Missing Me

It's funny how somebody can enter a new phase of life and completely -- and happily -- leave behind the other bits.

I think that's what happened to me when I had kids.

I love being a mother. I love all the aspects, even when they frustrate me to tears (and beyond)...and vice versa.

But I think I got to a point in motherhood when I realized that I "missed" myself -- the "me" that I was before I had Emily and Edward....though you know there's really no going back.

You become immersed in a new world when you have children. You learn to sing songs you hadn't remembered since Nursery School. You talk in a new language about simple subjects you'd long forgotten in the complex adult world. You watch educational programs with an enthusiasm you didn't know you still had. It's like you become a "kid" again alongside them.

Then one day -- when the kids are little older and more able to do for themselves -- you wake up and realize you don't really know who you are. All the things that used to go into making you "you" are gone...buried beneath the mountains of toys, blankies, character underoos, and stripey, mismatched socks. You've traded in pens for crayons. Novels for Dick and Jane books. Adult music for Wee Sing tapes.

It's not a bad trade-in...not by any stretch of the imagination. But you've lost your identity as someone other than "so-and-so's mommy."

During the summer of 2005, I began to read again. Books. Actual stories written for adults. And this past summer I began to write again. I rediscovered parts of myself that I definitely missed...and enjoyed blending into the new "me."