Great essay. I wish there was more on this - there seems to be a sea of thinkpieces wallowing around in this idea of self-immolation when it comes to motherhood, and how you kiss goodbye to your old identity like you're setting everything you know and love on fire. Motherhood is a change in everything, but so is arguably moving to another state - your routines and scenery and relationships change, but you adapt, and who you are at your core shouldn't dramatically alter, unless you're a phenomenally flaky sort of individual.
I mean, people change after they go to college, but you don't see overdramatic blog posts about how freshmen should prepare for an utter shift in personality - probably because colleges would prefer people keep enrolling. The birthrate, on the other hand, is seeing a keen drop, in part because of this disgustingly grueling portrayal of motherhood by narcissistic mommy bloggers who have nothing better to do than whine about how helicopter parenting Bradelyn is smothering their creative spirit, or something. (The only proper response to that dreck is "Get the hell over yourself!" but that seldom goes down well with these sorts.)
Great essay. I wish there was more on this - there seems to be a sea of thinkpieces wallowing around in this idea of self-immolation when it comes to motherhood, and how you kiss goodbye to your old identity like you're setting everything you know and love on fire. Motherhood is a change in everything, but so is arguably moving to another state - your routines and scenery and relationships change, but you adapt, and who you are at your core shouldn't dramatically alter, unless you're a phenomenally flaky sort of individual.
I mean, people change after they go to college, but you don't see overdramatic blog posts about how freshmen should prepare for an utter shift in personality - probably because colleges would prefer people keep enrolling. The birthrate, on the other hand, is seeing a keen drop, in part because of this disgustingly grueling portrayal of motherhood by narcissistic mommy bloggers who have nothing better to do than whine about how helicopter parenting Bradelyn is smothering their creative spirit, or something. (The only proper response to that dreck is "Get the hell over yourself!" but that seldom goes down well with these sorts.)