I always thought that I would be one sort of person: but now I’m someone else.

Or, Off Brand

Just as a head’s up: this week’s essay includes a story of birth and breastfeeding as illustration so if that sort of talk isn’t helpful to you right now, feel free to skip this one. - S.

Paid subscribers, you can listen to the audio recording of this essay. It’s called The Secret Field Notes Podcast Ep. 9 and you can listen to it in any of your podcast apps by following the prompts there. Happy listening!

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Hi friends,

Little known fact: I’m actually a marketer by trade and training. Yep. I studied marketing and communications for my undergraduate degree and then I spent about twelve years working in that field for both financial institutions and then non-profits. My specialty became strategic planning and brand development and communications.

I do love spreadsheets and a plan.

I often extolled the virtues of “branding” for our organizations. People often thought brand was language for the logo or perhaps the colour scheme, even the look and feel of our marketing materials. But really, brand is so much bigger than that: it is the story we are telling and it’s reflected in the way people think about us. Not only the marketing materials but our customer service, our strategic planning, our products, our design, our website, everything we do tells a story about us to the world.

A brand isn’t exclusive to corporations or non-profits. We often embrace a certain “brand” for our lives as regular people, we have a story we want to tell with our lives and we expect everything in our life – our food, our worship, our budget, our homes, our friends – to all reinforce that story. Influencers on Instagram are often an over-realized version of this. This isn’t necessarily negative, but it can be restrictive. Many of us are unconsciously thinking of what our choices communicate to the world about who we are and what we value and what our purpose is in this life.

This is my brand, this is what I do, this is what I have always done, this is the way I work, this is the way I minister, this is the way I lead, this is the way I am in church, this is the way I parent, every time all the time.

Don’t disrupt the brand.

Sometimes the story we tell ourselves about our own lives can become a prison. Our brand can keep us from the real life that is waiting for us.

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When I first became a mother, I was in my late twenties. And the experience of changed me inside and out. I know it doesn’t happen that way for everyone and I’m not saying my way is prescriptive or normative but it is the truth that this is the altar where I met with God. I was transformed. 

I felt like I not only uncovered something true about my own self but that I connected with God in a whole new way. My ideas of God and life were washed clean and hung out on the line of the bright sunshine of this experience. We quickly added another two tinies to the household and all of a sudden I had three kids four and under. (Even writing that sentence makes me feel tired all over again.)

The more I experienced pregnancy and birth in all its mess and glory, loss and life, the more I uncovered the devout parallels between how women experience birth and how the Holy Spirit often “gives birth” in our souls. Mothering was where I found God and even now it is where God continues to somehow find me, too.

IMAGE: Sarah holding Maggie when she was one week old. Photo by Sharalee Prang Photography.

When I spoke or wrote about birth, I always talked about how as soon as I had delivered a baby, I would break into joyous laughter. My husband would cry and I would laugh, tipping my head back with relief and joy, clutching that new life to my breasts. With my third baby, we gave birth in the living room of our house in a birthing tub of warm water, attended by midwives. I still look back at Evelynn’s birth day as one of the shining stars of my entire life – the whole experience from start to finish was so grace-filled, so healing, so peace-filled. What a way to end my experiences with childbirth, I thought. It was perfect.

And then there was breastfeeding, one of my true passions. My mother was one of the early generation of La Leche League (a breastfeeding advocacy community) and so I grew up in a home that normalized and celebrated breastfeeding. Without much thought, I exclusively nursed all of my babies, never even pumping breastmilk for a bottle. (Sidenote: These are the very real lived benefits of living in a country with a year of paid maternity leave for mothers!) I practiced child-lead weaning, simply nursing my children until they decided to stop, which happened right around 18 months old with all three of them. My children never knew anything different and neither did I. It wasn’t a burden, it was a joy to me.

This is how I mother. This is how I do it. Every time, without fail, this is the story I tell about myself as a mother of babies.

And here is how that story ended.

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Babies grow up. Toddlerhood passed, preschool, elementary school. I loved our new season of life as parents to “Big Kids.”

And then we found ourselves unexpectedly expecting one last little baby, nearly nine years after my first. 

And it was just different. I was different, the pregnancy was different. I felt disoriented, like I was having to reorganize the story my life was telling. I thought we were going in one direction as a family and now we were regrouping. I had changed a lot in the past decade in response to being a mother: now my mothering was going to have to change to accommodate the whole rest of me.

Back when I had my first three, I worked, sure, but it was local and I had a full year of mat leave, I blogged during naptime for the fun of it. Now I was a writer with legal contracts to fulfill and deadlines to meet. The administrative side of my life was a bit overwhelming sometimes.  At the time, I travelled for work twenty weekends a year. So I found myself gigantically pregnant and heaving carry-ons onto airplanes only to watch my feet swell to twice their size before a weekend speaking event.  

Having a baby in your late thirties is a bit of a different experience than having a baby in your twenties, I assure you. (My doctor called it “advanced maternal age” – thanks, Doc!) My next book was due right before the baby was due so instead of resting during the pregnancy even after my last trip, I madly wrestled words onto the page and finished a vulnerable and searching book about faith.

I knew how it felt to go into birth feeling fully empowered and ready, strong and capable. And I kept admitting the truth in the back of my head: I was exhausted, depleted. The baby was bigger, I was older, life had been too full. I remember that I said to my husband that I was really re-thinking having our typical home birth again. I wistfully daydreamed of a clean hospital with a capable anesthesiologist. But I quickly snapped at myself, doubling down in my own head: I will have birth the way that I always do! It will be beautiful, dammit!

On the day that I went into labour, I quickly realised that my own instincts - the instincts I refused to honour - were right. A home birth was not a wise decision and I couldn’t settle. Just a few hours into labour, we transferred to the hospital because when my water broke there were indicators that the baby would need oxygen or at least a paediatrician on hand. In the ambulance, I agreed to any and all drugs that they would give me and by the time we got to the hospital, I was a hot mess of disorientation. The rest of the baby’s delivery was a blur to me, a blur of pain and trauma and powerlessness. I only remember my husband’s voice cutting through my panic with his strength, I clung to him and somehow we kept going together.

By the time she was safely earthside and they announced her at 10 pounds 7 ounces, I was devastated by the birth we had just experienced. They put Margaret in my arms and I cried like we had just survived a war. There was no laughter on my lips this time: I shook with sobs and apologised to her over and over for how she had come into the world. My sister kept trying to get through to me: “Sarah, she’s healthy and you’re healthy, you did something amazing here even if it wasn’t what you expected!”

But the feeling was always there, even as I healed from her birth, even as I forgave myself for not following my instincts. It was the feeling that I had failed her.

All of my other children had a beautiful and redemptive birth story: by contrast, Maggie’s birth had been one of the most traumatic days of my life. Her story was different than the other tinies’ stories and it was my fault. In my heart, I felt that I had failed her already.

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It’s funny how we can say things to ourselves that we would never say or even believe about another woman. If another woman had been in my shoes, I would have said that this was a lie, that she hadn’t failed her baby, that she had done what she needed to do to keep everyone safe which is never a failure, that she needed to release the lies and welcome the truth over and over again. Of course the story was changing – this is normal and natural and even good.

So we became a family of six. I gloried in Maggie. We all did – she became the centre of our lives. I tucked her into bed with us, I got out my old baby carrier, I was ready to do what I always did for babies because babies are my jam. I know babies. I am the baby whisperer, this is how I mother, this is the story that I know, this is the story I tell with my life.

Maggie has been the baby who changed the story.

For the first time, I couldn’t get the baby to sleep at night. I tried everything, even the things I had sworn I would never do. Nothing worked. On a good night, we were up four times. On a typical night, we were up dozens of times and I went an entire year of my life at a level of sleep deprivation that meant I probably shouldn’t have been driving the mini-van or been responsible for other children. At about ten months in, I just surrendered to the nightwatch. I simply embraced the fact that this was Maggie and this is what we were going to do until we simply couldn’t do it anymore.

And then there was nursing. My supply was so much less with Maggie – a combination of my age and my stress levels, no doubt. So I had to nurse her much more frequently in order for her to be full and even a year into her life, I was still nursing more than ten times a day.

It was time to get back to work, too. Friends of mine who were in my line of work assured me that they had travelled with their babies at Maggie’s age and it had been fine. My mother retired from her job and planned to join us on the road in order to care for Maggie while I led workshops or taught or preached. All of the plans fell into place: my husband and tinies were all dedicated to my work and sent me out with joy. I worked with event planners to accommodate the nursing relationship, chasing back and forth from the events to the hotel to nurse the baby every two hours. Our babysitter came to our house to care for her while I was writing. I was willing to embrace the hardship of travelling with a baby for the sake of our nursing relationship. We were set for success! on paper anyway.

But the story wouldn’t cooperate: every single trip, Maggie fell sick with fevers. She slept even less than usual. She wouldn’t eat. She was not herself. Maggie was one of the happiest babies I’ve ever encountered, to see her laid low and miserable was painful for both my mother and for me. It became more and more obvious that despite what worked for everyone else, this was not working for us. 

She was more than a year old and it was just time to wean her. I had mothered babies for ten years and yet I had never weaned a baby, true, but it wasn’t the logistics that kept me from making that choice, it was that old feeling left over from her birth, the feeling that I was failing her. I couldn’t wean her because that is off-brand. We both needed her to be released from nursing but I clung to the mothering story I wrote all those years ago and we boarded another plane together.

It was a disaster.

We made the decision to wean Maggie. 

I was sure that it would be an awful two weeks of trying to wean Maggie from the breast and onto a little sippy cup of whole milk. Instead, she went from ten feeds a day to just one in short order. She loved her little sippy cup and devoured food. By the fifth night, when I nursed her at bedtime, she was losing interest, ready to go to bed with a full tummy already.

Wasn’t this supposed to be terrible? hard? horrible? instead she was fine and I knew I would be fine if I could just release us both from the story I had tethered us to with such good intentions.

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Going off-brand can be terrifying. Daring to change our story when we find our primary identity in that particular story feels like we are losing our own sense of self. It’s more than just changing an opinion or a way of life: it’s changing who we thought we were.

I thought I was always going to mother in one particular way always: instead I changed.

It’s the same way in many areas of our lives.

As I wrote in Out of Sorts, if we aren’t changing or evolving, then we aren’t paying attention. If we pay attention to our life, we will change. In fact, we will change in ways that we never imagined and even though there is grief to leaving behind that old story, there is freedom and life and space waiting on the other side of the threshold.

I always go to this church: but then you find yourself leaving.

I always believed that being gay was sinful: but then one of the most loving and Christ-like people you ever knew just came out and you find yourself rethinking.

I always knew I would live in this town for my entire life: but then you find yourself in faraway lands.

I was raised in a certain political persuasion: but then you find yourself feeling alienated from the people who taught you how to be a good citizen.

I always knew that marriage was the most important relationship and I judged people who got divorced: but then you find yourself signing papers and underneath the grief, there is relief.

I always knew I was called to ministry: but then you find yourself in a regular sort of job and you have to figure out a new story and deconstruct all those hero narratives you ingested about ministry.

I always knew I would get married and have kids: but then you find yourself single.

I always thought I knew exactly what I believed and why: but then you find yourself questioning everything.

I always knew I didn’t want to have kids: but then you find yourself with a houseful of small humanity to care for.

I always believed I was in control: but now you know you need help to quit.

I knew that I would homeschool my kids: but today you dropped them off at the public school.

I knew that I knew that I would work in this job forever: but now you’re starting over.

I pictured parenting would look a particular way: but your kid requires something different and you are having to reimagine a whole new way to parent than you ever knew.

I have always encountered God in this particular way: but then that way becomes barren and empty and you find yourself walking new paths, as a new seeker of God.

I always knew I would hold this belief or opinion: but then you find yourself questioning everything you ever believed and knew.

I always thought that I would be one sort of person: but now I’m someone else.

You don’t need permission to go off brand but if you are: here it is.

You have permission to go off brand. You have permission to change. You have permission, as Parker Palmer would say, to listen to your life and adjust accordingly.

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When I was debating whether or not I could bring myself to wean Maggie, my husband, my mother, and my sister reminded me of her birth. They reminded me that I had made my birthing decisions out of loyalty to the “way I’ve always done it” or to my ideology when my reality was demanding a change.

It seemed as if I cared more about giving Maggie the same story as my other children than I did about doing what was best for both of us and our unique needs now.

Life didn’t care about my brand.

I should have chosen life instead of my brand.

I stayed with my brand and it nearly cost us both dearly.

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That last night of nursing together, I sat in the darkness with her. I wanted the night to be meaningful, to be a sort of farewell to this era of my life. But underneath the sadness, there was relief. The very thing that used to bring me freedom had become a sort of bondage and now we were going to choose freedom together. She barely nursed that night, we rocked in that old creaky rocking chair, I tucked her into bed and left the room. I went to my husband and he held me in his arms while I cried in the kitchen.

“It was good,” I said to him. “This whole thing has been good. I know we’re doing the right thing but I think it’s good to be sad, too. God, I loved it. I loved everything about breastfeeding. But I’m ready for it to be over, too.”

Now my story as a mother includes this story too: I’m a mother who chose to honour her own mental and spiritual health as much as she honoured her children, a woman who took too long to reimagine her life. 

The next day, I got on a plane to Raleigh. I left Maggie at home with my husband. She promptly slept through the night. And she has slept through the night almost every single night since then.

In the mornings after the choice to go off brand, I would wake up to her laughing to herself in her little crib, we had both slept all night, we felt free. I would open the door to her huge smile, her arms up and waiting for me just as I was in that moment.

Love S.

P.S. I originally wrote a version of this essay in 2015 and, due to our family’s move, I’ve rewritten it for you this week.

Find Sarah Bessey on Instagram |  Twitter |  Facebook | SarahBessey.com

In case you missed these Field Notes:

• Enjoy having 85 tabs open in peace, the way God intended - Links and clicks for June 2021 (for subscribers)

• Answering your questions about creationism, deconstruction, guilty pleasures, weeknight meals, and more 🙋🏻‍♀️ - AMA for June - for subscribers

• Meeting the fam, sharing some big news - for subscribers

• It’s not just a chapter, it’s an origin story - for everyone

Learn more about my books:

• The NYT and International Bestseller A Rhythm of Prayer

• Miracles and Other Reasonable Things

• Out of Sorts: Making Peace with an Evolving Faith

• Jesus Feminist