Luxurious

Walking home from the Mejuri showroom, I kept looking down at my hand. I’d done it! I finally bought myself a little diamond ring for my right hand—something I’d wanted to do since the early 2000s when I first heard about what a “right hand ring” even was.

I’ve always loved what a right hand ring stood for: independence.

Sure, I’m married now, with a literal “dependant” (hi Miles!) attached to me at all times, but I’m still an independent person. Of course, I don’t NEED a diamond ring to remind me that, but it is something nice to look at when I’m not necessarily feeling like myself.

The idea of “feeling like myself,” and what that means to me has been bugging me a lot lately. It’s as though I am struggling to reclaim a sense of who I was before having a kid, while also trying to embrace the many changes that have come with motherhood.

I’m trying to reconcile those two people, because those two people are both me. Finding separation between “loss” and “change” has been tough lately, because what I’m going through hasn’t been easy. Sometimes, changing just feels like you’re losing something in the process. However, I’m trying to shift my perspective by replacing those words with “growth.” I mean, isn’t that what I’m really doing?

Growth not only sounds better—it feels better, too. Growth combines my pre and post-baby self with the comfort of knowing that my pre-baby self is still there, just with some added improvements.

For example, with every tough day, I find that my patience doesn’t wear as thin as I thought it would. And just when I think I couldn’t love them more, my kid, my husband, and my dog also seem to find new ways to fill my heart—and it hasn’t exploded yet! I’m also finding humour in the minutiae of my life. This has probably been one of the hardest transitions, because the pandemic made sure to eliminate any chance I had of trying to maintain some sort of normalcy while I’ve been on maternity leave.

I thought of this blog post because naturally, the moment I put it on, I wanted to document my beautiful little sparkler. I feel very sentimental about it and wanted to share.

No matter how I set it up, though, nothing felt quite right. Do I ever really hold sage in my hand? Do I ever have my jewelry perched just so in the sunlight? The answer, my friends, is of course not.

So here, I present you with realistic photos of what I really put this ring through on the day-to-day.

As much as I want to believe that I’m still living that beautiful, flat lay life, I really am not anymore—at least not at the moment. I’m hopeful that as we adjust to the chaos that a baby and a dog brings, I’ll find a way to it sneak in. Maybe. I doubt it.

I took a bunch more photos, but I thought I’d spare you and just show some of my personal faves. I may not feel luxurious all of the time, but at least I’ve always got a little bit of luxury with me.