Motherscope | February 2022
Motherscope LLC | San Diego, CA motherscope.com Cover Illustration by Alexandra Harvey | Mothershaped The Mom Salon logo by Samantha Acker | Gemini Designs Copyright © 2021 by Motherscope LLC and the individual contributors. All rights reserved. Leonard, Jackie (editor) The Mom Salon | February 2022 The Mom Salon features the writings of Motherscope’s 2021 Contributors, appearing in rotation from Mar. 2021 through Feb. 2022: Kate Bailey, Eunice Brownlee, Kelsey Cichoski, Heather Cleaves, Laci Hoyt, Micah Klassen, Shanthy Milne, Alyssa Nutile, Holly Ruskin, Kaitlin Solimine, Colleen Tirtirian, Megan Vos, Melaina Williams
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In This Month’s Mom Salon: Kaitlin Solimine | 5 a.m.
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Laci Hoyt | Honey-Dipped and Other Poems
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Colleen Tirtirian | Birth and the Black Heron
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Micah Klassen | Cinderella Syndrome
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CONTENT GUIDANCE “Birth and the Black Heron”: postpartum depression, reference to past miscarriage “Cinderella Syndrome”: references anxiety and past postpartum depression
5 a.m. By Kaitlin Solimine “Pregnancy brain” is a state of mind, is a 5 a.m. wake up call to pee, nose sick toddler in my bed, his feet against my back and the baby breaststroking my cervix. Of what am I in service to this time? Of what will I be called to survive? I tell his father birth is like dying. The closest you’ll get to it. Not you/him. Me/her. His eyes are wide and tired. Don’t try to talk to a bird. In the dream before 5 a.m., the Sea of Japan is mentioned. “There’s long maternity leave there, good healthcare,” a tall, white man says. “The Sea of Japan is a good place to ride out the pandemic.” I wake, take note — Find the Sea of Japan on a map, pin for future pandemics. I book depth hypnosis. Massage. Home organizer. I’m clearing something in order to give birth to something else: but what? My third eye pulses as soon as this miracle baby is conceived — at 5 a.m., I press my palm to my forehead, ask for divination but the sound machine set to wake in an hour doesn’t answer. I’m hungry for protein pancakes. “The body doesn’t lie,” the midwives said before they left us in the basement, their bodies pulled to another birth. They were distracted when they came. They were holding space for someone else’s birth/death, the walking of the coals. I want to cup Silvia Plath’s words in my hands — “The swans are gone. Still the river remembers how white they are. It strives after them with its lights, finds its shapes in a cloud.” A Townsend’s warbler returns again to the budding lilac above where the 18-year-old cat is buried. There’s a story about Townsend, 19th century
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grave robber, white man lurking in Chinook cemeteries, plundering skulls for scientific racism: “I don’t rejoice in the prospect of the death of the poor creatures certainly, but then you know it will be very convenient for my purposes.” There’s our daughter, almost six now, asking if the cat is bones. Just bones. “I miss him,” she says, and I’m tempted to dig six feet of soil and rocks we compressed over his body to touch what’s left of him, to finger what fur survived a season. Inside me, the third child’s magnificent spine is fully formed, skull 99th percentile, and the body performs perfunctory calisthenics — readying, readying, for what? This three-inch journey between bodies. Birth is three inches. I’ll never find my way again through this, metaphorically, but that’s not what this is, a way of speaking. This is the knowledge of a body in a body. The knowledge of a bird returning to the same nesting ground. Magnetic, some scientists say, arguing with pens and formulas but somewhere a bird is born from egg from bird mother. Somewhere else a beating heart ceases to flutter. 5 a.m. wake up call: “Unremarkable uterus and cervix,” said the ultrasound report. Unremarkable. I take issue with that. Write forward a new narrative of remarkable uteruses and cervixes. The dream voice again: “There’s nothing sweeter than the smell of a pregnant puss.” Pregnant with what? Possibility, I’d say, but no one is parting the Sea of Japan for this one, nor that one, nor the one before or the one before that. Good-bye federally mandated maternity leave. Good-bye childcare as infrastructure. Yours/mine. No one in the dream is rebuilding a monument to the remarkable uterus. Remarkable cervix. Mother. Forget forget. Pregnancy brain, shut up. On the drive home from the zoo, the kids are asleep while three little kittens who lost their mittens and they began to cry plays on repeat at a stop light. Along the sidewalk, a woman pushes an older woman in a wheelchair, blanket swaddling infirm body, only bright skull visible, tilted back mouth open to full California sun. She wants to eat the sun, I think. She wants to swallow it whole and take it with her to the other side, wherever that is, and the child inside me is eager to escape, eager to swallow this sun too, as if life is only a face in the sun and death its opposite and I am
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overwhelmed by the fear that one day the sun will be gone from my face too. Townsend valiantly displays Chinook skull to sky, effervescent California sunshine, but what can that forever-gaping mouth proclaim now?
KAITLIN SOLIMINE is mother to Calliope and Rafael, author of awardwinning novel Empire of Glass, cofounder of Hippo Reads and Hippo Thinks, and a childbirth and lactation activist. Her writing has been featured in The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal, National Geographic, Guernica Magazine, LitHub, and more. She lives in San Francisco where she is at work on a second novel, The Blue Lobster, which explores themes of midwifery, climate change, and New England Native American history, as well as a book of essays on home and motherhood.
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Engage with Kaitlin’s Story: Writing Prompt: swallow the sun
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Honey-Dipped and Other Poems By Laci Hoyt
Honey-Dipped Mom, will you play with me? you asked, your voice honey-dipped, the beckoning of a young heart wanting to connect. Sure, in a minute, I said as if dishes or laundry or vacuuming carried any importance, as if cleanliness could replace connection. Later, I held your action figures in my hands. I made them move just as you said and you giggled that infectious laugh when I used poison ivy as a weapon. Mom, will you play with me? you asked, again and again, so many times. I can still hear your voice dripping with the sweet nectar of your plea. I could have said yes more often.
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I wish I would have tended to your desires for nearness unfailingly, understood my full presence equaled more than enough. I wish I would have grasped reality, that one day I would desperately want your attention, just as you wanted mine because now I am the one with the sugary plea, asking Do you want to do something with me? and you are too busy in your teenaged dreams. I no longer own a coveted gaze and you are unaware that I’d abandon anything if it meant that you would look at me the way you used to; everything if you would take my hand in yours once more and let me into your atmosphere.
Becoming With one child gone from home, one standing on the edge of freedom, begging to fly, I find my space feels empty yet alive.
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I am middle-aged, still wondering who I am. I am still mending old wounds. I am still unearthing love for me that rivals my love for you. I am still becoming my own sacred space. Still a new woman is being birthed as old ways of being slough away. There is time now to explore seeds of creativity previously placed on hold. Time now for discovering my edges, expanding, remaking internal landscapes. I am still making sense of the totality of this time, while welcoming the invitation to finally, fully grow into me.
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Stitching Songs My mom taught me to sew when I was just three years old she gave me a jar of buttons, a scrap of cloth, and I
sewed with gusto, carefully choosing favorites, stitching them down, while mom stitched beside me, and I
didn’t know then my first love was born, that stitching would save me, even when I was too sick to stand. And with time on my hands, I
learned to knit, discovered a calm I didn’t know I missed. Knit stitches kept me from going under, from losing my mind as a mother and I
come up at one, down at two, gently pulling thread through
unravel and cut, weave needle through cloth, continuing on to the final knot
insert right needle, front to back, wrap a loop, pull through the crack
knit one stitch, purl two, repeat this pattern all the way through
practiced steadily, learning every kind of stitch, using them to unwind, to pull me back from the edges of this parenting life and then I slip hook into stitch, pull up a loop, wrap yarn again, pull through all with a scoop.
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taught my daughter to crochet. She writes patterns all her own, showing a confidence I’ve always longed to know. And as she stitches toward her future, I stitch my life back together and my mom, the master stitcher, revels in the legacy we create together.
LACI HOYT wants to live in a world where kindness is a priority and everyone owns at least one hand-knit sweater. She writes from her home in upstate NY about living with chronic illness, love and relationships, and any other thing she can’t get out of her head. Her writing has been published through The Kindred Voice. When she’s not writing, she can be found with knitting needles and yarn, hunched over the sewing machine, or creating unique dolls and bags for her Etsy shop. Every Sunday, you can find a new haiku published on her blog. Visit Laci at www.liviatree. blogspot.com.
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Engage with Laci’s Story: What is something you were taught when you were growing up that you are now teaching your child? Who taught you?
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Birth and the Black Heron By Colleen Tirtirian It’s 4 a.m. and I am sitting in the corner of the room in an armchair. My son is in my arms and he is getting closer to sleep. I will myself through each moment of rocking him as I fight heavy eyelids. The ache in my body is deep and I feel it in every crevice of this newly complicated body I inhabit, likely a result of the hot incision on my low abdomen a mere week prior. After what feels like an unbearably long time, I maneuver my way out of the chair the way a contortionist would. “Please be asleep,” I whisper. His eyelids open a sliver and I rock him some more, standing at the crib. When I am finally certain he is asleep, I lower him down next to his sister. I heave a sigh of relief as his eyes remain closed. Asleep. At last. I tiptoe backward, my eyes on the crib — my bed, a mere two feet behind me. I reach my hand back for bed and lower myself, my eyes still fixed on the sleeping babes. My head is a mere inch from the pillow when another set of eyes catch mine. My daughter. Instinctively, I am back at the crib and lifting her out for her feeding. I hobble my way back to the chair in the corner of the room, hoping that this time, she will latch. I curse myself as I slowly lower into the chair; the one that I purposely chose so that I would not fall asleep in it. I make a conscious decision with each feeding not to get too comfortable. No more feedings in our cozy bed, no. Not after that last time when, in my sleep-deprived haze, I woke up thinking a baby should have still been in my arms; panicked, I searched the sheets, certain I had done the unthinkable. “Oh thank god,” I whispered when I realized both babies were in the crib. I sit in the simple chair and attempt to feed her. No latch. I carry her out of the room and to the kitchen. Time to mix some formula. When I am sure she is full and content, I put her back to bed. Just as I am entering a restful sleep, my son begins to cry out. And the cycle begins again. 11
People always say you forget the newborn phase. But I will never forget it. When I look back on those newborn, middle-of-the-night feedings, the ones the nurses told me to make certain occur every two hours, I am taken straight back to a state of desperation. My body responds as though I am right back in those moments. The internal drive to help my babies thrive at the cost of my personal health was my trademark of new motherhood. My body went into overdrive. I knew I would hit a wall, and I knew in my bones that I could not keep up at the same pace. Between the pain I felt in my body and the constant worry that occupied my mind, I was certain I would crumble. And I did. Over and over, I crumbled. Yet, I kept going. I am still not entirely sure how. My body screamed “Give up!” and my mind said, “Power through.” I remember asking my husband one night, “Is it possible to die from sleep deprivation? Because I am sure that sleep deprivation is going to kill me.” To me, the lack of sleep was solely to blame. But anxiety and depression are cunning. In those early postpartum days, they lurked, pulling me into the cover of dark at every chance. They were the black heron wrapping her wings around a weaker creature, blacking out the world. My perception of reality in those hazy, early days of motherhood was that I was meant to do everything. I spent years of my life mentally preparing for motherhood. I nested for months, trusting that one day, I would hold a baby in my arms. Even throughout my pregnancy, I did not believe we would come home with two babies. The prior miscarriages told me to keep my heart guarded. Gratitude spilled out of every pore when I began trusting they’d come home with us. And on the day they were born, I held one in each arm, immediately wanting to feed them, to bond, to experience skin-to-skin contact. But those three days in the hospital were a tug-of-war between fulfilling the role of mother, and of allowing others to take care of me. My body was a working contradiction, both ridding itself and producing. Ridding of drugs that were pumped into it during the induction and, ultimately, the c-section. Producing milk to support life. It was a blink of an eye and an eternity, and then we were home. After a few days, the guests and well-wishers dwindled. Soon, my husband went back to work. And we were alone, the three of us. My head entered a dreamlike state. My feet were no longer planted on the ground and I was floating through space as I acted out the moments in my life with our babies. Sleep deprivation. Anxiety. Dissociation. Depression. Assigning 12
names to summarize those moments normalizes it. Yet, four years into my motherhood journey, I am still left wondering why I thought I had to power through and do it on my own. The version of me before motherhood believed that it was my sole responsibility to be in control at all times. That, should anything happen to my babies once they were born, only my misgivings would be to blame. I created a one-man show in my mothering. Now that my children are well out of the newborn stage, I believe a level of conditioning happened beforehand that made me voraciously buy into the idea that because women give birth, women are meant to do it all. So, when unpredictable things happened like my son needing surgery for his ears, I blamed myself. Or when my daughter needed extra feedings to maintain her weight, I blamed myself. But blame is a disservice to every mother. Society bores the weight of raising children on mothers. When you are pregnant, people dote on you, or, conversely, bother you with unsolicited comments. When babies are born, people flock to the mother. They want to meet the babies and do everything for you as you attempt to navigate your new reality. And then, as quickly as it started, as quickly as you were overwhelmed by the mass of other humans offering help and advice you didn’t ask for, they are gone. And you are utterly and completely alone. And, if you are like me, you said, “Well, I’ve got this. This is what I have been waiting for.” But the truth is that we are not meant to do it alone. But that is a paradox of motherhood: to simultaneously need others while pushing them away.
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COLLEEN TIRTIRIAN is a mother, writer, editor, and New Jersey native, currently writing from her home office in Hoboken. She believes that sharing the journey of motherhood, especially taboo topics, can help to normalize the difficult moments we all feel from time to time. When she’s not writing and juggling mom-duty, Colleen enjoys playing guitar and crafting (specifically, miniatures). Some may say she’s a bit quirky, but she chooses to embrace her eccentricities and channels them into her creative endeavors.
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Engage with Colleen’s Story: Free-write your immediate reaction to reading this story. What feelings came up for you? What did reading this remind you of about your own postpartum experience?
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Cinderella Syndrome By Micah Klassen A few weeks ago, during a text conversation with a Mom friend, I jokingly told her that she could call me “Cinderella”. We were updating each other on how our days were going and what part of the mothering routine we were wading through, and I was feeling pretty down about the fact that the boys and I would be stuck at home . . . again. Earlier that morning, my husband and I had rushed everyone out of the house into cold, miserable weather to make it to a doctor’s appointment on time, leaving a trail of mess behind us in the process. Our youngest son was due for his eighteen-month shot and after successfully making it through the appointment with only a few tears shed, we decided to celebrate his bravery with a coffee stop at Tim Horton’s before going our separate ways. But as you may have guessed, this well-intentioned plan ended with a runaway toddler chase, inevitable meltdowns, and both of us wrestling resistant bodies back into car seats before the coffees had even been half drunk. So after a quick kiss goodbye from my husband, I heaved myself half-heartedly into the driver’s seat and glanced in the rearview to confirm a niggling suspicion — both boys were displaying obvious signs of a head cold after having had the flu only a couple weeks prior. I sighed, wrestling with the disappointment of having to pull out of playgroup plans yet again on a day I’d really been looking forward to some adult interaction. And to make matters worse, I’d had a pretty rough anxiety attack earlier in the week which I was still navigating the aftermath of, mentally and emotionally. While I sat waiting at a stoplight on the way home, staring through the rain splattering my windshield and listening to one of my children wail loudly “I don’t want to go home!” I felt what I imagine Cinderella must’ve felt on that crucial night when everyone else was enjoying themselves at the ball and she was stuck at home, cleaning. Bitterness, frustration, despondency . . . it bubbled just under the surface like lava, ready to erupt.
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I resented being the one to go home to face the mess, the dirty dishes, the laundry piles. I resented the fact that I was the parent who had to endure my son’s wailing for the entire drive home; that I was the one charged with responding to his difficult emotions patiently and lovingly, despite the fact that my own needs for space, connection, rest and stimulation were far from fulfilled. I resented being the one having to shoulder the emotional, physical and mental load of supervising for another long, dreary day. Hence the somewhat dark reference to my friend. Even now, as I read back over what I was feeling, I fight the urge to minimize — to dismiss it in the name of ‘privilege’ or ‘overreacting’. But I think it’s worth noting that postnatal anxiety and depression are common traits of early motherhood for a reason. In 2020 when our youngest son was just six months old, we decided to move countries. We left sunny, humid Sydney — our home of eleven years — and made the long journey to Vancouver to be near my husband’s family; the plan was originally just to visit for six months in the midst of COVID lockdowns but travel complications arose which forced us to stay indefinitely, and we moved into a tiny basement suite in the suburbs. This is where I’ve spent numerous nights hunched over my computer writing, after the boys finally drift off to sleep. I struggle terribly with the winters here. The endless grey days, the high precipitation levels, the cold . . . oh man, the cold! Winter in Canada inevitably means a ton of time indoors, and that’s something I find really challenging with the boys at the ages they are now — almost two, almost four. Their energy feels relentless! Of course, we’ve learned to find our rhythms and adapt, but some days over the past three months I’ve felt like I’m operating in pure survival mode. I flail around feebly for motivation just to get dressed and do my hair. There have been moments where the sheer amount of effort it takes to leave the house (my youngest absolutely hates putting on clothes, or getting a diaper change, for that matter) has felt overwhelming and I’m all too aware of the resistance that awaits me at every single turn. I rotate through feelings of exhaustion, irritability, loneliness and intellectual and creative frustration; even just getting this piece finished and sent off has felt like a fight whilst dealing with sick kids, very limited personal time, fluctuating anxiety levels and new parenting challenges that are leaving me emotionally thin at the end of each day. It’s kind of ludicrous to think that the household load, plus parenting load, plus lack of social interaction, plus lack of stimulation, plus any
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other challenge that may arise will equate to anything positive, and yet there’s this invisible pressure to have things appear just so, isn’t there? There’s dissonance between what I would prefer the world to see — me, clothed in a shimmering ball gown, my ‘positive parent’ badge glinting triumphantly in the chandelier light — and the reality of what I find when I look down at my chipped nails and dry skin, when I behold their little faces looking expectantly back, the endless laundry, stained clothing, the crumbs everywhere. Recently, I was scrolling through Instagram and came across a set of “parenting reminders” that read, “Children should not be burdened with making us happy, nor blamed for making us sad or angry. Children are not responsible for how we feel. We are.” While I agree with this in theory, it got me thinking about how such a concept really outworks in the nitty unpredictable grit of everyday life. All the moments when I’m feeling anxious or exhausted and my child’s behavior rubs me the wrong way, or triggers a response before I have time to pause and think it through. Yes, my children shouldn’t be held responsible for how I feel, but their behavior will certainly (and regularly) contribute to how I feel. In other words, ‘positive parenting’ is easy when I’m feeling positive and energized, but when I’m not — well, what then? How do I keep showing love, when I’ve just borne the physical brunt of a two-year old’s intense and fickle emotions for the past two hours? How do I show patience when I feel like I’ve absolutely drained that barrel to the dregs? How do I balance the contrasting needs of a two and four year old on one schedule, and give them both the best of my attention and time? How do I even look after myself while I’m so busy anticipating their needs? In this season, I’m coming to terms with the fact that my role requires a lot of blood, sweat, and tears, and it’s really really HARD some days. But I’m also learning to accept that reality without succumbing to the urge to polish, or resolve, or tie a bow around it; I wish I could be a completely grounded, positive, emotionally stable person every minute of every day, but I’m not — I get overwhelmed by the load regularly, and just accepting this - that’s the difficult part. I’ve started meditating to help with my anxiety and my virtual coach has taught me that it’s more healing to practice acceptance than to try to avoid or ignore scary thoughts when they arise; I’m learning to label these wandering thoughts “thinking” which helps me not to get lost in the thought, but to simply acknowledge it and let it pass by. This lowers the risk of it spiraling out of control, and I’ve found this to be a very
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helpful practice. It’s in the moments when I’m honest with myself about my fears and questions, doubts and disappointments that I can gather the strength to move forward, to keep choosing love even on the darkest days, without letting them swallow me. The fairytale aspect of unquestionable love for my children most definitely exists, and even though my tendency is to share the moments that reflect this — the laughter and cuteness and moments of ease — these are only one side of the story. I remind myself that my dark days don’t negate the light ones or make the memorable moments any less beautiful, as I learn to hold both dark and light in balance. I believe wholeheartedly that my boys should feel loved and safe in their home and within the boundaries of their relationship with me, and I try really hard to deliver consistency as a parent because I want them to benefit from the security this provides. But while I intend to parent in an affirming, understanding way, this isn’t always what plays out. I’ve failed many times to respond with patience. And I know for certain I’ll fail again. I also know that being a ‘positive parent’ isn’t as simple as pinning a shiny badge on my lapel for all the world to see. Relationships (and love) are messy, organic, fluid, unscripted, and full of mistakes and disappointments . . . they’re not a static concept, nor can they be simplified into some easy three-step instruction guide. Love is a constant, momentby-moment invitation I have the privilege of responding to, even while on the 4th or 5th or 6th or 100th attempt. Love has the power to prevail in any circumstance, and this is what constantly grounds me. Love is a choice, it’s an opportunity that is always there, even after I’ve failed. So for me personally, positive parenting looks like apologizing to my child when I realize I didn’t respond in a loving or patient way. It has meant asking for help from family or friends when I’m feeling overwhelmed or anxious. Sometimes it looks like seeking out professional help, or taking medication, rather than trying to just “be strong” and internalize some of the things I’m dealing with, mentally. Other times it looks like sitting on the floor, taking deep breaths and reminding myself what I want my boys to remember most before projecting frustration onto them. Sometimes it means putting on a TV show for them so I can journal or paint or write poetry for half an hour, and get myself into a clearer headspace. Sometimes it’s just learning to recognise that I’m human, and fragile and fallible, and that in order to support their needs as best I can, I also must respect and prioritize my own. So I workout at home, I meditate, I try to take breaks when they’re offered; I read and learn whenever I can. A lot
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of times though, positive parenting looks just as much like falling asleep on the couch with my youngest little boy snuggled against me, watching Blippi, and making banana bread with my eldest at 5 p.m., because I promised.
MICAH KLASSEN was raised in New Zealand and homeschooled by her mum, who was the first to spark a love for creative writing in her during primary school. That spark quickly morphed into flame — writing is such a cathartic expression for Micah and has helped her through some very difficult seasons. In 2010, she moved to Australia, fell in love and married her Canadian sweetheart — They now have two babies and Micah is doing her best not to fall off the wild rollercoaster ride that is Motherhood! Currently writing from Vancouver, Canada.
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Engage with Micah’s Story: Write Micah a letter of support. Confess to her the things you do sometimes that make you feel like you’re “coming up short” and not the mom you want to be. Now, read this letter back to yourself, because all moms can use some extra compassion and grace.
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Continued Thoughts:
Every mother has a compelling story. What’s yours?
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Welcome to The Mom Salon. We may be separated, but we're closer than you think! Motherscope’s monthly zine is the collaboration of fifteen women united by a love of storytelling and our motherhood lens. Each month you'll connect with women from around the world, each experiencing motherhood in their own unique way. Learn from, relate to, and reflect using their stories and poetry. Your voice too is welcome in The Salon. After each piece you'll find space ready for your thoughts, inspired by and in reaction to a fellow mama. Here, there is room for everyone and every story.
Motherscope is a magazine and platform for women to write and share their own stories of motherhood. We believe every mother has a compelling story and that stories have the power to solve our world problems. Embrace your inner storyteller at motherscope.com.
