The motherhood test
Do you have what it takes?
The moment you become a mother, your “self” sacrifices an “ish” for a “less.”
Motherhood is not for the faint of heart. It will transform the plains of your previous life into towering mountains and gaping valleys.
Motherhood is the ultimate sacrifice.
Is it worth it? Yes.
Is it hard? Hell yes.
If you’re just in it for the chubby cheeks, gummy smiles and ‘gram-worthy photos, you probably don’t deserve it. Because to enjoy the highs, you must also experience — and conquer — the lows.
To truly deserve the mantle of motherhood, you need to be able to answer “Yes” to every single one of the following eleven questions with both honesty and conviction. As a mother, you may come across some, none or all of these. But the point is that you’re prepared to take it all.
Are you prepared to become the walking dead for the next year, a hollow-eyed zombie that drags its feet through each day on less than four continuous hours of sleep?
Are you prepared to become a one-woman dairy farm, with an initiation ritual that includes cracked nipples, stinging breasts and a concrete neck?
Are you prepared to hobble through each day with a burning back, a souvenir from of all the bouncing, rocking and swinging to calm a crying baby?
Are you prepared to constantly have some form of bodily fluid — translucent drool, curdled spit-up or porridge-smelling poo — stain your clothes?
Are you prepared to forego spontaneous coffee dates and lazy afternoon drinks lest they threaten to clash with your sleeping cherub’s hard-won nap?
Are you prepared to sacrifice intimate time with your significant other due to a menopausally dry and still-healing-from-birth vagina?
Are you prepared to regress and live as a child again to become your baby’s sidekick — stacking blocks, shaking rattles and crawling around on the floor?
Are you prepared to eat all your meals cold due to your baby’s built-in mummy-is-about-to-sit-down-and-eat sensor?
Do you have the infinite patience required to pick up and put down your baby hundreds of times (many times a night, many nights a week!) while you try and teach your baby the elusive art of falling asleep?
Are you prepared to argue with your significant other about the right way to console, teach and raise your darling baby?
But most importantly, are you prepared to love this tiny human being that you created more than your own life itself?
If yes to all of the above, you are ready.
If yes to all of the above, you are about to experience a joy so profound and a love so deep it will be etched into your very soul.
“The human heart was not designed to beat outside the human body and yet, [a child is] just that — a parent’s heart bared, beating forever outside its chest.”
Welcome to motherhood.