What is Matrescence? The word every mother needs to know

Matrescence was coined by Anthropologist Dana Raphael in the 1970s. It is the name given to the transition all women go through when they become a mother. Just like adolescence, when we are children becoming teenagers, the changes are remarkably similar , everything shifts hormonally, physically and emotionally, and just like adolescence, we never go back to who we were before. We have changed. And like adolescence, this is not something that needs to be fixed. It should not only be accepted, but celebrated.

When we go through adolescence, all our friends and peers are on the same journey, going through the same transition, so it feels like we are not alone and we have support around us. I remember my own adolescence where we had those girl magazines like Shout and Mizz in the noughties, where there were always pages of people writing in to ask about their body changes. What I remember from the replies from the expert who would answer their questions was that it was all normal. We knew we were in transition. We were becoming. We were changing. And that felt completely normal.

However, when I had both my girls, I had never heard the word matrescence. Not once. It wasn't until I was working with mums in my counselling practice that I came across it. "Wow" I thought. "This makes so much sense." The more I learn about matrescence, the more it makes me want to shout it from the rooftops. Even as I wrote this blog, on a plane back from sunny Mallorca, there was that little red squiggly line under the word as I typed it which tells you it still isn't in the dictionary. Say what?! Something that every single mother goes through, isn't in the dictionary? How can that be, when things like WTF is?!

Every client who joins my virtual therapy space, I tell them about matrescence. Every. Single. One. And every time, without fail, women haven't heard of it. This still blows my mind because this one word, and the understanding behind it, would reduce so much shame and fear around becoming a mother.

We hear a lot about postnatal depression, postnatal anxiety, even postpartum psychosis. There seems to be growing awareness of the mental health challenges that can follow birth, and that awareness is so important. I knew about PND. I expected it because I had experienced depression before. I also had two incredibly difficult pregnancies- Hyperemesis Gravidarum both times - and they were truly miserable. But even with that awareness, nobody told me about matrescence. If they had, I think I would have been able to offer myself some compassion when I struggled with my emotions after birth. Some acceptance of "right now I am in a transition and that is okay" - instead of feeling like a failure. Instead of feeling like my body had let me down after Hyperemesis, two c-sections, and not being able to breastfeed my first daughter, when all I actually needed was support and knowledge.

I needed someone to tell me that the postpartum period is not just six weeks. I needed someone to tell me that I didn't have to get my body back - because there was no going back, in the same way an adult cannot go back to being a child after adolescence. We would never say to someone after their teenage years "when are you going back to who you were before?" So why on earth do we put so much pressure on mothers to return to who she was before she had her baby? It just will not happen. And that is more than okay. That is the point.

Matrescence is not a problem to be solved. It is a becoming. And every mother deserves to know that.

If reading this has made something click for you, or if you are in the middle of your own matrescence and struggling to make sense of who you are now, I would love to support you. I am Becca, a qualified maternal counsellor specialising in motherhood and matrescence, and this is exactly the work we do together. Feel free to browse my virtual therapy space or send me a message — you do not have to figure this out alone.