iBlog Friday: Some women find motherhood demanding, others find it confusing and then there's moments that surprise us all

The winning blog will be posted on Monday. Until then, happy reading.

Rebecca McGregor of Mumma Tells makes a frank admission about motherhood in her post Why I'm a selfish mumma...and not afraid to admit it.

I've heard it said that there are actual chemical changes that occur after childbirth. Internal transformations within the brain, beginning the moment the baby is born. A physiological response to motivate a Mumma's attachment to their teeny tiny newcomer, which of course is key to a child's survival. I don't know whether it was supposed to be permanent, but in my experience it has been. On the day I gave birth, I became someone else. Someone's Mumma. I am no longer selfishly existing purely for and by myself. And that changed everything.

Read the rest of Rebecca's post here.

Kellie Turtu of Mama Pyjama talks about how parenting turns our world upside down in her post Perspective.

I remember the thought as it was born, “What if my world really had turned upside-down?".  What if I could be the one to walk on this pure untouched ground for the first time?  What if doorways were steps and lights extended from the ground up? What if this whole new, quiet, serene world had been laid out just for me ? It was like seeing everything for the first time. Everything looked beautiful and new and pure...everything seemed possible.  I learnt in that moment that sometimes we need to turn our world upside-down just to see it for how it really is.

Read the rest of Kellie's post here.

Keri Arkell of Awesomely Unprepared explains to her son what his second birthday means to his mummy, in her post Two.

Now that you’re running around, we can do so many more things and it makes me happy when you don’t have to be trapped in a stroller all the time. You hold your own in the backyard with the dogs, ride in your much loved bubble car and when it’s not too busy at the shops, you love strutting (yes STRUTTING) in while holding my hand. When there are two adults with you, you love to make sure you’re holding the hands of both. Occasionally, you’ll think it’s time to have a swing between us, but you never let us know in advance so you end up flopped on the floor a bit haha.

Read the rest of Keri's post here.

Joanna Lamb of Joanna Writes Here takes a look around and can't help but wonder where we've all gone wrong in her post Has Feminism Failed?

The demands for our achievement are now more complex than ever, and it seems that we are our own worst critics. Everything we do has to be achieved to a rewarding level. We should be satisfied with our careers. We should be satisfied with motherhood. My friends and colleagues speak solely of other women when they describe criticism for not breastfeeding. Criticism for having children in daycare. Criticism for their weight. Criticism for working full time, and criticism for being a stay at home mother. Men, it appears, couldn’t care less if we have a natural birth or c-section.

Read the rest of Joanna's post here.

Lisa Wilson of Two Point Five Kids fights feelings of envy in her post Behind the scenes - don't let comparison steal your joy.

Read the rest of Lisa's post here.

Susan Taylor of One Woman Circus writes about her son whose decision to sit in a bucket, just because, changed her outlook on life in her post Sometimes you've just gotta sit in a bucket.

That's my son. Sitting in a bucket, just watching the world happen in front of his 3 year-old eyes.

I've written before about seeing things from the perspective of my children and how we should all tune in to living in the present a bit more, but recently I saw something amazing which also made me realise sometimes it's just about looking up and opening our eyes

Read the rest of Susan's post here.

Melanie Dimmitt of Mel-o-Drama shares her feelings about bitstrips (those cartoons we've all been bombarded with recently) in her post Bitstrips are a bit shit.

I was not alone this week in being absolutely bombarded by cartoon versions of my facebook friends, created using what I soon discovered to be an app called Bitstrips. The first one I saw was somewhat intriguing... by the tenth I was pissed. As were those of my facebook friends not partaking in the 'fun'. A counter-culture soon developed, with instructions on how to block Bitstrips starting to chase the endless train of self-indulgent in-jokes dominating the majority of my feed.

Read the rest of Melanie's post here.

Caylie Jeffery of Distractions of a Busy Mother meets an idol who makes her feel normal, even in her slackest mummy moments, in her post Meeting Mia.

Today, Mia made us laugh until  we cried by telling us that we are not the only ones to have put a towel down on our child’s wet bed and left them in it for the rest of the night! It felt like she’d been in my house! She’s given her children baked beans in a can for dinner and sold it to them as a wonderful treat, and they should clean their rooms before she’d give it to them. And they believed her!

Read the rest of Caylie's post here.

Are you are mummy blogger? We want to meet you. Send us your favourite post each week by midday on Thursday at info@ivillage.com. We’ll showcase your work and you could even win publication and a fab prize, like this brilliant Banana Boat pack.

Good luck!