Motherhood — It’s My Hardest Role Yet. The Five Big Things I’ve Learned So Far.
Building confidence takes time.
No matter how many classes you take, books you read and podcasts to listen to — my friend Nina was right — nothing can prepare you for it. At the same time, you can never over-prepare enough for it though.
When it comes to following advices, less is definitely more.
Truthfully, there’s no shortage of good and equally terrible advice, post-partum. The real work is in analyzing which ones are worth taking seriously and which ones are worth dumping. This is a lot harder than you think.
Energy is just as valuable as time.
You can have all the time in the world but if your energy is depleted, there is no point. Guard both ferociously.
Surrender to the chaos, gracefully.
It comes with change. It doesn’t mean giving up nor caring less. Quite the opposite; it’s welcoming life as and when it happens. Rarely does anyone ever regret being fully present.
Manage yourself, emotionally, physically & mentally.
It’ll be extremely hard to follow #1–4 without this. This is so critical, if you can do one thing right, I would say this would be it.
Three months into this role and already, I’ve learned a lot. There’s a lot more to come, this I know to be true. It’s worth documenting what those are so that I may never forget them. This is an exercise to celebrate an experience, one I share with a million others around the world.
Parenting is such a difficult topic to write about. At least, for me anyway. Over the next few months, I’ll attempt to break this mental barrier and fear and use writing as a tool to help me along the way. It will be imperfect and flawed and glorious and I look forward to all of it.
Just as I’m eagerly and impatiently looking forward to the present and the future life we’ll share with our son.
I normally write about Design, Technology and Business. This is a new frontier, a small experiment, a fresh change. To go back to my usual stuff, please read, Working Title at https://nikkiespartinez.substack.com/
About the author
Nikki is a Sr. UX Designer working for a data company in New Jersey. In the last 2 years, she has helped design & build a holographic platform, contracted for a research team inside Fidelity Investments, worked in the Design Operations side of an e-commerce company, mentored brilliant design students/career-changers, advocated for UX best practices at RookieUp, have co-taught UX courses at General Assembly and have also contributed directly to the growth of the Mentorship program on UXPA-New York. Designing for a better world is her life. She also runs her own newsletter, working title, about her thoughts on the future and more.
