{"id":1497,"date":"2019-07-17T15:32:00","date_gmt":"2019-07-17T19:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/?p=1497"},"modified":"2019-07-28T11:30:27","modified_gmt":"2019-07-28T15:30:27","slug":"flashes-of-womanhood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/flashes-of-womanhood\/","title":{"rendered":"Flashes of Womanhood"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-1498\" src=\"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/07\/internal-thermostat.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1117\" height=\"1042\" srcset=\"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/07\/internal-thermostat.jpg 1117w, http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/07\/internal-thermostat-300x280.jpg 300w, http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/07\/internal-thermostat-768x716.jpg 768w, http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/07\/internal-thermostat-1024x955.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/07\/internal-thermostat-640x597.jpg 640w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1117px) 100vw, 1117px\" \/>Jolted awake at 2 (or 3 or 4) am.<\/p>\n<p>There is no baby crying<\/p>\n<p>No toddler is at the side of my bed, staring me awake<\/p>\n<p>There is no feverish child, looking for comfort<\/p>\n<p>No teen is arriving home too late, trying to quietly creep to a bedroom,<\/p>\n<p>The phone is silent; there is no emergency afar<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>This is a new stage<\/p>\n<p>A warm wave washes over me, a reminder that the baby-making days are done<\/p>\n<p>No regrets come with this reminder, just occasional melancholy<\/p>\n<p>I miss the baby snuggles, the soft pats, seeing those \u201clightbulb\u201d moments of toddlerhood<\/p>\n<p>Like most parents, I wish I had played more, listened more, been fully present more<\/p>\n<p>But active parenting is now in my past<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Now that I am awake, the brain has been turned on<\/p>\n<p>Tomorrow I have to remember to do X, Y and Z. Why didn\u2019t I write that down?<\/p>\n<p>How does anyone survive night after night of broken sleep?<\/p>\n<p>Do other people simply fake being awake and functional?<\/p>\n<p>Will the bags under my eyes ever go away?<\/p>\n<p>Will I ever sleep through the night again? Have I asked this question before?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>This is a phase that no one talks about, except to make jokes \u2013 Why?<\/p>\n<p>Because all women go through it and we feel the need to \u201cjust suck it up?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Because our lives have been blessed, so we can\u2019t complain?<\/p>\n<p>Because it means we truly have reached the other side?<\/p>\n<p>Because it\u2019s \u201cimpolite\u201d and we might make others uncomfortable?<\/p>\n<p>Why do we care what others think?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>There is no good reason<\/p>\n<p>This is a completely natural process<\/p>\n<p>Why do we go through this alone?<\/p>\n<p>We should talk about it more<\/p>\n<p>Pass me a cold drink and a fan<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jolted awake at 2 (or 3 or 4) am. There is no baby crying No toddler is at the side of my bed, staring me awake There is no feverish&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[145],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1497","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-midlife"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7mJ2U-o9","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1497"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1497\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1499,"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1497\/revisions\/1499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kimberlyyavorski.com\/whenigrowup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}