Motherhood – Sydney Leroux

Stand Up.

Growing up I really struggled with the color of my skin. I had no one around to teach me that it was beautiful, that it was strong, that it was me. Of course my mom did the best she could raising me but she didn’t have my hair. She didn’t have my nose or my lips and she didn’t have my skin. It took me a long time to learn how to embrace who I am and the learning hasn’t stopped.

I had the stereotypical ‘deadbeat’ father that wasn’t around and had multiple children with multiple different women. It made me hate black men when I was a little girl because I assumed they were all the same and they were all like my dad. Ironically, that is what we are dealing with now. People that think WE are all the same. ‘He was a thug.’ ‘He had a criminal record.’ ‘He owed this much in child support.’ Even if one of those ring true – the punishment should never be death by those who are supposed to serve and protect us.

I received a tweet that said something along the lines of, ‘well what about black on black crime’ and how they don’t see me up in arms about that. Of course black on black crime is a problem, and we mourn the loss of those souls too. But a white person killing a black person because of the color of their skin is a painful reminder of our country’s dismal racial history and just how far we haven’t come since the days of slavery, segregation, and lynchings.

I’m a firm believer in standing up for what you believe in. It’s so cliche, but its honestly one of the easiest things you can do. We all have a voice and we all have the ability to use it. There are things I believe in that I’m not really impacted by but because its common sense and because its wrong I’m going to say something about it. I’m going to fight for you and you and you because that’s what we should be doing for each other. I will never know what it’s like to grow up in a body that I felt wasn’t really mine. I will never know what it’s like to feel judged for who my heart chooses to fall in love with. But you better bet your ass I’m fighting for that because the people we are fighting for are our sisters and our brothers, our family, our friends, our teammates, our coworkers or maybe even a person you exchange smiles with as you pass by on the street. We need to work together. Gay marriage would never have been passed if the only people who fought for it were gay people themselves. We need each other to make things happen.

If we don’t stand up for each other, nothing will ever change. We always seem to spread our love during the most difficult of times. It now needs to be an everyday thing. I’ve been thinking about what I can do and the only thing I’ve got is me. I am the answer to the question. WE are the answer to the question. We always are. How do you break something down? Persistence. I’m thankful that I don’t still have the ignorant heart of the little girl I once was. I’ve grown up and I’ve learned that not everyone is the same and that everyone deserves a chance to tell their own story. The people that have passed away from police brutality shouldn’t have had to tell their story through their deaths. We need to stand up and tell our story now.

Four rules for a disciplined life:

No zero days. ‘What’s a zero day? A zero day is when you don’t do a single fucking thing towards whatever dream or goal or want or whatever that you got going on. No more zeros. I’m not saying you gotta bust an essay out everyday, that’s not the point. The point I’m trying to make is that you have to make yourself, promise yourself, that the new SYSTEM you live in is a NON-ZERO system. Didn’t do anything all fucking day and it’s 11:58 PM? Write one sentence. One pushup. Read one page of that chapter. One. Because one is non zero.’
Be grateful to the three yous. ‘There’s the past you, the present you, and the future you. If you wanna love someone and have someone love you back, you gotta learn to love yourself, and the 3 you’s are the key. Be GRATEFUL to the past you for the positive things you’ve done. And do favours for the future you like you would for your best friend.’
Forgive yourself. ‘Maybe you got all the know-how, money, ability, strength and talent to do whatever is you wanna do. But lets say you still didn’t do it. Now you’re giving yourself shit for not doing what you need to, to be who you want to. Heads up champion, being disappointed in yourself causes you to be less productive. Tried your best to have a nonzero day yesterday and it failed? So what. I forgive you, previous self. I forgive you. But today? Today is a nonzero masterpiece to the best of my ability for future self. This one’s for you, future homes. Forgiveness man, use it. I forgive you. Say it out loud.’
Exercise and books. ‘Pretty standard advice but when you exercise daily you actually get smarter. When you exercise you get high from endorphins (thanks body). When you exercise you clear your mind. When you exercise you are doing your future self a huge favour. Exercise is a leg on a three legged stool. Feel me? As for books, almost every fucking thing we’ve all ever thought of, or felt, or gone through, or wanted, or wanted to know how to do, or whatever, has been figured out by someone else. Get some books.’ – ryans01

Dear Son…

I can’t wait to teach you all of the things my mother taught me.

It’s my job to give you everything I can and more, to leave it all on the field. That job — being there for you — is bigger than anything I’ve ever taken on. Bigger than competing for gold or the World Cup. Bigger than anything else.

I promise to push you to pursue your dreams, but never so much so that they cease to be yours. Your dreams are my dreams, not the other way around. Your path will be unique.

You’re going to experience pain. I promise to be there for you, to be strong with you. To help you learn, as I did, that you can beat pain, and make pain work for you. The harder you push yourself, the more you will win.

I promise to sit with you and wipe your tears when you suffer your first loss, just as my mother did for me.

I promise to stay up as late as it takes to wash your grass-stained jersey, and to wake up as the sun rises so I can prepare you for your game, just as my mother did for me.

I promise to teach you how to fight. How to fight for what you want, for what you deserve and for what you believe in, just as my mother did for me.

I’m missing the Olympics because I’m pregnant with you, and was recently asked how that made me feel. Here is what I said: it feels glorious. It feels like the greatest gift I could ask for, the opportunity to love so profoundly, with such purity. That love doesn’t encumber my life — it enriches my life. I feel thankful, I feel lucky. You are my gold now and you are more priceless than anything I can ever win.

I promise to model for you that love, the only type of love. That unbreakable, unquestionable type of love. The type of love you’ll want to show your child one day, just as my mother did for me.

Pregnancy is tough.

Seeing my body morph into something different than what I’ve looked at for the last 25 years is scary. Maybe I would feel differently if I had planned for this. If I looked at my life and said, “okay, right here, right now – I want a baby.’ But it wasn’t planned. I was trying to get back to where I once was. I was fighting my way through like I always have. Then boom. My entire life changed when I looked down at a pregnancy test at The Belamar Hotel in the middle of camp right before Olympic qualifiers and it read, ‘Pregnant’ – surely that was a mistake. I took another one and looked down hoping I wouldn’t get the same answer. But I got it 6 times more with 6 different brands.
I wasn’t ready. I had so many more things that I had to do and accomplish and become and I came up with every other excuse that I could find to justify my thoughts for wanting to back out of this. I truly wish I could be one of those pregnant women who wake up every day happy, and feeling that ‘pregnancy glow’ but I don’t always feel that way. Most of the time I’m just in pain. My stomach feels like something is stabbing me from the inside and my hips feel like someone is ripping off my legs. Is it because I wasn’t ready? Is he in there preparing me for something much bigger than myself? Making me ready? I feel like when you’re pregnant you have to put on this smile even when you don’t want to. Sometimes when people ask me how I’m feeling I wish I could just be honest and tell them this is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. That it’s tough.
But I’ve been thinking, maybe thats why it takes nine months and doesn’t happen right away. Maybe we aren’t ever ready – some things just happen because it was meant to. Some things you can’t run from and you just have to figure out the best way to be the best person you can be for whatever that is. We can’t be brave if we don’t take the chance and this is the best chance I’ve ever had – to be someones mom might be the most courageous thing I will ever do. I know that when I’m finally able to look at him it will make everything worth it. To show him what love is and what it looks like when two people love each other. Something that I never got a chance to witness.
You know that quote that says, ‘do one thing every day that scares you.’ This scares me. Every. Single. Day. I’ve cried very hard for this little guy, wondering how we both got here and how this all came to be. I CAN say this: As much as this has been hard it’s had equally beautiful moments. Sometimes I’m so overwhelmed with love that I cry and I know that I want to be the best person and the best version of myself for him. Maybe that’s just the hormones? Or maybe the experience of trying to become the best version of myself is what is entertaining all of my fear. I may not have been ready to face that when I looked down at those positive pregnancy tests that day, but I know when I look down at his face for the first time, I’ll be able to face anything.

Everyone sees what you appear to be but few experience what and who you really are.

Hello, friends! Welcome to my new website where I’ll be talking and posting about literally everything (except politics because I’m not really in to that). I hope you all enjoy the things I share and enjoy starting conversations around things that are important in my life and hopefully in yours too. Some of you may relate and some may not but having the outlet to connect on a more personal level than just a sport or just a social media platform is something I’m very passionate about. So let the wildness commence.