I used to be a Martyrmom

I used to be a Martyrmom.

Veiled as camaraderie, women perpetuate the idea everyday that it is funny to survive only on coffee and wine.

Never mind the fact that it normalizes addiction as a method for surviving motherhood, can we examine that women only feel comfortable joking about their self-sacrifice rather than bringing awareness to our conditioning and consider what is at the root of our incessant doing, categorizing ourselves as superhuman and accomplishing everything while simultaneously subhuman and without basic physical needs?

Stephen Chbosky says, “You can’t just sit there and put everyone’s lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love.”

No one wants our martyrdom.

Our kids don’t want it.

Our partners don’t want it.

If we are honest we are the ones who glorify it for each other.

And more deeply, I realized that most martyrdom started as an attempt to ignore my own suffering. If I regurgitated this suffering with my newly-earned exhaustion I could spew it all over the world and call it a gift.

A selfless gift that desperately begged for recognition.

This is not how I wanted to love my family.

If it doesn’t feel like love it doesn’t count as love. Plain and simple.

So, I got selfish. I like this word because it has been used against me when I have considered my own needs.

So, I got really selfish. I get the sleep I need. I eat healthy food. I drink water. I stop whatever I am doing and go to the damn bathroom to pee as soon as I feel it.

Me first.

And my family is finally thriving. No one deserves to feel that ache in their gut that maybe somebody else is sacrificing themselves for them. No one. Especially not the people we supposedly love the most.