Emotional Cycle - Motherhood

I feel like my body goes through this cycle, and it does so without my permission. No, not a monthly cycle that most all women go through, but an emotional one. A cycle where my goals and ambitions change, where what I want in life is possibly on a different train car than the one I'm in at the moment.

I've found myself going from wanting to open a bakery downtown, wanting to get married, to just a few seconds ago looking at baby blogs and longing for a child of my own. This is a predicable cycle for me. I often daydream about a career that I could possibly start and live off of in a well off fashion. This is always followed by the desire to stare at David's Bridal's website and pick out two or three dresses that I would love to get married in. At this point, after wanting to fall in love and get married for so long, I could have the bare basics of a wedding planned in under a week.

The next part of the cycle is the heart breaking one. The one where I crave motherhood with such an intensity that the thought of staying on my carefully plotted schedule of waiting to get married, have a career, a job, and a life all to myself feels like a waste of time. What am I doing sitting here, writing a blog and avoiding studying? Shouldn't I be off preparing to become a mother?

I know this is crazy sounding. In a week or so, I'll be glad that I'm not pregnant and able to live my life without worrying about if what I'm eating is healthy for the child. I'll be glad that I can still go out with my friends, smoke hookah at Prince's, drink at Silas's and generally still be able to be a wild and crazy teen. I know all of this, yet, I'm still reading through Dear Baby and Kayla's blog with this longing and yearning to be a mother.

Back in the spring, I was in the same spot. My cousin Melissa had given birth to a beautiful baby boy, and as I stood in the hospital looking at this amazing child, my heart told me that I was meant to be a mother. It's not the first time that my heart has told me such, but I believe that it was the first time I actually listened. I really do believe that I'm meant to be a mother.

There are some many of my close friends that scoff at the thought of having children. They see kids as snot nosed brats that do nothing but scream and get in the way of stuff. When I try to express this want, this need to be a mother, they don't understand. I have literally had to sit through hours of being told that I should never have kids, because they would just ruin my life. You know, great, kids aren't for them. But for me, everything is really secondary to finding a wonderful partner in life and to experience being a mother.

I look forward to buying onesies, blankets, bassinets, dippers, cute little hats that will never fit or stay on but sit around the room in hopes that someday they will, shoes that will never really be worn. All of this along with the feeling of a child inside of me, holding a baby for the first time, waking up at all hours of the night just to check on the child. I want it. I look forward to it.

And in a week or so, I'll be glad that I'm not pregnant.

It's all part of my emotional cycle.