Finding Myself

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There I was. A wife and mother to two young children, a stay-at-home, working-from-home mother, being eaten up by guilt and utter delight in equal measure.

What was I doing here? Should I even be here? This is wrong! Isn’t it irresponsible?

The previous few years had been overflowing with love but also hard work, sacrifice and exhaustion. The never ending strive to be the perfect parent, the rollercoaster ride through chaos and joy, through the mundane and the amazing, through first-time parenting, in which the “I” that I knew, evolved and changed, and momentarily lost herself to this overwhelming new role.

Day after day trundled by with colic, cuddles, the “routine” – the kids’ routine – of walks, and bedtime, and blending baby food and reading stories and making playdates, and driving to preschool, and planning family holidays, and trying to keep a freelance career as a translator and editor afloat amidst the kids’ needs and my husband’s demanding job and constant work-related travel.

Where in this was I? A question never asked, because, who would have thought to ask it? I was needed! I was needed to mother these beautiful beings that had graced my lives. I was needed whenever my husband had a moment to spare, and to keep our day-to-day home existence going. I was the manager. The one in charge of the “unseen”. I was also needed to edit and translate for a friend who had started her own business. A job I thoroughly enjoyed, a job I was good at, a job that I could fit into my demanding mothering schedule. Even if it meant working nights and early mornings.

This was a good life. A full life. A life I would never go back and change. And then, one day, the kids started preschool, the workflow dwindled… And I found myself on the sofa bawling, feeling lost and empty. And there was nothing to take my mind off it. I was alone at home, with too much time on my hands. My full-time job of mothering reduced to part-time.

And that was when an idea shone through. Timid and daunting, yet so alluring. Yes. I love my work but I don’t NEED it. I can work with what I get but I don’t NEED to look for more. Maybe, just maybe, I can take some time out for myself? What?! Yourself? Isn’t that selfish? Shouldn’t you be attending to your family’s needs? Or working? Or doing the housework? What are these needs!?

And that is how I found myself here. In this light, spacious studio. In front of a mirror. Groovy music blaring from speakers. My enthusiastic instructor infecting me with this new passion. Feeling guilt and utter delight course through my body simultaneously. What am I doing here? Should I be here? Am I being irresponsible?

This is me: A wife, a mother, a translator, a dancer. I have found the missing part of me in this passion. I am whole.


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