We listen and we don’t judge.
I judged.
Oh boy, did I judge.
We all do.
Some of us are just better at the listening.
And some of us are just better at keeping our thoughts to ourselves.
Not to get all biblical on you, but:
Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?
Boy, do I have planks in my eyes.
The judgement I passed on the co-sleepers, the kids in wellies and woolly hats in peak summer, the mums letting their kids run wild in the aisles… it’s all coming back to bite me in the ass.
They warn you about the second child.
The first lures you into thinking you’re an excellent parent, nailing it on all fronts.
The second is a plank to the head.
A woman this week described them as a bulldozer, leaving havoc in their wake.
On top of the bags under my eyes, I now have bite marks, battle scars from lost battles, and a crick in my neck from co-sleeping.
What motherhood has taught me:
That you don’t know someone’s story until you’re living it.
So now I listen.
And I try very hard not to judge.
(I still judge. But quieter.)
That I owe a lot of women an apology.
To the mum in the wellies-in-July aisle: I see you now.
Your kid wanted the wellies. You wanted to get out of the house.
You won.
That tired and happy can share a body.
I started late: first baby at 37, second at 39.
My bones ache in ways I never knew.
My heart is full, but my cup is running empty.
I’m old. They’re young.
Everything is new to them, so everything is new to me again.
The joy of a passing tractor.
The wonder of the world around them.
The utter frustration of the wrong cup.
These beasts are not to be rationalised with. The goal is containment and corralling, in the hope of exhaustion before a timely bedtime.
That the plank was always there.
It just took a bulldozer to knock it loose.
So we go again, hoping the energy of their youth will carry us through and the wisdom of my years will keep us all alive until bedtime.
Leave a Reply