You Are Allowed to Grieve the Life You Had Before 🌊

Mourning and loving at the same time isn't a contradiction. It's matrescence.

Nobody tells you that becoming a mother involves a loss. Not a loss of love — you probably have more of that than you knew was possible. But a loss of the life you had before. The mornings that were yours. The spontaneity. The version of yourself who existed before this enormous, beautiful, disorienting transformation. Grieving that life doesn't mean you don't love your baby. It means you're human.

What matrescence asks of us

The word "matrescence" describes the process of becoming a mother — and like all major life transitions, it involves leaving something behind. Anthropologists and psychologists who study matrescence describe it as one of the most significant identity shifts a person can experience, rivaling adolescence in its depth and complexity. You are not the same person you were before. You can't be.

What grief looks like postpartum 🌊

It might look like scrolling old photos of your "before" life and feeling a complicated mix of nostalgia and sadness. Or missing your career self, your social self, your body-that-was-yours self. It might look like crying without knowing exactly why. All of this is grief. And grief is allowed.

This is not depression (though they can coexist)

Grieving your former life is a normal part of matrescence. It does not mean you made the wrong choice. It does not mean you don't love your baby. If the grief feels heavy, persistent, and like it's swallowing the joy entirely — that's worth talking to someone about. But the presence of grief alongside love is just the texture of this transformation.

What helps 💛

• Name it: "I miss some things about my old life. I'm allowed to feel that."
• Don't minimize it. "But I'm so lucky" is true and also irrelevant to the grief.
• Let yourself remember who you were — because she didn't disappear. She's inside the person you're becoming.

You are allowed to mourn and love at the same time. That's not a contradiction. That's matrescence. 🌱