Badges - UrbanMoms

I remember when I was pregnant with my first child, bemoaning the newly-minted stretch marks on my belly. My chiropractor, a woman about 10 years my senior and a mom of 2 herself, gave me some good advice. She advised me not to view the long, pink lines as scars marring my body, but rather as badges of motherhood, to be worn proudly as reminders of this remarkable and transformative stage of my life. I thanked her, and while I liked the idea, I didn’t really fully appreciate the meaning of her sentiment.

But now that my baby-bearing days are behind me; as my children grow up and enter adolescence; as my body enters a new stage of changes; I find a new measure of meaning and comfort in her words. As a young, idealistic woman on the brink of bearing my first child, I had no idea what was in store for me. But looking back more than a decade later, I see how motherhood completely transformed me. Becoming a mother re-wired everything about my self-image. It’s not like I didn’t recognize myself after giving birth, but the experiences of motherhood have slowly and inexorably written themselves on my psyche more indelibly than any stretch marks on my abdomen.

Today my oldest graduated from the Red Cross Babysitter’s course – which somehow seems like more of a milestone to me than her attendance at middle school. There’s something about the thought of her being responsible for other, younger children that feels so…grown up.

Today I also received an email from a good friend. An email that brought a tear to my eye. One of the sentiments that touched me was this quotation:

I am so blessed to have lived long enough to have my hair turning gray, and to have my youthful laughs be forever etched into deep grooves on my face.
So many have never laughed, and so many have died before their hair could turn silver.
As you get older, it is easier to be positive. You care less about what other people think. I don’t question myself anymore. I’ve even earned the right to be wrong.

Sure, it may be sappy, and maybe on any other day I would have just read it and deleted it. But today…today that email touched a chord.

There are days when I look at my growing children and they remind me of my own years. Days when I peer closely in the mirror and wonder: who is that woman with the grey hairs, smile lines and puffy eyes? Nights when I wake sweating despite the practically sub-zero bedroom temperature. I know these are all signs that I am growing older, but I’ve chosen not to fight them (well, okay…I do dye my hair…). Instead, I welcome them like the anonymous author above, not as signs of signs of decline, but much like the stretch marks of my pregnancies, as badges of experience.

Comments

Jen says

January 10, 2011 at 2:46 pm

Love the email from your friend. What a fabulous perspective. I wonder if this can only come with age? I am trying hard to accept and love myself as I enter my 40s because I want to relish it all.
Oh, and the night sweats? Ugh.
Tracey says

January 9, 2011 at 4:38 pm

Oh Kath, I feel you. Really. Each time I wake, drenched from the night-sweats, I think the very same: my body is changing. I am changing.
But I don’t really worry about getting older – I actually kind of like the process. Maybe because I feel like I’m still in relatively good shape… but I feel the slippery slope. Things change more quickly now… but it’s all good. I figure by the time I’m 50, ain’t nobody gonna tell me nuthin’ ever again, you dig?
I can’t wait until we meet, Sugar… xox