A Note from Maternity Leave

The end of a maternity leave is just the latest in a long list that always runs somewhere in the back of my mind regarding how women are so good at holding two sides of a coin in their very being. This is my third go at it, and there's something similar yet utterly unique to how I’m experiencing it this time.

I'm beginning the process of grieving what I will be saying goodbye to: the monotony that mixes with magic; the intimacy of being everything to another small person who’d truly be adrift without it (and the secreted-away feeling that comes with that). Yet even with the mourning comes a reaching toward what's to come. I've missed it. I want it back. I'm greedy for those parts of me that have been locked away in hibernation for months and months.

It's an odd example of how two things can be true at one time, polar opposites that can only exist when the other is hidden behind lock and key.

This time, older and wiser, I'm trying to take it not just day by day but almost minute by minute to enjoy the last few weeks and days of having both no obligations or claimants to my time (while also having the biggest obligation and the biggest claimant on my time). 

Ending a maternity leave is officially ceding responsibility to other caretakers, shrugging off a yoke that can feel heavy enough to choke. It’s saying goodbye to obligations to welcome others, an odd exchange that I know will bring with it a mixture of emotions.

For myself and the women I know in similar stages, the transformation is coming at a strange time regarding age and career development and the cosmos. I feel, more than ever, like there is something so close to explore and have at hand. It makes me more eager and more excited to move into the next stage of what's here for me but even that excitement almost makes me more sorrowful at knowing how this magical moment will never come around again.

x Leah