The Garden

At 43, I’m now too old to be sucked into the social media whitewash, the flat lay of life, the comparison battering belief that others are doing it better, harder, faster, stronger. I’m on the ‘gram but I don’t reel-ly ‘use’ Instagram (sorry, not sorry). Alex’s elder brothers next door have showed me enough Tik Twat to bring on actual middle age. I’ve never twitted. And yet with every sun I see setting on another day parenting (normally racing upstairs to the bathroom for a piss after rocking Alex to sleep), I realise pretty much every single motherhood cliche, reeled, not reeled, is basically true.

I am living my dream. I am full time, stay at home parenting, in the trenches, the first year of survival survived. My maternity leave has been extended by work. We are whisper it, sleeping b.e.t.t.e.r. The septuagenarian cat has moved to psychological toleration and a permanent toilet fixture by our front door. Our son is a proper toddler, the horticultural terrorist who shows no signs of leniency with plants, flowers, soil and bark. We survived our first bout of solo parenting, with daddy abroad, commenting somewhat unconvincingly that Dubai airport had no decent chocolate, champagne or frog toys. I managed the unexpected three hour wake up and screamathon that was the evening he flew from Heathrow, calling him in floods as the A380 received its push back from the stand. “Give Alex some calpol, put him in the cot – yes I know you don’t want to do it but you have to. Also, er, we’re taxiing now so I’ve got to go.” Anticipation, so often nine times out of ten worse than the doing: yet each night I got into bed, my body and mind de-tensed slowly as our son slept peacefully in his cot. The partners get to change their workplace. I live, breathe, sleep in mine.

I believe in embracing the mundanity of life. I support the desperate need to drastically improve childcare infrastructure in this country. I recognise the fetishisation of motherhood, this psychological pinnacle pushed by society, culture, our biological clock. I know the village is essential. Despite my only child status, I now understand the quasi-emotional-biological longing for a second child while shuddering at the very thought of undergoing more fertility treatment, more mind bending holding of nerve, more physical and mental assault. Reluctantly, as I feel the anger of keeping going keeping going keeping going keeping going, my mind has to bypass the guilt, shame and self-criticism because the two minutes spent reading the Little Book of Calm tell us it’s psychologically normal and I realise at some point my son is going to see me as the flawed human being we all are. I know my anchor, my strong points. I know our child is fundamentally happy and loved.

I know how fucking unbelievably, ungratefully, unashamedly how hard this is. 

Every trope a truth.

My toolbox, so carefully curated and honed during a decade of unexplained infertility, IVF, miscarriage, parental rupture, divorce, donor conception, pregnancy after loss and copious therapy is taking a battering. The kit is being chucked in the air, like the cards we were dealt with infertility, and shit is raining down. A silent – and less so silent survey via voicenote – of all the mums I know shows that I’m not alone. Despite massive changes in the law regarding flexible working and miscarriage leave, despite firms introducing fertility policies, despite the fact that most of us are with partners who support (and actually action) equality, women still remain more biologically susceptible thanks to having children, wanting children, wanting children but not having them, not wanting children and not having them. I used to half joke with my almost all male team it was a miracle anyone managed to be professional at work until I realised professionalism was the only veneer left.

There’s no job description for parenthood, parenting after loss, parenting after loss and donor conception. No quarterly reviews, no management process if you fail to perform. And so in a long standing meeting with myself and my son which lasts from approximately 4:45am to 7.30pm every day, give or take, I set the agenda. I’ve been on the rollercoaster long enough to know when the bumps become the plummet. The house, once my pregnant sanctuary and miscarriage four walls, unfairly takes the rap again. Getting out and about is the only plan. Oatmilk coffee in hand – the lactose intolerance is real – I take us to the community railway garden. 

The trains arrive on platforms 1 and 2, delighting our son who toddles onto the trainspotter platform with the out of control enthusiasm previously reserved for grabbing the….cat. Every ten to fifteen minutes we wave frantically. Thameslink drivers are decent, with most of them waving back and tooting the horn. Southeastern need to up their game. Sometimes I’m there on my own, with Alex. Other times there are dads with their toddlers, mums with their babies and toddlers, grannies in charge of childcare for the day. The children interact on the toadstools, the balancing stones, snatching the flowers, chasing bees in the lavender, grabbing twigs from the Bug Hotel and sharing the abandoned, or artfully placed, trike. Someone from Instagram recognises me and comes up to chat, improving my day immeasurably with her friendly face and forensic knowledge of Toad pastries. A few days later I talk about this lovely interaction with her unbeknownst to me husband. I see the same mum twice in quick succession, both of us drawn to the wooden train, the secret wishing well, the magical world created by local volunteers. Little by little conversations are facilitated by toddling, wobbling, crying little people. This garden becomes our safety net, a built in part of our routine. For some of us it becomes a confessional. 

Premature birth. NICU stays, both short and long term. Miscarriage. Life changing illness and brave, existential treatments. Infertility. How misinformative the NCT medical advice is, and the impact it has on patients’ choices according to one mum obstetrician. One grandma, telling me about her three daughters, her measured tone disguising the life changing grief of losing her second daughter at one years old. Another waiting with bated breath to hear about her daughter’s second baby’s twelve week scan. Two dads, talking about the 10.15am steam train through the station on a Tuesday, their two year olds in raptures; their kindness silently helping me on a difficult day. The sun shines. It rains. Somehow the pebble from the children’s marble maze game goes missing, bright blue amongst the bark. Everyone agrees it’ll turn up sometime.

Dark humour laces brief interactions. Everyone agrees the joy goes hand in glove with commensurate difficulty. This is hard. So hard. Trying, having, losing. Not having. At home. At work. Help. No help. Parenting. Not parenting when wanting to and hearing this sort of shit. The oscillation between feeling the highest of highs one minute, and then utter, isolating lows the next. The energy it takes to self-regulate. The energy and self-awareness it takes to professionally adult. The utter rage and ingratitude we would have felt listening to this whilst trying. The realisation that the story just doesn’t end with a live, breathing, cherished baby.

The pebble still hasn’t turned up. 

The biggest, most psychologically dangerous con of trying to, having, and not having children is its isolation. I know this. I understand this. I am (relatively) psychologically educated. Yet I, and it seems a lot of others, fall for this con artist every single time. The railway garden interactions are that little lift; the breeze which moves difficult thoughts along. I breathe in the lavender. The breathing space. My son tries to gently attack the Foxgloves. I said to Katie that our lives, outlooks, relationships had changed irrevocably since losing our babies. Here I feel validated, in listening to others, to realise it’s ok to still process. To reflect. To feel it keenly on some days, and softly, gently on others. To want to share my son’s genetics but know that if I did he probably wouldn’t be here. To feel that pang deep down and not know if it’s motherhood, genetics, hormones, tiredness, self doubt or a bastard mix of all. To want to be mothered the way I am mothering. To accept that this is always going to be a work in progress. That I am a work in progress.

The cards are still landing.

Maybehood x

Crofton Park Community Railway Garden is open Monday – Saturday, 9am to 5pm