dealbreaker.
