Textbook Mum
A sort-of birth story and a little bit of life lately | May 2024
Hello and happy Sunday and happy June and happy almost-summer and happy whatever-is-giving-you-life-today!
We are just back from a perfect time in France and I am very proud of my gang. Proud of my littlest guys for being the most charming travellers and my bigger guy for jumping hurdles invisible to others and my biggest guy, Paddy, for having hard and brave conversations at work to make this holiday possible.
And proud of myself. For dreaming up the whole thing, for naming my family’s needs and advocating for them and for asking my mum to come and help. Oh, and my biggest flex, for decoding French bus timetables. Goodness me.1
I have many stories, of course. But I’m going to park them for now because 1. They have not made it from my brain to the page just like my clothes have not made it from the suitcase to their respective bedrooms and 2. There’s something else I want to tell you about.
My baby turns one this month. For a whole year, I’ve been holding him close, and closer still, I’ve been holding the story of his birth. Not because it’s a particularly remarkable or interesting tale but because it was one of the most sacred moments of my life. A kindness to me that couldn’t, or maybe shouldn’t, be shared.
I still haven’t told my closest friends the full story as there isn’t much to tell. We get distracted every time I begin because there are no gripping details to hang on to–to return to after an interruption from a toddler. It was all so normal. Not perfect or painless, but entirely ordinary.
I laboured at home making dinner and preparing school lunches, counting out cash for a school trip while counting the length of contractions, and popping paracetamol while administering Calpol to a feverish two-year-old. When I later arrived at the doors of maternity, they were locked. No one could hear me buzzing and knocking and shouting. Eventually, I had to phone the booking line and tell them I was outside contracting on the pavement.
I was anxious about the midwives I had yet to meet and anxious about internal examinations I had yet to have and anxious about the body parts that had yet to heal from a previous birth and anxious they could send me back home with a false labour and diagnosis of drama queen.
But one hour later, he was here. All wide-eyed and unceremonious–as casual as can be, as if it or he were no big deal. A modest boy, begging us not to make a fuss.
Just before he finally burst into the outside world in a gush of waters and relief, leaving the safety of my bodily bubble behind, I noticed how safe I also felt. Sure, there were definitely utterances of I can’t do this and I don’t want a baby anymore. But I could have stayed there forever. Whisper-laughing with Paddy after the rising and falling surges of pain. The excited hum of sweet midwives with whom I’d connected instantly. The tender singing voice of Josh Garrels playing in our ears like a lullaby. The quiet surrender of my soul to what was coming next.
Like a twilight at the end of a long day, or the beginning of a new one. I think it was that liminal feeling of being suspended between two places or moments in time, on the precipice of something world-changing–not quite there yet but not where you once were. Where the threshold between this chapter and the next is extra thin.
Not knowing what comes next, but changed forever by the unfolding journey. A holy transition, like all of life itself.
A couple of hours later, I was stirred awake by the light touch of a midwife I didn’t recognise. She took some observations and asked questions about my birth and my bodily functions post-birth. Apparently, I did all the right things at all the right times.
“She’s a textbook mum! You’re a textbook mum!” she announced with victorious volume to whoever was conscious in the room. And then she smiled a real genuine smile, revealing the supernatural strength one must possess to be this chirpy with a stranger at 5 am. And, not for the first time that night, I thanked God for NHS midwives.
Textbook mum, I mouthed at Paddy, raising a cocky eyebrow. I felt like patting myself on the back for not being a burden, and for giving them a straightforward shift.
But after spending a day telling people we had a textbook birth and I was a textbook mum, in the safety of our bedroom where all of my honest thoughts find their way to my mouth, I had to confess what was plaguing me.
“Do you think being a textbook mum means I had an easy time?” I asked Paddy, and without giving him a chance to answer I continued, “Obviously I’m thankful everything went smoothly, but I don’t want to diminish how hard it was. It was still brutal. It was still one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I want to be a superhero mum. Why can’t every mum be a superhero mum?!”
“I think you’re a superhero mum,” he said, pulling my head into his chest.
I have waited my whole adult life to be textbook. I was an eighteen-year-old mother wearing modest dresses as an act of resistance against the trashy teen mum stereotype. In every room I walked into I felt a little on the edge. A little out of place. Too immature to relate to the married thirty-somethings in parenting groups, too weighed down by the realness of life to relate to my childless peers.
Now, a decade or so later, I’ve finally been awarded the esteemed title I longed for. And I found myself discontented–what gives?
Here’s where I’ve landed over the last twelve months. My labour and birth with Jesse was textbook. Normal, almost. Uneventful. Nothing to report home about. And isn’t that just the most enchanting thing you’ve heard today? I cannot believe I get to live in a world where such miracles are textbook. A world where the holy and human are mish-mashed together in this chaotic menagerie of beauty. What a trip. What a gift. 10/10 best textbook I’ve ever read.2
A Wee Catchup
It’s been a month full of goodness to share but I’ll try to pace myself with the photo spam 💕
I see more France stories to come in the near future so I’ll leave it there with this portrait directed and captured by my ten-year-old on an ice-cream date. Just the two of us❤️
May favourites:
I didn’t absolutely adore some of this month’s books so I won’t bother sharing those, but I did find a Taylor Jenkins Reid I hadn’t read and as per usual, loved it. And the latest from Emily Henry has been a perfect holiday read (even at home when I just need to take my brain off on holiday to a shimmering romcom world).
I had to sit down for a good guttural sob after reading this masterful essay from Sonya Spillmann. And just when I thought she couldn’t wreck me anymore, she only went and published this piece yesterday and I think it’s a word for all of us. “maybe the healthiest thing we can do for ourselves, and for those we love, is to take some time and instead of filling ourselves up, we empty out.” I took a writing workshop with Sonya this month and she introduced us to Sarah M.Wells and I’m absolutely livid I spent 29 years of my life missing out on her work. Time to catch up and gobble every word.
Also, this delight from Katie Blackburn—such a treasure.
Shameless Plugs:
Honoured to have this freewrite shared on the Coffee + Crumbs Instagram page. It’s a love letter to every woman I know and I couldn’t think of a more perfect home for it.
This reel I posted on my personal Instagram is very out of character for me but the final two seconds of the video perfectly encapsulate my personality and priorities. Right on brand. I won’t lie, I had the time of my life making and writing this. 👇
Sending you lots of love and tight squeezes from the in-between,
Reb x
Google translate ‘casse-couille’ for an accurate insight into the whole debacle 👀
At the risk of over-spiritualising or going all woo-woo on you, I need you to know I spent the whole of my first labour thinking WTF WTF WTF and the whole of my second labour thinking can anyone else see that the bottom half of my body is on fire. Just, FYI.
Reb, this was a JOY to read! I absolutely love you voice ❤️
As always, lovely words! Thanks for sharing your birth story and thoughts. Birthing has so many conflicting emotions! There are all the things we are "supposed" to feel and then all the things we actually feel but don't realize until we've had a moment in the chaos to think through them! Love how you portrayed that.❤️