life's work

I'm a little amazed at the change in myself. For much of my life, the pull of romance has been strong, I have looked for the sparkle of attraction with males, been driven by it, have felt defined by who liked me at the time, what they liked about me, how it shaped me, or even felt defined by which heartbreak I was getting over, which boy I was grieving. Even as a little kid, I had innocent romances with little boyfriends. There was a time in my twenties when I slept around maybe too much, there were certainly relationships I stayed in too long because I couldn't be without one, much to my chagrin. I have been called a love junkie. Then I had a child and I find motherhood fulfils me in a way those other relationships never did or could. I feel like this is what I was born to do, the nourishing, the self sacrifice, the daily call to self regulate, to model respect and presence. I don't feel touched out, I have great conversations, I am overjoyed and amazed with watching this small human grow and form and be shaped. I feel like this is life's work and my body's work and it fills most of me. Of course it won't and shouldnt replace an adult partnership between equals, and I do not feel like I have in my child a mini husband. I have seen that in an aquintance and it was creepy. But motherhood for me has expanded like a fetus inside a woman to push aside many other desires, cravings, flings and fancies that used to take up much more room in my life, for better or worse. Of course my experience is shaped by felix's medical experiences; maybe I wouldn't feel so unambiguous, and also by my solo parenting. By needing to carry the whole load and not having any moment for myself, there just can't be space for a love of horses, of going hiking, or the chance to go to yoga classes or massage courses. And all this has has taken up the want for romance too. Getting a child also coincided with a drastic rupture in my marriage, in the total inability of husband to be there when I needed my partner the most, in labour, in birth, in the postpartum first year, second, third, fourth, in hospitals, in the mmiddle of the night, in the middle of a fight, in the mundane, in parenting, in making major medical decisions, and in my private moments of grief doubt exhaustion and despair. I experienced first hand what the memes are saying, the man child, the woman who keeps asking the man to be just that and after a while, stops asking and starts forging her own way. I'd rather have someone who raves about my kid than tries to flatter me, I'd rather be told how strong I am after an all nighter than some compliment on my legs as I get dressed in the morning, I'd rather have someone who will and can do bedtime once in a while instead of wanting to stay up late with me alone. I was online (too)late last night when I got an incoming call from husband, coming off ski patrol shift in nz. At the end of the conversation, he thanked me for waiting up for his call and I very quickly had to curb and moderate my response of laughable disbelief so as not to be cruel. I had zero intention of sacrificing my sleep in the off chance that he remembers to call, just for a straining 'conversation' where I get interrupted by him while I'm answering his interrogative questions about what I did that day. I hate talks like that, ask me something interesting, intuitive, something that tells me you know me. I HATE that reflex standard question of "how are you" first thing in a call, it makes me immediately get my hackles up, I bristle, I cringe, I clench my jaw, yet 9 years after meeting me, he's still doing it to me and thinks me rude if I balk. For him to think I'd wait up half the night for him shows me he's not paying attention, he doesn't realize, still, how much I've pulled back, how I don't extend myself to him across some gap anymore because it's rarely been reciprocated and usually results in my falling from the heights of expectation. I waited up for years. I sacrificed a lot of sleep and a lot of myself. Now I'm doing things for me and for my child. And he's right, we did recently do some late calls but those were purely so felix and hamish had time together and not for me. He's still in love with me.