Social Media is for the {Consenting} Birds

Something became clear to me today, and I felt it necessary to share.

I’ve felt uneasy, and I wasn’t sure why. I do my best to live honestly and purposefully. I work hard, give hard, love hard, think hard, cry hard and play hard (with stuffed animals and blocks, obviously). I rarely feel true regret for my actions anymore because everything I do is done for the well-being of my family. But still, I felt uneasy, off-balance and like something was simply out of place.

Quite slowly, the cause of this feeling revealed itself to me. With every Instagram scroll I felt weirder and weirder, and I knew that the app had to be the source of my discomfort. In addition to friends and family, I follow a variety of semi-famous artist/blogger moms with beautiful feeds, beautiful lives, beautiful thoughts and beautiful children. I sometimes found myself comparing my success as a woman to theirs, but, for the most part, that was manageable.

What really began to bother me was that I didn’t feel like I was following the feeds of cool and successful moms anymore. Rather, I felt that I was following the feeds of their children, who (since the majority are toddlers and babies) didn’t actually choose, edit or post the photos of themselves being shared with tens of thousands of people, some of whom leave comments like, “Ugh I just wish I could take your beautiful babies and keep them for myself!” The abounding creepiness and borderline obsessive followers that I often noticed commenting on the feeds of others was certainly enough to make me rethink posting photos of my own children without my girls giving me their very informed permission, which, clearly, they are too young to provide.

I considered changing my account to private, but realized that wouldn’t be beneficial for my business endeavors in a time where social media accounts are basically mandatory, and I thought about what it might mean to have an account focused on my mom and baby business without sharing any pictures of my own babies. It’s pretty much the norm in the mom blogger community to share absolutely everything about your own personal motherhood and your baby’s babyhood, and for a while there I was more than willing to do just that. One of my main priorities as childbirth educator and postpartum doula is to educate women about life postpartum (which, by definition, involves a lot of TMI), but I was coming to realize that my children’s life experiences don’t necessarily have to be the topics of discussion, at least not in excruciating detail, nor do their faces need to be the face of my business.

These thoughts swirled around my mind for months as I continued to post photos of my girls here and there. I often questioned, why did photos of my girls need to be at the center of all that I am doing? Why is sharing photos of our children doing normal things like bathing, playing, eating and sleeping considered normal now? Does being considered normal mean it’s okay to share all of these photos, and that doing so is free of repercussions? I was leaning toward no, but the Instagram community was screaming, “Yes!”, and it was hard to ignore.

Then, something clicked, and it convinced me to change the way I approach social media, as well as the way I work toward accomplishing my goals as a mother/writer who hopes to motivate other mothers by sharing my own experiences. The revelation was this:

As much as I love my daughters, and as beautiful as they are,
their story is not mine to tell.

Though I created them and brought them into this world, their story is theirs, and they deserve to have ownership of it from day one, no matter how crazy-adorable they are when they’re sleeping, eating, crying, etc., nor how "acceptable" it is to share these moments with the world. All of the weirdness and social pressures aside, it became apparent that the bigger issue for me was that I was creating an internet presence for my babies and telling a lot of people about their failures, accomplishments, silliness and sacred moments – all of which are things they should be in charge of sharing with others one day (if they want to, and at their own discretion). Using my daughters' faces as the faces of my own personal (and, technically, business) brand is no longer something I want to do, and it was probably something I never should have done in the first place. 

I don’t wish for them a life centered on how their experiences will be displayed for the people they care about. I don’t wish for them a life where said experiences are remembered with a little less joy because the photos of that experience didn’t receive as many comments and likes as they thought it would. I don’t wish for them a life that feels less worthy because it’s not as followed on the internet as those of their peers, nor do I wish for them a life full of approval from strangers on the internet, because we all know how unimportant and fickle such love stories can be.

Furthermore, how many of us are so, so, SO tired of feeling glued to our phones, tablets, computers and social media in its entirety? I most definitely am. I’m in an interesting position, as I was in high school when MySpace took over. This means I experienced a social-media-free childhood, but still got to experience social media during a highly impressionable time in my life. For the past decade I’ve concerned myself with creating perfect profiles, debated with myself over whether or not I should delete a comment from a cyber-bully, posted awkward statuses, posted cool statuses, “liked” things I didn’t really like but felt obligated to “like,” accepted friend requests from people I didn’t know that well because I didn’t want to hurt their feelings and shared my political beliefs in hopes of swaying just one person to vote in favor of nationwide paid family leave. I've also felt left out on so many unnecessary occasions, simply because someone shared a photo of something I wasn't invited to - events I probably never would have found out about or cared about if it hadn't been for social media. Hell, this happened today! It's an irksome part of daily life now, and I already fear the days this same feeling burdens my girls.

Do we wish these annoyances on our sweet little babies, who should know nothing right now of this world of digital congratulations, condolences and stabs in the back? I don’t wish it on my own children, but if they were to want that for themselves one day, so be it. That’s their choice – not mine, but I will do my part in raising them to know that they don't need social media profiles to survive, nor do they need to use them solely for "humble" bragging. Our duty in life is to promote joy and acceptance, to be light for those surrounded by dark and to help those who need it. We should never use our life experiences to promote doubt or sadness in others. That should never be okay, but so many people do it, and if that is the example they are setting for their children, I have a feeling their children will assume that's how social media is to be used. 

Though I am now choosing to avoid posting photos of my girls doing nothing more than living their daily lives, I’ll continue to have my own social media profiles because they are a necessity when it comes to owning a business.

Another reason is that I would like to share my story of motherhood because it is my story, and it is my choice to do so, and I believe that the more honest all of us moms are about motherhood, the better the experience of motherhood can be for moms who need to know that they’re not alone.

That being said, I will no longer be posting photos of just my girls. Family photos or abstract snapshots where they are in the distance, yes, but daily life portraits, no. The photos I take of them might be photos I own and love and want others to see because I am so, so proud of my daughters – but they are photos of two sweet girls who one day might not want their faces and life stories shared on the internet with people they don’t know or love. I would never want them to feel exposed as a result of my past actions, nor would I want them to feel that posting photos of themselves on the internet is a necessary part of social living. I also don't want them to feel used by me to help me further my career or accomplish my goals, especially if I didn't succeed. Would they blame themselves? I would hope not, but, thanks to my recent decision, the thought won't cross their minds. 

In addition to these concerns, I am fully aware that one day, my girls will care what others think about them, both personally and physically. I picture them looking at my Instagram profile (if I were to keep things the way they are) and scrolling way back to pictures of when they were babies, toddlers, little girls. I imagine them noticing that some of the photos didn’t get as many likes as the rest. I picture them comparing the photos and trying to figure out why some people liked a few but not the others. I hear their voices in their heads saying, “Maybe it’s because my hair is in a bun in that photo, or maybe it’s because I’m wearing pink in one and blue in another. I never noticed how bad I look in blue. Oh wait – I know why. It’s because my crooked tooth is showing in that one. I should probably not smile with my mouth open in pictures.”

Imagining such unhelpful self-criticism in the little people I’ve brought into this world makes me cringe, especially if it were to come about as a result of my past posting. While I will do my best to make sure my girls know how beautiful they are, how loved they are and what it means to be a good person in this world, it is inevitable that they will experience things like self doubt and insecurity. My responsibility as their mother is to enable them in positive ways, not in ways that could potentially have negative interpretations. I want them to know that their lives are theirs to share if they want to, but that the opinions of others should not define the value of their story, or anyone else’s for that matter.

I know I am not the first or only person to do this, and I also acknowledge that this idea won’t resonate with every parent, nor will I judge those who post photos of their children on social media. But this type of decision is a first for me, and it will be a huge transition, as I am an over-sharer at heart. My plan is to continue writing to my daughters in journals, to create photo books that they will be given on every birthday, to share our favorite photos with family and to continue sharing my story, a story within which my daughters are a part, without taking over their stories as a whole. The way they see their lives is different than the way I see their lives, and I can’t wait for them to show me just how different our versions are. My hope is that the underlying themes will be the same from all accounts, and that they feel their lives were built on a foundation of love and understanding.

Atop that foundation will, hopefully, be the knowledge that family is sacred, and that childhood is sacred. I remember being a child who was so impatient to grow up. I couldn’t wait to be in high school or have a real job or have babies. At times I couldn’t wait to get out of the house I grew up in and start a life of total independence. Now, I’ve done all of the above, and I still don’t feel totally satisfied. There’s so much more I want to do; more that I will do – and yet, I miss being a kid who couldn’t do much more than get creative in the backyard, and I miss the time spent with my parents when I depended on them fully. I want my girls to be aware of how special and magical this time in their lives is, and to live without concern regarding the thoughts and opinions of mom’s social media community or their own social media communities in the future. I want them to know that having a family and being a part of a family is something to be treasured and treated with total respect, and that there's nothing wrong with choosing to not show everyone just how awesome their family is. It's kind of like the "tree falling in the woods" scenario. Just because other people don't see evidence of the awesomeness and confirm the awesomeness with comments and likes doesn't make our family any less awesome. 

I’m starting to believe that in a time when people share everything with everyone whether or not anyone wants to see it, the best way to maintain the sacredness of something is to keep it private and unexposed to the outer elements. So, that is what I will do, and I have a feeling only good will come of this change. In fact, I’m excited about it. So excited that I have updated almost all of my social media accounts by deleting hundreds of photos, and I even archived quite a few blog posts. If my girls want to share their story one day in the future, they will, and I'll have all the details of the very beginning of their lives packed up and ready to hand them if that time comes. For now, it remains where I believe it belongs - safe with me, the person they trust with all their hearts to keep them protected.

The Fullest Day

Today was a DAY. It began early, involved many firsts, transformations, appointments and sweet treats, and it ended late after a botched bedtime routine. But there were two hours of the day {in between an adorable and necessary ice cream date with toddler friends and a giggly cuddle session on the living room floor} where:

time slowed
the temperature cooled
all that we had to accomplish had been accomplished
and we were together as a family, with nowhere else to be but by each other's side.

Those two hours were spent at our happy place: the beach.

Walking through warm ocean water, sinking into soft wet sand, wearing a cozy baby, holding the hand of an excited toddler and admiring my husband were the best ways to spend the evening of the only day he and I will both have off at the same time for the next few months.

Because this day was a rare occurrence, I couldn't help but document the shit out of it. I took photos of every moment of Lorelei's first day of preschool; I took photos of Isla smiling at me in her high chair; I took photos of Lorelei and her little friends eating ice cream and saying "Cheese!"; and I took photos of us being happy in our happy place - photos that will forever be special to us because they capture our shared family soul at such an important and transitional time in our lives.

Today was good. It was full and complete and exhausting, and I'm happy to have lived it with the people who have impacted my life the most in such cool and varied ways. 

Yes, Lorelei took a wooden spatula to the beach. She's experimental like that. 

Double

One year ago, I wrote about one of the most intense weeks of my life. When I was three months pregnant with Isla, I witnessed a birth, grieved a death and cared for Lorelei while she endured Hand, Foot and Mouth disease (which I then caught myself). We traveled to Orange County before the illness and were able to spend some much-needed quality time with Ryan's side of the family. It was my mother-in-law's father who had died, and we were blessed with the opportunity to say goodbye to him hours before he passed. 

This year, Ryan's family gathered at his mother's home to honor her father's life. Because Ryan was coincidentally given an extra two days off of work that same weekend, we decided to take advantage of the four-day weekend and have a mini vacation with our two girls. Isla would be meeting many family members for the first time, so the trip was meaningful on a variety of levels. 

I wish I could say it was an incredible trip and everything was super awesome and perfect, but it had THE worst beginning - worse than any bad vacation I've ever had before. We decided last minute to leave a day earlier than originally planned, but, due to bad timing, we ended up leaving right before rush hour. This caused our travel time to double, and we didn't arrive at our destination until 8:30 p.m., which brings us to a total of five hours in the car with a potty-training toddler and a baby. Word to the wise - never drive through Los Angeles on a Thursday, and bring lollipops if cry-worthy traffic is unavoidable. I also wouldn't recommend leaving during a full moon, let alone a Blue Moon, because you're basically asking for shit to get weird.

The Blue Moon taunting us toward the end of our incredibly long drive.

After a bad first day of travel, things improved immensely. Lorelei became besties with a Chihuahua named Dolce and, later on in the day, a cat named Simba; we got to sleep in a fluffy king-sized bed; and I woke up to enjoy a delicious home-cooked breakfast that was made by someone other than myself.

The girls and I spent the rest of the day with Auntie Taylor (Ryan's sister), and we checked out sea lions and tide pools (or "party water" as Lorelei decided to call them; photos of this excursion are at the end of this post) while our husbands surfed for hours upon hours. After reconvening, we drove to my mother-in-law's together for the gathering, and we enjoyed the company of family we wish we could see much more often than we are currently able. 

The day as a whole was slow, deliberate and fulfilling - despite the fact that it took almost three hours to get Lorelei to fall asleep come bedtime. She was so amped on life after spending the entire night re-telling stories of mine as though the events had happened to her. It was highly entertaining, and I couldn't help but let her stay up way too late just to hear her sweet voice compose all kinds of fiction for her loving, kind audience.

After the majority of the extended family went home, my mother- and sister-in-law joined me to view the Blue Moon that was hanging over us that night (so-called because it was the second full moon in one month). It was beautiful, powerful, huge and probably the main reason things had been so "off" for us the day before. I embraced it, came up with a few thoughts about things I'd like to release to the powers that be and went back inside to finish my wine and pass the fuck out. 

My crap photo of the Blue Moon that I insist on publishing to prove to myself that I'm not scared of future full moons. 

We spent our final day in Orange County slowly, yet again, enjoying coffee and breakfast in the backyard with my in-laws, watching Lorelei play, relaxing while Isla napped next to a beautiful succulent arrangement, avoiding an overly friendly bee, holding an ice pack to Lorelei's head after she ran into a closed sliding glass door and trying to decide if we should leave early, or if we should go to the beach and leave at bedtime so the girls could sleep on the way home.

Obviously, because we're not dumb, we chose the latter, and it was awesome/the only thing that really went completely right all weekend. 

Enjoying the warmth of a wind-free beach day is so, so good for my soul. I was able to sit and relax with a margarita while two extra pairs of hands helped Ryan and I take care of our babies. Lorelei bonded with her aunt and uncle, she figured out how to have fun without any beach toys, she got her hair wet in the ocean and went deeper into it than ever before. Isla napped peacefully in her own beach chair to the sounds of waves crashing and people living happily outdoors. We stayed as long as we could before having to return to the responsibilities of real life, and one last long drive home.

We returned to the beach bungalow from whence we came, and I took a bath with the girls before we dressed them in jammies and fed them as much as possible in preparation for our final adventure. Had it not been for an unexpected detour, they would have slept the entire way home. Instead, both girls woke up, resulting in a mini cry-it-out session for Isla and all of us listening to "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" on repeat for Lorelei until she fell asleep again.

Thankfully, we made it home safely at a decent hour; both girls transferred to their beds easily without waking; and Ryan and I were able to binge-watch some Seinfeld before finally going to sleep in our own bed once again. 

Normal life resumed the next day, and I felt much like I did when Isla was four months old and thoughts of a third baby entered my mind before quickly receding in fear - I knew I would travel with my children again one day, but it definitely won't be anytime soon. That being said, we love our Orange County (and beyond) family so much. You're all welcome at our home anytime! 

Side note: the number two won't be a chosen number on any future Lottery tickets. 

Slow

There was a summer storm three days ago. It was unexpected, but much enjoyed. The weather was warm and humid and the skies were gray, then blue, then gray again. The rain poured, then drizzled, then stopped, then poured and drizzled again. And it was beautiful.

The girls decided to sleep in until 9 a.m. that morning, but my phone, unfortunately, decided to NOT push the reminder for a breastfeeding class I was supposed to attend at 9:30 a.m. My joy at the extra two hours of sleep was quickly transformed into panic when I realized I was going to have to bust my slightly curvier mama butt to pump some milk and get both kids fed, dressed, packed up, out the door and delivered to my parents in a totally unreasonable amount of time. Moments before I decided to just skip pumping, take Isla with me to the class and walk out the door with my babies in their PJs, I messaged the instructor that I was running late. She replied with the most glorious words right as I buckled Lorelei into her car seat:

“Oh, I was actually going to cancel the class today!”

Thank you, thank you, thank you! I hate being late, like, really hate it, so it was a total blessing that the universe aligned in such a way. Though I need this class to fulfill a certification requirement, I’d much rather attend it on time and without my squishy, giggly baby serving as a major distraction (no offense, Isla, you just make it really hard to focus).

The next thing I knew, we were enjoying breakfast with my parents and discussing the weather in a very “not cliché” kind of way, because the weather was actually very weird and discussable. Another hot topic was the chrysalis my mom had transferred into a tiny greenhouse in her living room to protect it from the wind and birds outside. We had seen it first as a caterpillar in a “J” hang a day or two before. We examined it from a distance with Lorelei and watched The Very Hungry Caterpillar on Netflix in honor of the fact that it was beginning its butterfly transformation on my parents’ front porch. As we headed out to go home that night, Lorelei yelled, “Hey! Where’d the hungry caterpillar go??”

My mom and I took a look and were surprised to see that the caterpillar had transformed into a chrysalis when we weren’t looking. It was incredible to see, and we were all very excited. Lorelei was so excited, in fact, that she dragged her little red Adirondack chair over to the pot the chrysalis was attached to so she could sit and stare at it. Sadly, I had to tell her to get up out of the chair so that we could go home and hop in bed, but I reassured her that we would be able to watch the chrysalis for many days in the future.

“Goodbye chrysalis, goodbye ant, goodbye little yellow bugs, goodbye plant,” she said, before following me to the car. Goodbyes are never easy.

But, oh, how I wish we could have sat there as the sun set, and simply watched a transformation in progress without actually seeing the work going on behind the little green cylindrical wall of sorts. Nothing would have made me happier than to talk about caterpillars and butterflies with Lorelei while Isla listened and observed all the goings on. But a successful bedtime routine is all too valuable to me (Lorelei and Isla’s future moods depend on it), and it really was time to go.

On that weird-weather day a few days forward, Lorelei spent a lot of time watching caterpillars shed their skins and form their chrysalides on YouTube. But when it began to rain, we hurried outside to admire the huge raindrops that were glittering the sidewalk. Lorelei isn’t able to see rain all that often, seeing as how California has been in a serious drought for her entire life thus far, so being able to really experience a storm was very exciting for her. It was warm as we stood on the porch with my parents and watched the rain splatter. We guided Lorelei out onto the sidewalk so she could feel the heavy drops fall onto her skin, and we told her to stick her tongue out so she could drink some of the rain. After a little while, we went back inside and watched the rain stop and start again repeatedly out the window while kneeling on the couch. We eagerly listened to the thunder and told Lorelei that it was the sound that was made when the clouds bumped into each other. She liked the idea of that very much.

Eventually the rain slowed down enough that we could go out and play without getting soaked. As I looked around the front yard, I could literally feel the pace steadying. My mind was working more slowly, I didn’t feel as anxious as I usually do, I was able to play with Lorelei without feeling like I was forgetting to do something time sensitive, I didn’t feel like I was starving (a common side effect of nursing every few hours), Baby Isla was sleeping and the vibe in the air was a very, very peaceful one. Water drops on flower petals caught my eye, and I felt extremely inspired to photograph all of the beauty that I was surrounded by in a yard that I walk through hurriedly almost every day. The next half hour or so was very reflective and enjoyable for me. The air was still, Lorelei was beyond happy to be experiencing a different side of nature and I felt like my old, artistic self at the same time that I felt like a good mama. The combination of the two has never happened before, and this moment deserved to be remembered.

After Isla woke up and it was time to go back inside, I continued to see beauty in the most ordinary of places, like the contrast of the stormy skies against the curtains in my parents’ bedroom, Lorelei's attempt at wearing lipstick, or the colors shared by Isla’s blanket and onesie. I snapped away like crazy without ever leaving the moment. It was unreal and amazing and gratifying to know that I had nowhere else to be and was allowed to simply be myself, and actually enjoy it fully.

As the day came to an end and it was nearing the time to go home and help my girls go to sleep for the night, my mom and I both commented that the day in its entirety was actually really good. It never felt stressful, and everything that had happened that morning worked out for the best. We both love the rain, and I’m sure the change in weather was a much-needed change for our souls. I know that, for me, I was able to see my surroundings in a new light, and this ability allowed me to simply slow down and enjoy all of the mundane and ordinary parts of life that I never actually appreciate.

I’m thankful for the many wonderful and beautiful moments of that day.

And, I really miss the rain.