It's a holistic change in multiple domains of your life. You're going to feel it perhaps bodily, psychologically. You're going to feel it with your peer groups. You're going to feel it at your job. You're going to feel it in terms of the big philosophical questions.

Matrescence, Lucy Jones captures how hard it is to be a In Matrescence, Lucy Jones captures how hard it is to be a

Matrescence took me on a journey of reminescence through my own pregnancies and early years of motherhood, eliciting wry recognition, surprise at new evidence and insight, and gratitude for a work that really sees what it is to mother - Clare Chambers From the acclaimed author of Losing Eden (“Powerful, beautifully written”—Anthony Doerr) an important, moving, passionate and passionately written inquiry—personal and scientific—into what happens—mentally, spiritually, physically, during the process of becoming a mother, from pregnancy and childbirth to early motherhood and what this profound process tells us about the way we live now. Matrescence’ is a little like the TV show Motherland, meets David Attenborough, meets Germaine Greer. The author weaves together her own raw experience as a mother, with her early immersion in feminist education and her knowledge as a science and nature writer (resulting in the reader contemplating their motherhood journey alongside that of a mother spider who is consumed by her spiderlings days after they hatch…and other such wonders in nature). Part memoir, part scientific and health reporting, part social critique, ecological philosophy, eco-feminism and nature writing, Matrescence is a kind of whodunnit, ferreting out with the most nuanced, searing and honest observations, why mothers throughout this heightened transition are at a breaking point, and what the institution of intensive, isolated motherhood can tell us about our still-dominant social and cultural myths. Jones sheds a fascinating light on the plethora of issues surrounding how childbirth and mothering fits (or fails to fit) into the current social and economic systems of the modern, western world.

This book should be a must-read for pretty much everyone. We don't talk about the hidden realities of the biological, social and psychological effects of matrescence nearly enough. Thank you, Lucy Jones, for changing that Dr Jodi Pawluski I was challenged, comforted, educated and nourished by this book ... It is the single most powerful, life-changing, heartachingly healing thing I have been given ... The kind of book we must ensure every one of us reads Kerri ní Dochartaigh

Matrescence by Lucy Jones | Waterstones

Mattrescence is an anthropological term, referring to the process of becoming a mother. Motherhood transforms a woman biologically and emotionally. It alters her social status, her identity and her relationships, and redirects the focus of her days. It is perhaps the most profound metamorphosis most women will go through and yet, Jones observes, this process remains largely overlooked in our culture and by science. You will not even find the word matrescence in the dictionary. We recognise that adolescence, another period of rapid physical and emotional change, can be painful and awkward, and yet expect women to slip effortlessly into their new roles and their new bodies. The first step is to start talking about this metamorphosis, the highs and lows and growing pains. Experiencing the reality: Before the birth, mothers often imagine the baby according to their culture, their personal history, and their own childhood. At birth the reality may be different and the gap between fantasy and reality may be a source of negative or confusing emotions. It is illuminating. It is affirming. It is moving. Her anecdotes from early motherhood, stirred emotions in me because of the way they touched nerves that I didn’t know were still exposed. The pinball between abject panic and relief that is caring for a toddler. The desperation and joy. The powerlessness and the fulfillment. When they know the milestones and markers of Matrescence, they can navigate this time of their lives powerfully – without overwhelm, perfectionism and shame. A beautiful, intelligent book that is as tender and moving as it is demanding and urgent. An absolutely essential new addition to the literature of mothering and parenthood.” —Clover Stroud, author of The Wild OtherCarve out time for self-care. It is exhausting to be pregnant and it is exhausting to care for a baby. It is important to carry on with usual relationships and activities as best as one can. Mothers-to-be and new mothers need to be creative and use the support of family, relatives, friends, or paid care to ensure time for self-care. Jones is known primarily as a science and nature writer (her first book was about foxes and her most recent, Losing Eden, looked at the human need for wild spaces) and I’ll confess I sighed slightly when I waded through an opening section about slime mould, though no doubt this will reassure readers of her other work that Matrescence is not a complete departure. Subsequent chapters begin with similar passages, which, Jones writes, attempt to show that natural change is not always beautiful. Initially I felt they jarred with the body of the work, which follows Jones’s journey into motherhood and is divided according to a series of themes, including birth, the brain, sleep and society. In my expanded definition, the process of becoming a mother or matrescence, the term first coined by Dana Raphael, Ph.D. (1973) and which I later built upon, is a developmental passage where a woman transitions through pre-conception, pregnancy and birth, surrogacy or adoption, to the postnatal period and beyond.The exact length of matrescence is individual, recurs with each child, and may arguably last a lifetime! The scope of the changes encompasses multiple domains --bio-psycho-social-political-spiritual-- and can be likened to the developmental push of adolescence. Increased attention to mothers has spurred new findings,from neuroscience to economics, and supports the rationale for a new field of study known as matrescence.Such an arena would allow the roundtable of specialists to come together and advance our understanding of this life passage.”