I never wanted to be a stay-at-home-Mom.

When my son, my first born, arrived seven weeks early and spent three weeks in the NICU everything I thought I knew about Motherhood changed.  I had to l leave him every night of those three weeks.  For the first five nights, I was down the hall recovering from my c-section, for the next couple of weeks until his discharge, I left my tiny newborn in the care of skilled nurses amidst the sounds of beeps from life sustaining machines and the tiny cries of other preemies while I went home to toss and turn and wake every three hours to pump.  I felt like a part-time Mom.

Several weeks after returning home and out on a walk with my then husband, he turned to me and asked if I would consider staying at home with our son. 

I had been asking myself the same question.  The thought of leaving this fragile little human in the care of anyone other than me felt brutally at odds with the primal attachment I had developed with him.  It was decided.  I would go all in on the Mom front and be with this little guy, and the next one (fingers crossed) until they went to kindergarten. 

Word to the wise for all expecting first time parents, you might not want to make 7 to 8 year commitments to anything in the wake of the hormonal ride of your life. 

So here I was, not the part-time Mom I felt like in those first three weeks, but a full time 24/7 playgroup attending, spit up wearing, boob-on-tap Mom.  While there are several books worth of SAHM stories in the subsequent years, I will skip to the part where I went back to work after five years at home, plus, an additional kiddo, and four months later I was sitting in an empty house three days after my ex moved out. 

I share 50/50 custody with my rock star of a co-parent.  Our split was about as amicable as one can hope for in this situation, and when all was said and done, there was never a question in my mind that I chose the right person to be my kids’ Dad, but that first weekend at Papa’s house?  Brutal. 

A tidal wave of self-doubt crashed into me, and I felt like my reasons for being had been torn away from me.  My desire to be a Mother started when I was old enough to gurgle out “My baby” to my dolls, and now, were these still “My” babies if I wasn’t there half the time to hold them when they cried, play hide and seek, or tuck them into bed?  I was back to feeling like a part-time Mom. 

I felt like a failure, not only with the ending of my marriage, but with my commitment to my kids.  I had always maintained that there were four people in our house that mattered equally, but when it came down to it, two people wanted to stay and two people wanted to go.  It was a draw, and nobody won. 

That was one of the hardest parts of choosing divorce, feeling like I chose myself over my kids.  The guilt would keep me up at night in tears, googling “am I the f**king worst?” and journaling furiously while I wondered if I could ever be at peace with the lifelong burden I felt I placed on their tiny shoulders. 

Gradually, I stopped bursting into tears on the regular, and began to examine my beliefs from different angles.  It occurred to me that my children were never “mine” to begin with.  They never belonged to me and are not an extension of me.  I am here to teach them, support them and love them furiously as they forge their own unique paths.  It is my honor, and also my ego busting privilege to love them far more than they love me (my three year old currently prefers her Dad, so…that’s fun). 

I also began to internalize that they will have many important guides along their journey- teachers, grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends, and possibly, future step-parents.  They will gain something from all of us because as we all know, but often forget, it takes the whole damn village.

So, as I sit here writing late at night, with my kids’ warm little bodies tucked into their beds on my custodial day, I ask myself again- am I a part-time Mom?  And the answer is no.  I became a full time Mom the moment I walked out of the NICU for the first time and left a piece of myself behind in that incubator. 

For all the parents and caregivers out there, I’m curious, what makes you feel like a full-time parent (or not)?  Is it the amount of time you spend with your kids?  Whether they need or want you, or not?  Or do you reject the phrase all together and simply view yourself as a parent with your own unique definition?

With love,

Steph