The five most important lessons motherhood has taught me, according to Telegraph writers

From hunger pangs to hangovers, seven Telegraph writers share their hard-won lessons in motherhood.

Mothers day gift guide

Anna Tyzack

1. Some people hate children. Sadly, I always end up sitting next to them on a plane, with three screaming infants. Or at the adjacent table in a restaurant. I’ve learnt that there is no point getting into an argument; only immaculate behaviour from your children will win them round, and that is unlikely to happen. 

2. We all have our different interpretation of tidiness. It used to frustrate me endlessly as a teenager that my mother would quietly re-wash up after me, or “have another go” at the coffee stain on the carpet. I realise now, when I see my own sons’ pitiful attempts at tidying up, or a friend half-heartedly washing her child’s spilt juice out of my sofa, that we all have our own levels of tidiness – and if you want a job done properly, do it yourself. 

3. Use the word “broken” sparingly. There was no such thing as “broken” when I was growing up, unless the object in question still didn’t function after my mother had tried to fix it herself. Now, as a regular shopper at Playmobil’s spare parts department, I can confirm that it is even easier to mend toys and games today. And on the rare occasions something can’t be mended, the manufacturer will often send you a new one to get you off their back. 

4. Everyone is struggling, deep down. My mother has never really cared what other people think, and urged me to remember that no one’s life is as perfect as they present it. This is all very well until you become a mother: there are so many opportunities to compare and so many “perfect mothers” online. It’s important to keep reminding yourself that no one breezes through parenthood.

5. Don’t be the one with the wet child. My mother used to snap “Don’t be wet” at me when I was being timid. I hated it, even though it prompted me to swallow my fear and get on with whatever it was. When my four-year-old sobbed about going out in the rain the other day, I realised how important it is in our over-nurturing society to encourage children to be brave. And instinctively I dealt out the same treatment.

Bryony Gordon

1. How to say no. I’ve never been very good at saying no to things, partly because I am a people pleaser, partly because I suffer from FOMO (fear of missing out). But when I had my daughter, I got good at turning things down. “Do you want to come out for a really tedious and expensive dinner with people you don’t even really like?” Normally I would have said yes to such an enticing offer, but soon I realised that having a child was the perfect excuse. (NB: being able to say no is a useful skill to have when dealing with an almost four-year-old.) 

2. How to live in the moment. At 7.30pm, there are lots of things I would rather be doing than stroking my daughter’s back while reading another Princess Evie’s Ponies book. Drinking beer, eating pizza, going to bed myself for example. Then I remember that she won’t want to do this forever – ditto when she climbs into bed with us at 2am. I’d much rather that than the likely scenario in 15 years’ time: lying awake at 2am waiting for her to come home from a night out. 

3. How to have a hangover. God, I used to be such a wuss after a big night out. “Boo hoo, poor me, I’m so tired.” If only I had the super strength that comes with a crack-of-dawn start after a night out on the pop. Just. Get. On. With. It. 

4. How to enjoy being bored. Last summer, my husband and I went to a really boring wedding service. You know the type: an hour and a half, endless hymns, numerous readings, umpteen sermons. And it was a dream. I just switched off, and allowed my mind to wander, because: how wonderful to have all that time to think! (With apologies to the happy couple.)

5. How to do gymnastics and acrobatics. I love that when you become a mother, people think you are suddenly full of wisdom, a font of knowledge who will be able to solve all problems. In reality, the only thing I’ve really learnt is how to do a flying angel properly without accidentally launching my child across the room and into the bookcase (as I did to my little sister when she was five). This skill is not to be underestimated, especially on rainy days, or when you have a hangover. It clears the head a treat.

Victoria Lambert

1. Acceptance. In the early, sleep-deprived days of new motherhood, I rang my own mother looking for sympathy. She refused to feel sorry for me. In fact, she told me to accept that broken nights were how life would be from now on – possibly for a couple of years, even 18. She pointed out I would never really know a full carefree night’s sleep again – that even when my child had left home, a part of me would always sleep light, on high alert for a phone call. But that was all part of being fortunate enough to have a child. Her advice was annoyingly brilliant. I’m not saying I didn’t wander around in a fug of sleep, but I stopped obsessing over it, and got on with the job. 

2. Hungry children eat. You may think or be told your child is fussy/picky/vegan, but when they are hungry they will eat. You needn’t cut sandwiches into smiley faces, buy organic chocolate spread, allow meal times to drift into hours. Nor do you have to create special menus. Set clear boundaries: offer them what you eat, keep portions small so they can ask for more, and eat together at a table.

3. Milestones are forgettable. Enjoy them when they happen. Because they slightly lose their fabulousness as you get older. I know in my heart that my daughter’s first steps and words were Very Very Exciting. But I cannot remember them at all. Nor did I make a note of them in the really lovely notebook I was given on her birth by a friend. Nor did we ever get around to downloading the photos of her first few birthdays from the digital camera. This may all have something to do with point one.

4. Their pain is your pain. You feel it all – from the scraped knee to the broken arm, the childhood argument to the sadness when a pet dies. That invisible cord between you and your child is at its most taut when times get rough.

5. It’s never too early to introduce your child to the Beatles. Or whatever music inspires you. Music has been a really important part of parenting in our house. I sang lullabies when Rowena was tiny and we listened to counting songs in the car, the soundtrack to The Jungle Book, even Mozart. But we also put on Revolver and Sgt Pepper’s and danced her around the room. As she got older, she introduced us to Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran. But those Fab Four songs are still on her playlist. 

Kathryn Flett

1. You can’t un-become a mother. This isn’t surprising but it is important because my generation have, I think, sold themselves short expecting to be able to compartmentalise their working/mothering lives. Every woman who holds down any kind of full-time job recognises that feminism has chucked us a curveball we’re still trying to catch. Perhaps our daughters will do a better job? (FYI, I don’t have any daughters…).

2. Two people with the same gene-pool can be very different. Entirely obvious to anyone who wasn’t an only child! My sons, 14 and 10, are physically both very much their parents’ offspring (luckily, they appear to have got the best bits of both of us, too) but when it comes to their personalities… well, being a mother is, I now believe, mostly about getting to know who your children actually are. The poet Kahlil Gibran nails it:  “Your children are not your children./ They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself./ They come through you but not from you,/ And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.”

3. You learn more than you’ll ever manage to teach. What we teach them: the ordinary developmental stuff – how to eat/tie shoelaces/flush the loo (apparently, we’re still working on the latter in our house) etc – in order to equip them to be reasonably functional adults. What they teach us: that apart from being able to do up shoelaces we’re even more flawed than we always secretly suspected we were. They do this over the course of our lifetimes by a clever combination of a) shining a light on and, b) holding up a mirror to every single one of our frailties and weaknesses. Especially at 3am while they’re projectile vomiting. 

4. Life without them is unfathomable, unimaginable and (mostly) undesirable. Of course this knowledge is very much after the event, so it is therefore equally unfathomable to women who aren’t mothers. And while I can vividly remember my own pre-maternal life, even though it looked a bit like the one I live now, the emotional terrain was entirely different.

5. I will only get brought a cup of tea in bed by my children on one day every year (if I’m lucky). But that this cup of tea will taste better than every single other cup of tea that has ever been made by anybody, ever. 

Kathryn Flett’s second novel Outstanding is out in paperback (Quercus, £8.99) on April 20 

Sally Peck

1. My mother was right about everything. But no longer. Now I’m the mother. Currently I’m right about everything.

2. There’s nothing that can’t be commercialised. From prenatal colouring books to pram “systems” that cost as much as a week’s holiday to separate soap for girls and boys, early parenthood is one big bonanza of shopping opportunities. Rebel. Resist.

3. Selfish isn’t an insult; it’s a goal. It is too easy to lose yourself in the “selflessness” of trying to be The Perfect Mother. It’s essential to make time for your own development – professionally, socially, personally, physically. No child wants a mother who has lost her own sense of individual purpose. I bring my children to my office regularly so they can see what I do when I’m not with them – that I have a life beyond our house, just as they do.

4. My husband and I were raised in happy households with strong group mentalities – if one person had a football match, we were all going; if there was a treat for one child, the other would get the same. My parents even gave me gifts on my brother’s birthday, so I wouldn’t feel left out. Because of my work, I often travel with just one of my children at a time, and it’s a great pleasure to get to know them as individuals. My daughter and I love to paint together. My son and I share a grand passion for Chinese dumplings and frequently lunch à deux in Chinatown. My husband has his own special projects with each child, too. I treasure our time together as a foursome, but I think it’s important to pursue this one-on-one time, too.

5. There is nothing more romantic than having a child with someone. It is intoxicating to think that someone else looks at Antonia and Henry and believes they’re the best thing to have happened to the universe. Of course, having these children inspires regular rows about who is doing more of the childcare but still: Big Picture. Our children are the best of us.

Judith Woods

1. Ensure you fit your own oxygen mask before helping others. Or to put it another way, if Mummy falls apart, everything else does. Know your limits; once the flames are starting to lick your toes, it’s time for a restorative yoga class, coffee shop or a stolen afternoon at the cinema. If it helps, tell yourself you’re doing it for everyone. Motherhood is so open-ended that you could literally devote every waking moment to it. But just because you could doesn’t mean you should.

2. Blue sweets are not (always) the enemy. I am not ashamed of administering E-numbers in order to stave off four-year-old hunger pangs or before a tricky car journey. By tricky car journey I mean that Sunday evening schlep home from a weekend with friends when you know the wee one is going to fall asleep, then wake up full of beans just at the point where you want to drug yourself with wine and a costume drama.

3. Stop, look and listen. Not easy when you’re simultaneously breastfeeding and rustling up a stir fry, but that pause in proceedings so your six-year-old can witter on about igneous rock is developmentally crucial. Apparently. The key is to listen very extravagantly and nod a lot. Pretend you are being televised if that helps. Ask a question if you can bear it. If it’s all a bit tedious and you want to wrap things up, suggest it might be an opportune moment for a spot of mental maths or spelling practice. As your son bolts, call after him “I love our little talks!”. Job done.

4. Teach your toddler the term “refurbishment”. This magical word absolves you of all responsibility and enables you to break promises without breaking their hearts. Express dismay that you were hoping to visit the library/pool/playpark but it is closed for “refurbishment”. Sigh and shrug in “what can you do?” resignation. The resignation bit is important; it impresses on your child that shouting or crying is useless.

5. Don’t just take photos of happy times. You don’t have to go the full Richard Billingham and snap grandad in his underpants necking a screw-topped bottle of claret, but allow reality to impinge on your carefully curated Kodak memories. When your daughter is howling at the satsuma-sized lump on her forehead, it may seem weird to whip out your smartphone and take a picture. But it will serve as a memento of that terrible day and if you follow it up with a shot of her drinking hot chocolate in her daddy’s lap, a reminder that some things can be kissed better. Real life is sometimes a bit tough and we do ourselves no favours by pretending otherwise; unless it’s Facebook.

Allison Pearson

1. On giving birth, you acquire a superpower. Suddenly, you’re Calamity Girl, blessed (or cursed) with the ability to foresee disaster around every corner. It starts with moving sharp objects out of the reach of tiny hands, but it never really stops. How are they doing at school? Worried you’re putting too much pressure on the kids to work hard. Kids not working hard enough to get into a Russell Group university. Kids being an unpaid intern till they’re 41 and living off KFC… A hundred different worries blipping across the air traffic controller’s screen and there you are, Calamity Girl, alone in the control tower, tensed to avoid a collision or note any small deviation from the maternal flight plan.

2. Fathers do not register any of the above. It’s down to you.

3. Everything you thought would be hard turns out to be the easy bit. Nappies? No problem. Knowing what to do? You don’t need to. Baby knows and if you do whatever makes him/her content then you’ll be fine. Food, Sleep and Poo. That’s all you need to know. Even when your baby boy is 17 and pats you on the head and says, “Is there any pasta?” Most things that ail a child can be cured by FS&P.

4. The one ballet show or football match you fail to attend, even if you went to all the others, will be entered in the ledger of Maternal Neglect in indelible ink. You will never be allowed to forget it. On the other hand, whatever you feel you got wrong, whatever form of childcare you chose, however much you think you failed it won’t matter because here’s the good news: you’re the only mother they’ve got. They prefer you to any other. It may not always feel that way, especially when you’re in the middle of the Seven-Year Tidy Your Bedroom War, but they do.

5. You think they will need you less as they get older, but they need you more. A tiny infant can be taken care of by any loving adult; a bereft 14-year-old who has just been deleted from her friends’ Snapchat group needs her Mum. That how much you love them never ceases to astound you. That they may cut the umbilical cord on the day they are born, but it will tug on you all the days of your life.

Celia Walden

1. I’m not as selfish as I thought. Somewhere in the frenzy of self-involvement that is your pre-motherhood life, you make peace with ‘selfish.’ Not only is it normal to find extended conversation about anyone other than yourself (or indeed thoughts about another human being) tedious, but it’s probably beneficial. Selfish people get ahead, don’t they? Then you have a child and there’s this worry: isn’t it supposed to be all about them? How does that work? I found out a few months in, when my daughter’s novovirus and a cream cashmere coat collided to devastating effect. I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t a heart pinch as I peered at the designer wreckage (did it have to be the vintage Biba?), but basically I was too busy trying to get her fever down to care. Nights out and weekends away cancelled at the last minute, money and time spent on her rather than myself: five years on, I’m still searching for a resentment I can’t find.

2. I actively enjoy the arts and crafty stuff.  I would gladly spend the rest of my days making paper mâché animals (a bombshell if ever there was one), but find the Sylvanian family role plays a little harder to get stuck into.

3. I don't feel strongly about the things I thought I would. Despite having no particular affinities with Gloria Steinem I have such a visceral loathing of Barbies that any given to my daughter are instantly deposited at Oxfam. But if she wants to leave her plate half full? Fine by me.

4. I don't feel guilty about working. But I do want my daughter to understand that mummy doesn't "have" to go to work; she "wants" to.  

5. I am feral. Where my daughter is concerned, I’m no longer governed by notions of social etiquette and dignity. And that’s been the biggest surprise about maternal love: how animalistic it makes us. And how the fact that there aren’t scrums of mums fang-deep in each others’ flesh everyday outside the school gates is only proof of some pretty major self-discipline.

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