The Perspective I've Gained Through Parenthood

Entering parenthood presented it's challenges for me. At first, I experienced a lot of grief and loss of self. I found the adjustment from having all the freedom in the world to working around a 24/7 schedule exhausting to say the least. I felt angry at times that I just couldn't seem to find time to do anything I wanted to do for myself. Especially during the first two months.

A trip to the ER 4 weeks postpartum really sunk my lifestyle change in for me. Thankfully, I wasn't there for a life threatening reason. So I had the luxury of sitting there for six hours uninterrupted to read my book. I remember thinking how sad it was that it took an ER visit for me to do something so simple.

I knew it would be easy to fall down the resentment rabit hole. I didn't want to slip. So, I began challenging myself to reframe my thoughts. I would ask myself each day "Is there something I can do differently to make today easier than yesterday?" This led me to think about what perspective really means. By definition, perspective is "a particular attitude toward or way of regarding something; a point of view." I thought about the things that seem to influence my own perspective through the lens of a new parent.

Time

The first influence my lens zoomed in on was time. I realized that I had to perceive time differently.

My days did start to go from complete and utter chaos to having slivers of downtime. I'd repeat the same words my mom told me "Rome wasn't built in a day Christian."Rome was not built in a day and neither was a good parent with some level of their sh*t together.

Even though I gained downtime, it's not abundant

I value time differently. It's more important to me to be present in the activities that I do for myself and use my time wisely. Before becoming a mom, I lacked motivation to seize the moment. I was always under the assumption that I could "just do it later". I may have been right that I could always do it later. However, there's something to be said about developing a "just do it now" attitude. I now have the tendency to do something while I'm thinking of it knowing that I may not get the opportunity to get it done later. I find myself a lot less overwhelmed by all the things I used to put off in my abundance of time.

I also began to look for ways that I could create more time instead of just assuming there wasn't any. For example, I was feeling guilty that I couldn't get to walking our dog most days. Once our son started to sleep for longer stretches I realized I had two options. Option one, sleep another hour before my partner went to work. Option two, sacrifice the extra hour of sleep to walk our dog. On the nights I feel like I've had a reasonable amount of sleep I get up at 4 am and I take the dog for a little date. We get tea together and we go to the park. I love seeing how excited he gets and it makes me feel so much better than an extra hour of sleep could knowing that I am still prioritizing time with him when I can.

The other thing about time is that you're either spending it positively or you're wasting it negatively. I've found that spending time on negative activities burns my energy faster than spending time on positive ones. Therefore, I'm more selective of what I give my time to when it's my choice how I'm spending it.

Relationships

The second influence on my perspective is relationships.

I firmly believe that the thoughts you invite into your mind plant seeds. Thoughts can be sourced from those around us. I've only had my parenting membership a few short months and I've already run into mom shaming. That is not my vibe. I am very careful to limit my time around those who choose to mom shame. I don't want those thoughts to plant the seeds that everything has to be done a certain way for it to be"right." I also don't want to feel guilt that just because I didn't do something a certain way means I did something "wrong".

The same can be said for relationships in general. A positive of parenthood for me has been the cleansing of my circle. The shift in my priorities has resulted in me no longer upkeeping relationships that were one sided or toxic. The loss of these negative relationships has organically created space for me to develop new friendships and maintain positive ones that are aligned to my interests, where I am at in life and what I value. I am grateful for this calibration because it's given me a lot of clarity and peace.

We've also realized that keeping negative relationships no longer impacts us alone. Keeping negative relationships would impact our son too. We feel a greater sense of responsbility to ensure that the people who we surround ourselves with are good people. It's our job to make sure that we aren't exposing our little man to people who aren't the best examples for him.

Image

The final influence on my perspective is image.

I had to shake the insecurities that built the previous version of my image. I had this picture perfect idea of how I should portray myself that needed to get blown up. I used to place so much importance on having everything together all the time. I wanted the clean house when guest came over, the salon fresh hair. I would get agitated if someone stopped by and my house was a mess. I'd feel urgency to book a hair appointment when my roots came in.

Once I became a mom, I knew hanging onto that image would be the hill I died on. So I decided it was time for a rebrand. No, my house will not always be perfectly clean when guests come over and I've learned to sit comfortably with it knowing it's in exhange for my sanity. This goes back to time and knowing that I have 24 hours of it in a day. So it's okay to cut myself some slack if I don't get to everything like I used to. It's most important that I'm spending time meeting my sons needs and my own over a perfectly scrubbed floor and house that smells lemon fresh all the time. Plus hey, as I alluded to earlier, I don't extend invitations to the Karen's of the world to visit our place anyways.

My point is that upholding a partiular image you've created for yourself can be exhausting. I can't hang onto this perspective of needing to have an image in the first place. It feels like too fixed of a mindset after having a son who I know will constantly have our days and priorities looking differently.

Overall, I have gratitude for the perspective I've gained through parenthood. Parenting is not always easy. What would be easy would be to allow myself to feel negatively about the bad days or tough learning curves. Instead, I buy into the concept that hard work does pay off. I put in the effort to reframe my thoughts so I can adjust my perspective and maintain a positive mindset which results in me avoiding mistaking opportunities for burdens.