Early Motherhood In The Age Of Coronavirus

My life has combusted twice in the past eight months. Two entirely different explosions – one long planned for, the other terrifyingly unexpected. The first, five years in the making. The second, ripping through the globe hour by hour.

You might think early motherhood and the Coronavirus pandemic have little in common. But I’ve been shocked to discover the many similarities between these experiences. Change, uncertainty, loss of normalcy, isolation, burn out…  Becoming a parent and surviving lockdown have more in common than you’d expect.

But first, motherhood.

On July 22nd, 2019, I waddled into an operating theatre in compression stockings, sat on the edge of a cold metal bed and received a large needle in the spine. Before my lower half went numb, I swung my heavy legs onto the table and lay down. A nurse erected a sheet above my chest.

“Try lifting your legs,” the anesthetist said after a minute.

I couldn’t. But was I numb enough to endure major surgery while I was wide awake? The anesthetist took one look at my terrified face and gripped my hand. Surgeons cut into my stomach. I squeezed K’s fist and tried to breathe. The strangest tugging sensation started up. It didn’t hurt, but it was brutally uncomfortable. As our 3.61 kilo baby was wrenched from my gaping abdomen with forceps, a nurse snapped gruesome photos on K’s phone.

Half an hour later, we held our gunky, purple miracle in our arms.

Ari Laurel Barclay Strakosch is quite honestly the sweetest little guy in the entire world. I mean, just look at that face.

beautiful baby

His cheeky smile, bright eyes and delicious laugh melt my insides. When he’s gazing around at the world, he gets these three horizontal lines on his forehead, a sort of well-intentioned, Yoda-like look that says, “interesting you be”. His innocence sometimes breaks my heart, and his relentless demands to be fed, changed, clothed, entertained and loved have at times broken my spirit. He’s a joy, plain and simple. He’s also a catalyst for the most world-shattering, life-altering change I’ve ever experienced.

World-shattering change… Sound familiar?

The month of March decimated the Australian way of life. As the Covid-19 infection rate climbed rapidly, borders closed. Cafes and restaurants and pubs shut up shop. Huge chunks of the population lost their jobs. Government guidelines changed daily. Groups of no more than 100, then 10, then 2. Social distancing as a way of life. Four reasons and four reasons only to leave the house. Our homes as our entire, insular little worlds.

Coronavirus pandemic stay at home
Illustrations – Jennifer Baer

Like new motherhood, the Coronavirus pandemic is a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence. And just like life with a newborn, its borders are difficult to ascertain. The routine of self, perfected over a lifetime, collapses. Sleep deprivation – whether caused by a shrieking baby or gut-clenching anxiety – leaves us brittle and exhausted. The hours blur into one another. The walls of our house feel like a prison cell. We long to catch up with friends and family, to hug and kiss one another, to feel like we’re living, really living, instead of just getting by.

In the face of this new world order, routine is impossible. A rhythm is the best we can hope for.

A rhythm we accumulate slowly, the way we learn to ride a bike – by stacking it a bunch of times until finally we don’t.

When Ari was three months old, we started to find our rhythm. My beloved fringe re-emerged, a result of having ten actual minutes to myself in the morning to straighten my hair. I relegated those disgusting stretched black maternity leggings and nursing tops to strict home wear only, bought some new clothes that fitted me and made me feel nice and hell, actually started wearing them.

I booked in a 6.20pm Monday Pilates class at my old studio, told K to get his ass home from work by 6, and began the simultaneously thrilling and demoralising task of re-discovering, somewhere beneath the great gaping crater of my bellybutton and jelly rolls of my stomach, my pelvic floor. I exfoliated the bejesus out of my dimpled thighs and went and got a spray tan while Ari slept, praise be, in his pram. I sat down at my new desk for the very first time and actually wrote. I felt, for the first time in so so long, that my purpose and work and talent were flooding back.

But with the rise of Covid-19, that rhythm has disappeared. So many of us have lost our jobs and sense of direction.

Like many new parents, we’re struggling to find meaning and purpose in this strange half-life.

I’ve been sleeping late. Letting my personal hygiene lapse. Living in my dressing gown. Downing a glass of wine just to survive watching the news. Getting to the end of each day without anything of redeeming value to show for it, other than a baby who is fed, only crying intermittently and not swimming in shit.

Who then, like me, is in desperate need of a project? Something to devote themselves to – to lend shape to their days and weeks?

Four days ago, I made a big decision. I decided to finally, finally, rewrite my second novel, The Gap. With an eight-month-old, of course, I don’t have much in the way of spare time. But I’m determined to make the most of Ari’s infuriatingly short day naps.

To carve out minutes where and when I can.

Who else is using this enforced Coronavirus break to start something? To tame the chaos, the crippling fear and uncertainty, with planned activity?

To my fellow mothers and social distancers out there, I feel you. May we all rise up in these trying times, alone – together.

Let me know how you’re travelling in the comments. Until next time.

Virtual hugs,

Antonia xo.

Feature image – Liv Bruce: Unsplash

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