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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
Lifestyle
Hannah Matthews

Motherhood is saying ‘I can’t do this any more’ – then doing it

Trayvon Martin
A graphic illustration of a woman with brown skin, wearing a T-shirt and jeans, collapsed in an armchair with a vacuum cleaner propped against it, a plant knocked over and a basket of laundry in front of her, while two brown-skinned children play - a toddler runs with their arms up, and an older child does a handstand.
Parenting in the US can feel like an endless endurance test. Photograph: Malte Mueller/Getty Images/fStop

Maybe I uttered the words for the first time in my 15th week of pregnancy, when I was admitted to the hospital for an IV drip of anti-nausea medication because I had vomited six times in the past 24 hours and couldn’t keep down water.

Or maybe I said them on the second or third day of my failed induction, as I labored all day and all night toward the C-section I’d hoped to avoid, with no progress beyond 5cm of cervical dilation.

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