On Mother’s Day as a New Mother: Alice Willett Fox

My daughter was born on the final day of Barack Obama’s presidency. The following day, Donald Trump was sworn into office and the day after that, millions of women around the world marched in opposition to his agenda.

As I lay in bed with my newborn baby – the same bed in which she had been born forty-eight hours prior – my heart swelled to read reports and see the images of so many women standing strong together, in solidarity. Still processing the experience of birth and my new state of being as a mother, I felt a deep connection not only to those women marching, but to my mother, grandmothers, and the lineage of mothers and daughters throughout time. I was in awe of the strength of our bodies, and of our primal instinct to nurture new life.

As Mother’s Day approaches, I think of what a profound gift it is to mother. How my baby’s first smile brought me to tears (… and then I heard her laugh!) How I’ll have the great honour of sharing this world with her and helping to shape her environment through my own lens of experience, including all the feminine wisdom that shaped me.

 

– Alice Willett Fox

@alicewfox