I AM THE MOTHER

Jennifer Penney - 10 Mar 15

I am the mother. I know I am definitely not alone in ruminating this fact, as my husband also joins me in the moment of realisation… that I am the mother, he is the father… WE ARE THE PARENTS.

We sit there and literally blink our eyes and just look at each other and say it out loud – all the time.

It’s such a weird feeling, cause I suppose I still mostly feel like the kid. Like I just suddenly woke up one day and I was the grown up, the responsible parent who was in charge of putting food in my children’s mouths, clothes on their backs, and washing them, worrying about them, helping them understand things and learn about life… Bloody hell, what a thing to realise!

I am still the child too, I guess that is part of the reason it feels so strange. I still call my Dad up for advice (often), or text my mother in the middle of the night about some strange question I have about the girls health (don’t worry, she lives in Australia, and she is a nurse, so she is always awake at strange times). But isn’t it just odd to think that these parents of ours, are now essentially who we have become??? Doing what they did for us, on a daily basis?

I find it particularly odd sometimes, because even though I always hoped I would be a Mum, I certainly didn’t have much of a plan to get there. I was one of the ones who turned 30 and realised that most of my friends forgot to tell me about “the plan”! You know the one – study, travel and work abroad, meet someone, get married, career, career, buy a house, a bit more career, career, and then have some kids… Where was I when that plan went around? I definitely missed that one.

And now I am catching up, in my own round about way. I have actually, just almost, but not quite, nearly completed “the plan”, not in the “right” order mind, but I am getting there. Is this perhaps the reason I feel so shocked still after 3 ½ years that I am the mother? Or is this how every mother feels for the rest of their days? I guess it is similar to the feeling that I am pretty convinced I am only 27 years old, when the reality is I am pushing 40. In fact, I quite like this part of “growing up”, the realisation that you are not really 27, but can choose to be in your mind eternally and for ever after. I am slowly understanding the ongoing joke when your birthday does arrive that you are turning 27 again…

It’s not a bad feeling by the way – this feeling. It’s just something that takes me by surprise. It takes me by surprise, but I like it too. I love the amazement that I feel when I look at those little girls and realise that we created two little human beings that we are now responsible for. I like being responsible for someone else (it certainly takes the pressure of being responsible for yourself anyway). And I love watching them leave behind their baby ways and grow into little people, just like us. People we are helping them to be, and people we actually have no control over…

It’s fun, it’s scary, but I love it. I love just to sit there sometimes and look at my girls and think, wow. I am the mother…

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Jennifer Penney

Running a little creative agency with her husband in Hove and a crazy household containing two little girls under 3... Needless to say, she is busy, but loves to blog whenever there's a spare moment.

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