Ordinary. Extraordinary.

I am a 70s baby.

Which means my heyday was the 90s.
Frizzy hair, Oasis and ladette culture.

I was raised to be a good girl.
Independent. Capable. Not needy.
Crying was dramatic.
Asking for help was weakness.
Self-worth was earned,  preferably with academic achievements and a good career.

I was told I could have it all.
An education. A career. A family. A body that bounced back. A home that ran like clockwork.

What they didn’t say was that “having it all” often meant doing it all.

I competed with men as if that was empowerment.
I hardened myself.
I pushed down anything that looked like softness because softness didn’t win.
There was no language for feminine energy only drive, productivity, performance.

And then I became a mother.

And motherhood did not care about my productivity.

Motherhood cracked me open.

I thought I had to be a super mum.
Calm. Capable. Coping.
No cracks visible. Not to my husband. Not to my parents. Not to anyone.

I didn’t know how to say:
“I’m f*&ked”
“I’m scared.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing.”

No one had taught me about emotions. No one said I might be neurodivergent. 
No one had taught me how to feel safe inside my own body.

So I learned.

While raising babies.
While navigating school systems.
While trying to understand highly sensitive, neurodivergent children in a world that is now so different it amplifies their experience of it.

I have re-parented myself while parenting my children.

I have sat with parts of myself that were never allowed to speak.
I navigated post-natal hormonal crashes and perimenopause
while learning how to mother toddlers and teenagers at the same time.

I lost my parents, holding grief in one hand and GCSE and A-level exam timetables in the other.

It is a lot.

And some days I want someone to say:
This is extraordinary.
But it is not extraordinary.

It is normal.

Every woman I know is carrying something like this.
Grief. Invisible emotional labour. High-achieving exhaustion. Emotional translation services for the entire family. The silent recalibration of generations.

And yet.

Here we are.

The women I am lucky enough to be surrounded by,  in my work, in my family, in my friendships,  are extraordinary.

Ordinary.
And completely extraordinary.