Motherhood & Brotherhood
This is not the story of a writer, but of a documentary photographer and a young mother who is still learning how to be one. Here, I share my thoughts on being a mom of boys, hoping to make someone feel a bit less lonely on this extraordinary path.
Table of Contents:
Chapter1.: Motherhood is a mind-blowing adventure!
Chapter 2.: About Mother's Legs
Chapter 3.: Night Knight Mommy
(To be continued...)
Somewhere Between
I'm somewhere between a size 8, 10 and 12,
but clothes in odd sizes aren't sold on the shelves.
My fashion's between what I like and I need,
something that looks good but still lets me feed.
I'm somewhere between wide awake and asleep,
between survival and living the dream.
I'm somewhere between five half-finished tasks,
I'm somewhere between happy and sad.
Some days I look but it's hard to see -
I'm postpartum, but what am I pre-?
I'm somewhere between fading and glowing,
a strange combination of shrinking and growing.
I'm somewhere between broken and whole,
maybe losing my dreams, maybe reaching my goal.
I can't tell if I'm trapped or totally free,
if I'm lost or exactly where I'm meant to be.
I guess you could say I'm in no man's land,
in a place only woman can understand.
I'm somewhere between the shadows and sun,
in the part of my life where me becomes mum.
I'm somewhere between rock bottom and heaven,
and still looking for clothes in a size eleven.
Hannah Blanton
Instagram & Facebook: @hannahblantonpoet
(This photograph was the very first image taken to launch this never-ending project. It was captured at five o'clock in the morning, when I finally found the courage to get out of bed and record what it truly feels like to be surrounded by my boys. Looking at it, it’s hard to believe there is any room for me to sleep in this bed. It is crowded, tight, and exhausting. Yet, this is my life. In the depths of severe postpartum depression, I felt an unfamiliar, dark loneliness and invisibility. Starting this project was a huge step toward healing. I finally realized what I needed to do to be seen and heard: I picked up my camera and took the shot.)
Motherhood is a mind-blowing adventure!
Without a doubt I have always dreamed to be a mother.
How little I knew about that!
Taking my own family as a role model, I believed that motherhood was purely about giving and never expecting anything in return. My family taught me what ultimate sacrifice and true love look like, and I still carry that wisdom with me.
Yet, it has been deeply profound and mind-blowing to realize that my search for meaning in motherhood would eventually lead to finding myself—all through watching my young boys grow up.
It took seven long years before we finally met our firstborn son. He is the love of my life and the greatest gift we could have ever received!
Knowing that we were having a baby boy made me incredibly anxious. It was completely uncharted territory for me, as I had grown up almost entirely surrounded by women. I have a sister, and I attended an all-girls school. Even my father raised me with a strong sense of self-worth and the belief that women rule the world. Because of that upbringing, I did my best to grow into an independent woman.
There was always a strong feminist spirit in my family, and in my country as a whole. Women have played a monumental role in Ukraine’s history and culture. We place them on a pedestal as queens—the silent, powerful leaders of the pride.
I always understood womanly pride and my value as a woman. But having a boy became my greatest milestone. I never really understood how these little creatures become who they are—or, more importantly, what they need from us to become the best versions of themselves. I felt an immense responsibility: I had to raise a man! It became the biggest mission of my life.
Since I was little, I was told how gifted women are — that we receive a vast array of skills, talents, and strength at birth because we carry so much on our shoulders as we grow. Men, on the other hand, I used to think were given far less by nature, making it harder for them to stand out—and that this was why they felt the constant need to prove themselves.
Boys will be boys!
Why do they need to bump into things all the time?
Why do they scream so loudly?
Why do boys love falling down and making so much noise?
These were just a few of the questions constantly running through my mind whenever my son got rough, over and over again. The mystery remains unsolved! But whatever my son was hurling himself into—whether a hole in the ground or a terrifyingly high slide — I knew what I had to do: run right behind him. I think I remember my bruised knees far more clearly than he does!
It takes two!
When our first son was born, I couldn't pick up my camera for a very long time. I no longer knew who I was, or whether I even wanted to take photographs anymore. That incredible chapter of my life felt sealed and locked away, the key lost somewhere between toy excavators and dried beans. (My son loves to play with construction trucks and beans as if his playroom is a real job site! 😅)
Don't get me wrong — before children became my entire world, I loved photography profoundly. It was my heartbeat, and often the only way I could express my deepest emotions to the world. But when my first child arrived, there was nothing in the world more beautiful than him. I simply couldn't take my eyes off him. I was terrified of missing a single breath, a single milestone, or the subtle ways he moved. For almost four years, photography was completely erased from my life—until life blessed us with our second boy.
Loosing myself and finding myself.
Without hesitation, I had fully dedicated myself to being the best mother in the world, because there was nothing I cherished more. And that was completely natural. I was never afraid of losing myself in motherhood because, deep in my heart, I trusted that I would always find my way back.
But my strength was put to the test during my second pregnancy. I couldn't understand where all my vitality and energy had vanished. After the birth, I slowly began to fade away. I felt as though I had been abandoned in the darkest cave in the world—a place where the love of my life, my husband, my oldest son, and my newborn could not reach me.
I slept so little that I could barely function. I was in constant physical and mental pain. Now, I can finally open up and admit that it was the darkest period of my life—a time I endured in total isolation. Postpartum depression hit me head-on, confronting me with terrifyingly unfamiliar questions:
Where am I in all of this?
Am I still here?
Does anyone still see me?
Who am I?
Motherhood is a superhero job!
Then my friend Charlie reappeared in my life, along with the Fearless Family. Time and time again, she became a lighthouse in my darkness. Because of her, I began to speak and allow myself to be seen again. I cannot express enough gratitude to her, nor can I adequately describe how essential she is in my life. I did nothing to deserve a friend like her, yet she is always there, time after time.
It takes profound inner bravery to stand up again after falling so deep. But it was time to find myself once more.
I must confess: I am a mother who becomes quickly overstimulated and sensitive to touch. Even the affection of someone I love can push me over the edge when I am drained. And yet, I am climbed on and touched by my hyperactive boys constantly! It is wild how boys need to test their physical limits on mothers just as much as on fathers. We teach them to be gentle, but what a heavy price we pay to teach that lesson.
I admire mothers immensely for what they do every single day. It is the most demanding job you could ever hold, and you can never truly comprehend it until you are standing in the middle of it. Like so many others, I underestimated what it takes to be a mother. Through my own struggle, I have finally, truly seen my own mom: the sacrifices she made so effortlessly, so quietly, and without ever expecting anything in return. How naive I used to be.
While I spent all this time believing it was so hard to raise boys, I finally realized the truth: all this time, I was raising myself. And that is actually the hardest part!
My journey through motherhood is ongoing, and I carry hope. I hope that my home will never be less warm than it is now—this home where I finally found my way back to myself.
Every day, I remind myself:
Our house is not a mess; it is full of life! I used to hear chaos everywhere whenever things weren't organized the way they were before children. But every day, I am learning how to compromise with our space and integrate chaos into the fabric of our lives. It isn't chaos after all — it is a child's world, rich with imagination and creativity.
Children are washable! It is completely okay to let them get dirty.
Slow down. I am teaching myself to stop running through my days. Our children slow us down, but that is precisely what we need. The true wonders of life only become visible when you stop rushing and simply watch them unfold.
Play more. Things become so much easier when we play with our children — when we truly step into their world instead of multitasking around them.
I am still learning, and there is plenty of blank space left on these pages to keep writing. But this is what I have learned so far, and I wanted to share it with you.
There is a time to work and a time to rest. So, I will stop here and get some well-deserved sleep. And so should you! 😉
With love,
Lara
* * *
About Mother’s Legs
It all started this week with my feet — specifically, when I was thrilled to successfully cut the nails on my right foot while my son was taking a shower. As women, we transform from normal human beings into multitasking monsters. If, before children, we were proud of walking through the house and managing to tidy up everything in our path, now we celebrate simply cutting the nails on one foot! Yes, it was a great success for me — though not so much for my left foot. We still multitask, but on an entirely different level.
We carry so much weight on our legs. On top of everyday household chores, we carry a heavy bucket filled with emotional worries, support, and responsibilities for ourselves and everyone around us. It piles up so high that our stress reaches the sky just as often as food drops from a toddler's high chair.
We multitask a lot—far too much, in fact. It is a hidden danger for a mother's brain. I realized this a bit too late, after I had already drained myself to the point of becoming a desert. There were only cacti and snakes left for my family — a sad picture for a warm, cozy home. But now I know that celebrating little wins is just as important for keeping my spirits high. So, yes: this week, the right foot. Maybe next week, the left! ;-)
A few years ago, our house had a very clear center. The heart of our home was right in the middle of the kitchen, where all the best things happened for just the two of us. Now, I feel like the center of the house has "grown legs." It moves around. Or, better yet, everything now happens mostly around me. A mother is a place to eat, a place to cry, a place to jump on, a place to play hide-and-seek, a place to cuddle, and a place to find security, safety, comfort, and everlasting love.
There is so much happening around us as mothers. Other people don’t usually witness it, but it is an undeniable truth. It is a gift, but it is also a heavy weight of responsibility—it is not easy, and it is not always fun. It is so important to recognize the mental load that comes with it all. Sometimes, I just wish "these legs" could take a peaceful stroll through a regular park, and not Jurassic Park.
In the meantime, I still have dreams that put high heels on my feet instead of sneakers. For a while now, I have truly loved and preferred my sneakers, and I wouldn't trade them for anything in the world. But I allow myself to dream about my heels sometimes. I don't actually want to wear them, but in a way, I still need them.
With love to my feet,
Lara
* * *
Night Knight Mommy
The first time I ever witnessed and photographed a childbirth was the birth of my lovely sister’s first baby boy. I remember that day so vividly, as if it happened today. It was a golden autumn day and night. All the happiness in the world was in that hospital room. There was that magical moment when I was blessed to see the very first breath of a human being with my own eyes. I felt as though his soul entered his body in that exact instant, and my whole world stopped for a second. To this day, I am profoundly grateful to my beautiful sister for allowing me to be there.
That day, I saw a sign in the waiting room of the delivery unit that has stayed with me ever since. It read: “Sleep deprivation makes everything worse.” I remembered that striking phrase, but only now have I truly and deeply felt what it means to be completely consumed by sleep deprivation.
I don't know if everyone experiences it the same way; I can only share what happened to me. I hope you or your loved ones will become a bit more alert to that very dangerous period when mothers face an extreme lack of sleep. I am going to be very careful with my words, as this is a deeply personal experience for me.
With our first child, I still had a "bucket full of energy," and somehow I made it through that first year of sleeplessness without major trouble. However, with our second child, I completely lost myself to sleep deprivation.
When night came, it turned into a war zone. I found myself on a battlefield, standing completely alone against the most difficult enemy I could face — I was fighting myself. And there was no one there to save me. In those moments, you have no rational understanding of what is happening; you cannot rely on yourself because you are simply surviving. A battle without weapons, a battle without shelter to hide in, a battle without a winner. It happens inside your mind, and no one knows how it will end. The baby is hungry, crying at the top of his lungs… I was still breastfeeding my always-hungry "caterpillar," and I was in agony. I was never blessed with an easy breastfeeding journey; I never produced enough milk, and it was always painful. My nights were a hundred times more exhausting than my days. Every two hours, I had to feed, and I couldn't bring myself to stop. Strangely, no one could convince me to stop breastfeeding because it had become an absolute necessity in my mind.
Somehow, around six months, I finally stopped when I reached my absolute limit — when I had to save my own life. It was the best decision I could have made for myself and my baby. It took another two months to fully transition to bottle-feeding; however, my sweet boy saved another night challenge for me that still continues today. He wakes up at 5:00 AM every single day, ravenously hungry. So, we rise together. Luckily, sometimes we do instead of just me. That helps so much! Thank you, my love, for being there for me.
Sleep deprivation made me numb, highly overstimulated, and so inattentive that while driving, I failed to notice large, obvious objects in front of me, damaging our car. I found myself crying at the dining table without a clear reason, feeling my body so heavy that I couldn’t lift it up. Our kids were born heavy, and they are still heavy — it was hard to lift them, but it became hard to even lift my own body. I was right on the edge.
I wish we could all be so much more protective of our sleep, because it has such a profound influence on our well-being.
It has been a while since I hit that turning point, but these peaks of exhaustion still return from time to time. At least now, I know how to recognize them. I exercise, I try to rest alone without disturbances, and I talk about it so my family remains aware. And I speak to you here, my reader. You heal me simply by listening. Thank you for being here for me without even knowing it.
Love,
Lara
* * *
Invisible Me
When I close my eyes now and think about that terrible period of my life, I remember encountering the first unfamiliar feeling of my motherhood: isolation. It hit me like snow in August. All of a sudden, after giving birth to my second baby boy, I was left at home alone with a newborn while my beloved firstborn son was taken away. Nothing bad was happening — my lovely husband simply took him out to play somewhere else, wanting to give me rest and peace. Neither he nor I knew how harmful that would be for me.
Inside, I couldn't find rest. I felt left behind, isolated within four walls with pain, struggle, and a heavy expectation to instantly feel unconditional love for our new baby, while the love I already held so close was suddenly out of reach. There were no reserves left for a new wave of love. I felt grounded nowhere.
Now I realize that was the first and most critical sign that things were going wrong. But how could I have known? We do not speak about this during maternity visits or over coffee. It is a topic shrouded in pain and shame. It is hard to start that conversation, and nearly impossible to bring it up unless someone asks directly.
A few months later, I remember sitting at the dining table and crying. Crying from the pain all over my body, and a pain deep inside of me that I couldn’t explain. I felt as though I was standing between two trains passing by at a tremendous speed. The noise around me was deafening — people talking to one another, objects slamming and being thrown around, plates shifting on the table, forks and spoons clattering, and chaos everywhere. The mess made the noise feel even louder. I don’t know how to explain it, but the clutter around me was screaming in my head so loudly that I couldn’t focus on anything important. I was sitting there in my living room, surrounded by people and things, yet nobody noticed me. I was in the middle of a hurricane, and all I wanted was for everything to stop right then.
Isolation, sleep deprivation, breastfeeding pain, exhaustion, invisibility… everything was piling up and growing exponentially day by day. I couldn’t stop this postpartum avalanche by myself anymore. I was falling so fast. I needed someone to notice that there was almost nothing left of me but a shadow. I needed my “village” to rescue me.
Help did come, though not from where I expected. My family doctor urged me to see a psychologist while I was actually visiting to ask for help with physical pain. You might ask why that was unexpected — isn't that what doctors are supposed to do? But after years of infertility and helpless medical appointments in the past, a solid fortress of mistrust toward the medical system had built up inside me. That is a story for another time. But in that dark moment, when I felt completely alone, they truly saved me. And for that, I am deeply grateful.
Coming out of my "postpartum coma" into the outside world was not an easy thing for me. I remember the first time I went back to my yoga studio, thinking that after so many months, I was starting to rebuild myself from scratch. I didn't expect anyone to even recognize me there. To my great surprise, they still knew who I was, even though I wasn’t even sure I knew who I was anymore. I received the warmest welcome I could have ever expected. There were hugs, questions about my newborn, sincere interest, and a soothing balm for my broken soul that I honestly hadn’t anticipated. How is it even possible to feel so lonely and invisible inside yourself while being surrounded by so much kindness?
Everything had changed so much for me. My brain had rewired tremendously. My vision of myself was altered beyond recognition.
I’ve heard a lot about the restructuring of a woman's brain after pregnancy. We can laugh all we want about foggy pregnant brains and "mom brain" in general, but it is a medical fact that we women end up with a completely new brain after having a child. However, only after having my second son did I truly feel like I had "installed Wi-Fi" in my brain, while my body was still taking notes with a pencil in a notebook. I wasn’t ready to be so overwhelmed. The embarrassment and shame of my own feelings and thoughts made me hate myself and believe that I had become a horrible, angry mother — someone I had never been and hopefully never would be again. But it was me, and sadly, I was dealing with my demons every day and especially every night, grieving the loss of the loving mother I used to be.
The loud noises in our house will never disappear — we have boys, after all, so that won't change—but my mindset has started to shift. Sometimes I still feel that woman sobbing at the dining table, but she is slowly fading away.
So, I am taking my first baby steps into a new reality, still very hesitant and unsure of where it will bring me in the end. The only thing I know for sure is that I never want to return to "that mother" I was during those darkest moments. I am slowly moving from falling down to falling in love with myself again.
Love,
Lara
It is so real, how much we grieve after becoming a mother. Grieving our beautiful bodies, our relaxed lives, our careers, and all the achievements we made; grieving the warmth between ourselves and our partner, and even the love we once had for ourselves. It doesn’t mean that I would ever trade my life for the one I had before children; I am deeply grateful to have the chance to be a mother after so many years of infertility. But the sadness of never being able to return to who I was has scarred my mind, my body, and my soul.
Now, looking in the mirror, I know what I am going to see and what has disappeared forever. My C-section scar has taken root in my daily life, leaving me no choice but to let go of who I was — forcing me to accept this change and move on.
Slowing down the speed of my life from fifth gear to first has made me notice the world around me. I go out of the house, sit, and watch how the wind blows through the leaves on the trees and how a gentle ray of light plays across my face. Holding my little one, I feel that we have finally started to grow into each other; the seed of love has begun to show new leaves. He looks at me, then starts to look around too. We observe the world together now.
* * *
to be continued...