Self Doubt Having A Baby As An Older Mom

Welcome to Mom On Purpose, where it’s all about helping moms overcome challenges and live their best lives. My hope is by being here, you are more inspired to become the mom you are made to be. I’m Natalie, your host, a wife, boy, mom, dog, mama, Chicagoan, and former lawyer turned professionally certified coach. If you’re here to grow, I can help. Let’s go.

Hello, my beautiful friend. Welcome to the podcast. We are in June, and that’s really fun. It is the summertime. I am starting to feel a little bit better and that that’s amazing in my third pregnancy, I hope you’re doing well, enjoying the summer months as they’re kind of just getting started. I’ve been doing so much coaching on topics about summertime and transitions and camps and kids and screen time and marriages and all of the things. I think that when we transition into summer, there are natural challenges that often arise and it’s a beautiful time to grow and to use these tools.

So I invite you to do just that. For those of you inside the membership, you already know this if you’re not inside the membership, I just released a brand new course called How to Change Your Life, and it is fantastic. It is a course that I use in all of my coaching and have used for the last handful of years, but I didn’t have it laid out this simply and in such a useful, helpful way for the members. And so now when you join right away, you get this course and I walk you through how to take your current results of whatever it is. Maybe you’re 200 pounds and you want to be 150 pounds, or maybe you yell at your kids and you want to stop yelling or maybe you really struggle with your in-laws and you just want more ease and connection. I walk you through how to go from where you are now to where you want to be in my before and after process.

This is the process of transformation. It is what I’m most passionate about because I think that that’s one of life’s greatest purposes is to grow and evolve and change. And to do that in such a way that inspires you and motivates you and helps you strengthen your relationship with yourself and your relationship with your family is just so incredible. So it’s been a lot of fun so far. And if you’re not in there, you can join us over at mompurpose.com/coaching. Now let’s dive in to today’s episode, which is about self-doubt, having a baby as an older mom. In a minute I’m going to play a recording from a caller who is having self-doubt about having a baby in a phase of life where she’s called being an older mom. And I have so many thoughts that I want to share with you about this. So in the episode we’re going to talk about self-doubt. We’re going to talk about growth journeys, we’re going to talk about answering questions that your brain asks you. We’re going to talk about how growing and growing your family really gives you an opportunity to look at the relationship you have with yourself. We’re going to talk about how to make decisions and evaluate not from scarcity, but from abundance. And I’m going to be sharing my story and how I think about myself, my age, and being a mom in this later season of life. And with that, let’s listen in.

Hi, Natalie. I’m 43 years old with two children, planning for a third one. I am really struggling with my thoughts, such as who do I think I am 43 old to have a baby? It’s risky and I would like some help in having my own back with this decision. Thank you so much for everything you do. Bye-Bye.

I want to start off talking about my experience and specifically my mindset around this topic. So for those of you who don’t know, I just turned 38 years old. I had my first child at 35, and I will be having my third child at 38. So I fall into the bucket of an older mom, which is typically defined as having kids when you’re over the age of 35. And this stems from, you know, what the medical profession calls a geriatric pregnancy where they sort of have to have a cutoff line that they use to, help professionals and providers take a look at your stuff going on, your scans, your ultrasounds, everything going on with you, um, as part of a higher risk category. And it’s not that something magical happens at 35, it’s just that there has to be some sort of line that they draw otherwise, they wouldn’t be able to do that.

And so there are a lot of other reasons why you might have high risk pregnancies. Age is just one that they use. And I think if we can separate out why there is this age and this sort of line that the medical profession uses and view that as a helpful tool to making sure that mom and baby are safe and healthy and view it as a positive. That’s how I think about it. We can separate that out from what we make, make it mean about ourselves. So personally, I have done a ton of thought work on this. It was actually just decisions I made to believe that I do not call myself an old mom. I do not call myself an older mom. I do not believe that I am too old to have kids. I do not believe that, I am doing something wrong or bad.

I do not sort of buy into the cultural narrative of, oh, I’m too old to be doing this or too old to be up this late at night or anything like that. I just completely disregard all of it. Now, I’m not mad when someone else buys into that. I’m not mad when someone else kind of tries to relate to me in that way. I don’t think it’s wrong or bad. I just think that when I think about myself as an older mom or as someone who could be too old, or as someone who doesn’t have the energy for this, any kind of thoughts that make me feel old or like my capacity is lowered or I’m incapable of this, or thoughts that I do not want to think, they do not serve me. They do not help me particularly because I am having kids. Now, if I wasn’t having kids, then sure, maybe I would have those thoughts and they wouldn’t negatively impact me.

But as someone who is actively having kids at 35, 37 and 38, I don’t want to think that I’m too old for this. I’m an old mom. Um, I don’t have the energy for this. I don’t want to think any of those thoughts. I want to think that I’m the exact age that I’m supposed to be having my family right now. I am the perfect age for my kids. I am so grateful that I get to be a mom because that was a desire that was on my heart. I love being a mom at this age. I am young. I am energized. I am vibrant. I am, you know, of course tired because I’m lacking sleep. But that’s not different than any other mom who’s 10 years younger than me. So I just choose to think of myself as healthy and young and capable. And you can do that too. There is no one in charge of what you believe about yourself. You do not have to buy in to the norm or the cultural narrative that older moms are too old or too tired or even that you are an older mom. So if you know that you have two kids and like this caller said she wants to have a third kid and she’s 43, and you know that you’re going to do that, then tell a story that supports that I am the exact age my kids are supposed to have. One of my colleagues, another coach, she had her fourth child at 42 and I think her fourth child’s like eight or nine now. And I love the way that she talks about it. She never calls herself an older mom. She says, my youngest keeps me young and I love that. And she’s energized in the way that she talks about it.

And so other people might offer you thoughts and you might read something, but it’s your job to filter out those thoughts and decide how you want to think about yourself, particularly if you’ve already made the decision like it sounds like you have. Now, when it comes to making the decision, yes, consider the risks and also consider the opposite. So a lot of times when we’re evaluating something, we think about the cons of both, but we don’t think about the pros of both. So for example, I’ll coach a lot of moms who are navigating different school options for their kids. So let’s say you’re deciding between different elementary schools for your child. If you are thinking about the drawbacks of each, your brain is going to go into scarcity. And it will be really hard to decide because you’ll be so focused on what’s wrong with each one.

Comparatively if you focus on what’s amazing about each one, then you realize you can choose either one and it can be amazing. So when you’re making a decision about kids, it, it sort of sounds like you may have already made that decision, but you did reference risks. And so if you are still making the decision, yes, consider the risks and yes, talk to professionals, but make sure you clean up the facts versus your thoughts about the facts. The facts will be very boring. The facts will be like statistics, like one in every 200 or whatever it is that you’re reading the facts, your interpretation or a provider’s interpretation about the facts or thoughts. And it doesn’t mean that they’re wrong. It doesn’t mean that they’re untrue, but they can have a lot of subjectivity in them that can either help you or hinder you. And so what you want to do is make sure that you’re making a decision from abundance, from looking at the information as best you can without all of that subjectivity, looking at the facts and then deciding for yourself.

Now, there isn’t a way to do anything without risk, right? If I decide to go to the grocery store today, there is some risk in that. If I decide to get on an airplane today, there are some risks in that if I decide to leave my house at all, if I decide to, take my kids somewhere, there are risks. There are always risks, but a lot of times we don’t think about the day-to-day risks, and I don’t think we should, right? Because then we would be so overcome with fear, we would probably never leave and get really paranoid. So I don’t think we’re meant to carry all of the risks all of the time, and yet we still want to be safe. We still want to look both ways before we cross the street. So yes, consider the risks, but the way that you’re talking about it right now seems like that’s the channel that the TV is on.

In your mind, it is only looking at the risks. What I didn’t hear, what I want you to give equal airtime to is flipping the channel to having the third child that you want to have and how amazing it could be. I remember when I was thinking about whether to try for a VBAC or not, after my first child was a cesarean section, and I was weighing the pros and cons, but mostly looking at things I couldn’t control. So I wanted to try for a VBAC only if it resulted in a vbac. And of course, ahead of time, there’s no way to know that there is inherent risk in any decision that we make. And that doesn’t mean don’t consider the risk, but it does mean that ultimately you can’t control the outcome. So for me, what got me to such peace was deciding this is who I want to be.

It was safe for me to try and go for a vbac. So I wanted to do that, and I did, and it worked out. And I’m so glad that I did. And I decided ahead of time that even if it didn’t work out, I was going to be so glad that I tried because I wanted to be someone who tries. That’s who I wanted to be. It created such a sense of certainty and self-confidence regardless of what happened in my circumstances. And so that gets to the relationship you have with yourself. What are you telling yourself? If there are additional complications or one of the risks does materialize, are you telling yourself that you will have made the wrong decision? This is your fault. You did this, you’re irresponsible. Because if you’re choosing to beat yourself up, you want to notice that this is why it is such a beautiful opportunity to improve the relationship you have with yourself.

Any growth journey is motherhood specifically is one, that’s one we’re talking about today. But marriage and weight loss and all of the other growth journeys that you can go on give you the opportunity to believe in yourself, to not know what the outcome is going to be and still choose to go for it and to decide that you won’t beat yourself up when there are obstacles, when there are challenges, when there are things that you can’t control when some of the risks do materialize, that you decide to talk to yourself with kindness, with love, and with compassion. And you can just make that decision today. You never have to beat yourself up. You can make the best decision that you can given the information that you have. And if there is a gap in the information, get that information and then make the decision and then move forward and have your own back, whatever the outcome is, because you can always learn and you can always navigate the challenge in front of you.

Your brain wants to solve challenges that aren’t even yet challenges yet, but the challenges that are actual challenges in front of you, you can solve them, my friend. So when your brain offers you questions like who do you think you are? Answer your brain, who do you think you are? You know what I like to say? When my brain offers me that question, I say, I am Natalie Bacon. That’s who I am. I am someone who tries, who goes for what I want, who makes mistakes, and who has a lot of love and compassion for herself. And if there is a desire on my heart, I want to be someone who tries to go for it. That is who I am. So answer your brain. Don’t answer your brain with, I’m an old mom. If you want to have a third child at 43, answer your brain with I am freaking and fill in the blank with your name.

That’s who I am and this is what I want and this is what I’m doing. That is a choice. It’s not based on something outside of you. The reason that you have these thoughts is because of ways that you’ve heard other people talk about being a mom at 43. And that’s not to say they’re wrong or bad, we don’t have to make them the villains here, but it’s just useful to know that the only reason you have those thoughts is because in our culture and in our society, we have thoughts and ideas that I do think stem from the medical community, from research and studies, and from the cutoff age of 35 to use as a helpful measure, but then often is used against ourselves to make it mean that we’re too old. And you don’t have to do that. Instead, you can just know, oh, of course some people view it this way and that’s okay.

I don’t need their approval or validation or confidence. I’m going to approve of myself and validate myself and have self-confidence in me. That my friend is how you put self-doubt in the backseat. You don’t know all the answers ahead of time, not with anything. You can’t possibly predict what’s actually going to happen. And yet that doesn’t mean that you be careless. It just means that you don’t use that against yourself. You don’t say, I’m not going to do this thing because I’m so scared. When you have a real desire to do this thing and it makes sense for you, you put that self, self-doubt in the backseat, you name it. You say, okay, I have some self-doubt. That’s all right. I hear you. By identifying that self-doubt and allowing it to be there, you have some control over it, just the act of labeling it. And inside the membership, we have a Processing Feelings course where I walk you through exactly how to do this.

So your emotions are there, but they’re not in the driver’s seat. They’re not leading you to take action where you self-sabotage. Instead, take action from that highest self part of your brain, that prefrontal part of your brain that makes the best decisions. So get quiet, get clear. Think about what you want for yourself and your family. Do you want to have a third baby? And if the answer is yes, then tell a story that supports that.

Be your best advocate, your best cheerleader. And it doesn’t mean you go to toxic positivity, but it does mean that you actively cultivate the skill of believing in yourself and of knowing that there may be some unforeseen obstacles that you don’t know about and you’re willing to go through them. You’re willing to put yourself out there and try this because that’s what you want, and you’re not going to beat yourself up along the way. This my friend, is a beautiful self-growth opportunity for you, and I am so glad that you called in for anyone else who would like me to answer their question, marriage, motherhood, kid stuff, parenting, anything that’s going on in your life, give me a call at eight three three three. Ask Nat. That’s 8 3 3 3 2 7 5 6 2 8, and I’ll talk with you next week. Take care.

Thank you for being here and listening. Now, head on over to momonpurpose.com/coaching to learn more about the Mom On Purpose membership, where we take all of this work to the next level.