You Already Know: What Motherhood Teaches Us About Listening to Our Own Bodies

When my boy was a baby, I could smell when he was ill.

Yes, you read that right. I could smell him, mainly his head, he smelled 'off' to me. The first few times it happened my husband thought I was bonkers until my son started displaying symptoms of illness shortly after I said it.

There is real science behind that. When we are unwell, the body changes how it breaks down fats and proteins, which shifts the chemicals released through the skin and breath. The microbiome responds too, so the overall scent profile subtly changes.

Babies make this easier to pick up. There are no products masking their natural smell, you are in constant close contact, and you become deeply familiar with what 'normal' is for them. When something shifts, even slightly, it stands out.

There is also a neurological element. As a mother, your brain becomes highly tuned to your child's patterns, including smell, so small deviations are picked up quickly.

Yet isn't it ironic that the same ability to pick up the smallest change in your child is often completely ignored when it comes to yourself.

You will notice everything in them.

And override everything in you.

Fatigue becomes 'just a busy week'. Low mood gets brushed off. Stress is normalised. That nagging feeling that something is not quite right? You push it aside because someone else needs you, because there is laundry to do, because resting feels like a luxury you have not earned.

But here is what I want you to understand. It is not a lack of awareness. You already have the awareness. You proved that the moment you noticed your child's smell had changed, or their cry sounded different, or they were not quite themselves before anyone else could see it.

It is a lack of permission to listen.

We are trained, as women and as mothers, to be the ones who hold everything together. To be the thermometer, the observer, the early warning system for everyone else. But when the same system flashes a warning about us, we silence it. We label it drama, or weakness, or just one of those things.

Your body gives signals constantly. You are already good at reading them. You have spent months or years learning the language of someone else's body, responding before they could tell you what was wrong. You have that skill. You developed it through love and attention and repetition.

You just do not always believe your own.

The headache that keeps returning. The energy that never quite returns after rest. The joint pain you tell yourself is just age. The irritability you blame on being busy. The breathlessness walking upstairs that you laugh off. These are not character flaws. They are data. And you are already fluent in this language. You just need to turn it inward.

I see this all the time in the women I work with. They come to me with a long list of symptoms they have normalised over years. The bloating that happens after every meal. The sleep that feels shallow no matter how many hours they get. The stiffness that takes an hour to shake off each morning. They have been telling themselves these things are just part of being a busy woman, a mother, someone in their thirties or forties.

And then, when we start to look at what is really going on, there is almost always relief. Not just because we find answers, but because someone finally says: I hear you. That matters. It is real. And we can do something about it.

Your body does not lie. It does not dramatise. It signals. Quietly, consistently, patiently. And the same part of you that knew your baby was becoming unwell before any thermometer confirmed it, that part knows about you too. It knows when you are running on empty. It knows when inflammation is building. It knows when your nervous system has been stuck in fight or flight for too long.

The question is not whether you can sense it. You can. The question is whether you will let yourself act on it.

That does not mean dropping everything and moving to a spa for a month. It means starting with one honest question: what is my body trying to tell me right now? And then allowing the answer to matter. Not tomorrow. Not when the children are older. Not when work calms down. Now.

It might mean eating differently. Moving differently. Resting differently. Asking for help. Saying no. Seeing someone who will listen properly. Small shifts, made consistently, create a different trajectory. But they start with believing that what you feel is worth paying attention to.

You did not doubt yourself when you smelled that change in your baby. You trusted your senses, your instincts, your deep knowing. That same knowing is available to you now. It never left. You have just been applying it everywhere except the one place that needs it most.

Learn with me. Regain your power. Reclaim your wellbeing.