When You Really Don't Want To Be A Mom

A couple years ago, I was going through a writing course as I began to write my story. I have a folder full of stories that I wrote, and never shared with the world - they were just for me. For my own healing.

But as I go through them, I’ve realized that some of them need to be shared. Because when you are going through postpartum depression, you feel so alone in your pain.

You think there’s something wrong with you because you don’t feel the love and joy that you thought you would feel as a mom - and thinking that there’s something wrong with you leads you to that spin of not knowing what to change or if you even can. Which is a complete and total lie.

So this post is for you - the mom who doesn’t want to be a mom, and wants to know what to do to love her life again.

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Sometimes I just really don’t want to be a mom.

And not like, I’m just tired of motherhood. But like I really don’t want to be a mom anymore.

I want to just rewind the years, and remake that decision somehow. To somehow not fall in love with my husband. To change the course of my life right in that moment – no wedding day, no babies.

This is something that I don’t share lightly.

Have I told anyone this?

I’ve said so to my husband, but I think he just brushes it off as me in the heat of the moment. The emotions rushing high, words said that aren’t meant.

And maybe this is just that thought error, the thought from my depression that seems to play on repeat. Like a stuck record. Life goes on, but then it comes back to this same thought again.

I really don’t want to be a mom.

I wonder, do any other moms feel this way?

Am I the only one?

I wonder if it’s because of my depression that I have these thoughts – are they normal or is this another relapse?

I’ve always thought that I’m not as happy as I should be in motherhood, partly because of the depression but partly because of these times when I just don’t want to be a mom.

When I feel like I could happily become a non-mom again and life would be amazing.

At which point I always feel the need to insert “but YES I LOVE my kids. I wouldn’t trade them for anything. I know if they weren’t here I would be pining for them.”

Why the need for the qualifiers?

I feel less than.

I feel that my love is somehow flawed. Not enough.

That I don’t love my kids as much as other moms love theirs.

And when I think these thoughts and feel these feelings, I proceed to prove them true.

I don’t act like a loving mom, snarling when the office door gets flung open in the middle of my writing.

I don’t treat my kids with patience or with love as they fight over legos.

I cut myself off from them, distancing myself in mind, in heart, in body.

I sulk in the kitchen, doing yet another mindless task. Blocking my heart from the pain that I’m creating for myself with these thoughts.

I resist the hurt. The hurt of denying myself the love of my children, the love of myself.

I use these thoughts against me, to spin in them and prove how bad of a mom I am.

Somehow it turns from I don’t want to be a mom, to I don’t deserve to be a mom.

To my kids would be better off without me.

The same story, told again and again.

Becoming an ingrained path in my brain, one that is so easy to follow.

So again, I remind myself – thoughts are simply sentences in your brain. Neither true nor false. Simply a sentence that your brain is offering you because it’s the easiest one. One that you can choose to believe or to let go of.

And with this reminder, I feel the load lift.

My shoulders feel lighter, removing the slump in them. The weight that was on my chest begins to lighten and I can breathe deeper again.

That fog that came over my brain begins to thin, and I begin to think clearly again.

Yes, sometimes I am a mom that doesn’t want to be a mom.

But can I love myself through these thoughts anyway?

Can I recognize that these thoughts are also just thoughts, and even though I sometimes choose to believe them, they don’t mean anything about me?

Can I see that I am still worthy of my love, of my children’s love?

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Can you see that you are still worthy of your love, of your children’s love?

Accepting and receiving love is one of the most challenging things we do in our life - which, if you look at it logically seems kind of silly, no? Like who wouldn’t want more love in their life?

But the truth is that it can feel like a very scary and vulnerable place to be - especially for those of us with an insecure attachment style. It’s something that we want most, and yet we feel afraid to open ourselves up to it because of what might happen after.

The biggest thing that I want you to walk away from this blog post with, is knowing that you are not alone and that there are things you can do to become the mom you always thought you would be. This is what I help you do inside of Operation: Happy Mom, and you can join the group of incredible moms doing this work right here.

Choosing To See Magic

Before you become a mom, there are ideas of how it will be. You think of the magic, the love; how incredible it will be to hold your own child. There is wondering of how it will go, but you don’t know what you don’t know, and the fear isn’t so big. You dream of the day that baby is born, of the day that baby will smile. All the milestones and all of the everydays in between. You can’t wait for motherhood to begin.

Then your first child is born, perhaps a second and third follow. It becomes your reality, this motherhood life. The everydays blur one into the next. Sometimes you stop and think, “The days fly by, but where do they go? What do I do with my time?” Perhaps you had postpartum depression. Maybe it was a colicky baby. Whatever it was, you lost the magic of motherhood. Life became just life, duller than you imagined it to be. The dreams of the future don’t come as easily and you become stuck in the monotony of the days. You feel a discordance with what you pictured before and what is now. Do you look with envy at the newly engaged, the newly married, the ones whose faces are glowing as they announce their due date? Do you wonder how they can be so happy, that they have no idea? When we have a vision of how something will be, it can be hard when it doesn’t turn out that way.

I look down at my baby boy, five months old and growing too fast. It’s so cliché because it’s so true! The lights from the Christmas tree reflect in his eyes as he reaches for the ornaments. It hits me in this moment, that there is magic here.

I used to feel angry – why didn’t anyone tell me it would be this hard? There were times that I would look at a newly married couple and wonder what happened to me – when did I become so bitter and hardened? But it’s merely shifting my perspective on life. Motherhood isn’t what I thought it would be and I have had to do much painful growing, but look at what I would’ve missed out on if I hadn’t taken that step.

I want to challenge you to find the magic again. This life may not be the picture-perfect idea that you had dreamed up, but find the beauty in this life that is yours. Choose to see the beauty in what is.

Why I Share My Story

I don’t share my story for pity.

I don’t share it so that you view me as “the mom with depression”.

Not so that I would be known.

I share it because I believe that moms of families both big and small can enjoy motherhood. That it is possible to prioritize mental wellness as we raise our families. That we can create time for ourselves, to take care of ourselves. To put the work in because we want to, because we love our children, and to not give up when it gets hard. To take control of our thoughts and see how that can change our view of life. To actually apply all of these tools instead of just consuming them. To be mentally well, rather than simply not mentally ill.

This isn’t just love your life, follow your passion, and live your dreams. It’s more than that, deeper than that. It’s living from a place of love and wellness. Of accepting the bad with the good. Of not beating ourselves up when we fail, yet again. It’s working through the hard things. Not staying in the dark places, but finding our way to the light and savoring the lightness.

It is hard work to lift the darkness off, but it is so worth it. To keep fighting every time the darkness threatens to swallow. This is why I share my story, that others could find parts of themselves in mine. To take what resonates with them and apply it.

To find hope and courage to move forward.

There is power in telling our stories. In rewriting our stories, with us not as the victim of our lives.

This is why.

Taking A Step

Here I sit in my green armchair, in a darkened living room. The tears are cascading down my cheeks, the sobs racking my body. Baby is at my breast, sucking with all the force he can muster. It feels as though the milk is being pulled from my body, my body unwilling to let it go. I am consumed by my thoughts, thoughts so dark and deep it feels impossible to break free of them. My whole body feels as though I am weighted to the ground, some unseen force pressing me into the earth. To lift my head feels unbearable. I am alone, or seemingly alone. Everything outside of me is blurred, with only my dark, repetitive thoughts so clear.

I thought this time would be different. That I was stronger this time around. I thought I was prepared to handle a downturn of hormones, if it came. I gained so much knowledge around postpartum depression – why it comes and what to do about it. Plus, this was my fifth baby. One would think that counts for something!

But I couldn’t stop it.

The darkness overtook me. I was aware of what was happening, but I felt helpless against it. I knew the tools that would help me get out of that hole, but where was the motivation to do them? Where was the hope that I even could climb my way back up if I did them? Feeling joy felt so far out of my reach.

The loneliness. The hopelessness. The helplessness.

The numbness, void, the lack of emotion.

Emptiness.

Where do I go from here?

There is only one direction from rock bottom – up. Little by little, the clouds started to clear and the sun would shine through if even for a few moments. Find the hope, the small belief that change is possible. That being well is possible. It’s a huge change to feel like you can do something about your situation versus feeling trapped and hopeless.

Realize where you are and that you want to – can – do something about it. Reach out for help, let someone know the thoughts and feelings you’ve been having. Take that first step in the climb, because no matter how cliché it sounds:

It is worth it.

You are worth it.