Hang in there

A note to the me of last year

This week autumn has blown in with heavy rainfall and layers of leaves thick on the ground, dark mornings and fast fading light. I’ve felt mellow, the days feeling long - the window panes continually splattered with rain and the hallway littered with mud, sticks, soggy leaves.

Tonight, the house is quiet. The little ones are in bed and I tidy. I straighten the sofa cushions, switch on lamps, sort the leftovers into the fridge. I line up the wellies and the damp coats on the radiator. I re set. A candle is lit, mellow music plays, I exhale.

The shift in seasons this year feels acute. More noticeable than usual perhaps - it’s taking me a little while to catch up.

Over the past few months, I’ve felt a shift in my own season. The first year of babyhood for Bea is now long gone and we’ve firmly hit the toddler stage. With it a whole set of new challenges but also a relief. The fog in my mind begins to clear, no longer breastfeeding I feel a sense of self returning, full nights sleep and predictable routines brining me a sense of calm I haven’t had in a long time.

I’m tentatively taking steps to know myself better, to do the things that bring life to my bones, to be me. I read book after book and I’m sometimes scribbling words on pages and every so often I exercise. I see friends in the pub and do the odd wild river swim. Ed and I manage some date nights and for the first time in years we even had a meal with our beset friends. No children, no interruptions. Just margaritas and tacos and talking. Bliss.

A year ago me is four months post partum and we’re hitting the for month sleep regression with the baby. I have a needy 21 month old who seems to be catching every single bug going and my husband is studying vigorously for an exam, every evening and some weekends. I’m breastfeeding a tongue tied baby with allergies so every feed is painful and frustrating and I could really do with a huge bowl of Mac and cheese but not the vegan kind. A year ago me is surviving.

If I could, ’d say to her - just hang in there. Things change quickly and quietly and often unnoticeably but they do change. You’ll sleep again, and the baby will feed better and soon you won’t even crave the dairy any more. (Ok maybe that’s not fully true but you get used to it - I promise). I’d say He passes that exam and all the team work pays off, and the then toddler will suddenly become a little boy before your own eyes. I’d tell her that a year from now, the baby will be walking and sharing a room with her brother and fully weaned and whilst she’s a feisty fireball little girl - the complexities of her baby hood have gone. A year from now you’ll be writing in the evenings and you’ll mange to finish a whole book and even do some wild and brave things.

I wonder what me this time next year will say. We’ve got the rest of the leaves to fall still, and a slow winter, then beautiful spring and summer to come. We have birthdays and celebrations and days full of sunshine ahead. We’ve got people to love and new babies to meet and friends to walk alongside. We’ve got hard days and very normal days and sick days and days of  beautiful wonder. And then, the leaves once again will slowly turn golden and flaming red and will start falling. The days will dim and the window panes again will be splattered with rain. And here I’ll be. I’ll feel mellow and nostalgic and I’ll have some snippets of wisdom and some lines on my face and some more stories to tell, and I’ll say to me now - there is so much to come, and things change, quietly and often unnoticeably, but they do change. Hang in there

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