The Best Year of My Life?
Maya Ocean is almost one.
I can't believe it's been an entire year since she was put on my chest all wrinkly and new. A nameless mop of dark hair. Eyes swollen shut, huge hands and a tiny cry that sounded so deafening to my new mummy ears. At times it's felt like the year that would never end, like I have been stuck in a vortex of sleepless nights and blind panic. And at others I've been left feeling totally terrified that it's all passing too fast. Sobbing because I can't remember her baby-smell, or because I didn't write down the date she cut her first tooth. And as the year draws to a close I have started to reflect on it as a whole. To generalise. To label it and categorise it. It's something I do - I like order and structure. Lists. So of course I have asked myself, 'has this been the best year of my life'?
Because people say that don't they? You see it on Facebook as babies turn one and mums and dads post the obligatory gushing update and birthday photo - 'this little darling has given us the best year of our lives'. Of course it's what you're meant to say. Who wants to hear you say that it's been a year of unimaginable change, good and bad. A year of sleep deprivation, shitty nappies and baby talk. A year of joy and desperation in equal measure. Nobody wants to see that on their Facebook feed.
For me, the word 'best' just doesn't seem right. It suggests comparison. Relativity. Judgement against all of the other years of your life. But how can you possibly compare the year you had a baby, to the year you travelled around the world with the love of your life. The year you smashed your career and found happiness in a new city. The year you spent every weekend doing exactly what you wanted - from staying out all night, sleeping in, and laughing so hard you cried, to racing over a triathlon finish line, climbing a mountain and devouring Michelin starred food. You can't. Because you can't compare having a baby with anything that has come before. It's so unique, so unfathomably massive, so unexpected, that it obliterates anything that has come before. It's not just another series of events, successes and failures, memories for your diary and Instagram feed - it changes your very core. You transform from being 'you', the 'you' you have been living with and working on for 30 odd years, to being something totally new. 'Mum' or 'Dad'.
Overnight you get a total life and personality transplant. Another human being, and a tiny one at that, is 100% dependent on you, for everything. You can't take a time-out for a lie in or a night out. Hell, you can't even take a time-out for a piss. Your wardrobe is restricted to maternity vests and your husbands' shirts, your diet is STILL alcohol-free and your phone and lippy have been replaced with breastpads and pacifiers. The days of being selfish are over. The days of waking up and being spontaneous are long gone. Now it's time for routines, nap times, and clock-watching. Easy comparison? Impossible.
So I'm going to say it, the thing that I'm not meant to say. No, this hasn't been the best year of my life. Has it been the hardest? Yes. The most life-changing? Definitely. The one in which I have reached my lowest lows? Unfortunately. But despite all that, has it also been the most rewarding? Revealing? Revolutionary? Absolutely. Has it been the year in which I have seen my future filled with the most unimaginable joy? Without a doubt. Do I feel scared? Every single second.
So no, this year wasn't the best year of my life. It was the start of a whole new one. One filled with love and tears in equal measure. And one which has promised a whole lot more of both. I cried with a whole new kind of joy and pride the first time Maya clapped her hands - what will I feel when she takes her first steps? Scores her first goal? Finds her life's passion? Finds her first love? Feels her first heartbreak? Has her own daughter? I can only imagine.
There are no more 'bests' - best days, best years, best memories. No comparisons. No looking back or wishing for the future. Just living in the now, savouring every unique, amazing, and sometimes terrifying, Maya moment.
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