A whisper that became a storm
It started as a whisper. A fleeting thought drifting through the hallway of my mind in the middle of another exhausting night. Toys scattered like confetti beneath my bare feet, a cold plate of dinner that never made it to my mouth, the sound of Disney songs looping endlessly in the background. I remember reaching for my cup of tea—stone-cold—and thinking, What if I… stopped wanting this?
At first, I buried it. Buried it under layers of guilt, old dreams, societal rhythm. After all, how could I not want motherhood when I am a mother? How could this be anything but betrayal toward the one person I would willingly walk barefoot across coals for—my child?
But the whisper didn’t go away. It grew sharper, clearer. Not a cry for escape, not resentment—but a quiet unraveling of who I thought I’d become.
The sacred myth of maternal instinct
There is a fierce kind of adoration we bestow upon the archetype of the mother. She is fertile, forever-giving, haloed with patience and self-sacrifice. Images of motherhood are often steeped in soft light—sun-dappled laughter, syrupy cuddles, the divine dance of creation.
But rarely do we sit in the shadows of it. We don’t poetically capture the fatigue so deep it gnaws at your sense of self, or the loss of freedom that slowly chips away at your identity until you’re not sure where you end and the laundry pile begins.
When I say « I don’t want to be a parent anymore, » I don’t mean I don’t love my child. I do. Fiercely. But love and desire are not always braided together. And the desire to mother, to parent, can ebb like tidewater—and that ebb, as painful as it is, deserves compassion and understanding.
Was it ever truly my dream?
In journaling my way through these feelings, I stumbled across a question that unraveled me: Did I really want this life—or did I simply follow the script handed to me, believing it was mine?
Growing up, the narrative was woven into my girlhood from the start. Dolls placed in my arms before I could walk, miniature prams and plastic bottles. The congratulatory tone every time I instinctively helped a smaller child. The expectation nested so deeply within me that by the time I made the choice to become a mother, it didn’t feel like a choice at all—it felt like a rite of passage.
And I say this not to mourn becoming a parent—but to recognize the vast difference between freely chosen love, and love from which there is no culturally sanctioned escape.
When the heart grows tired
I see now that some days, my heart is simply tired. Tired of performing the invisible labor—the logistical orchestration of daily life, the emotional temperature check for every family member, the weaponized guilt of « shoulds » and « why aren’t yous. »
To feel exhausted by parenting isn’t weakness. It’s human. And to admit that weariness does not unravel our worth as women. In fact, it’s in naming the heaviness that we reclaim a piece of ourselves, lest we quietly vanish beneath the mountain of unmet needs and forgotten passions.
Guilt: a mother’s second language
I used to think guilt was reserved for wrongdoing. But in motherhood, guilt becomes a second language. I speak it when I suggest screen time, when I buy pre-cut fruit, when I take ten extra minutes in the bathroom just to breathe.
But more than that, guilt whispers in the silent spaces. The ones where I fantasize about a life spent alone in an old stone cottage, surrounded by books and bee-friendly gardens. A life where my name is not called every thirty seconds, where tea is sipped while it’s still warm.
Am I allowed to want that?
The answer I’m learning is yes.
Yes to longing. Yes to ambivalence. Yes even to not wanting this role anymore—while still choosing to stay. There is no singular template for mother-love.
Practical ways I’m coping
So much of this inner dialogue lives in silence. But I’ve found that naming the truth, aloud or in ink, breaks the spell. Here are a few ways I’m learning to cope—without judgment.
- I give myself permission to feel everything. There are no ‘bad’ emotions. Resentment, boredom, grief—these are messengers, not moral failings.
- I create micro-escapes. Five minutes of deep breathing. Sitting in my car after errands with the music loud and the windows cracked. Reading fiction that makes me feel alive again.
- I ask for more help. This one was a hard pill. But help isn’t a luxury—it’s oxygen. My partner, family, even hired support—sharing the load does not diminish my strength. It amplifies my capacity.
- I reconnect with my womanhood. Beyond the role of mother, I am still a whole woman. I seek spaces (like this blog) that awaken my feminine nature—graceful, powerful, sensual, alive.
- I envision a future that holds me, too. The version of me that thrives with or without the label of “Mom.” A version that blossoms in her own time, in her own words.
Redefining legacy
Sometimes I question what legacy I leave behind if parenting no longer defines me. But perhaps legacy isn’t always biological. Perhaps it’s the stories we tell, the women we lift, the joy we reclaim, the ancestral traumas we choose not to carry forward.
Maybe the most radical act of mothering is the one we perform for ourselves—tending to our wounds, whispering sweet nothings to the little girl within, and saying You matter too.
A new kind of motherhood
I haven’t walked away from parenting. But I have dismantled the pedestal it once sat on. I no longer see motherhood as my sole source of meaning. I mother. I love. I care. But I also rage. I ache. I disengage. And in that duality, I’ve found something liberatingly honest.
There is no shame in reassessing one’s desires. No failure in realizing that the path once followed with joy may no longer nourish your spirit. Life is an evolving map—and we, tender cartographers, learning as we go.
If you find yourself at the edge of that same whisper—a voice saying “I don’t want to be a parent anymore”—know this: you are not monstrous. You are not ungrateful. You are simply waking up, peeling another layer of yourself open to the sun, asking the question, What could my life look like if I allowed myself to truly choose it?
Perhaps that answer will shift with the seasons. But the asking of it—that is sacred. That is yours.
