(Still Me In Here Blog — Free Writing Edition)
I’m sitting on my bed with ocean sounds playing from PokPok, pretending I’m the kind of person who has her inner world totally under control. Evelyn and I had a good morning, which is probably why my brain decided to take this moment to fire off thirty-seven thoughts in different directions. When I first started this blog, it felt so easy to free-write — the words would just pour out of me without thinking. Now I feel like my own mental traffic jam, everything trying to merge at once.
I’ve been thinking a lot about mental load, that invisible backpack women carry while pretending it’s light. I always thought it was a “mom thing,” but honestly? It’s a woman thing. Men have thoughts too, they really do — just usually one at a time. Like a very determined little train on a single track. Meanwhile, Nick is out here fully side-questing through life. I’ll be trying to plan Christmas and dinner and everyone’s schedules and the existential meaning of motherhood, and he’s mentally reorganizing the basement, rebuilding the network infrastructure, researching snow tires, and probably writing an internal cybersecurity manifesto in his head. No main quest in sight.
And speaking of Christmas, every year I swear I’m going to be on top of it, and every year I’m somehow accidentally auditioning for an episode of “Holiday Panic: Mom Edition.” But this year feels different — less “add to cart,” more “make something that actually means something.” I keep coming back to the idea of handmade gifts, something personal, something rooted. Maybe the girls and I will make something for their great-grandmother using a skill she taught us. That feels like the kind of gift that outlives wrapping paper. And instead of “what’s your favorite candy,” I want everyone’s favorite food — like the weird little snack they hide from the rest of the family. Give me something I and only I eat. My little goblin-treasure treat. Hands off, everyone else.
Then, because the universe loves emotional whiplash, I saw an Instagram post about things you should do with your mom while you still can. You know the kind — the ones that crack your ribs open and poke around your soul a little. Film her making the meal she always made when you were sick. Record her humming while she puts dishes away. Have her go through her wedding day. Take a picture of her hands. Ask when she realized she was becoming her own mom. All these simple, human, home-feeling things that hurt a little because they matter so much.
And then — because my brain cannot resist divinely chaotic segues — I suddenly started thinking about trauma bonding. How so many of the friendships I’ve had over the years were built in the pressure cooker of workplaces, places that made us cling to each other like life rafts. But then friends reached out after last week’s post saying they never felt awkward picking up a conversation after months or years, and it made me grateful in a strange way that I grew up as an Army brat. I’ve never had the same friends since kindergarten, but I’ve always had people who love the current version of me — people who don’t need to drag up who I was at 17 or 22 or during that one disastrous era I pretend never happened. It’s nice to be known for who I am now, not who I used to be. Also, with that came the realization of how many people I can no longer connect with because the trauma was what we had in common.
Somewhere in all that chaos, I started thinking about my mom. When I realized I was becoming her. It wasn’t when I first had kids — it was when she died. I was 38, already a mother for years, but that’s when I really stepped into myself. I am ashamed of some of the nonsense my girls had to navigate during my divorce, but not ashamed of choosing better. My mom did the same. The difference is I owned the mess. That’s where I became her and myself at the same time.
And then there’s the sound of home — something I’m still trying to define. Right now, home sounds like chatter overlapping chatter, dogs barking, someone yelling “FINN, QUIET!!,” and stories we’ve heard too many times but keep telling anyway. It’s chaos, but it’s our chaos. One day I’d love Winter Café ambience, but for today, this is real and alive and warm and the ambience is playing on 5 in the background on my Nest.
I’ve also been thinking about the small things my mom taught me — how to fold laundry, load a dishwasher, all the tiny rituals that somehow matter. I teach my girls these things too, though every time they open the dishwasher, I swear their souls whisper, “I see what you’re trying to do here… FUCK THAT!” and then proceeds to put the cup in the middle of the rack, not with the other cups.
If I could go back and talk to my younger self, I’d tell her to stop waiting for people who don’t show up. I’d tell her to leave sooner. Move sooner. Become the journalist she always wanted to be. But then again — all those wrong turns are exactly how I ended up here, and here is actually pretty good.
And then there’s my mom’s individuality — the thing she did right. She was always herself, even when she didn’t feel enough. She didn’t shrink. That’s what sticks with me more than anything she said: she showed up as who she was, even in the messy moments. I want to know the one thing I’ve done right that has shaped who my girls are as people.
My wedding day came to mind too — the calmest day I’ve ever had. No rushing, no drama. Present, grounded, completely in the moment. We didn’t tell the girls we were getting married until after we’d done it, because we wanted that moment to be ours. It still is.
I think about how often I say “I love you.” I say it constantly. I wonder if my kids will miss my voice someday the way I miss my mom’s. That thought landed harder than I expected.
And then… Evelyn. When she was two, she crawled into my hoodie like she always does and suddenly asked, “Mommy, want to listen to my heart?” I had heard her heart through ultrasounds and dopplers and all the little medical gadgets, but never like that — never as a person. So I put my ear to her chest, and there it was: the heart I once grew inside me, now beating strong inside her.
Later, when I told the older girls about it around the dining room table, they lost it. Ava immediately joked about going up to Emily and saying, “Hold still, I need to listen to your heart,” and Emily didn’t miss a beat — she leaned back, pointed at her like a feral house cat and said, “Don’t even think about it.”
And then they both mimicked it across the table, dramatically leaning toward each other like some deranged family science experiment. Pure chaos. Exactly on brand.
But still — the moment with Evelyn hit different. It grounded me in a way I didn’t realize I needed.
And as I kept thinking about that list. All the things you’re supposed to do with your mother before she’s gone, I realized there are a few on there I’ve been too embarrassed to do. Not because they’re embarrassing, but because I have been embarrassed. My body, my face, my angles, my everything. This quiet self-consciousness that women just… carry. It lives in us even when we pretend it doesn’t. And it hit me that one day, my girls aren’t going to remember my stomach or my arms or how “put together” I looked. They’re going to remember how I felt when I hugged them, how I smelled when I tucked them in, how my voice sounded when I said I loved them. That’s what I remember most about my mom — the feeling of her. Not her appearance. So maybe it’s time I get over my own body image nonsense and give my girls those moments without holding back. They deserve the version of me that shows up fully, not the one hiding behind insecurity.
These aren’t things we should save for later.
They’re things we should be doing every day — while we’re still here.
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