To The New Mums Wondering If This Is The End Of Their Career.

You may be a brand new mother, you may be a fledgling mother finding her wings, or you may be a seasoned pro. Either way, it’s pretty likely you will have, at some point, questioned your ability to be anything other than a mother. Once your days are consumed with talk of nipples, shit and puke and once you’re existing on three or maybe four hours of sleep a night and once you’ve spent a substantial amount of time talking a lot like Boo from Monsters Inc., you’ll be wondering if your social skills, or creative thinking, or professional brain matter are ever going to return from their baby-induced sabbatical. 

But I have a secret to tell you: they will return. And do you know what? They’ll be bigger and better and ballsier than ever. In my short-lived existence as a keeper of small humans, I have come to discover the power of the mama, or as it’s rapidly becoming known thanks to Jenny Scott of Mothers Meeting: the #mumboss.

Do you know what you should do? You should go to your CV right now and stick ‘MOTHERHOOD’ at the top in big fuck-off letters. In fact, while you’re at it, go ahead and delete everything else on there. University degrees, references from employers, previous experience, your bloody gap year in Thailand…they all pale in the face of the efficiency and bloody awesomeness that motherhood bestows upon you. 

Why? Because since becoming a mother two things have happened. Firstly, you have reassessed all your priorities. You don’t really give much of a shit if the boss raises an eyebrow when you have to leave work to pick up your small human from nursery. You are happy to nonchalantly get your baps out at the desk and attach them to an electric pumping machine while you conduct a conference call. You’ll laugh in the face of anyone without kids who tries to tell you that work is so stressed and so tiring and, if they try to argue their point, you’ll casually give them a Chinese burn. Why? Because of the second thing…

…You are now an efficiency machine. You are dazzled by the fact that some people only have to get themselves out of bed in the morning, feed themselves, dress themselves, get themselves to work and go home and sleep for as long as they choose. You are even more dazzled by the fact that you used to be one of those people. How much time you wasted worrying about how much you had to do before you had the job of keeping a human alive while you did it. 

What used to take you all week, you now achieve in the space of a nap and you know what? You’re better at it. You multitask like a motherfunking demon and woe betide anyone who gets in your way. You are creative because you have to be - that shit doesn’t all get done on a wing and prayer. You are social because lord knows you need to be nice to everyone, especially those who may agree to keep your small human alive for your for a few hours here and there and you are a pro - so pro that even you keep running to the mailbox to see if they’ve sent you your #MUMBOSS certificate and medal. (Newsflash: they haven’t and they won’t but I think it’s something we should start, no?)

So, if you’re wondering if the old you will ever return. If you don’t quite recognise yourself as you look down at sweats covered in porridge and your hair that you’d rather chop off than find time to wash, fear not. In bad news, the old you is not coming back. She was fun but she was a little flighty, and really selfish and prone to the odd bout of laziness and procrastination. But the good news is (and it’s really awesome news) the new you is so, much, better. The new you is an improved version of the old you. It’s the old you with the (granted, metaphorical) wrinkles ironed out. It’s the old you with a vibe. It’s the best you yet.