no filter

It's the 251st day of lockdown in Melbourne. I have no make up on (does moisturizer count?) but I've managed to have a luxe shower (used an unopened fancy hotel sized body wash I stashed in my suitcase during my honeymoon 3 years ago). I'm wearing my favourite lounge pants and have a crop top bra on under my oversized tee. My hair is greasy and not tied up in a cute messy bun (how do the mum bloggers look so effortlessly unkempt?)

I've been a mum for six months now in this isolated, pandemic world. It has been so hard, especially the days I have been desperate for having my family next to me. I've felt truly battered and lost. I wonder though, is it the whole post-partum loss of identity thing, or the lockdown social deprivation thing? Who am I, really? Is the PM (pre-motherhood) and PC (pre-Covid) me in there, or has she been repressed or replaced? Maybe she has just grown and evolved?

As I sit in the rocking chair in the corner of my son's nursery, helping him latch as we commence our breastfeeding and rocking to sleep hour, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I am 10 kilos heavier, have a whole bunch of undyed greys poking through that oily regrowth and the circles under my eyes could give the pandas at the zoo a run for their money.

I feel everything and also nothing. I feel grateful and content and scared and angry. So, then, who am I, really? If I am all things, am I a fraud?

What, or who, is my authentic self?

His heart. His soul. His eyes, his smile, his cheek. His sweet face, his sweet hands, twirling his sweet hair. He is everything and being in his presence is when I am me. He is my real. I am his real. I am authentic in his company because I am me, with my many layers and also just me, stripped down to nothing but pure love.

I've become a cliche. I feel happy and real and live my truth when I am with my son. I laugh so hard, bearing all my crooked teeth. I run around chasing him, letting all the rolls on my stomach jiggle. I am not perfect, but that is perfect - I am completely, unapologetically me.

So this one is for you, my son. At the darkest hour during the darkest days, I felt joy. That's real.

I also felt real when I posted videos of you laughing on Instagram because I wanted to share that joy in this social media world we live in. That's real, too.

Oh, and those long, hard days. Those days I changed your outfit multiple times and soaked your poo stained onesies in the bucket. The days I left your dried up vomit on my sleeve because adding to the already high pile of laundry was just not worth it. Those days I was really, real.

The truth of the matter is, in all forms and through all the things I have faced in my life, at the point of each moment, I was me. I was a version of my self. With each day, week, month and year that has passed, I have grown as you will too, my son. With the lows, come the highs and with the highs come the lows.

Be kind, be respectful and acknowledge and appreciate the different authentic beings around you. Take all the good with the bad and filter the darkness out (not all though, because you need some darkness to find your light).

Then...

let

yourself

shine.

Let yourself sparkle!

My dull, tired skin and my round squishy belly. My big toothy smile and my flabby arms that pulled loved ones close. My humour, my sadness and my love and frustration. That's the real me, a diamond amongst diamonds.