I’ve been reading a lot of posts about #maternalmentalhealth this week and though I wasn’t diagnosed with #pnd I found it overwhelming, lonely, wonderful and exhausting. I confided in an older woman that I was feeling depressed and she laughed and said ‘what are you talking about, these are the best years of your life!’ContinueContinue reading “Making Sense of Motherhood with writing”
Tag Archives: writingmotherhood
Why I write about motherhood
I just want to put it out there that I’m not a self-certified expert on parenting by any means. I run courses on writing motherhood because I write, I always have done; it’s how I process my feelings – my grief, my joys, my disappointments, and it’s how I can convey my wildly fluctuating feelingsContinueContinue reading “Why I write about motherhood”
#81
We go in to the caves by torchlight, he leads the way. He loves being the leader, being the quickest, the fastest, always. We won’t let his dreams defeat him.
#77
I will do the garden this evening, pull the roots up from under the soil, shake the mud from them and pile them up in a bucket. There is nothing so therapeutic as gardening, and for a long time I didn’t know this.
#76
Cold back, happy heart. The boys fall into bed at 8.30. Sam has been at school all week, His first week. There have been tears each day from my love, My brave boy who was the biggest and loudest in the Preschool playground, who jumped the highest, who ran the fastest. Just next door, atContinueContinue reading “#76”
#73
Sitting outside, listening to the beautiful noise coming from that shed. Tiny Leaves rehearses with his cellist. This is what summer is like, After two weeks of cold rain, I had almost forgotten. Mud covered children at dinner time, Finding potatoes like jewels in the mud. Birds singing still at 8.30, The fresh scent ofContinueContinue reading “#73”
#66
I am reading my blog, And find my first post, And realise it was four years ago today And realise also that it was the first time We saw her, on the ultrasound.
#65
I don’t know how to dress for this weather; pouring rain, then bright bright sun. I have a carload of sleepers and five minutes to spare. We have come to meet a friend at Attingham, but there is a tinge of sadness as I wait because all of these sixty-somethings that I see walking aroundContinueContinue reading “#65”
#53
He screams in his high chair, sends the broccoli rolling onto the floor, says no to his drink, the banana. So I pick him up out of his chair, wash his hands, his face and hold him to me as we walk upstairs. Up there, he is a different boy, quiet and happy. I runContinueContinue reading “#53”
#50
He pulls the carrot from the ground, And is amazed at what he finds. The bright orange of it peeks through the soil which he shakes from it. ‘My carrot!’ he says. He sowed it, watered it, watched it grow and is pleased with himself now, pleased with what he finds.
#48
After dinner I am sweeping the kitchen floor, when I turn and pick up the scent of fresh mint that drifts in the back door. Sam is waiting there, almost completely covered with it, the leaves trailing over his head, hiding, waiting for his Daddy to find him.
#45
Today, Littlest is coming to light, Pushing up through the baby months, He is pointing and saying da. He crawls onto his brother’s bed And bounces with him, He crawls around after them in the hot sun. He knows he is like them, that he should be doing what they do, So he chews pensContinueContinue reading “#45”
#44
She whines after her nap, Fell asleep in the car with Daddy On their way back from Sainsbury’s But she shouldn’t sleep really, She’s too big. When she woke, Red cheeked, with hot tears, I told her Eva was coming, Her little friend, her cousin, And she stopped, just like that.
# 42
There is wonder in their eyes as they come face to face with the lobsters in their tank, scuttling across the floor, not much bigger than Ben. A touch of magic, of electric blue.
#41
We’ve set up camp, the children burble in their tent. ‘I want to sleep like this’ ‘the other day, last time, you said’ we mill around getting sweet things and cups of tea. There are cakes and pancakes to be eaten. Sheep bleat, the light falls.
#38
Sometimes we don’t even have time to say a word to each other, Don’t look at each other before we must attend to this or that, The fight or the nappy change or the insulin. And then after they sleep we each have our uphill journey to continue with. Music, writing, these dreams, we pullContinueContinue reading “#38”
#30
Your face makes a shadow against the sun. You crawl over me, Pinning me to the earth, This moment, This place. I’m lying on the grass in the hot sun. The bells ring loudly this Sunday afternoon. I’m too tired to move.
#26
He says he wants to make a cake with me. He flicks through the book, Says ‘there’s too many, I can’t choose’. He finally settles on a pavlova. We crack the eggs and whisk them, he says it tastes like marshmallow and I tell him off for licking his fingers. He smoothes out the greaseproofContinueContinue reading “#26”
#25
I have a helper in the garden today, she gets changed into her blue spotty dress, she holds the secateurs awkwardly as she tries to clip a branch out of the way. ‘I cant do it’ she says, ‘push me on the rope swing’. She drops the secateurs in the long grass, and turns andContinueContinue reading “#25”
#20
We walk over a hill under blue skies and down a track going deeper into the knotty woods. We try to wear them out before bed but they still have more energy than us. Run little ones, you will overtake us one day.
#16
A good day. Ben is like clockwork. He sleeps, then wakes red faced and hair ruffled. He tells me what he wants all day long and I think it is a wonder, all that goes on inside him that I don’t yet know. I close the curtains and he says ‘a da da’ very definitely.ContinueContinue reading “#16”
#15
Sam went to school today For the first time, And then he wouldn’t tell me about it because he was too tired, And it reminded me of those days When I’d drop him off at preschool, Only three, And go to get him later, not knowing what he’d done, How he’d spent his five hours,ContinueContinue reading “#15”
#12
I forgot to write yesterday, too busy with these little ones who bring me so much joy, who make my back ache and who have taught me to love.
#8
It is half past nine when we step outside into our clear beautiful garden, and inhale a lungful of sweet night air. I pull the washing (still damp) from the line and you gather up those dirty and faded plastic toys that the kids have scattered around. We fold up the teepee, look at theContinueContinue reading “#8”
#6
We are woken this morning by a rumble of thunder. You sit up in our bed and say ‘I’m not scared of thunderstorms anymore’. Later, there is a break in the rain and we walk through the farmers field behind our house. The sky is big and beautiful. It stops me in my tracks andContinueContinue reading “#6”
#4
It has been a crazy non stop day. There has been laughter and tears in the garden, fighting over the rope swing, a big four year old boy getting toys for his little brother, playing with him. There has been a scoot to the playground where the light was beautiful and clear, where we satContinueContinue reading “#4”
#1
They are bundled off to preschool this morning and there is space and time while littlest sleeps. But I am not writing yet, only reading. It rains and the sky is grey. We go to Grandmas and I am bursting to be out of my house, out of my smallness and as soon as we’reContinueContinue reading “#1”
Enough is enough
here in the evening, emptied out. here I am, sitting on the carpet, the debris of the day strewn around me like a fox has been at a rubbish bag. the baby squirms and wriggles on the sofa; he is not yet settled. I have not yet washed up, had a cup of tea, hadContinueContinue reading “Enough is enough”
July Thunder
We are at playgroup; the last of term in a heatwave. The grass has turned to straw, and the children run about in their swimming costumes. The colour goes out from the sky though, and there is a clap of thunder that makes us all jump. The rain falls on us like God is pouringContinueContinue reading “July Thunder”
elisabeth pike 