The torrents of Anger that wept down when I rose to greet my first pregnancy took us all by surprise, shock and horror. When it drenched us again during my second pregnancy, we were doubly astounded. Anger is not an emotion typically associated with motherhood, let alone ‘good’ motherhood. I think I shocked myself the most, because I had always believed & often declared myself to be a fairly peaceful, conflict-avoiding citizen. I’m known to my colleagues as Zen Seun, to my family and close friends as The Mediator, always sticking my oar in to diffuse and placate wherever high emotions and injustices arise.
But the first nine-month period of Undoing and Growing and Becoming Anew apparently let loose long-bound fastenings. Things that I had not been allowed or given myself space to feel for a very very long time, if ever, had their great escape and it was equal parts ugly, painful and exhilerating. There was anger, yes, but fiercer things still we were met with: desire, passion, terror, disappointment, sheer joy, unbridled faith and hope and fear and so many others whose names I did not even know.
The biggest grace I have received in my experience of becoming a mother is the opening up of a special new space (or perhaps it was always there, unnoticed on my periphery) to be exactly who I am and always have been and was always meant to be. Wholly me - good, bad, delightful and devious all present and accounted for. Not just Good Daughter, Defender of Sisterhood, Doting Wife, Loyal Friend, Mediating Presence or even simply (complexly) Mother of Any Kind. I am all and so much more - my newfound expansiveness is most fulfilling even though I have no clue into what where or whom I might continue to expand. I do now know that at the end of each blessed little battle of a day, the only person I and my children need me to be is ALL of me. Acknowledging, knowing and accepting this under all circumstances has been my most glorious feminine triumph yet and I can only rightly give that glory back to my Maker.
The only shame I've happened to feel here is that it took this long for me to arrive at who I've always known myself to be (and I say ‘this long’ as if I’ve not only just turned 29 - some never get this close to themselves at all if we’re being real). I just feel like I’ve been holding my breath and holding myself in up until the point I knew I was to be a mother. Motherhood in all its cherished forms (biological, adoptive, spiritual, or otherwise) is by no means ‘for’ everyone for myriad complicated, mystical and human reasons, nor is it at all a necessary prerequisite of joyful self-discovery and -expression. But I know in my own body and bones as I’ve always known for as long as I can remember: that it is a very essential part of who I, Oluseun (neé Alabi) Stancombe, am. This assuredness isn’t everyone’s experience - in fact it is perhaps the opposite for many in our anxiety-riddled self-conscious world - so I also acknowledge the incredible privilege of giving myself total permission to be what I am, external expectations and consequences be damned. Again, I can only thank my Maker here.
Of course turning up to the same old party freshly hatched as oneself can cause a great deal of confusion and damage to the people around you, especially if there is a great deal of perceived negative change. To clutch at the familiarity of albeit limited/limiting titles again, going from Agreeable Yes Woman to Combative Shouty Lady for example, all in such a compressed space of time, can be jarring from the outside. What might have seemed a gradual and natural awakening to me was perhaps more like the sudden flip of a switch in the wrong direction to some others. What brought light and freedom to me, how I view myself, how I operate as purely as I can within this world, may have brought sheaths of shadow and darkness to the person others thought they knew well enough in me. While I sympathise, I hold no shame and proffer no apologies here. My only hope through all this is that my little family will be all the richer for mama showing them just how powerful and Good it can be to walk in the spaces that have been divinely held for you, and how wonderful it is to truly follow the lifelong process of knowing thyself and turning up to all those spaces as exactly who you are. There is no point in denial or repression here; more so, the feelings of guilt and shame that often dog these openings have their place and use but certainly not here. Only truth and integrity, with a healthy dose of compassion of course, are worthy pursuits for me and mine. Call it naive to make such bold, stake-driving statements at so tender an age on something as inconsequential as an online personal blog, but this is indeed how I’ve always intended to grow my life and make it as bounteous as is within my God-given power.
