Mind Of Steele

This photo was taken, by me, on my 36th birthday. I love to celebrate and adore birthdays, but this one was different. It was the first time, since the birth of my second child almost 3 years previous, that I made an effort just for me. No expectation of anyone else doing it for me, just me being happy for me and by myself. Although I live with my partner and our children, it was the first time I had been determined to make myself the centre of my day. You see, previous to this I am not sure I had been a character in my own play, called life! It sounds absurd when I say it aloud, but alas, lockdown taught me how little I took care of myself, and how thinly I was expected to spread myself.

Whilst people may gasp and say things like “but you have to look after yourself” and “can’t you just scale back” the answer is far more complex. In my family I am a single mother to my eldest son and have a second son with my partner. Now, my son sees his father alternate weekends as he lives further away than is possible to navigate the school run. This means that pick up and drop off are all on me. All before school, after school and weekend activities fall to me. My second son is pre school age so no clubs just yet, although his dad did take him to a music club on weekends. Still, the realities of clubs and interests, whilst working a full time job, shopping, cooking and preparing dinners whilst trying to maintain relationships finally caught up with me. It took a massive outpouring of emotion for me to reengage with my core.

I am guitly of letting other people think for me and have been guilty of that ever since I became a mother. I went through my first pregnancy in a foreign country with my partner at the time, and it was hellish. My eldest son was a surprise gift that my 27 year old self thought she could handle. Bloody hell did I not know what on earth I was in for. Not only was my relationship pretty much finished, but I was a million miles away from my support network. We had skype but 2012 skype does not compare to 2020 Zoom!! It was a rude awakening for me on choices, and it made me grow up pretty quickly. I ended up having a C-section, which I was alone for. Due to language barriers I was put under as I thought I could feel the knife and was already full of drugs. I never heard my sons first cry. His father was the first person to meet him. Once I woke up I was too scared to ask if he had been delivered, but I eventually saw the big ball of hair and instinctively knew he was mine.

Through the journey that followed, some of it brutal, I had no choice but to activate my “mind of steele”. I was on my own with a 3month old baby, packing up a life I thought was going to be mine for the next 5 years, but instead I was going home, alone with a baby. The universe blessed me with friends and even my best friend who helped me clear out my apartment, inclduing a sofa down 6 flights of stairs, a fridge, table, lampshade etc etc. It was a tough and punishing time I will never forget. It awoke something in me that made me continue to fight for myself…or so I thought.

Fast-forward to life in the UK. I landed a job and was instantly slapped in the face with the harsh reality that teaching had fundamentally changed. I never replaced the friends from my first job, nor did I ever replicate the fun I had had. This was a cold hard reality of being an outsider and never being understood. It was also the first time I suffered bullying, something I didn’t even realise was happening at the time, but on reflection realise how disgraceful some adults can be to one another. The affects of that didn’t hit me until I left and had time to reflect, and the “mind of steele” began to fall away.

I left my job, having brought a house as a single mother, but had to completely renovate the house, whilst being a single mother. It was the hellish experience with builders disappearing and not completing work and refusing to finish what they started or work full days! Still, somehow, I managed to fall my way through. It was a lonely expereince and I was beginning to unravel. My strong disposition was dissolving into anxiety, where I rarely left the house when on my own with my son. The only thing I left for was to shop, work and see family. I didn’t understand it at the time, but I was really suffering. I had lost my sense of self, my weight continued to gain, I didn’t really go out, unless it was with my partner. When i look back now I wonder what path I would have chosen had I been in control of my mind?

I chose to uproot myself and my son from our support network into my partners home, which is across the river to my home. This was a decision that I did not take lightly, but on reflection didn’t take seriously enough. What followed was a pregnancy and birth of my second son and a few years of living my partners life. My partner also has a son from a previous relationship. Living in his house, by his rules, on his timeline has been tough because he chose to renovate his house after we moved in, despite having the chance to do it before the baby arrived. So two renovations, moving out of the house to move back in, having to deal with dust and horrible things that appear in the house when it has no back door. Then of course came lockdown. Lockdown was the definitely the straw that broke the camels back. It definitely made me rethink everything I had failed to do because of the limiting beliefs I had allowed others to put in my head and the insults that I had sustained and absorbed into my pysche.

All in all it took a lot of meditation, exercise and consistency, something I learnt from a young age having played two instruments from a young age. I ran every other day for months, I meditated, I learned how to trade, although not very successfully. I chose me before anyone else. I stopped trying to make other people happy and the best thing was I stood up for myself. I began to build the “Mind Of Steele 2.0” which I guess is the adult, mother of 2 boys person that I am.

So I brought new clothes, which for me was a big deal because I have hated my body since I had my first son. Of course I wish I was fat like I thought I was at 25, but in reality I embrace the jiggly bits and dress for the me I see inside. I am still building my “Mind Of Steele 2.0”, but I have a feeling this one is for life…pending updates of course.