The Same Story

On Writing and Motherhood: the moments we live and the words we carry

I don’t know exactly when it started—this sense that the words had packed up and moved out. They can often have a mind of their own, drifting away when life becomes too full, too loud, too much but I do remember a moment I felt their absence.

It was a Tuesday morning, the sky overcast and heavy as the snow was preparing to roll in. The air inside the house cozy, still, and quiet. My mug had gone cold, though I don’t remember drinking from it. The notebook in front of me was blank and not in a hopeful way. Not that fresh, crisp, let’s see what happens blank. It was the heavy blank. The kind of blank that dares you to start, knowing you won’t. 

I sat there, staring at the emptiness in front of me, feeling the weight of everything that had gone unwritten. It wasn’t just about the words. It was about the life that had filled the space where writing used to be—the days layered thick with needs and routines, the years of pouring myself into other things, other people. Somewhere along the way, I had convinced myself that I could always come back to the words, that they would be waiting when I was ready. But now, faced with the silence, I wasn’t so sure.

Somewhere in the house, the day was unfolding. I could hear one child’s voice, small but certain, carried down the hall to my desk. Then, there was the sound of water running in the sink. The squeak of a door opening upstairs. The pages of a picture book being turned, the weight of the other's small body pressed against my side even as my mind wandered elsewhere. Life was in motion all around me. 

Motherhood and writing live in the same space inside me. They are both demanding and generous, both full of stops and starts. Some days, I wonder if they can truly coexist—if I can be fully present in one without losing hold of the other. Writing requires solitude, but mothering is made of interruptions. And yet, I have never been able to separate them. I would never want to. 

Because even though I was a writer before I became a mother, now the two are inseparable. One shapes the other, deepens the other, and gives the other more to say. Motherhood wove itself into my words, filling the quiet spaces. It did something else, too—it sharpened my noticing, widened my understanding, stretched my words in ways I never expected. It gave me more to see, more to hold, and even more to say.

Before I had children, writing was an uninterrupted practice—quiet mornings or afternoons,  a steady flow of words, long stretches of time where the only thing that mattered was the page. But now, I see that writing is not separate from life. It is woven into it, threaded through the smallest moments.

It happens in the margins, all around the edges of life—scribbled notes in the grocery aisle, half-formed sentences whispered to myself while driving from one place to the next, an idea caught and held in the middle of washing dishes.

It happens when I least expect it—when my child hands me a crumpled leaf and calls it treasure, when I catch a glimpse of my grandmother’s hands in the way I braid my daughter’s hair when I watch the sun melt behind the mountain peak, and feel the weight of time slipping through my fingers.

Writing and mothering are both acts of noticing. Both require patience, a willingness to sit with discomfort, and a deep trust that something good is forming even when it feels like nothing is happening.

Some days, I write freely, as if the words have been waiting for me. Other days, I write in fragments, between snack requests and scraped knees, between folding laundry and answering questions that never seem to end. And on the hardest days, I don’t write at all—but I live in the unwritten story. 

I used to think the interruptions were stealing my words. Now I know they are my words.

I used to fear that if I stepped away from writing for too long, I would lose my place entirely. That inspiration was a thread I could misplace in the folds of daily life, never to be found again. But now I know that the creative life moves in rhythms, like the tide. It rushes in, full and brimming, then pulls back, leaving behind a stillness that feels like loss but is really just space.

In that space, life carries on.

A child pulls at my sleeve, needing me now. A bedtime story is read, the same one for the hundredth time. A last-minute question is asked—one more thought before sleep, one more way to keep me close a little longer.

There is no solitude in these moments. No quiet, no long stretches of time to string together thoughts uninterrupted. And yet, this is the work, too.

Because writing is not just the act of putting words on a page. It is the way I learn to see. It is the way I bear witness to the ordinary, the way I hold onto something fleeting and give it shape.

And when I return to the page—whether a day later or several—the words are there, waiting. They have been growing in the dark.

That morning, I didn’t write anything groundbreaking. The sentences stumbled, and the rhythm felt off. The words came quietly, uncertain but steady, finding their way onto the page with a kind of quiet persistence. But it was real. It was me, at that moment, as honest as I could be.

And maybe that’s what it takes to begin again—not a grand declaration, not a brilliant idea, just a willingness to pick up the pen and write.

Over time, I’ve come to see how much beginning again is a part of the process. It’s the part we don’t talk about enough, the part that’s messy and vulnerable. I used to think that good writers, real writers, didn’t go through this— that once you settled into your voice, it would never slip away. But now I know that the creative life ebbs and flows, and the moments of ebb are just as essential as the moments of flow. They teach you something. They humble you. They remind you that the work isn’t about perfection or productivity; it’s about showing up.

And showing up doesn’t always mean writing a thousand words a day. Some days, it’s just picking up the pen and writing a single line. Some days, it’s sitting down and staring at the page until you start to see something—a glimmer of a thought, a spark of an idea. Some days, it’s scribbling a few words that don’t go anywhere, just to prove to yourself that you can still write at all.

Each small effort, no matter how tentative it feels in the moment, is a thread pulling you closer to that creative rhythm again.

It’s interesting how the smallest offerings can break the heaviest silences. For me, it was an old line of poetry I came across—What you seek is seeking you. Something about those words cut through the fog. They reminded me that I didn’t have to chase after inspiration like it was some elusive, fleeting thing. The words were there. The ideas were there. They’d been waiting all along. I just needed to trust them enough to sit down and listen.

Since that day, I’ve had to begin again more times than I can count. Sometimes, the blank page still feels intimidating. Sometimes, it feels like I’m starting over from scratch, even after all these years. But now I know that’s part of the deal. The creative life is a cycle, not linear.  You lose the words, and you find them again. You feel empty, and then you’re filled. You fall away, and then you return.

The difference now is that I trust the process more. I know the heavy blank won’t last forever. I know that even on the days when the writing feels frustrating or forced, it’s still worth it. Because the act of writing—showing up to the page—is an act of faith. It’s faith in my own voice, faith in the value of my story, and faith that the spark will return.

Even when I can’t see it, even when it feels impossibly far away, it’s there.

Motherhood has taught me this. Writing has taught me this.

The words never really leave.

They just go quiet, waiting for me to trust them again.

And so I sit, again and again, picking up the pen, meeting their gaze, listening to their imaginations—knowing both are part of the same story.