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The longer I am in motherhood, the more I feel.

That is the first thing to say. Not that it gets easier. Not that it gets harder. That it gets bigger. Every month I am further inside, and every month there is more of it.

Some of what I feel is the size of what I was given.

My mother gave me this. Her mother gave it to her. I did not see it while it was happening. You do not see the cost of a thing while you are being carried by it. Now I am the one carrying. Now I can see the price.

It is a huge price. I did not know.

So this is how I pay. Not with money. With service. With my body, my sleep, my hours, my attention. The same acts, done again, and again after that. That is the currency. I hand it over and there is no receipt.

They call it a selfless act of love. I understand now why they call it that. The self does not go first. Some days the self is not in the room.

Someone said it is a massage for your soul. Love, working on you. I hold that against my days. Some days it is true. Some days it is only work.

It is not easy. It is being needed before I am awake. It is a body that is not only mine anymore. It is love that does not ask if I am tired.

The debt does not close. That is the part I did not expect. I thought paying back was a thing you finished. You give what you owe, and then you are even. This is not that. There is no even. I pay, and I keep paying, and the account stays open, because what I am paying into is a life. A life is not a sum.

My daughter will not pay me back. She will pay it into whoever she carries next.

My grandmother paid my mother. My mother paid me. I pay my daughter. Each one pays the one who comes after. No one pays the one who came before. No one is repaid. Everyone keeps paying.

The highs are high. I have never felt anything like the highs.

The lows are low.

Both keep growing. The longer I am in it, the more of each.