What do life after disaster and motherhood have in common?

Okay, this may sound a little odd, but it strikes me that life after disaster is a lot like becoming a parent for the first time. A huge caveat here before I begin. I promise you, I don’t mean to say my children are disastrous — they are quite the opposite. I’m also very aware that I’m blessed with the good fortune of being able to have children.

When I embarked on motherhood, I knew it would be one of the most profound and life-altering experiences I would ever have, and it was. I was unprepared for the relentlessness, the exhaustion, the anxiety, and the hard-won achievements and satisfactions. Through the fog of hormones and endless sleepless nights I dug deep and learned a great deal about me.

Fast forward ten years and our family of four was sleeping like any other night. However, In the dark of the early morning, I was jarred awake. The violence was primal. A deep-gut terror flowed through me. I found myself trying to get to my daughter’s room. It wasn’t a decision. Our house had become an obstacle course. I don’t know how my feet carried me there. Doors were flapping, floors were moving. The furniture came alive, possessed. One hand held up a bookcase, the other fished for my daughter in a bed that was dancing to the beat of the earthquake. Holding thirty kilos in one hand, a bookcase with the other, I couldn’t be heard calling out to my partner and son over the roar of the earth coming undone.

Here I was again with a profound and life-altering experience that I was unprepared for. From that terrifying moment and through the months and years that followed I had familiar feelings of anxiety, exhaustion and, what I came to realise later, hard-won achievements and satisfactions. Through the fog of stress hormones and endless sleepless nights I dug deep and once again learned a great deal about me.

As with parenting, I found that just when I thought I had finally worked out a solution, a new challenge presented itself. Home, community, city, my emotional core — everything in fact — had been shaken off its axis and needed to be rebuilt and recalibrated.

I wasn’t sure I was up to the task, what the task was and when — if ever — it would end, or if it was actually a new beginning. I felt immense pressure.

In both motherhood and life after disaster I ruminated over decisions made, or potential missteps along the way. I was reminded that no matter how hard I tried, I didn’t always get it right. It took a while to figure out this didn’t make me incapable, just human. I found that motherhood and life after disaster were both humbling. Both kept me feeling like a novice — no matter how far along the path I got I was still learning.

So, when the darling toddler is tantruming and you feel like shutting yourself in the pantry (yep I actually did this once) or the demands of life after disaster feel crushing, it might help to take a moment to turn around, look back, and celebrate that you have survived the ups and downs and that you have learned much. Go ahead. Take a moment. Consider all that you’ve endured. Consider how far you’ve come. Despite how hard all this can feel, give yourself some credit. You’ve earned it.

©Hummingly 2021