Then the announcement came: Kate and her husband Mike had some big news. So, everybody gathered that día in the same coffee shop we used to go to every weekend just to hear what they wanted to share with the whole world. Sometimes life can be contradictoria e impredecible because all of a sudden Kate was pregnant and happier than ever. The one thing she had longed for was finally a dream come true. We were all excited for her. So, maybe we had to plan on hiring another persona to babysit our children. Kate was no longer available.
Whether my girlfriends and I were ready to give up our time and freedom to raise our kids, was something we were not sure about, but what we truly knew was that we had each other for support, as well as our husbands and family.
Días, weeks and months went by, and we could only imaginar how our whole life would change from one minute to the next. We got older, married, pregnant and suddenly started talking about labor, diapers and nombres de bebés. The overwhelming situation was not going to disappear so quickly, nor would the depresión or anxiety related to parenthood. The non-stop atención, the need to feed the bebé every couple of hours, the multiple times it woke up in the middle of the night, the lack of sleep, the constant crying… None of us had a real clue about what it meant to be a madre but we were all willing to learn on the fly. After all, that was the curso natural of life.
Getting ready for newborns can be messy and disturbing, but also gives us the chance to connect with our most sensitive self. We will no longer be the same. Our priorities are going to change and sometimes we are going to feel so exhausted that we’re going to doubt whether we made the right decisión. But then we will look around and our bebé’s smile from the crib is going to make us find the strength to continue.
Despite all the hard momentos we may experience, there will also be times of fulfillment that are hard to ignore. The way children grab our hands, their first words, the way they laugh at our jokes or respond to our cuddles, all those little momentos made la diferencia.
From now on, everything we do is going to be for that bebé’s well-being and happiness. There’s not going to be a greater love, a bigger blessing, more satisfacción in our entire life.
Our children are always going to force us to become the better versión of ourselves. They are going to give us the motivación to go to work every single day and be the best profesionales we can because we want them to be proud of us. We have the responsabilidad to teach them good values, how to play the guitarra or make friends: it’s all about helping them find their way in the world. The path can be challenging but also enjoyable.
Anyway, my girlfriends and I had found a new goal to meet in our lives: some by sticking to a plan, others in the most unexpected way. We were all afraid but we still knew that every time we fell apart, we were not alone because we had our newborns by our side.
Series – Evanescent
January: If Something Can Go Wrong…It Will – Jonay Quintero Hernández (Spain)
February: The Planet of Pleasure – Nane Sevunts (Armine Asryan) (Armenia)
March: Evening with Jackie Chan – Gennady Bondarenko (Ukraine)
April: Vuvuzelas, Walkie-Talkies and Madiba Magic – Sarah-Leah Pimentel (South Africa)
May: Remembering – Seyit Ali Dastan (Turkey)
June: 5-4-3-2-1 – Talia Stotts (America)
July: Getting Ready for Newborns – Marilin Guerrero Casas (Cuba)
August: Regrets – Kate Korneeva (Russia)
September: A Hollow Pursuit – Diana Haidar (Syria)
October: The Test – Alejandra Baccino (Uruguay)
November: A Life Rekindled – Lauren Voaden (United Kingdom)
December: Translation Perfect – Zhang Lu (China)
Special: Catching Water III – Javier Gomez (Argentina)
Background – Context
Transadaptation Volume 2: Conceived – Childhood Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2021)
Transadaptation Volume 1: In the Middle – Prelude to a Contemporary Transadaptation, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2020)
Peripatetic Alterity: A Philosophical Treatise on the Spectrum of Being – Romantics and Pragmatists by Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
La Syncrétion of Polarization and Extremes Transposée, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2018)
L’anthologie of Global Instability Transpuesta, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2017)
From Wahnsinnig to the Loony Bin: German and Russian Stories Transposed to Modern-day America, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2013)
Emblems and stories on the international community
Perception by country – Transposing emblems, articles, short stories and reports from around the world
Credits
Cover photo: Havana, Cuba – Women walking – Trina Barnes (Shutterstock)
Source: The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed