The holidays are over.
The tree is still up.

Does depression mean one is depressed? Does society understand how, just exactly, depressing being a mother can be at times? I think not.
Motherhood is this fairytale that is shown on TV as pushing a pink pram, or baby jogger..while staying trim, neatly pressed, fashionable in a 'Vera Bradley' matching diaper bag kind of way.
It's an illusion.
Anything that starts off with as much pain as childbirth should immediately send off warning signals.
"I'm dying!!!!"...oh quick, let's get a fun picture and "smile!" and "push" and "OMG I AM DYING"...not good.

I dreamed the dream! I did. I thought having a child would 'complete me' (gag) and make me 'whole' (double gag). Motherhood is an illusion that we as young mother's created, conveniently forgetting the fact that most of our mothers drank bloody mary's for breakfast and gin and tonic's for lunch.
I have the fortune of not working. Loosely defined as 'not working out of the home'..because you can bet your bottom dollar that if I had to herd my peeps out the door every day by 7 am, no one would be alive in this house.
I married a man who was raised with a mother at home, as mine was. This is kind of what he expected of me, which is just dandy with me because as mentioned five seconds ago, mass genocide is really not a good option.
Mothers who 'work outside the home' (I'm starting to find this funny) have it so incredibly hard that I cannot believe there are not more suicides.
The reality of motherhood is that is it supermegaultraomgcanihavecoffeefromanivdrip hard.
First an foremost, getting the child here in one piece is beyond hedonistic. From first pee on the stick, you are a vessel of life. A vessel. Nothing more, trust me. Do not drink. Do not take medication. Do not exercise. Do not have sex. Already, I'm sensing this person (or in my case, people) is more important than me. Now, for those of you who do not know me, no one is more important than ME. Many of my friends really love this about me. I do not pretend to be this earth mother/self sacrificing friend/wife/lover. I am selfish about me. I love my time. It's mine. I do not share well with others.
Enter fetus. After giving birth in front of every medical resident in the hospital (11 sets of eyes total on my cervix), I bring these people home and proceed to lose my mind. Hey guess what? Babies do not sleep, EVER. And I had two of them. The only human sleeping in my house was my husband. No sleep, again, it's all about me, means I cannot function in a way that society deems fit. Now, of course, in hindsight, I had postpartum depression, obviously. But 11 years ago, that was a new term and no one was really used to it. So, a young mother at that time struggled usually alone. Another part of motherhood that is neglected is the presence of the black death bellybutton. What is THAT? It's like some awful reminder that the baby was attached to you WITH said disgusting growth. It's a real bright spot in a mother's life when, after two weeks of wrestling with the lifeless stump, it finally falls off. Congratulations, baby, you are on your own now.
So, there is little to no sleeping. Hair is falling out. Boobs are foreign objects. Husband is a FOREIGN OBJECT.
These little beings begin to grow. And they grow and grow and grow and grow.
Beings are now walking. Goodbye privacy! I have not had a BM alone in 10 years. I have taken maybe 2 showers alone. They are everywhere all at once. Oh hey and guess what? They still don't sleep that much. Know what else? They get sick. A lot. This means coughing. This means vaporizers and cleaning vomit at 1 am. Right about this time is when mother's attempt to potty train said beings. Well, now that's just another domain of hell. So, along with the coughing, cleaning the vomit, now there are bed filled with urine to contend with.
I am not kidding.
There are battles. Time outs. There are reasons for things that need explaining. Because now, along with walking and shitting their pants, they talk. The questions! "Why" "why" "why"????
BECAUSE I SAID SO.
I learned as I got older and my kids got older to answer their incessant questions with a question or two of my own. "Is this seriously a question, child?" "Do you ask questions just to hear your own voice?" and my personal favorite "Do you want to live to see tomorrow?"...
Now that they are older there is much more food involved, as in I should buy stock in Wegman's groceries. The sheer food intake of a young boy is comparable to how much sleep a mother loses. Inconceivable.
By now, must of us have had more than one, or in my case, two kids. In my insanity, I added two more children to the already present twins.
Children, children everywhere!!! And if they are not actually physically present in a room, I can guarantee you that something of theirs IS. Shoes, backpacks, laundry, homework, football gear, toys, toys toystoystoys!!!
At this time, mother herself has little to no identity AT ALL, aside from sous chef and chauffeur.
All this time, there is still little sleep available. A mother has to be, at all times, alert to coughs, kids falling out of bed, pee incidents, etc. Along with this, a wife must be, at all times, ready to drop on the bed and have sex with husband. hahahaha....yeah.
There are friends. Even better, friends parents. You muddle hopelessly trying to find someone who can relate to the situation. There are some! Oh yeah.
The laundry is like something from a novel, in terms of one doesn't think it's real until it's actually walking itself out of the laundry room.
There are boo-boos. Broken bones. Hurt feelings. Slammed doors. Fighting siblings. Teeth knocked out.
There are complications, there are doctors, dentists, speech therapists.
There are teachers, there are coaches.

However. That all being said, these are only the parts that no one warns about.
The parts that people talk about are the good things.

The relief of carrying twins to a due date. The first cry. The smell and feel of their skin.
The first smile, the first tooth.
"Mama".
"Dada".
The feeling that you get when they are finally asleep and you collapse on the couch.
The feeling you get when two little feet, encased in fleece pjs, pad into your room, way to early to get up, and ask to sleep with you.
Pink cheeks. Messy hair. Fingerpaints.
"I poopy on the potttyyyyy!!!"
Reading stories. Watching Dumbo 62,000 times.
Trick or treating and Christmas morning. Riding a bike with no training wheels. Becoming a big brother.
Riding the school bus to school, only to find out that mom is not there.

There are the unmistakable signs of a mother. She is usually surrounded by a gaggle of children. Her purse is large enough to carry a change of clothes for a toddler, a sippy cup, a snack, wipes, and a wallet, perhaps a toy or two. Hair almost always in a ponytail. She has on little or no makeup. Hopefully, she is laughing.

It took me months to fall in love with my husband. Little bits at a time. It took about 2 seconds to fall in love with my children with all the emotion that one body can physically handle without exploding.
It's intoxicating, it's awful. It's tiresome, it's thrilling.
Your pride and prejudice will come out with a tiger growl. And no one will ever hurt my child as long as I'm around to protect him or her.

Welcome to motherhood.
Sleep is for wimps.