The arrival of a child is just about the biggest earthquake you can experience, not least on a mental and emotional level. Nevertheless, no one prepares you for the drastic changes it also brings about in your brain. That you can never have enough tetra cloths in the house and that white noise is a gift from the gods: sure, that is important information.
That your sleeping pattern and your body will change, too. But no one had told me that the changes would go so much further: my emotions, my view of the world, my entire identity. Sometimes I am overwhelmed by such an intense wave of love for my one-and-a-half-year-old daughter that it takes my breath away: then I suddenly start crying, because I love her so much, but also because I find it scary to love someone so intensely, down to the depths of my bones.
How come I was so unprepared for this? Am I experiencing a different kind of motherhood? Is my brain working too much? Am I taking it all too seriously? No, says science: all mothers feel this to a greater or lesser extent. After the teenage years, there is no other time in a person’s life that brings such enormous psychological, social and physical changes as becoming a mother. Neurological research shows that the brains of mothers undergo an equally great and lasting transformation as during puberty.
This process is called matrescence, or motherhood. “Matrescence literally means becoming a mother,” explains clinical psychologist Lies Clerx. “A baby is also a moth.
