I know, it’s only been 2 months (Aurélie turned 2 months a few days back) but already my life – and me – has become so different.
{You can read about the beginning of my pregnancy in this post.}
For a start, everything we do, everything we plan revolves around her schedule. We work/live/eat/sleep/relax in 2-3-hour blocks. When I have lunch/brunch/dinner dates with friends, I can only schedule a time period when I’d be able to arrive instead of an exact time. At night, we’re a little luckier because Aurélie has learnt to sleep through the night (*happy dance*) and right now she’s already doing 5 hours. You can say that we’re so proud!
But for a couple of nights last week, she’s had a diaper leak upon waking up in the mornings, so it was really laundry time those mornings for me (Xav’s back at work).
Technical, day-to-day things aside, there’s been this tremendous change in energy within me. It feels like I’ve levelled up in this game called life, and there’s no way I can “level down” from here on. There’s this inner power that I now feel that wasn’t there before. I’m not sure how to describe this newfound empowerment – but I can tell you this transformational shift feels so amazing. A friend of mine on FB (who also recently became a mum) shared this and it’s the most accurate depiction I can find anywhere: Interview: Photographer Documents 33 Women Before and After They Became a Mom
I don’t think of my life now as better or worse than before – it’s just different. And I’m glad that I had lived my life the way I did before now. All the studying hard like crazy as a student, the exploring of the world and travelling solo far and wide, the crazy clubbing-drinking nights, the meeting all sorts of people (weird or not)… etc. In a nutshell, it’s the experiencing all that life had to offer up till now.
Everything that was new was an adventure and so is this new phase I find myself in. Being a parent opens a whole new world that I’d otherwise never have access to and countless new doors to more adventures ahead.
Life now feels much more meaningful, even though I haven’t quite figured out what clothes to wear with granny nursing bras that offer good support. I can also finally get Gelish nails and dyed hair once again. I can finally bend forwards and touch my toes again (heck, I can see my feet while standing up).
I guess the main and biggest change to my life has been that I now live in the present.
Before this, I was always thinking about the next big thing, the next achievement, the next big project, the next promotion at work, the next level in French… I was never exactly satisfied with whatever I had even though what I had was pretty darn good. I blame it on ambition and ego, for if I didn’t have those, I wouldn’t have wanted to achieve more.
But now, those things don’t really matter. Not as much as spending whatever time I have with Aurélie and Xav in the present. While those other accomplishments can happen in the future (or they may not), what she needs is me, here, now, with her. To feed her now. To bathe her now. To soothe her now. To help her grow and see the world now. To make her smile now.
Not tomorrow. Or the week after. Or “later when I have time.”
Because later, I will *not* have time. And later does not matter now.
I’m well aware of the opportunities (mostly work-related) I’m giving up. However, I also know of all the opportunities that I had grabbed by the horns before she arrived into my world – and I have absolutely no regrets that I’m not grasping every single one that now comes my way.
Because right now, she is my biggest opportunity. ?