The Yoga of Motherhood

Not too long after my first child was born, I became acutely aware of things about myself I had never really noticed before.

And if I’m being truthful, they weren’t necessarily things I liked about myself either.

In those early days of motherhood, I struggled. I struggled with the sheer emotional weight of becoming a mother while still somehow being expected to keep life and a household moving around me.

I struggled with sleep deprivation and being awake through the night while my husband slept. Breastfeeding was excruciating. Often times I felt so lost, feeling as though I had zero idea about how to look after a baby, nevermind myself!

I loved my baby, but that love didn’t always arrive in the uncomplicated, overwhelming way I had imagined it would. Sometimes I simply felt exhausted, overwhelmed and completely unprepared for the emotional demands of motherhood.

What I came to realise in those first few months after giving birth was that, in more ways than one, it had also been my birth.

In the process of birthing my child, I have also birthed the mother in me at the very same time.

In the early weeks with my first baby — when he was just one month old, and I was only one month into becoming a mother.

And perhaps that was why yoga became so important to me.

Long before motherhood, yoga had already become an anchor I returned to through times of change.

As a young mother, it gave me somewhere to meet this new woman I was becoming.

Yoga had supported me through labour and birth, but it was in the months and years that followed — as I found my way into motherhood — that I began to understand just how deeply I needed it.

My practice didn't look particularly impressive.

Often it was 15 minutes here and there. A few poses on the floor. A little breathing. An occasional class if I was lucky.There is now a word that defines this time of transition, it’s one I use often in my work: matrescence.

In the. same way adolescence describes the enormous transformation from childhood into adulthood, matrescence describes the transformation of becoming a mother — a profound shift that can touch almost every part of a woman's life: her body, identity, relationships, emotions, priorities and sense of self.

We place so much attention on the birth of a baby — understandably so — but what about the birth of the mother?

Looking back, I can see that so much of what I experienced in those early months was part of my own matrescence. I wasn't simply learning how to feed, settle and care for a baby. I was learning how to inhabit an entirely new version of myself.

But it was there.

And when so much of my life suddenly revolved around the needs of another human being, yoga gave me somewhere to return to myself.Becoming responsible for raising a child also awakened something else in me. I wanted to be the best version of myself for my child. I wanted to understand myself more deeply. I wanted to meet the parts of myself that motherhood was suddenly revealing to me — including the uncomfortable ones.

There was a strong pull to explore this through yoga.

Yoga had already accompanied me through so many transitions in my life: my teenage years, heartbreak, the death of my father, pregnancy, labour and birth and now matrescence. It made sense that I would turn towards it again as I crossed this enormous threshold into motherhood.

Interestingly, I didn't undertake my teacher training because I wanted to become a yoga teacher or begin a new career.

In many ways, I did it for myself.

I wanted to learn. To heal. To understand myself more deeply. And perhaps, instinctively, to gather some of the tools I knew I was going to need for the years of mothering ahead.

I had no idea at the time just how profoundly that decision would shape my life, my teaching and eventually the work I would do with other women.

Because motherhood continues to teach me that yoga isn't simply something we do on a mat.

Sometimes the yoga is in noticing our reactions before acting on them.

Sometimes it is finding one conscious breath in the middle of the chaos.

Sometimes it is recognising that we need rest.

Sometimes it is surrendering the idea that we should be able to do everything.

Sometimes it is meeting ourselves — our impatience, grief, anger, tenderness, joy and love — exactly as we are.

Motherhood has been one of my greatest teachers.

And perhaps this is the yoga of motherhood: not becoming a perfect mother, but continuing to meet ourselves within the practice of becoming.

Again and again.

So, if motherhood feels hard today, know that I see you.

You don't need to have it all together. You don't need an hour-long yoga practice or a perfectly calm home.

Sometimes the practice is simply finding your way back to yourself, one breath at a time.