Somewhere in the blur — maybe it was at the market, when the tomato seller called you "mummy" and it took you a full second to realise she meant you — the question slipped in quietly, the way dangerous questions do: who am I now?
Because you remember her. Ada who read two novels a week and had opinions about everything. Ngozi who danced at every party and laughed with her whole chest. Bisi who was building a business and saying her full name proudly at conferences. And now you're someone's mummy, and you love that name more than your own breath — but some nights, folding tiny clothes at 11pm, you catch yourself grieving a woman you can no longer see clearly.
Can we be honest here, the way we would be if we were sitting together? You didn't lose her. But pretending nothing changed isn't strength either — it's silence. And silence is where mothers disappear to.
Here's what actually happened: you didn't vanish, you expanded. The woman you were didn't get cancelled — she became the foundation. Her patience now steadies a screaming baby at 3am. Her humour is the reason your toddler collapses into that belly laugh you'd trade the world for. Her stubbornness — the one teachers used to complain about — is the exact material it takes to fight for a child in a Nigerian hospital waiting room. Nothing about you was wasted. It was all reassigned.
But be careful with the two lies we tell ourselves. The first: "Once the baby is older, I'll go back to being me." No — the baby gets older, then school fees start, then another baby, and "later" is where Nigerian women bury whole lifetimes. Waiting to return to yourself is not a plan. The second lie: "A good mother doesn't need anything outside her children." We come from mothers who poured themselves out completely and were praised for it — and many of them, if you asked them softly, would tell you they wish they'd kept one small thing for themselves. You can honour them and learn from them in the same breath.
So keep something. Not a vacation, not a whole day you don't have — a thing. Five honest minutes with a journal, where you write your name and your feelings, not the baby's feeding times. A course on your phone, fifteen minutes a day, that trains your mind to remember it can still learn. The business idea you keep scrolling past — it's not too late, and it's not selfish. Worship, rest, a walk where nobody holds your hand. An interest outside of motherhood is not betrayal — it's maintenance of the whole woman your children actually need. A mother who is still becoming is the best map you can hand a daughter. And the strongest lesson you can hand a son: this is what a whole woman looks like.
And on the days you can't feel her at all — the survival days, the crying-in-the-bathroom days — don't do what we were taught: don't disappear gracefully. Speak it, to your husband, to a friend, to the circle. A woman who says "I don't feel like myself" is not broken; she's right on time. Feelings like that are the soul clearing its throat, asking to be heard again.
You are a mother. And you are more. Not "used to be more" — are more, right now, in this season, in this tired body, at this 11pm folding table. Both are true. Both are beautiful.
You were never meant to lose yourself to find your family — and in this circle, you never will.
Community • Support • Growth
