Reflections on motherhood.

Coming up to the 1 year mark with Auguste!

I didn’t always want to be a mother. It wasn’t a driving force or a lifelong dream like many women I know. From the outside, it looked like a lot of hard work and sacrifice; putting aside your own goals and dreams for a time or sometimes giving them up entirely.

Then I moved to Mo’orea with Martin. We started babysitting his niece and nephew together. At the time Ioane (the Tahitian version of Jean, pronounced you-wan-e) was around 2-years-old, and Myriam was about 6 months.

We’d spend the day chasing the two around, wrestling with them on the bed, trying to stop Myriam from opening every glass jar or bottle she managed to steal from the cupboard, watching Ioane mix up potions in the garden of mud, ash and water.

We changed nappies, we bathed them, we sang them to sleep to Louis Armstrong songs. Myriam would fall asleep on our chest and wake up immediately when we tried to move her; rolling her onto the bed without waking her up as akin to diffusing a very sensitive bomb.

I got a glimpse of what looking after kids would be like with Martin. Only a glimpse because, at the end of the day, we got to give these kids back to their mum!

Sure, there was lots of work, and at times we’d collapse exhausted on the bed after the chaos of looking after them for a morning. But it was really fun as well. We made up silly games, like making a sandwich (where we’d sandwich them between two pillows and pretend to cut the sandwich in half and eat it) or one time when they watched us bury a pet and wanted us to hold a fake funeral and burial for them as well (this one was a bit morbid and we went back to sandwich making pretty quickly).

Bit by bit I realised that we could not only do it ourselves, but it might actually be a lot of fun to have a baby together.

Myriam at 1 year old

I fell pregnant early 2023. The pregnancy was fascinating. I sensed the changes happening in my body, watched my baby move on the ultrasound, and eventually I felt him move around in there. When Auguste arrived, it was the most elated and most scared I’ve ever been in my life. This tiny, fragile being was put in my care and I would brave sleep deprivation and searing nipple pain to keep him alive.

And then it only got better from there. My tiny newborn who looked like a grumpy old man plumped out into a round, soft, curly-headed baby who loves to make people laugh with funny faces and weird voices. Recently he started tottering around on his fat little legs, arms in the air, like a tiny Godzilla. I watch him wander around the garden like this, naked, and the sight of his chubby little bum gives me an instant rush of love. Martin says whenever he looks at Auguste walking it’s like someone is squeezing fresh dopamine straight onto his brain.

Everything is elevated after his birth. Joy is more pure, I look at the world with the same fascination that he does, everything is new again. At the same time, the frustrations are bigger. My time is no longer my own. I’ve got itchy feet watching friends travel and have to remind myself that it will happen again, just not for a while. I feel more than ever the urgency to create art and yet I have no time for it. I always feel stretched between spending time with my baby and trying to work on my business.

I don’t need to remind myself that this moment, whether joyful or frustrating, is only temporary. Every day I watch my baby change and the baby he was before disappears forever. I’m painfully aware of the passing of time as he hits each new milestone. One day soon he’ll be a teenager and these moments will be gone forever.

So I lean into the joyful chaos. And with number two on the way, I’m guessing it’s about to get even more chaotic.

January free download - Bookworm Building

This month I wrote about one of my favourite projects, and your free download for the month is a print of my favourite one of the series!

About Jimmy Watson’s:

The place is a Melbourne institution, hailing from the 1930s and self-described as one of Melbourne’s very first wine bars. Famous clientele over the years include L. Ron Hubbard (who was apparently thrown out), American actress Ava Gardner, and former Prime Minister Bob Hawke.

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