expecting:

the motherhood project
what were your unexpected(s) around motherhood, pregnancy, fertility etc… ???

WHAT IS IT LIKE tO BE A MOTHER?

I was having unexpected feelings around turning 40 and not being a mama.
I’d always thought it didn’t matter.
And all of a sudden… this was a force to be reckoned with. MOTHERHOOD.

SO… I started asking.

WHAT UNEXPECTED-S HAD HAPPENED TO OTHER WOMEN AROUND PREGNANCY AND MOTHERHOOD?

turns out they had a lot to say:

motherhood is

a huge topic for women to grapple with. Whether you want kids or not, have them or don’t, it’s always worth looking motherhood straight in the face and being brutally honest with your feelings surrounding it. Then you can sort through them and make peace with them in a real way. Everyone deserves that.”
- Denise Gasser

THIS PROJECT ENCOMPASSES OVER 30 WOMEN’S STORIES.

EXPECTING: the motherhood project August 2022

new moms. grandmas. first time pregnant moms. adoptive moms. single moms. two moms. widows.
women who can’t have children. who never wanted children.
who’ve always wanted children.

closing thoughts:

Our beliefs about ourselves run deep.
One of the big themes that rises to the top of all these conversations on motherhood is that acceptance matters:
The struggle to understand what your life is … regardless of what you wanted at the outset… to acknowledge and accept what IS. The women who've made peace with what IS - be it infertility or dragon babies or the world's criticisms of their choice to be child-free … to carry what is, to be able to laugh about it, to dispense that same grace to someone else in the face of their hard. That's the ultimate goal.

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