The Truth About ‘Be the Village’ When You Never Had One

Okay, before I start I’m going to be clear. I know how this sounds. I know it’s going to come across as petty to some and I know others will see it as counter productive. I also know, there is a whole cohort of mums out there who may feel the same way I do and haven’t said this out loud (at least to anyone other than their husbands/partners) because it sounds selfish. And lets be real, in a sense it kind of is but can you blame us? 

No village turned up 

I didn’t have a village when I had either of my kids. Partially through not wanting to put anyone else out (toxic independence at its finest) and also through the fact that it wasn’t offered. With our first born, I managed everything myself. I bought and stocked up a chest freezer with postpartum meals. I sourced bags of second hand clothes off Facebook Marketplace because I didn’t want a baby shower. I made all the self care postpartum stuff you see on social media - frozen aloe pads, adult nappies, peri bottle and solutions, the whole shabang. 

Once baby arrived, I grinded through the sleep deprivation and just got on with it. Months later when I was struggling, I screamed into pillows until I’d almost lose my voice, then I'd cry alongside my baby from the guilt of feeling so frustrated at her. I held even more guilt about not being what I considered to be a ‘good enough mum’. 

My family lives overseas and didn’t come to visit (long story short, they committed to coming and then pulled out a few months before having baby). My mother-in-law wasn't close by, about a 30-40 minute drive away and getting together was occasional for a lunch on the weekend. Friends either had babies of their own and were in the trenches too or hey were on the opposite end of the spectrum, completely uninterested in babies and the family dynamic I was creating. So, I was alone. Yes I had my husband but there was no village, no external support, nothing. And it really sucked. 

Village turns up, but not for me 

Then came our second born, 18 months after having our first. He was admitted to hospital for a myriad of reasons and I never left his side. During this time, it was my husband who had the village turn up. He was invited for dinners and lunches to help him manage our toddler who he’d never before looked after solo. Now don’t get me wrong, I am very grateful for the support they gave him. The pill that’s hard to swallow was once I came home, a three week old tube feeding newborn in tow, after trying to recover from child birth for two weeks on a thin booth style hospital room seat converted into a bed with the simple addition of a blanket and pillow, it was crickets. 

I didn’t get upset at the time because honestly, I was too exhausted. Too exhausted to care, to take offense, to ask for help. But now looking back I think to myself, why did everyone show up for Dad but not for Mum? Even thinking about it now pisses me off because yes, his job of looking after our toddler solo was a difficult one, but it was the same job I had been doing for all nine months of my second pregnancy. The result of me lying while saying everything was fine to save face, ended up with me becoming a solo act instead of what I really wanted, which was to be part of a choir.

In the spirit of full transparency, my mother-in-law in fact did offer to help out. But since my brother and sister-in-law didn’t ask for her help with their first baby, I felt the need to follow suit. "Why ask for help when everyone else was coping with parenthood just fine" I told myself. I failed to recognise my sister-in-laws parents helped a few times a year when they’d visit and I’m a stay at home mum while she’s a working mum, so eventually her baby was in daycare. That’s no hate on choosing to put kids into daycare, it’s more I didn't realise the constant burnout that was accumulating after months and now years of being the all hours preferred parent without any reprieve. 

Resentment festers 

Now, being 10 months into my second postpartum period, I’m bitter. Not at everyone, just at people who ask for my help and expect the support I didn't get. My sister-in-law is having her second baby soon and asked for home cooked meals during postpartum as her gift. I know this is a completely normal request and something I can do (even with budget limitations being on a single income and time restraints with two kids under three) but part of me was annoyed. Not because it’s undoable but because it wasn’t offered to me. 

Yes, it was offered to my husband but he wasn’t the one that pushed a baby out of his nether regions and ‘recovered’ on a hospital booth seat for weeks. He wasn’t the one sleep deprived, with engorged boobs and clumps of hair coming out in the shower every time I dared to wash it. He wasn’t the one being asked “what’s for breakfast”, “what’s for lunch”, or “what’s for dinner” while I was stressing over mastering the technique of tube feeding a newborn without the slightest bit of medical experience whatsoever.

What's worse, the love language I like to express through is giftgiving. I LOOOOOOVE gifting people meaningful presents and the idea of making food for my brother and sister-in-law while they need it would usually fill me with joy. During this season of life however, it just makes me squint my eyes, purse my lips and bite my tongue from saying “gees, that would have been nice to get when I was postpartum too.” 

To add insult to injury, other pregnant friends have asked for the same thing. I would think "what happened to sending you something from a registry? I buy it online and it arrives at your house within the week. Now it's common place to expect labour and a delivery service of free food?" It grinded my gears that women had the audacity to really ask for this much from another mum with young kids and this annoyance has occupied my mind and dictated my mood more than I should let it. 

From petty to doing the work

Today, I’ve decided I’ve had a gut full of feeling this way. The resentment, the bitterness and the feeling of constantly side eyeing these requests feels shit. Motherhood is hard enough without  how I’m feeling towards my lack of a village and others asking me to be part of theirs. 

So, I’m going to ask myself some questions and answer them in real time and with brutal honesty to get to the bottom off this. 

1. What is it that’s actually annoying me about these requests

 

It’s a combination of jealousy and selfishness. 

 

Jealous that someone else gets to expect me to be the villager for them that I didn’t get when I needed it. Then knowing that I’ll do it because I feel too cruel to make someone else feel the way I did. 

And selfishness. I’ve never relied on anyone for anything other than my husband because of intense independence which can be a good thing. But in my case, it has made me selfish with my time and effort. I reserve it for people who I deem truly ‘worthy’ and what that means is because I haven’t been supported by others, it’s hard for anyone to do the things that would gain my trust and value that equates to my version of ‘worthy’. Essentially, I’ve painted everyone into a corner they can’t win from because if they can’t support me, I don’t have to reciprocate. Also, I’ve been so busy looking after myself that others requests for support feel selfish on their behalf.  I have the conversation in my head “can’t you see I’m busy looking after all of my own shit right now, you think I have time to take yours on too?”

Woah, that’s a confronting sentence to read back but radical honesty hits different I guess. 

2. How are those approaches serving me? 

Jealousy quite clearly isn’t in any way. It makes me a meaner, more cynical version of the woman I’m trying to become. It doesn’t align with the caring, kind, empathetic person I want to be and it further fans the flames of past ‘transgressions’ I haven’t moved on from. Really it’s like a time machine, bringing me back in time to how I felt when things first happened, instead of letting me deal with it and move on. 

Selfishness through independence is a bit different. My independence was a necessity to begin with and eventually morphed into a personality trait. It was to the point where I considered people without extreme independence as weak. Writing this, I now realise that’s because of how I feel about my older sibling (another story for another day). I so desperately didn’t want to be anything like them that I chose the extreme opposite, extreme independence over extreme dependence. It helps me to look after myself and others in many ways, but it also makes me closed off to being the support person for some people. This is especially the case with people who I think should be able to handle themselves or that I did it myself, so should they. In essence, and this sucks to say out loud, it made me judgey and unwilling to help. 

God, what a shitty trait. 

3. What qualities do I want to embody instead? 

It’s easy to say “the opposite of all the crap things I just said” but I’m going to make the effort to be more nuanced.  

When it comes to jealousy, I’ve always struggled with this because I’ve never felt good enough. But instead of just trying to just love myself more (which I’m in the process of, I suspect that will be a slower burn than anything else I ever do in my life), I want to change my perspective and approach. I had a lovely woman comment on an IG post I did last week and she challenged what I was saying in a really insightful way. What I took away from our interaction is to try looking at something with curiosity, question the why behind the action/statement/request. That’s something I’m going to try. Instead of taking offense because of how it makes me feel, I want to have the maturity to stop, ask myself why they’re needing this and for lack of a better term ‘walk in their shoes’ for a minute. 

With the independence fuelled selfishness, I want to keep some aspects and neutralise others. Independence, yes, I never want to lose that. Judging others for needing help, drop that like a bad habit. Take care of my own business and own the outcomes, keeper. Avoiding asking for help when I really need it for fear of rejection or judgement from the person I’m asking for help from, it’s time to get over that. Those who don’t ask, don’t receive so I can’t keep harping on about not having a village when I have a giant impenetrable gate guarding me from anyone trying to get behind the wall. 

Being less of a bitter b*tch 

So, that’s the roadmap. If you're thinking "But you didn’t answer the question “how will I make these changes happen”" that's because I think awareness is the first and biggest converter of behaviour. Now I know the real reasons for how I’ve been feeling and more importantly, what I want to become instead, I need to stay aware. Aware of the moments when I can practice empathy, not jumping straight to judgement, cutting off my projections of my own experience onto others requests and both taking up offers of support and asking for it when I need it. 

Will things change overnight, god no. Will things change in slow increments, I’m gonna give it a bloody red hot go to make sure it does. Being a bitter, jealous, selfish mum complaining about her lack of village while holding contempt for those who ask me to be part of theirs isn’t the vibe. So here’s to becoming a better villager, getting over my own lack of a village and getting a few steps closer to the woman and mum I want to be.