Sometimes it’s really hard to remember who I was before I became a mom. It almost seems as if it was a past life or like it was someone else who rode a motorbike in a bikini in Greece, or jumped out of a plane, or went trekking around Nepal in silence for days with nothing but the beautiful mountains around her. I think back and there are times I feel like that girl I used to be – brave, bold, adventuress and care free, is completely gone and like I am, bit by bit, slowly losing myself.

It’s another one of the things no one tells you about when you become a mom. How once you become someone else’s mother, everything else starts to fade away and disappear.

I know it can sound ungrateful and childish but I’m actually sick of apologizing for complaining, or for pointing out the “bad stuff”. It’s not about it being ‘hard’, it’s about losing a sense of who you are with every load of laundry you do and every chore you tick off that never ending “to do list” called ‘life as an adult’.

Well I’ll have you know that I am very grateful and as someone who struggled to get pregnant and nearly died in the process of having my twins, you can be sure that I appreciate just how fortunate I am to be anyone’s mother, let alone to be alive and able to moan about it. On top, although I was never the type of girl who always dreamed of becoming a mom, once I did become one, I was over the moon and I wouldn’t change it for the world.

But that doesn’t mean there aren’t days I miss the “old me”.

Remember her?

Topless on the beach on a summer holiday, dancing in a club till 6 am, or snowboarding in white powder and living life to the absolute fullest.

I’ve realized that for the past 6 years since becoming a mom I have been living according to the notion that once you become a mother, you are a “mom first” and a person second.

It kind of makes sense when you think about t because when your baby is born they need you for EVERYTHING so you do what any loving parent would do – you put yourself to one side, forget about your dancing shoes, your own dreams and needs, and you take care of that little new person you’ve created the best way you possibly can, giving them your heart and soul and all that you have to give.

And then one day you wake up and your baby is no longer a baby and can actually wipe his own butt (finally) and with every day that goes by needs you a little less (which is good news), but when you look into the mirror you suddenly realize that you don’t know who the person looking back at you is anymore.

The reason I know this is because I am there – staring at myself in the mirror and wondering where the hell did I go.

And the reason I am telling you this is because I know there are many women out there who feel the same way. Trapped in the daily grinding routine of diaper changing and blending squash with sweet potatoes and I want to tell you that it’s okay to feel frustrated and say that it sucks. It’s okay to want more, to miss what you had and to try and get it back. It doesn’t make a “bad mom” or any less loving than you are. It just makes you human.

And after you give yourself that green light to feel how you really freakin’ without worrying about what other people are gonna think about it, know this: that girl, is still in there and she is begging to come out. She may have been in a coma for the past few years and she may be hard to spot under the new stretch marks and added pounds each of our lovely babies left behind them, but she is 100% still in there.

Time to go get her!