I Started Having Kids At 35, Aging Is Super Fun, and Motherhood

Before I became a mom, I’d nonchalantly brag that I could handle a lot. 

I became a mom at the ripe ol’ age of 35, aka, “advanced maternal age” according to the medical community— meaning, I got allllllll the prenatal tests included in my OB visits. 

I felt like I was a celebrity at the doctor’s office once they found out my age. 

Oooooh, you’re old AF?! Ok, then you get THIS extra test. 

I bypassed the sly jab at my aging ovaries and simply welcomed any extra tests I could get for the sake of my baby. And also use this expensive insurance more. 

There’s nothing I love than USING insurance. And if I don’t use it like a knight laying then ditching a half-drunk peasant whore circa 1390… I cancel that shit. 

Alas, I actually had baller insurance, sooooo extra tests, you say?! SIGN ME UP. 

I don’t care that you see me as a museum relic promenading around, my bones crumbling at the joints. I don’t care that you squint your eyes to count my forehead lines, wondering exactly when to advertise to me that your sister-in-law runs a medspa and there’s an excellent deal on botox right now. 

As far as I know, as a woman I don’t get much high-fiving for getting older until I turn 65 and then get sWeEt senior discounts at the local diner…

Thus: 

If I can get something additional at this bougie ObGyn’s office, right now, I’ll take it. (Insert evil laugh here.) 

I jest about getting old because it’s a strange phenomenon to look in the mirror day after day and think:

I guess I need even MORE caffeine?! 

Why do I look so tired?

I look like I have Resting Bitch LIFE. 

It really is a sham that women feel bad about themselves because they’re aging. As a mother, I can tell you that being “aged,” comes in VERY handy when you’re dealing with wild little ones. 

When I got pregnant at age 35, I fortunately had all this life experience behind me:  

I had lived in every time zone in America

Traveled Europe solo

Been married

Then divorced (wee!)

Moved cross-country 6 times (thanks, pandemic)

Procured jobs with zero nepotism (Me = smart)

Lost many a job (wish I had that nepotism!)

Started businesses

Made rent juuuuust in time by scrubbing floors and never sucking 1 dick (go me!)

And basically reinvented my life more times than I care to count. 

In other words:

I lived some damn LIFE. 

I didn’t just spring out of my mother’s womb and exclaim:

Gee golly! Scooby doo! Am I adulting or what?!

No, the glimmer of innocence had effectively been erased out of my eyeballs because I’d kind of already been through it… 

A lot of “it.”

A lot of life drop-kicking me in the tits.

A lot of people acting one way, then morphing into some ‘nother. 

A lot of being surprised by the harrowing realities of Planet Earth, such as human rights abuses that STILL happen today. 

On the outside I looked 35 (or 29, depending on if I stuck to my 2349837-step skin care regimen the night prior)...

But on the inside, I felt 1,000 years old.

I felt like a coal miner who just tunneled up after being stuck underground for a week:

Dirty, dusty, and doggone ready for a dental cleaning. 

That’s a lot of D’s! 

By this crumbling skeleton got pregnant, and damn, I was happy I was coming into this journey having been through the bootcamp of life already because… spoiler alert… turns outtttt:

Kids are hard. Shocker, I know. I should really write suspense. 

The thing with babies is that they are constantly acting like, well, babies.

• They sleep like crap.

• They expect you to be this evening’s entertainment, so grab a top hat and start singing show tunes from Singing In The Rain.

• And they cry like they are watching the end of Armageddon for the first time, all the time. 

I tell you when Bruce Willis tells Liv Tyler he’s not coming home after all, I fall apart EVERY TIME. Sigh— I digress… 

If babies could simply read the email I sent them and sleep like normal people, that would handle a lot for me. 

OR: 

If when they cried you heard Spice Girls music come out instead of piercing wailing, I’d be good. 

Motherhood presents a fantastical concoction of stress and stimulation that frankly this little lady was not ready for, despite graduating college into the worst economy since the ‘80’s. 

I’d been through so many ups and downs in my life— a ton of falling on my face— so, I was shocked out of my shorts when my little babies made me feel like a weak chair that could bust apart if even a moth sat on it. 

In many crappy jobs I’ve had, customers would scream at me, and that barely fazed me.

I thought: 

If I can stand in line at the DMV for 2 hours…

If I can listen to my neighbor drone on and on about his mini van’s carburetor…

If I can visit a hoarder’s house and not toss gasoline at it upon leaving with a swift light of the match…

I can handle a widdle baby. 

Right? 

It’s not that I wasn’t ready in life for kids; I was:

I had a steady relationship, a house, and a dog that pre-stressed out my relationship so we knew we could handle kids (nothing like your puppy having diarrhea 5 days a week for 5 months straight!). 

I’m constantly learning that kids are a Lord of the Rings journey, and although you can be more ready than a 19-year old still clubbing and puking up vodka in an alley at 3:00 am…

You WILL be surprised by kids, motherhood, and there will be days you feel back-handed by overstimulation and just falling short. 

But, at least you can fall back on this nugget: 

Being a mother is a gift, even if you’re more or less wrinkled.

Even if you lived life or not enough before you started.

Having your kids is the ultimate win— even if your tits hang low, do your best to keep your spirit high.